Ludwig landed in Aragon without any issue. He stepped out of the helicopter with his carry-on and walked to the waiting car.

I’m here. Now what?

He didn’t know much about Aragon. All he knew was that he had booked the best suite in the best hotel in all of Aragon and rented the best Mercedes available. And that he was an outsider.

Maybe he could get her to fulfill her promise and show him her home in the same way he’d shown her his. That would be a lovely idea.

One thing was for certain. He needed to figure out just how serious he was about her. It was one thing to lust after a woman, to crave her. It was a completely different thing to need her and he was dangerously close to that.

Do I need her enough to weather through anything that might be thrown at us? That’s one question he had to answer.

He had a feeling that his normal powers of persuasion weren’t going to work on her in Aragon. She would have the upper hand on her own turf and that wasn’t something he had any experience with.

But he was willing to find out.

Good lord, am I.

Siobhan held the phone to her ear and listened to it ring, her fingers drumming on the white wooden desk she was seated at. The glass partition under her showed colorful fish calmly swimming in the cerulean waters of the Indian Ocean.

“Hello?”

“Hi, Angelica. It’s Siobhan.”

“Oh!” Angelica’s voice on the other side of the line seemed cheerful. “How’s the honeymoon? I bet you’re getting a great tan.”

Siobhan blinked at the woman’s chatter. In all the days Angelica had stayed in Lektenstaten, she had never been warm. “It was lovely, really. You must visit. I don’t want to leave.”

“Well,” Angelica sighed. “I guess everyone has to get back to the monotony of life.”

Siobhan grinned. With Angus, there would no monotony. Her husband constantly surprised her at every turn and she was unbelievably lucky to be his wife. “I’ve had the opportunity to talk with Angus at length and we…well, I don’t want to be Aragon’s Crown Princess.” She had been thinking about it since marrying Angus, anxious to enjoy her newlywed status and their family. She didn’t care to be caught up in the political drama they had witnessed on TV. “I will renounce my position at the first opportunity.”

To her surprise, Angelica didn’t immediately react over the phone.

“You don’t have to do that,” she said a moment later, a heaviness to her voice. “But I don’t blame you. Aragon is in a world of distress at the moment. I cannot sleep without thinking of what might happen.”

Siobhan’s heart went out to Angelica. Being a royal was not an easy life and she wished she could alleviate her sister’s concerns. They were her concerns as well. “But that doesn’t mean I’ll abandon you or Valantín to deal with this alone.”

“Thank you,” Angelica sighed. “We’ll need all the help we can get.”

Angus, wearing only swimming trunks, which marvelously displayed his tall, muscular body, walked into the room and Siobhan reached for his hand, a shiver of desire running down her spine as he cupped the back of her neck lightly. “Let me discuss it with my husband. I’ll let you know when.”

“You’ll always be part of our family,” Angelica responded, her words warming Siobhan’s heart. “No matter what you decide.”

“Thank you. We’ll talk soon,” Siobhan said, clicking off.

“Angelica?” Angus questioned as she set the cell phone on the desk.

“Yes,” Siobhan replied, leaning into his strong touch. “I called her. They need me, Angus. They need my help to heal Aragon.”

“No,” Angus said curtly, his fingers stopping on her neck.

She turned, looking her husband in the eye. She saw the worry in their depths and understood his concern. There was no telling what danger she might face by going to Aragon. “I must go. Please, Angus, I know you will keep me safe.”

He blew out a breath, looking away. “I worry about you. If anything happens to you…”

She stood and wrapped her hands around his waist, holding him as close as her round belly allowed. “I know I am asking for a great deal but I must do this.”

“A weekend,” he finally said, pulling back to look at her. “One weekend and then we come home, and I will lock us in the bedroom until we both can’t walk straight.”

A smile curved on her lips. “That sounds like a fine plan to me.”

Angelica sighed at her mobile screen and put it inside her bag.

Since her talk with Jaxon, Siobhan’s foster brother, Angelica had suspected Siobhan would abdicate her rightful position as the Crown Princess, so it wasn’t a big surprise, but now that it was confirmed, she wasn’t sure how she felt about it.

Or rather, she had mixed feelings.

First was relief. The only life she’d ever known would be hers again and her future was certain—to that extent.

But she also felt some anxiety. If she had remained truly free, her options for a possible relationship with Ludwig were wide open.

Now she didn’t know how things might develop, or what was even possible.

When her car pulled up in front of the commissioning building, Angelica was prepared for the crowd of people who greeted her. She was rather used to it, especially of late, with the current political fire. In her opinion, the royal family needed to be approachable, something her brother and most of her advisors vehemently disagreed with.

The people lined up on the street weren’t there to judge her for her latest fashion, though she was sure the only headlines she’d find about her wouldn’t be about her stance on certain issues. They would be about what coat she decided to wear and the outrage over the fact that she refused to wear nylons.

Just once, she would like it to go on record that she had a political opinion. But instead, she would have reporters detailing her hair and her make-up choices, or how her hat had been seen in public three times before, in an off-the-cuff attempt to prod her for not spending more on clothing, while at the same time her brother would be in the headlines for allowing the budget to go over.

She didn’t understand the public sometimes. There was a notion out there that princesses either weren’t real people, or that they didn’t have anything to do for real, and neither was the case. She worked more than twelve hours a day for their sake.

“Bring more jobs,” one woman shouted from Angelica’s right, waving a sign in front of her.

A man pushed forward from the throng but was kept back by the barrier made by the police. He shouted, “We need a living wage.”

There were more shouts, most of which she couldn’t make out. She wanted to stop and address them, but it wasn’t her place to do so. If she did, she would undermine her brother, and she refused to do that. Her brother was a fair king. He was just a little out of touch with his people.

She followed Celipa through the cleared path and up the steps of the commissioning building. Celipa cleared the hallways, talking into her wrist periodically. She poked her head inside the meeting chamber, then turned to Angelica and nodded curtly. “After you, Your Highness.”

Angelica smiled at her bodyguard on her way through the door. She had a great deal of respect for Celipa and with all the years they’d been together they’d developed a kind of friendship. Angelica often wished she had the freedom to be more like her.

The room was full of people. There were the observers in the gallery and on the seats along the walls.

The council members sat along the curved bench in the middle of the room. Her brother sat at one end of the curve. She took her place on the other end.

When their father had been on the throne, he had sat in the middle, commanding the attention of the council, but Valantín and Angelica had insisted that the members of the council be awarded some respect of their own. Their voices were to be heard as well, and they were encouraged to voice their opinions. Valantín’s word was the law, but that didn’t mean he needed to only listen to his own voice.

She had arrived several minutes early and so had to wait for Lord Boezio Agustin, the council’s oldest member, to arrive. That was fine though because it gave her time to rearrange her papers and to gather her mental notes.

Seeing Abelardo had been rather disruptive.

She still couldn’t believe him. To show his face in her office, and then, of all things, to suggest they get back together. He has to be insane to think I’d consider such a thing. Does he think I’m that desperate? That lonely?

Angelica was not at all conceited, but she was aware that she was considered very attractive, possibly to both sexes. And she was a member of the royal family. It was not as if she lacked suitors.

Feeling eyes on her, she glanced up and scanned the observers for anyone she might know. She was afraid she might see Abelardo there.

But instead she saw Ludwig.

It’s almost unfair how handsome he is.

The morning sunlight streaming in through the windows bounced off light blond hair that would have been too long had it not had a bit of an unruly curl to it.

He stopped on the threshold and rubbed his hand through his hair as he contemplated her, mussing it even further. But whatever softness the disarray of his hair might have imparted to his appearance was countered by his eyes. They were startlingly sharp, a piercing blue, like a creek flooded with icy spring waters under a clear sky.

What is he doing here? Her heart beat erratically almost as if she was nervous. She wasn’t, but she really didn’t understand what he was doing there. It made no sense at all.

Those startling blue eyes landed on her causing a frisson to run through her spine.

She tried to ask him non-verbally from across the room.

He shrugged.

That was all. He just shrugged.

What does that even mean?

The meeting began, demanding she focused her attention on the subject at hand: the budget and schedule for the new hospital.

The old hospital was rather outdated. It had been top-of-the-line at the time, but they had struggled to keep it up-to-date as the times progressed. Now, with how far technology had advanced, everything needed to be updated. The size of the rooms, and all of their services, which she didn’t fully understand. They wanted to get a new MRI but did not have enough electrical capacity to support the new machines. The cost to increase it was almost more than to provide a completely new one in a new building.

The population had grown to such an extent that they needed a larger facility anyway. It was Angelica’s hope, and she knew it was her brother’s as well, that this new hospital would be just one step in a long line of upgrades they both hoped their people would appreciate.

If they could get the kinks worked out of the plan, Valantín would sign off on it and put it into action next month.

After two hours of deliberations and debate, half of which Angelica won—or at least, it felt as though she’d won—they were done. The changes were agreed upon and would be incorporated before officially being reissued and put on Angelica’s desk in the morning. After her review, she would send it to her brother for approval, and then finally they could begin.

Her mind still buzzed with the details of all she’d digested through those last hours when she looked up and her eyes locked with Ludwig’s once more.

Well, it appears that he’s not quite as done with me as I thought he might be. But am I done with him?