We somehow make it back to my room without causing another scene. Leo slides his arms around my waist and lifts me up, his lips never leaving mine. But we only make it a few feet before there’s a knock on my door.

He groans and sets me on my feet. There’s something in his gaze—something almost frightened, I think—and I know he must believe it’s Stephan on the other side of the door, finally here to make good on his threats.

He turns to face the door. “Yes?”

The handle turns, but it isn’t Stephan who enters. It’s Andrew. And he looks like he ran here—he’s out of breath. But it isn’t just that—he looks pale, too.

Andrew glances at me before his gaze falls on his brother. “I assume you haven’t heard the news?”

Leo’s brow creases and he shakes his head.

Andrew nods, glancing at me again but not really making eye contact. He turns back to his brother. “Leopold, we need to speak. It is urgent.”

Leo scoffs. “Whatever it is the weasel has done, I’ll not hear of it. Not tonight. Whatever it is can wait until morning.”

Andrew gulps and glances at me again—it’s pretty clear something else is going on. He lets out a short breath. “Brother, please. We must speak. In private.”

Leo’s gaze narrows. “Whatever it is you have to say to me, you may say it in front of Elle. In fact, I welcome it. Considering it is almost certainly about her, I’d rather she hear of these ridiculous rumors from the source rather than having me explain to her what is going on tomorrow.”

“Brother, please.” Andrew’s voice lowers, and he turns his head away from me. It’s clear he doesn’t want me hearing whatever news he has. “This is not a matter we should be discussing in front of Doctor Parker. I assure you—”

Leo throws his hands in the air. “Just say it. Whatever it is, Andrew—it isn’t as though it doesn’t affect her, too.”

“Indeed.” Andrew’s words are slow, calculated. He turns and looks at me, frowning before he turns back to Leo. “Though I imagine you will regret this decision, Leopold.”

“I’ll regret nothing. You of all people should know that, Andrew.”

Andrew winces a bit. His gaze darts between the two of us before it finally rests on Leo. “We really should discuss this in private. If you later wish to divulge to Doctor Parker—”

“Just say it!” Leo is almost sneering at his brother now. “I’ve about had enough of Stephan and his games. I’m going to make sure that man hangs for putting us through this. For his threats—”

Andrew interrupts with a loud breath. “Brother, there’s been some news reported just within the past hour.” His voice lowers a few octaves. “Do you recall the reason you joined me in Prague several months ago?”

Leo’s brows draw together, and he frowns. “I remember the reason we left Prague together several months ago.”

Andrew nods and his expression pinches up again as he looks over at me for a moment. “Yes, but I’m not speaking of that. I’m speaking of the reason you came to Prague.” He clears his throat. “The reason…”

Leo lets out a sigh and stares at his brother for a moment. “What are you getting at, Andrew?”

Andrew’s gaze darts once again between me and Leo. He doesn’t say anything; he just lifts his brows when his gaze meets Leo’s.

Leo shrugs. “What?”

Andrew frowns again and his brows pinch together. “The…” His voice lowers to a whisper. “The woman.”

Leo scoffs. “What woman? I have no idea—” He stops himself mid-sentence and his expression falls. His own voice lowers to something above a whisper. He blinks a few times. “Yes, I know who you’re speaking of. What about her?”

Andrew nods. “We should take this conversation outside for a few moments.” He looks over at me. “My apologies, Doctor Parker.”

“No apologies necessary. Take the conversation wherever you want. And please call me Elle.”

Andrew’s mouth opens, but he doesn’t get a word out before Leo interjects.

Leo looks over at me before looking back at Andrew. “No. We’ll discuss it here. Elle is willing to sacrifice her own well-being for our family—I’ll not have whatever this is kept from her. She’s more than earned the right to hear it.”

Andrew’s mouth falls open again, but he snaps it shut and stares at Leo for a long moment. “I believe when I tell you what I’m about to tell you, you will change your mind, Leopold.”

“Tell me, then, and we’ll see if I change my mind.” Leo pulls my hand into his. “Whatever it is you have to say.”

Andrew nods and glances again between the two of us. “Stephan was…” He clears his throat and stares down at the floor. “Stephan was only protecting you, Leopold.”

“Pardon me? He has been abusing the woman I love—there is no excuse for what he has done. There is no reason on earth—”

“He was using the only leverage he has, Leopold, to try to protect you. To try to protect our family. He was only using the information he had regarding Doctor Parker’s past to try to deflect attention from an even bigger story. One that is even more damaging.” He winces and bows his head slightly toward me. “I’m not saying that I condone his behavior toward you in the slightest, Doctor Parker.”

“Okay.” My brow furrows with confusion. “Then what are you saying?”

His brows pinch together. “I’m saying that the damaging story—the real news story that he’s been trying to cover up involves you, Leopold. And the reason—the woman—you had been seeing before we left for Prague four months ago.”

Leo looks as confused as I feel. He stares at Andrew for a moment before he turns to me. “I’ve never lied to you about anything, Elle. And you know I had a past before I met you. And right before I was sent to Rio de Campo—”

Andrew clears his throat and lifts a brow.

Something in Leo’s eyes tells me he’s covering something up for Andrew. Even if this is about some girl Leo had been seeing, there’s something else to this story. Something neither of them wants to talk about or acknowledge to the other.

Leo closes his eyes for a moment before he looks over at me again. “I briefly dated a woman before I met you, Elle. It was nothing special—just another of my—what did you call them before? Flavors of the week?”

I frown and my gaze narrows. I hate that my stomach has grown hard as a rock. I hate that my chest feels like it’s on fire. “I don’t need to hear about this, Leo.”

“My thoughts, exactly.” Andrew cuts in. “Leopold, we should take this conversation to another room for Doctor Parker’s—for Elle’s—sake.”

Leo’s brows draw together and he searches my eyes for a moment. “Nonsense. There is nothing to tell. And anything that weasel Stephan is making up—”

Andrew interrupts again. “That’s just it, Leopold. Stephan isn’t making anything up. What he’s done—the things he’s done to Elle—have all been for our family’s benefit. He’s been protecting you, as I’ve been trying to tell you.”

“You haven’t told me anything, though. And what he has done to Elle—the embarrassment and shame he has caused her—is far from anything that might protect me. And you and I have been dancing around this topic of Prague for long enough, Andrew. It isn’t as though—”

“The woman—Karina is her name, I believe.” Andrew’s attention has turned to me, and he’s speaking directly to me now. “Leopold had a short but torrid affair with her.”

Leo rolls his eyes. “Andrew, this really isn’t necessary—”

Whatever it is Andrew needs to say is clearly painful for him. He winces every time he hears Leo’s voice, and it’s obvious he doesn’t want to be talking about any of this in front of me.

“Karina is of noble blood. She’s a member of the aristocracy of—”

“Andrew, this matters little to anyone.” Leo turns to me. “It is true. She is the daughter of a duke, but it makes no difference. Our affair lasted less than one week. And I met you shortly after, Elle, and as I’ve told you there has been no one but you since and will be no one but you ever again—”

“It would seem…” Andrew’s voice trails off and he coughs. When he looks up again, I can see a mixture of emotions in his eyes. “It would seem the woman is pregnant, Leopold.”

The air in the room grows suddenly thick and it’s difficult for me to breathe.

Andrew breaks the silence a moment later. “It is why Stephan did what he did, you see. It wasn’t that he hated Doctor Parker so much as he was trying to protect our family from further embarrassment. She was merely a convenient scapegoat to try to deflect the attention of the media.”

I close my eyes. “I seem to be good at that.” My eyes squeeze shut even tighter as I try to keep my knees from buckling under me.

“Father would like to speak with you, which is why I came to see you tonight, Leopold. And he also wishes to remind you that the Tax Council is still meeting tomorrow and that your presence there is mandatory, particularly now that—”

“Fuck the Tax Council. Fuck the reports and Father and…” Leo’s voice trails off.

“I realize this is a difficult situation, which is also why I thought it would be best for us to take our conversation elsewhere, Leopold. I tried to tell you—”

“Oh, you’re one to talk about secrets, Andrew. You’re one to speak of anything—”

“Leopold.” The tone of Andrew’s voice is so curt that I open my eyes to look at him.

I don’t say anything, but Andrew’s gaze seems to be fixed on me.

Andrew lowers his voice again, his eyes locked with mine. “Leopold, we need to take this conversation elsewhere. And we need to speak with Father. Not about what you’re threatening. But about your…situation.”

I stare at back at Andrew. I can’t even bring myself to turn to look at Leo, let alone speak to him.

I knew this was going to happen—not this, but I knew somehow that it was all just a little too good to be true. That it was all going to come crashing down at my feet. I just thought it would be my fault. That my past was going to be what tore us apart in the end. I had never considered that I’m not the only one with secrets—with skeletons hidden in my closet. I suppose I always thought Leo was an open book—that his life was on display in every grocery store checkout line for everyone to read about at their leisure. I don’t think I’ve ever once thought that there were things I didn’t know about him. That he has secrets of his own.

My chest is aching—it feels like my heart has been ripped out whole. But I am not going to cry about this.

“Leopold?” Andrew is speaking to his brother, but he’s still looking at me.

“Elle, this changes nothing. And even if…” His voice lowers and he narrows the distance between us, tipping his head to whisper into my ear. “There is no way this story is true, Elle. It is merely one more obstacle—”

I’m not sure what happens exactly until it bubbles up inside of me and spills out of my mouth. But I turn to him, glaring. “How is it not true, Leo? Are you saying you didn’t sleep with her?”

He pulls away from me, his jaw dropping as his eyes widen for a moment. Then something in his expression softens. “Not at all, Elle. I’m not denying the affair. I’m merely saying that there is no way I could have fathered a child with her—”

“Because you’re so careful.”

He nods. “Yes. Because I am always careful. Because I always—”

“The way you have been with me? You’re actually saying there’s no way you could have fathered a child with this woman because you use protection. Every. Single. Time.” My words are clipped and he has to be able to hear the accusation in them.

His cheeks flush and his mouth opens for a moment as he stares at me. “Elle…”

“Save it, Leo. You need to go see your father.”

His brows draw together. “But it isn’t like that, Elle. You have to understand—”

My jaw tightens and I can feel my cheeks burning. “What I understand, Your Highness, is that your father has requested that you join him this evening. It sounds like the only person you really owe any explanation to is him.”

I glance at Andrew before I turn my back to both of them. I walk toward the bedroom and stop in the doorway. I don’t even turn to face either of the men when I speak. “That will be all.”

I’d be surprised if everyone in Montovia didn’t hear the slam of my door behind me.

* * *

“Matthias said I might find you here.” Leo sits on the bench next to me, not quite close enough to touch me.

I’ve been lost in thought since last night, trying to figure out what I’m going to do with myself. In between all the phone calls, anyway. I’m pretty limited in what I’m actually able to do while I’m still here, but that isn’t going to last much longer. And it was only a matter of time before Leo heard about my plans. Word travels too damned fast in this country—and even faster in the palace, it seems.

I don’t look over at him. I keep my eyes firmly fixed on the rock in the middle of the stream in front of me—there’s something about the way the water moves over the stone that I’m finding calming, at least at this particular moment. And even though I had hoped to be able to sit out here by this stream with Leo at some point, this isn’t exactly how I had pictured being with him when Sophia had told me about this place the first night I arrived in Montovia. Damn, it seems like that conversation with her happened in a different lifetime, but it was really only a few days ago.

I let out a long breath. Even though I can’t bring myself to look at him, I know we do still need to talk. “How was your Tax Council meeting?”

He chuckles. “It went about as well as I expected. Our country seems to relish doing things the old-fashioned way. If nothing else, I think I might be able to bring these people into the twenty-first century.”

“That’s good.” My stomach is twisting on itself, dreading the conversation I know we’re about to have.

I’ve kept myself busy today—busy taking care of the things that I knew I needed to do to be able to get myself out of this mess. There was something almost calming about that, too—figuring out that I’m not as helpless as I sometimes fear I am. Finding out I don’t necessarily need to run away from my problems.

Leo finally breaks the long silence between us. “Elle…” He lets out a short breath. “I want you to know that even if the story you heard last night is true, it doesn’t change my feelings for you in the slightest. And I hope that it doesn’t change your feelings for me.”

“It doesn’t.”

He lets out another short breath and I can hear the relief in his voice. “Oh, Elle, you have no idea how much it pleases me to hear you say that. I imagined—”

“It doesn’t change my feelings for you, Leo. But it changes everything else. I can’t stay here.”

“Elle—”

“No.” I shake my head, but I still can’t bear to look at him. “You know what’s funny, Leo? I thought I was going to be the one to fuck this up.”

“I don’t see how that’s funny at all, Elle. If you would let me explain—”

“I don’t need to hear it, though.” I press my lips into a line, trying to hold back the mixture of emotions I can feel starting to rise in my chest again. “I talked to the reporter today. Victoria Simpson—”

“Victoria Simpson? That’s the reporter Matthias thought you should speak with? Elle, she’s been writing about my family for several years. She’s—”

I grit my teeth and continue. “She’s going to meet me for lunch at the end of the week. She doesn’t just think mine is a good story—she thinks between my relationship with you and everything else that’s happened in my past, I can get a book deal out of it.”

I hear him gulp. “A book…” He lets out another short breath. “Elle, none of this is necessary, though. What’s happened is a blessing to us, really. The press will only be interested in what they can dig up on Karina now. They’ll leave me alone—”

“That’s just it, though.” I finally turn to look at him. “They’ll leave you alone. If I stay here—if I stay with you—then I’m the other woman. I’m the home wrecker. I’ve played that role before, Leo. And I’m not about to play it again. Not for you—not for anyone.”

He closes his eyes and bows his head. “I don’t believe for one moment that her child is mine, Elle. She’s refusing to take a paternity test, though, and I can’t force her. It isn’t until the child is born that she can be compelled to do anything.” He shakes his head and opens his eyes, finally meeting my gaze. “You have to believe me.”

“It doesn’t matter what I believe, Leo. The only thing that matters to your family is the story. How they look in the press. And it’s going to look a hell of a lot better for everyone if you’re supporting the mother of your child. Stephan knew that—it was why he tried to get rid of me.”

His lip twitches at the mention of Stephan and he turns his gaze to the stream at our feet. He’s silent for another long moment. “You don’t have to leave Montovia. I’ll be working in the city now—I’ve been given an office in the Tax Council building. I’ll rent a flat nearby—you can stay there. I’ll be able to visit you almost daily—”

I wish he was close enough to me so that I could reach over and slap the back of his head. But he isn’t, so I only interrupt with a scoff. “And that won’t be tawdry at all when the press finds out, right? Then I really would be your courtesan, Leo. Are you going to leave me some money on the dresser before you leave every morning, too?”

I hear a sound in his throat that is almost a growl. “That is not how it would be at all, Elle.”

“How would it be then, Leo? Your family is going to insist that you marry her, right? And even if you’re somehow able to get out of that—if she would even have you—how do we make us work? You’re asking me to step aside so that you can have your life. You want it all—you want to be able to fix your mistakes with no repercussions. But you can’t—I know that better than anyone. Your past always comes back to bite you in the ass.”

“Elle, I have no intention of making you be the other woman in the long term. It would only be until this child is born—until I can prove to you and the world that it is not mine—”

“But what if it is yours—?”

“Impossible.”

I tilt my head, frowning. “Not impossible, Leo. I’m sure I don’t have to explain the mechanics—”

He interrupts with a shake of his head. “But it is impossible, Elle. There is no way—”

“Did you sleep with her?”

He clenches his jaw. “Yes.”

“You put your dick inside the woman?”

He frowns, almost wincing. “Elle, there is no need to be crass—”

“Did your cock at any point enter the woman who is claiming to be pregnant with your child?”

He groans and closes his eyes. “Yes.” He pauses. “Elle, you truly do not need to explain this to me. I do understand the mechanism. Believe it or not, Montovia is very progressive in the sexual education of its youth.”

“Then stop telling me it’s impossible that there is even a remote chance that her baby is yours. If you fucked her, there’s probably a great deal more than a possibility.”

“Fine.” He rolls his eyes. “There is a possibility. But, Elle…” He shakes his head again. “I know. I can’t explain how I know, but I do. I know that the universe would not do this to me. I wouldn’t have been allowed to find you if this were true. We would have never met—”

“Oh my God, Leo. Seriously?” I close my eyes and shake my head. I sigh and look over at him after a moment. “If I hadn’t fucked my boss, I wouldn’t have been fired from my job. I wouldn’t have ever gone to Rio de Campo and I wouldn’t have met you. I don’t actually believe that the universe intervened on my behalf, though. And I don’t believe you were sent to Rio de Campo so that we could meet, either.”

“I didn’t say that, Elle.”

I groan. “Well, you can’t have it both ways. You can’t have the universe not allowing you to meet me if your ex is pregnant and having it arranging to have us meet because it was meant to be.”

“And none of this matters now.” His voice is low, almost tinged with sadness. “Matthias said you were planning to leave tonight.”

I turn my gaze back to the rock in the middle of the stream. “My plane leaves at nine. I only have a few more hours.”

“Oh.” He’s silent for a moment. “You realize that you don’t have to go through with telling your story to the press now, though. And there’s really no reason for you to leave.”

“Aside from you needing to be with another woman—”

“I don’t need to be with her, Elle. I’ve already told you, I don’t believe—”

“Fine, don’t believe what she says.” I turn to look at him. “What happens when you find out that the baby is yours? You’ll have wasted all this time. Time you should have spent figuring out your shit. Time you should have spent learning how to be a father.”

His gaze darts away from mine before he looks back at me. “These things happen often, don’t they? In your celebrity tabloids? Aren’t people having children out of wedlock or with other partners, then leaving them for someone else? Isn’t celebrity divorce-watching almost a pastime in your beloved magazines?”

“Fuck you, Leo. My beloved magazines.” My jaw clenches before I turn to him again. “You know, I didn’t do this. This one isn’t on me.”

“You’re leaving, though. I need your help and you’ve decided to leave. After you promised that you would discuss leaving with me before you left—”

“I am discussing it with you, Leo.”

His gaze narrows. “You know what I mean. And I heard it from Matthias—”

“And now you’re hearing it from me.” I let out another long breath, trying to curb the anger that’s trying to unleash itself. “Look, I don’t have a problem with you having a kid. I don’t even have a problem with you having spawned a child with one of your flavors of the week.”

He’s speaking through gritted teeth. “Then why are you leaving?”

“Because there’s always going to be something with you. And I’ll always be the one to have to take the fall.” I shake my head. “If Stephan’s plan had worked, I would have been the one going through hell right now. Fuck, Leo, I’m still going to have to go through hell. There are enough people out there who know about me now—my story is going to come out eventually, so I’m still going to have to tell it. I just don’t want to have to do this every time something happens. Every time there’s some embarrassing thing that’s going on in your family, Stephan or whoever can just shove me in front of the press and point at me and say, ‘Look at this whore! Pay attention to her! She’s got way more interesting shit to dig up than the Royal Family!’ And I don’t want to be the scapegoat. I don’t want to be the person they keep around to be able to wheel out to deflect attention when things get rough for you.”

“Then we can go somewhere else. Somewhere outside the range of the media. We’ll live on a beach—”

I interrupt with a sigh. “And then what? We run every time the paparazzi finds us? We’d have to move to Antarctica, Leo.”

He’s silent for a moment. “If that’s what it takes.”

I can’t help but smile. “It’s pretty cold there.”

He shrugs. “We’ll bring coats.”

I laugh for a moment, but it quickly turns into something that feels and sounds an awful lot like crying. “I can’t do this.”

“I can’t do this without you.”

“You can, though.” I blink back the tears that are stinging at my eyes. “We both need to own the mistakes we’ve made. And you need to learn how to be a father to your child. I need to face the consequences of the choices I’ve made in the past—we both do.” My chest aches at the finality in the tone of my voice.

“We can still talk, Elle. I can still come to see you. I’ll send my plane for you—we can go anywhere we want—”

“In between your Tax Council meetings? And your family gatherings? And after the baby’s born, your pediatrician visits? Maybe after your baby learns to crawl but before he says his first word?”

A tear slides down my cheek—I hadn’t thought about it before now, but maybe I really do have a problem with him having a child with another woman. Those are all things he was supposed to have someday—just not with someone else. Those are things I wanted to have with him. For him to have with me.

He closes his eyes. “She meant nothing, Elle. It was six days. We were only together for six days—”

I swipe at the tear on my cheek with the back of my hand and blink hard to keep the rest from leaving my eyes. “We haven’t been together much longer than that, Leo. Not really when you total up the numbers.” I shake my head. “Someday, you can look back on what we had as a short term thing, too. Tell the woman you end up with that it meant nothing.” I have to choke back the sob I feel forming in my throat hearing my words.

He’s silent for a moment, and when he finally speaks, his voice is low. “One last time, Elle. I need to have you one last time. I need to burn you into my memory. I need to burn myself into yours.”

I’m not even sure what sound it is that comes out of my mouth when I open it—some mixture of a sob and a laugh, I think. My shoulders have dropped and I rub my fist against my chest, almost desperate to stop the burning ache inside it.

“Please, Elle. One last time. I’ll…I’ll do whatever you ask of me. I’ll accept my responsibility—I’ll do whatever you want. I just… I need you to know. I need you to believe me when I tell you how I feel about you.”

I shake my head again. “I believe you, Leo. That’s the problem. I feel it, too. But I can’t—”

“If you feel it, too, then there is no reason for you to leave. If you love me—if you honestly meant it when you told me that—you will stay. We will find a way to make this work together. Isn’t that what you told me? That we could find a way through anything together?”

“That was when…” That was when it was about me. Fuck, maybe I am being selfish. Maybe I am running away from my problems again. But hell if I want to stay and fight right now. It isn’t what’s best for him. It isn’t what’s best for either of us.

He continues. “It shouldn’t matter, though, should it? Whether it was something you did in your past or something I did in mine? All that should matter now is that you’re here—that we’re together. And we can face our problems together—”

“Did you talk to her? Your ex? Did you speak with her today?” I press my lips together and search his eyes.

He frowns. “I attempted to have her contacted, yes—”

“That isn’t what I asked, Leo. Of course she doesn’t want your people calling her. Your press secretary or whoever. She’s scared—she’s pregnant and alone and afraid. And all you’ve told her you want is a paternity test to prove she’s lying. You can’t just have your people deal with her. You have to call her. You have to be the one—”

“I don’t—”

“What if it was me, Leo? Can you think about it that way? Would you want me out there by myself, dealing with the wolves that are the media—?”

“Of course not, Elle. But believe me, she is not you. And she is desperate for media attention. It was why she seduced me in the first place—”

I can barely hold back my laughter. “She seduced you? You expect me to believe that, Leo?”

He narrows his gaze a bit. “You don’t know her, Elle. My mother actually invited her here to try to arrange a relationship between her and Andrew. But at least he was smart enough to not become involved, though I can’t say the same for myself. Otherwise, I suppose we would be having a much different conversation at this moment.”

“It doesn’t matter, Leo. If she’s having your baby—”

“She’s not.” He lets out a sigh that sounds almost like a growl. “I can’t prove that yet, of course, but I am quite certain that whatever she is saying is a lie. There is no way—”

“Leo.” I pause for a moment. “Just own this. At least until you can prove otherwise. Even if what you’re saying is true, it’s going to make you look bad if you don’t just own the responsibility.”

“You have no idea how frustrating this is.”

I lift a brow. “I have some idea, Leo. It wasn’t even a day ago that I was on the hook for something I did almost eight years ago. You did this four months ago. You need to own it. We both do.”

He’s silent for a moment. “You still have an hour before you must leave for your flight.”

“Is that a question?”

“I could take you in my plane to wherever it is you’re going. We would have those hours together, at least—”

“But then people would see your plane when it lands. And they’d see me get off your plane—they’d see you were there with me. And then I’m the other woman again. Leo…” I pause, trying to catch his gaze. He won’t make eye contact with me now, though. “I already told you how I feel about that. I did that once. I’m not doing it again.”

He shakes his head and closes his eyes. “But I love you.”

“Yeah. He said that, too.” I have to close my eyes for a moment—of course Leo is nothing like him. Nothing about my relationship with Leo is like that, but it does seem like I’m living my life on repeat. I need to do something to break out of this cycle—and it has to start with me not backing down on what’s right for me. “I have to go. And I have to go alone.”

He nods but keeps his eyes closed. “May I see you again?”

“Leo…”

“After I’ve proved it to you? Will you come back?”

“I…I don’t know.”

He winces. “This hurts so much more than I ever could have imagined.”

Another tear slides down my cheek. “I know.”