rned. She’d meant to sound light but a note of bitterness crept in. How could he have made so many assumptions? But how could she be surprised that he had?
‘It was the first thought that came to my mind,’ Rico acknowledged. ‘But perhaps that is because of my experience, not yours. Now I’d like to hear in your own words how you came to be at that palace.’ He paused, gazing down into the glinting ruby depths of his wine. ‘How did your family take the news of your pregnancy?’
‘Not well.’ The two words scraped Halina’s throat and she took another sip of water. ‘Not well at all, to be perfectly frank.’
Rico frowned. ‘I thought your father doted on you.’
She laughed, the sound rather grim. ‘Where did you hear that?’
‘I hired a private investigator to find you. He found that the general sense was that your father doted on you, and that you were rather spoiled.’ His gaze, when she dared to meet it, was steady and clear, without judgement or pity. ‘Is that true?’
‘It was true,’ Halina said after a moment, when she trusted her voice to be as steady as his gaze. ‘But it all changed when I ruined myself.’
Rico’s eyebrows drew together in a straight line, his frown turning into a scowl so that he looked quite ferocious. ‘Tell me what happened.’
‘What I should have expected would happen,’ Halina answered with a shrug. Even now she couldn’t believe how stupid, how utterly naive, she’d been, and in so many ways. About Rico, about her father, about life. ‘My parents were beyond furious with me. When the negotiations with Prince Zayed broke down, my father had been hoping to marry me to someone else, someone he deemed suitable, who would afford us another political alliance. My disgrace precluded that.’
‘Surely in this day and age a woman’s virginity is not a prerequisite, even for a royal marriage?’
‘In my country, in my culture, it is. And I knew that.’ She shook her head. ‘All along I knew that, and yet still I acted as if the consequences wouldn’t apply to me.’ She tried for a twisted smile. ‘I suppose you truly did sweep me away, Rico.’
‘It was mutual,’ Rico said after a brief pause. ‘If I’d had any sense myself, any ability to think straight, I would have realised how innocent you were. And I wouldn’t have touched you.’
‘Was it that obvious?’
‘In hindsight, yes. So what did your father do?’
‘He was livid with me, first of all. Utterly enraged, as well as disappointed. I’m not sure which felt worse.’ She shook her head, the memories assailing her like hammer blows. ‘And when he found out I was pregnant...’
‘How did he find out, as a matter of interest?’
‘He made me take a pregnancy test,’ Halina said simply. ‘At the earliest opportunity. And then he tried to have Prince Zayed marry me, spoiled goods that I was, because he didn’t think anyone else would have me. And when that didn’t work out...’ She gulped, not wanting to go on, closing her eyes against the harshness of the memory that still hurt her even now.
‘What?’ Rico demanded roughly. ‘Whatever it is, tell me, Halina. Surely it can’t be worse than another man claiming my child?’
She saw how the skin around his lips had gone white, his eyes hard and metallic. He was angry, but with her father, not with her. Would he be even angrier when she told him the whole truth?
‘You have to understand,’ Halina said slowly. ‘My father is a good man. A loving man.’ She had to believe that, because if she didn’t what did she have? A father who had never actually truly loved her? ‘But,’ she continued painfully, ‘he was in very difficult circumstances...’
‘It sounds as if you were in very difficult circumstances,’ Rico interjected shortly.
Yes, she had been, but the circumstances had been of her own making. And she supposed she wanted to explain her father’s actions—absolve him, even—because she still loved him and wanted to believe he loved her. Otherwise, what was love, that he could be doting one minute and damning the next? How did you trust it, if it could so easily turn into something else? What was love, if you couldn’t forgive a mistake, an insult, an open wound?
‘Halina,’ Rico said, and it sounded like a warning.
‘He tried,’ Halina confessed in a low voice, ‘To make me have an abortion.’
* * *
Rico stared at Halina, her pale face, her pain-filled eyes, and felt a whole new kind of fury sweep through him—a tidal wave of anger and indignation and, beneath those, a deep, soul-reaching pain.
‘He tried?’ he repeated in a growl. ‘What do you mean by that?’
‘He insisted, and he wouldn’t listen to me at all. My mother agreed with him, and they took me to a discreet doctor. Forced me.’ She blinked rapidly but a tear fell anyway, glistening on her cheek like a diamond. Rico’s fists clenched on the table. ‘I fought the whole way, tooth and nail.’ She stared at him, her eyes huge. ‘You have to believe that, Rico. I would never want to get rid of my child. I begged and pleaded, I cried and fought. I did.’ She let out a choked cry, one trembling fist pressed to her mouth.
‘I do believe it,’ he said in a low voice. It was impossible not to when he could feel her desperation and grief like a tangible thing, a shroud covering her. ‘So, what happened then?’
‘The doctor refused to perform the operation,’ Halina whispered. ‘Because I was fighting against it so much. My father was furious, but in the midst of it all I think he saw where his own anger had led him, and he was ashamed.’ She swiped at the tear still glistening on her cheek. ‘I have to believe that.’