They were about to explode right now if she was not careful. He pushed back his chair. ‘I don’t intend discussing it.’
‘No, that’s right. You don’t discuss anything, do you?’ she questioned in frustration. ‘You act like nothing has happened and yet so much has. Because of Ben, you’ve been forced not only to remain as King, but to marry me—and not once have you ever told me how you feel about it. But then, you don’t “do” feelings, do you?’
‘Melissa—’ he said warningly.
‘I haven’t finished.’ She cut through his objections, ignoring the growing look of fury which had made his eyes flame like golden fire. ‘You didn’t bother warning your brother that you were about to abdicate in his favour, did you? Without even asking him whether he wanted the position.’
He froze. ‘What did you say?’
She shook her head. ‘It doesn’t matter.’
‘Oh, but it does, Melissa. Really it does. If you have been spending your time engaged in idle speculation on my brother’s thoughts—’
‘I wasn’t speculating!’ she shot back defensively—and then the words tumbled out before she could stop them. ‘Catherine told me.’
There was a long and disbelieving pause.
‘Catherine told you?’
‘Yes. She said that Xaviero thought you were about to do something dramatic. And let’s face it—you were.’
‘So you have been gossiping behind my back with the Princess?’
‘There you go again!’ she accused. ‘Shooting the messenger! We weren’t gossiping, as it happened. We didn’t sit down and talk about it—just that when we were out choosing my trousseau she mentioned they’d been slightly worried that you were thinking about abdicating.’
‘And you told them that I had?’
‘No, of course I didn’t.’
‘There’s no “of course” about it,’ he flared. ‘Why didn’t you give me this information beforehand?’
‘Maybe I couldn’t see the point, since it was no longer relevant. Or maybe I was worried that I’d get just this kind of reaction,’ she said bitterly. ‘Autocratic, overbearing—’
‘Overbearing?’ he echoed ominously.
‘Well, why didn’t you bother discussing it with Xaviero first? Were you so certain he’d want to be King? So keen to take on the life you wanted to reject?’
Casimiro stared out of the windows to the gardens beyond without really seeing the bright beauty of the flower-beds. Yes, there had been times when his younger brother had envied him—because the heir to the throne was always singled out as special. But Casimiro had envied Xaviero, too—for the kind of freedom that he as King would never know. Each had wanted something of what the other had.
‘For many years, yes,’ he said slowly, almost to himself. ‘He did—especially as a boy.’
‘And lately?’
Casimiro did not know about lately. The new-found weight of the monarchy had driven all personal relationships from his life so that Xaviero had become almost like a stranger to him. But hadn’t that happened with just about everyone from the moment the crown had been placed on his head—leaving him in a powerful position of complete isolation? Wasn’t that the only way that a King could properly govern his people—by taking full responsibility for his kingdom? ‘He did an excellent job of being my stand-in when I was ill,’ he answered. ‘And if I hadn’t recovered then he would have continued to rule. According to my aides, he settled into the job happily.’
In spite of the tension which hung over them like a heavy storm cloud, Melissa couldn’t dampen down the flicker of hope which flared inside her. Because this was more than he’d ever admitted to her—and even though she ran the risk of angering him with her persistent line of questioning, wasn’t it better to see it through and to thrash it out? Together. To let Casimiro see that she was someone he could confide in. Because that was just as important a facet of her role as visiting schools and opening new roads.
‘Wouldn’t it have been easier to have sat down and talked to him about it?’ she probed gently.
His eyes narrowed as he considered her question. Had it been arrogance whic
h had stopped him from doing just that—or pride? Fear that his memory loss would be discovered—and make him appear vulnerable? Or was it the fact that he and Xaviero never really talked very much? Men didn’t; not in his world.
He looked at Melissa now—at the eagerness on her face as she tried to delve beneath the surface despite his repeated warnings not to—and he sighed. She was a good mother and a pleasing lover and she had all the potential to be a great Queen. But that did not give her carte blanche to behave as if she were still living her life back in England. He would not tolerate her interference—and neither would he tolerate her springing things like this on him over breakfast. Far better that she learned that if they were to have any kind of amicable marriage, then she was going to have to learn to follow his rules. Rules which had existed in his family since they had first conquered this fertile kingdom, and which had been passed down through generation after generation.
He rose to his feet. ‘I don’t subscribe to the modern habit of dragging up the past and putting it under the spotlight—I think I told you that on our honeymoon,’ he gritted out. ‘What’s done is done and has no relevance on our lives now. So let’s just leave it at that, shall we? And I’m warning you, Melissa—that this is your last chance. That I cannot and will not have a rerun of this conversation just to satisfy your curiosity.’
Melissa flinched. It was as if she’d been peering into the first few pages of an open book—a book filled with beautiful pictures and a wonderful story—which told her something about her husband’s inner life and the feelings he hid from the world. But now it felt as if he’d just slammed that book shut in her face and then flung it to the floor. Her lips parting in shock, she stared up at him in disbelief. His face was hard—a beautiful golden mask, behind which his eyes were cold and forbidding. And a terrible sense of foreboding whispered over her as she recognised that they had reached an impasse and that maybe he needed to know that.