âWhat are we going to do?â he asked at last.
Emily pushed away from him and walked over to the window. He knew the view she was afforded from the window. This place had been hard-earned. Heâd worked just as hard as his siblings to make Montoro Enterprises into the success it was today.
âI just wanted you to know. Beyond that I donât need anything. Someday the kid is going to ask about youââ
âSomeday? Iâm going to be a part of this,â Rafe said.
âI donât see how. Youâre going to be jetting off to Alma to take the throne. My life is here. The babyâs life will be here.â
He rubbed the back of his neck. The timing on this sucked. But he didnât blame Emily. Heâd been running when he went to Key West, afraid to admit that he was in over his head. He was the oldest son. He was Rafael the Fourth, the future king. He should be in command all the time. But the truth was he was lost.
And somehow in Emilyâs arms heâd found something.
* * *
Carrying a Kingâs Child is part of the series Dynasties: The MontorosâOne royal family must choose between love and destiny!
One
Emily Fielding was shaking as she stepped off the elevator into the foyer of Rafael Montoro IVâs penthouse in South Beach. The Montoros had settled in Miami, Florida, decades ago, when as the royal family of Alma, they had to flee their European island homeland because of a coup. Now the dictator whoâd replaced them was dead and the parliament of Alma wanted the Montoros back.
With Rafe as king.
Great. Happy ending for everyone. Well, everyone except for Emily, the bartender who was pregnant with the soon-to-be-kingâs baby. Or at least that was what her gut told her. Her gut and three home pregnancy tests. She wasnât easy to convince.
She had debated not telling Rafe about the baby, but having grown up without knowing who her father was, she just couldnât do that to her own child. Sure, sheâd had to lie to get up here to his very posh penthouse apartment, and she knew her timing sucked because Rafe had a lot of royal duties to attend to before his coronation, but she was still here.
Getting past security hadnât been that easy, but sheâd made a few calls to friends and found that one of them had a connection to Rafe via a maid service. So sheâd used Mariaâs pass to get into the gated community and her key to get into his building.
Sneaking around wasnât her style. Normally. But nothing about this situation was normal.
She was shaking as she stood on the Italian marble floor and let the air-conditioning dry the sweat at the small of her back. Luxurious and well appointed, the apartment was exactly the sort of place where she expected to find Rafe. His family might have fled Alma in the middle of the night, but theyâd brought their dignity and their determination with them to the United States and this generation of Montoros had truly flourished.
Rafe was the CEO of Montoro Enterprises. He had been featured in Forbes long before the recent developments in Alma. Heâd earned the wealth she saw around him, and the fact that he played as hard as he worked was something she could respect. She played hard, too.
She forced herself not to touch her stomach. Not to draw attention to the one thing that changed everything. Since sheâd looked at that stick in the bathroom and realized she was going to have a baby, everything had changed.
Pretending that there was more to her visit than ensuring that her child would know who its father was would be stupid. A wealthy businessman she could have had a shot with, she thought. But not a king.
Still...
Sheâd seen photos of Alma. With its white sand beaches and castle that looked like something out of a dream, it was a beautiful place. The kind of place that she might have dreamed about as a little girl. A fairy-tale kingdom with a returning prince. Sounded perfect, right?
Except that Rafael Montoro IV was a playboy and theyâd had a fling. She wrinkled her nose as she tried to come up with something else to call it, but a two-night stand didnât cover it, either. One weekend spent in each otherâs arms. She could lose herself in the memories if she wasnât careful.
Hell, she hadnât been careful. Which was precisely why she was here. Pregnant and determined. She walked down the hallway toward the sounds of Jay-Z playing in the distance. She paused in the doorway of his bedroom.