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IT WAS, by necessity, a quiet and hasty wedding With the young King lying hovering between life and death in a hospital bed, any lavish display of celebration would have been seen as being in extremely bad taste

In the event, Cathy found the low-key tone of the event a relief Iht—attended by all the world’s top dignitaries and politicians? The kind of nuptials which had apparently been enjoyed by Xaviero’s own parents and which had been splashed over glossy ed to pretend that her own unionwas all for real—and that her royal groom was madly in love with her—if there were battalions of cameras around? Until she reminded herself that she wouldn’t be here if it were a ‘nor—because Xaviero wouldn’t have needed a bride in such a hurry

Flavia was assigned to help Cathy settle into the beautiful and closely guarded house within the palace coe—and to school her in the auto

‘You understand that with theof your vows, you will automatically become a princess?’ the older woman asked

‘Yes’

‘And that in future, you will be known as Catherine’

Cathy smiled ‘I prefer Cathy, if you don’t mind’

Flavia’s expression hadn’t changed ‘Actually, that won’t be possible,’ she said apologetically ‘The Prince Regent has ordered all your stationery to bear the name Catherine’

For someone whose identity had already been in crisis, this was the final straw—and Cathy went ent’s roo hile Xaviero finished off with soovernment business before he could see her

When she was eventually ushered into his office, he took one frowning look at her and then dis which had not happened since the day when he had proposed e to her

His eyes narrowed as he indicated the seat in front of hi with the transport secretary in half an hour and a whole stack of reading to get through before then in order to get his head round the new road plans For the first ti that he couldn’t use his iate—that the buck really did stop with him And that maybe this kind of poasn’t all it was cracked up to be…‘Sit down,’ he said