No one would suspect a plain, bookish woman of excellent breeding and quiet social manners of deception or violence. Only a select few were aware that the woman beneath was capable of both.

For a reason she couldn’t name, that thought made her turn away from her reflection. Deception had been with her all of her adult life, and yet she couldn’t quite dismiss the twinges of guilt she felt whenever Eve looked at her as a friend.

It was a job, Hannah reminded herself. No emotional attachments, no emotional involvements were permitted. That was the first and most important rule of the game. She couldn’t afford to allow herself to like Eve, to even think of her as anything but a political symbol. If she did, everything she’d worked for could be lost.

The envy had to go as well, Hannah reminded herself. It was a dangerous lapse to let herself look at the love between the prince and Eve and wish something similar for herself. There was no room for love in her profession. There were only goals, commitments and risks.

There would be no prince for her, royal or otherwise.

But before she could prevent it, her thoughts turned to Bennett and the way he’d smiled at her in the moonlight.

Idiot, she told herself and began tightening a few loose pins. He was the last person she should think about in a personal way. If for no other reason, there was his dossier and the astonishing list of women who’d been part of his life already.

Use him, certainly, her mind went on. But don’t think about him as anything but a means to an end. Romantic fantasies had ended for her at sixteen. Ten years later, in the middle of her most important job, was hardly the time to begin to weave them again. She would do well to remember that the stiff-lipped, proper Lady Hannah would never see His Royal Highness Prince Bennett de Cordina in a romantic light.

But the woman within dreamed and for a moment strained against the confines she’d built herself.

Hannah turned to look back at the mirrors when she heard the footsteps.

Immediately alert, she cast her eyes down and walked from the room.

“Ah, there you are.”

At Bennett’s voice, Hannah gave an inward curse, but curtsied. “Your Highness.”

“Taking the grand tour?” He walked closer, wondering why she looked as plain as a maiden aunt and continued to intrigue him.

“Yes, sir. I hope it’s all right.”

“Of course.” He took her hand, willing her to look directly at him. There was something about her eyes. . . . Or perhaps it was her voice, that cool, always composed British tone. “I had some business in town. Alexander suggested I swing by when I’d finished to see if you were ready to go back.”