His Royal Love Child by Lucy Monroe

Danette Michaels knew the rules when she became Principe Marcello Scorsolini’s secret mistress. There would be no marriage, no future, no public acknowledgement. All she’d have was his hard Sicilian body and his undivided passion. At the time, it was enough.

But Danette can’t be a dirty little secret any longer. She wants all or nothing – and that means their affair is over. Until a pregnancy test changes everything…

When Danette first met Prince Marcello, she was smarting from a bad breakup with a guy she thought really cared about her, but how betrayed her instead. So she was fine with staying in the background and hiding their affair. But after awhile, as her feelings started to develop and she sees pictures of him in a rag magazine dancing with other women, she gets tired of keeping their affair a secret. Thinking he truly cares for her as she does him, she wants to make their relationship public, even if it means dealing with the press constantly in their business.

For Marcello's part, he doesn't want his private life put in the limelight and he doesn't ever want to risk marriage again, because he doesn't think he can have children and he doesn't want a women to have to deal with the disappointment of being married to him without them (like his first wife was).

When Danette demands that they make their relationship public, Marcello refuses, so she breaks it off with him. But then she finds out she's pregnant and all bets are off.

This is the second book in Lucy Monroe's Royal Brides Triolgy offered by Harlequin Presents and it was just as satisfying as her first, The Prince's Virgin Wife. We actually meet Danette for the first time in LM's Wedding Vow of Revenge, so we're familiar with her before the story begins, which I think is great. When I finished WVoR, I wondered if she'd get her own story and I'm glad she did.

Danette was a great heroine. She stood her ground about her affair with Marcello being over, even after finding out she was pregnant. LM is amazing at writing heroines that are tough but still vulnerable. It's a great combo.

Marcello was your typical Alpha-Male Prince, arrogant and a take-charge kind of guy, but he also had hidden depths that we caught glimpses of in the beginning and explored fully as the story went on.

I'm so excited for her final installment in this series. The Scorsolini Marriage Bargain, which tells the story of the eldest Scorsolini brother, Claudio, and his wife Therese, whom we met in the first and saw more of in this one. I can't wait to see what LM has in store for them. I'm also curious about the King and his ex-wife, Marcello's mother. I hope Lucy includes more of them in the final book, or gives them on of their own later.

4 out of 5