Thanks for your reviews and keep letting me know what you think. More Robbie this chapter
When Eleanor wakes, she can hear a voice in the background and she wonders why it is so far away.
She cracks open one eyelid, then another, while her eyes adjust to the light.
A tall, blurry figure comes into focus and she smiles as it gets closer.
"Robbie," she states, reaching out a hand towards him.
He takes her hand and helps her to sit upright on the settee.
She looks round her confused, and after a moment pulls herself to her feet carefully then walks slowly to the window.
The house is old with stone walls, a stiff draft and from the window she can make out a walled garden and courtyard beyond.
She stares at it. It looks familiar and she wracks her memory to recall where she is.
After a moment a name comes to mind. "Is this Brigham?" she questions, furrowing her brow.
She thinks they've been here maybe twice before, one when she was about nine and again when she was sixteen perhaps.
The family have well over a dozen properties but only a few that they visit regularly.
And Brigham is one more of a quaint relic of what was, than something fit to live in today.
The pint sized castle is situated in Dorset and is entirely walled in, with a turret and a guard tower, a drawbridge and a moat. It's quite uninhabited, and if Eleanor recalls correctly the only people who visit the place are a couple of locals who visit to tend to the garden or keep the castle interior tidy.
Robbie nods and gives her a lazy smile.
"Why are we here exactly?" Eleanor questions, confused.
The last thing she recalled was being in France with Jasper, and she has a vague memory of Robbie turning up on the doorstep and her letting him in.
Has he brought her here because he thinks she will be safer from whatever threat Jasper's worried about here, away from everything?
Robbie clears his throat and starts speaking. "We're here because I'm King and you know much too for your own good. Given that you're now aware that I'm not your brother and I'm not your father's son, I can't have you running around telling everyone who I actually am," he says, finishing his comments with a charming smile of pearly white teeth.
Eleanor draws a breath in and stares back at him blindly.
"Nor can we have you disgracing the Royal Family by giving birth to a bastard by an American con artist and putting the reputation of the family into disrepute or threatening my ability to continue to govern," he adds, sitting himself back in his seat, and folding his legs together.
Eleanor sits forwards sharply, and challenges him. "Are you holding me hostage here?" she demands.
"You had your choice Lenny. I could have made the arrangements for you to marry Sebastian or any number of eligible Royals but you wouldn't have it," Robbie chides.
"So now you'll be remaining here. I have three men in place who will detain you if you try to leave. You must see that I can't let you go, knowing what you know," he adds, as if this should be perfectly obvious.
Eleanor sits back in her chair, and puts her head in her hands.
"Why are you doing this Robbie?" she asks desperately, as her voice breaks.
Robbie stares back at her, unfazed. "Like I said you made your own choices Len. Even as we speak the news that the Princess has been tragically killed in the south of France in a car accident is making its way to the Royal household. No doubt the media will fawn over the loss of the young and beautiful Princess. You may find you're far more popular dead than alive," he adds harshly, raising an eyebrow.
Eleanor looks back at him, stunned. He wants to erase her forever and keep her locked up until she grows old and vanishes.
"You can't just shut me up here forever," she snaps, half demanding and half pleading with him.
Robbie raises his eyebrows and repeats himself again. "Like I said Len, if you had just agreed to marry someone suitable this situation would have never arisen. But you wouldn't. Because you're stubborn and headstrong. And like usual you would go slutting around and let Jasper bloody Frost knock you up," he adds, lecturing her.
Coming from Robbie, even if he is now something very different and darker to the brother she knows and loves, the words still hurt.
Eleanor watches him carefully while he goes to stand at the window, looking out over the garden with his back to her.
Eleanor's not stupid. She has a chance and she'll take it.
She's on her feet in a flash and at the door a few seconds later. She pulls at the heavy wood desperately, but unsuccessfully.
Robbie doesn't even turn around to address her. "It's locked. And I have the key," he adds.
Finally he decides to turn around and gives her a charming smile. "And even if you did make it out you would find my men, and then a six metre wall with a moat surrounding it."
Eleanor's leaning against the door, eyes wide and heart beating against her chest. For the first time its just occurred to her that maybe Robbie doesn't want to keep her here as a prisoner.
Maybe he has something far more sinister in mind. Maybe her life will be tragically cut short not in a car crash but in this very castle.
Robbie steps away from the window and slowly advances towards her.
There is something so slow and methodical about the way he approaches her that Eleanor thinks suddenly of a cat approaching a mouse it is planning to capture and torment.
Robbie stands in front of her, so close she can feel his coat scratching into her bare arms. He looks down on her and when she looks back, its not love or warmth she feels, but stone cold fear.
Robbie reaches forward and brushes her hair. Eleanor freezes.
"You know Len, maybe its for the best that you didn't marry some foreign Royal. And maybe its for the best that you know who I actually am and that I'm not your brother. Liam used to say that out of everyone I loved you best. And he was right. Just not like a brother," he adds, sliding a hand around her waist.
Eleanor panics at his touch and tries to shove him back, but his feet are planted firmly on the floor and he's too heavy to be moved.
Suddenly he has her arms imprisoned in his grasp and his lips are on hers, pressing against her and pushing her back into the door, strong and demanding.
Eleanor can't breathe and she can see with terrible clarity that that the man she thought of as her brother - someone she loved and respected her whole life - is not who she thought he is.
He is evil and controlling.
He is a monster.