“You were seeing that really nice dentist from Austin who had perfect teeth and a nice butt.”
Blakely smiles at the memory. “Yes. I remember that butt.”
“Well, do you remember how panicked you were that you were going to have to spend the rest of your life with him because of one busted condom?”
She pinches her lips to one side of her mouth and deflates slightly. “Yes.”
I cut off a triangle of pancake and point it at her. “That is how I feel about being with Colby. He’s fine to hang around with, but I don’t want to spend my life with him.”
She winces, but I see understanding flicker in her eyes. “Poor Colby.”
I snort. “Poor me. I almost had a prince.”
Blakely taps her phone. “Based on these tabloids, lucky you. Your prince is a serial heartbreaker. Nothing like the leading men in your books.”
I shrug. “Sometimes the male lead is a mess at the start and then turns things around by the end.”
Blakely wags her bacon at me. “Don’t waste your life waiting for a man to change. If there’s one thing women in this world need to realize, it’s that movies and romance novels aren’t real. You found your prince and now he’s gone, and where are you?”
“Hungover and stuffing my face with pancakes?” I hazard a guess.
“Exactly,” Blakely says. “He isn’t going to ride up on some white horse to save you. The two of you had a good time together and now it is time to take control of things.”
A surge of enthusiasm bursts through my self-pity. “You’re right. If going home with a prince hasn’t changed anything about my life, then nothing will. I have to take control.”
“Yeah,” Blakely says around a mouthful of eggs.
“I need to get serious about my job, so I can afford a house one day.”
“Yes, girl!”
“And I need to be done with honky-tonking and try to find a nice guy I can see myself being with long term.”
“Okay!” Blakely says, her face pinched and unsure as she bobs her head from side to side. “I’m definitely still going to the honky-tonk, but I support your enthusiasm and stand behind this declaration for forward momentum!”
I raise my glass in a cheers. “That’s good enough for me!”
She knocks her coffee against my chocolate milk, and we both take a deep drink. Despite my hangover, part of me wishes I had a stiff drink in my hand. After the last twelve hours, I could really use it.
Chapter 8
Christian
By the time I land back in Sigmaran, I can’t understand what inspired me to fly halfway around the world. I’ve had one shower in the last forty-eight hours, and I feel like the tin cans that get dragged around behind a car after a wedding.
When I turn my phone on, I have another text from my father telling me to message him when I land. I dismiss it without responding. I also have a message from my brother Erikson.
You are so screwed.
Ahh, who wouldn’t want brothers? They are always there to support you when the going gets tough.
I pocket my phone and wish I hadn’t left the chauffeur’s cap back at the honky-tonk in Texas. Somehow, word leaked that I’d taken an impromptu trip across the pond, and I know there will be photographers waiting to catch me in all of my greasy, exhausted glory.
Everyone on the plane remained relatively low-key about my presence, especially since Father booked me a first-class ticket, but my walk through the airport is not as understated. Security are waiting for me at the gate, so I march through the airport with a small army of muscled men trailing behind me. And as soon as we walk into the lobby, photographers descend.
“Where were you, Prince Christian?”
“Do you have a secret American girlfriend?”
“Is it true you spent the evening in a Texas…honky-tonk?”
I pray none of them find out about Jane-Ann. I’d like her to remain my little secret. Something I can remember fondly without the taint of the press. Though, what do I know? Maybe Jane-Ann has finally looked me up and is now realizing the prince act was not an act at all. Maybe she’s getting powdered for an exclusive interview about our night together.
I shove the thought down. Jane-Ann wouldn’t do that. I only knew her for a few hours, but I still feel like I know her. For the few hours we spent together, we were honest with one another. Vulnerable. Even if she didn’t fully believe me at the time. Once she realizes that, I have a suspicion our evening together will be as special to her as it will be to me.
Or for my sake, I sure as hell hope so.
The palace has never looked so much like a prison.
A lavish, well-lit prison, but a prison all the same. The gates shutter behind the car as we pull down the long drive toward the house, and when I step through the front doors, two maids close them behind me. It feels like I’m willingly walking into my own dungeon, smiling and thanking the people locking me inside.
My mother appears at the top of the stairs seconds after my arrival. “Christian. It is so nice to have you home.”
No mention of why I was away or where I’d gone. Mother’s favorite coping mechanism. Denial, denial, denial.
“Where’s the King?”
She purses her lips. “The sitting room. And you know he doesn’t like when you call him that.”
“I don’t like when he closes down accounts that are in my name and forces me to crawl back home like the prodigal son,” I say with a violent smile on my face. “He is the king, not a dictator. How did he have any say over my accounts?”
Her jaw clenches, and she shakes her head. “He’s waiting for us.”
I follow her down long hallways, past rooms we never use, and into a large formal sitting room. Father is sitting in a wing-backed chair like it’s a throne.
“Christian.” His face is flat, neutral.
I make a grand bow, bending at the waist.
In seconds, the usual signs of frustration are creasing his brow and tightening his lips. “Sit down. We need to talk.”
“So I heard,” I say, dropping down on the sofa, my arm lazing across the back. “It was important enough to pull me out of my vacation.”
“You ran away,” Father snarls. “Vacations require planning. You bought the first ticket out and found another dingy bar full of riffraff to hole up with.”
My mother moves across the room to place a hand on his shoulder. Her presence has always steadied him, but not enough. She is the bucket on a sinking ship, managing to bail some water, but the ship is going down either way.
Jane-Ann’s blond braids and heart-shaped face creep into my mind. She isn’t riffraff. Though I know my father would disagree.
“What your father is trying to say,” Mother says, “is that your actions affect more than just you.”
“Did I miss an important meeting with one of the hundreds of charities we support? Once my accounts are unfrozen, I’ll send them an apology check. They won’t mind.”
“Your brothers have been acting out,” Father says sharply, ignoring me. “Jory and Niles have refused to attend their lessons without force since you’ve been gone, and Erikson has begun speaking to us…”
His voice fades away, and I know what he wanted to say.
“The way I speak to you?” I ask.
His jaw clenches. It was a slip. A crack in his armor. An admission that despite how much he pretends otherwise, it is important to him that his sons respect him. He’d hoped I was a bad egg, but with Erikson beginning to push back, it seems the rebellious streak could be a trend.
“It upsets your mother,” he adds quickly, placing a hand over my mother’s, which is still on his shoulder. “You have upset your mother.”
The guilt slides over my skin without sinking in. I’m too used to it by now. The way my family uses one another to manipulate the others. I’m supposed to do my duty for the sake of my brothers, for my mother’s nerves, for my father’s peace of mind. No mention of my own feelings, of
what I want.
“To be frank, I’m not too pleased with you all, either,” I say calmly. “Placing a deadline on my personal life is unacceptable.”
Father is on his feet in a heartbeat, and I flinch back into my seat only because I’m surprised the old man is still so spry.
“What is unacceptable is running away from your responsibilities and deserting your family and your country.”
“I was gone less than three days.” I sigh, focusing on the oil portrait hanging above the fireplace.
The painting is of my great-great-grandfather and his wife. A woman who is not biologically related to me. My great-great-grandmother died shortly after bearing her children, and the king remarried within the year. I’ve never seen a portrait of her, and her name isn’t written anywhere except in connection with her children. Almost as if she had shown a weakness by dying young, and everyone hoped they could hide it away. I’m positive my father has considered a similar strategy with me. Perhaps, he should have left me in America.
He takes a step to the side as if he wants to pace, but then clicks his heels together and stands directly ahead of me, focused like the muzzle of a gun finding its target.
“It shows a weakness. It gives our people room to doubt the strength of our family. It gives our enemies room to doubt your loyalty to this country.”
“Enemies?” I scoff, rolling my eyes.
“The independence of our island is not a joke,” he snaps, straining on an invisible leash, desperate to attack. “There are those who would like to see us fall so our land could be claimed and repurposed. You know this, and yet you act as though it is a joke.”
I do not take the freedom of our island lightly, but I cannot view those who would wish to use our ports for their own benefit as our enemies. They are not readying their ships to storm our shores, even though I’m sure that is how my father likes to imagine it.
“Does this conversation have a purpose?” I sigh. “I could do with a nap.”
He stares at me for a second, unspoken words filling the space between us, warming the room until sweat dampens my palms. Finally, he turns and sits back down in his chair, my mother resting on the arm like a decoration. When he says nothing, my mother clears her throat and settles her hands in her lap.
“While you were away, we came to a decision about the future of this family,” she says. “And we reached out to your father’s friend, Fredrik Andersson.”
“The baron?” I ask, looking to my father for any kind of reaction. The last I knew, he believed Fredrik Andersson was a snake with aspirations to ascend the royal ladder.
“Yes, the baron. His daughter, Lady Freyja, is going to be in Sigmaran for the next several months, and we have offered her a room and your company.”
My mother says it all so quickly, so casually, that I almost miss the implications. Almost. My fists tighten until my knuckles ache.
“I assume you would like me to be more than her tour guide.”
Mother moves across the room in a few quiet steps and sits next to me on the couch, her hand on my knee. “Lady Freyja is a lovely woman who comes from a good family. She is very interested in spending time with you, and your father and I believe it is time we push you toward your future.”
I know Lady Freyja. Not well, but enough to know I do not wish to know her better. We’ve crossed paths at different parties over the years, and she was unfailingly snobbish and vapid. Her interest in a person extended only as far as they were useful to her, and I knew her interest in meeting me was no different.
“I am capable of finding my own path.” The words sound like a plea, and I hate it, but I also know my usual sullen indifference will do little to sway the situation.
Father snorts. “Your path took you halfway across the world. Your path has you single at thirty, stumbling drunk out of nightclubs.”
“Ranell,” Mother warns, her voice feather soft. She turns back to me. “She will be here in a few days.”
I stand up, hands shoved in my pockets. “I won’t see her.”
“You damn well will,” Father shouts, shooting out of his chair.
We are standing ten feet apart, but it feels like he’s right in my face. I can almost feel the heat of his breath.
Mother stays seated, one of her ankles delicately tucked beneath her other leg. “There will be consequences should you refuse.”
My eyes snap to her. “What is that supposed to mean?”
“You graduated from the Royal Sigmaran Military College, yet served less than two years as a Lieutenant,” she says softly, eyes pinned to me. “Some would say that your service pales in comparison to other past and future leaders.”
Her voice was gentle, but her implications were sharp.
“You are threatening to send me to war?”
“There is no war, boy.” It is apparently Father’s turn to roll his eyes. “But if you do not take on the responsibilities of family, then it seems only right you would take on the responsibilities of serving this country.”
“Do not think of it as a threat,” Mother adds. “We are providing two paths for you, and it is your choice.”
“Is it a choice if I am poised at the edge of a cliff with a gun at my back and given the opportunity to jump or be shot?”
“Military service would wipe that dramatic streak away,” Father adds.
I want to argue, to scream, to fight with them the way a normal child would fight with normal parents, but there is no winning here. As much as I’ve spent my life trying to fight it, they hold the keys to my future.
Even if I was somehow able to escape the crown, I would spend the rest of my life being the man who ran away. Who deserted his family, his country. It would be a shameful existence as far as the press was concerned with few upsides.
In short, my parents had me by the balls.
I stand up and move toward the door, ignoring my father’s mumbled remark about “the runaway prince.”
“Send word when Lady Freyja arrives,” I say, my back toward them, one hand on the sitting room door. “I will meet her as you have asked but will promise nothing else.”
I pushed through the door and marched down the hallway before they could respond.
Chapter 9
Jane-Ann
Two Months Later
Rhonda is shuffling piles of papers around her desk, licking her thumb between each movement to help separate the pages. It’s one of my pet peeves, but I keep an easy smile, ignoring the clench of disgust that roils my stomach. I’m receiving my annual review today, and I don’t want to do anything to upset Rhonda before she can read me my results. If all goes well, I’m hoping for a raise. I’ve been at Rufus’ Sofa Shack for three years, which is longer than any other employee.
In the two months since my run-in with Christian, I’ve focused on making improvements to my life. On doing what I told Blakely I’d do. I have focused on my career, putting in overtime and covering shifts when asked, and I’ve stopped frequenting Jimmy’s Honky-tonk.
Less time at the honky-tonk has also meant seeing Colby less, which feels like a good step forward for both of us. I don’t have to constantly spurn his advances, and he can move on. According to Blakely, he has been “moving on” with a new girl every weekend. She only told me to see if I’d get jealous, but I couldn’t care less. Good for him. At least one of us is getting some action.
Finding a serious relationship is the one hitch in my plan. Not going to the honky-tonk means my usual mode of finding a guy is gone, and short of online dating, I have no idea where to start.
But that’s okay. A relationship will happen naturally once the rest of my life falls into place. Or, at least, that’s what I’ve been telling myself. I hope it is true.
“Here we go,” Rhonda says, licking her finger before pulling a single piece of paper out of a folder and sliding it across the messy desk to me.
I pick it up, avoiding the corner that is curled with her spit.
“This is your third y
ear here, so you know what this is,” she says, holding up her own copy of my employee evaluation form. “You were evaluated on a bunch of different measures, but if you look down at your final score, you’ll see I gave you a five out of five.”
Sure enough, at the bottom of the sheet, Rhonda had given me full marks in every category and circled my average score in a green marker. Next to it she’s scribbled, “Keep up the good work, Jane-Ann! We love you!” I only hope she loves me enough to give me a raise.
“That’s great, Rhonda. Thanks,” I say, studying the paper diligently, letting her know I take it all very seriously.
“No, thank you,” she says, setting my review aside and folding her hands under her chin. “You’re a valued employee here, and I hope to see you in my office in another year for another performance review.”
“Me too,” I say. “I love it here.”
Rhonda raises her brows and smiles. “That’s wonderful to hear because Rufus and I have discussed it at length, and we would both like to promote you to key holder.”
I open my mouth, but before I can say anything, Rhonda continues on.
“You’re under no obligation to accept the position, but it would come with a one-dollar-per-hour raise and more responsibility. We believe you are more than capable of taking on more duties around the shop, and we trust you to keep things running while we are away. You don’t have to answer now, but—”
“I accept,” I say, lunging across the table to grab Rhonda’s hand and shake it. “Thank you so much.”
I do the mental math quickly, figuring an extra one hundred and fifty dollars in my budget every month at least, which isn’t a lot but would give me room to relax a little bit. Maybe I could reinstate a monthly dinner with Blakely. Maybe I could even splurge on a drink from the bar. I bite the corner of my lip to keep from beaming like an idiot at the prospect.
Rhonda congratulates me again, assures me there will be paperwork and procedures to discuss on another day, and sends me home.
Prince Baby Daddy - A Secret Baby Royal Romance Page 7