The streets are narrower, and the rules of the road seem less stringent. My driver weaves in and out among traffic that doesn’t even seem to be staying in any particular lane. I’m glad I’m not the one driving, because I think I’d be completely spooked.
The drive goes by quickly, and before I know it we’re pulling up in front of the hotel. It takes me a moment to recognize it for what it is, because it looks nothing like an American hotel. It’s more like my idea of an old boarding school, with stone walls and a red tiled roof, columns and a walkway with arching windows. It’s not until I get out of the car that I realize I’ve forgotten to exchange my money.
“I’m sorry,” I say to my driver, displaying a few American bills. “This is all I have…”
He reaches into my wallet. It’s awkward, but he does it gingerly, pinching with two fingers as if he doesn’t want to disturb any but the bills he’s taking. He removes a twenty and a ten and shows them to me with raised eyebrows.
I nod.
He gives me another thumbs-up and drives off.
Checking in goes easily. I give my name at the desk and receive a key with a room number on it. Finding the room itself is a little more difficult—none of the signs in this building are in English, and the receptionist doesn’t speak it either—but I follow the numbers and eventually find my door.
It’s very different from an American hotel room. French doors open onto a balcony that overlooks the city. The floor of the room is tile instead of carpet, and the bed is a four-poster draped in mosquito netting. Do I need to worry about mosquitos here? I suppose I probably do if I sleep with those French doors open.
I make a mental note not to do that.
After a quick shower, washing off the stale feeling of the long hours of travel, I change into a fresh set of clothes. And just like that, I’m out of things to do. I’m here in Avaran, and I’ve got a whole day ahead of me.
I could claim jet lag and take a nap, put off what I know needs to be done next, but I know I’d never get to sleep. My nerves have been jumping since we taxied to the runway at LAX. And now I’m here. I’m so close.
It’s time to go to the palace and see how close I can get to Alex.
The taxi driver seems highly amused when I hand him the scrap of paper on which I’ve written the address of the palace. He chatters at me in Avaranian—or, more likely, about me. I’m sure he knows I can’t understand what he’s saying. He’s probably making jokes about the tourist who came to Avaran to see the palace. He must deal with dozens of people like me every day.
If only he knew the truth.
I’ve noticed that I’m not being recognized here in Avaran the way I am back home. It doesn’t bother me—it’s a good thing, in fact, because it lets me move around a bit more freely than I’m used to. But I am curious about it. Royal Blue is an internationally famous TV show. Does no one in Avaran watch it?
The taxi pulls up outside a large pair of wooden doors. The sign over them reads Tours in several languages, followed by a list of times. I glance at my phone. The next tour begins in an hour. I don’t want to wait that long.
Fortunately, there’s a young woman sitting at a desk just inside the doors. The place has the look of a lobby. It doesn’t feel like part of a residence at all. Which makes sense, I suppose—the business of leading the country happens here too, it’s not just someone’s house.
This woman has the look of a receptionist—she’s working on a slimline computer that completely fails to blend in with the rest of the space’s aesthetic. She’s flanked on either side by enormous, burly looking guards, and I imagine they’re here to protect the entrance to the palace as much as they are to protect her.
She looks up when I come in. “May I help you?” she asks in accented English.
Nothing to do but go for it. “I’m here to request an audience with Prince Alessandro.”
The girl laughs. “His Highness doesn’t receive unscheduled visitors. I’m sorry. Would you perhaps like to sign up for the next tour of the palace?”
“No, I need to see the prince,” I insist. “He knows me. Can someone take a message and let him know I’m here? I can wait.”
“I’m afraid you don’t understand,” she says, rather patronizingly. “Tourists are not permitted to meet with the royal family. The prince is not going to take a meeting with you.”
“Listen,” I say, hating what I’m about to do. “My name is Erica Steadman. I don’t know if you know who I am or not, but I play the character Aeryn Redfall on the TV show Royal Blue. I met the prince a few weeks ago when he was visiting Los Angeles—”
I stop mid-sentence. She’s waving her hand for me to be quiet, an irritated look on her face.
“Do you think I am a fool?” she asks. “I’ve seen that show. I know the woman you are talking about. Her coloring is different. And she is very fit. You do look somewhat similar, and maybe this has worked for you before, but this is the royal palace of Avaran, and we are not fooled by celebrity lookalikes.”
My face grows hot. Of course my coloring is different under makeup and lighting! And I’m wearing loose-fitting clothes right now, but that doesn’t mean I’m not in shape. Does this woman really think I’m an impostor? This has honestly never happened to me before.
As I stand there, gaping like a fish, she turns to one of the guards behind her.
“Please escort this woman off the premises,” she says. “Before she can make any trouble.”
I can’t believe it. I stand like a statue, unable even to fight back or defend myself, as one of the bodyguards comes to life and moves toward me.
“Erica?”
The voice is familiar but drenched in shock and pain. I turn toward it with a confused rush of relief and apprehension.
Alex.
He holds up a hand to the guard.
“Stand down,” he says, but he doesn’t approach me. “What on earth are you doing here?”
“I—I came to see you…” I say, not knowing where to begin. The conversation we need to have obviously can’t take place in front of these guards and this rude receptionist. “I wanted to speak to you. I hope that’s all right.”
“Of course it is,” he says, and for the first time, there’s real warmth and welcome in his voice. “God. Of course. Francesca, can you cancel my afternoon meetings?”
“You don’t have to do that,” I say quickly. “I can wait until you have some free time.”
“Nonsense,” Alex shakes his head. “You came all this way. It’s the least I can do. And Francesca doesn’t mind rescheduling a few things, do you?”
He glances her way, and automatically, I do the same. The woman’s face is as red as a sunset and she’s openly gaping, but she manages to nod.
“Wonderful,” Alex says. “That’s all taken care of, then.”
“And you’re sure it’s not a problem?” I say. “Really, I don’t mind if you need to go. I have a hotel here in town, and we can arrange a time to meet later and talk.”
“Erica,” Alex says quietly. “You don’t need to be so accommodating. I want to see you.”
My heart begins to race. Can that be true? Even though he left? Even though he decided it didn’t make sense for us to see each other again?
“Shall we go somewhere we can speak privately?” Alex asks, cutting his eyes at Francesca the receptionist, who’s still hanging on our every word.
“Where did you have in mind?” I ask.
“I know a place,” he says. “Come with me.”
And he takes me by the hand.
Immediately, my hand becomes the most pivotal part of my body. I’m aware of every inch of it. I’m hyper-focused on how tight my grip is—tight enough to show him I want this, but not so tight as to seem clingy. It’s like walking a tightrope. And a little bit like coming home.
He still feels something for me. Even if it’s only physical. There’s still something here.
He leads me to an underground garage, to a dark blue car whos
e make and model I don’t recognize.
“Where are we going?” I ask as I climb in.
“To the coast,” he says.
He starts the car and pulls slowly out of the garage. I can feel the thing rumbling with power, much more power than I’m used to, and I’m sure that once we get out of the city, it’s going to be incredibly fast. I don’t know what the speed limits here are, I realize, but if the traffic in town is anything to go by, speeding down the freeway is status quo. I’m a little nervous and a little excited.
Maybe that’s just his presence, though.
“There’s a private cottage on the coast,” Alex says. “A private stretch of beach. It belongs to the royal family, but no one will be there right now. We can spend the day out there and…no one will need to know about it.”
“It’s a problem, isn’t it?” I ask. “People knowing about us.”
“It’s something we need to be judicious about, that’s all,” he says. “I’m a public figure. So are you. I know you understand.”
“I do,” I say.
I understand better than he knows. I understand what happened to his uncle when he stepped out of line. Alex is almost certainly afraid of suffering a similar fate.
Even though he doesn’t know I’m pregnant, it must make him nervous to see me and to know what I could reveal about our history together. Maybe he’s taking me out to the beach to talk me into keeping my silence.
Well, that’s fine. I’m not here to sell him out to his family or the press. The only one I want to tell the truth to is Alex himself.
Chapter 11
The drive to the ocean is surprisingly calm once we get out of the city. Without the hectic motion of other cars rushing around us, the speed at which Alex drives isn’t so nerve-wracking.
I sit back in my incredibly comfortable leather seat and take in the beauty of Avaran. It’s a region of low-lying mountains with rolling green fields leading up to them. Now and then we pass an orchard and the smell of lemons permeates the air. A part of me wishes I was just here for vacation, with no stressful responsibilities to take care of. It really is a beautiful place.
Of course, my ability to just relax and soak up the scenery is somewhat compromised by the fact that Alex is sitting next to me. My body is so aware of his. It feels like every cell in me is reaching for him, trying to close the distance between us. My hand is still warm from being wrapped in his.
Every few minutes, he glances my way. Each time we make eye contact, a stupid grin comes over my face. I can’t help but smile. He smiles too, every time, but is he smiling for the same heart-pounding reasons I am? Or is he just returning the expression on my face?
Eventually Alex parks outside a large white house with a screened-in, wraparound porch. I stare at it out the window.
“I thought you said we were going to a cottage.”
“This is it,” he says.
“This isn’t a cottage; this is a mansion!”
He shrugs. “We just call it the cottage.”
I shake my head and climb out of the car. “I was picturing something small and quaint. Are you sure there’s nobody here?”
“Definitely,” he says. “No one’s allowed to come to the cottage without a contingent of royal guards. It’s a whole production.”
“We’re here without any guards,” I point out.
“It’s different,” he says. “We’re just here for the day. For a few hours. If we were planning to stay, we’d have had to go through security procedures.”
“I see.”
“Do you want to take a walk?” he asks. “We can go down the beach a bit and talk. Or we can go inside, if you’d rather, and get something to drink.”
I take one more look at the big, imposing house. I don’t want to go inside yet. I’m having enough trouble getting my bearings here in Avaran, where all the architecture feels foreign. To go into a building that belongs to the royal family and make my confession in their space would be downright intimidating.
“The beach,” I say.
The beach is familiar. It reminds me of home.
He nods and starts off, slowly, letting me set the pace.
I wait a moment, hoping he’s going to take my hand again, but he doesn’t. Instead, he takes off his shoes and picks them up so he can walk down to the surf and drag his toes through the water.
After a moment, I follow his lead.
The beach here isn’t like the ones in LA. The sand is rougher, a little rockier, and the waves are smaller and gentler. Even though being on the beach is a familiar feeling for me, I’m surprised by how different it is.
The extent to which this is not my beach, not even my ocean, is very apparent. And suddenly it seems representative of everything that’s happened to me lately. How quickly my life has changed, and how completely out of my element I am. If someone had said to me two months ago that I’d be walking down a beach next to a European prince and trying to work up the courage to tell him I was having his baby…well, I wouldn’t have been able to fathom how such a thing might happen.
And yet, here we are.
Alex speaks first, after we’ve come several yards.
“So what are you doing in Avaran?” he asks. “Not that I’m not happy to see you, of course, but I have to admit I thought I’d seen a ghost when I first spotted you in the reception hall.”
“What do you mean?” I ask, taken aback. “I told you what I was doing.”
“No, you didn’t,” he counters with his eyebrows furrowed.
“I definitely did.”
I’d told him I’d come to talk to him. I remember it clearly, because it was a difficult thing to say, not knowing how he would respond to my presence. I remember my relief at realizing that he wasn’t judging me for coming or wishing that I would go away.
Maybe he was too surprised to see me. “I told you I came to see you.”
“I know that’s why you came to the palace,” he says. “But I meant why are you in the country in the first place? Are you working? You’re not filming here, are you?”
He misunderstood me, I realize. I told him I came to speak to him. I thought he understood. Didn’t he even say “you came all this way?” What was that supposed to mean, if it wasn’t an acknowledgment of the fact that I flew here from California to talk to him? Could he really have just been referring to the taxi ride over from my hotel?
I suppose he very well could have. Maybe I should have been more clear. But now I’m going to have to tell him all over again, and it’s going to be that much harder because I’ve allowed myself to relax. Because I thought part of the hard work was already over.
I turn away from him and face out to the sea for a moment. I’ve already done most of what I need to do. I’ve made the trip, which was a huge leap of faith since I didn’t even know whether I’d be able to see him once I got here. I’ve been to the palace, faced down the snotty receptionist, and by sheer luck, managed to actually gain access to Alex. If he hadn’t just happened to walk into that reception area at that very moment, I’d still be there arguing that I needed to see him. So far, everything that could have gone wrong has gone right instead.
But now I’ve reached the most crucial point. It’s time to start the truth-telling, and I have no idea how he’s going to respond. I can feel myself shaking, anxious and terrified. But I’m not going to turn back now. I just have to rip the Band-Aid off.
I take a deep breath and release it slowly, hoping my voice will be steady when I speak.
“Actually, I came to Avaran to see you.”
He seems not to register what I’m saying for a moment. “What do you mean?”
“I mean I don’t have any other reason to be here,” I say. God, my hands are shaking. “I’m not here for work or on vacation or anything like that. I came to see you.”
He’s quiet for a long moment. Too long. I can’t look up from the sand. I dig my toes into the beach as if I’m getting a grip on the earth, desperate not to be washed awa
y. I can’t deny that that is sort of how I feel.
Then he speaks, and his voice is husky with emotion.
“I’m glad you did,” he says.
I look up quickly. “You are?”
“I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you.” And he reaches over, hesitantly, and takes my hand again.
My heart beats double time. It’s the first time he’s touched me since we’ve arrived at the beach. I feel my skin heat up, spreading from my hand to the rest of me more quickly than I would have thought possible.
Behind me, a wave crashes. The sheer noise and power of it seem to press up against me, driving me closer to Alex.
His eyes. Those deep brown eyes. I’ve thought about this feeling dozens, maybe hundreds of times—what it was like to look into his eyes and feel the force of gravity shift, so I was falling forward instead of being held down, drawn irresistibly in by him. I’ve thought about it, but I’d forgotten what it actually felt like, how heady and wonderful it felt to surrender.
“I’ve missed you,” Alex says. “Leaving you…it hurt, Erica. It was painful. The night we spent together was the best of my life.”
I can’t believe what I’m hearing. After all this time. He’s been suffering just as much as I have.
“Mine, too,” I say, unable to do more than whisper.
“It may be unwise,” he says. “I’m sure it’s unwise. But I can’t deny I’m happy to see you. And my God!” he laughs suddenly. “You were so bold! To walk right up to the palace and demand an audience! Not many people would have had the confidence to do that.”
“I had to do it,” I say. “I didn’t have a choice.”
“No,” he agrees. “Once you’d flown all the way over here, I suppose you didn’t. I can’t believe you did that! What on earth made you decide to do it?”
“I needed to talk to you…” I trail off, hesitating again.
I need to force the words out, but they won’t come. He’s being so kind, so welcoming. It’s more than I ever expected and more than I had any right to expect.
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