Fairy Godmothers, Inc.

by Jenniffer Wardell

  Instead, he crumpled the letter into a ball and turned back to his father, who actually flinched away at whatever he saw in Jon’s eyes. “I need the page who brought this,” Jon snapped, then pointed at the tallest of the two pages still being thwarted by the bird. “Get me one of the stable boys helping to park carriages downstairs.” As the first page raced off, Jon switched his attention to the shorter, still frozen one. “Get me Monsignor Lawton. NOW.”

  Lawton—he’d decided early on that “Monsignor” conveyed suitable flair while meaning absolutely nothing—could tap his spy network and hopefully start tracking Rupert from the details provided by the page and the stable boy. Also, he was one of a very small number of people who could find Kate and explain the definitely temporary situation that had cropped up. He could fix it, of course—he just needed a little time.

  The restlessness outside had gotten infinitely worse in the time it had taken him to read the letter. Only moments after the pages left, it got bad enough the royal announcer abandoned his post and pushed into the room. “Your Majesties, the people are waiting for you!” At the sight of the sobbing queen, he froze and stared at her husband and son in horror. “Her Majesty can’t be presented like this? What have you done to upset her so?”

  “She’s fine,” Jon growled, shoving Rupert’s letter deep in his pocket. He wanted to leave so he could start seriously working on the situation, but he needed to get everyone here secured first. “And there’s not going to be any announcements for this ball—just get the music started. Now.”

  The steward’s eyes widened in horror. “Surely there’s someone I can announce! At least Prince Rupert—he cuts such a stunning figure in those spotlights.”

  At this, the queen erupted into a heartbroken wail. “My baby’s not even a prince anymmph—” Her husband’s hand clamped down over her mouth, but the horror in the steward’s eyes made it clear he’d gotten the message anyway.

  If the resulting silence had lasted just a few more seconds, it might have given Jon enough time to come up with a suitable cover. Instead, the trumpeter burst in, a desperate look on her face, backed by the sound of a crowd that had started to grow almost angry. “Worthington!” she hissed at the announcer, glancing nervously over at Jon and his parents. “I don’t know what’s going on in here, but someone needs to get out there immediately.”

  The steward grabbed Jon’s arm and practically threw him through the open doorway and onto the top of the ballroom stairs. The muttering of the gathered nobility turned into a sigh of relief that someone had come out to acknowledge their presence, but it faded away as Jon straightened. This was definitely not the member of the royal family they had been expecting.

  Jon took a deep breath, already putting together a story about Rupert being called away on a quest at the last minute. Hopefully, everyone could hear him from here.

  The trumpet started. “His Highness Prince Jonathan Alistair Crispin Lorimer Charming, heir to the throne of Somewhere!”

  There were a few heartbeats of echoing silence, then a lone clapper started somewhere near the front of the ballroom. Soon, others followed, creating a hesitant, scattered round of applause fueled by a mixture of confusion and fear that they might be the only people who hadn’t already heard about this. Comforting himself with the thought that he was going to immediately fire the announcer as soon as he got clear of the crowd, he smiled in an attempt to assure people this was exactly what was supposed to be happening. He’d mention the quest as soon as the people had finally given up on the clapping, and everyone could start the ball far more relieved than they were at the moment.

  Then, he saw Kate, standing by the furthest set of doors. Jon could tell even from this distance she was far too still, but he told himself that could just be some well-deserved shock on her part. He could get past it if she would just give him a few minutes to explain.

  His stomach clenched as she backed away from him, almost stumbling in her rush to leave. When she hit the door she turned and ran with enough speed to make it painfully clear that she wasn’t planning on coming back.

  Without even needing a command from his brain, Jon ran down the stairs after her.

  THIRTEEN

  Falling Apart

  It wasn’t until Kate looked down and saw grass beneath her feet that she realized she’d run out the wrong door.

  Breathing hard, she stared blankly at the manicured gardens that served as the palace’s backyard, desperately trying to make her brain work enough to figure out what she was going to do next. Or if there was anything that could be done at all.

  Behind her, she heard the sound of running footsteps; Rellie was panting. “Did you mean to come out here?” The question was genuinely curious, and Kate remembered she’d left the girl standing behind one of the doors when she’d stepped into the ballroom. Rellie had no idea what was going on when she saw Kate bolt past again, and it could only be blind luck that the girl had even thought to follow her. “Because I know I’m not an expert on the whole fancy dress ball thing, but I really don’t see where this fits in.”

  Kate squeezed her eyes shut, fighting the sudden and absolutely unhelpful urge to burst into tears. How could she have been so stupid as to believe this could work? Sure, the paperwork had said there was a Prince Rupert, but the paperwork had been wrong before and she’d known that. And Jon—her chest hurt at the thought of him—maybe he’d lied to her because he thought it was the kindest way to get out of having some random girl thrown at him. She didn’t know what he’d planned to do when they got to the ball and there was no Rupert for Rellie to dance with, but knowing Jon, he would already have some plan worked out if she hadn’t just ruined it by walking in before he was ready.

  But the part about pretending to be interested in her . . . There was no need for that, no need at all.

  “Kate?” Sounding definitely worried now, Rellie reached out to tentatively touch Kate’s shoulder. “What happened? Are you okay?”

  Opening her eyes, Kate forcefully shoved everything else aside until she was fairly certain she could trust her voice. “It turns out that Jon is the prince you’re supposed to be marrying.” Sure, she sounded like someone had been jumping up and down on her throat, but as long as the tears didn’t show up she’d take what she could get. “He was announced as the heir to the throne just as I stepped into the ballroom.”

  There was a long moment of silence before Rellie’s hesitant voice said, “But . . . both of you said that the name of the prince I was supposed to be marrying was Rupert. I even danced with his jacket.”

  “I don’t know what happened with Rupert. I don’t even know if there was a Rupert.” Kate turned around, guilt slicing through her at the rapidly deepening confusion on the girl’s face. Just because Kate had been an idiot to trust in the magic she sold, she had no right to drag Rellie into the middle of all this. “I’m sorry, at least part of this is my fault. I lied about Jon being my assistant, and there’s a chance that Jon lied about a couple of different things.”

  Rellie’s brow furrowed, as if she knew she must be missing something before it would all start to make sense. “But why? I mean, I get the bit about the assistant—I knew right away that was pretty fishy. But why make up all that stuff about Rupert? And if he was lying, why did he keep coming back? I mean, I’m not very good at lying, but even I know that you’re not supposed to hang around afterward.”

  Kate folded her arms across her chest, a protective gesture that did absolutely nothing to ease the raw ache inside her. The slow burn of anger rising within her only made it worse, lashing her with the memory of each time she hadn’t listened to her brain telling her this was never going to work. “He probably had a reason,” she said, not wanting to imagine what it might have been. It wouldn’t make it any easier to know. “You’ll have to ask him the next time you see him.”

  Rellie stared at Kate, dismay slowly replacing the confusion. “You’re not going to be with me? You’re my Fairy Godmother! You have to stay
with me until we’ve figured out what to do about all of this!” She blinked as a thought hit her, and her expression cleared for just a moment. “Wait—since there’s no Rupert, can’t we just sort of cancel this whole thing? I’ll keep the dress, you go back and tell your boss that it all fell through, and later we can come back here together and yell at your sweetie for causing all this trouble.”

  Kate, however, was no longer listening. “My boss,” she whispered in horror, eyes tearing at the possibilities that had begun to tumble in her head at Rellie’s words. Bubbles wouldn’t care what had happened, why it had happened, or even what the name of the groom was. If Kate went to her with the news that the entire job had collapsed, she’d just send in another Fairy Godmother to dose everyone with so much True Love they wouldn’t come out of it for at least a year. If she never reported back in, Bubbles would’ve done the same thing.

  Jon would end up marrying Rellie anyway, no matter how either of them felt about it now.

  She was jolted back into the moment when Rellie shook her shoulders. “Stop looking so freaked out!” the girl insisted, starting to sound more than a little panicked. “You’re the one who’s supposed to know what’s going on!”

  A thousand different and equally dreadful emotions swamped her all at once. There was absolutely no way any of them was going to be able to get out of this. “You liked Jon, didn’t you?” she heard herself say, the words sounding distant in her head. It didn’t mean she didn’t hate herself for them. “And I know you’d enjoy being a princess.”

  Rellie’s panic gave way to an even deeper confusion than before. “Kate,” she said slowly, hands still on the Fairy Godmother’s shoulders. “You’re really starting to scare me. I think you should sit down for a while and take a couple of deep breaths or something, because you’re making me be the sensible one right now, and I really, really, really don’t like it.”

  Kate blinked, saved from having to respond by the sight of a figure emerging from the palace’s backdoor. The figure paused, then headed in their direction. Kate cursed herself for not taking five extra minutes to find a spot that wasn’t immediately visible to absolutely everyone wandering by. Like guards, for example, or people willing to call for them without listening to explanations. One of a thousand mistakes she’d made since first tripping over Jon. “We need to get out of here,” she said quickly, grabbing Rellie’s arm and heading toward the ornamental maze. A few minutes in a quiet corner was all she’d need to set up a doorway, and which would at least mean prison wouldn’t be added to the carriage wreck that had become their lives. “Fairy Godmothers might be okay in the ballroom, but out here without proper authorization, we can be considered trespassers just like everyone else—”

  “Kate!”

  It took a second for her to recognize Jon’s voice shouting her name, and she nearly tripped as her brain missed her body’s instant decision to stop moving. Kate whirled around, staring wide-eyed at the figure running toward them. Beside her, relief crossed Rellie’s face as she pulled her arm out of Kate’s slack grip. “This is perfect,” she whispered to Kate. “Now you can yell at him right away, and he can tell you he’s sorry that much faster.”

  Kate couldn’t respond, thoughts scattered by the realization that there was no way Jon could have been out there this fast unless he’d run after her the moment she’d fled. But she hadn’t thought he’d even seen her show up, let alone disappear. And he couldn’t just run off when there was an entire ballroom of people staring at him, especially if he were the crown prince.

  He was close enough now she could see his expression; the desperation on his face was enough to make her heart stumble. Her anger, however, was quick to lash out, grateful to have another and equally deserving target. “Your Highness,” she said icily, throwing her internal walls back up as fast as she could. “Taking a quick break from your party?”

  Jon stopped a few feet away from her, wincing as if she’d just jabbed him with something. “Come on, Kate, don’t look at me like that. Please.” His hand lifted briefly, as if he was going to reach out to her, but something in her face made his hand flinch back into place. “I know I was an idiot for not telling you right away, but I swear I was going to fix that tonight at dinner.”

  She folded her arms across her chest again, fighting off a fresh stab of pain at the reminder of the evening she’d been so looking forward to. “You don’t have to pretend we were still going to dinner anymore,” she shot back, once again cursing herself for her stupidity and Jon for working so hard to encourage it. “I’m pretty sure I would have figured it out after Rellie made her entrance at the ball and there was no Rupert waiting for her.”

  Jon’s eyes blazed with a rush of anger that was almost surprising. “I swear to you I’ll find him,” he said darkly. “I’ll have to kill him first, but Rellie can have him when I’m done. It may take me a couple of days to drag him back here, but luckily Rupert’s an even bigger idiot than I am . . .” He trailed off when he noticed Kate staring at him in confusion, then took a deep breath and started again. “I’ll have more of the details after I’ve talked to a few people, but I only found out that he’d disappeared about five minutes before you did. I haven’t really had time to question anybody.”

  Kate just stared at him, half of her wondering if he was just trying to talk his way out of everything. It was the other half, though, that she needed to be careful of. “So, you’re saying that Rupert just . . . ran off before the ball.” There was an accusatory edge to her voice, a self-defense that she clung to with both hands. “For no particular reason.”

  Picking up on everything Kate wasn’t saying, Jon’s eyes narrowed. “He decided to go find enlightenment. Stupid, yes, but that’s Rupert for you.” He watched her, a little wary. “Why do you look like you’re waiting for me to sell you something?”

  Kate opened her mouth, more than ready to start shouting at him, but Rellie had already started answering the question. “She said you were lying about Rupert because you didn’t want to be the guy who had to marry me,” the girl announced, claiming both Kate and Jon’s attention. Rellie glared at Jon, hands fisted on her hips and chin lifted in defiance. “It made her really freak out, which means I’m kind of mad at you right now even though I didn’t want to marry you either.”

  Jon’s eyes widened, then his brows snapped back down into a glare as he turned to Kate. “You think I was making the whole—”

  But Rellie wasn’t quite finished. She turned to Kate, looking just as frustrated with she had at Jon. “But now I’m kind of mad at her, too, because she was just supposed to yell at you and be okay again.” She switched her gaze back to Jon, but lifted a hand to jab a finger back in Kate’s direction. “But all she’s doing is standing here being all frosty, you haven’t even said you’re sorry once, and if you two keep this up we’re going to be out here all night!”

  Kate had seen the hurt that briefly flared in Jon’s eyes before sliding into anger, of all things. She was more than happy to do all the yelling Rellie wanted to hear, but the last thing they needed right now was an audience. “Yelling isn’t going to fix any of this, but feel free to go back inside the ballroom,” she snapped, meeting the girl glare for glare. “I won’t be able to give you the entrance we talked about, but Jon should be in to dance with you in just a minute.” She shifted her gaze over to Jon, packing as much ice into her voice as it would hold. “I have no idea what it was you were planning, but the least you can do is let her have tonight.”

  “What I was planning?” His voice sounded strained, like he was barely keeping himself from shouting, his hands curled into fists. “One thing I didn’t tell you—one—and you’re suddenly certain I’m a compulsive liar. A bad compulsive liar, which right now might almost be even more insulting.”

  She gritted her teeth. “Maybe things just got away from you.”

  “They did! That doesn’t mean I made any of it up!” When her only response was silence, his expression hardened. “Believe me,
if I’d just been trying to get rid of a pest of a potential bride and her Fairy Godmother, there are plenty of easier ways to go about it.”

  The words stabbed, as they were meant to, deflating her anger into a knot of grief and heartache that made her lose her stability all over again. “I know. Maybe you were just trying to be gentle.” Kate put all her energy into keeping her voice even, resisting the urge to look anywhere but at his slowly widening eyes. She could maybe figure out a way to keep them from getting hit with True Love, but not if she let herself keep pretending she was going to get anything out of it for herself. “If you have any complaints, there’s a Fairy Godmothers, Inc. customer service desk.”

  “Kate.” The word had more than a little desperation in it. “I’m begging you not to do this to me. I was sorry I said it as soon as I closed my mouth.” Whatever had kept Jon from touching her previously was no longer enough, because he reached out and grabbed her arm before she could think to take a step back. “I don’t know what’s going on in that head of yours, but I swear the only thing I lied to you about was my job title.” His eyes radiated the clearest sincerity she’d ever seen. “Everything else was just my idiot brother and really bad cosmic timing, both of which I will fix the second I figure out how.”

  Kate squeezed her eyes shut for a moment, not quite able to look into those eyes of his anymore. She wanted so much to be mad at him again, since it was worlds easier than having to deal with Jon being sweet. “I shouldn’t have accused you of making up your brother.” She took a deep, shaky breath, opening her eyes to focus on a point somewhere around Jon’s left ear. “I was thrown by the announcement in the ballroom, and I . . . I overreacted.”

  The tension in his muscles eased slightly, but he still didn’t let go of her arm. “Given the circumstances, that is completely understandable,” he said gently, taking a step closer. “Next time, though, I’d consider it a favor if you’d just shout at me like Rellie suggested. It would be much easier to take.”