His to Princess

by Theodora Taylor

  Talia squints. “Ok, there’s this we again. How do you know so much about Victoire? And why do you talk like its history is so important to you."

  His face tightens in a look that has now become very familiar.

  Thunder rumbles in the distance, as if to provide a soundtrack for the shadow that falls over Al’s face. “Why is it so important for you to know more about me?” he asks as he reaches for another pitcher to polish.

  Talia shrugs, focusing on a spot of tarnish. “I guess because I’m two semesters away from graduating from law school, and grilling people is something I learned to do while I was there. Also, it’s not right to keep yourself holed up like this for so long. Somebody must be worried about you.”

  Her eyes raise to meet his. His brow furrows, and he looks away.

  “D’accord,” he says with a heavy sigh.

  But then after a long, quiet moment of nothing but fierce rubbing he says, “I will tell you this. I do have a family, and maybe they worry about me. But I do not want to go back yet. Things are…difficult…right now. I need to stay away for some time. This castle is the perfect place for me to do that.”

  “No kidding,” Talia says, rubbing the last of the spot off her mirror image in the mustard pot. “No TV, no internet, just me and the chickens. And the chickens probably know more about you than I do.”

  “Oui. However, the chickens do not make me laugh so much.”

  “Really?” Talia says with an incredulous look. “Because have you seen the one-eyed rooster who keeps trying to pick fights with the giant tortoise that hangs out by the pond? It cracks me up every time! Totally posting that to YouTube as soon as I get back to the States.”

  He laughs. “Yes, it is true. Even you aren’t as funny as the one-eyed rooster. I am sorry to say it.”

  “It’s okay. I know there’s no way I can compete with that.”

  They laugh some more, but when their chuckles die down, he gives her a serious look. “But here is the real question. Why is a nice American girl like you living on a small island in the middle of nowhere? You say you have an education to complete…and perhaps a boyfriend to get back to?”

  “Uh, well…yes, I’m technically in the law program at Columbia University— “

  “This is impressive— “

  “Thanks,” she tries to smile. “But to be honest, I was pretty miserable there. And I’m not miserable here. I’m happier now than I’ve ever been, despite coming here for a sad reason. So…I decided to take academic leave for a semester…to get my head on straight.”

  “Hmmm…if you are miserable in school, why don’t you make a change?”

  “You mean, like quit?” she asks. The thought of her mom’s face if she ever told her she was dropping out of law school makes Talia laugh out loud. At Al’s look of confusion, she shakes her head and explains, “Law is everything to my parents. And it’s what they’ve always wanted for me. My mom’s been grooming me for Columbia since I learned to read. All my extracurricular activities were carefully selected by my parents to get me noticed by top colleges. I was captain of the debate team. I volunteered for campus political campaigns. I did everything my mom and dad wanted. But now that I’ve had some time to myself, away from school, I’ve been wondering if lawyering is really my jam.” Talia is surprised at how easily her feelings flow out of her mouth and onto the table when she’s with Al.

  “You don’t want to be a lawyer?”

  “I thought I did. I mean, I always thought it was about rules, and making sure people follow them. But honestly, it’s more about deconstructing and twisting the rules until they don’t mean anything anymore. I don’t want to help people get away with bad things. I want to help people. Like Papy does.”

  “Help people as you’ve helped me,” Al says, his beard widening with something like a smile. “But you say your parents would not understand this?”

  Talia gives him a grim smile. “Let me put it to you this way: my parents don’t even know I took the fall semester off. When they find out…” Her stomach turns to lead at the thought of it. “Well, my mom will eviscerate me. I mean, you should hear her in a court room. Back home, they call her the Shark of Wall Street. But she’ll be way harder on me, because she and Dad will most definitely consider me a huge disappointment…” Her wrists go limp and she stares at the mustard pot with sad eyes, thinking about what would happen if she decided to do what she wants as opposed to what her parents want for her.

  “Mais non,” Al says. He shifts to touch her cheek, his eyes locking with hers. “If anyone’s family is disappointed, it is mine. Look at me,” he glances down at his beard, and lack of a t-shirt. “Like you say, I have become a caveman.”

  Talia laughs, and his finger curls across her cheek, drawing her close.

  “But you…you do everything right. Your parents…they should be proud of you, not disappointed. I think that’s so…”

  Al doesn’t finish. His face comes closer. His breath is on her lips. Talia leans in, sliding her elbows across the table…

  But then thunder crackles, and the windows flash white. As if in warning.

  Al stops, dropping his chin. The air cools around them, and to her surprise, the flirtatious caveman pulls away first.

  “I figured the rain would have let up by now,” Talia breathes out, not knowing what else to say in the awkward moment. “Most afternoons it doesn’t even last half an hour.”

  “There’s too much wind.” He abruptly stands and goes to the window. Then frowns at the ocean where the whitecaps have given way to a rough chop, and heavy dark clouds glide low across the sky. “This is not a normal rain. If the wind becomes stronger, it will turn into a cyclone,” he says.

  “Wait, you mean like a hurricane?” she asks, eyeing the dark sky warily.

  He nods, and another roll of thunder booms again. Fat raindrops splatter across the windows, loud as dropped marbles.

  “Talia, you must return to Terre d’Or,” he says, standing up. “Right away.”

  She shivers. The wooden shutters on the terrace blow free in a gust. They bang open and closed, open and closed, threatening to shatter the glass panes they are meant to protect.

  Al squeezes her shoulder. “I’ll lock down the shutters before they damage the windows. Please go back to your grand-père before you are trapped here.”

  Talia doesn’t want to go out into the storm, but Al’s right. She needs to get home before things gets worse. Papy will be worried, and might even need her help. He’d explained the island's word-of-mouth alert system to her when she first arrived. The islanders use it primarily to ensure everyone finds shelter during big storms. Meaning there could very well be a lot of farm laborers harbored in Papy’s small cellar.

  In any case, Al is practically shoving her towards the door, like he can’t wait to get her out of there. “Allez!”

  But despite his insistence, Talia quickly turns back to say, “Be safe, Al.”

  His face softens. “Thank you for befriending me, Talia. For trying your best to help me with my…problems. Now go! Au revoir.”

  Their eyes meet. And she has the distinct feeling this is a real goodbye.

  But that’s silly. Because she knows Al will be okay in his fortified castle. And she’ll be more than okay in Papy’s cyclone-proof cellar. They’ll both be fine. And she’ll see him again, maybe even tomorrow, after the storm clears.

  Talia lets out a shuddering breath.

  “Au revoir,” she calls out, before turning and sprinting through the rain toward the bridge.

  Chapter 5

  As Talia hurries away, Al steps onto the terrace to catch the wildly banging shutters and pull them closed. After securely latching them, he moves to the next window, and the next.

  He can see Talia running down the front steps, her dark, curly hair whipping around her head as she makes her way toward the stone walls that have harbored him for so many weeks. How is it that such a bright spark could arrive so suddenly in his dark life?
>
  She’d been raised to care about one thing: the law. But there isn’t enough goodness in it for her. And Terre d’Or, of all places, brings that goodness out in her.

  Talia disappears behind the wall, running toward the bridge, and he immediately makes for the stairs as soon as she’s no longer in sight.

  Taking the steps two by two, he alights on the second floor and strides down a hallway. The howl of the wind rushes through the corridors of the old building, and he can feel a pull under the door to his bedroom.

  But he can also hear the unnatural melody of digital bells.

  He crosses the room to a small balcony, and digs into the customized Patagonia Stormfront pack he’d hidden the offending device in.

  “What are you doing here?” he demands, speaking a full sentence in his native French for the first time in weeks.

  “Your Highness! You’re okay. It’s so good to hear—” a familiar voice says in French before Al interrupts.

  “Bernard, I told you not to come here unless it’s an emergency. Is it an emergency?”

  “Euh, non,” the voice stammers. “No emergency, but with the storm we wanted to be sure you were safe. To put everyone’s minds at ease.”

  “Get away from the storm, go back to the mainland immediately, and do not call this phone again.”

  “But your Highness—” the voice says, before Al ends the call.

  Putain… He’d nearly had a heart attack when he glanced out the kitchen window and saw the official naval yacht floating in the distance. If Talia had seen it, too. If she’d heard the ring of his satellite phone…it would have been a disaster. She’d have found out. And if that happened—

  “Al?”

  He freezes. Recognizes the voice immediately. It’s Talia.

  Talia, here in his temporary bedroom.

  How much had she heard?

  Carefully dropping the satellite phone over the balcony, he turns to face her.

  A flash of lightning illuminates her in his dark room. Wet clothes are plastered to her body, and her curly hair is dripping water.

  She is a vision, and his breath catches for reasons that go way past having been caught in his carefully crafted web of omission.

  But then Talia winces apologetically, jerking a thumb over her shoulder. “The bridge is washed out, so I had to come back.”

  Relief washes over him. She didn’t hear. Didn’t see…

  “Papy will come get me in his rowboat for sure,” she’s saying. “But I’ll have to wait out the storm, and then wait for him to get word about the bridge…”

  Her voice trails off as she finally takes in her surroundings. Unlike the kitchen, the bedrooms have more or less been gutted by various Victoire historical museums. So there’s little more than a pile of old blankets spread out across the stone floor.

  “This is where you’ve been sleeping?” she asks, the familiar tone of concern back in her voice.

  Al nods.

  She shakes her head. “Well, I guess I’m here for the night. Maybe there’s another room I can use? And more blankets…?”

  The wind changes direction and blasts the balcony. Talia’s teeth start to chatter. She’s soaking wet and likely cold to the bone. A wave of sympathy travels through Al. She’s not exactly dressed for a surprise storm, and like most stone castles located on tropical islands, this one has been designed for warm weather without any thought to insulation from the cold.

  “Do you have, like, a t-shirt or something?” she asks, folding her arms across her chest. “I mean, do you even own a t-shirt? I’ve only ever seen you in those disco cutoffs.”

  Al reaches down to his makeshift bed and grabs a blanket.

  “I’m sure we can find something,” he says, thinking of the day he arrived, tired and soaked after a two-hour swim from La Reine des Mers, the royal yacht.

  He had been with his guards, headed for the nightclubs on Mahé Island in the Seychelles, looking for a way to ride out the customary two-month grieving period after his father’s death. But the A-lister level debauchery he usually buried himself in didn’t feel right. And it also, he knew, wouldn’t help him feel any closer to his father. Quite the opposite, in fact.

  Truth is, he’d been avoiding the old man long before he fell ill, and even when his father’s illness became terminal, Al never found the courage to face him. To sit at his bedside and talk. Just talk with the man who had become so old, so fast. To tell him who he really was, why he acted like such a fool. Or to apologize for disappointing him.

  There were so many things Al could have said. Instead, he stayed silent. Let his father pass with words unsaid.

  That’s why he’d come to Vieux Victoire. To be alone.

  If he couldn’t correct their broken relationship, perhaps he could at least make peace with it here, in this fortress of a castle. Maybe the solution to all his pain would be found lurking down a long hallway, or tucked away in a drawer full of tarnished silver.

  But despite Al’s notorious past, he knew he wouldn’t find it between the legs of some done-up Euro-girl at a VIP table, or at the bottom of a magnum of Ruinart.

  The weight in his chest increases as he thinks of his father’s death. With the weight of his loss. And with the weight of what is now expected of him….

  “Hey, Al.” Talia’s hand cups his shoulder, warm against his bare skin. “Are you okay?”

  His eyes lift from the floor to find her brown eyes. So soft and worried, he can barely stand to meet them. He squeezes her delicate fingers, and his chest loosens. Suddenly he can breathe again.

  This feels good. As always, being with Talia makes him forget his real life, or what will be expected of him once he returns to it. Do not forget, a censorious voice that sounds a lot like his father’s reminds him, Never forget your duty or who you were born to become…

  “Al,” Talia says again.

  Once again her soft voice keeps him from spiraling. “Want to tell me where you keep disappearing to?” she asks with a gentle smile.

  Yes. Yes, he does.

  But obviously, he can’t.

  During the weeks they’ve spent cleaning the old château together, it’s been a constant struggle not to give in to her questions and lay his troubles at her feet. Only the knowledge that it would ruin their friendship has kept him from telling her everything.

  But she’s looking at him again. So adorable, wrapped in the blanket he’d draped around her shoulders. So much more tempting than a bottle of champagne or some Euro girl…

  The storm rages outside. But in this room, there is a stillness that belies the wind and rain on the other side of the wall. They are alone.

  He shouldn’t.

  He knows who he is.

  He knows what he came here to avoid—at least for a little while.

  And he knows he really, really shouldn’t sleep with this sweet young woman. Eh, merde…allez, he thinks at her. Silently warning her about cads like him. Asking her to go before it’s too late.

  But…

  The storm is raging outside.

  One kiss, he tells himself, reaching out for her. A tout petit taste—

  But then…merde…

  Al realizes his mistake as soon as their lips touch. Because one taste is all it takes. The storm raging outside is now indoors, exploding his chest with a passion like none he’s ever known.

  Chapter 6

  This is unexpected. Okay, strike that. It should be unexpected.

  But somehow when the kiss comes, it feels like something Talia’s been waiting for her entire life. His mouth is hot and shockingly masterful. With deft strokes his tongue draws her closer, inviting her to give him not just her mouth, but her soul. At least that’s what it feels like. An invitation for her, Talia Jeffries, to give him, Al the Homeless Vet, everything she has. An invitation she can’t stop herself from taking.

  Letting the blanket fall away, she leans in on her toes, and wraps her arms around his neck. She’s still shivering as the wind caresses their
skin, spattering them both with rain from the open balcony doors. But suddenly, she’s not cold anymore. Not even a little bit.

  Al scoops her legs around his waist and carries her over to his pile of blankets.

  “I tried. Mais, c’est pas possible…I cannot resist you,” he says as he lays her down.

  Talia could say the same, though she hadn’t realized just how much she’d been resisting him until the moment she gave in.

  His eyes travel down her body, where her warm weather clothes are plastered to her skin with rain water. She wonders if anything’s become transparent, and then realizes she doesn’t really care.

  He picks up her foot, then cradles it to his chest, removing her flip-flop and kissing her ankle up to her knee. It’s so relaxed, so…natural, she almost wants to laugh. That is until his free hand rests on her thigh, splaying his fingers wide so they border on delicate territory.

  His eyes are hooded with desire, and he whispers: “Magnifique.”

  Talia raises up on her elbows and their eyes lock. Without breaking her gaze, Al’s hand continues to move over her wet shorts, up towards her waist. His fingertips explore the damp fabric around her hips, eventually finding a path between the wet drape of her tank top, and her waistband. Next come his fingers, dragging across the sensitive skin of her belly, right before he tugs her shorts up by the belt loops, putting pressure on her already aching pussy.

  Her breath catches, and then he’s on the blankets, knocking her knees wide with his own, pushing her back into the soft bedding that smells of must and some ancient perfumed detergent. Their lips touch again, harder this time, desperate to taste each other. Her hands trace the muscles of his back. He’s at her jaw, down her neck, kissing and biting, biting and kissing.

  He’s so hard against her, but they are separated by layers of wet clothing. Mind meld, she guesses, because suddenly he’s lifting her tank top over her head, tangling her arms with her wet curls. He has to rise up to peel off her shorts, but when she’s lying there in only her white cotton panties, he dips over her again. He pauses a moment to kiss her, just there, just at the edge of her sex. A promise—or a threat—of things to come, and a shiver rushes through her as he pulls her panties off, too.