The Royal Runaway

by Lindsay Emory

  Let’s just say, I was glad Tamar and Hugh’s bodies were bracketing the door.

  I said a nervous “good evening” to him in English. He repeated the sentiment in Driedish, and then it was time for me to do my one official duty of the evening.

  When the royal box was occupied, the announcer told the crowd that the national anthem would be sung in the direction of the Queen’s representative.

  Who was me.

  I stepped onto the balcony so I could be seen under the spotlights. While my smart bottle-green leather jacket and dark blue pants were appropriate for a friendly international football match, they were all wrong—too warm, too tight—for my first public appearance since my wedding fiasco.

  As nearly a hundred thousand people turned my way, I saw my face on the giant television screens, the same lacquered and plastered tight smile that had been lacquered and plastered on thousands of key chains and tea towels and coffee mugs.

  They see what they want to see.

  The crowd cheered.

  They don’t see my flaws.

  I thanked God for that.

  The familiar canned music started and the crowd sang along to every word.

  Our fair native land, one people here we stand, in service to God and Queen.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Nick still lounging in the chair. He was out of view from anyone in the crowd, but his refusal to stand during the national anthem was obscenely disrespectful. The song ended, I waved to the cheers of my people, and then I retired out of view, ostensibly to enjoy the match.

  But really I wanted to tear Nick Cameron a new one.

  “Leave us,” I ordered Tamar and Hugh. “We have a lot of catching up to do.”

  Nick had the audacity to look amused at the turn of phrase. When the door closed, I spun on him. “How dare you!? You are a guest of the Crown and the least you can do is stand during our anthem.”

  “Or what? You’ll throw me in the dungeon?”

  My fists balled. “I would if I could.”

  He made a face. “Duly noted. I won’t get on your bad side.” He waved his hand at me. “Speaking of sides, will you move over a bit? I can’t see the game.”

  The game? Was he being serious?

  “And how does a man get a drink around here? Is there a button to call a serving wench or—”

  “A drink!?” I saw red. “You brought me here to drink and watch a soccer match!?”

  Nick blinked a few times and then shrugged. “Yeah.”

  I was fuming. “You’re blackmailing me.”

  “So?”

  “So get on with it,” I said between clenched teeth.

  “I have to say, Princess, most women ask me a bit nicer than that.”

  “Oh!” I exclaimed, throwing up my hands and walking a half circle around the box, staying clear of the line where the lights would touch me. He was the most infuriating man I had ever known. The crowd roared and Nick jumped up, his eyes focused on the field. I couldn’t believe this. Only a man would prolong his blackmail so he could squeeze in a free soccer match first. Even for scoundrels, sports came first!

  “Christian didn’t watch soccer,” I spat.

  “Really,” Nick said distractedly.

  “He liked documentaries.”

  Nick didn’t respond. He was following the ball on the field.

  “Historical dramas.”

  Still not even a flicker of interest. Totally concentrated on the game.

  “Pornography.”

  Nick lifted an eyebrow.

  “So that gets your attention,” I muttered as I crossed my arms and gave up trying to talk to him while the men on the field were kicking the ball around. Clearly, the man could only focus on two subjects at a time: soccer and sex, which left me at something of a disadvantage, as I had no desire to kick a ball, and as to the other . . . well, surely I could manage the situation using my brain and not my body. I was no Queen Marie-Therese, after all. She didn’t get the nickname “The Whore Queen” for nothing. Until I figured out how to convince him that he didn’t want to release photographs of me kissing him, I had to manage this situation some other way. Preferably without resorting to watching pornography with the man.

  I called for food and drink to keep up appearances that this meeting was simply a reunion of two old friends, and trays of chilled mugs and hot dishes were rolled in. Nick didn’t even say thank you—he simply cheered in between huge bites when Scotland scored the first goal and scowled when Drieden soon matched it and earned another one after a penalty kick.

  Around the hour mark, when it became clear that Scotland’s offense was total shit, Nick threw up his hands. “Do you know where Christian is?”

  I took a sip of the champagne I’d been angrily gripping for the past hour. “Now you want to talk?”

  “Yes, now that your guard dogs will leave us alone.”

  I glanced quickly at the door that had stayed closed since the traditional Driedish roasted chicken and buttered noodles had been served. “Where is Christian?”

  “I don’t know and I don’t care.”

  “You don’t care? You were going to marry him.”

  “I was. Now I’m not. Therefore, I don’t care.”

  He nodded sagely. “Got it. He was just a boy toy, then.”

  I sputtered at the insult. “Princesses don’t marry boy toys.”

  “So that’s why it didn’t work out. He was beneath you.”

  The man was incorrigible. I crossed my arms. The truth was, Christian was a duke in the United Kingdom. And as I was a royal princess of a kingdom, he was beneath me, if one wanted to get technical about it. If I pointed out either of those facts, however, I was sure this boor would still mock me. Therefore, I would ignore him until he asked a reasonable question.

  “Who called it off?”

  I couldn’t help but laugh. Loudly. Incredulously. Which, strangely, seemed to confound the crack reporter in front of me. “That’s funny?” Nick asked.

  “I was in my wedding dress when I was told that my fiancé was nowhere to be found. I think it’s safe to say he called it off.”

  Nick’s eyes narrowed. “Who told you this information?”

  There was something about that question. Maybe in his inflection, the demand in it. The turn of phrase. The plain sterility of it.

  A still, small voice told me to tread lightly.

  “Why does that matter to your readers?”

  “Personal interest.”

  “And then what? Will they want to know how long I cried? The months I went without reading a newspaper or watching a television? The hours of sleep I’ve lost?”

  We stared at each other for a long moment. I could have been wrong, but I thought I saw a slight softening in his expression.

  “I agreed to talk about Christian,” I finally said. “I didn’t agree to open up a vein and drain my soul for you.”

  “Even if I release those photographs of us?” His voice was soft and low. Which was almost sexy, if one ignored the threatening words. “What will you do to stop that?”

  I thought of my overworked press secretary and the palace staff that had worked tirelessly to orchestrate a royal wedding and then dismantle it, piece by piece. I thought of the stacks of tea towels and souvenir mugs that had mysteriously disappeared from gift shops around Drieden. The effort to maintain the illusion of my life was monumental and never-ending.

  Letting Nick publicize those photographs could bring it all crashing down. Another scandal on the heels of my disastrous wedding would not be forgiven—by Big Gran or the country.

  Maybe I wasn’t sure how to fulfill my duty to the Crown after I’d failed so spectacularly at the whole royal wedding thing, but I wasn’t ready to burn the whole monarchy down. I wouldn’t submit to an unscrupulous reporter’s blackmail. But I would make him a deal.

  “I’ll answer fifteen questions. About Christian only,” I warned him. “After that, you’ll delete your photographs and we’ll never speak a
gain.”

  Nick pulled back and crossed his arms, looking at me as if I’d spoken in Chinese.

  “Perhaps you haven’t noticed, you’re in no position to bargain with me,” he said pointedly.

  I looked out over the crowd in the stadium, knowing that with just a few bells and trumpets, I could probably make them shout my name. One day, that anthem that they sang would be about me. Their queen.

  Nick Cameron was in no position to bargain with me.

  I turned and fixed him with my fiercest Princess Theodora stare. “That’s my offer. There won’t be a better one.” I swept toward the door. “I’ll call tomorrow at nine to arrange the details. You may stay until the match is over.”

  I couldn’t resist a last peek over my shoulder before I left, only to see Nick staring at me with a strange, sad smile on his face.

  My curious streak was dying to know what that was all about.

  eight

  NICK HAD INSISTED ON SOMEPLACE public for our interview: The Drieden National Galleries. I had been nervous, but the museum was unexpectedly crowded on a Tuesday morning, and I realized that worked to my advantage. Everyone was too preoccupied with hustling bodies and jockeying for space to look at a plain, normal Driedener with glasses and a cap on.

  Somehow, the crowds seemed to melt around Nick. No one stepped on his toes or jumped in front of him in the Renaissance wing. Of course, if I had dropped my disguise and announced my presence, I could have had the entire place cleared out in fifteen minutes and Nick and I could have enjoyed a private guided tour.

  Other women looked at him when we walked by, which I appreciated. It meant they weren’t looking at me, and that they were focused only on the rugged, well-built, green-eyed Scottish bastard next to me.

  I turned left, trying to avoid the ever-popular Impressionist hall, and led Nick up a staircase to enter the much less popular portrait gallery.

  “It will be quieter up here,” I told him when he gave me a skeptical glance.

  “Pictures of dead people?”

  “Important dead people,” I informed him. “Do you have the list or not? I don’t have all day.”

  I had agreed to answer fifteen questions—no more, no less—and I had demanded that he provide me a list of everything he planned to ask. I had dealt with reporters like him before. They always tried to sneak extra queries in. Nick took a folded piece of paper out of his jacket pocket and handed it to me, sending a shock of static electricity through my fingers when his hand brushed mine. I ignored the sizzle and unfolded the paper.

  He had listed exactly fifteen questions in a tight black hand, just like I had required. But the jackass had written them in English.

  “Can’t you read it?” he asked, feigning concern.

  I hoped my annoyed glance was answer enough. He seemed to be quite fluent in Driedish when he wanted to be.

  “Number one. Names of Christian’s security guards.” I bit my lip. This seemed very real, all of a sudden. “Do you want their birth dates and registry numbers, too?”

  “No.” Nick stopped in front of a painting and waited for me.

  “What if something is classified?” I asked, gesturing with the paper. “I won’t answer that.”

  “I’ll substitute another question,” Nick allowed. Well, wasn’t he generous.

  “Aren’t you going to write this down?”

  “I have an extremely accurate memory.”

  That seemed unlikely. I held out my hand. “Are you recording me? Give me your phone.” It was another one of the points we had negotiated. I refused to speak over the phone, lest I be recorded. He refused to meet in private. Hence, our current argument in front of seventeenth-century paintings.

  Nick didn’t move a muscle. “You’ll just have to trust me, Princess.” Then he pointed at a painting of a very somber black-haired man with a pointed beard and a crow sitting in a window. “He doesn’t look very important.”

  Which was annoying on so many levels. “That was Olivier Ekkleson.”

  “Who?”

  I sighed. “Olivier Ekkleson, eighteenth-century philosopher, scientist, and entrepreneur.”

  Nick still didn’t look impressed.

  “He was the father of the Driedish printing press.”

  “Which differs from the printing press that Gutenberg invented?”

  “Of course. It was the first that printed exclusively in our native language.”

  Nick raised an eyebrow and I sighed again. This was going to be a very long trip to the museum if we kept this up. “Fine,” I said, and then I rattled off the names of the two guards who had been assigned to Christian during our engagement.

  I looked back at the paper. The next few questions regarded the address of Christian’s apartment in the city, his business office, and his gym. Nick walked to the next portrait and I followed, beginning to feel frustrated. “You couldn’t research all this?” I asked.

  He nodded at the next painting. “And this fine woman? Did she invent the first Driedish pot that cooked Driedish food?”

  The woman in question was bewigged and beribboned, captured with a coquettish smile on her lips and two intertwined roses on her lap. “Of course not. She was Elsa of Ganvine; at that time she was the mistress of Leopold the Fourth.”

  “A mistress next to a philosopher? What an open-minded lot you Driedeners are.”

  “Some might say there are a lot of similarities between the two,” I said.

  “They both do their best work in bed?”

  “They tell people what they want to hear.”

  “No one’s mother ever wanted them to grow up to be either.” Nick grinned at me. “Next question, Princess.”

  In resignation, I gave him the answers to the next three questions on his list. “Tomas Claytere was his closest associate at work, his cousin was the person he spoke with on the phone the most, and never.”

  Nick clearly didn’t believe me. “Never?”

  “No.”

  “You never slept with him. Like, ever?”

  “No!”

  “You never spent the night at his apartment?”

  “I don’t have to explain this to you.”

  “You promised to answer my questions.”

  “And I have.”

  “But now I have so many more,” he said with a sly smile. “A beautiful engaged woman who doesn’t spend the night at her fiancé’s house? Was it a common hygiene problem or something harder to treat?”

  I made a sound of frustration and skipped over the rest of the Renaissance portraits, feeling more and more annoyed at each echoing footstep behind me. Then my aggravation got the best of me. I spun and practically ran into Nick’s chest, which ended up being convenient because I already had the impulse to jam my finger in his sternum. “Perhaps Christian and I didn’t have the usual type of romantic relationship, but that doesn’t mean I’m an idiot, and it doesn’t mean that I don’t want to kick him in the balls for what he did to me.”

  “Is this normal behavior for a princess?” Nick asked, his Scottish burr more obvious now that he was amused.

  “Oh, shut up!” I couldn’t take his sarcasm anymore. “Why do you want to know all this? What possible angle could you have to write an article about something that’s old news?”

  “It’s very much not old news.”

  “It happened four months ago!”

  “And no one has seen Christian Fraser-Campbell in those very same four months.”

  “Probably because he doesn’t want to be kicked in the balls!”

  Nick put his hands on my upper arms and turned me gently toward a large portrait of the Council of Kinervale during the reign of Otto the Pretender, and I realized too late that a group of tourists was walking and talking by us. “Now tell me who these very proper men were,” he said, his lips close to my ear, his voice the only one I could hear.

  His left hand drifted to my waist, curling intimately there. I knew he probably was only pretending to be an attentive boyfrie
nd, to distract any curious visitors. But his hand lingered, and my silly heart raced. It had been too long since anyone had held me this close. After taking a moment to collect myself, I managed to tell Nick, “It’s the first Driedener rock band.”

  “And their name?”

  “Hell Hath No Fury Like a Woman Scorned.”

  He chuckled softly. “When was the last time you saw Christian?”

  I hung my head low, remembering the night. “At my father’s house. There was a ball two nights before the wedding.”

  “And where have you been the past four months?”

  I turned and walked past the next three portraits, my eyes not really seeing the historical figures I knew so well. Instead I thought of the long days and nights since my wedding day, of how Christian’s desertion meant I’d had to go into isolation, even though I had done nothing wrong.

  We stopped in front of a more modern painting. “My great-great-grandmother,” I said before Nick could prompt me. “Lucretia of Luxembourg.”

  He looked between me and Lucretia with that dubious expression I was beginning to know so well. “I don’t see the resemblance.”

  Perhaps there wasn’t one, not on the outside. Lucretia had been a big-boned woman, with raven hair pulled tightly away from her face. But I knew that Lucretia’s blood was running true within my veins today. “She was the first princess to ask for a divorce.”

  “Did she get one?”

  I shook my head. “No. It was unheard of. But they sent her to Perpetua to live out the rest of her days as a compromise.”

  “Perpetua?” he echoed.

  “It’s an island that was transferred to my family from the Holy Roman Empire about four hundred years ago.”

  “I’ve never heard of it.”

  I shrugged. “That’s not surprising. It was first home to a convent that was then fortified in the seventeenth century. It’s now just used as a retreat for the family, but back then it was where they used to send the women who couldn’t be controlled.”