by J Santiago
He tried the knob, and when it didn’t give way for him, he muttered, “Attagirl.”
She almost laughed. She knew if Robert wanted to get in bad enough, a flimsy lock wouldn’t stop him. And it was that realization that made others tumble around in her head. Robert could have walked in. He could have surprised her at any point. Instead, he had come to her door and knocked. Some of her anger faded.
“I’m pissed as hell,” she said.
There was a small bang on the door. She imagined his forehead leaning against the tough wooden barrier. “Aye.”
Without any conscious thought, she reached out and flipped the three locks. She pulled the door open, and there he stood. He didn’t look anything like the man who had saved her life all those years ago and protected her ever since. Gone was his tailored suit and starched shirt, his blue or gold or blue-and-gold-striped tie, his loafers that looked impossible to run in but didn’t stop him from sprinting when he needed to. His face was covered with a well-groomed beard, and his hair was no longer military-length. But the watchful eyes, those were exactly the same.
She backed up, an unspoken invitation to enter. He took a deep breath and walked in. Ele closed the door, and they faced each other. He did a quick perusal of her person, and a jaunty smile peeked out on his face before he hid it behind his familiar stoic mask.
“You look good, Your Highness.”
“Thank you. You too.”
He self-consciously rubbed his hand over his face. “I owe you an explanation.”
Just like Robert to get to the point.
“Yes.”
“Did you pack up all your tea?”
She turned for the kitchenette. Without paying him any mind, she fixed two cups of tea. She could sense him walking around, looking at her humble abode, probably wondering how she’d managed to live here for the last couple of months. But she took her time, gathering her thoughts and lassoing her wayward emotions. This was only the first in a number of difficult encounters coming her way.
Buck up.
She picked up the mugs and strolled into the tiny living room. Handing a cup to him, she settled into one of the club chairs. Robert dropped into the small love seat across from her, making it look like a child’s dollhouse sofa.
“It’s good to see you.”
Her face remained impervious. She could have told him how she thought she’d felt secure here, but now that he was in her presence, she knew what safe really felt like. But she didn’t. She had managed here, thrived even. And she’d accomplished it without him. It wouldn’t have been her choice, but she’d done it all the same. At her continued silence, the imperceptible grin threatened to lift his lip. But he fought it. As usual.
“I have a story to tell you.”
Ele tilted her head. Thank you, Tristan, for this new little trait of mine. “I’m listening.” She took a dainty sip of her tea.
Robert mirrored her action before leaning forward and placing his cup down. Their eyes met, and Ele glimpsed his part of the love between them. She gave him a small smile.
It must have fortified him because he leaned back and spoke, “Once upon a time, there was a crown prince.”
Ele straightened in her seat. Her hand began to quake, so she deposited her cup. She couldn’t begin to explain how she knew, but she suspected everything was about to change.
“He was everything you’d expect from an only child who had been indulged his whole life. He knew he would ascend to the throne one day, and he used up all the time before to be royal. When he was eighteen, he convinced his parents to allow him to attend Oxford. He explained how it would help him when he ruled the country. Because they gave in to all of his requests, they sent him off.” Robert paused and broke eye contact between them. “But something interesting happened when he interacted with normal people.” On a sardonic chuckle, he continued, “The prince fell in love with a commoner. His parents again indulged him because they assumed it would be temporary. When he completed college, the girl would return home, the prince would return to his country, and life would move on.
“But they’d miscalculated. The prince had always been single-minded, purposeful, but it had mostly been used to fulfill his every desire. Now, it was focused on this woman. He came home to tell his parents he was going to marry her, and they told him to choose—the girl or his kingdom. While it pained him, he knew if he gave up his crown, he would eventually resent the girl. So, he let her go. What he hadn’t counted on was resenting the kingdom when he lost the girl.
“For the next six years, he threw himself into becoming the best future king and to pretty much do anything else he wanted. There were little restraints on him. But when he reached his thirtieth birthday, his parents forced him to marry a woman of his station. He married her, and a year later, to great celebration, they had a set of twins.”
Ele had assumed this was her father he was talking about, but the clarification—the set of twins who could only be her and Jamie—brought her forward in her chair. Leaning intently into the story, she watched Robert.
His gaze returned to hers. “Like everything the prince did, he threw himself into the role of father. The public loved it. The prince was often seen pushing his twins in a buggy, providing mad photo ops.”
Ele knew this. Her life had been chronicled in the press. From birth to age seventeen, one could trace the growth, the whims, the children’s fashion by the day by looking up pictures of her and Jamie.
“On one such outing in a park, our prince received the shock of his life. He’d been running after his willful daughter and stumbled over an eight-year-old little boy. The boy had fallen and scraped his elbow and his knee. The prince, being who he was, scooped the boy up to return him to his mother, who happened to be the prince’s lost love. The moment he spied her, the prince knew the boy in his arms was his son. It wasn’t just the math; it was the crooked smile of the child along with the absolute horror on the face of his former lover. After much haranguing and yelling and blame, the prince demanded to be part of the boy’s life while promising to keep his son’s existence from everyone else in the kingdom.”
“I have a half-brother?” Ele whispered.
But Robert merely continued, “Again, our prince never did anything by the half, so he moved the boy and his mother closer to the palace. The prince divided his time equally between his duties and his two families, but they never crossed paths again.
“The boy knew all about the twins. When his young half-brother got sick, the boy was frantic with worry. The illness changed the prince too. He decided he needed to make sure both of his legitimate children were ready to rule. He confided in his older son that his daughter took to it quicker, more naturally.
“The boy never once resented his half-siblings; in fact, he loved them like the younger siblings they were. He saw their life and didn’t want to live like they did. To be trained from birth to fulfill a role didn’t appeal to him. He loved open spaces and the freedom to do what he wanted. For a few years, everything was perfect really.”
Robert paused for a sip of tea. “When the boy turned eighteen, he told his father he was joining the army. It was always what he wanted to do. But the prince worried about his son, so he placed him in the care of his country’s highest-ranking general. The boy was trained to fight, to defend, to stay alive at all costs.”
Ele froze.
“Before every out-of-country trip, the prince would visit his son. Twelve and a half years ago, he showed up at the base. He was unusually pensive and quiet during the visit. But before he departed, he sat his son down and told him that if anything were to happen, it would be his responsibility to look after the twins and Juliana. But specifically, Eleanor.”
“You’re my brother?”
“When they were assassinated, I was on a plane an hour later. We didn’t know at the time that you’d been taken. But I knew I had to get to you.”
Ele had been reliving that day hundreds of times since August. The stubbornnes
s that had saved her life. The disorientation of the bomb. The anger of her capture. The joy of her rescue. She spoke at length of the safety she’d experienced when Robert came for her. They’d enjoyed an immediate affinity for one another. She recalled the instant familiarity. Ele had recounted it all for her therapist, so it was fresh, a wound newly scabbed over.
“Why didn’t you ever tell me?”
“We determined it was an opportunistic crime rather than a premeditated one. Or so we thought at the time. Still, when I’d found you in that cellar, I’d expected to see a broken shell of a girl, hampered by shock and grief. But instead, you were this fucking force of nature. I actually felt sorry for those motherfuckers. You had given them more grief than they’d anticipated.”
A small smile dawned on her face. She remembered that too. But just recently.
“Then, you were home for a while, and the queen reached out to me. She explained your panic attacks and your virtual withdrawal from everything. She asked me to come, to take over your detail. I couldn’t refuse. And not just because our father had asked me to look out for you. The girl I remembered, the fearless badass, had retreated, and I was determined to find her. But I think I ended up enabling you.”
“No, you didn’t. I just wasn’t ready. Trust me; it wasn’t you. It was me.”
They looked at each other and snickered.
“But you’re ready now?” His look was hopeful.
“I think so. Maybe.” This time, Ele glanced away. She wanted to think she was ready, better equipped to deal with all she’d gone through. She was quietly proud of herself. But she wondered and worried about what would happen when confronted with her real life.
“You look good.”
“Does Jamie know all of this?”
“Most.” Robert gave a rueful smile.
“I guess you won’t be returning to my detail?”
There was a touch of sadness in his face. “The only bad part of all of this is that I won’t see you every day.”
“But you get your life back.”
Robert stood and walked toward her. He reached down with his hand. She placed hers in his, and he pulled her up. When he took her into his arms, engulfing her in a deep hug, it seemed the most natural thing in the world. As he held on to her, she realized how much she liked affection. She’d noticed that with Tristan—the random touches, the hugs, the spontaneous embraces.
“I won’t be far.”
They stood like that for a while, holding each other. Brother and sister.
“Robert?”
“Yes?”
“What if I had become one of those clichéd women who fell in love with her bodyguard?”
He pulled away from her and stared down. “Well, that would have been bloody awkward!”
They cracked up.
36
8 December
Shuffington Palace
Beatrix had chosen an ice-blue sheath gown for Ele. It brought out the blue of her eyes, enhanced the glow of her skin, and contrasted with the dark strands of her hair. One thin strap held the dress up on her left side as it draped lovingly across her chest. It fell straight with an almost-too-high slit. The one-shoulder precluded her from wearing anything around her neck. Her hair was twisted into a stunning chignon, leaving her ears and new piercing on display. Minimal makeup and the most diaphanous tiara she owned made her appear like the Ice Princess the press described her as. She took a moment to study herself in the mirror.
Back only a week before the gala, most of her days were spent being reintroduced to her duties. With a new perspective, she found an appreciation for what she did. More vocal than before, she started charting her course. She knew the things she loved to do, and she was determined to make those her focus in the future. Meeting with her newly constructed team and taking control of them and the protocols was a strangely empowering feeling. Michael used to defer to Robert, and now, everyone deferred to her.
Dressed in what felt like glamorous armor, she was ready to meet the queen. The atmosphere at the palace was decidedly harassed. The push for independence for Nava still loomed. The euphoria of the World Championship Cup, which had managed to unite the kingdom for a while, had dissipated. Ele knew her battle paled in comparison to what Queen Lilian was dealing with, but Ele was determined to see it through.
Off the throne room was an office the queen used for events. Although she often met with dignitaries and presidents here, the space was decidedly less formal than her personal office. It had confounded Ele as a teenager, but she knew now that Lilian used it to put people at ease. Ele knocked on the door and stepped through when it was opened. Ele was somewhat surprised to see both Jamie and Robert in the room. Both offered her encouraging smiles that she resented. She didn’t need them to bolster her for this conversation.
“I didn’t invite, nor did I expect, to see either of you here,” she heard herself say.
Funny how they both wore identical expressions of pride at her words. That she never noticed similarities between them seemed oddly shortsighted.
“You didn’t. But I did,” the queen informed her.
Then, because she was the queen, she held out her ring. Ele moved forward, her face a mask of placidity. She hated this part of it and had already made her twin promise in blood he would never make her kiss his ring. He winked at her from his space across the room, and she knew he was remembering. Ele performed her duty and then sat as straight as she could in the chair across from her grandmother.
“Robert has informed me that he shared his story with you.”
Ele hadn’t expected to start there, but she supposed it was as good a place as any. “Yes, Your Majesty.”
The queen winked at her, and then all at once, she morphed into her grandmother. “How about Grandmama for this conversation?”
Some of Ele’s tension drained away. “Of course.”
“You look lovely.”
Not ready for a compliment, Ele smiled tentatively. “Thank you. Beatrix is a master.”
“Well, one can be when one has a beautiful canvas with which to work.”
Ele’s hands rubbed once across her thighs. It was hard to resist Lilian when she was being charming. Ele merely bowed her head in acknowledgment.
“You have questions, I’m sure.”
The thing was, she didn’t really have any. Robert’s story had rung true for her. The father he’d described was the one she had grown up with. Indulgent but firm, committed to his duty as both a father and a crown prince, loving. She remembered the shift in her family around the time of Jamie’s diagnosis. She’d refused to leave Jamie’s side through his leukemia treatments, so they’d turned one of the palace rooms into a hospital room, and the two of them had weathered his illness together. Even though her father had had another son, Ele never doubted his love for his family.
“No.”
Her grandmother speculatively eyed her. “Hmm,” she hummed. “But you have things to say.”
Until then, she hadn’t really known what she was going to say. She glanced at Jamie, and he nodded his head, her adoring brother who always had her back. Then, to Robert. It had been easy to forgive Jamie for sending Robert away after learning the truth. What had there been for her to be mad about? Robert watched her though, like he was expecting her to put something together.
Lilian and Jamie, they’d needed a catalyst. It hadn’t occurred to her to question how things had gone so horribly astray the night of the gala, how easy it had been for the paps to surround her. The palace was a fortress, her security team a well-oiled machine. There was no chance of failure because they covered every angle. The only way for the press to crawl out of the woodwork like a swarm of rats was if the cheese had been planted for them. A breach of security was the only way they could send Robert away.
“You set me up,” she said suddenly.
Robert looked proud, Jamie slightly horrified, and the queen triumphant.
Lilian was still a gorgeous woman, and when
she rose to her feet, with her crown planted perfectly into her coifed hair, Ele got chills. She was that magnificent. The queen sauntered around her desk toward Ele. The queen’s gaze turned inward, and Ele knew she was remembering the terrible day she’d lost her son.
“It was time, my dear. We should have pushed you harder, made you face up to what had happened. But once Robert took over your detail, we got complacent, and we let you slip away. To think, it was your interactions with that footballer that made us all stop and reevaluate. I’m sure you will be livid about the heavy-handed manipulation when you’ve had time to really digest it. But it came from a good place.”
Ele almost scoffed. She should be mad. But right at the moment, most of her anger was directed at Jamie. The queen was the queen, and she was going to do what she wanted. For some reason, Ele didn’t hold Robert accountable. But Jamie’s betrayal hurt more than anything.
“Still,” the queen went on, “as much as I am indebted to Mr. Davenport, it has to be over. You are still a princess, the second in line for the throne, the mother of the future king or queen. And I’ve entered into an agreement with Lord Barrington. With the current political situation, I am afraid I can’t renege on our agreement. A joining of our two houses will go far to stabilize the call for succession.” Queen Lilian’s stare bore down on Ele. “I’m afraid you must put a stop to this relationship.”
Ele locked eyes with her grandmother and held on. There were tomes of information exchanged but not one morsel of apology. A glint shone in the eyes, so like her own, and Ele knew the pillars of hopes for her relationship with Tristan were about to be bowled over.
“Unless, of course …” The queen’s index finger came up to rest against her mouth, like some divine inspiration was about to flow from her lips. Lilian looked to Jamie, her brow raised. “There’s always Juliana.” The queen merely raised her brow before she withdrew to move behind her desk, the grandmother portion of this discussion clearly at an end.
Ele’s wide eyes met Jamie’s.