Nobody's Princess

by Sarah Hegger

  The kid flipped through his cell before slipping it back in his pocket.

  Thomas slid out of his parking spot. He would keep an eye on the kid, at least as far as the Mexican restaurant. The boy looked to be about eighteen, all legs and arms without the muscle to give them a reason for being. The kid was oblivious, his fingers flying across his phone as he texted.

  Thomas rolled down the window. “Hey.”

  The kid’s head bopped up and down to the music no doubt blaring through that killer set of headphones. Just his luck, they would be the noise-canceling type. Thomas looked for somewhere to park. Both sides of the street were crammed bumper to bumper.

  What was the name Luke had said? He kept thinking airplanes for some reasons. Nobody was going to call their kid Boeing, however screwed up.

  The kid crossed an alley and kept walking.

  Two guys came out of the alley and fell into step behind the kid. Thomas wouldn’t have noticed them, except they seemed to be walking really close to the boy. They were both older and bigger, too. Thomas’s Spidey sense tingled.

  One of them grabbed the kid by the arm. The pizza box sailed through the air, flipped open in mid-flight, and dropped warm, gooey pizza all over the sidewalk.

  Ah, hell no. He squeezed the front end of the truck into the alley and jumped out. A horn blared behind him. Thomas gave it the finger over his shoulder.

  The kid’s face had gone even paler as he spoke rapidly to the two men.

  The men crowded the kid toward the alley.

  The kid glanced over to Thomas, a brief flash of raw fear before he masked it again.

  A slow burn simmered in the pit of Thomas’s gut. He hated wasted food, particularly when he was ready to chew his arm off from hunger and the pizza lay scattered across the sidewalk in a cheesy smear.

  But most of all, he hated a fucking bully.

  Chapter Five

  Tiffany hit the restaurant at a dead run. Ryan hated tardiness. She steadied her breathing as she sedately trailed the maître d’ to her table. Ryan would be quick to pick up anything wrong. God, she’d sucked at acting as a kid.

  “Hello, Princess.” Her father rose from the seat beside Ryan to kiss her on the cheek. Tiffany gaped at him. Her mouth moved and she made some reply.

  Ryan rose next and gave her a slightly warmer kiss before holding a chair out for her.

  They seated themselves, and both men smiled across the table at her. They were in a hot new restaurant, all burgundy, silver, and crystal. A hip new take on an old-style ladies’ lounge. Tables were set far enough apart to guarantee privacy. Amber light flickered from the small cluster of votive candles nestled between orchid blossoms. The place screamed romance.

  Until she looked across the table at her father. Her head spun. If she’d got it all wrong and this wasn’t a proposal, then she had a reprieve on the Luke front. Right? She dug her nails into her palms. But if she’d got it all wrong, it meant Ryan wasn’t going to propose. No proposal, no New Tiffany. Damned if she knew whether that bubble in her belly meant disappointed or relieved. Confused came closest to what she was feeling.

  “I suppose you’re wondering what I’m doing here?” Her father’s chiseled, handsome face relaxed into a smile.

  Tiffany forced herself to focus. “It’s always nice to see you, Daddy.” And it was. Her father had the same classic good looks and impeccable sense of style as Cary Grant. His dark hair had elegantly and graciously changed gleaming pewter as he’d aged.

  The waiter hovered with the wine bottle and she gave him a nod.

  “I’ll let Ryan explain,” her father said after the waiter moved away. “As you were late, we ordered for you.”

  “I’m sorry, I got caught up at work.” She flinched and waited for the lecture about her job.

  Her father took a sip of his wine, rolling it around his mouth before swallowing. He beamed at Ryan in approval. “Perfect.”

  Perfect was a big thing with Daddy. Something was up. Her belly tightened. Daddy always had something cutting to say about her working for Piers.

  Ryan smiled at her and she clung to that lifeline. He wore the suit they’d picked out together at Hugo Boss; charcoal gray with a starched white shirt and a red tie. Ryan was handsome in the same style as her father, the lines of his face carved in bold, masculine sweeps that invited you to drop your troubles on his broad shoulders. His dark hair was impeccably, but conservatively cut. “You look beautiful.” Ryan winked at her. “But then, you always look beautiful.”

  “Watch yourself, son.” Her father chuckled. “Don’t get too carried away with her father right here.”

  Ryan slid him a look and chuckled back.

  Dear God, they were tag-teaming each other. Tiffany curled her mouth up into a smile and grabbed her wine. She barely stopped herself from chugging the glass. With the two glasses from the condo, she was dangerously close to sloppy impulse control territory. Her silverware didn’t balance. Two knives and a spoon on one side of her plate, two forks on the other. She took away one knife and placed it on her bread plate, bisecting the circle through the center.

  “Your father and I are celebrating.” Ryan leaned forward as he spoke. His cuff links gleamed as they peeked out from beneath the sleeves of his jacket. Simple, square and gold. Conservative, understated, classy. She bet her father had a pair exactly like them.

  She looked from one to the other. She’d seen her father and Ryan together hundreds of times. Her father had introduced her to Ryan. Maybe it was her day making her super aware, but she’d never really noticed the similarities between them before. “Okay.”

  “Ryan has accepted a partnership in our firm.” Her father leaned his arms on the table, just like Ryan. She was right about the cuff links.

  “That’s great.” It was great. They both looked really happy about it. It was just … not the reason she thought she was there. She hid her confusion behind a smile as they talked a bit more about their partnership.

  This was a dinner to celebrate their new partnership. A lump lodged in her breastbone. She’d had such high hopes for tonight. All through this nuts day, she’d clung to the hope that if she could get through it, her pot of gold was waiting for her.

  The waiter arrived. He put a green salad, no dressing, in front of each of them. She picked up her fork. Her stomach clenched so tight she wouldn’t get a thing down, but she needed something to do with her hands. She’d told everybody she was getting engaged. She wasn’t getting engaged at all. Her father was getting a new partner.

  “Tell her the rest,” her father said.

  Tiffany stopped pushing arugula around her plate and looked at Ryan. God, please let the rest be better.

  “Tiffany.” He placed his knife and fork side by side on his plate. “You and I have been seeing each other for two years now.”

  “It’s our anniversary.” Part of the reason she’d been so sure this was a proposal. Ryan had been dropping hints all week. Damn it, her father had been dropping hints right along with him. Leading her on for no reason would be cruel.

  “Didn’t I tell you she would know that?” Her father dabbed the corners of his mouth.

  “You were right, Carter.” Ryan dabbed. “Tiffany, your father and I, we want to cement our relationship.”

  What about cementing our relationship instead? Daddy had pushed her and Ryan together, told her nothing would make him happier. Even gone so far as to say that her mother would have loved Ryan. Since Luke, she’d made sure to get Daddy’s approval before she took any of her dates seriously. Had her father pimped her out for a new partner? No, not possible, she was his Princess. He always said so. She forced a sweet smile and nodded for Ryan to continue.

  “And it’s no secret that you and I have been heading in a certain direction for a while now.”

  A small bubble of hope pushed through the gloom. Tiffany’s gaze flickered to her father. This was sounding more like a proposal. With her father sitting right there. The hope bubble popped. She
didn’t care which way her father sliced this, there was nothing romantic going on here tonight.

  “What Ryan is saying, Princess,” her father took over when Ryan went silent, “is that he has asked me for your hand in marriage.”

  Her mouth dropped open and she snapped it shut again. It was a proposal. Her father was proposing for Ryan. Her mind blanked. Her crazy day had spiraled into the most crackpot night ever. She saw herself years from now telling her children how their father proposed. Well, sweeties, your father proposed by getting your grandfather to ask. Laughter boiled in her stomach, except her brain wasn’t finding this funny at all.

  “Of course, I said yes.” Her father gave her a pleased smile. “Nothing would make me happier than to see you settled with a good man like Ryan.”

  The two men exchanged a warm glance. Neither of them seemed to find any of this odd.

  “He hasn’t asked me.” The words came out of her mouth and she sounded all of five years old.

  “Sweetheart.” Ryan touched her hand. “You don’t have to worry about that. Of course I’m going to ask you, and not with your father sitting right here. This is more of a pre-proposal.”

  “What?” Only half of that made sense. Her brain latched onto the proposal part.

  “Except we have some concerns.” Her father rearranged his knife to line up perfectly with the fork.

  Tiffany glanced at her father and then at Ryan. She was so lost here. “Concerns?”

  Her salad was whipped away and replaced with a fillet of sole accompanied by lightly sautéed vegetables. Tiffany nearly turned her nose up at it. Fish and veggies weren’t going to cut it at all. Another waiter went past their table with a dessert trolley. Chocolate cake! Hot damn! A piece of chocolate cake with chocolate frosting, and sauce all over it. There were times when a girl needed carbs and sugar, and this was one of them.

  “Ryan feels, and I agree with him …” Her father took up the line of crazy again. “We feel that you are not ready for such a large step.”

  Her pulse marked triple time. She speared her fork into her fish. It hit the plate and screeched.

  Her father reached over and covered her hand. The one Ryan had touched. “Don’t be angry, Princess. We love you, this is for your own good.”

  She dropped her fork onto the plate with a clatter. The couple at the next table whipped their heads in her direction. Go ahead and stare. I can lay money this is the first time you’ve seen this.

  Her father and Ryan stared at her, wearing matching caring expressions.

  Shit! This was one of those things. One of those things where people got together and told the screwed-up one just how wacko they were. An intervention. That was the word. This was a fucking intervention. She grabbed her wineglass and chugged the remnants. Let the calories roll. Was that the seams of the Versace she heard groaning? She’d come here dressed for a proposal and got an intervention instead. What did one wear to an intervention? Perhaps Chanel would have been more the thing. The insane urge to laugh once again roared through her.

  “We feel, your father and I,” Ryan continued in his everything will be all right voice, “that you’re still harboring an unhealthy attachment to your ex-husband.”

  And then she did laugh. Luke. This was about Luke. That made it four in one day. Trouble wasn’t supposed to come in fours. Threes. That was the rule. Everybody knew that. “I’m over Luke.”

  They stared at her. Ryan winced a tiny bit. Her father’s eyes filled with pity.

  “I am.” A horrible thought snapped her mouth shut. Did they know? They couldn’t know. Her hands shook so badly she dropped them into her lap.

  “We don’t believe you are.” The corners of her father’s mouth tilted down. “I have been waiting for you to do something about that car since your divorce.”

  He said divorce. Sweet relief almost brought tears to her eyes. They didn’t know.

  “I want us to have a future together, darling.” Ryan oozed sincerity with his dark gaze. “For us to go forward together, we need to be free of the past. I know I’m ready, but you, my darling, have some unfinished business.”

  The votive candles flickered cheerfully in the center of the table. Her brain stuck on the play of light on the crystal facets of the bowl. Familiar lies churned in her gut. “Ryan, I—”

  “I know.” He squeezed her dead fish hand. “I know your first marriage was painful for you. I know you have strong feelings for your ex-husband. Feelings of anger and resentment.”

  “My ex-husband.” She tried the phrase out, daring to peer up at Ryan. Her heart was pounding so hard it threatened to bust right out of her chest. They didn’t know the worst part.

  “Yes, Luke.” Ryan placed her hand carefully on the table. There should be a ring, right there, third finger. Ryan covered it with his. “You’re stuck in the past and it isn’t healthy.”

  “You need to make peace with your past.” Her father pushed his plate away. They must have gotten together and practiced their earnest expressions. “You need to resolve whatever it is that lies between you and Luke. For us. For our future.”

  Tiffany dragged her gaze up to his. “Daddy, Luke is out of my life.”

  In all ways, other than a legal technicality.

  “Princess. The car?” Her father weighted the words like an 18-wheeler struggling uphill with its abnormal load of disappointment. He had her there, but as long as he didn’t know the full truth there was still hope. So she’d sell the car. Tiffany opened her mouth to reassure them. She couldn’t do it. Selling the car would be like ripping a limb off. Her nails dug into her thighs, probably ruining the Versace. If she didn’t watch it she could lose everything. “You know why I had to fix the car.”

  “Yes, we do.” Ryan tipped her chin up so she had to meet his gaze again. “You wanted to atone for the past, but that doesn’t explain why you still have it.”

  “I’m going to give it back.”

  Her father sighed, setting the candle flames dancing amongst the orchids. “When, Tiffany? When are you going to give Luke his car?”

  “When I find him.” She took a huge sip of her wine. “He’s always traveling somewhere. Tibet or Tokyo and I don’t know where the hell else. It isn’t as if I can just shove it in an envelope and mail it to him.”

  “I understand that.” Ryan’s expression softened, his tone endlessly patient; it pressed on her shoulders heavier than her father’s disappointment. “But I don’t think you are being entirely honest with either of us. Do you want to know what we think?”

  No, she wanted to snap at him. I want my fucking proposal. Of course, she didn’t say that. They were good-cop, bad-copping her, and she had to take it because she was guilty as hell.

  “I think the car is a symbol for you. It’s a reminder, a memento, of your youth and your past,” Ryan said.

  “I don’t want a memento of my marriage, it was bad enough living through it the first time.” Except it hadn’t been all bad. Not really. Sure, the end had been brutal, but there had been times at the beginning … great times. Tears pricked her eyelids and she blinked them away. Shit, could her father and Ryan be right? Was she hanging on to the past? To Luke?

  Ryan leaned forward in his seat. “I love you, Tiffany.”

  “We both do,” her father chimed in.

  “I want to spend the rest of my life with you,” Ryan said.

  “Nothing would make me happier,” her father said. “You’ve chosen the perfect man in Ryan.”

  “Do this for us.”

  “It’s time, Princess.”

  The candlelight cast loving shadows across their handsome faces. Their expressions were identical, part concern, part affection.

  “This wasn’t how I was expecting tonight to go.” Not even fucking close. “I was expecting a proposal.”

  Ryan looked down.

  Her father met her look. “Tiffany, are you ready for that?”

  “I thought I was,” she said in a wooden voice. “I made a mistake. Lu
ke was a mistake. It’s in the past.”

  “Then prove it,” her father said. “Start by getting rid of that ridiculous car.” Her father watched her, candlelight playing across his features.

  Tiffany dropped her gaze. The thing was, he was right. Some part of her was hanging on to the past. Actually, considering her non-divorce, her father was more right than he thought. Her fingers curled into tight fists in her lap. The fight in her vanished under a tsunami of tired. “I want to go home.”

  “Don’t be petulant, Princess.” Her father’s lips tightened. He sat back, folded his hands on the tabletop, and waited for her to simmer down.

  “I’m sorry.” She wrestled her temper under control. It upset Daddy when she got too emotional. Her mother had never yelled, always handled every situation like a perfect lady. “This has all taken me by surprise.”

  “Of course it has.” Ryan smiled at her. “Now, let’s all have a nice dinner and talk about the future. Our future.”

  “Which reminds me.” Daddy tapped the edge of the table. “I’m going to need to see your divorce settlement so we can draw up a little pre-nup between you and Ryan.”

  Her lies closed around her like a trap making it difficult to breathe. “Sure, Daddy.”

  “Eat your fish, Tiffany.” Ryan pushed her plate closer. “Can’t have you wasting away on me before our big day.”

  Tiffany picked up her knife and fork. Dinner was fucking awful. She dredged up a few smiles, managed some light chatter, and made her escape as soon as it was polite to do so. Ryan didn’t press to come home with her—thank you, Jesus. He stood beside her father as they put her into a cab. She didn’t turn around as she drove away.

  She dropped her head against the back of the seat. “What a mess.”

  “Did you say something, miss?” The driver glanced in the rearview mirror.

  “No, nothing.” In twenty-four hours her life had gone apeshit. She’d gotten herself into this mess. If they ever found out the full truth, life would be over. Bang would go her proposal and any chance of her future with Ryan. God, her father would never get over it. Her mind whirled so badly she thought she might puke. She dug around in her clutch. Lipstick, compact, spare tampon. She tapped the back of the driver’s seat. “Do you have a piece of paper and a pen?”