Royally Claimed

by Marie Donovan

  “Ah…” Frank pushed the money away in disgust and Benedito shook it at him. “Stop shoving your money at me.”

  A middle-aged male clerk walked around the corner, eyeing them with interest. Frank groaned and grabbed some seeds. “No, Ben, you don’t have to pay for these, I’ll pay.”

  Disappointed, the clerk wandered away. Benedito let out a wheezing laugh. “If only you were here with a beautiful lady, he wouldn’t have gotten the wrong idea.”

  Frank rolled his eyes. Maybe he could text his sisters for some paint ideas. “Come on, old man, let’s get some coffee.”

  “Ah, you finally have a good idea.” Benedito slapped him on the back.

  Frank followed him out of the hardware store and down the street to a café where equally wizened men lounged around tables and eyed the surprisingly scantily clad local girls walking around. He didn’t remember seeing quite so much exposed flesh in his last visits to the Azores and mentioned it to Ben.

  The older man gave him an amused glance as he sipped his thick black coffee. “You sound like a cranky grandma. All they do is complain about the racy Brazilian soap operas influencing the girls nowadays, but the old ladies watch them all the same. Why not just enjoy the view?”

  Frank shrugged. Girls half his age were children, not women. “Like I told you, I have Paulinha on my mind.”

  “Ah.” He was uncharacteristically silent.

  “What does ah mean?”

  “Let me be blunt, Franco.”

  “How could I prevent it?” he murmured.

  “Do not settle for a marriage without fire.”

  Well, he hadn’t expected that. “What are you, a couples’ counselor?”

  “And how long have you been married, you young punk?” He took another sip. “You know I don’t like to interfere…”

  Frank almost snorted hot coffee out of his nose. “Since when?”

  “Shut up and listen—this is serious. You would be miserable with her—not because she is not a nice woman, but because you are not in love with her.”

  “And how do you know?”

  “Because you are fifteen hundred kilometers away on an island with an old man and not back on the mainland with her.”

  Frank made a dismissive gesture. “I have business here, not in Portugal.”

  “So you can’t buy her a ticket to come with you? Are you too cheap or do you not want her here?”

  He knew he was beat. “Love can come later.”

  “Or not at all.”

  “Enough about me. We have other errands to do.” Benedito was one of his oldest friends and mentors, but he wasn’t Frank’s first choice for a romance advisor. Especially when what he said cut too close to the bone.

  2

  From the website of Fashionista Magazine:

  The Royal Review

  FASHIONISTA MAGAZINE IS thrilled to bring you The Royal Review—a hot new blog devoted to the upcoming wedding of Princess Stefania of Vinciguerra and her über-sexy, über-famous groom, Count Dieter von Thalberg, international soccer star. In less than two months, the stunning couple will say their “I do’s” in the magnificent cathedral tucked away in the tiny, exclusive principality of Vinciguerra high in the Italian mountains.

  Fashionista Magazine has an inside track with the royal lovebirds—last year, we brought you Romance in Provence, a blog written by American travel blogger Lily Adams about her trip to sunny, sensual Provence. Lily did more than write it, she lived it, and is now married to Princess Stefania’s childhood friend, Count Jacques de Brissard, who owns the oldest lavender farm in the South of France. Countess Lily has kindly offered to fill us in on some of the inside scoop, with the bride’s permission, of course!

  One juicy detail—in a huge break from tradition, Princess Stefania will not have any brides-maids—she’ll have bridesmen! Her brother Giorgio, Lily’s husband Jacques and their friend Francisco Duarte, Duke of Santas Aguas in Portugal, will be standing up with the bride.

  “These men helped raise me after my parents passed away in their tragic car accident,” said Stefania. “Along with my grandmother, they are the dearest people in the world to me. How could I not acknowledge that special relationship?”

  Even the most jaded celebrity reporter has to admit to a certain misty eye at the tender sentiment. And the thought of those handsome men lined up in their formalwear is enough to make the heart go pitter-pat!

  JULIA FOUND HERSELF wandering around the town again the next morning. Her parents had arrived safely in Boston and were on their way to the hospital to visit her aunt and uncle. She had rattled around the apartment for a few hours, cleaning things that didn’t need cleaning until sheer boredom ran her out the door.

  Boredom and a nagging curiosity about the man who looked so much like Frank. It could just be the familiar surroundings triggering her memory. The summer she and Frank had spent together had been magical, the summer after her first year in college. She attended Boston College but had gotten a cheap ticket to the Azores, a favorite place since her family had been stationed there for a year when she was a kid.

  It was a favorite of Franco Duarte das Aguas Santas, especially since she’d found out later that his family owned their own small island there. He’d enjoyed America but was relieved to be home where he could speak Portuguese again after a few years in New York.

  Julia heard plenty of Portuguese coming from the town square. She followed the noise and found a farmers’ market full of fruits and vegetables, local honey and wine. The Azoreans didn’t eat vegetables by themselves, either in a salad or cooked. The locals preferred to cook them into a soup filled with mostly meat, if they remembered the vegetables at all. She had discovered this after asking for a salad in the local restaurant and getting a blank stare. And when her neighbor had seen her eating a raw carrot as she sat in the garden, he told her those were either for the soup pot or the donkeys.

  Julia had given a loud hee-haw, sending the man into a laughing fit that threatened to topple him.

  But the fruit in the market was something more exciting. Baby bananas and golden-fleshed pineapples were on the table every morning. And her mother had made a great marmalade-type topping out of the local sour oranges, tart as lemons.

  Julia picked up a packet of locally grown tea, the only tea grown in Europe, if she remembered correctly. And a jar of Azorean honey would sweeten it nicely. She paid a young lady for the tea and honey and wandered to a booth with Azorean wines and aperitifs. Too strong for her right now, although the bottles were beautiful. She declined a free sample but bought a bottle of the Aguardente velha da Graciosa brandy that her father liked and a bottle of passionfruit liqueur for her mother, who liked sweeter drinks.

  A masculine laugh, full of joy and amusement rang in her ears. For a second, she thought she had fallen into the past again. But there it was again.

  Not daring to breathe, she turned slowly, almost hoping she was just imagining it. She looked across the tables and saw him. The apple fell from her hand and clunked into the bin.

  Frank stood across from her. She put her hand to her throat in shock. His raw masculinity at age twenty had matured into solid manhood, his shoulders broader, his arms thicker. His dark hair curled over his ears, one wave falling over his forehead. His face had hardened but his dark eyes crinkled with amusement.

  Frank was leaning on a vegetable stand, listening to an older man who was obviously telling a funny story, thanks to the amused faces of the surrounding shoppers. Frank clapped the older man on the back and turned away, a smile on his face.

  He saw her. The smile vanished, leaving a stunned expression to match hers. Instead of freezing, he moved. Toward her.

  She panicked. What could she say to him? What would he say to her? She took a step backward, automatically searching for an escape.

  But Frank was coming, cutting around the customers and tables with the grace she remembered. He stopped next to her. “Julia?” he asked, his voice full of disbelief. Good, so she
wasn’t the only one.

  “Frank, well, my goodness! How in the world are you?” Her tone had enough sugar to frost a wedding cake. Light and friendly, light and friendly, she decided.

  He didn’t cooperate with her game plan and reply in an equally frothy manner, saying, What brings you back to the Azores? Or Gee, Julia, how many years has it been? Instead, he stood silently staring at her. Almost as if she were a ghost popping up through the floor.

  “Frank?” She touched his forearm and he jumped as if she’d shocked him. She was shocked too and jerked her hand back.

  Oh, no. Why that futile spark of attraction, after all these years? She looked away desperately.

  “Julia. Your husband is here with you?” He casually scanned the crowd but his question was far from casual.

  “My husband?” She wasn’t thinking clearly, all the warning bells in her head distracting her, telling her to run away before she got hurt again. “No.”

  “No, he is not here, or no, you have no husband?”

  “Oh, Franco,” she whispered. He no longer fit his boyish nickname.

  “Tell me, Julia. Which is it?”

  “I have no husband.”

  Triumph flared in his eyes, quickly banked into a neutral expression. She resented it. As if she were a prize horse unexpectedly put up for auction.

  “What about you? Any wife?” She meant it for turn-about, but he took it for interest, his mouth curling into a victorious smile.

  Maybe it was interest. Oh, of course it was. She was dying to know if there was a Duchess Mrs. Franco Duarte, or whatever they were called in Portugal these days. She’d never quite picked up the naming system that could leave a person with four last names.

  “No wife. Yet. I am here on business with Benedito.” As if summoned by his name like Rumpelstiltskin, the wizened old man popped up at Frank’s elbow.

  “Bom dia, senhorina.” He bowed at the waist, his eyes sparkling with unabashed curiosity. Julia could well imagine why. She was probably pale as a ghost and Frank looked like the cat who’d swallowed the canary.

  “Hello.” Someone had to act with normalcy, so she extended her hand to the elderly Portuguese, who bowed over it almost as if she were a princess.

  “Senhorina.”

  “Senhorina Julia Cooper, may I present Senhor Benedito Henriques Oliveira. Benedito, this is Senhorina Julia Cooper, whom I met here a long time ago.”

  The old man’s eyes sharpened as he gazed between them. “A long time ago?”

  “When we were younger,” Frank answered evasively.

  “Then you must talk!” Benedito practically shoved Frank at her. “Go to lunch! Don Franco, I will pick out those paint colors you wanted and have them mixed.” He ducked away into the crowd as Frank let out a yelp of dismay.

  “Paint colors?” Julia asked.

  Frank gave up trying to spot his assistant and sighed. “We are here to fix up the villa.”

  “The villa.” She was swept back in time again, to the stone building overlooking the sea on Frank’s private island. “Why?” She immediately regretted showing any interest. It was his own business, even if he were setting it up for a bachelor pad.

  “A honeymoon.” He watched her closely.

  “Ah.” Of course Frank would have moved on. It wasn’t as if he’d pined for her all these years. “And when is the happy event?”

  “Two months, roughly. The wedding is in June.”

  Oh, the bitter irony. Over ten years since their separation and then she arrived two months before his wedding. “Well. May I congratulate you and the future duchess?”

  He gave her a slow smile. “The wedding isn’t mine.”

  FRANK DIDN’T FEEL THE slightest bit guilty about taking advantage of Julia’s state of confusion to guide her into a cozy back table at a local café. She’d tried to hide her shock and then relief at finding out he wasn’t the lucky groom, but Frank could still read her emotions, even after all these years.

  “Would you like some wine?” He held the bottle over her glass, ready to pour. It was a variety they used to drink together.

  She held up a hand. “Just water, please.”

  “All right.” He ordered a bottle for her and filled her glass when it arrived. She drank eagerly, as if her throat were dry, then twirled the stem between her fingers. She looked all around the café—anywhere but at him.

  “Julia,” he began, not sure what to say. Why did you leave me when we were college students? sounded more than a bit whiny and pathetic. “How have you been?”

  “Fine.” She gave him a polite smile.

  He tried again. “You finished your nursing degree?”

  “Yes, and after a couple years, I went back to graduate school. I’m a nurse practitioner now and have taken some classes toward my doctoral degree.”

  “Good for you.” Pride for her, misplaced or no, swelled his chest. “You always were the smartest woman I ever met.”

  The compliment broke through her polite shell and she snorted in disbelief. Now that was more like the old Julia he remembered. Or was it the young Julia he remembered? This woozy sense of past and present was mixing him up. “Why do you make that noise?”

  “What?”

  “You don’t believe me.” He shook his head. “Do you remember me as a liar?”

  She pursed her lips. “Surely you’ve met smarter women than I.”

  “No, and just to prove it, all of them would have said ‘smarter women than me.’”

  “Good grammar doesn’t make you smart.”

  He shook his head. “You always were terrible at accepting compliments.” Like how her dark hair shone in the sun, her hazel eyes sparkling like his estate’s premium sherry.

  “I was not!”

  “Argumentative, too.”

  “I am not—” She stopped arguing when he started to laugh. “Frank, that is not fair. You know I can’t say anything to that without arguing.”

  “Then you’ll just have to agree with me.”

  “Hmmph.”

  “Ah, Julia, no need to fuss. We are just old friends who have met again for lunch. What would you like to eat?”

  She pressed her pretty pink lips together. Oh, how could he have forgotten how her dimples appeared when she did that. He had to hide a delighted smile before she really lost her temper and walked out on him. Again. Well. Remembering that wiped the smile off his face.

  “Frank?” She gave him a questioning look.

  “Lunch, oh, yes.”

  “Where is the menu?”

  He pointed to the chalkboard outside. “Whatever they feel like cooking today. Chicken with rice, salt cod stew and chouriço de carne—sausage with fava beans.”

  “Mmm. I haven’t had chouriço in years,” she said wistfully.

  “You can’t get Portuguese sausage in Boston?” There was not only a huge Portuguese-American community there, but a large portion of that was specifically of Azorean heritage.

  She shrugged. “I live in a different part of town.”

  That wasn’t much of an answer. How long could it take her to drive to a Portuguese deli? He’d driven to Massachusetts and Rhode Island Portuguese restaurants from New York when he’d had a craving for sausage or the sweet, eggy desserts that were an Azorean specialty. “Well, you must have it here.” He waved to the waiter and ordered the sausage and fava beans for her and the salt cod stew for him. “Sure you don’t want any wine?”

  She shook her head, so he ordered another bottle of water and switched to that, as well. Julia alone was making him light-headed enough.

  He acknowledged she had become even more beautiful in the eleven years since they’d parted. “How is it that you aren’t married yet?” he blurted, then winced. Smooth move, dummy. If she were married, she would either not be here at all or else her husband would be sitting across from him shooting daggers with his eyes at Frank. Maybe they’d have a few small kids, too, who would wonder in embarrassingly loud voices how this foreign guy used to kn
ow their mom.

  “I’m not married yet because nobody ever asked me.” Now her lips were really tight, her dimples even deeper.

  “I did.”

  “Out of some misguided sense of obligation. That doesn’t count.”

  He’d taken her virginity and changed her life forever—why wouldn’t he feel obligated toward her? And it wasn’t misguided, but he knew she would run away from him forever rather than discuss that now.

  She jumped to her feet. “Look, Frank, it was nice to see you, but I have to go home.”

  He jumped up, too. “Julia, please stay. I spoke out of turn. I apologize.” He shifted his body in front of her but the look of panic in her eyes made him move out of her way immediately. “But of course, I will not keep you here if you don’t want to be.” Frank wanted to kick himself. Good God, his prize bull at the estate had more finesse than he did.

  She relaxed slightly, but was still wary, and he didn’t blame her. The last time they’d parted, he’d been desperate to keep her and had been too overbearing. But twenty-year-old men in the agonies of first love were often thoughtless, and he’d been no exception. If he’d had a cooler head, he would have backed off, realizing the poor timing. Asking her to forgo the rest of her college education had been a bad idea, to put it mildly. “Come, sit. I promise, no more talk of awkward things. We will just be old friends who are catching up on the past ten years.”

  “Eleven,” she corrected him automatically. So she remembered exactly, as well. That was intriguing.

  “Eleven, of course.” He took her elbow and guided her back to her seat. The waiter, sensing a juicy story, plied them with a basket full of hearty chunks of bread and fresh whipped butter. Frank practically had to shoo him away.

  Julia seemed more amenable once she had a bit of homemade bread and butter in her, asking, “So who is getting married?”

  Frank smiled. “Do you remember me telling you about my best friends from the university?”

  She nodded. “The Italian guy and the French guy. Both were rich noblemen like you.”