by Lara Hunter
“I forgot that the paparazzi were a thing,” I said absently.
Kasper slid his arm around my waist. It was likely supposed to be comforting, but his touch turned my knees to jelly and I had to grip onto him in order to keep standing.
“All right there, Doctor?” Kasper whispered in my ear.
I nodded. “Just getting my bearings.”
Kasper’s grip tightened, holding me close to him. I leaned in, inhaling his sexy scent. I’d never been this close to the Prince before, and it was sending my heart into overdrive. The red carpet was a blur, like I felt his arm around me with such intensity that the rest of the world dulled.
It was a feeling I wished could last forever.
SEVEN
Stepping inside the venue felt like entering a whole new world. The cavernous hall was decorated all in white, with thousands of glittering lights covering the ceiling. There were tables set up around the room, but the focal point was clearly the large dance floor. A stage had been erected against the rear wall, and a band was already playing smooth jazz melodies.
“This is incredible,” I breathed, awestruck.
Kasper glanced down at me, a boyish grin lighting up his face. “I thought you’d like it. It’s nice to be here with someone who doesn’t know what to expect.”
“Well if you like amazement, I’m certain to have it in spades for the evening to come,” I remarked slyly. “What exactly are we supposed to do, though?”
Kasper led me over to the bar, grabbing two flutes of champagne. “We’re not supposed to ‘do’ anything,” he said. “Generally, I mingle with the other guests, have a few drinks, and take a few turns on the dance floor. But if you’re feeling overwhelmed, we could just sneak off to some hallway in the back and get rip-roaring drunk.”
I laughed. “Tempting,” I said. “But isn’t that beside the point of coming here?”
Kasper shrugged. “I mostly just have to be seen showing up. What I do once I’m here isn’t too much of a concern.”
“Then let’s just go through this as you normally would,” I suggested. “But I reserve the right to try out the second option if things start to go downhill.”
Kasper grinned. “Deal.”
I didn’t realize just how quickly things would start go downhill.
It was when Kasper and I were conversing with one of New York’s wealthiest media moguls that I felt the first stirrings of anxiety. Kasper seemed so at ease, like he did this kind of thing every day. He probably did. He and Bernard Heltz discussed politics and current affairs, all the while I tried desperately to keep up with all the names they kept flinging back and forth.
Then Bernard, who apparently owned a “small handful” of newspapers, turned to ask me a question.
“And what is it you do, Miss Flowers?” he asked. His walrus moustache poked out from under his half mask, giving him a comical air. “I never forget a face, and even behind a mask, I don’t believe I’ve had the pleasure to seeing yours before.”
He was just being polite, but it may as well have been the Spanish Inquisition.
Kasper’s words rang through my head. “The great thing about masquerades is you can be whoever you want to be.”
“I’m a doctor,” I said. “I just started my residency.”
“Ah,” Bernard said, smiling approvingly. “Such a breath of fresh air to have a regular working Joe among us, isn’t it, Kitty?” He turned to his wife, who nodded disinterestedly.
He turned back to me. “And what do you think of this ball, then? Are you accustomed to such occasions?”
I shook my head. “I’m not. It’s beautiful though.”
“And ever more beauteous thanks to its mysterious benefactor,” Bernard said, lowering his voice to inject drama into his words.
“I don’t understand,” I said, furrowing my brow.
“Prince Kasper!” Bernard said, feigning shock. “You mean you didn’t tell her the most interesting part?” He looked back at me. “Speculating on the evening’s mystery is half the fun.”
I looked up at Kasper, who merely shrugged. “I suppose it slipped my mind.”
“Sometimes I wonder if you royal types get excited about anything,” Bernard teased. He turned his charcoal gaze back to me, eyes widening behind his mask. “This whole evening was funded by a mystery donor—and he or she is most likely in attendance!”
“I thought this was a charity ball?” I asked. “Some of the ticket price goes to cover the costs, and anything above that goes to charity?”
“You’re half-right, there,” Bernard said, nodding. “Between the guests, millions will be raised tonight. But a ball of this size and gradeur couldn’t take place without the funds of some very generous, very silent benefactor. Everyone is positively buzzing about it, trying to figure out who they are.”
“Interesting,” I said. “And who do you think it is?”
Bernard waved a white-gloved hand. “Speculation is not my strong suit,” he said. “I deal in facts. But if I find out, you can be assured it’ll be hitting the front page in a tick.”
Bernard’s attention shifted to a celebrity couple who had just walked in. I could only see half of their faces, yet I still recognized them as one two of Hollywood’s most in-demand actors. The mogul wished us farewell and headed over to them. I didn’t blame him—I wasn’t exactly the most interesting person in the room.
I felt constantly reminded of this fact, the more people we met. It was like swimming through a sea of billionaires. If I looked left, I saw royalty. If I looked right, one of daytime TV’s most popular talk show hosts. And Kasper knew them all.
The more I thought about it, the more stressed I became. I didn’t belong here. I wasn’t even really a doctor! If any of these people found out that I was just Kasper’s maid, would they even give me the time of day?
“I’m just going to go to the bathroom,” I whispered to Kasper while he chatted to a New York socialite whose reality TV show I had binge-watched only months before.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
I nodded and plastered on a reassuring smile. “I’m great. I’ll be right back.”
EIGHT
Stepping inside the lavish marble powder room, I immediately started looking for a window. It was just a need for air at first—outside air. Air that made sense. But when I got to the window, I actually began sizing it up to see if I’d fit through. There was no one else in the bathroom, so I had the opportunity to stick a couple of my limbs out as a test.
The window wasn’t big enough. And anyway, would I crawl out if it was? Would I actually leave Kasper like that? No. Of course not. And not just because he was my boss and was paying me to be there, either.
I took a long look at myself in the mirror. I was different, but still the same. I still had freckles on the bridge of my nose. I still had the little scar on my forehead from roughhousing with my brothers when I was a kid. I was still me—I just looked like a movie star.
Still, I wondered if Kasper would let me go home if I asked nicely.
I didn’t have to wait long to find out, because Kasper was waiting for me outside of the bathroom. Stunned, I froze on the spot.
“Everything is not all right,” Kasper observed. “What’s the matter?”
I approached him, furrowing my brow. “Are you always so perceptive? I’ll have to be careful next time I sweep all the dirt on your floor under your bed.”
Kasper chuckled and reached for my hand. His fingers were long and elegant, like the rest of him, but there was a roughness to them that spoke of work. I wondered how he got them like that.
“I thought you’d jumped out the window,” Kasper said. “I was only a few minutes away from assembling a search party. With dogs and everything.”
“I love dogs.”
Kasper grinned. “Tell me what’s wrong, Laurie.”
I sighed and looked down at our linked hands. “I don’t belong here,” I replied. “Everybody would laugh at me if they knew who I really was.”
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br /> “They most certainly would not,” he said. “I’d have their heads.” The twinkle in his eye forced a smile to my lips.
“I’m sure that would go down well,” I said, laughing in spite of myself. “I can see the headlines now: Mad Dutch Prince Decapitates Ball Attendees for Snootiness; War Imminent.”
He snorted. “More like: Gallant Prince Defends Date’s Honor; Women Everywhere Swoon.”
“See it how you want to, Casanova,” I teased. “But at the end of the day, I’m just not right for this crowd. I’m just going to end up making you look bad. Maybe I should just go home.”
Kasper’s thumb lightly stroked the back of my hand. My breath caught in my throat.
“Laurie,” he murmured. “You don’t have less of a right to be here than any of them. Certainly not me. Being born into royalty doesn’t make me any better than anyone else.”
“But it’s easy for you,” I countered. “People automatically respect you. They want to know you.”
“And these people would want to know you, too, if you just gave them a chance.” He raised my hand to his lips, pressing a gentle kiss to the back of it. My heart thumped in my chest like a bongo drum. “We all wear masks, darling. Tonight, yours has more truth than most of the people here. Embrace it.”
He released my hand, and it fell numbly to my side. My brain could barely function with all the electricity running between us. I thought I might pass out.
“If I stay, you’ll save me if anything goes wrong?” I asked.
Kasper’s lip curled upward. “I’ll do you one better than that,” he said, threading an arm around my waist and leading me back into the main hall. “I’ll dance with you until you feel like you can talk to people again.”
“What if I never want to talk to anyone again?”
“Then I guess we’ll be dancing for quite some time.”
Even though I didn’t know any dance steps, the thought of dancing with Kasper made my heart sing.
***
He guided me out to the dance floor and turned me in a circle before settling my hand on his shoulder, clasping the other in his.
“I should warn you that I don’t know any dance steps,” I told him.
He began leading me backward, his eyes on mine the whole time, a gentle smile on his lips. “None at all?”
“Well, I know the Macarena,” I admitted. “But I hardly think that’s going to help me here.”
Kasper laughed. “You never know with these society functions,” he replied. “I once saw the French Prime Minister breakdance.”
“Somehow, I don’t believe that,” I said, narrowing my eyes.
Kasper winked. “It was worth a shot.”
“Any other yarns you’d like to spin while we’re here?”
Kasper twirled me. “I know a good one about a man-eating fish,” he said.
“I thought you might.”
Kasper smiled. “I’m glad you didn’t jump out the window.”
I felt myself go pale. “How did you know?”
“I didn’t,” he said, grinning. “But I suspected. You had that look in your eye.”
I wasn’t doing the correct steps, but I could keep up decently enough to look like I knew what I was doing from the waist up. Or so I hoped.
The song ended and we parted from one another to clap for the band. I leveled my gaze at him as I did, desperate to figure him out. When the band started up again, Kasper pulled me just a smidge closer than he had before. I didn’t know whether it was just him or a requirement of the dance. I didn’t care.
“Do women often try to jump out of windows when they’re on dates with you?” I asked. “It seems to be something you’re pretty familiar with.”
“It’s a hazard of my profession,” he replied.
“Is that so?”
Kasper leaned in close to me, his lips tickling the skin just below my ear. “You should know,” he said softly. “I’m sure you’ve heard that about me before.”
“I’ve heard lots of things about you before,” I replied, my breath catching in my throat.
“So you know all about me, then,” he murmured.
I laughed. “I know almost nothing about you,” I said. “Nor does anybody else who reads those God-awful magazines.”
Kasper’s rumbling laugh tickled my neck and sent a shiver down my spine. He pulled back to look at me, his lips curled in amusement. I smiled brightly in return.
In his arms, with the music drowning out the endless chatter of the hall, I felt at peace. His arms were strong and warm around me, never faltering in their strength. I wondered how one man could contain so much elegance and grace, yet had a knack for making me laugh even when I thought I was about to cry.
Kasper was an enigma. I studied him while we danced, hoping to find something written on his face that would help me understand him. And somehow, I think it worked. Because something clicked into place in my head.
The letters in Kasper’s study.
The evening’s mysterious donor.
The whispers. The secrecy. The masks.
I didn’t know why he didn’t want praise for funding it, but in that moment I was certain that Kasper was the donor responsible for organizing the ball. I smiled.
“What is it?” Kasper asked. “You look a little devious. What have you done? Should I tell Eric to bring the car around?”
“What?” I asked, laughing. “Can’t a girl just smile?”
He spun me in a lazy circle, holding me even closer when I came back around. “That depends,” Kasper replied. “But I suspect you’ve got a streak of mischief in you.”
“It’s nothing like that,” I said. “I’ve just had a realization.”
He raised one eyebrow at me, smirking. “Oh yeah?”
I leaned in close, sliding up onto my tiptoes to get close to his ear. “Prince Kasper van Dijk, crown prince of the Netherlands: I know which mask you wear.”
A look of surprise and what I could have sworn was admiration dawned on Kasper’s face. I didn’t get a chance to study it properly though, because at that moment, every light in the ballroom went out, and the world became a sea of black.
NINE
Darkness has an equal potential for beauty and horror. Some of the guests went straight to the horror end of the spectrum, punctuating the darkness with the sounds of screams and the clatter of things being knocked over. But Kasper and I felt something different.
As soon as we were plunged into blackness, Kasper pulled me closer. At first, I thought he was just keeping hold of me so he didn’t lose me in the crowd. But then I felt his lips press against my ear, my cheek, the side of my mouth.
I turned my face to his, feeling the soft brush of his lips against mine. Then our mouths met, and I sank into him like water crashing against the sand.
In the dark, it was like we were alone. We were back in his living room, drinking wine as the snow piled down outside. Erased of our identities, we were free to explore our innermost feelings. Or at least that was how I felt.
But nothing lasts forever; power outages even less so.
The first bright flash in my face sent me reeling back, eyes wildly searching for its source. Around us, a sea of lights had begun to flare. Cellphones, flashlights, lighters, and even camera flashes were being used to illuminate the ballroom.
And I hadn’t moved away fast enough.
“Is that Prince Kasper?” someone called out.
“Who’s he with?”
“Who is she?”
Kasper began pulling me through the crowd, our path lit by a dim electronic glow. I followed along without question, anxious to escape the scene we’d just created. My head was still in a spin from the kiss; I wasn’t even sure where the exit was. Thankfully, Kasper knew the way. Within a few minutes, we were back in his limousine and back on the road.
“I’m sorry about that,” Kasper said.
I was seated next to him on the wide backseat of the limo, still panting from our speedy exit.
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“I’m not really sure what just happened,” I replied. “Why did the power go out?”
“Who can say?” Kasper said, grabbing a bottle of champagne from the cooler and popping it open. “It could have been foul play, but it was more likely just a power grid malfunction.”
“And…the rest of it?” I prodded.
Kasper grinned mischievously, handing me a glass of champagne. “I’m not sure I know what you’re referring to.”