Alex walked over to look out the wide window at the sea.
“But I do need to speak to you, not as my son, but as my appointed regent. I want the security people to pull back, to afford us a bit more privacy. And I want them to be especially diligent with regard to the media. Every year, at least once, some enterprising paparazzi manage to remember me and lurk about waiting for the perfect picture. Usually, they go away too bored to keep up their surveillance. This year, an untimely expose´ would be most unwelcome.”
“I’ll do what I can. I’ll ask the team to not report further on personal matters, and to be extra diligent with regard to any media.” In the pause that followed, Alex wondered what Michael thought. “Father, you need to know that I’ve already requested a background check on Mrs. Jones one level deeper than the standard done on all the guests registered at the Villa.”
Alex winced. Each year, prior to his vacation, such basic security precautions would be undertaken. He was, after all, the reigning monarch of his nation. Yes, Boisdemer being a small country, it held no great prominence on the world stage. But in this age of enhanced world security, such measures needed to be taken.
“Are you concerned that Hannah may have skeletons in her closet?” He wondered if Michael heard the edge in his voice.
“No, Your Majesty. I’m simply doing my job.”
“Forgive me, Michael. I’m not handling this at all well.” Then, because he felt he needed to make amends, he confided, “She doesn’t know who I am.”
“Is that wise? From a relationship point of view?”
“I don’t want the specter of my title to intimidate her. I just want a chance to see what’s here.”
“One of the things I’ve wished for a long time, is that you have a chance to experience what I have with Helene. I’ll speak to the team leader there, as I said, and demand discretion. And unless some unexpected emergency comes up, you’ll have mine, as well.”
Alex was a little steadier when he disconnected the call. One matter he’d needed advice on, but didn’t feel he could broach with his son, was protection of a more personal sort. He still didn’t know how he would go about getting a supply of condoms without drawing attention to himself.
* * * *
“Did you follow us?”
Philip smiled at the indignant look on Kate’s face. “Absolutely not. I simply decided to spend the rest of my day off from the hospital by taking in the fair.”
“Hi, Philip!”
“Hi, Jamie.”
As Philip watched, Jamie looked at his mother, winced, then said, “Sorry. Doctor Philip. Mom said I’m supposed to call you that, cause it’s your title.”
Beaming at the look of chagrin on Kate’s face, he hunkered down. “Moms can be sticky about things sometimes. I like it that you call me ‘Philip’.” Then he got to his feet. He addressed Kate as if they hadn’t just bumped into each other.
“So what do you think? Is this your first Medieval Fair?”
“No.”
He waited, one eyebrow raised. He could see she was having trouble deciding how to treat him, how to behave. She looked down at her son, then back up at him. And he knew, in that instant, that she would relent. At least here, at the fair.
“We went to a Medieval Fair last year back home.”
“In Canada?”
“Yes. They’re quite popular across Canada and the United States.”
“But in North America, in medieval times the population consisted of aboriginal tribes, yes? I think I would very much like to see such an exhibition.”
“Ah. Well.”
Philip kept the expression on his face guileless.
“No, it wasn’t Natives, Philip. It was sort of like this, but there wasn’t a big stone building. Just tents in a field. But they had horses, and knight training, only there weren’t any jugglers. This one is better.”
Jamie’s natural enthusiasm and candor made Philip smile. The little guy continued to worm his way into his heart. Crouching down again, he asked, “And did you receive any knight training at the fair back home?”
“No, cause I was too young. How come all the neat stuff in life has to wait until you’re either older, or taller?”
“You know, I can remember thinking the same thing when I was a kid. That hasn’t changed, then?”
At Jamie’s solemn headshake no, Philip said, “Well, that’s not fair. Let’s see what we can do about that.” Standing, he put his right hand on Jamie’s shoulder, and looked over at the knight’s training area. As he’d hoped, it didn’t take long for one of the knights to notice him. Philip signaled him over, then looked at Kate. “This is Robert, today Sir Montrefort of the Knights of the Citadel, but actually a major in the Royal Boisdemerian Army. I’ve known him all my life.”
“My liege,” the knight bowed low, his language and actions in keeping with his role of the day.
“Sir Montrefort, we have here Master James of the house of Jones, who wishes to train as a knight. He has a particular fondness for our equine forces.”
Philip tried to keep a straight face, but Jamie’s eyes had widened when the strapping man in light chain mail approached.
“By your command, my liege. Come, young Master James. We’ll make a knight of you!”
As Philip watched, Jamie curbed his eagerness and turned to his mother.
“May I, mom? Please?”
“I’ll take very good care of him, madame. We will be right here, where you can see us,” Robert said.
Philip remained silent, not wanting to intrude on Kate’s parental prerogatives. When she nodded and Jamie whooped in glee, he chuckled.
“You’re very good to him,” she said when they were alone.
“He makes it easy to be good to him. He’s a great kid, Kate.”
“Yeah, he is.”
“Poor Kate,” Philip whispered the words as he turned to her, and couldn’t resist tucking an errant strand of hair behind her ear. She looked so forlorn. “You came across the ocean, looking for nothing more than a vacation, and what do you find? A man who wants to get to know you better, one who is having a damn hard time keeping his hands off you. And one who has nothing but admiration for the woman you are and the child you’ve raised.”
“You confuse me. I don’t have time for this. I don’t have time for you. My life is set for the next few years. Jamie starts school and I start college. It’s going to take all of my energy to take and pass that nursing course. And…”
“What kind of nursing?” He didn’t really need her to answer, because suddenly, he knew. But he wanted to hear her admit it.
“What does that matter?”
“Kate.”
“All right, so I want to be a pediatric nurse. The thing is…”
“The thing is that we have a lot in common, certainly enough to have one dinner together. Please, Kate. Have dinner with me. I’m not asking for a lifetime commitment.” I just want to have dinner with you.”
“Just dinner.”
Philip kept the triumph out of his voice, and tried to keep it off his face. “Just dinner.”
* * * *
From overhead, comfortably ensconced on a cloud of rose petals, Eugenia and Gwendolyn smiled down as Philip wended his way toward the parking lot and his car. Then they smiled at each other.
“What a nice man,” Eugenia said on a sigh. “So dedicated to his young patients, and quite taken by that young Jamie, if I’m any judge.”
“Quite,” replied Gwendolyn, nodding her head. “He’ll make a wonderful father, and what could be more important to that poor young woman? Ah, well, her difficult times are nearly over. Everything’s in place, and tonight when the charming young Prince and Catharine have dinner, why, it’s going to be the beginning of a real happy ever after!”
Eugenia turned to her sister, unable to keep the worry from her voice when she said, “Sister? You didn’t read the Primer For Modern Romance that I gave you, did you?”
“Oh, piffle. You know
I hate to read, sister. Besides, it hasn’t been that long since our last case. I know it’s a different world, and we no longer need worry about horses and carriages, or castles for that matter. But modern technologies and conveniences aside, princes and young maidens couldn’t have changed that much.”
Eugenia opened her hands, and a book appeared. Holding it toward her sister, she said only, “Read.”
* * * *
Funny, I don’t look any different. Hannah took another moment to examine herself in the full-length mirror. For a woman nearing fifty, she supposed she didn’t look too bad. Her breasts weren’t as perky as they once had been, and having given birth to three children meant her tummy was softer than when she’d been twenty. Then she smiled, and the sheer wickedness of her smile reflecting back at her nearly made her giggle. She would have thought that passing the day as she had—having sex three times and then swimming outdoors naked—would have left some sign on her.
She wasn’t any different on the outside. Only on the inside. Turning away from the mirror, Hannah slipped on her caftan and left her bedroom. Standing in front of the bay window that overlooked the ocean, she let her mind play over the day she’d just spent. There was a lightness inside her that hadn’t been there two days before. She never realized there’d been a part of her that had felt old and unattractive. Those feelings certainly had been banished.
No woman could reach multiple orgasms in a single day with a wonderfully handsome and elegant lover and feel unattractive.
She also never would have thought she’d be the type to indulge in an affair. Before feelings of guilt could even begin to form, she squelched them. She deserved whatever fun and excitement she could grab for herself, and damned if she would feel guilty about it.
This had only been the first full day of her two-week vacation. Alex had the same amount of time. Judging by his passionate kiss and the promise he’d asked for when she left—to meet him for breakfast in the morning—he wanted more of her. So she would give herself this gift. Two weeks during which she planned to enjoy as much time with Alex as she could grab.
In the next instant the door burst open.
“Grandma! We went to a farm and I got to ride a horse and then we went to the fair and now I’m a knight!”
Hannah turned at the excited sound of Jamie’s voice. He fairly bounced toward her, holding a plastic sword and shield.
“My goodness! It sounds as if you had a full day.”
“I’m going to put these in my room!” Jamie ran off, likely, Hannah thought, to practice with his sword and re-live some of his adventures without any adults watching. She smiled at Catharine. “And you look like he wore you out.”
“Do I? Well, it’s…been a busy day, I can tell you that. But you don’t look worn out. You look fabulous! So, good seaman?”
“Pardon?”
“Alex? Sailing?”
“Oh! Oh, yes. He seemed to know the ropes. He…ah, handled everything extremely well.”
“Well, that’s good. I’m glad you had a good time. So what else did you do with your day?”
“What else did I do?” Hannah felt like a parrot, and she wondered if she could blame the red decorating her cheeks on the sun. Catharine looked at her expectantly.
“What did I do after sailing? Ah, I napped. And I swam.” And while it delighted her to be having her first-ever affair, she didn’t think she could get used to prevarication. “Well, Giselle will be here any moment. Why don’t we start getting ready for dinner now, without her?”
Catharine, looking a little reluctant, didn’t move. Hannah raised one brow. She'd have thought her daughter would have been eager to thwart their martinet maid.
“Mother? About dinner...”
Chapter 7
“It’s only dinner.”
Catharine felt like a skip on a record. First with Philip, and now with her mother. She sat at the vanity in her room, and began to apply her makeup. Behind her, Jamie stretched out on her bed, completely absorbed in a cartoon playing on the television. Her mother sat beside her. They kept their conversation quiet.
“No, it’s more than just dinner. It’s dinner with a man.”
“Mom, there’s no happy-ever-after here. I only met Philip today.” For reasons she didn’t want to think about too deeply, she’d only told her mother his first name, and his profession. She hadn’t mentioned the tiny fact that he happened to be a prince. “He seems like a really nice guy, and he went out of his way to be nice to Jamie. But I’m not going to marry him and have his babies. I’m just having dinner with him.” She’d known her mother would react this way. For all her protestations to the contrary, Hannah Jones was a very old-fashioned woman, in Catharine’s estimation. Look at how her mother had lived her life. Having been married for more than twenty years to her childhood sweetheart, and widowed nearly ten, her mother seemed to embody the concept of “forever love.” Catharine knew this to be so, because her mother hadn’t dated since her father died. She had, in fact, seemed totally uninterested in doing so.
“Well, of course there’s a happy-ever-after for you, Catharine, if you want there to be. I’ve assumed you were living it. You certainly don’t need a man for that.”
Catharine knew the shock she felt showed on her face. “I don’t?” She’d never thought so. But she had always assumed that happiness, and fullness of life, in her mother’s view, only came with marriage. To hear that her mother really believed otherwise set off tiny rumbles within her.
“Of course you don’t. You’ve got Jamie, and you’ve set a goal in life. You don’t need a man. But it would nice, don’t you think, to have a social life of some sort? To have dinner or go to a movie from time to time with an interesting man or, hell, with an interesting woman, for that matter. It’s not about romance, as stimulating as that would be. You think I’ve wanted you to get married? No, sweetheart. I’ve just wanted you to get out and have a bit of fun for yourself from time to time.”
Catharine turned back to her own face in the mirror. “I’ve been afraid to.” She closed her eyes. Damn, she hadn’t meant to say that.
“No kidding.”
Those two words, dryly spoken, had her opening her eyes and facing her mother, whose next words floored her.
“You and I are so much alike it’s scary.”
“Us? Alike?”
“Yes. You’re almost a mirror image of me. Pregnant at just about the same age, and just as determined to do it all yourself. And ever after, afraid to get involved with a man, have a personal relationship, because you’re afraid of making the same mistake twice.”
“But you married daddy!” Catharine felt a lot of what she had believed to be true sliding out from under her.
“Of course I did. It’s what was expected back in my day when you got knocked up. But getting married only meant that your father and I tied ourselves to each other. It didn’t mean any magical happy-ever-after. If you want to know the truth, many a time I wished I could have gone it alone. It might have been easier, and I certainly would have felt freer. But then, I wouldn’t have had you or Peter.”
“So what’s stopping you now?” Catharine asked, really wanting to know. Her mother’s answer wasn’t at all what she expected.
“A little bit of what’s been stopping you, I guess. Being afraid to make another mistake. And, well, until very recently, I thought myself too old, and too unattractive for any man to be interested in me.”
Unsettled, Catharine turned back to her mirror and tentatively picked up her mascara. For a long time she’d been dropping hints to her mother, trying to get her to develop a social life. This morning, she’d been delighted to learn that Hannah would be spending the day with a man she considered sinfully sexy. She’d been so pleased because her mother deserved to be happy, and have fun. Her mother deserved to be loved. And now, looking at their reflections together in the mirror—hers and her mother’s—she began to think that maybe, just maybe, she did, too.
* * * *
> Alex had hoped to see her tonight. It didn’t matter that they’d spent the entire day together, or that they’d agreed to meet in the morning for breakfast. They’d only been apart three hours and already it seemed too long.
He wondered if he had slipped into a second childhood, only now discovering teenage angst. Hannah might be on vacation with her family, and he may be the king of Boisdemer but those two facts meant nothing at the moment. He wanted to wrap her in his arms, tuck her into his bed, and feast on her.
He saw her, of course. The resort, for all its exclusivity, wasn’t overly large. She sat at one of the outdoor café tables on the deck overlooking the ocean. But she wasn’t alone. Her grandson, Jamie, accompanied her. The boy enthusiastically consumed a dish of ice cream, while chattering happily away. He should probably leave them be, rather than intrude on their time together. He should, he acknowledged as he approached the table, but he didn’t. Jamie saw him first.
“Hi. Mommy’s on a date and me and Grandma are celebrating.”
“Jamie!”
Alex laughed, totally delighted in both the child’s guileless candor and Hannah’s obvious embarrassment.
“That’s not what it sounds like,” she said, looking up at him.
Alex took a seat at their table, and couldn’t resist running a hand down her back. “I’ll presume he meant that you’re celebrating the opportunity to spend time together.”
Looking at the young man, he noticed the plastic sword and shield that lay on the table, and the protective way Jamie had his arm covering them. For some reason, the sight called to mind memories of when his children had been small. Philippe often would transform simple possessions into treasures he would then guard with his very life.
“You have new treasures,” Alex said, nodding to the toys.
“I’m a Knight of the Fortress.”
Alex couldn’t help but smile at the way Jamie straightened up and spoke those words with pride.
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