by Geneva Lee
She looked like she seriously doubted that, and I hadn’t given her good reason to believe me over the last year. But despite her concern, I wasn’t going to relent on the issue of dating her brother. Barrister or not. Thankfully, I was saved from more of her fawning by the arrival of her fiancé before she could continue to plead her case.
“There’s Philip,” she said, jumping up and smoothing her skirt. She turned to me for approval.
“You look fabulous, as always.” I didn’t have to fib. No matter how much she’d drank or how long she’d been on her feet, Belle always looked freshly pressed and carefully polished. “Tell Pip I said hello.”
Belle stuck her tongue out at me as she sashayed toward him. Philip acted a bit too serious for my taste, and that was saying something. He hated the nickname Pip, which made me love it. Not because I didn’t like him. He was fine—classically handsome with a sharply angled face and dusty blond hair, tall and well-spoken. And the fact that he came with a title and loads of money didn’t hurt either. He was exactly what Belle wanted in a man: financial and genetic security. I couldn’t blame her for that. We’d both felt lost in our lives, so I understood seeking a safe spot. I only wished she could respect my safe spot would never be with a man like him or her brother or any of the other old friends I was likely to suddenly meet in the next few weeks.
I watched as Philip caught her hand and pulled her to him. Her face lit up as soon as she was in his arms, and a sigh escaped my lips. They looked perfect together, like a fairytale come to life. Maybe I was wrong about why they were together. Perhaps he was more than just a soft landing after all.
There are some places you walk into and immediately feel at home in, as though it had been waiting for you to show up all your life. For me, most of those places had been libraries and cafes, quiet spots on secluded beaches and under shady trees. I’d never really felt at home in any of the houses my parents had purchased when I was a teenager. They were too big and too cold. It had been more like living in a museum and I hated to feel like I was on display. But I’d known as soon as I walked into the flat Belle’s aunt owned that I would be happy here.
More than happy: safe.
“What do you think?” Belle asked me, twisting her engagement ring around her finger.
I wasn’t sure I could find the words, and there was a little part of me that hated to admit I was wrong about the idea of renting from her aunt. But I turned to face her, unable to keep a silly grin from sliding onto my face. “When can we move in?”
Aunt Jane swept by us in a blur of flowing tunics and scarves to open a window. “That’s better! I can’t stand stuffy rooms.” She sighed into the breeze floating in through the window. “It’s vacant, and that’s not good for a house’s soul. I have the keys right here. It’s yours when you want it.”
I took a set from her outstretched palm without hesitation. To deal with end of term stress, I’d systematically made a list every day that included all the things I needed to worry about after exams. Finding a flat had been one of the items I’d still lost sleep over. Now it felt like the pieces of my life—my real, adult life—were falling into place. And the rent she’d given us would be easy to cover even after Belle got married so long as she offered what was clearly a family discount. I wouldn’t even have to dip into my trust fund.
“It will be nice to have young blood in this house,” she continued. “The last tenant was a musician, who I fear was going slightly tone deaf.”
“Aunt Jane has a soft spot for musicians,” Belle informed me with a wink.
“They make excellent lovers,” her aunt confirmed. Her face was deadly serious, as though we were merely discussing a business item like what to do if the toilet overflowed. “Please tell me you’ve gone to bed with a musician.”
I choked back the laugh that bubbled into my throat and shook my head. Aunt Jane’s expression suggested that she thought this was a great loss. She turned hopefully to Belle who answered in the negative, as well. Her petite shoulders slumped and she shook her head sadly.
“And with you getting married. Ah well, you can always have an affair. Musicians are excellent for that, too.”
It seemed to me that the breath of fresh air in this flat was Aunt Jane, and I followed her from room to room as she pointed out the small quirks of my future home. Nothing about her screamed old money, although I knew she was if she owned this building. Her gray hair was spiked in a sort of punk rock pixie that suited her slight frame and elegant face. She had aristocratic bones, that much was certain, but she felt worldly and exotic. Nothing like the stuck-up types I’d encountered at university functions. I’d known that I liked her instantly and my gut was never wrong.
The flat was perfect. It had been updated recently with gleaming, stainless steel appliances and an overlarge Jacuzzi tub. But the walls were a combination of exposed brick and carefully maintained plaster with delicate woodwork that framed the doorways and windows. The oak floors had been refinished and polished. The only thing it lacked was a fireplace, but I’d hardly miss that during the upcoming summer months. Once we had furniture, I’d be able to check off most of my to-do list. I might even have a few days to explore London before I began work.
“Do you have a room preference?” Belle asked me as we took a final stroll through the flat.
“Either is fine.”
“Liar.” She linked her arm through mine and dragged me to the smaller but cozier of the two rooms. “I know you want this one.”
I chewed my lip, afraid I would be stepping on her toes if I admitted she was right. With its bay window, it was exactly to my taste.
“It is nice,” I said slowly.
“It’s yours. The other one has a door to the loo, so I can beat you into it every morning.”
“How devious of you.” I laughed, not because she was clever, but because the idea that Belle would rise before me seemed unlikely. Belle’s primary job for the next twelve months was finalizing the details of her wedding. If there was ever a career that allowed for schedule flexibility, she’d found it.
“I’m going to thank Aunt Jane.” She disappeared, leaving me alone in the room.
I could already see where the bed would go and my bookshelf. I could probably even squeeze in an armchair or at least a bench under the large window that overlooked the bustling street three stories below. Everything was falling into place, thanks to a stroke of luck and my careful plans over the last academic year.
But deep down, I wondered when it would all change. Staring out my new window, I noticed the spring sky had gone gray and clouds hung low—a storm was coming.
Faint noises crept into my dreams from the street below my window, but I clung to the unconscious state. I was dreaming of a handsome man with the slight scruff of next-day stubble, his face cast in shadows, and the sultry scent of cloves hanging in the air between us. His fingers were on my collarbone, tracing down to my top button as his lips found my jawline. The honk of a horn distracted him, and he pulled back even as I fought harder to stay asleep. But then he was several feet from me, a knowing smirk on his face. He shrugged as the morning light seeped through my eyelids, dissolving the final fragments of the dream. But I refused to open my eyes, desperate to sink back into the fantasy.
It was the rich scent of coffee that did me in entirely, forcing my eyes to open as Belle sauntered into the room. She crooked her finger at me. “Sit up, darling, and you can have this.”
“What time is it?” I asked, still searching for the strings of consciousness to connect me with the all important where and when of my early morning state.
“Time to unpack,” Belle said, releasing the mug to my custody, “or are you off to be a grown-up already?”
“I don’t start until next Friday. You have me at your mercy for a while yet, which is why you should let me go back to sleep.” I took a sip of the coffee, surrendering to the fact that I wasn’t going to have a lie in.
“Did you get anything unpacked?” Bel
le asked as she read the list of contents scrawled across the nearest box top.
I patted my mattress. The four-poster bed was fully made up with a down comforter stuffed in a creamy duvet and a half dozen feather pillows. A good night’s sleep had been my top priority after a week of crashing on couches and trips to and from Oxford. But that meant that all around us boxes were still taped shut. My walls were still bare, save for a coat of steely-blue paint. I’d even have to dig to find clothes, although, from the looks of it, Belle had already unpacked her closet. Despite the fact that it was the crack of dawn, she was fully dressed in skinny, dark jeans and a loose, draping t-shirt that fell artfully across her slender figure. She looked like a model with her shiny blond hair tied back from her perfect, naturally sun-kissed complexion.
Outside, a series of honks shattered the somewhat peaceful bustle of early morning traffic. Belle leapt to her feet to peek out the window, frowning when she caught sight of the street below.
“What in the hell is going on down there?” I asked.
“A bunch of gawkers. They look like reporters,” she said with a dismissive wave. “Maybe there was an accident.”
I groaned and shoved myself out of bed, depositing my coffee mug with a sigh on a nearby box. It was disgraceful how reporters flocked to any gruesome scene in London, as though the public wanted to see photographs of mangled cars on the nightly news. Even the protection put into place after Princess Sarah’s death hadn’t stopped them from finding new ways to stalk their bloody headlines. My stomach turned over just thinking about it. I had no idea what had their attention now, but no doubt I’d be subjected to all the sordid details at every newsstand for the next few days.
“I don’t see anything happening.” Belle wrinkled her nose in annoyance, obviously put out to not know what was happening on the street.
“I’ll never be able to lay in now,” I said, shifting boxes around until I found one marked clothes. “Let me get a shower and then we can unpack.”
Belle nodded, slipping toward the door. “I might pop down and have a look while you get dressed.”
I shook my head, doing my best to look reproachful.
“What if there’s an emergency? Or a murderer on the loose?” Belle asked. “We’re new to the neighborhood, Clara darling. We should take precautions.”
“Don’t you mean we should catch all the gossip first?”
Belle mashed her lips together, trying to hide a grin, but only appearing more impish for the effort. “You won’t even know I’m gone.”
It took nearly five minutes for the shower to heat up, but when I slipped in, my shoulders relaxed and I let the water wash over me. Shutting my eyes, I thought of my dream and the mystery man from earlier in the week. Something stirred in my belly, tightening in my core, and I wished I could finish the dream. Or better yet, I thought as I lathered soap across my body, I wish I could see him again. I tried to convince myself the desire was innocent. That I only wanted to know what his name was and why he’d used me to avoid that girl, but honestly, more than anything, I wanted him to kiss me again. My hands had slid further down my stomach, making their way for the pulse growing more demanding between my legs.
“Don’t be stupid,” I said to myself, turning to rinse off the rest of the soap in the hot water before I shut off the shower. Hopefully, I wasn’t desperate enough to get myself off alone in the shower yet. By the time I had towel-dried my thick, chestnut hair and found a pair of comfortable old jeans, I could hear Belle in the kitchen.
“Uncover all the sordid details?” I asked as I joined her. There was fresh coffee in my mug, and I sipped it as I waited for her to spill.
Belle met my eyes, her face both pale and flushed at the same time. Her fingers drummed against a stack of newspapers on the counter.
“Is there something you forgot to tell me, Clara?” she asked.
My eyebrows knit together as I tried to decode her question. Belle and I had been flatmates through our years at Oxford because, apart from generally liking each other, neither of us pried. We didn’t have to. Belle never separated personal from private, meaning she had no secrets from me, and since my life was far less interesting than hers, she knew it all.
“What’s going on, Belle?” I asked in a low voice. My stomach twisted into a knot. “You look like you’re going to be sick.”
She let out a nervous laugh that evolved into a fit of giggles as she tried to speak. “It’s…just…so…absurd!”
I grabbed for a paper, but Belle snatched it away, shaking her head with a coy smile.
“You might want to sit down, darling,” she instructed me.
I sank onto a kitchen stool, dread creeping up my limbs and turning my blood to ice. I’d never done a single thing wrong in my life. There was absolutely no reason to suspect that whatever had Belle in a tizzy had anything to do with me. But it did. I was certain of it. I could tell by the way she was acting.
She was positively gloating.
“Out with it,” I said with impatience, feeling sicker by the minute.
She flipped over a tabloid so that I could see the cover photo of two people snogging. This is what she was freaking out about? I raised an eyebrow at her and she shoved another tabloid under my nose. This photograph was cropped closer to the subjects, but it took me a moment to process what I was looking at. I recognized the paneling of the hallway and the terrace behind the couple. It wasn’t just any two people. It was me and the mystery man from the party at the Oxford and Cambridge Club. The photograph jolted me back to the moment.
His silky hair.
The taste of cloves and bourbon on his lips.
My body responded to the memory with a pang, aching for his touch.
It had been a legendary kiss, but that didn’t explain why we were on the cover of a tabloid.
“I don’t understand,” I said, but even as the words left my lips, the attached headline began to sink in. “The reporters outside?”
Belle nodded.
How could I not have recognized him? Apparently I’d been more out of it the last few months than I thought. The tiny voice in my head clucked at me, tossing around words like idiotic, naive, innocent. Then I remembered what had woken me this morning and I grabbed Belle’s arm to steady myself.
“Me?” My mouth went dry as I asked.
“You were the one snogging the fucking prince,” Belle said, her words a curious mix of jealousy and admiration.
“But I didn’t know it was him,” I said weakly, memories flashing so quickly through my mind that everything became a tangled jumble of thoughts and emotions. My pulse raced as I realized the mystery had been solved. I knew who he was, and the excitement of that bubbled through me until I realized the terrible price of that information. It was no longer my mystery, and I could no longer claim the innocence of ignorance. Not knowing who he was? It wasn’t much of an excuse, and it certainly wasn’t going to grant me a reprieve from the reporters out for whatever piece they could get of me. And knowing who he was? It wasn’t going to get me back in his arms. My stomach dropped as the full implications of this mistake hit me, and I choked back the bile that rose in my throat.
“How on Earth did you not realize it was him?” Belle asked.
I paused to consider this, trying to ignore the tongue-lashing that my overly critical, rational side was giving my subconscious. Like most girls my age, I’d grown up on a diet of the royal family, particularly the two handsome princes that weren’t much older than myself. They’d even graced the cover of a few popular teen magazines in the States when I was younger. But they’d all but vanished from public life. At least Alexander had, not long before my family had moved from California to the UK, and then I’d gone off to university. A crush on the crown prince hadn’t exactly been my top priority for the last few years.
“He seemed familiar,” I admitted. “I thought I knew him from Oxford. I haven’t even seen a photo of him for years. Are you sure that’s him?”
“H
ave you been living under a rock?”
“I have been studying and going for jobs,” I reminded her, pacing through the kitchen as though I could walk off the embarrassment. Lack of a social life was a foreign concept to Belle, who thrived on being at the center of a group as often as possible. I hadn’t even been to see a movie in months.
“He’s back from Iraq,” she told me, her fingers tracing the photo longingly. “He got a medal of some sort and has been celebrating by shacking up with every vagina in the greater London area.”
I winced at this revelation, feeling surprisingly hurt. Not only was the guy I’d been fantasizing about for the last few days completely unattainable, but I was just another girl in a long line. “Should I be flattered or horrified that I’m counted in the throngs of his conquests?” I tossed the tabloid I was holding in the rubbish bin. Then immediately pulled it back out to stare at the photo more. “Why is this even news?”
“Because the press thinks you’re different.”
I snorted at this, shaking my head in disgust. “I guess I didn’t actually let him fuck me. Does that make me different?”
I didn’t add that I would have let him or that I’d been fantasizing about him for days. It was foolish of me to even think about him after that day. I’d known he was trouble the moment we’d met, so why had I toyed with the idea of seeing him again?
“It’s not that.” Belle wrinkled her nose in frustration. I couldn’t exactly see why she was the one getting annoyed when it was my face on the bloody magazine cover. “It’s the circumstances. He’s been photographed at clubs with plenty of women.”
I raised an eyebrow. “You already mentioned the throng.”
She continued, ignoring my color commentary. “He’s only been seen in public places. No one’s caught him doing anything or anyone.”
I groaned, starting to feel frustrated myself. “You said he’d shagged half of London.”
“That’s what I’ve heard—”
“That’s what you’ve read,” I corrected.