“I understand,” he said. “I wasn’t trying to pull one over on you, I swear. It’s true when I met you, I was there to do surveillance for the Front. But I didn’t know about the gunman! And I…they haven’t talked to me in weeks.”
“What do you mean?”
“I hadn’t been going to meetings,” he said. “We meet once a month—”
“Where?”
“It changes constantly,” he said. “They’ve probably already moved on—especially since I was arrested—but the last place I knew about was an old loft apartment someone rented out on the Air BnB website.”
“The exact address?”
“I can write it down for you.”
“Is that it?” I leaned forward, as though I was going to get up again. I could see the panic in his eyes, and his hands twitched as though he could stop me.
“I can tell you more,” he said. “Look, I know they’re planning something at Christmas, the Holiday Gala. They’re doing something with that.”
“What?”
“I don’t know. I’m sorry.”
I sighed, and we just looked at each other. My protective wall shimmered, and for a few heartbeats I saw that he was a scared, tired, hungry, young man. He wanted to go home. Was this really all he knew?
I let my disappointment show in my features and stood again, slowly. This time he made no move to stop me. I gave him time, but there were no last-minute revelations.
I let the door shut behind me, and found myself standing face to face with Vince again. Normally, his face would be a comfort to me, a safe place. But right now all I felt was exhaustion. I gave him a small, sad, smile.
“Well, it’s better than nothing,” Benecio said. “We’ve got a lead.”
He said it like I’d failed, and actually that’s how I felt , too. I turned away from him. I wasn’t interested in his brand of judgement.
“I want to go back now.”
“Right away.”
Vince seemed to sense my agitation because he was there, opening the door for me. Chin up, I looked neither to the left nor right as I walked quickly to the car, aware of all the eyes on me. I just wanted to get out, get home, and get into my bed where I could think for a little bit. I opened the door for myself and climbed into the car, just as I had stepped out of it before.
Vince slid in after me and shut the door.
“He wasn’t all that helpful,” Vince said after a moment, and I wondered at what point we had moved beyond formalities and to the point where Vince was willing to share his opinions on things. I didn’t mind, not really.
“I was afraid something like this would happen,” I said. “That was a waste of time. He played me again.”
“I don’t think he was playing you as much as you think,” he said with a reluctantly sympathetic tone. “I think he didn’t expect to see you. He was just trying to slight the agents by making it hard on them. He knew he didn’t know anything, so he had no chance for a plea deal.”
Well, we did learn that something was being planned for the gala at Christmas. I wondered if they would shut it down, cancel it, or if it would just be covered and crawling with security and soldiers ready to fire guns to keep the crown safe.
The car lurched forward, and we didn’t talk any more.
Chapter 13
By the time I returned to school two days later, the whole situation had turned me from the quiet, somewhat unknown girl in the back of the class into a celebrity.
“Are you nervous?’ Vince asked as we waited in the foyer of the palace for the driver to pull up outside.
He’d gotten bold in his questions. It didn’t offend me; in fact I enjoyed his friendship and having someone to talk to. He was sweet and kind, and right now I had nobody else like that around me. Of course, if his superior officers found out he was speaking with me in any fashion, they’d strip him of his badge and gun so fast I probably wouldn’t even know he was gone for several hours afterwards. For that reason, I tried to talk quietly and not draw attention to our conversations. But it was hard when all I wanted to do, constantly, was talk to him.
“Of course I am,” I said. “I got pulled out of school last when my only friend was arrested as a terrorist and haven’t been back since. I’ve been all over the news…people are going to be awkward about this, I’m sure.”
“I imagine,” he sighed. “And I’m sorry I can’t help you bear the burden.”
“You help plenty,” I said.
The plan, right now, was that we were going to have that gala. My aunt had announced that Carlo was going to help us, that he’d been offered a deal and he’d accepted it eagerly. We were going to use the event as a way to catch the terrorists who wanted to put an end to the crown. It was Aunt Sonia’s plan, and she was proud of it. I couldn’t tell if Antonio was quite as enthusiastic. He sat quietly beside her, unsmiling, but also not telling her he thought she was nuts.
I’d agreed. I was angry and I wanted all this to be over.
“I’ll be there, you know,” he said, and shifting towards me ever so slightly. He was able to protect me physically, but we both knew he meant he wanted to be more than that. His gaze dropped and he became highly interested in his shoes while he seemed to be searching for the words he wanted to say. “I’ll be as close as I can be.”
That statement had many meanings: he’d be as close as he could be without alarming other guards, as close as I would let him be, as close as the classroom layout and the lecturer would physically allow him. There was a lot standing in the way of the things we wanted and he had managed to convey them all with one sentence.
“I know,” I whispered. “I’m grateful.”
He didn’t meet my eye, and I wanted him to. I wanted to see what he was feeling and hope that it was real.
But what I really wanted to know, more than anything, was whether my own feelings were real, or if I just needed someone to like me – somewhere to turn after the betrayal I had endured. I wasn’t sure, and Vince tended to look at me with an intensity that took my breath away, but made it hard to tell what he was feeling.
I realized with a little jolt that he had some power over me. If he wanted to, he could just flip the switch. If he gave me a clear indication of his feelings he’d have me in his thrall. Maybe he was already doing that.
“We should go,” I said, disconcerted, but still noticing that I could smell the soap on his skin, that I could see the spray of little freckles on his face. Even as I realized I needed to be careful, I was leaning a little closer.
We were standing in the foyer of the palace, in view of the security cameras. Anyone could walk in and see us – would they be able to tell how I was feeling? Did Vince know?
“The car isn’t here yet,” he explained softly.
Before I could make several mistakes, we heard the sound of a car pulling up outside. I placed a hand against his chest and gave him a small smile.
Then I pushed off and placed a reasonable amount of distance between us just as the door opened and someone came in to tell us the car had been pulled around and was ready for me.
* * *
But school was a nightmare. As soon as the car pulled up onto campus, several eyes were already pointed in my direction, waiting to see what I would do. They knew who I was. They saw the flags on the front of the car, the symbol of a government official – and there was only one official who went to this school.
Vince stepped out of the car quickly and came around the side, opening the door for me and avoiding eye contact as he did so. He straightened his tie and gave me a stiff nod when I stepped out, as though we were nothing more than princess and servant. I ignored the scent of his aftershave, which I’d become so familiar with over the past few weeks. Then I was on the sidewalk, where everyone could see me – and everyone was looking.
I couldn’t tell what they were thinking, what was on the minds of the people staring at me from all sides of the courtyard. They weren’t smiling, they didn’t look like sympathetic
well-wishers. My skin prickled at the unwelcoming feeling, like somehow I was a pariah now, despite being the one who had been attacked and threatened. They didn’t trust me.
I wanted to turn and ask Vince what he thought was going on, but I couldn’t draw attention to him. It would be best if I just carried on. Chin up, I walked into the quad and to my first lecture.
I used to sit next to Carlo in this class, and he would explain to me everything I didn’t understand about the lecture. Now, I was going to have to understand it all on my own, as best I could. It was ok, I was getting better at the language – but I still felt his absence.
I walked into the lecture hall with my head held high and eyes forward. At the front of the room, the outline of the lecture was already written on the whiteboard. The TA paused, turning to look at me and then steal a glance at the professor. She seemed a little surprised, but she gave me a warm smile and nodded. It was the best thing that had happened to me all morning. I nodded back and chose a seat in the front.
I knew the politics of stealing someone’s seat far into the semester. There was a grace period and I was breaking an unspoken code – but I didn’t care. This was part of the whole proving myself thing. I’d sit right up front, where everyone could see me. I’d answer as many questions as I could and look as informed as possible.
“Good morning, ladies and gentlemen,” the professor called out. “As I mentioned in the last lecture, we’ll be continuing with our look at the economic crisis in Heledia in the 1940s as a result of the Great Depression.”
I took out my notebook, pretending that I wasn’t going to be so far behind from missing classes. I knew all about the Great Depression; at least the American end of it, and I could imagine it wasn’t so different for people in Europe. This should be an easy topic for me to grasp quickly and hit the ground running.
“Now, at this time, Heledia was still utilizing the cinci system.” Cinci system, I knew that one. It was the currency from my grandfather’s time. “That is believed to have been part of the issues with the Heledian economic situation.”
“How so?” someone called out from behind me in the classroom.
“The cinci was weaker,” the professor said, simply. “It couldn’t withstand the loss of value against other currencies.”
The student grumbled.
“Something the matter, Mr. Cichello?”
“I just don’t think my parents pay my bills at school to hear the opinion of professors over fact.”
Uh-oh. I stiffened in my seat and felt the creeping heat of secondhand embarrassment flooding into my system. I could tell from the change of pressure in the room, the sound of several creaks in chairs and desks, that other students felt the same.
“I beg your pardon, Mr. Cichello?”
“Telling us that the cinci was weaker than other money—”
“Is a fact, not an opinion.”
“We were never stronger than we were in the 1930s when we had our own, independent system of currency.”
“And then the world economy collapsed and we were forced to adapt.”
“And lose our heritage in the process.”
“That is not a part of the economic situation, Mr. Cichello.”
“I just don’t like foreigners ruining our perfectly good systems.”
“Evidently, they were not ‘perfectly good,’ considering their collapse.”
I swallowed a thick lump in my throat that seemed to have been formed from my own irritation. I was used to hearing things like this in America, people complaining about immigrants, about foreign investors coming into the country, about anything that wasn’t made in America. I knew everyone had their own form of nationalism but, for some reason, I didn’t expect it here.
That was ridiculous, of course. My struggles were living proof of Heledia’s national pride, with all the protests and critical newspaper columns about bringing in an American to rule the country. I had a feeling that if I turned around, I’d be met with a rather unhappy and unwelcoming gaze from the students behind me. I suddenly regretted my decision to sit at the front of the class and show off everything I thought I knew. I could feel the eyes on me. The discussion was just as much about me as it was about the economy.
I wanted to hunker down, make myself small and curl inward, but one movement from me would alert them all. I needed to be still, not let them know how nervous I was, how much this conversation was affecting me. I needed to be cool under the pressure, that’s what a queen did. This was yet another test of my abilities. I could be a queen in this classroom and I could be a queen for the country.
“Moving on…” the professor said, turning back to her outline on the board.
The rest of the class passed without incident, though the boy in the back who had spoken up before was still blowing out puffs of air and snorting every so often when he didn’t agree with something – which seemed like every other statement the professor was making. I wondered if she was taking such a pro-immigration stance because I was there. I wondered if it was for my benefit that she was speaking so proactively about Heledia being a place for world citizens.
The class ended and I decided it was in my best interests to wait for everyone else to vacate the classroom before I left. I didn’t want to make eye contact with anyone or, God forbid, run into the boy who had spent the entire class vocalizing how much he hated foreign influence. I sat there, pretending to take the time to reorganize my backpack, while I heard the scuffled sounds of shoes walking out, chairs being pushed in, people making small talk with each other as they moved out of the room.
“I’m glad to see you back in lecture,” the professor said, and I jumped at the sudden voice. She smiled kindly.
“I’ve had a busy week,” I said, zipping up my bag.
“I can imagine,” she said. “It was quite the stir and I’m sorry for any distress you’ve been under.”
“It’s part of my job,” I shrugged. “Or will be, one day.”
“I’ve always loved Heledia’s place as one of the last true monarchies in the world,” she said, wistfully, while looking out the window. “I’ve always loved that I can say I have allegiance to a king or queen, and one day that queen will be you.”
She looked back at me with so much pride that I felt butterflies in my stomach. She was smiling so brightly that I couldn’t help but smile back at her. She was the kind of person with an infectious sort of energy. She did manage to make me feel better about my day, at the very least.
I thanked her for the lecture, hoping she understood the sincerity in my voice was more for her vote of confidence than anything else. She smiled and sent me on my way to Vince, waiting in the doorway wearing a frown that was almost a glare.
“What is it?” I asked, when I got close enough to him that no one else would hear.
“That kid was running his big mouth some more after class,” he said. “It’s frustrating.”
I gave him a small smile, the best I could conjure up. Then I nodded and we moved on, down the hall, and out of the building.
I had an hour’s break until my next class, during which I usually got a cup of coffee. Unfortunately, my normal coffee companion was Carlo. I wondered if Vince could join me, if he would be allowed to buy some coffee on campus and sit down at a table and drink it with me. So far we’d done several things that probably weren’t considered kosher by his bosses. What was a cup of coffee at a café table on top of that?
“I want to get coffee,” I said, making a sharp turn towards the place I usually went to. Vince followed without missing a beat. “Do you want some?”
“I had my fill of coffee today,” he said. “I’m not supposed to drink more than a couple cups. I’ve had about three this morning.”
“Rough night?”
“I haven’t been sleeping all that great, recently,” he shrugged.
I looked at him. His face was paler than usual, I realized. He had dark circles under his eyes, which were a little glazed. His hands were s
hoved in his pockets instead of out and at his sides, ready to take on an attacker, like they should be. His shoulders were tighter, more hunched. I hadn’t noticed earlier, dodging the looks of other people around me. He was exhausted.
“How come you didn’t take the day off?” I asked.
“Because I didn’t want to leave you alone on your first day,” he said. “You needed a friend, not Benecio glaring at you the whole time.”
I smiled at his kindness, but felt bad about being the cause of discomfort for him. I knew it was his job and sometimes we all had to do our jobs when we would really rather be home alone, relaxing, sleeping, being with our families. But I knew there was something personal in it for him. He wanted to help me, he wanted to be the one protecting me because he felt like he was going to do the best job of it.
“Thank you,” I said softly over the din of students as we entered the café. “I really do appreciate it.”
We worked our way to the back, to a seat tucked away in the corner. I sat down and for a minute it seemed like he was going to insist on the pretense of standing near me, but he relented and sat down as well. He was stiff, uncomfortable. We’d gone from standing together, a professional protector and his charge, to almost looking like we were on a date that he was dressed far too formally for.
“Relax,” I said. “It’s just coffee. It’s my ritual between classes; I can’t very well give it up now, can I?”
I smiled determinedly at him, and finally he relented and relaxed slightly. We were surrounded by other people, but not those who were likely to report him, or reprimand me, or look down on us both. The other bodyguards were patrolling the campus, tasked, recently, with looking for any suspicious activity while I went between classes with a single guard.
They said it was better that way, that they didn’t want to draw attention to me or make me stand out too much. Personally, I thought the school’s own security was covering the grounds, but I would take what personal freedom I could get, especially if I could get away from Benecio and his cronies.
A Royal Renewal: The Royals of Heledia Page 15