Dieter couldn’t remember how many times he’d tracked Flicka down when she was a defiant teenager, insisting that nothing would happen to her, even when something did. She’d been the target of five separate kidnapping attempts that he knew of, but she’d run off dozens of times. She called it walking the Earth or jumping ship. No matter how she tried to spin her ability to slide out from under the nose of her security details, it was always dangerous for her. Dieter hated it when she did that. His job was complicated enough without chasing down his primary subject three times a day when she slipped around a corner to get a little alone time.
Even though she was twenty-three now and supposedly much wiser, he didn’t trust her at all. If he could have locked her in or stationed guards at her door, he would have.
Large guards.
Several of them.
Flicka still might have pranced into the Las Vegas crowd when they blinked.
She had the escape artist ability of a mischievous hamster, and it had served her well when she’d had to escape her husband, who had abused her, and his Secret Service security team.
Dieter ground his molars, trying not to turn red with anger because Flicka didn’t like it when he did that. His pale, Swiss skin hid nothing when he got mad.
Before he zipped the duffel, he tucked in the pink teddy bear that Flicka had haggled the pawn shop owner for when they had sold the Laurel Tiara. Pawning Flicka’s family heirloom still grated on him, but he was glad to have the bear to appease Alina for leaving her with her nanny for over a week.
“Besides, it’s not like I could go out and get a job,” Flicka said. “I don’t have any real skills like an engineer or an accountant.”
“Just don’t,” he said.
“No one is hiring princesses that I can find. I looked at the Las Vegas job listings on all the websites, and everything wants a degree or special training or something. I don’t even know what half of them meant.”
“Don’t look at job listings.”
“It doesn’t matter, anyway. I’m useless as a human being.”
“You finished your bachelor’s in music.” Dieter pressed his lips closed, but it was too late. That sounded like he was tacitly encouraging her to go out and get a job, which he wasn’t.
“Yippee yee-haw,” Flicka said, sighing. “The local philharmonic appears to be full up for soloists next year.”
“I’m not encouraging this—”
“You never are.”
“Maybe you could teach piano to kids.”
“Oh, God, no. Kids hate me. They sense that I don’t understand them and don’t know how to relate to them, wandering around like feral little animals. They should all be locked up in boarding schools until they’re human.”
Dieter laughed at her. He was concerned about how Flicka was going to get on with Alina when he brought her back with him, but he’d have to deal with that when he could. “You weren’t locked up in a boarding school. Wulfram sprung you when you were in kindergarten. You lived off-campus with him in a house.”
“Yes, and look at how I turned out: at loose ends, with no degree or skills of consequence and no prospects,” she fretted. “Maybe I should go back to Pierre. Being a princess is all I can do.”
He leaned on the duffel. “You know that’s not true. You made it to Concerto Finals at Leeds. You are, demonstrably, one of the best pianists of your generation.”
“Nonsense. I’m just valuable marriage material,” she said, scowling at the cartoon flowers on the bedspread. “I’m the only Hannover princess of my generation. For two generations, actually. My father only has a younger brother. No princesses in that generation at all. And I’m accomplished at music and sports.”
Her sneer over the word accomplished made it clear that she thought accomplishments were asinine. Dieter had heard her accomplishments rant before. Useless things that royal and noble women toiled at but produced no real benefit to society or the Earth were accomplishments. Useful things were skills.
“Flicka,” he said, keeping his voice firm, “you were at the top of your class at the Royal Academy of Music. You received three offers from symphony orchestras to be a soloist, plus the Leeds finals. You know that you aren’t only a princess.”
“I haven’t even practiced for weeks,” she said. “I haven’t even run scales.”
“When I get back, we’ll see if we can find a piano for you. Maybe you can use this time while we’re in Nevada as a sabbatical to work on your piano.”
“Yeah, sure,” she said.
Dieter suspected that she was scoffing at him. “We’ll pick this up when I get back,” he said, slinging the duffel onto his shoulder, “and I will be back. In the meantime, don’t leave this hotel room.”
Alpha Princess
Flicka von Hannover
I was just biding my time
until Dieter left.
Flicka grinned brightly as Dieter walked out the door.
Because she was expected to.
Because she was a princess, and smiling and waving were essential job skills.
The hotel room door thumped closed behind him, the heavy steel slamming against the wooden frame.
Her arm fell beside her.
She breathed slowly for a while, trying to get used to the silence.
The absence of sound filled her ears, pressing on them like an airplane’s whirr.
Bodyguards, admins, and household staff had surrounded Flicka her whole life. Even when Wulfram was raising her in a small house in Switzerland, they had a housekeeping staff, drivers, and security around them all the time.
Dieter had been with her for years.
Now, all that security was gone.
Or it would be, when Dieter climbed into his taxi and went to the airport.
Flicka would be far more alone than on any of her sojourns into normal life when she’d ditched her security.
Then, freedom had been intoxicating. She’d run through parks to feel what other people did.
Now, Dieter’s absence was stifling.
Yes, he’d told her to stay in the hotel room and take no risks, but she was a Hannover. Her ancestors had been the warrior-princes who had ruled Europe and defeated anyone who tried to take their kingdoms.
Until 1866, at least. Ever since her family had been deposed, they’d merely been fabulously wealthy and ruled the world through the strength of their fortunes. Money worked just as well as conquering armies did. Ten million dollars could buy an election almost anywhere, no matter what the “will of the people” was.
She waited until Dieter texted her that he was at his gate, and of course, one more admonishment for her to stay in the hotel room.
Just for effect, even though she knew no one would hear, Flicka snorted as she texted him back that she would stay in the room and await his return.
Living in a hotel room was not sustainable. The money from pawning the Laurel Tiara would run out within weeks if they stayed there.
They needed somewhere else to live, somewhere more frugal.
Flicka had appointments with three apartment rental offices to look at possible situations in the next few hours.
She tapped the ride-sharing app on her phone to call a car for the first one.
These days would be her test, she had decided. If she hadn’t been born a princess, this was how she would have had to live. She wouldn’t have waited in the cinders for fate to send her a handsome prince. She would have gone out and taken what life had to offer her.
Heck, handsome princes were just pretty traps, and she was damn well done with all of them. After this divorce, she was never going to even date a royal, ever again.
She wasn’t sure whom she would date, but she knew that they wouldn’t be royal.
Dieter was humoring her, she was quite certain.
And she didn’t really trust that he would come back.
She gathered up her clothes and things, stuffing them in a shopping bag, and checked out of the hotel.
&nbs
p; Townhouse
Flicka von Hannover
Yeah, I left the hotel room.
What did you expect me to do?
The first two apartments were dismal wrecks with nothing to recommend them, but the third was a cozy two-bedroom townhouse.
While she was looking at the second bedroom, the rental agent admitted to Flicka that the housing market in Las Vegas was soft that year due to some obscure local economics that Flicka didn’t understand. They had five empty units ready to rent, and no one had so much as looked at them for a month.
Flicka excused herself and did a little internet research to make sure there wasn’t a reason like a muddy tap-water problem or a rattlesnake infestation for five near-downtown units to be empty. Her search turned up blog articles on the deplorable situation for rental owners that was a good opportunity for renters to lock in a long-term contract at that year’s lower-than-average rents.
The rental office lady smiled at Flicka as she emerged. “So, what do you think!”
The woman had a distressing habit of making every sentence sound imperative and thrilling, but Flicka liked her, nevertheless. She had lived among the reserved British and dour Europeans for so long that enthusiasm amused her.
“I’m not sure,” Flicka said, smiling back. “I think I’ll look around a bit more.”
“Oh, you don’t want to do that,” the agent said. Her teeth were white and straight, very American teeth, and she wore her makeup well. “I can tell that a young thing like you is just starting out in life, and I understand if you need a little incentive, Gretchen.”
Flicka had supplied Gretchen Mirabaud’s passport to the woman for identification, but every time she used the name, Flicka’s stomach felt a little sick.
“Oh, really?” asked Flicka. Hope gripped her for the first time. “What can you do?”
“You can have your pick of the five units,” the lady said, conspiracy coarsening her voice. “I’ll even give you the corner one. It’s got twenty-six more square feet than the other ones.”
“Well, that’s very tempting.” Flicka looked at the ceiling. “We do have a toddler.”
“Any pets?” the lady asked, pulling a piece of paper out of a clipboard she carried.
“No pets,” Flicka confirmed.
“Good, then we can cut the deposit in half.”
Now they were talking. “Just one toddler.”
She bit her lower lip. “Small children can be hard on apartments.”
“Alina is a very tidy child, very quiet. She likes to look at books and play with stuffed animals.”
“I think we have a toddler bed we can put in the second bedroom for you.”
“She will be at daycare all day while we work, also.” Flicka had no idea whether any of that was true in the slightest.
“Yeah, but,” the lady said, bobbling her head from side to side. Her long, black ponytail swished over her shoulder. “Kids can cause damage.”
“Not Alina. Her grandmother calls her ‘the angel child.’ She’s perfect in every way.”
“She’s your daughter?”
“Step-daughter, and even I think she’s perfect.”
The lady bobbled her head again, her eyes a little wider. “You’ll have to pay for any damage before you move out, but I can knock another five hundred off the deposit. That will bring it down to a manageable level.”
Flicka nodded “The deposit that Desert Gardens is asking is six hundred less than that, though. We’re strapped for cash right now.” All that was true, but the other apartment’s rent was higher.
The woman pursed her lips and stared at the paper for a full three seconds before she said, “All right, we can match that.”
“Thank you,” Flicka said. “I appreciate that.”
Her cheeks flushed a little, and her smile warmed. “It’s the least I can do for a young couple just starting out.”
No, it wasn’t the least she could do, but Flicka was quite sure that she could talk the woman down to whatever her least was.
In the end, Flicka signed the rental agreement for the furnished townhouse for less per month than a one-bedroom, unfurnished apartment, and it included all the utilities except water, plus free run of the rental office’s computers. She looked at the five available units and didn’t pick the marginally larger corner one because one of the units had a child’s bedroom already decorated. She’d only met Alina once, but surely the little girl liked pink.
Even with the reduction of the security deposit, between that and the first and last months’ rent, she had only ten dollars left of the money Dieter had given her and from pawning the Laurel Tiara.
Just securing a place to live had taken almost everything Flicka had.
And she had to pay rent again in three weeks.
When Dieter got back, she wouldn’t have enough to buy a decent supper for the three of them, and that was if she skipped lunch.
She needed a job, fast.
The rental agent’s name was Indrani, and she was a sweet woman. Her scarlet fingernails were tipped with gold leaf. A slim, gilded chain led from one of her heavy earrings to her nose stud. “While you’re looking for a job, you can print out your resume on the printer, too. I remember when I was just starting out with my husband. Things are a lot harder now than back then.”
“Are they?” Flicka asked, just making conversation while she used the woman’s computer to set up the water bill. Because Indrani was staring out the window, Flicka quickly typed in her real name, Friederike von Hannover, thinking that leaving a legal trail with her legal name might be a good idea to establish residency so she could file for divorce.
“Yeah,” said the woman, looking out the window at the beige, desert landscape that ended in mountains made of red boulders. “A lot of young kids come out of college with a lot more debt than when we were young, the equivalent of a mortgage but they ain’t got no house to show for it, and then they have to pay that off. And they can’t get health insurance because they’re working three part-time gigs instead of a real job with benefits and a pension. I’m working weekends at the Silver Horseshoe Casino as a blackjack dealer.”
“As a dealer?” Flicka asked, perking up even more. She knew most of the table games quite well. “Are there many jobs for dealers?”
“Oh, yes. Lots. I went to dealer school for three months, blackjack and specialty games,” she said, “even though most of it was taught in the first couple of weeks. After that, it was practice dealing hands, over and over again, until you never, ever make a mistake. If you make a mistake, the house won’t pay out if someone hits a pot like a Bad Beat or High Hand, and that’s not fair to the players.”
Flicka didn’t know what half of those terms meant. She gambled, of course. Good Lord, she was a Princess of Monaco, where the world-famous Monte Carlo Casino was. Pierre played cards at least once a week, more to keep up the cachet of the casino than because he particularly enjoyed it. Gamblers loved to see the heir to the principality walk through the casino and enter the high-roller room. Tourists paid fifty dollars just to walk into the casino and gawk, and they surely felt like they got their money’s worth to see royalty come in to lose money.
They didn’t realize that Pierre and the rest of the royals gambled with state money. When they lost, they were merely returning some of the tax revenue to the casino, not reducing their private fortunes.
Only commoners gambled with and lost their own money.
“I don’t have three months to attend dealer school,” Flicka said. “What other kinds of employment are possible?”
She was hoping that Indrani would suggest that she work in the rental office, trying to lease those four remaining townhouses. A princess could surely lead a tour and extol the virtues of a living space, even if it was a small Nevada townhouse instead of a palace.
Indrani sucked on her teeth. “The casinos are always looking for pretty waitresses. The gamblers like blondes, too. Blondes make good tips.”
“Tips?” Sh
e just didn’t think it through.
Indrani raised one sculpted eyebrow at Flicka. “Money, a dollar or two that they give you to bring them the drink.”
Oh, the gratuity. Of course.
Immediate money was just what Flicka needed.
But, a waitress.
Flicka paused, considering.
There was nothing wrong with being waitstaff, Flicka mused. She had been terribly grateful to waitresses over the years, especially when they’d brought her a drink when she’d desperately needed one. At Wulfram’s wedding, she’d given one particular waitress an exorbitant amount for taking such good care of her.
Waitresses served an important function in society and seemed to be kind, caring people.
Flicka could fake that.
She drew a deep breath and smiled at Indrani. “I’ll look into it.”
Dieter and Theo
Dieter Schwarz
I haven’t had time to install my favorite tracking app
Phind-A-Phone
on Flicka’s new mobile.
It was almost like she was hiding it from me so I couldn’t.
As soon as the plane touched down, Dieter called a ride-sharing service and ran errands. His first stop was to a bank, where he opened a checking account in the name of Dieter Schwarz—because surely yet another bank account in this town under that name wouldn’t be suspect—and texted the routing and account numbers to his tame hacker at Rogue Security, Blaise Lyon. Blaise texted back that it would take a few days to make sure they had enough firewalls in place, but he could get money to them within a week.
Excellent. Flicka’s tiara pawn money would last that long, and then they could retrieve it and be all right to go to ground for six weeks or so until the divorce was final.
In a Faraway Land Page 3