Protecting Her Royal Baby

by Beth Cornelison

  “Thank you,” Brianna said with a nod to Grant.

  Hunter shook his head. “I still don’t like it. But if you insist on going, I’m going with you.”

  Chapter 12

  Leaving Ben in Grant’s and Nancy’s capable hands, Brianna and Hunter flew out two days later, having gotten directions from her aunt Robyn to the vacation home on the beach at Cape Cod. They rented a car in Boston and drove the remaining miles, an anxious anticipation humming through her.

  The sights and sounds of Cape Cod did little to jog her memory as they made their way through town, and disappointment grew in her chest. But as they neared the address she’d jotted down for her parents’ vacation home, something familiar stirred in her brain.

  “This is it,” Hunter said as he parked the rental car on the crushed-shell driveway, and Brianna looked up at the weathered clapboard house. According to Aunt Robyn, she’d spent many summers here with her parents. This unassuming beach house with gray shutters and a screened porch jutting out toward the ocean had been a second home to her as a child.

  She felt Hunter’s gaze on her, knew he was watching her reaction to the house, sensed his eagerness for the past to spill its secrets. She stared hard at the front door, the empty flower boxes under the windows, willing her brain to work.

  Relax. Don’t force it. Let the memories find you. Remembering the doctor’s advice, she closed her eyes and took a deep breath. She rolled the tension out of her shoulders before opening her eyes again and sending Hunter a lopsided grin. “Ready?”

  As she climbed out of the car and walked toward the wood-plank boardwalk leading to the front door, she inhaled the salty scent of the sea air, spiced with a hint of fish and the smoke of a nearby chimney. The smells were familiar, and she clutched the railing of the boardwalk as memories rushed over her, pulling at her like a riptide. She could hear her mother’s voice warning her not to go too deep into the waves. She could see her father in his lucky fishing hat and hear his hoot of victory as he reeled in a prize catch from the ocean. She felt the prick of sunburn and the sting of jellyfish from summer days gone by.

  “Bri?” Hunter stroked a hand down her back, yanking her from the onslaught of memories.

  She tipped her head up to meet his worried gaze, and he thumbed away a tear from her cheek. She’d been so lost in sweet recollection that she hadn’t realized she was crying.

  “Are you all right?”

  She nodded and chuckled through her tears. “I know this place. I belong here. I remember my parents, summers here, laughter. Good memories. So many happy memories—they’re all coming back.”

  He cupped the back of her head and drew her close to kiss her temple. “That’s great, Bri. Thank God. Anything...else?”

  Something dark and uneasy shaded his eyes, and lines of strain framed his mouth when he smiled. Though he didn’t say it, she knew he was worried what she might remember about Chris, what it might do to their budding relationship. Because they could deny it all they wanted, but something special had grown between them. They had a bond, an affection, a physical chemistry that went beyond friendship.

  The ocean breeze mussed Hunter’s hair, leaving it sexily rumpled. She couldn’t help but comb her fingers through it, savoring the silky strands as she rearranged them, only to have the wind whip his hair into disarray again with the next damp gust. Her heart clenched as she studied Hunter’s rugged face in the bright autumn sun. Little girls dreamed of being rescued by a handsome prince, being swept away to a life of luxury and romance. How ironic that she’d had a real-life prince enter her life, yet Hunter’s was the face that filled her dreams. He was the one who’d saved her life, been her champion...and won her heart.

  If she were honest with herself, she’d have to admit to being more than a little scared herself of what she might learn in the next few days about Ben’s father, the romance they’d shared, the promises they’d made. If her memories of last winter returned, if old feelings for Chris resurfaced, how could she say goodbye to Hunter, knowing it would hurt him? How could she walk away from a man who meant so much to her?

  Swallowing the knot of grief that thought brought, she scanned the beach and spotted a few chairs planted along the water’s edge. A handful of people meandered along the sand or ventured knee-deep into the cold Atlantic waves. “Maybe we should talk to the neighbors, see if anyone knows me and remembers Chris.”

  Hunter firmed his mouth and jerked a nod. “Lead the way.”

  Brianna took a breath for courage and held her hand out to Hunter. He laced his fingers with hers and squeezed her hand as they followed the wood-plank boardwalk through the sea grass and down to the beach. Brianna slipped off her shoes and socks and carried them in her free hand, enjoying the feel of the cool sand between her toes. They walked down to the water’s edge, his pace quickly matching hers stride for stride, their bodies in sync. Brianna canted toward Hunter as they walked, thinking of the many ways they fit. After so short a time together, he could finish her sentences, and she could read his moods from subtle changes in his eyes. Their easy rapport came as naturally as the change in seasons. His companionship, his steadfastness, comforted her, buoyed her in a way she sensed no one else had in many years. Surely if Chris had been this in tune with her, she’d remember more about him.

  When a wave rolled in and soaked her feet, Brianna yipped at the shock of the cold water.

  “Mmm-hmm. That’s why I left my shoes on,” Hunter said with a chuckle. “This Southern boy prefers his beach balmy and his salt water warm.” He wrapped an arm around her as they strolled down the beach toward a family building a castle in the sand.

  “Excuse me,” Brianna said to the parents. “I know this will sound odd but...do you know me? Are you regular residents here on the Cape?”

  The husband, a balding man with wire-rimmed glasses, squinted up at her and shook his head. “Sorry, no. We’re borrowing a house from my law partner for a little R and R. Is there a problem we can help you with?”

  “No.” She flashed him a smile, hiding her disappointment. “Thanks anyway. Enjoy the day.”

  Farther down the beach, they encountered an older couple digging for clams. When Hunter called to them, over the sound of the waves and squawking seagulls, the gray-haired woman glanced up. Holding her floppy hat in place with one hand when the sea breeze buffeted her, the woman sized them up as they approached. Gasping, she cried, “Glory be! Brianna Coleman, is that you? Harry, look! It’s Brianna. How in the world are you, darling?”

  Brianna exchanged a look with Hunter. Mission accomplished.

  “Good morning, ma’am. How are you?” Brianna dropped Hunter’s hand to shake the woman’s in greeting.

  “I’m fine, honey,” the woman said with a scoff as she folded Brianna into a hug. “But what is this ma’am business? What happened to Aunt Mimi?”

  Brianna blinked. “You’re my aunt?”

  The woman canted back, holding Brianna’s shoulders, and frowned. “Honey, don’t you recognize me?” She glanced at Hunter and furrowed her brow. “You’re not Chris.”

  Brianna’s heart tripped. “You remember Chris?”

  “Of course I do. It’s only been, what? Ten months or so. I’m not senile yet!” The woman laughed, but her puzzled look remained. The elderly man shuffled up, stretching his back and setting his bucket of clams aside.

  Hunter extended his hand to the gentleman and introduced himself. “We’re actually hoping you could fill in some blanks for us. Brianna was in a car accident recently and lost her memory.”

  The woman—Aunt Mimi, she called herself—gasped. “Oh, Brianna!”

  “It’s coming back as I heal,” she hastened to add, “but we’re looking for answers about my relationship with Chris last winter.”

  “What sort of answers?” the man asked.

  “I...I’m
sorry. Who are you? You seem familiar, but like we said, my memory—”

  “You poor child! How awful for you.” The woman pressed a hand to her chest. “I’m Miriam Hartley, and this is my husband, Harry.” She motioned to the man, who nodded to them. “We’ve been your neighbors here for twenty-five years. That’s our house, the blue one.” She pointed to the large, brightly painted home near Brianna’s. “You played with our daughter, Helen, every summer from the time you were two until your parents died. After that, you still came for a week here and there, when your aunt could get away or when you could come stay with us.”

  “Helen.” Brianna closed her eyes and saw a giggling, freckle-faced redhead buried in sand so that only her head and neck showed. “We ate Popsicles on your back porch. Grape was her favorite. Cherry was mine.”

  Miriam brightened. “Yes! You do remember!”

  “Bits and pieces. Coming up here, seeing the house and beach in person, is helping bring back scattershot memories.”

  “Well, why don’t we go inside, get some hot tea and see if we can’t help you remember more about those days? And you say you need answers about Chris?” Miriam lifted a hand to her mouth. “Gracious. I’m surprised you don’t remember him. More surprised he’s not still with you. I felt sure you two would be married by now.”

  Beside her, Hunter tensed, and Brianna’s stomach swooped. “We were close, then? In love?”

  “Oh, boy.” Harry hoisted his bucket and, taking his wife by the arm, hitched his head toward their house. “Sounds like we have our work cut out for us. Let’s get lunch, and we’ll help you out as best we can.”

  Hunter placed a possessive hand at the small of her back as they followed the Hartleys across the beach and up the warped wooden steps to their back porch. Shedding their shoes, the couple stopped at a hose and rinsed the sand from their feet before heading inside. Brianna followed suit, and Hunter toed his shoes off by the back door, entering the house in his sock feet.

  “Harry,” Miriam said, waving a finger toward a cabinet in the corner of the family room, “while I fix us tea and sandwiches, show Brianna and Hunter the photo albums.”

  “Oh, good idea.” Harry pulled out a couple of fat books and patted a spot next to him on the overstuffed couch. “Sit with me, Breezy.”

  Brianna cocked her head as she settled next to Harry and Hunter next to her. “Breezy?”

  “Yeah,” the older man said with a grin. “That was your parents’ nickname for you. We adopted it because it fit so well. You were always a happy child, without a care in the world. Friendly, outgoing...breezy.”

  She glanced at Hunter, and he arched an eyebrow and smirked. “I like that.”

  Brianna felt her cheeks flush, and she turned back to Harry. “That’s the sort of thing I want to know. The details that made us a family.”

  He cracked open the dusty photo album, and she smiled at the old snapshots encased in plastic sleeves. Right away she spotted the redhead she remembered, flashing a toothy grin and showing off a handful of shells. “That’s Helen, isn’t it?”

  “Our pride and joy.”

  “Where is she now? What is she doing?” Brianna asked.

  “Teaching school in London. She’s married and has two boys. Ryan, who’s five, and Billy, who’s seven.”

  “He’s eight!” Miriam called from the kitchen. “You were at his birthday party last month. Remember?”

  Harry chuckled and swiped a hand over his mouth. “So I was. Wow, the rascals are growing up fast.”

  “Helen’s in London?” she asked. “Why there?”

  “That’s where her husband is from. It was tough on all of us when she moved overseas. She’s our only child, and she was your best friend. You were in graduate school at the time and took it hard. You moped around here for days after her wedding like she’d died instead of moving to England.”

  Brianna stared into near space, a hollow, lonely feeling engulfing her. A new memory sifted from the corners of her mind. “She gave me my ‘I Heart Cape Cod’ key chain before she left. She said a piece of her heart would always be with me in Cape Cod.”

  “That sounds like our Helen. She’s sentimental that way.”

  Brianna looked to Hunter as the memories of her best friend’s wedding and subsequent departure played out in her mind’s eye. She had been devastated when Helen left. She’d felt the loss as deeply as when her parents had died.

  Hunter put his arm around Brianna. He leaned close to see the pictures as they flipped pages and Harry told her stories of days past. She shoved down the melancholy of Helen’s departure and focused on the fond memories Harry recounted. When Miriam brought in hot spice tea and ham-and-cheese sandwiches, they shared the meal and laughed over the Hartleys’ tales of shenanigans Brianna and Helen got into as children.

  “I don’t know who told her honey and lemon would remove freckles,” Miriam said, wiping tears of mirth from her eyes, “but by the time I found you girls, Helen was covered in the sticky mess and your experiment was drawing the attention of flies, bees and ants.”

  “You were very scientific about it, though. You had one clean patch saved on her arm as the ‘before’ spot for comparison.”

  “A control,” Brianna said, the term popping freely to mind.

  “Early evidence of the research scientist you’d become.” Harry raised his tea to her before he sipped.

  “I figured you had a mischievous side.” Hunter grinned at Brianna and massaged her nape with his fingers, his arm still draped possessively behind her on the couch. A tingle raced from her scalp to her toes, and she shifted slightly on the couch so that her leg touched his from knee to hip. She tried to refocus on the anecdote Miriam told next, but her body hummed, hyperaware of Hunter winding a wisp of her hair on his finger and the feel of his firm muscles pressed along her thigh.

  “But enough about your antics with Helen.” Harry clapped his hands on his legs. “You asked about Chris. Your relationship with him.”

  Beside her Hunter stiffened, and Brianna’s pulse stumbled, yanked from her sensual sidetrack at the mention of Chris’s name. Guilt shot through her, as cold and sobering as the Atlantic waves on her feet. Chris. The father of her son. Likely a political prisoner.

  Miriam tipped her head and set her teacup on a lamp table. “What specifically did you want to know?”

  Hunter removed his arm from the couch behind her and cleared his throat as he folded his arms over his chest. Brianna mourned his withdrawal, feeling a draftlike chill sweep over her.

  She rubbed her palms on her slacks and met Miriam’s gaze. “Everything. How did we meet? How serious were we? Did we talk of marriage? Of a future together? Obviously we had an intimate relationship. Ben is proof of that, but—” Brianna stopped when she saw the woman’s reaction to the mention of Ben. “Oh. You don’t know. I had a baby. A little boy. Two weeks ago. Chris’s son.”

  Miriam and Harry looked at each other, then smiled.

  “Congratulations, Breezy.” Harry sent an awkward, pointed glance to Hunter.

  Hunter said nothing, but he inhaled a deep, silent breath and rubbed a hand on his chin.

  “No wonder you’re so interested in Chris,” Miriam said. She sat forward in her chair and furrowed her brow in thought. “Well, as I recall, you said you met him in town. At a coffee shop. Something about sharing the last cinnamon roll in the pastry case, which led to a lunch invitation and...well, several more dates. Several weeks spent together. We had the two of you over several times. For the Super Bowl, for Harry’s birthday dinner, for lunch after the Sunday church service once.”

  “What was our relationship like? Did we seem...close?” The question felt ridiculous. Uncomfortable. Obviously she’d been close enough to Chris to make love to him, make a baby with him. But sex didn’t have to mean they’d shared an emotional bond...alth
ough the notion that she’d sleep with someone she didn’t love didn’t feel right to her. It didn’t fit her instincts about herself. Maybe she was hoping she hadn’t loved Chris so she’d feel less compunction for the feelings that were blossoming in her for Hunter.

  “Well, you never said so, per se,” Miriam said carefully, “but based on my observations of the two of you when you were together, I’d say you were very close. In love, even.”

  Brianna held her breath, a fist of something—regret? guilt? disappointment?—gripping her lungs. Even with all the evidence pointing toward that truth, she’d been reluctant to accept that at one time she’d been in love with Chris. She found some comfort in knowing Ben had been conceived in love. But if they’d been in love...what happened?

  The same image that had brought a painful ache to her a few days ago, a flash of Chris walking down the beach, away from her, drifted through her mind like a mist.

  “He made you so happy, and we were happy for you, considering all the heartache you’d suffered throughout your life.” Miriam shook her head slowly. “I don’t know why you would have split up.”

  Harry cleared his throat and cast her a guilty side glance. “I might. I never mentioned it, but I pulled him aside once and asked him about his intentions. You’re like a daughter to me and with your own father gone...” He huffed a sigh and scratched his cheek. “Well, he said he wanted a future with you but that he had—what was the word he used?—complications he had to straighten out before he could propose.”

  “Complications?” Hunter echoed. “Did he explain what he meant by that?”

  Harry shook his head. “But he loved you. I was sure of that.”

  Brianna swallowed hard and held Harry’s gaze. “Sure...how?”

  The older man’s cheek twitched in a grin. “It was in his eyes, the way he looked at you. The way you looked at each other.” He paused and arched one graying eyebrow as he tipped his head toward Hunter. “The way this young man looks at you, and you him.”