by Holly Rayner
If I were to see other men? It would be an option for me not to?
Out of everything he’s said, I’m focusing on that. It’s so silly I almost laugh.
“Alternative to separating at some point,” Max says, “is the possibility that we remain married.” He pauses, and then lowers his hands from the back of his head. “That would be preferable. It would look best, but I understand if you would eventually like an out.”
“You’re talking about being together for the rest of our lives,” I confirm.
His cautious gaze meets mine, and the look in his eye is the affirmation I need.
“Your life would be one free of worry,” he says. “You would not need to work. You would be able to travel and pursue your pleasures as you wish.”
The life of a princess.
It sounds amazing, but I’m shaking my head.
“Max, this is a lot for me to think about right now. I’m flying home in a few hours. My life is supposed to be in the States.”
“Do you want it to be?”
It’s painful to answer. “No,” I say quietly.
“Then don’t let it be.”
I open my mouth. Close it.
“You know you’d just be trading one sham for another,” I finally say.
“But one would be much better than the other.”
“Why is that?”
He leans closer to me, and my breath hitches in my chest. I think he’s about to touch me, maybe even kiss me, but it turns out he’s only adjusting on the bench.
“The princess of Spain would not allow me to live my own life. I know that for sure. I have heard she is very traditional. Our marriage, for her, would be more than only for looks. She would want to make it real in every way.”
Well, darn. Can you blame the girl?
In the few minutes we’ve been sitting on this bench, I’ve noticed several women do double takes at Max. Since they didn’t stop to talk or take pictures, I assume they didn’t know who he is and were only gawking because he’s so delicious-looking.
He touches my shoulder. “If this is not for you, I understand.”
“I’m not saying no.”
His eyes light up, and it’s like little fireworks going off in my tummy. I want to make him happy like that again and again.
But…
“I’m also not saying yes either,” I clarify.
Max pulls his phone out. “May I have your number?”
I give it to him, and then I feel my phone buzz in my purse when he texts me.
“I do not need an answer right this moment,” he says, “but as soon as possible. Within the next few days, preferably.”
He stands.
I do the same. It’s time to go, but part of me fights it.
“I can walk you back to your hostel,” he says.
“No. That’s okay.” I wave him off.
I would love to have him with me each extra minute I can get, but I’m gonna need a whole lot of time to think about his offer, and that starts now.
“I’ll be thinking about this,” I say.
“Good.” He smiles slightly, like he’s remembering or imagining something. “I had a wonderful time with you last night, Poppy. I am only sorry we don’t remember it all.”
“Same here.” I laugh.
We part at the edge of the park. At the corner, I glance behind me and find him standing still on the sidewalk, hands in his pockets, watching me go.
Chapter 6
Poppy
“Hello!” I call, opening Laura’s front door.
There is a high-pitched shriek from down the hall, and then a little head pokes around the doorway.
I close the door, leaving my suitcase where it is, and walk toward my niece.
“Hi, Hallie.”
The little girl giggles and runs off. There’s crying. An adult groaning.
“Jackson!” I hear Laura chastise. “No dumping out! Melon is for eating.”
Stifling a laugh, I stop at the living room and lean in the doorway. My older sister is on her knees, picking up bits of cantaloupe from the floor. Jackson, her toddler, bangs on the coffee table. Hallie, who takes after Laura and me with her strawberry-blond hair and green eyes, tugs on her mom’s shirt.
“What, Hallie?” Laura asks, not looking.
“Babe,” Oscar, Laura’s husband, calls from another part of the townhome. “Did you throw away my razor?”
“It was dull!” Laura calls back. “There are new ones in the cabinet.”
Hallie tugs on Laura’s shirt again.
“Aunt Poppy,” Hallie says.
“Aunt…” Laura trails off. While still on her knees, she turns and sees me. Her eyes widen. “Poppy!”
Jumping to standing, Laura drops the plastic bowl in her hand. Pieces of cantaloupe hit the floor all over again, but she doesn’t notice. We’re in each other’s arms, squeezing tight and laughing.
Jackson claps his hands. “Yay!”
“Aunt Poppy is here, you guys. Aunt Poppy!” Laura draws back to look at me.
“Yep,” Hallie says. “I know.”
Not satisfied with her quick once-over, Laura steps back and really studies me. “You’re pale.”
“So are you.” I reach out and poke her. It’s a joke we’ve always had with each other. We both have ivory skin that burns after a few minutes in the sun. We couldn’t tan in our wildest dreams.
“But you look really good,” I add.
And she does. She might be in sweats, her hair a tangled bun on top of her head, but she looks healthy and happy.
“You should have let me pick you up,” she says.
“Seriously?” I laugh. “A car was fine.”
Jackson toddles up to Hallie and pulls her hair, making her scream.
“And you look like you have your hands full here.” I laugh.
Oscar appears in the doorway to the kitchen, a smile stretched from ear to ear. “I thought I heard your voice. How you doin’, Poppy?”
“Good, Oscar. You?”
I go to give him a side hug, but the bear of a man he is, he wraps me in his arms and nearly squeezes the air out of me.
“Great. You made it right in time for dinner.”
His cell phone rings, and he holds up a finger. “Sorry, I gotta take this.”
He’s back through the kitchen in a flash, and we hear his muffled voice in the dining room beyond.
“Work stuff,” Laura explains.
“Ah. How’s the landscaping going?”
“He’s busier than ever.”
She’s past me, grabbing my suitcase and hauling it upstairs. I glance at the kids and hesitate.
“They’re fine,” Laura says. “House is babyproofed.”
Upstairs, she sets my suitcase in the guest room. “Sheets are clean. Drawers are empty. I think you know where everything is, right?”
I nod.
“So make yourself at home.” Laura throws her hands up with a smile, but it dims when she looks at me. “Poppy?”
My tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth. “Yeah?”
“You good?”
“Yeah.” I can’t stop nodding. “Real good.”
Her lips purse. “Look, I know you don’t want to be here.”
“It’s not that,” I quickly say. “Gosh, no. And thank you for letting me stay here.”
Her expression hasn’t changed. She doesn’t believe me.
“This is a new house,” she says.
My heart plummets. “Same town.”
Laura’s eyelashes flutter, and her eyes become red. “You have to focus on the good memories, not the bad ones. That way, what you’re used to being a source of pain becomes a source of joy.”
“I know. But you know what’s really easy? Being half a world away from your past. Try that on for size.”
Smirking, she lightly punches my shoulder. “Whatever.”
Some picture frames on the wardrobe catch my eye, and I go over to them.
“I though
t you might like those up here,” Laura says, some uncertainty in her voice.
There’s the one taken of me, Laura and Hallie at Hallie’s first birthday party. Then there’s one of the two of us in elementary school with our mom. They’re both emotional memories, but it’s the third picture that really does me in.
Me and Dad.
About a year before he got sick.
I reach out to touch the frame, then withdraw my hand. I don’t know why, but even though I want to pick up the photo, I can’t bring myself to do it.
“It’s nice,” I choke out. “Thank you.”
Laura’s quiet, and I get the sense she’s waiting for me to take the lead.
When I don’t, she speaks.
“It’s good to have you home,” she says. “I know it probably won’t be for long, but…”
I turn to face her. “That’s not true. I might stay.”
As soon as I say it, I can’t believe I did.
The whole flight here I thought about Max’s offer. Mostly, I told myself over and over how crazy it is, how I shouldn’t do it, how there are so many other options.
There have to be other options; I just don’t know what they are yet. What I do know is that staying in Jersey probably isn’t one of them.
I hate lying to my sister.
Which is why I open my mouth to tell her about Max. Right before I get the first word out, there’s a cry from downstairs.
Laura rolls her eyes and goes to the doorway. “Oscar!”
The crying continues.
“You get settled in,” Laura tells me. “Dinner should be ready in about fifteen.”
She hustles downstairs, and I sit on the edge of the bed and stare at the pictures.
Three years. That’s how long it’s been since Dad died.
When I think about the bare facts of my departure from the U.S., it looks pretty bad. I took off only a month after we buried Dad, and it probably looked like I was leaving my family to mourn all alone.
The truth is that I went with Laura and Oscar’s blessing. When Dad got sick two years earlier, I was the one who moved back in with him. It only made sense. Laura was working all the time and pregnant with her first baby. I had just finished college and had a job at a coffee shop in town, but didn’t know what I wanted to do next.
Plus, with my only parent was the place I wanted to be. Mom died when Laura and I were still in elementary school, so for most of my life, it was the three of us.
I knew the cancer would take him one day. It was lung, and it was bad. Still, he hung on for those long twenty-four months.
When the end came, I was ravaged. There were some days I thought I might go insane. None of my friends understood. They’d never gone through something so catastrophic. Only Laura felt my pain.
Except hers was buffered some by the presence of her young family. I didn’t have anything like that.
So I left. Because I didn’t know what else to do.
I didn’t go to Europe to find myself. I went there to lose myself. As it turns out, you can accomplish that somewhat well by constantly country-hopping.
I take a quick shower, and the hot water on my tired muscles is enough to have me nodding off under the spray. Most of the other passengers slept on the flight, but I didn’t catch a single wink. I was too busy thinking about Max. His warm, brown eyes. The way I can feel his voice in every part of my body.
I want to see him again so bad.
I just don’t know if I want to tether myself to him through a contractual obligation.
But the money… He didn’t say how much he would offer me, but I get the impression it would be a nice sum.
Drying off and dressing in some jeans and a loose T-shirt, I head downstairs right in time for dinner.
“You like lasagna, right?” Oscar asks.
“Love it.”
Hallie’s coloring at the table, and I bop her on the nose as I pass by.
“That’s what I thought,” Oscar says.
Since it needs to be done, I start setting the table without asking. Laura comes in with Jackson, who’s undergone a wardrobe change, for whatever reason, and the five of us settle in for dinner.
It feels like old times, somewhat. Except different. Dad’s not here. And now there are two kids.
Laura and Oscar interrogate me on my winter job, and I tell them basically everything about the last six months in Sweden and Copenhagen, except I leave out the part about Max. I still haven’t wrapped my own head around that.
Oscar’s phone rings twice in the middle of the meal, and he silences it both times. When it rings a third time, Laura raises her eyebrows at him.
“Take it,” she says.
“No, babe. It’s fine.”
“Take it.”
He offers an apologetic smile, then takes the phone and goes through the sliding door that leads to a small back patio.
“Work,” Laura says to me.
“Right.” I nod and help myself to another garlic knot. Maybe it’s the long flight or the stress of the last few weeks, but bread has never tasted this good.
Laura’s eyeing me. “You sure you’re good?”
“Actually…” I look at the sliding door. Oscar is pacing on the other side of it, still talking on the phone. “There’s something I need to tell you about.”
She nods knowingly. “How much time do we need? Can you do it in five minutes?”
I’d say even thirty is pressing it.
I sigh. “There’s a lot to unpack.”
“Heard loud and clear.”
The door opens. Oscar’s back.
“Babe,” Laura says as he settles back at the table. “Poppy and I have the dishes tonight.”
“What? No. She’s tired, and you’ve been running around with—”
She touches his arm. “No, we have them. You go take the kids to the park after we eat, okay? You’ve been working so hard that you’ve barely had time with them this week.”
“Are you sure?” he asks.
“Absolutely.”
“Aw, thanks, babe.”
Laura kisses him quickly and then, when he’s not looking, she winks at me.
Less than fifteen minutes later, Oscar has Jackson in the stroller and Hallie by the hand and they are headed out the door, to the park down the street. Since it’s June, there’s at least a couple more hours of daylight left.
I’m already filling the dishwasher, and Laura’s pulling out a bottle of red.
She doesn’t say a word until the washer is running and two glasses are filled. Taking our wine, we go out to the back patio and settle into the loveseat there. That’s when she takes her first drink and turns to me.
“Spill,” she commands.
I take a deep breath, and I do.
I tell her everything I can remember, including the whole blackout thing. By the time I’m finished, my head is woozy, but I feel good. Much like after a really powerful cry.
“Wow.” Laura’s eyes are the size of saucers.
“Yep.”
“You’re married to a prince.”
“Yep.”
Without saying anything, Laura goes inside and gets her phone.
“What are you doing?” I ask.
She curls back up on the loveseat, typing away. “Looking him up.” A moment passes, and then her jaw drops. “You are kidding me. This prince?”
She shows me a picture of Max. Sitting down doesn’t stop my legs from turning to jelly.
“Yep,” I say. “That prince.”
“Lucky girl.”
“Am I?”
She raises an eyebrow. “Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t realize you were already married to several other princes. My, you have been busy in Europe.”
“Shut up,” I laugh, knocking my knee against hers.
“Seriously, Poppy.” She puts the phone down and gawks at me. “What are you going to do?”
“I don’t know.”
Or do I? Talking the whole thing out has made me r
ealize a few things.
“Max seems awesome,” I say, “but I don’t really know him.”
“Your eyes sparkle when you talk about him.”
“So?”
“You’ve clearly fallen for him.”
“That’s beside the point.” I sigh.
“No, it’s not.”
I give her a pointed look. “What he’s offered me is a business transaction. It’s not a real marriage.”
“And?”
“And I can’t mix business and romance,” I say.
“That’s right. You don’t date people you work with.”
“Oh, gosh.” I groan and then laugh, because this whole thing is shocking and hilarious at the same time. “It wouldn’t even really be working, by the way. He said I only need to show up to events once in a while. Other than that, I’ll be free to do as I wish.”
“Are you supposed to… you know… share his bed?”
My cheeks warm. “I don’t know. We’d have to live together, for sure.”
“But would he expect you to sleep with him?” She laughs. “What am I saying? If you did this, why would you even want to see other men?”
“Because I don’t know Max!” I say, my voice rising. Is she not hearing me there? “And I don’t know if there’s even… that… between us.”
“Yeah, okay.” She laughs.
I grit my jaw. Laura notices and calms down.
“Okay,” she says. “Sorry. It’s just that I can tell you’re into Max from how you talk about him.”
“I am into him,” I admit, “but if I were to accept his offer, I think it would be really important for me to check that. Say we did get romantically involved and then things didn’t work out. We’d still be stuck together.”
“Yeah.” Laura’s face scrunches. “That would be awful.”
I swirl the wine in my glass, look at it for a moment, then put it down on the ground. A few sips of it combined with my mental and physical exhaustion has me feeling like I could fall asleep right in this loveseat.
“I’m gonna do it,” I say.
She nods. “I support that. Especially since, this way, I get to live vicariously through you. I don’t get to be married to a prince. I mean, Oscar does call himself the landscaping king of New Jersey… but he’s the only one who does that.”