Surprise Packages

by Layla Valentine

  “Well, I didn’t ask you to join me as a fan of your show,” Alex says. “I mean, don’t get me wrong. I am a fan of your show. But to be honest, I think you’re pretty, and since you were finished at your party, I saw an opportunity to get to know you. That’s all.”

  I’m taken aback. “That hasn’t happened to me since I was cast on the show. Everyone just wants to get to know Princess Aeryn.”

  He waves that idea away. “I already know Princess Aeryn,” he says. “Everything about her is what’s on the show. It’s not like she keeps existing after the director says cut, right?”

  He’s not entirely right about that. I’ve always felt like kernels of Aeryn exist in my heart, empowering me to approach intimidating situations with her trademark bravado. But I do understand what he’s saying, and he’s right.

  “Yeah,” I say. “But so many people seem to think I have some kind of inside information about her. You wouldn’t believe the questions I get.”

  “Like what?” he asks.

  “Oh…” I think back. “‘In season one, episode fourteen, Aeryn and Boniface exchanged a meaningful look over dinner. Are the two of them concealing something from the rest of the family, and if so, when is it going to be revealed?’”

  “Seriously?” Alex raises his eyebrows. “People think you were teasing out something for that long? Just by looking at the man who plays your brother?”

  “After getting asked that question, I went back and reviewed the tapes,” I say. “And you know what? I wasn’t even looking at him. There was a cut in between the two shots. Chris wasn’t even sitting at the table when we shot my side of that scene.”

  Alex laughs. “Amazing.”

  “So what do you do?” I ask him. “You’re not from Hollywood. You’re not an actor, are you?”

  “No, I’m not,” he agrees. “Would you like another drink?”

  I look down at the cup in my hand. It’s empty.

  “I would,” I say, even though this will be my third drink of the evening.

  The swimming that’s starting to take place in my head is pleasant, light rather than heavy, giving the night a frothy feeling. Everything I’ve been worrying about feels very far away, suddenly.

  Who cares if Jay decided to sell my story to the lowest bidder? Jay’s a terrible person anyway, and he must be very unhappy if he needs to do things like that. And Lizzie and the others gossiping about me? What difference does it make, really? I don’t need to impress those girls. It’s more important that I am happy than it is to look happy.

  And right now, I’m very happy. Alex is so easy to talk to, so pleasant to be around. How could anybody not feel like opening up to him? What’s more, he’s so clearly interested in me, in Erica. He looks at me and sees a girl he met at a bar who just happens to have an interesting job. Despite the way he initially introduced himself, he’s not writing me off as Princess Aeryn and nothing more. It’s such a refreshing change from what I’m used to that I feel as if I could happily spend the rest of my evening in his company.

  “Alex,” I say, inspiration striking me in a rush. “Would you like to come to a party with me?”

  “A party?” he asks, squinting.

  “The friends I was with earlier,” I clarify. “They’re in the main ballroom. Actually, the assistant director of the show owns this hotel.”

  I flush as these words come out. It’s the kind of thing I sometimes catch myself saying without realizing how it sounds—braggy, name-droppy. I’m not trying to show off. I’m just stating a fact. This is Peter’s hotel, and that’s why the party is here. But it sounds so self-important: oh, I know the guy who owns this hotel.

  If Alex picks up on that, though, he doesn’t say anything about it.

  “I thought you’d had enough of that scene for tonight,” he says. “You want to go back?”

  “I don’t know,” I say, sensing his hesitance. It’s unexpected. He’s been so enthusiastic about getting to know me so far, I thought he’d be into this. “I mean, if you don’t want to go—”

  “Please don’t take it personally,” he says earnestly. “I’m just not the sort of person who gravitates to parties. I always feel a little out of place. That’s all.”

  “But so do I!” I tell him, feeling more of a connection than ever. “That’s it exactly, see? It’s a party of work people, and I really should be there, put in an appearance, let them see me being social. But the whole thing is so draining for me, and I could use a little moral support. It would be so much better if I could do it with someone.”

  Alex smiles, and it seems to light up his whole face.

  “In that case, how can I refuse?” he asks. “Lead the way, princess.”

  “Okay, but you’ve seriously got to stop calling me princess,” I say. “Once or twice before someone in the cast has brought along a date to something who insisted on calling them by their Royal Blue name or title, and we always tease them mercilessly. You can’t walk in there and call me princess in front of them.”

  “Promise,” Alex says, shooting me a grin. “Erica it is.”

  I pause outside the entrance to the ballroom and thread my arm through his. I can feel the strength in him, the muscle of his solid arm making me feel small and delicate by comparison. It’s not a feeling I’m used to. Aeryn is short in stature, but she’s a fighter. She would never take a man’s arm like this and float into a ballroom as if wafted inward by the force of her attraction to him.

  Does he know, can he sense, how attracted to him I am?

  It’s ridiculous to think that anything real could come of tonight, this chance encounter, but even the feeling of being paired up with him is magical. I feel like some of his attractiveness is rubbing off on me, like glitter, leaving me luminescent as the two of us make our way through the crowd.

  I can sense the eyes on us. Peripherally, I catch a glimpse of Lizzie. Her jaw is hanging open, and I feel a rush of pleasure at how much I’m going to enjoy telling her this story later.

  All around the room, eyes are finding their way to me and Alex, and I know people are wondering what happened. I was here long enough before that they know I didn’t arrive with a date. Everyone is aware that I simply wandered out of the party for a few minutes and returned with this handsome man on my arm.

  I have to admit, it feels great.

  I ignore the faces around me and let Alex tow me through the crowd and toward the dance floor. I can see what he has in mind, and I’m hesitant. I don’t have a lot of confidence in my skills as a dancer.

  Aeryn doesn’t do a lot of dancing on Royal Blue—she’s a fighter—so when Lizzie and Chris are in dance training for royal ball scenes, I’m usually practicing my kickboxing moves. And there’s nothing in my life before acting that I can draw on. At school dances, I was always the girl who jumped around in a big group of girls, more interested in exerting energy and yelling than in dancing with any grace or style.

  What’s more, I know that people expect me to be a good dancer. It’s come up with a few guys I’ve dated, who have assumed I’d want to do old-fashioned things on a date. Or so they claim.

  “I thought you’d like to go on a ballroom dancing date night!” one man whined, shortly after I’d started my role on Royal Blue. I didn’t believe him for a minute. He wanted to go on a ballroom dancing date night with Princess Aeryn. He even had the nerve to ask me for a picture as he was dropping me off at home, despite the fact that the date had been a clear catastrophe. It was never about what I wanted.

  So as Alex pulls me toward the dance floor, I’m tempted to pull away. Surely his interest in me will diminish once he sees how pathetic I am on my feet? I’m about to tug his sleeve and suggest we go sit down instead, but then he slides his arm out of mine, catches my hand, and pulls me tightly into a spin.

  I land against his chest, gasping for air, stunned.

  And then we’re moving.

  I couldn’t say where my feet are going, where they’re going to land at any given moment.
It feels like flying. He’s so strong and so confident that it doesn’t seem to matter that I don’t know what I’m doing—my feet always land where they should anyway, as if I’m his puppet. He spins me out, reels me back in, dips and twists me, and all the while my brain struggles to catch up with what’s happening, until finally I relinquish control completely and decide to just enjoy the ride.

  The song comes to an end, and right on the beat, Alex pulls me into his chest. I rest there for a moment, catching my breath, looking up into his warm chocolate eyes. The moment seems to spool out forever. I am vaguely aware that we’re still in a ballroom full of people, that many of them are probably looking our way, but I don’t care anymore. I’ve never had an experience like this in my life.

  I think—I would swear—we lean in at the same moment.

  It’s been so long since I kissed someone like this, without agenda or obligation. For so long, kisses have either been functional overtures toward sex or else the way I’ve propelled bad dates toward the moment when the man will go home and leave me alone.

  This kiss is neither.

  This kiss, in and of itself, is better than, more than, any other I’ve ever had. I could lose myself in it. It’s kissing the way kissing was when that was all that was on the menu, when sex was still too adult and frightening to consider, and so kissing felt extreme and ultimate and like everything two people could do together.

  We break apart, and I’m pleased to see that he’s as lost for breath as I am.

  I slowly become aware of the fact that his hands are still on my body. Our hands are clasped together as if we never stopped dancing, our arms wrapped around each other. And, indeed, the next song has started to play, its slow melody driving people all around the room into each other’s arms, so maybe our dance really has continued, one merging seamlessly into the next.

  Then he pulls away from me.

  “I need a drink, I think,” he says, and his voice is huskier than I’ve heard it so far.

  Whatever’s going on, it’s affecting him as much as it is me. That much is unmistakable. I feel a faint sense of pride. It’s a nice feeling, unbalancing someone this much, having such a powerful impact on him.

  “Can I bring you anything?” he adds.

  “Another rum and cola?” I ask.

  “Sure.” He disappears into the crowd, leaving me alone with my thoughts, my racing heart, and my overheated blood.

  I decide to take the opportunity to retrieve my purse so as not to be caught without it again. The idea of approaching the table where people were gossiping about me just a short time ago should be unnerving, but thanks to Alex’s kiss, I still feel like I’m floating. I feel untouchable.

  I make my way over to the table, where Lizzie is still sitting. She doesn’t bother to hide her amazement as I bend over the back of my chair to scoop up my purse.

  “Who was that?” she demands. “He’s not a member of the crew.”

  “No, he’s not,” I agree. “He’s not from the show at all.”

  “So what is he doing here?”

  “I brought him.”

  “But I saw you arrive!” Lizzie says. “You didn’t have a date.”

  “I know that. I went out to the lobby a few minutes ago and met him there.”

  She screws up her face, a little bit of judgment showing through.

  “You just went out to the lobby and picked up a guy there?”

  “Are you questioning my taste?” I ask. I indicate Alex, who’s now up at the bar ordering drinks. “He’s gorgeous. And he’s sweet, too.”

  “Yeah, but I mean, just bringing any old guy you could find…”

  “I didn’t go out there looking for a date,” I say, exasperated. “I met a cute guy, and we hit it off. I can’t help that it happened in the lobby.”

  A hand grabs my arm. “Erica. Oh my God.”

  I turn. The hand belongs to Melissa, one of our makeup artists. She specializes in two things: gore—open wounds, blood, ugly scars, things of that nature—and gossip. She makes Lizzie look bush league by comparison. Lizzie’s form of gossip is like a group of water-cooler hens in an office, but Melissa is more like a tabloid. She likes to know everything, and she like to tell everyone.

  “What’s up, Melissa?” I say.

  Her eyes are wide. “How do you know Prince Alessandro?”

  “Prince who?” I ask. “Are you talking about Alex? The guy I was dancing with?”

  “Yes!”

  “I just met him,” I say. “Why are you calling him Prince Alessandro?”

  It occurs to me for a moment to wonder if he’s an actor after all, perhaps on a competing show.

  “You don’t know?” Melissa asks. “He’s the prince of Avaran.”

  “He’s what?” I stare at her. “No, he isn’t.”

  “Oh yes, he definitely is. Remember how during the last hiatus I was in Italy working on that location shoot?”

  I don’t remember that at all, actually. Melissa and I have never been close, and I have no idea where she goes during breaks. It’s very like her to assume that everyone is constantly aware of what she has going on at all times.

  “Sure,” I say.

  “Well, he was in all the tabloids and gossip rags,” she says. “And I was buying everything I could get my hands on, because…well, honestly, I had a bit of a crush. I mean, look at him.”

  We all do. He’s on his way back now, carrying two cups in one massive hand.

  “That’s Prince Alessandro, all right,” Melissa punctuates this statement with a nod. “I can’t believe you didn’t know.”

  Lizzie turns to me, mouth agape. “What are you going to do?”

  I have no idea. But I need to figure it out because Alex—Prince Alessandro—is walking up to our table now, a smile on his face and a drink held outstretched for me.

  Chapter 4

  Since joining the cast of Royal Blue, I’ve been through plenty of awkward situations. I’ve had to answer every question under the sun about my situation, and I don’t feel qualified to speak on most of them at all.

  “What’s it like to be royalty?” I wouldn’t know, would I? I’m not really a princess.

  I try to answer this question with as much sincerity in my voice as possible, but I’m afraid I sound like I’m making fun of the person asking. People know I’m not a real princess, of course they do, and yet it feels like they expect me to have some insight into the world of royalty. I doubt the lives of real royals are anything like what I experience on the show.

  “What’s it like to be famous?” Another question I get all the time, and another that I feel woefully unqualified to answer, though in this case, I have little excuse.

  I’m famous, I know I am. My show airs worldwide and has won awards. My face has been on billboards and magazine covers. And yet, every time I’m asked this question, I feel like an imposter. “I’m not famous,” I want to say. “I’m just Erica from Ohio.”

  Then there are the questions about my personal life, maybe my least favorite of all. Eager fans want to know all about what’s going on with me, what it’s really like to be Erica Steadman. “Are you dating Chris Watson?” eager girls ask me as they reach the front of my autograph line. Their eyes flick from me to Chris, who usually sits next to me at these things, and I know they’re examining us for some secret sign that will indicate we’re together, some flicker of sexual tension.

  There’s nothing there. But more than half the time, I would say, the fans walk away with a knowing gleam in their eye, looking satisfied and sure that they were right all along.

  Then there are the journalists. They’re even worse, because their job is to make stories out of lives, and lives are not simple narratives. When they find out I’m single, they start looking for reasons. Did I suffer a tragic heartbreak? Am I pining for someone I can’t have? Or, perhaps, is it that I’m just too difficult, too unpleasant to be around, and I can’t keep a man because of it?

  The journalists don’t want to b
elieve the truth, which is that as nice as dating sounds, I haven’t had the necessary time to devote to it since being cast on the show. Sure, I’ve been on a few dates here and there—Jay comes to mind—but the men who have sought me out for dates have invariably been either jerks or weirdos more interested in Princess Aeryn than they are in me, and I haven’t been able to look for men on my own.

  And now here I am standing opposite Alessandro—Prince Alessandro, if Melissa is to be believed. I can feel Lizzie’s eyes boring into me, her desperation to know what’s going on here ripening on the air.

  I take the drink held out to me and sip it, giving myself time to think. Do I confront him with what Melissa said? Do I put him on the spot right now, the way fans and reporters do to me? The way I hate?

  I have to know the truth. I have a right to know who I’m spending my time with. I’m not being nosy or intrusive. It’s a perfectly valid question.

  I don’t have to do it in front of the others, though. I can spare him that much.

  “Can you come with me, please?” I ask.

  “Where are you going?” Lizzie interrupts in consternation.

  “I’ll be back,” I tell her. “I just need to speak to—to Alex for a moment.”

  He looks mystified, but he follows me back out of the ballroom and down the hall toward the hotel bar.

  “I thought you wanted to go to that party?” he says. “I assumed we’d stay a little longer than that.”

  “I don’t know,” I say. I’m acutely aware that this is the second time I’ve walked out on Gary’s party tonight. “I really just wanted to put in an appearance,” I add. “Everyone’s seen me now. It’s an okay time to get away for a while.”

  Alex—or Alessandro—nods his head. “If you say so.”

  The booth we left at the bar is still empty, so I return to it. He takes a seat opposite me and watches me, evenly, calmly, waiting for me to say something. But what I have to say feels ridiculous out here in the open atmosphere of the bar, away from Melissa’s gossip. She can’t be right, can she?

  “You’re not a prince, are you?” I finally blurt out, feeling foolish.