Surprise Packages

by Layla Valentine

  Although I haven’t had time to make any deliberate strides toward it, I want a family of my own. I feel a pang every time I see my friends with babies and toddlers. And lately, with how busy I’ve been working on Royal Blue and handling life in the public eye, I’ve begun to wonder if normal family life will ever be possible for me.

  Of course, there isn’t anything normal about this situation.

  I stop at a drive-through pharmacy to buy a pregnancy test. I put sunglasses on even though it’s a cloudy day and let my hair down to disguise my face. I’ll have to hope the clerk doesn’t figure out who I am, or if he does, that he has enough discretion not to leak it to the press. There’s nothing to stop him.

  Most women in my position would send a friend or assistant or their agent to the drugstore for them, but I don’t have anyone I trust enough, and I don’t have time to track someone down. I need this answered now.

  Back at home, I make my way to the bathroom, tearing the little pink box open as I go and shaking out the package with the test inside. I rip it open with trembling fingers. I have no idea at the moment what outcome I’m hoping for. The only thing I know for certain that I want is information.

  Is it true?

  The waiting is the hardest part. I place the test on the edge of the bathtub and pace, not daring to look at it, waiting for the timer on my phone to inform me that the results are in. It feels like forever. I lose a year of my life waiting on that test.

  The alarm rings.

  I freeze for a moment in the eleventh hour. Once I look, there’s no going back.

  Then I cross the floor quickly before I can stop myself and grab the test.

  Positive.

  I’m pregnant.

  I’m pregnant, and the father is a prince.

  I’m having a prince’s baby.

  Chapter 8

  It takes me a long time to calm down. I sit in the bathroom, frozen in shock, for at least a half hour. Even though I suspected it, even though I was pretty sure, I wasn’t at all prepared for having it confirmed. Even now, it feels like there must be some mistake.

  I can’t be pregnant. I’m not. I don’t feel any different.

  That isn’t true, of course—haven’t I already been noticing ways in which I feel different? But it should be more than that, shouldn’t it? I’m having a baby. I’m growing a whole person inside me. And the difference I notice is that I feel a little more tired? That’s nothing. Compared with the magnitude of the news that I’m pregnant, that’s not even worth talking about.

  Finally, I scrape myself off the floor and make my way to the bedroom to lie down. I don’t bother turning the lights on.

  I feel like I need to call somebody. I don’t know what my next step is here. There’s never been anything like this in my adult life. I’ve always known what I needed to do next, even if that thing wasn’t easy. When I wanted to become an actress, I needed to move to LA, get an agent, and start going on auditions. It was straightforward. But this? What do I do next?

  My friends back home, the ones who’ve had babies, they could tell me how to handle a pregnancy. But they wouldn’t have any idea how to keep sensational news out of the press. Can I trust the entire staff at my doctor’s office not to leak something like this? Lizzie, on the other hand, is great with advice on avoiding publicity, but what does she know about babies?

  Besides all of which, the person I really need to talk to is Alex.

  We agreed we’d let things die between us, that our one great night together would be just that, but this changes everything. Doesn’t it? Wouldn’t he want to know about this?

  I realize, suddenly, sharply, that I don’t know.

  How well do I honestly know Alex? It felt like we had such a connection that night. But can I honestly claim to know him? We barely had time to talk. I know nothing about his family, his childhood, even the country he comes from. I don’t know what his values are at all. And I don’t know anything about the strictures placed on him by his title, either.

  This baby is his, there’s no doubt about that, but it was conceived out of wedlock on a one-night stand with a woman who is decidedly not royalty, and not Avaranian either. How much of a problem might that be for him? It’s possible he’ll want nothing to do with this child.

  What would I do if that were the case?

  I have to tell him about the baby. That much is clear. He has a right to know he’s going to be a father. No matter how he feels about it, he has the right to the information, and he has the right to decide what he wants to do next.

  And, if I’m honest with myself, I want his involvement. It’s more than just wanting Alex in my life, too, although I definitely want that. If I had my wish, this would bring us back together.

  But I can’t count on that. He’s made it clear that a relationship between us won’t work no matter how we feel about it, and his reasons do make sense. So I’ll just have to hope that he wants to be involved in the life of his child. I hope very much that he will. I want my baby to know his or her father.

  Telling Alex the truth will be hard, there’s no doubt about it. But I feel confident in my decision. It’s the right thing to do for everyone concerned.

  And now I have a path forward.

  I close my eyes and pull my pillow over my face, stunned at how quickly my entire world has changed around me, and how much.

  Chapter 9

  I’m expecting another sleepless night, like the one I passed when Alex was here in bed with me, because I’m once again so distracted and caught up that it seems impossible I could ever relax enough to drift off.

  And yet, to my surprise, I find myself waking up as the early rays of sun slot their way through the windows. It must be the pregnancy, is all I can figure, ensuring that my body gets the rest it needs.

  I really know nothing about being pregnant. I feel like a book will spare me days getting lost in the myriad of information online, but it’s not like I can just walk into a bookstore and buy a pregnancy guide—the news would be out before I even got home.

  Fortunately, I have a P.O. box set up under a pseudonym, so I can shop online without having to attach my name to the shipment.

  I reach over to my nightstand and pull my tablet out of the drawer and tap a few buttons to place a quick order. The book won’t arrive for a few days, but that’s okay. I can look for information online until then.

  And speaking of looking for information online…

  The problem is that I don’t know any details about Alex, and that’s going to make it next to impossible for me to contact him. We didn’t exchange phone numbers or any type of contact information. Of course, there’s the significant fact of him being the prince of Avaran, and that makes him fairly traceable, I would assume. But it doesn’t tell me how to get in contact with him at all.

  Really, he was right about one thing. His situation is incredibly similar to my own. I know I have thousands of fans, but it’s almost impossible for them to talk to me directly. Fan letters have to be sent to the production company, and they have people whose job it is to screen them before I receive them. Even once I do, I would never have time to read them all. And my public social media accounts are managed by other people. I’m sure Alex has exactly the same setup—not reachable to the public.

  But I have to try. I have to do everything I can to let him know.

  Before I can think about what I’m doing or try to talk myself out of it, I’m typing “Avaran” into a search engine.

  I steel myself, half expecting Alex’s face to pop up immediately, but it doesn’t. The first few images shown are all either maps of the little country or photos of a city I don’t recognize. I suppose it must be the capital. I scroll down. The search results page offers me a tourism guide, a list of hotels, and—an encyclopedia article.

  It’s as good a place to start as any.

  I click the link and skim the article, waiting for something to jump out at me. The article seems to cover the entire history of Avaran. T
he first part shows me where Avaran is in the world and talks about things like major imports and exports and what the currency is. Nice to know, but not the kind of thing I’m looking for.

  I scroll down a bit, not sure exactly what I’m hoping to see, and stop at a heading that says “Politics.”

  “Avaran is a monarchy with a recent history of turmoil,” the article reads. “Although the throne has been occupied by the Gosar family for several generations—”

  Gosar. His last name must be Gosar.

  I open another browser tab, type in “Alessandro Gosar,” hit search, and click back to my encyclopedia article to finish reading.

  “Although the throne has been occupied by the Gosar family for several generations, a recent ruler, former king Enzo Gosar, was forced to abdicate the throne thirty-five years ago. Enzo Gosar now holds the title of Duke of Avaran. Meanwhile, his younger brother Donato Gosar has assumed the throne and now holds the title of King of Avaran. Because of Enzo’s abdication, the line of succession has shifted from his family to Donato’s.”

  Which means that Alex must be Donato Gosar’s son, right? And Enzo is his uncle. Forced to abdicate… I wonder what happened there?

  I open a new tab and run a search on the name Enzo Gosar. Then I click back into the tab with the results from my search on Alex himself.

  My jaw drops.

  I don’t know exactly what I was expecting—maybe another encyclopedia article or a nice shot of the royal family—but it’s all tabloids. They’re not in English, so I can’t read the headlines, but God knows I’ve seen enough of this kind of publication to recognize what I’m looking at.

  This must be what Melissa was talking about when she said she’d seen Alex’s face everywhere while she was in Italy. Based on the design choices and layouts of the magazine covers, I’d be willing to bet they were fairly recent.

  I return to the tab about Enzo Gosar. There are tabloids here too, but there are also actual news articles, text instead of just photographs of magazine pages, so I’m able to have the internet translate them into English.

  The articles are old, probably older than anything I’ve found so far. It looks like there isn’t really any recent news about the former king—despite being a titled member of the royal family, he’s faded into obscurity.

  So much the better for me, really, because what I want to know about is what happened back then, not what he’s up to now. Why was he forced to step aside? Why is his brother—Alex’s father—now on the throne? Could something like that happen again?

  The encyclopedia article said that the country was in turmoil, but I know enough to know that those things are just written by internet users who may or may not know what they’re talking about. Newspaper articles are a much better source.

  The page finishes translating, and I settle in to read.

  “Enzo Gosar has abdicated the throne in disgrace after news emerged that Countess Giovanna Mancini is pregnant with his child.

  The countess and Gosar had been courting for several months, and this publication has speculated on his intentions to marry her. However, no proposal has yet been extended, and the couple remain unmarried.

  The throne will be assumed by Enzo Gosar’s next eldest brother, Donato Gosar. The royal family has yet to release a statement.”

  Oh, my God.

  Enzo Gosar, Alex’s uncle, impregnated a woman out of wedlock, and it was such a scandal that he was forced to give up his throne to his brother? The word disgrace catches and holds my eye, like a flashing red sign on the page. Disgrace. Is that what I’m going to bring to Alex? Will I humiliate him in front of his family by telling the truth? Will I cause him to be disinherited?

  I don’t think I could stand that. This whole situation is messy enough, but if I had to watch Alex lose his title because of me, it would break my heart. I was so certain when I made the decision to tell him I was pregnant, but now I have to admit that I had no idea what the stakes were, and I’m second-guessing everything.

  And from what I can tell of Enzo’s story, mine is even more scandalous. At least he knocked up a woman he was in a relationship with. A woman he knew well. A titled woman of Avaranian heritage. If this article is to be believed, he was on the verge of marrying her anyway, and things just happened a little out of order. Yet they still stripped him of his title. If that’s how they respond to unplanned pregnancies in the royal family of Avaran, what are they going to say when the unwed mother is some random girl from California—from Ohio?

  They’re not going to want anything to do with me in Avaran. And Alex—what if Alex hates me for disrupting his life, for putting him in an impossible position? I know it takes more than one person to become pregnant. It’s not my fault this happened. But maybe he’ll expect that I should know I’m on my own at this point.

  After all, he did say we shouldn’t keep in contact.

  I lean forward, bracing my elbows on my knees, trying to collect myself. This is crazy. This exact same thing happened to Alex’s uncle, and it’s happening again now, just one generation later. And I have no idea anymore what I should do.

  Maybe I shouldn’t tell him.

  But no. Something deep within me refuses to accept that option. I have to tell him.

  I’ll do whatever I can to tell him privately, so he’ll have the power to keep it a secret at least until we decide what to do. I don’t want to bring him public shame or do anything to mess up his life, but he needs to know he’s going to be a father—not only for his sake, but for the sake of the child. This isn’t a secret I can keep for the next twenty years. My baby is going to want to know who his or her father is. I’m not going to be able to lie about that.

  But how on earth am I supposed to get in touch with a prince?

  If only I’d asked him for a contact number! Would he have given me one? I have to admit, I wouldn’t normally give my personal cell phone number to a guy after a one-night stand… Although, if Alex had asked, I would have done it in a heartbeat.

  Why does this have to be so difficult?

  I wish I could call Lizzie. She’s been in Hollywood so long that she’s become an expert at penetrating the layers of security around famous and influential people. She’s always getting us dinner reservations at some pop star’s favorite restaurant or taking us to the salon where a movie star gets her hair done on the off chance that we might run into someone who’s more of a big deal in this town than we are. It always seems like a long shot, and I always tease her, but it works out more often than you’d expect. We’ve come across our share of big names, and most of them recognize us from the show and are happy to chat a little.

  But that strategy wouldn’t work with Alex anyway, because he’s on the other side of the world. I can’t just try to figure out what bars or coffee shops he frequents. They’re all in Avaran. Of course, he did mention that he likes to come to California when he wants to get away from it all, but who knows when he’ll next want to do that?

  I can’t rely on it being anytime soon.

  Is it possible that there just isn’t a way to get in touch with him? That as much as I want to do the right thing here, the right thing is out of reach?

  It can’t be, can it? There’s got to be something I can do. He’s out there. There must be some way of reaching him, even if it is difficult, even if it involves a lot of leg work. It can’t be impossible.

  Maybe there’s contact information for the royal family at the palace. That seems like a long shot, but I search the words “Avaran palace address” just to see what comes up.

  They have a website! Avaran Palace Residence and Administrative Headquarters. It looks like an informational page, much like the encyclopedia article I began with on the country itself.

  I scroll down a bit further and a subheading appears.

  “Contact the Royal Family.”

  Really? This seems too good to be true. Can it really be as simple as clicking on a link and getting an email address or a phone number that will lead
me to Alex?

  With bated breath, I click.

  The website surprises me. I’m expecting something ancient and very formal-looking, but it looks like it could belong to the administrator of an elementary school. It’s headed by an image of friendly looking motherly women attending to paperwork.

  I read:

  “Members of Avaran’s royal family may be contacted by mail at the following address:”

  An address follows. Immediately, without meaning to, I commit it to memory. This is where my baby’s father lives. This is where I can find him. It’s the most important piece of information in the world.

  And I can write to him! I can actually send him a letter, and it will get to him! He’ll open it, of course. I don’t doubt he receives hundreds of letters every day, but he’ll open mine. The time we spent together was enough to ensure that. The feeling of relief that floods me at the knowledge that I’ll be able to reach him, after all, is indescribable. I didn’t realize how afraid I was that it was hopeless.

  Then my eyes move further down the page.

  “All correspondence sent to the royal family is received and reviewed by private secretaries before being shown to the addressee.”

  The reality of it splashes through my elation, shattering it and sinking into the pit of my stomach like a stone.

  Who are these secretaries? How private are they? Would a letter to Alex remain confidential, seen only by himself and the person whose responsibility it was to read it first? Or would the reader divulge the salacious information I’d have to include in the letter to someone else? Would they tell the king, Alex’s father?

  If there’s even a chance of Alex’s father reading my letter, I realize, I can’t send it. Not when it could cause such damage in Alex’s life, cause him to lose his throne and his title.

  I press my fingers against my temples, trying to think. Just when I thought I’d found a solution, it evaporated. Of course they’ll show the letter to the king. That’s probably why they employ private secretaries to open letters in the first place—to control the flow of information.