by Leslie North
Katie frowned, clearly disappointed. “They’re done in a few minutes. And I have to run into town after I drop them with the French tutor.”
Armin’s disappointment mirrored hers, but he did his best not to let it show. “Go now, if you’d like,” he offered. “I can spend some quality time with them on my own.” He pulled up another chair as Katie stood from hers.
“Are you sure?” He felt pulled to her, like she was her own source of gravity.
“I’m sure. Go.”
He settled into the chair. Now the girls did notice him, staring openly in the mirror. He gave them an encouraging nod, and they continued on.
Katie hovered, one hesitant moment, and then she was gone.
She took all of her notes with her.
“I’m done.”
Katie dropped the notes on the table in front of Papazyan. The café was crowded, the perfect cover for their meeting—not a single person would be paying attention to them.
Papazyan picked up the little packet of papers and leafed through it.
“Did you hear me?”
He glanced up at her. “I heard you.”
“I’m done.”
He did not answer.
“There’s nothing to find. You’re barking up the wrong tree. Prince Armin has nothing to hide. He’s spotless.” She took a big breath in and let it out. “Artur, the middle brother, is the partier. Maybe the real dirt you should be digging into is about him.”
Papazyan turned over another one of her pages, then looked up at her, a gleam in his eye that made her stomach turn over. “I’ve heard more interesting rumors that came from Kamsbourg.”
Kamsbourg, where Armin had taken them for their holiday.
“What rumors?” Katie was a beat too late, and she knew it. But she kept her face neutral.
“About a prince.” Papazyan leaned back in his chair, and she gave an impatient huff. “And a nanny that he’s spending an inappropriate amount of time with.”
She cocked her head to the side. “Define an inappropriate amount of time.”
“Too much time.” He grinned at her, a sickening expression. “More time than a prince would need to spend, even to get closer to his own adoptive children.”
“I haven’t heard anything like that,” Katie said primly.
“You wouldn’t have, would you? Because people wouldn’t be repeating it to you.”
“Because I’m a nanny for the prince?”
“Because I think you’re the nanny for the prince. I’m almost certain.”
“You’re certainly wrong.” Her heartbeat fluttered in the side of her neck. He wasn’t wrong, and she hated to lie about it. But she had to protect Armin.
“I’ve seen this kind of thing before, Ms. Crestley.”
Katie’s stomach plummeted into her shoes. About Armin? She didn’t believe it. If Papazyan had anything, it would have been plastered all over the newspaper’s front page. But maybe there was more. Maybe he had a hidden card to play.
“Look,” he said, spreading his hands wide in front of him. “Either get me a story or become the story yourself. It’s that simple. I’d hate to burn a source, because it’s always better to have access to ten stories than to ruin someone for just one, but that doesn’t mean I won’t do it.”
Katie stood up as straight as she could. “I don’t know why you’d go so far as to print blatant lies.”
Papazyan smirked at her as he reached for the papers on the table, folded them up, and put them into his pocket. “There are people in Prince Armin’s orbit who will be all too happy to confirm the rumors, for the right payout. Not to mention the anti-royalists who are hiding in his administration.” He leaned forward, folding his hands on the table. “So. What’ll it be?”
She couldn’t hurt Armin like this…especially now. But if the story of their affair came out, it would be disastrous for them both. The reputation of the royal family would take a major blow, and as for her…she’d never live it down. People would question her integrity for the rest of her life. Worse, she’d lose her job. And worst of all…she’d lose Armin and the girls.
“Just…hold on.” Katie bit her lip, looking away from the table. At the art on the walls. At the extra chairs stacked up in the back hallway. Anywhere but his horrible face. “Give me time to find something.” Time to maneuver. To figure a way out of this.
“You have one week to get the kind of story I want.”
“What kind of story is that?” Katie made a conscious effort to relax her knees so she didn’t faint.
“A scandal. Ask about the secret child. That’s the mother of all rumors, if you’ll pardon the pun.”
“Fine.” She clenched her teeth together. “I will. But what if it turns out to be a rumor and nothing more?”
“You’d better hope it’s not.”
He dismissed her with a wave of his hand, and she turned on her heel and went.
At the door of the café, Katie swallowed hard and went out.
10
Alexei Mihailo sat up straight in his seat across from Armin, a confident smile on his face.
They were almost finished signing contracts for the orphanage project.
It would be led by Alexei, with four other contractors in the mix, and Armin was very close to feeling on top of the world. This had been a long time coming. But he had done it.
It was down to his signature on the papers.
In the corner of the room, the royal photographer snapped photos. Normally, a meeting like this wouldn’t be an occasion to photograph, but Armin had wanted her there. His brother Rafael, the king, sat at his side at the meeting table, lending the whole meeting an extra aura.
Mr. Klemen sat to Rafael’s left, and the man was beside himself with the attention Rafael was paying to the relatively young contractor. Armin could see sweat gathering at Klemen’s brow even as he answered Rafael’s careful questions and Armin signed on several dotted lines.
“—a wonderful way to apply your talents,” Rafael was saying to Klemen.
“How could anyone pass this up?” Klemen gestured at the rest of the table. “Among this crowd, I might as well still be in school. It’s an incredible honor.”
It hadn’t been such an incredible honor when Armin had initially proposed making life better for orphans, but he let the comment pass. What mattered was that he had three men and two women sitting at the table who would make his vision a reality. That reality could come none too soon for the children who needed the orphanage’s services.
Mihailo cleared his throat, glancing between all of them. “Prince Armin, I’ve heard tell that there may be more than one cause for celebration today.”
It was to be a celebration. Armin had had bottles of champagne brought in for all of them to toast with when the papers were signed. He himself would not appear in any of the photos of the contractors all together—he’d made certain that the only photographs would be of him signing the contracts, available in the public archive. But as much as he wanted to improve his image, he wasn’t going to take all the credit for the work that this team would eventually do.
Mihailo’s words registered in his brain. “More than one?”
The way the man beamed at him made him wish it would stop.
“I’ve heard that you’ve become quite close with a certain lady.”
Armin froze in the middle of his final signature. He stared across the table at Mihailo, the silence ballooning around him until even Klemen realized something was wrong.
“A certain lady?” Armin repeated, his voice flat and cold.
Mihailo nudged the man next to him, who nodded his agreement. “We’ve both heard the news, Prince Armin.” It was as if they were waiting for an admission…or for Armin to say it was all a joke. Something they could have a good laugh about.
“What news?” asked Rafael jovially. “Have you been keeping something from me, brother?” The look he gave Armin was meant to reel him in, to make this moment less uncomfortable, but
it wasn’t working.
“I’m curious to find out myself.” Armin scrawled the last of his signature on the line and put the pen down with a hollow thud.
“Come now, Prince Armin.” Mihailo seemed to have realized he’d stepped onto shaky ground, but he was already out in the middle of it, all eyes on him, with no room to retreat. “Surely you’ve heard of your own nanny?”
“I’m shocked, Armin. You’ve never said a word about her.” Rafael’s tone was meticulously light.
“That’s because it’s not true.” Armin looked around at each of the people at the table in turn. Klemen was the first to drop his eyes to the tabletop. It was palpably uncomfortable in the room, the air so thick Armin could hardly breathe.
Rafael rapped his knuckles on the table. “Is everything signed, then? We should celebrate!”
A chorus of relieved agreement filled the table. The photographer held her camera low, not daring to take a photograph as everyone stood up.
Armin stood up woodenly, heat rushing to his cheeks even as he struggled not to let anything show. Rafael leaned in close. “I sympathize, brother,” he said quickly. “But perhaps now isn’t the best time to appear…”
“To appear like what?” he said through clenched teeth. “Irritated that the city is spreading false rumors about me?” It stung, to lie about his feelings for Katie like this. It stung more than he had anticipated to hide the truth from his brother. But the battle between his competing interests roared. He had to protect his reputation, protect her—and protect the girls. But it tasted bitter to call what they had a fake.
“One, two, three,” said the photographer. Behind the two men, up against a wall that had a framed oil painting of a map of Stolvenia, the contractors had gathered for a photograph. The camera clicked and flashed. “Very nice,” she said.
“Armin, you’ve done good work here,” Rafael said softly. “Don’t let this ruin the moment. It’s an innocent rumor.”
“Are rumors ever really innocent?”
Rafael narrowed his eyes. “Is there something else you’re not telling me?”
There was something else. Of course there was. But he already knew that Rafael was in the dark about what their eldest brother, Eduard, had done.
And if now wasn’t the time to rock the boat about his own secrets, it certainly wasn’t the time to divulge any others. He’d kept the secret this long—he’d keep it a while longer.
He took a deep breath, pretending to calm himself. At least he could give the appearance of placidity, if nothing else. “No. I’m only frustrated.”
Rafael reached out and clapped him on the shoulder, turning to face the contractors. “Smile at them,” his brother said softly into Armin’s ears. “Smooth it over. Good man.”
Armin’s brother Rafael had offered to come to the girls’ painting lesson. The king, Katie discovered, was a serious man, who nonetheless had a good sense of humor and an expansive attitude. He’d asked the instructor to set up two additional easels for him and Katie, and they stood behind the girls, giving them a little space, and tried to follow along with the lesson.
As the instructor went over the finer points of shading the apple they were attempting to recreate on canvas, Rafael looked across at her. “I heard an interesting rumor at the meeting this morning.”
“The signing?” she said neutrally. “What kinds of rumors would be discussed at a contract signing?”
“Rumors about you.” He didn’t waste time, the king. She could appreciate that. “You and my brother.”
“You know, Your Majesty,” she said, swirling her brush in bright red paint, “if you have questions, you can just ask.”
He considered this with a huffed laugh. “All right, Ms. Crestley. I’ll ask. What is your relationship with my brother?”
She added a few more strokes to the apple. “I’m the nanny to his daughters.”
“And the rumors? Is there any truth to them?”
“You’d have to be more specific about which rumors you mean,” Katie said with a little sigh. “There are so many of them flying around the palace, and around the city.”
“Is that so?”
“People talk about everything. I hear them when I go on outside errands, while the girls are in school. The royal family is on everyone’s lips.”
Rafael nodded solemnly, looking at his own painting.
“So many,” Katie went on. “There’s the one that Armin is actually a twin.”
A smile broke across Rafael’s face. “He’s not a twin. I can put that one to rest.”
“Or, that one of you has a secret child.” She said it lightly, so lightly, but even from the corner of her eye, the change in Rafael’s expression was obvious. He pressed his lips shut tight.
“That’s not the first time I’ve heard someone mention that particular rumor,” he said, an edge to his voice.
“Well, most rumors with any legs—”
“You’re right, Ms. Crestley. It wasn’t wise to discuss this.”
She took another deep breath and steadied herself. All families had secrets. The royal family was no exception. But a secret child? As a natural-born journalist, she wanted to know more about this. But as a grown adult, she knew when a line had been crossed. And it had. She didn’t dare press the king about it any further, even if it could be her ticket to silencing Papazyan for at least a little while longer.
If one of the brothers had a secret child hidden away somewhere, then things were complicated beyond what she had expected. A secret child could mean a secret heir to the throne, for one thing.
“My intent was…” Rafael’s voice trailed off, and then he spoke again. “If there is some…other emotion between yourself and my brother, then my intent was to tell you to tread carefully.”
Katie’s heart pounded. “I don’t know what you mean by that.”
“A prince is not always as available as he seems. His past sometimes has a tighter hold on him than we realize.”
Cryptic.
Her thoughts moved slowly, as if through the mud. Did this count as confirmation that someone had a secret child? If it was, and she took it to Papazyan, it would be a deep dive into tabloid journalism all over again.
And if Armin ever found out she was the source…she knew what the consequences were for that. She’d been over them with herself many times.
But…if people were asking about their relationship, then maybe the writing was on the wall already. Armin wouldn’t stay with her if it meant hurting the country, damaging the reputation of his family, or putting the girls’ happiness at risk in anyway.
No matter what she did, Katie was on the verge of losing everything that mattered to her. And she was a little afraid to find out what she might do to hold on to it just a little while longer.
“Katie, look!” Lily called to her from her easel. The lesson had ended while Katie wasn’t paying attention. “Come see what we’ve done.”
She put her brush down on the holder on her easel and went to admire the girls’ work. Rafael did too, giving no sign that anything was wrong—that they’d even talked. He was so calm and collected that Katie could almost believe the conversation hadn’t happened.
Until he left the room, giving her a meaningful look before he went.
So it was real. The stakes had never been higher.
Katie delivered the girls to their final lesson of the day, which was one of their favorites—tennis. Armin had squeezed sporting lessons in as a way to let them blow off steam, and they genuinely loved it. It was so much better than the violin, they said.
When they were engaged on the court, Katie slipped away and back to her room.
Back to her desk.
Back to her notepad.
Her hand shook a little as she opened the book to a fresh page and scribbled down the note.
Rafael seemed to believe in the possibility that someone in the royal family has a secret child. Other heirs?
The words made her sick. She didn’t want
to be this person.
But what other choice did she have?
11
Rafael and his entourage had just swept out of the building when Natalia came into his office.
“All the paperwork is filed, Prince Armin.” She gave him a proud little smile, then seemed to hesitate. “I know this project has taken a lot of work. I wanted to congratulate you on the accomplishment.”
His own chest swelled with pride, though Armin never wanted to gloat. It had been a hell of an undertaking.
“Everyone played an essential part,” he told her.
Out at Natalia’s desk, the phone rang. She dipped her head and went to answer it. A moment later, Armin’s phone blinked—an incoming call.
“Prince Armin.” The voice on the other end of the line boomed. It was Stephen, the man in charge of repairs and renovations on the orphanage. “We’ve heard the excellent news. I hate to monopolize your time, but—”
“Yes? What is it?”
“We were hoping you could come out here for an hour. Meet with us. Now that the plans are finalized, the logistics will begin. I want to make sure all of us are on the very same page so that your vision can be brought to life. And—it’ll be good for the press to see a little groundbreaking ceremony. A few shovelfuls of earth, and it’ll be clear we’re on our way.”
Armin cleared his throat. “I’ll be available in a few hours. However, this isn’t my vision. This is the vision of Stolvenia. All our people should agree that caring for those who have lost the most is our top priority.” This was slightly embarrassing. Yes, it had been a good idea to present a more caring, open front to the people, but he didn’t want everyone thinking this was about his ego rather than about the orphans.
“Of course, of course,” Stephen said quickly. “We’ll be waiting for your signal.”
