Royal Affair

by Laurie Paige

  A pain shot straight to Ivy’s heart at the idea. “No,” she said, then stronger, “no, I couldn’t. I couldn’t do that to Max.”

  Because I love him too much, was the rest of that statement, left unsaid. Her knees went rubbery at the thought.

  “Good. Besides, you’ve already given up your apartment and had the furniture put in storage.” Katie patted her cheek. “Max is a good person, little sis. I knew it the first time I met him.”

  That drew a smile from Ivy. “I trust your judgment, O great wise one.”

  Katie rolled her eyes. “I know I got you that blind date with the jerk from college, but anybody can make one mistake.”

  “This mistake involves marriage.” Ivy fingered the jewels around her neck.

  Katie did a double take. “Ivy, they’re the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen! Max gave them to you? Of course he did,” she answered herself. “When?”

  “Just before we left the hotel.”

  “Wow,” Katie murmured as they left the room and went to join the rest of the wedding party. “Hey, you can give me your cast-off evening dresses the way Princess Diana did with her friends. We’ll be so glamorous our friends won’t recognize us anymore.”

  Her sister pushed her glasses up on her nose and laughed at the idea. Ivy smiled, then considered Katie’s practical two-piece evening pantsuit. It was a simple black outfit, smart and dressy but very plain. It was a bit loose and didn’t do a thing for Katie’s new slimmer figure.

  Maybe, Ivy thought, it was time for her and Katie to learn to be more fashionable and less…business oriented. Neither of them had ever learned to flirt—

  “Ah, the minister is here,” Katie said, breaking into the rather odd musing. “We’re ready,” she called out, guiding Ivy into the living room.

  The rehearsal took place in the library. Chuck was Max’s best man, and Trent was the groomsman. Danny would have been the other, but he didn’t appear. Ivy hadn’t expected him to come, but she still missed him.

  Katie and Emma walked side by side as her maid and matron of honor, then she and her father practiced walking down an imaginary aisle. Her eyes met Max’s when the brief practice session was over. He gave her a slight wink, his eyes alight with mischief. As if he’d spoken in her mind, she knew he was thinking of having his wicked way with her.

  She looked down before her thoughts could give her away. He chuckled and took her arm. “Let’s go. I’m starved,” he told her.

  At the country club, a private room was ready for them, again with white and golden mums adding a festive air to the surroundings. An arch made of balloons with Congratulations spelled out in glittering golden letters welcomed the bridal pair. The manager greeted them and presented a bottle of expensive champagne to them, then discreetly retreated.

  For Ivy, the evening felt more and more surreal as it wore on, as if none of this were happening. Max’s touch on her wrist reminded her that it was. Very definitely.

  Trent took an opportunity while the women were repairing their makeup and the men were enjoying cigars after dinner to discuss with Max and Chuck as well as his father the latest findings on security.

  “You were right,” he said to Chuck. “The bugging of Ivy’s phone was an inside job. As you suggested, we gave the culprit enough rope and he did, indeed, hang himself.”

  Chuck nodded in satisfaction. “You got him.”

  “We did. It was a programmer we hired last year to work on the Lantanya project. He came to us from a Silicon Valley company and had a great recommendation from his former boss. No wonder. He was feeding info back to them on the setup of the educational system, both hardware and software.”

  “The traitor,” his father muttered.

  “Right,” Trent agreed. “They wanted the new router design, but Ivy kept the drawings under lock and key and only gave out parts of the design on a need-to-know basis. The guy wasn’t in the loop, and thanks to Ivy’s care, he couldn’t find out what he needed to know.”

  “So what did he hope to gain by bugging her phones?” Max asked.

  “Clues to where the system was being tested, if she had the drawings at home, anything they could get a hold of,” Trent explained.

  “How did you catch him?” Jack Crosby asked.

  “Chuck told us to hire a new computer guru who was supposedly an expert on running the tests that integrated the hardware with the software. Naturally our expert was really an expert at company espionage. When one of the programmers expressed an interest in the tests and made a practice of hanging around and got real chummy, our man let him, feeding him just enough to indicate the expert knew the whole system and had the entire design set.”

  “Ah,” his father said with a pleased expression as he puffed on the cigar.

  “This afternoon our man caught the other guy going through his office files, which he’d conveniently left unlocked, and copying those marked with the Lantanya project code name,” Trent finished, leaning back in the chair with a pleased grin.

  “Trent called me shortly before we left the hotel,” Chuck said, taking up the tale. “The D.A. has a warrant and is now searching the man’s apartment as we speak. The cops have already traced the culprit’s e-mails to their source, so we know who was on the receiving end of his messages and directing him in the espionage.”

  “Good work,” Max told Trent and Chuck. “I’m pleased with the business contract we have with Crosby Systems and the level of cooperation you’ve given Chuck in this.”

  Jack Crosby chuckled. “It could prove a bit awkward if we didn’t cooperate. After all, as my son-in-law, you’ll have an inside source within the company.”

  “Your daughter, sir, can be very closemouthed when she wishes,” Max murmured, bringing laughter to the men, which included Morgan Davis, but not the minister, who’d had to leave when the meal was over.

  “It has been a pleasant experience for me that all my children are involved in the company,” Jack continued, his manner introspective. He gave Trent a mock frown. “I hope you will take a hint from your sister and produce an heir. We need children. I didn’t realize how much while my own were growing up. Young people add energy to life. They’re our hope for the future.”

  Max recognized regret in the older man’s eyes as he paused, then smiled, as if in apology for his serious tone.

  Jack’s eyes went to the door. “Here are the women.”

  Max’s gaze was drawn from his future father-in-law to the end of the room. Sheila Crosby entered first, her manner disclosing a mixture of pride and determined confidence. Her ex-husband’s second wife was behind her, looking as lovely as a high-fashion model.

  Emma, Katie and Ivy came in as a group, all smiling. Ivy was slender and erect, as regal as a queen. His queen.

  Max tensed as an odd feeling flashed over him. His heart gave a sort of lurch, then a painful contraction as he stood and waited for his bride to join them. He didn’t understand the feeling at all.

  “Have you men solved the problems of the world?” Emma demanded as they prepared to leave.

  “Just this corner of it,” Jack assured her. He clasped his daughters about the shoulders. “With beauties such as these around us, the problems seem small.”

  Both Katie and Ivy looked surprised by this, but Max understood their father’s sentiment. There was something about a woman’s loveliness and gentle bearing, about marriage and family and the trust implied by those, that made a man proud.

  Thirteen

  “You’re restless,” Chuck said, studying his friend the next afternoon at the hotel.

  Max grimaced. “Why does time pass so slowly when you want it to rush, and yet go so fast when you want it to slow down?”

  “Now let me see…how am I to interpret that?” Chuck murmured aloud as if discussing Max’s question with a third party. “Does he want time to pass fast or to slow down? Is this wedding jitters or eagerness?”

  Turning from the window, Max smiled at his best bud. “I’m ready,”
he said.

  “Ah, the rose has truly captured the elusive playboy prince, has she?”

  Max ignored that. “It’s time you were thinking of hearth and home and all that, too. You’re not getting any younger, old man.”

  “Yeah, well, I had a good time before I lost my hair and my teeth.” He rose from the sofa and joined Max at the window. The afternoon shadows were growing longer. “It’s time we left.”

  “Good. This place is too quiet, like a morgue.”

  “You miss her,” Chuck murmured.

  Ivy had left early that morning for her father’s house, driving herself now that the culprit behind the break-in and bugging of her place had been arrested. She didn’t know that she’d been followed by four security men, in a motorcycle, a delivery van, an SUV and a family sedan.

  Max paused at the door of the hotel suite. “It’s an odd feeling. I worry about her when she isn’t in my sight. I was raised to be responsible for a kingdom, but I’ve never thought about those feelings transferring to a person.”

  The two men walked down the corridor to the elevator. “I suppose it’s natural,” Chuck said. “Ivy has been in the thick of company espionage and that rather inept kidnapping attempt. However, I don’t think any of it was directed at her personally.”

  “You think no one has it in for her, then?” Max asked sardonically.

  “No more than for you. Shall I drive?”

  Max nodded and got in the passenger side of the car, which was waiting at the door. “Thanks for your help on everything. As usual, you came through like a champ.”

  “We aim to please,” Chuck said modestly, but spoiled it with a know-it-all grin.

  Max relaxed each set of muscles as he’d learned to do from his father. It dispelled tension and allowed one to think more clearly. However, there was a tightness in his chest that he couldn’t ease. It was annoying.

  “The day couldn’t be better,” Chuck said when they turned into the drive of the Crosby estate where a guard checked their credentials before allowing them to proceed. “Yesterday’s rain cleared the air. The sun dried everything up today. The weather is perfect for a wedding.”

  “Yeah, Ivy was worried about that.” Max gave a half smile. “I told her I’d ordered sunshine for today. I’m glad Mother Nature didn’t show us who’s boss.”

  At the handsome mansion, the two men surveyed the preparations for the wedding. Three florist vans were pulled discreetly to the side of the house. A raised walkway, covered in red carpet, led to a pavilion covered by a white tent. The filmy white walls of the tent were artfully draped and tied at the corners, opening it to the lovely vista on all sides.

  One end of the main tent opened on a gazebo, also white and covered with silk braided with wide, colored ribbons at each corner. Pennants of blue, gold and black, the colors of the Lantanya flag, wafted in the gentle breeze like medieval banners.

  Magnificent sprays of fall flowers in white baskets lined the aisle leading to the gazebo where the vows would be exchanged. The two steps and the floor of the outdoor structure were covered in the red carpet with a white satin runner ending at an altar woven of pink, white and golden roses on a trellis. Candelabras flanked the altar.

  The minister would stand in front of it while the couple stood on the first step. There they would exchange vows of trust and fidelity until death.

  “Did you bring the rings?” Max asked.

  Chuck removed the gold bands from his pocket to show that he had them. The groom’s ring had no jewels, as Ivy’s did, but it was engraved with their names and the date as was the bride’s wedding band.

  “I’ll give your ring to Katie as soon as I see her,” the best man promised.

  “Good.” Max checked his watch. “Almost time. I suppose we should report in.”

  “We’ve been spotted. I saw Katie at a window when we first arrived. Look, the driveway and parking area are almost full. I thought this was to be a small affair.”

  “Ivy has lived here all her life,” Max said as they headed for the side door to the house. “I’m sure she has many friends she couldn’t leave out.”

  Trent greeted them when they entered the house, then led the way to a small parlor adjoining the library. The minister was there, looking dignified in a black robe.

  From the front of the house came the sounds of many voices raised in greetings and several bursts of laughter.

  “It’s time,” Trent said.

  At that moment, soft music mysteriously began, a fairy melody heard from far away, beguiling the listener to follow its charming notes. Strangely, the crowd did just that. As if on cue, they left the house and gathered in the tent.

  “Okay, this is it,” the capable CEO announced. “I don’t know why I’m nervous. I’m not the one tying the knot again.”

  Max knew that Trent had been married but was now divorced. He didn’t want to think of the other man’s unkind fate in picking the wrong woman. Not that he was worried about that being the case with him.

  Ivy was everything he wanted in a wife. The marriage was a wise arrangement, with mutual respect and a strong physical attraction on both sides.

  I love you, love you, love you.

  She’d said that in passion. But not since then. The tightness in his chest increased. He frowned, not sure what it meant. The solemnity of marriage he recognized. He felt that. But other emotions jostled inside him, confusing him with an urgency to do something.

  He unclenched his hands and took a calming breath as Trent peered out the window.

  “You are nervous,” Chuck murmured.

  “Not about the wedding.”

  “The wedding-night retreat is ready. I checked it out myself this morning. It’s secluded enough to suit your tastes.”

  “Thanks.”

  Trent gestured to them and the minister. “There’s the signal. You first, sir,” Trent said to the preacher. He held the door for the other three men to precede him.

  The unsettling sensation expanded in Max’s chest as he stood at the gazebo and waited for Ivy and her attendants. Annoyed, he suppressed the unidentified emotions and turned to the crowd.

  The music changed. Max spotted the organist on the patio behind the house. From her vantage point, she could observe the pavilion and the ceremony. Sheila and Toni were seated in the front row on the bride’s side. For a second he felt the loss of his own parents, then he cleared his mind and concentrated on the present.

  Katie and Emma, looking very pretty and properly serious, appeared and came down the aisle together. When “The Wedding March” began, everyone stood.

  Ivy and her father, with stately movements, swept toward the gazebo. She was the perfect vision in white, the most beautiful creature he had ever seen.

  Max’s heart gave a giant contraction, so swift and painful he was almost staggered by the force of it.

  Let her be happy. Let me be worthy.

  The prayer stole into his consciousness. For the first time since the engagement, he worried that he might fail…that she might hate her new home…the constrictions of palace life…him…

  Her eyes met his. She smiled, and it was like sunshine melting the ice that had invaded his heart. Logic prevailed. Ivy would never forsake her vows. She would stay for duty’s sake, if nothing else. And for their child.

  “Dearly beloved,” the minister began.

  The ceremony was traditional and soon done. Photographs were taken quickly, then they were off to the reception at the country club. A much larger crowd awaited them there.

  For nearly an hour he and Ivy stood in the receiving line and greeted their guests. His bride was as gracious as any queen, her smiles generous, her gaze, when she glanced at him, a bit questioning.

  He realized he had hardly taken his eyes from her since she’d walked down the aisle and pledged her life to his.

  “You are incredibly lovely,” he murmured, bringing her hand to his lips. “I am overcome.”

  He’d meant to reassure her, but the
words were not mere gallantry. He was entranced by her, his princess of the roses. The tightness invaded his chest again.

  The sweet shyness of their first encounter suffused her manner with just the right amount of intriguing reserve. He wanted the festivities to be over. He needed to be alone with his rose.

  Ivy was aware of something different about Max, some subtle disquiet inside him that impinged on his usual confident manner. Was he not happy about the marriage? Or was he simply impatient to get the ordeal over and return to his country where a thousand details of running a kingdom surely awaited him?

  Uncertain about his thoughts, she felt chilled as they ate, endured endless toasts, then danced for hours.

  “We should go,” Max said shortly before midnight.

  She nodded. After kissing her father, mother and stepmother, she turned to Trent and Katie. She hugged each of them closely as emotion filled her. “Thank you. Thank you both for being wonderful,” she whispered.

  “Be happy,” Katie ordered, a break in her voice.

  “We’ll see you in November,” Trent reminded her, his tone husky.

  “And when the baby is born,” Katie added.

  Ivy tossed the bouquet, and Max did the garter bit, looking a bit sardonic at the ritual, then they were free to leave. She had no idea where they were going.

  A car was waiting for them, a long, black limo, the driver smartly dressed in a black uniform, an assistant at his side. “A guard?” she asked.

  Max nodded. “There will be others where we are going, but if all goes well, we won’t see them.”

  “Where are we going? I assumed we would stay at the hotel. No?” she questioned when he smiled mysteriously.

  “It’s a secret place for only the two of us.”

  She liked the idea of a honeymoon cabin deep in the woods or high on a hill overlooking a lake or the river, somewhere as romantic as the resort in Lantanya had been.

  It came to her that she wanted to recapture that night. She wanted to hear him call her “my love” again.