The King Next Door

by Maureen Child

  He saw a couple of kids playing in the sand and remembered making castles for Connor to knock down. He caught the scent of hot dogs on a grill and remembered barbecues in the backyard. He determinedly walked past a young couple so wrapped up in the kiss enveloping them, they were oblivious to everyone else. And he remembered kissing Nicole.

  Remembered the taste of her, the scent of her, the soft sigh of her breath on his neck when she leaned into him. He remembered how she felt in his arms and how empty those same arms felt now that she was out of his life.

  Griffin pushed one hand through his hair and muttered, “This isn’t working. None of it is.”

  She was burned into his brain, his heart.

  “What the hell am I supposed to do with this?” he demanded of no one.

  Someone shrieked, and Griffin whipped around to watch a woman get tossed into the water by her boyfriend. Laughter pealed out and he gritted his teeth against the envy that washed over him.

  He didn’t think about it, just acted. Pulling his phone from his pocket, he dialed a number and waited. When she answered, the mere sound of her voice lit up his insides.

  “Nicole?”

  There was a long pause. “Griffin. Hi.”

  Well, she could have sounded less enthusiastic. If he’d offered her a bouquet of poison ivy. Had he really expected her to greet him with nothing but welcome? Hell, he was lucky she hadn’t hung up yet. Calling her was a bad idea, he told himself, but he couldn’t regret it. Turning, he stared out at the sunlight glinting on the surface of the water.

  They’d made a deal, right? That she would work for his company. So he had a right to call her to talk details. That’s all this was. Business.

  “Yeah. I wanted to know if you were serious about working off the deductible on the kitchen.”

  Another long pause. Hell, this was tough on a man’s pride.

  “Of course I was. I told you I don’t need you to buy things for me.”

  “Yeah,” he said, cutting her off as a kid raced by, splashing water into the breezy air. “I remember. So the deal is, we’ve got the museum security job coming up and since you’re already familiar with the proposal, I thought you could start with that. Work out the numbers on payroll for the guards, say, in four-and six-hour shifts.”

  “Fine.”

  He imagined her sitting in her new kitchen in a splash of sunlight, her eyes narrowed in thought. Maybe Connor was in the room, too, playing at her feet. Then he pushed those images aside and focused on the matter at hand.

  “How’s Connor?” he blurted.

  “Connor’s fine,” she said tightly, and he could hear the tension in her voice. “I’m fine.”

  “Good to hear.” What the hell else could he say? He’s the one who had opened up this chasm between them. But in his defense, he thought wildly, splitting up had been their deal all along. So he pushed aside regrets. “Okay then. I’ll have Janice overnight you the plans and you can get to work.”

  He was good at thinking on his feet, he silently commended himself. He’d only come up with this idea a few minutes ago and it was spilling from him like he’d been working it out for days. “I’ll need a complete write-up on the expenses by the end of the week.”

  “You’ll have it,” she said firmly. “Is that it?”

  No, he thought. There was more. There was admitting that he couldn’t sleep without her curled up beside him. That he woke up craving the taste of her more than his first cup of coffee. That breathing was disappointing because her peach scent didn’t flavor every breath.

  But that would make him pretty damn pathetic, wouldn’t it?

  “Yeah. That’s it.”

  “Okay then,” she said. “Goodbye, Griffin.”

  She hung up, and Griffin just managed to keep from tossing his phone into the sea.

  *

  Sunlight filled her gorgeous new kitchen and still Nicole felt as if she was at the bottom of a very black hole.

  Griffin’s voice had caught her off guard. She hadn’t been prepared for it. Hadn’t been able to steel herself against the pain that ripped into her like the slash of a knife. Days now, she’d been working at getting over Griffin. She’d concentrated on her work and her son and had almost convinced herself that her life was normal again.

  Then he had to call.

  She stared at her cell phone and willed the misery she felt into a small, dark corner of her heart. She wouldn’t give in to it, because once she did, she didn’t think she’d be able to stop.

  “Griff coming?” Connor’s voice steadied her.

  She had to hold it together, if not for her, then for her son’s sake.

  “No, sweetie, Griff’s not coming today.”

  “Tomorrow?”

  Nicole scooped him up into her arms and held him close. Inhaling the soft, sweet scent of him, she heard herself say, “We’ll see…”

  Eleven

  Life in a palace had its perks.

  Solitude wasn’t one of them.

  Griffin had never seen so many people. Which worked well enough for him at the moment, but he just couldn’t figure out how Garrett managed to put up with it every day. There were dozens of servants working around the palace.

  Maids, chefs, gardeners, footmen…footmen, for God’s sake. He guessed that living in a castle meant you were predisposed to embracing the Middle Ages.

  Coming to Cadria to see his twin had been a spur-of-the-moment decision. That’s where being a member of the King family came with its own perks—all he had to do was make a call and suddenly one of the family’s jets was at his disposal. Beat the hell out of security lines and hassles at the airport.

  He stepped up and braced one boot on the bottom rung of a pristinely painted white fence and stared out across grounds so tidy it was as if they’d been manicured with scissors. The sun was out and huge white clouds sailed across a sky blue enough to make your eyes ache if you stared at it for too long. Ancient trees stood like soldiers around the perimeter of the fence, dropping shade from twisted, gnarled limbs.

  The wind tousled his hair, and behind his dark glasses, Griffin squinted into the distance. The palace grounds were immense and as pretty as a painting. There was a massive stable adjoining the paddock that was as big as Nicole’s neighborhood. Behind him, closer to the palace, was a hedge maze and a rose garden that filled the air with amazing scents.

  Despite the fact that Griffin wasn’t a big fan of horses, he felt more comfortable out here than he did inside the castle. There was too much protocol there. Too much formality. Out here, there was too much time to think—but given a choice…

  “Since when do you like horses?”

  Griffin didn’t even turn around. His arms were crossed on the top bar of the fence as he watched million-dollar horses being put through their paces by their trainers.

  “I don’t. They’re big, and they have mean eyes.” He laughed. “They’re okay to watch—from a distance—never could understand riding them.” He finally glanced at his twin. “That’s your thing.”

  Garrett had always loved going riding, the one thing as twins that they’d never shared.

  “Yeah,” Garrett mused, taking up his brother’s pose at the fence. “Have to admit, it’s great to be able to come out here and ride whenever I want to.”

  “So being royal doesn’t suck.”

  “Not even a little,” Garrett told him on a half laugh.

  “Good for you.” Griffin really was glad his brother was happy. He just wished he himself wasn’t so…hell, he didn’t even know what he was.

  “So what’s going on?” Garrett turned his head and stared at Griffin. “Not that I’m not glad to see you any time, but you’ve got a job in L.A. to see to and you were just here a couple months ago.”

  Griffin squinted even tighter. Not that he was interested in the view, but it was better than meeting his twin’s too-sharp gaze. Seeing Garrett and his wife, Alexis, so happy together made Griffin almost sorry he’d come to Cadria. Hell,
how could Garrett understand where Griffin was coming from when he was locked into his own little fantasy world, here in the palace?

  “It’s Nicole, isn’t it?” Garrett stared hard at him until Griffin turned his head to meet his eyes.

  “What’re you, psychic?”

  “Yeah, like it takes a psychic to figure out what’s eating at you.” Garrett laughed a little and looked back out at the horses.

  Well, hell. That’s why he’d come here, wasn’t it? Because no one knew him like his twin did. “Fine. Great. One look at me, and you can see I’m miserable. Nice to know that gives you a lift.”

  “I’m only laughing because it wasn’t so long ago that you were giving me the same kind of advice that I’m about to give you.”

  “Even better. Secondhand advice. That’ll help.” Disgusted, Griffin scowled at his twin.

  “Hey, you’re the one who came to me, remember?”

  “Shows you just how bad off I am,” he muttered.

  “Yeah, good to see,” Garrett said, slapping his twin on the back.

  “Thanks very much,” Griffin muttered.

  “I was worried when you started up with Nicole,” Garrett admitted. “She’s not the kind of woman to use and then dump.”

  “I didn’t dump her,” Griffin argued. No, he hadn’t. He’d damn well panicked and run for it.

  That was still eating at him.

  “You didn’t do anything to keep her, either, did you?”

  No, he hadn’t, Griffin thought, and wondered if it was possible to kick himself. If not, he was pretty sure Garrett would gladly do it for him.

  “So now you’re the expert on women, is that it?” Griffin laughed shortly.

  “No,” Garrett admitted with a smile, “but I’m an expert on you.”

  He snorted. “Please.”

  “Not only are we twins,” Garrett went on as if his brother hadn’t spoken, “but we’re both Kings.”

  “And that means?”

  “It means we’ll stick to our guns even if they end up turning on us.” Garrett frowned and looked out over the paddock. His voice dropped, became thoughtful. “The trainers here, they work with a stallion and they sort of sneak up on him.”

  “Seriously?” Griffin just stared at his twin. “You’re gonna give me horse talk?”

  “The reason why is,” Garrett continued, “the stallion doesn’t even know it’s happening, but slowly, old habits are broken. New ones are born. And pretty soon, the damn horse figures everything he’s doing is all his idea.”

  “Right. Thanks. That’s clear.”

  “It would be if your head wasn’t so far up your—” He took a breath, worked his jaw for a second or two then tried again. “The problem is, this thing with Nicole jumped up on you from out of nowhere, so your first instinct is to fight it, even if it’s what you want.”

  “Who says it’s what I want?” Griffin mumbled.

  “You do,” Garrett shot back. “Just by being here, you’re telling me that you’re miserable without her.”

  “I don’t remember saying that.”

  “Like you would,” Garrett said on a snort. “Remember the night you gave me hell about Alexis?”

  Griffin scowled. “Vaguely.”

  Another snort. “Then let me remind you. You told me I was a moron for standing back instead of going after what I want. Well, happy to tell you the same damn thing.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “Who the hell else can call you that without expecting a fist to the face, if it’s not your twin?”

  “Don’t count on the twin thing saving your ass.”

  “I can still take you.”

  “Not on your best day,” Griffin assured him and asked himself why the hell he’d come to Cadria in the first place. He should have known it would go like this, Garrett-the-know-it-all pontificating from the mount of his happiness.

  As for what he’d said, this was nothing like the situation his brother had been in with Alex. There had been lies separating them. Lies Garrett had told and Alex had caught him in.

  This was different.

  “The problem here is,” Garrett was saying, as a cool breeze slipped past them, “that you’re used to dealing with the temporary kind of woman. What did you used to say? ‘Dating a woman with more than two brain cells is a waste of time’?”

  Griffin gave him a tight grimace that couldn’t have been mistaken for a smile.

  “So what’s your deal?” his twin asked. “You want to go back to spending time with women who talk about exfoliating and how to make their skin…what did you call it? Shimmery?”

  Griffin groaned and closed his eyes. Yeah, he remembered saying all of that to Garrett. He remembered all of the nights spent being bored to tears just to be able to take a woman to his bed for a couple of hours.

  “You told me once that I lived more in King Jets than I did at my condo,” Garrett said softly. “You were right. But the thing is, you don’t even have that. Your condo’s sold. You’re killing time in a hotel. Damn it, Griff, where is the place you’ve felt most at home?”

  He sighed and gave up fighting the truth. “With Nicole.”

  Nodding, Garrett accepted his twin’s surrender and added, “Not only is she making you nuts, but she’s smarter than both of us.”

  “What?”

  Garrett grinned. “She noticed the significance of that ugly-ass brooch in the gem collection. Neither one of us did.”

  “I would have, eventually,” Griffin said.

  “That’s the thing,” Garrett told him. “You didn’t have to, because she did. That’s what being a team is, Griff. And if you’re as smart as you’re always telling me you are, you won’t let her get away.”

  Griffin’s heart told him Garrett was right. But his mind was still struggling. “How can I do that again? Nicole’s a package deal. There’s Connor to think about, too.”

  “And you’re remembering Jamie.”

  “Yeah.” Griffin turned to look at his twin. “Having that kid torn out of my life was hard.”

  “I know it was,” Garrett said and slapped his brother on the back. “The difference this time is that Nicole didn’t take Connor away. You walked away. From both of them.”

  That truth hit him hard. To protect himself from losing what was important to him—Nicole and Connor—he’d turned his back on them.

  In the paddock one of the prized stallions suddenly erupted into a wild gallop, hooves churning the soft earth, mane flying.

  “God, I’m an idiot.”

  “Congratulations,” Garrett said with a chuckle. “It’s hard to admit, but once you do, you can fix things.”

  “I don’t know,” Griffin told him, his heart still heavy, his mind racing with possibilities. “I think I might have blown any chance I had there. I not only walked out on Nicole, but on her son. No way is she going to forgive me for that. Her ex-husband did the same damn thing to her before Connor was even born.”

  “Useless male,” Garrett muttered.

  Griffin agreed. And it shamed him to realize that he’d walked out on them, too.

  “He never went back. You will,” Garrett said firmly, catching his brother’s attention. “You make a mistake, you fix it. It’s the King way. Hell, it’s your way. In spite of what I usually tell you, you’re not an idiot, Griffin. You know what you want. You knew when you came here. You just wanted to hear me say it out loud.”

  His twin was right, damn it. Griffin hadn’t had one easy moment since he’d left Nicole. He had to try to get her back. Damned if he was going to lose the best thing he’d ever found.

  “Hell,” he said wryly, imagining the look on Nicole’s face when he showed up at her house, “she’ll probably slam the door in my face.”

  “You won’t know until you try.”

  Shaking his head, Griffin argued, “Nicole and Connor both deserve the best. What if I suck at being a husband and an instant father? Is it fair to them to risk it?”

  “Griffin, you’
ve never sucked at a damn thing if you wanted it badly enough.” Garrett reached over and gave his twin’s shoulder a hard shove. “If they deserve the best, then give it to them.”

  Griffin nodded, feeling his old self-confidence come rushing back. He’d been second-guessing himself when it came to Nicole for so long, it was a relief to finally see his path laid out in front of him. Hell, yes, they deserved the best. And he’d damn well make sure they got it.

  “So?” Garrett asked. “You going to be at the palace for dinner tonight?”

  Griffin grinned. “Hell, no, I’m going home. To Nicole.”

  *

  Nicole missed Griffin so much, it was a physical ache.

  It had been days and nothing had changed. If anything, the pain kept growing, swelling inside her until she could hardly breathe. But it wasn’t only her pain she had to deal with.

  Connor had been moping around in toddler misery. Every day he asked for Griffin and every day, she explained that Griffin had had to go away. Her son’s pain layered over hers until Nicole felt as though she was drowning.

  Middle-of-the-night television was less than thrilling, but it beat lying in bed, trying futilely for sleep. She sat on the couch in her tank top and boxer-short PJs, flipping mindlessly through the channels until she came to an infomercial about psychics. For only five dollars a minute, you could have a stranger tell you how to fix your life.

  But she didn’t need a psychic for that. What she needed was what she’d already lost.

  Outside, the world was quiet, peaceful. Inside, the television sound was set to whisper. So when the doorbell rang, she jumped a foot off the couch and then hurried to the front door. She grabbed the phone on the way, just in case she needed to call 911. But then, what kind of mad-dog burglar would ring the bell?

  She looked out the window at the front porch and her heart jolted hard into life when she saw Griffin standing there in the soft glow of the porch light.

  Why was he here? What should she do? Ignore him? Open the door just so she could slam it?

  He rang the bell again, and her decision was made. If Griffin kept that up, Connor would wake, and then she’d spend a half hour getting her son back to sleep.