by Ashley Hall
Gabe stands up, fast enough that the chair threatens to topple over. He slams both hands down on the table. The beer tips, spilling carbonated amber out across the table. “Fuck you, Winston. I'm not resigning just because I fucked a girl.”
Winston's eyes narrow. “Is that all it was?”
“Of course,” says Gabe.
Winston says, “That's not how it looks. She's been pregnant for a while. I saw it on the news. Fuck, Gabe, we all have. She's been pregnant for weeks, and you already said you're the one that knocked her up. That means this picture isn't a one-time thing. You've been with her before.”
“I'm not resigning,” spits Gabe. “And you can just fuck off.”
The president of the Desperados storms out without another word. Winston leans back in his chair. He pulls out his phone and pulls up Slade's number. “Okay,” he writes. “I brought it up.”
Slade doesn't text back, but Winston knows the message went through just fine.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Three days pass by with no word from Gabe and little word from the King and Queen. It seems that they've decided the best way to deal with this problem, for the moment at least, is to ignore it.
Isabella doesn't mind. She has no interest in speaking with either of them. She keeps pay-per-view up on the television, watching movies every chance she gets in an attempt to ignore the news.
Everything on the news is about her, and the young woman hates it. She hasn't craved a normal life this badly since she was just a young thing when her dreams of being a fashion designer were first crushed by her parents.
She wears the dresses that she likes, not the ones that Alexandra likes. She orders dinners that she wants, not ones pre-planned by her parents.
It's not living, but it's something close, this hollowed, echoing attempt at life. The walls of the suite serve as a prison, and the blood in her veins is a life sentence.
But the knock at a door? That might just be the judge coming to grant her early release.
Isabella rushes to open it. She grins at the sight of Gabe. “You came back!”
“Of course I did,” says Gabe, hooking an arm around Isabella's waist and dragging her in for a harsh kiss. It's more tooth and tongue than anything else, and Isabella can't help but moan into the contact.
A strand of spittle keeps them connected, even after they've parted. Isabella says, “I missed you so much. This week has been hell.”
“Trust me,” mutters Gabe, walking Isabella back into the suite, “I know exactly what you're talking about.”
“You do?”
“Were you the only one in that picture?”
Isabella shakes her head, blushing. “I'm sorry. Did it get you in trouble with someone?”
“No, it just pissed some friends of mine off. They're fucking jealous,” says Gabe, voice too light for the topic of conversation, too light for his words. “It's fine. Your mom still giving you a hard time?”
Isabella dips her head down, unable to meet the biker's eyes. “I don't know. She hasn't spoken to me since you left.”
“So she's not.”
“It's almost worse. I've never gone so long without talking to her. It's strange.”
“It's good. She's a bitch.”
“She's my mother,” insists Isabella, but the words are weak even to her own ears. “And I do miss her. It's hard, dealing with this.”
Gabe frowns. He tucks a piece of hair behind Isabella's ear. “I've got a question for you that's going to make this harder.”
Isabella frowns, too. “What do you mean? I don't think there's much that could make this more difficult, Gabe.”
Gabe catches her in another kiss. This one is softer, less tooth and more touch. When they part, he takes a step backwards.
This is nothing like a fairytale. No matter how much Isabella longs for her happy ending, the simple truth of the matter is that real life seldom plays out like a book or a legend. It's hard and brutal, just like the choice she suddenly finds herself faced with.
Gabe doesn't fall to one knee. He does, however, pull a ring out of his pocket. It's cheap, clearly picked up at a local pawn shop. The gold is tarnished. The diamond is small. He asks, “Will you marry me?”
There are no sirens. There is no music. It's a simple question, the sort that Isabella should easily be able to answer.
It's the sort that she wants to answer.
Yes.
The word is already lingering on the tip of her tongue. Isabella bites it back. She curls Gabe's fingers back around the ring and shakes her head. “I do, but I can't do it this way. My parents need to approve of it.”
“That's bullshit,” says Gabe. “If you want to marry me, then fucking marry me.”
Isabella shakes her head. “I do. I would love to marry you. I would love to spend my life with you, Gabe. I said that before, and I'll gladly say it again. But I can't. Not this way. I'm not…I'm not someone that lives out here, in these States, with a house of her own and no rules to follow. As much as it kills me to say this, I can't say yes to you unless my parents approve of it.”
“They're never going to do that,” says Gabe.
Isabella gives him a small, wavering smile. It's hard not to cry.
Here's her happy ending, standing right in front of her, and there's an impassable divide between them. Here's her chance at freedom, and Isabella can't take it.
“I know,” says Isabella. “I'm going to ask them anyway, but I know.”
“So you're basically saying that you won't marry me. You're telling me you're planning on having my kid, and you won't marry me.”
“I can't. I'm sorry, Gabe. I just…I can't marry you, not right now, at least. There's too much happening, too much that I can't control.”
“Then step up and control it,” spits Gabe angrily. He shoves the ring back into his pocket. “This isn't right, Isabella!”
Isabella shakes her head and scrubs at her face with her palms. She's trying very hard not to cry and is actually rather proud of herself for that. “I know! I know it isn't right! But sometimes, bad things happen to good people! Sometimes, you just have to deal with the hand that life's given you! That's what I'm trying to do, Gabe! I don't want to leave you. I don't want to lose you. But I can't marry you right now.”
“Then when?”
“What?”
“You said you can't marry me right now,” says Gabe, stressing the words. “So when can you marry me?”
Isabella takes a deep breath. She brushes a single tear off her lashes. “When I speak to my parents and they give their approval.”
# # #
That night, Isabella puts on her best dress. She smooths it out, does up her hair and makeup, and makes sure that everything looks exactly as it should. Her clothing is starting to get tight across her stomach.
Isabella runs a hand down her burgeoning baby bump as she walks down the hall. Her parents are having dinner in the main ballroom. It's a big thing, with white walls, blue floors, and glass chandeliers on the ceilings.
She walks up to their table, curtsies at them, and then sits down.
Her father doesn't look up from his meal. Alexandra frowns at her and asks, “Did you need something?”
“I was hoping to eat with you,” says Isabella lightly.
Alexandra shakes her head. “No. I will not eat at the same table as a slut.”
Isabella's cheeks color. “That's not fair of you, Mother. I'm no slut. I've only ever slept with one man.”
“That's what you say,” insists Alexandra. “But you've lied to me countless times already, Isabella. As far as I know, you've gotten into the habit of spreading those thighs for every man that looks at you twice. Is that what you were doing the night that the Duke came into town? Letting someone fuck you in the garden?”
“Mother! That's uncalled for!”
“Your behavior is uncalled for,” sniffs Alexandra. “You have behaved nothing like a princess. You have behaved nothing like my daughter.
”
“But I am your daughter, and I have a request for you.”
“Not surprising,” says her father, still refusing to look up from his meal. “I knew you were only down here to ask for something.”
“I want to get married,” says Isabella.
Alexandra sniffs. “The Duke has rescinded his request for your hand. He has no interest in taking a common whore as his bride, not that I blame him.”
“Nor do I,” says the King. “Your mother and I may not have been in love when we first met, but at least we were honest to each other. There would be constant fear that you would run off after another man. I couldn't bear it, and it's no wonder that he can't bear the thought of it.”
“Forget about the fear,” says Alexandra, “think about the papers! To be willing to marry a slut—what would that say about the Duke?”
It's hard not to come off with a biting remark. Isabella stays her tongue, folding her hands neatly in her lap. If there's going to even be a chance that this will work, she must be on her best behavior. “Mother,” she says, “Father, I don't wish to marry the Duke. I wish to marry someone else.”
“No one will want you,” says Alexandra dismissively. “You're already used up, Isabella.”
“Gabe wants me,” says Isabella firmly. “He's asked for my hand in marriage. The idea of having another man raise his child doesn't bode well with him. More than that, he loves me, Mother, and he doesn't want to lose me to the other side of the ocean.”
Alexandra doesn't even pause to think over her answer. She says, “No,” and shakes her head.
“Please,” insists Isabella. “Please, let me marry him! I love that man, Mother!”
Alexandra says, “Does it look like I care if he loves you? We've been over this, Isabella. Love isn't a requirement for marriage—money, status, and loyalty to the crown are requirements. I will not let you marry the same man that soiled you for the Duke.”
The way that the Queen is talking makes Isabella blush. She doesn't feel soiled, and she doesn't much enjoy talking about this with her parents. Still, she has one more chance. She has one more thing to try.
Isabella isn't afraid of playing into her parents’ warped beliefs. She says, “Why not? You've said it yourself, no one else is going to want me. Let me have this, Mother.”
“No,” says Alexandra firmly. “That is my final answer, Isabella. You can't marry him. I simply won't allow it. No. When we return home, I will simply have to lower the standards of the family and broaden our search. I will find a nobleman to marry you, and I will find another family to raise that child, and you shall give him a new heir to the throne.”
Her words are physical, like a slap to the face. Isabella reels back. “What?”
“I will not repeat myself,” says Alexandra. “Pay attention when someone's talking to you.”
“What do you mean you will find a new family for my child?”
“I mean exactly what I said,” answers Alexandra, lips twisting up into the mockery of a smile. “That child is no family of mine. He will not be family of yours, either. I will send him away, and as you enjoy letting men have their way with you so much, you can simply let your new husband have a child of his own. That's obviously going to be the only way to get someone to take you as their wife.”
Isabella's mouth opens and closes a few times, but she can't get any words to come out. The world is spinning. She feels light-headed all of a sudden. “My child?”
“Isabella, focus. Your child will have a good home elsewhere,” says Alexandra. “Now go back to your room. We aren't going to discuss this any longer. You're spoiling our dinner.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
“They won’t let me,” says Isabella sadly. The dress that she’s wearing is simple enough, a dark blue skirt with a pale blue top. Her fine golden hair has been pulled back into a French braid, tied off at the end with a silver ribbon that matches her earrings and her necklace.
Gabe scowls at her. He’s uninterested in sitting down. The park looks odd as a back drop for him, with his ripped-up jeans, muddied combat boots, bruised-up knuckles, and black eye. “Fuck them.”
“I know that’s what you want me to do,” says Isabella. She shakes her head. It’s hard to look the older man in the face. “But I can’t. Gabe, you don’t understand. If it was just us on the line, I would tell them that in a heartbeat. But I’m the next in line for the throne. Davaria needs a ruler, and ten, twenty years from now, it’s going to be me.”
“So go back then!” Gabe throws his hands into the air, like that answer should have been obvious. “Telling your parents to fuck off and marrying someone else, that’s not going to change who your blood’s linked back to!”
“They could denounce me.”
“They could what?”
“Denounce me. They could discard me as their child, legally and officially revoking my place as the heir apparent to the Davaria throne.” Isabella hides her face in her palms. The park is quiet. There’s no one else around.
That’s what happens when you show up at two in the afternoon on a Monday. Most people are at work.
Isabella should be at work.
At least, she should be somewhere that’s not here. A press meeting, maybe, trying to get away from the horrible rumors that are milling around.
But she doesn’t want to.
She doesn’t want to be anywhere but here, with Gabe, away from her family. The air is fresh and cold and smells like golden leaves and the pale yellow flowers that grow along the cracked sidewalk.
“Then that’s on them,” says Gabe. “I don’t see what the problem is.”
“The problem is that my country needs me!” Isabella lets her hands fall away. She stares up at Gabe, once more on the verge of tears. “They need me, Gabe. Don’t you see? My parents will put someone else in charge. They’re going to put someone like...like the Duke of Cambridge in charge!”
“Do you even know his name?” Gabe rakes his fingers through his messy hair.
Isabella gawks at him. “Of course! I just, you just don’t do that!”
“Call someone by their name?”
“Yes! Not when they’re royalty!”
“Why? It’s his name!”
“You just don’t!”
“I call you Izzy,” shouts Gabe. This is a pointless fight, but it’s better than trying to deal with the larger issue splayed out before them.
Isabella jumps to her feet. She curls her hands into fists at her side. “That's different! You call me that because you aren't supposed to be part of my royal life! Don't you understand how hard this is?”
“No! It's a name! It doesn't mean anything!”
“It means everything! Titles and names and reputations, they're all linked together. It's like now, when my name is ruined! No one will respect me at home! A disowned whore, that's what they say. Your papers, they're only interested in the way my mother may have treated me. They all talk about how it looked like she might have raised a hand at me.” Isabella shakes her head. She's struggling hard not to cry. It's more difficult than one might think.
Isabella continues, “The papers at home, they're different. My mother is a well-respected woman. They love her, and they love my father. When they look at those pictures, the only thing that they focus on is me. The focus is on me and you and her.”
She rests a hand on her stomach. Each day, it seems like she grows a bit more. Isabella has never once pondered what it would be like to be a mother. She's never been able to picture herself with a bundle of cloth and flesh in her arms, with a babe crying in the middle of the night.
Isabella's always pictured herself working with cloth. She's always imagined herself sitting on the throne, like her mother.
But a child? The thought is foreign and startling.
“They call me horrid names,” says Isabella. “And they do it because of my name. Princess Isabella, that's what it is. Princess Isabella, the whore. Princess Isabella, the slut. They pose questions th
at completely eradicate my reputation, and it's all because of my name. Names are important!”
Gabe flounders for a moment. He's not good at dealing with his emotions. In a desperate bid to make things better, to get things back on track, he asks, “What are you going to name her?”
Isabella blinks, taken off-guard by the question. “Pardon me?”
“What are you going to name her? The baby,” says Gabe, nodding at Isabella's stomach. “What are you going to name her?”
