Once Upon a Prince

by Rachel Hauck

  “You’re drunk.” Nathaniel snatched the cup and saucer from Stephen’s hand and set it on the cart. “You best be bright-eyed and spot-on in the morning.”

  “Nathaniel.” Stephen worked to command his words. “Our plan was to wake you up. Stop dragging your feet with Genevieve, nursing some schoolboy crush over this American girl. It’s Lady Adel all over.”

  “Ah, there it is.” Nathaniel dropped to the couch. Mum listened humbly from her chair.

  “You’ve not fallen in love since,” Stephen said.

  “Adel was ten years ago. I was an idiot university man. Susanna is nothing like Adel. Nor is our relationship. If you must know, I’ve not spoken to her since I left Georgia in July. Until tonight … thanks to you. I came home focused on my business here and getting over her.”

  “We believed if you met Susanna on your terms, in your home, you’d see your vast differences. That she’s not right for you. Nathaniel, you’re more than a king, you’re a beacon for all Brighton’s tomorrows. The hope of the monarchy.” Mum set down her tea. “If you marry for the monarchy, for Brighton and her future, then you will do well. Time will prove you right. You will be following in the footsteps of many who’ve gone before you. Love is a choice. Choose to love what is right for Brighton.”

  “Gone before? Like who? You, Mum?” Nathaniel spilt his words without considering the consequences. His frustration and the late hour made this conversation unwise.

  “What are you saying, Nate?” Stephen asked. “Mum, did you marry Dad for Brighton?”

  “We are not talking about me.” She made her way to the tea cart without her cup and saucer. “Get this American out of your system, Nathaniel, and propose to Ginny. Let’s solve your queen, heir, and political situation in one joyous celebration. Find a way to love her. Woo her. Make her love you. In a few hours you will be anointed as king. It won’t be a week before the papers, the bookmakers, the gossips, our friends and foes will be begging for a royal wedding. Will we have an heir? Will the House of Stratton live on?” Mum’s steely, stubborn side surfaced. “Our foes would like nothing more than for our reign to at least crumble. Though our friends, who are many, cheer us on.”

  “I’m only thirty-two. There’s time to marry.”

  “Do you intend to abdicate? I want to know.”

  “Mum, I’ve been working for five months, preparing for the coronation. Why would I abdicate?”

  “You know if you leave things to Stephen he’ll have the throne room converted into a bowling alley before his coronation confetti has been swept from the streets.”

  Stephen cut Mum a wry smile. “Sweet, Mum, you remembered.”

  Mum sighed. “Nathaniel, we’re sorry.” She walked over to him and took hold of him. “But it’s untrue that we don’t believe in you. We do. You are our king.”

  When Nathaniel returned to his quarters, Ginny waited for him.

  “I hope it’s not too late.” She stood as he entered, still in her ball gown. “Malcolm let me in.”

  “What do you want, Ginny?” Nathaniel tossed his keys to the lamp table, still steaming from his confrontation with Mum and Stephen.

  She regarded him with tired green eyes. Ringlets of her black hair had fallen loose from her hairdo and curled about her neck.

  “Why did you humiliate me like that tonight? The first dance? With her? My stars, Nathaniel, she disrespected the guests, the Crown, the ball, and all of Brighton when she dragged you off, away from your guests.”

  “She did no such thing. I took her off.” He sighed as he slipped his tie from around his neck. “This is what you want to talk about at nearly two in the morning? The first dance?” He motioned to the clock. “I have to be up in six hours, fresh and alert for my coronation. If you don’t mind …” He pointed to the door.

  “Yes, I do mind.” She crossed her arms, standing firm. “Let’s just get this out. How do you feel about me?”

  Pretty Ginny. Gutsy Ginny.

  “Why don’t you tell me how you feel?” He was really too weary for this, but she was here now, might as well go ‘round.

  “You know how I feel.” She fixed her pearly smile on him and shifted her pose. Ginny used her assets well. “Nathaniel, you’re tying yourself up in knots over this when the solution is so simple. I know this girl was your friend in America. I understand she’s different, exciting, fresh. But I’m your kind. I’m Brightonian. I’m the solution to the entail.”

  “Excuse me, but I thought we were talking about love. Not a business deal.” Nathaniel looked for a place to sit that didn’t have him crossing Ginny’s path. But she stood between him and his favorite chair.

  Had he confessed to Susanna just hours before that he loved her? The whole exchange in the turret library was beginning to feel like a dream.

  She laughed. “Darling, remember the year I studied abroad and fell in love with the French ambassador? I was so sure he was my destiny, but you and Jon knew better. You flew all the way to Paris to snatch me out of his clutches.”

  “He was a schemer and a lothario.” Nathaniel pulled a nearby King Mark chair forward and sat. “He’d have taken every shilling of your father’s money.”

  “But you showed me the light. Now it’s my turn. We’re a good team, Nathaniel. We cover all the bases. You’re a military officer and businessman, an ambassador, a bright star in Brighton, handsome, smart, athletic. I’m a businesswoman, a scholar, an athlete, a beauty queen. We have a common history. I am Brightonian with Hessen roots. Our partnership will put us in the halls of great European monarchies. We can’t lose.”

  “You don’t know that, Ginny. You as grand duchess only gets Hessenberg back to being a sovereign nation. Are you prepared to help guide them through their floundering economy?”

  “I’ve read for my business master’s, Nathaniel. I run a successful company—”

  “And we’ve not even discussed the implications of the grand duchess being married to the king of Brighton. What kind of turmoil might that create?”

  “Details, love. Details we can manage along with our governments. But the goal of a sovereign Hessenberg will be achieved.”

  “With you as their monarch?”

  “Yes, with me as their duchess.” Ginny stood in front of him, arms out to her sides. “Nathaniel, I’m offering myself as wife, lover, partner.”

  When he was weary, his senses, his reasoning broke down. Ginny’s offer wasn’t really about tomorrow, but about tonight. Right now. His bed more than his heart. The weight of revelation and responsibility caused his soul to ache.

  “Nathaniel?”

  A thread of pain crept up the back of his neck, around his ears, and up to his temple. “I don’t know, Ginny.”

  “What don’t you know?” She knelt beside him, placed her hand on his knee. He shifted his leg away. “Know what I think? The people of Brighton and Hessenberg will embrace us.” She rose up, leaning into him and smoothing her hands over his shoulders. “It will be a win for all, love.” He felt like he was drowning. Suffocating. He unlocked Ginny’s arms from around his neck.

  “You’re willing to marry a man you don’t love? Who doesn’t love you? A man who loves someone else?”

  “What is love, really?” Ginny slipped her hands from his shoulders down to his chest. “It’s friendship, commitment, a decision. I can love you, Nathaniel.”

  The exact words a man likes to hear from the woman he might marry. I can love you.

  He gazed toward the window, where snow drifted through the outside lights. Perhaps he’d change clothes and take a walk, be one with the snowy silence.

  “You won’t be happy, Ginny. Not unless you’re married to a man who loves you with an intense passion.” He looked at her. “‘Twill be a long life, waking up every day with your heart empty of things I just cannot give you.”

  “My dear Nathaniel, do you not know me at all?” She flashed a tiger grin and it frightened him a bit. “I’m so confident in our match that we will be lovers by day�
�s end. Make no mistake.” She slinked against him as if to give him a taste of her hidden talents.

  He shoved her away. Space. He needed space. “Are you the one behind the LibP articles?”

  “What? I can’t believe you’d ask me such a thing.” She rose up, turning away with a pout. “Morris fancies me, but he’s just running those stories to sell papers.”

  “Just to sell papers?” He leaned toward her. “What did you promise him if I actually married you?”

  “You’re tired. I’m not going to dignify that with an answer.”

  “Stop evading, Ginny.” Nathaniel grabbed her hand as she started away. “What deal did you strike with him?”

  “Nathaniel, listen to you. You’re suspicious and testy. But if you must know, I bring the power of the press and media with me. You want the monarchy to survive the twenty-first century? Then you need me. You want me with you.” Ah, the she-devil surfaces. “But you abdicate to marry this woman or force the law to change or linger too long in bachelorhood, the press will turn on you. Hessenberg won’t be independent, and she will turn on you. The Crown will be all but lost. The legacy of Brighton’s great kings will end in disgrace with you standing watch.”

  “I see you have it all worked out. What’s in it for you?”

  Her laugh rang wicked in his ears. “Royalty, Nathaniel. Royalty. It’s the closest thing to immortality.”

  “But if I don’t marry you the press will hunt me down? Murder my reign in a slow agonizing newsprint and cyber-space death?”

  Ginny bent over him, hemming him in with her hands on the arms of his chair. “You’ve a year.” She lurched back, grabbed her bag and coat and headed for the door. “One year.”

  “Are you threatening me?”

  “Certainly not. How unproductive to threaten the king. I’m merely informing you, Your Majesty. The press will give you a honeymoon for your glorious inaugural year. Just in time for the entail to end.” She slammed the door as she left.

  A cold breeze cut through the room. Numb, Nathaniel collapsed forward, face in his hands.

  Lord, give me wisdom.

  Malcolm made his presence known.

  “Your quarters are ready, sir.”

  “Thank you.” Nathaniel unbuttoned his shirt, making his way to his room, his thoughts entangled, catching in his own heartstrings.

  He loved Susanna.

  He loved Brighton.

  He disdained Ginny.

  More than ever, he needed the presence and grace of the Almighty.

  An usher escorted Susanna and Avery down the nave toward the altar of the breathtaking, ancient Watchman Abbey.

  “This place is amazing, Suz,” Avery said, aiming her smartphone.

  “Amazing in its purest definition.” Susanna examined the ribbed vaulting and flying buttresses cut from polished stone, the high-gloss wood accents, and the arched windows that were stained with religious scenes and Brighton’s history. From the resurrection of Christ to King Stephen I’s coronation to the Battle of Shores in World War II.

  More and more she realized the sacredness of the day. Nathaniel was a king on the earth. Largeness pinged in her spirit. The extraordinary God was in attendance. The Divine was tangibly touching earth.

  Susanna fluttered away her tears as prune-like Lady Margaret, along with her peckish husband, Lord Stanley, joined them in the row and scowled at her.

  Susanna grabbed a pinch of Avery’s arm. “Let’s move to the back.”

  “Nothing doing. These are great seats.”

  “We’re not at the movies.”

  “Even more reason to sit here. When are we going to be this close to a coronation again?”

  Susanna made a face. She batted away tears. She thought more about her own sense of largeness while Aves took her seat like she sat front row at a Michael Bublé concert. Thrilling, sure, but not quite the same.

  The coronation combined all that was good about life, church, weddings, babies, first kisses, and yes, front row at Bublé.

  “Aves.” Susanna pinched her again with a viral whisper.

  “Stop doing that.” Avery jerked her arm across her torso.

  “Do you recognize these people? They’re the nobles and royals, dignitaries from the ball. Good grief.” Susanna pointed discreetly to the left corner pew. “That’s our president.”

  “OMG, where?” Avery rose up, then sat down, grinning, and wedged herself against the polished pew. “We’re sitting among princes and presidents. You’re going to have to blast me out of this seat.”

  “Lady Margaret is sitting just to the right of me.” Susanna tipped her head slightly, cupping her hand to the side of her face. “How’s that for dynamite?”

  Avery had groused again last night on their way up to their suite after the ball about how the lady introduced herself to Susanna with such a rude confrontation.

  But Susanna only heard every hundredth word or so. She was reliving her evening with Nathaniel.

  Avery angled a sharp look at Lady M., as she liked to call her. “I’m still not leaving. We danced all night among these people. They love us.”

  “You’re too much like your mama.” Susanna cut a glance at Lady M. She stared straight ahead. Fine, they could sit together in silence.

  “Thank you. She’ll be proud to hear it.”

  Susanna sighed. Aves was right. They had blended beautifully with these people last night. She opened the embossed coronation program, but scenes from last evening paraded across the scripted pages.

  Nathaniel kept to his confession and treated her like a queen, his queen, all night. Susanna felt treasured and special. He left her a few times to dance with others, but when he did, he secured Susanna a dance with a prince, duke, or lord. But when they danced, he held her as if she were meant to be in his arms. They shared private laughs and tingling whispers.

  He introduced her to his mates with his arm around her. She curtsied her wobbly curtsy before Prince William and Kate but, by gum, held her own during the conversation. She’d even made the duchess laugh, touch her arm, and declare, “I’m with Susanna.”

  Surreal. Magical. Out of this world. And over. Done.

  Last night they could pretend they had a forever, but the light of morning brought truth and reality. She was the American. A commoner’s commoner. Unworthy of a royal prince.

  In three days, she was getting on the plane for home and never looking back. She could not, before God, interfere with Nathaniel’s destiny.

  Besides, what did she have to bring to the royal table? Her extraordinary landscaping design skills? Her sharp people skills? How she stayed with a man she didn’t love for twelve years? With a somewhat alarming amount of contentment. Her ability to make a plan.

  Or her waitressing and back-of-house skills she’d honed at the Rib Shack?

  Need a baby with sweet, side fries, greens, and cinn apples.

  “There’s Prince Colin.” Avery cracked Susanna in the ribs with her elbow, rising up to wave at the twenty-something prince, cousin to the king, a lower-ranking member of the House of Stratton, sitting in the forward pews.

  Lean, aristocratic with an outdoorsman ruddiness, he nearly made Susanna swoon when he winked at Avery.

  “Let me never wake up,” baby sister said, fainting back down to the pew, fanning herself.

  “Wake up? I thought you never wanted to sleep.”

  “Quiet,” Lady Margaret hissed, pointedly touching the brim of her hat. “The coronation is underway.”

  Susanna scooted down an inch, ducking under the rebuke and the sea of hats in which she and Avery sat—remembering they were bareheaded.

  No one said anything about hats! Susanna only hoped they weren’t offending the hallowed abbey or Nate’s family.

  When the car arrived at Parrsons this morning at ten sharp to pick them up for the coronation, Rollins met Susanna at the bottom of the stairs with a look of bewilderment.

  “What’s wrong?” In two short days, he’d become something of a
confidant.

  He cleared his throat and tilted his head toward Lady Margaret’s sprawling feathered chapeau. They needed hats? Panic. But with no time to shop, off they went to the coronation, rude and bareheaded.

  Yet comfortable-in-her-own-skin Avery barely noticed. The difference in their upbringing surfaced in times like these.

  Susanna was purposeful, watchful, as if on constant guard. Avery was spirited, confident, passionate, and deeply trusting. Beautiful. A low Georgia moon on a steamy night.

  So here Susanna sat, bareheaded under an ornate hemispherical dome painted with images of holy life, a boys choir began to sing “Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring,” and a royal guard marched with precision toward the altar, carrying Brighton banners of chivalry.

  Chills raced over her skin, over her heart. The power of the organ and the crescendo of pitch-perfect voices awakened her heart.

  Forget hats. Or how baby sister Avery was raised by the same parents but in a different house. Forget the beauty of a low Georgia moon.

  She was here to witness a man being crowned king before men and God. All else paled. She closed her eyes. Be with Nate, Jesus.

  The song ended, a celestial crown of notes and lyrics dripped gently from the hand of God, anointing them all.

  The quiet stirred the air. The narthex doors opened and the congregation rose. Led by the archbishop and priests, Nathaniel entered dressed in simple white slacks and a button-down shirt. His eyes were intent and fixed straight ahead.

  Susanna’s heart turned over in her chest.

  “This is so sobering,” Avery whispered, linking her arm with Susanna’s.

  “I know, I can hardly breathe.”

  The archbishop took his place beside the throne and stood over a kneeling Nathaniel. From the side of the abbey, remote-control cameras drifted slowly, silently, over the congregation.

  Susanna glanced at the ceremony program as they were instructed to sit. A procession of nobles dressed in blue robes entered from the side of the abbey carrying the regalia and artifacts of Brighton’s ancient coronation ritual.