Prince and...Future Dad

by Christine Rimmer

  It wasn't a lie, exactly. Soon, after all, could mean just about anything.

  She gave them permission to snap few pictures and then, at last, they went away. She sat at the gate and she waited, watching the other standby passengers: the executive types with their pinched expressions, their laptops always open and their phones permanently glued to one ear. And the retired couples, holding hands, looking pleased with themselves, off to see the world in their waning years. And the harried mothers on vacation with their little ones—little ones who too quickly grew weary of Game Boys and picture books.

  One woman had a baby—how old? Three or four months? Liv really didn't know. She'd never been one to hover over other people's infants, making silly cooing noises, declaring, "Oh, what an angel—and how old is he?" She left that kind of stuff to Elli, who was born to be a mother.

  And the plain fact was, she didn't feel any more like cooing right then than she ever had. It was just another of those shocking moments when the truth she already knew decided to make itself painfully clear.

  In nine months or so, she'd be like that woman, holding her baby in her arms, swaying gently back and forth, making small, soothing noises, looking down at the scrunched-up red face within the blankets, absurdly in love the way mothers always seemed to be with their newborns.

  She thought of the birth then, of giving birth. Oh, God. She was going to be doing that. In nine months or so.

  She put her hand over her flat stomach and wondered how the two of them were going to survive it.

  They would. Of course they would. Women and their babies rarely died during labor anymore. The two of them were going to be fine.

  But what about Finn? Okay, they didn't have the kind of marriage that most people had. But now that she had let herself think of it, she definitely wanted him to be there. Really, he had to be there for the baby's birth. He had the right, as the baby's father, and besides, she truly couldn't bear the thought of going through all that difficulty and pain and sweaty unpleasantness without him.

  She fumbled in her big shoulder bag, looking for her phone. Finn had given her a couple of numbers—to his cell and to the main line at Balmarran—in case she ever needed to reach him.

  Well, what could be more important than a father's presence at a baby's birth? Nothing. Nothing at all. She found the phone and flipped it open and started to dial his cell number.

  Halfway through, she stopped. She flipped the phone shut and let it drop to her lap.

  She was being ridiculous and she knew it. There was no need to call Finn right this moment about something that wasn't going to happen for months yet.

  It was only…

  She missed him. Terribly.

  A few hours away from him and all she wanted was to get back to him, to see his face, hear his voice, feel his touch.

  Oh, this was bad. This was very, very bad.

  She put the phone in her bag again and took out the little white box he'd given her. He'd said to open it when she got home. She should probably follow his instructions.

  But she'd never been all that good at following instructions. She always had to make her own rules, do things her own way. He had to know that about her by now.

  And really, how much could it matter if she opened it now or later?

  She took the end of the bow and gave it a tug. The ribbon went loose. She pushed it out of the way and removed the lid and found … her blue satin panties. The ones she'd lost that fateful night.

  Liv sat back, vaguely irritated. Really now. What kind of morning gift was that? She'd been hoping for something sweet and romantic.

  A love poem.

  Jewelry.

  Jewelry, a man like Finn with all his amorous experience ought know, was never amiss as a gift for a lady.

  But her own panties?

  Uh-uh.

  She lifted them by the elastic and held them high, scowling at them, not stopping to think that the travelers around her might find the sight of her dangling a pair of satin panties distinctly odd.

  "Ahem." A white-haired lady in the seat opposite her coughed into her heavily veined, beringed hand.

  Liv shoved the panties back into the box and replaced the lid.

  Right then, the boarding call began for her prospective flight. Ten minutes later, all the confirmed passengers had filed through the doorway. They began calling the standbys. Hers was the third name on the list. Liv heard it and didn't move.

  More names were called. Still Liv sat where she was.

  Finally the attendant shut the door. Liv watched out the window as the plane taxied off toward the runway.

  A long time went by. A whole new group of travelers surrounded her, more aging tourists and young families and busy type A's. Another plane landed. The doors were opened and the passengers spilled out.

  They were just starting to board yet another flight when Liv rose and returned to the ticket counter. She bought a ticket for the next plane to Gullandria.

  It would depart tomorrow at 9:45 a.m.

  In a daze, she caught a shuttle and found herself deposited at the Crowne Plaza hotel. She checked in and went to her room and ordered room service. She ate sitting on the plaid bedspread, channel-surfing and wondering if she might have, just possibly, gone out of her mind.

  Time after time, she picked up the phone and then set it down again. What was to say?

  "I've gone insane. I'm throwing over my internship and coming to see you at your precious Balmarran."

  Oh, it was impossible. What about her plans for her life? She really did have to be crazy, to be thinking what she was thinking.

  In the end, she called her mother. Ingrid picked up on the third ring.

  "Mom?"

  "Livvy? Where are you? Are you—?"

  "I'm in a hotel right outside London. And yes, I'm okay. I'm stark raving nuts, but I'm okay."

  "The wedding? Did you—"

  "Yes. I did it. I married Finn."

  "Oh," said her mother. Liv could hear the tears in her voice. "I'm glad, I truly am, but I thought you were supposed to be on your way home now."

  "I am. I was. But I couldn't do it. I'm going back."

  "Oh, sweetheart."

  "I just, well, I can't seem to leave, you know? I want to be with Finn."

  "I know."

  "It's so unlike me. Throwing my internship over, for a man."

  Ingrid gave a low laugh. "Not just any man. He is, after all, your husband."

  "I miss him," Liv said in a small voice. "I want to be with him. I want to … work things out with him."

  "Of course you do."

  "I think he's angry with me. Oh, Mom. I don't know what's wrong with him."

  "I'm sure he's hurt."

  "Why? What did I do? It's not as if he didn't know how I am. It's not as if I never told him that I had plans for my life and I—"

  "Just go to him. Just work it through."

  "His sister hates me. She's sure it's all my fault that he's so broody and mean lately, and you know, I think she's probably right. I think … he really loves me, Mom. And I think I love him."

  "You'll work it out."

  "You keep saying that."

  "Because there's nothing else to say. Because I know that you will. I knew it the moment I met him. The two of you are perfect for each other. You need a little humor and passion in your life. And I think that Finn needs a little direction."

  "You're sure? You don't think I'm crazy to be doing this?"

  "I absolutely do not."

  "But what about—"

  "There'll be other internships."

  "He wants to live there, in Gullandria. How will I—"

  "One step at a time," her mother said.

  * * *

  "One step at a time," she told herself the next morning. "I'm going to visit him at his castle. We'll see how it goes…"

  She called his cell phone as soon as she reached Gullandria, but he didn't answer. She left a brief message, then tried the number at Balm
arran. The housekeeper picked up.

  Prince Finn was not taking calls.

  "But is he there?"

  The housekeeper confirmed that, yes, the prince was at Balmarran.

  "Then will you please tell him that his wife would like to speak with him?"

  The housekeeper asked her if she would please hold.

  "Yes. Yes, of course." Liv waited.

  The next voice on the line was one she didn't especially want to hear. "What do you want?" Eveline demanded.

  Liv suppressed a sigh. "To speak to my husband."

  "He doesn't wish to be disturbed." The line went dead.

  Liv muttered a few rude words beneath her breath. Really, she should have strangled the girl when she had the chance.

  She decided she'd give up on phoning him first. She would go to him, somehow get past the housekeeper and his overbearing brat of a sister, and speak to him face to face.

  But first, she had to find out where Balmarran was. Most likely, her father would know.

  * * *

  Osrik started in on her the minute she entered the private chamber.

  "Odin's bones, what is it now? I thought you were deserting your husband and returning to America as fast as public air transport could carry you."

  "I changed my mind."

  Her father sent her a wary look. "Should we be heartened? Is it possible you've come to your senses and realized your place is at your husband's side?"

  "Sure, be heartened. Why not? And I think it's probably better for both of us if I don't even try to answer that second question. I understand Finn has returned to Balmarran."

  "Yes, and with a dark look in his eye and a scowl on his too-handsome face. I never thought I'd see the day that Finn Danelaw couldn't spare a smile and a clever remark. But that day has come, and I'm shamed to say my own daughter has brought it upon us."

  Liv resisted the urge to defend herself. She knew her father well enough by then to understand that arguing with him would accomplish zip, beyond possibly incurring the royal wrath.

  She didn't need that. Between Finn and that sister of his, she had enough people mad at her already.

  "Father, I'm hoping to do what I can to … make Finn smile again."

  "Harumph," said her father.

  "But I can't do that unless I can see him. I came to ask you for directions to Balmarran."

  Osrik called for a car to take her there.

  * * *

  Balmarran estate lay a short distance beyond the small village of Skolvar, at the foot of a tiny mountain range called the Midlings. The estate was 130 kilometers from Lysgard—in American terms, roughly 80 miles. Liv sat behind the driver and stared out at the rolling countryside dotted here and there with rippling fields of grain and pastures full of fat-tailed sheep and tried to imagine what in the world she was going to say to Finn when she got there.

  Silently she rehearsed a number of elaborate speeches. But in the end, she decided to wing it. She'd be honest and forthright and tell him she'd been thinking long and hard. And she'd decided she wanted to try to make a real marriage with him. She'd let the rest take care of itself.

  The driver was no chatterbox. He stared at the road ahead of him and drove like Finn, faster than he should have. They roared around turns and more than once she had to ask him to please slow down.

  It seemed no time at all before they reached Skolvar, where the houses were small and narrow, with steep-pitched dark roofs, each house painted a stunningly cheerful primary color—red, yellow or blue, with white window frames and shutters. The people stopped on the cobbled streets to smile and wave, as though they knew the black Mercedes must belong to their king, and they recognized Princess Liv in the back seat.

  A mile or two beyond the village, the driver swung too fast around a curve and a castle loomed proud in the distance. She asked the driver and he confirmed that it was, in fact, Balmarran. Silhouetted against a cloudy sky, it was a long, imposing series of linked structures with a domed tower in the middle and more towers at either end.

  "Skolvar granite, Highness," the driver gave out rather grudgingly when she asked him what kind of stone it was made of. "There's a quarry northwest of the village. Skolvar granite is famous for its pale, almost white color."

  It truly was lovely, rising from the wooded grounds below it. It seemed more Georgian than medieval in style, more of a fine manor house, less a fortress. Arched windows ran the length of the two central buildings. They would let in lots of much-needed light during the long Gullandrian winters. It looked … gracious and welcoming. On a little grander scale than Liv preferred, but from here, well, it seemed a place she might be able to live.

  And oh, she might as well face it. With Finn at her side, she could probably learn to live just about anywhere.

  Trees obscured the view of the house as they got closer. And then they turned off the main road. A hundred yards later they arrived at an iron gate inset with medallions: dragons, their long tails twining in and out of some sort of runic symbol she didn't recognize. The pillars to either side were of that distinctive Skolvar granite.

  The driver honked, but no gatekeeper appeared. With a put-upon sigh that Liv could hear even from the back seat, the driver got out and approached the gate. He fiddled with the latch, then grabbed an iron post on either side and gave it a hard shake. Nothing. He returned to the car.

  "Sorry, Highness. The gate's locked up tight."

  Liv got out her phone and dialed the castle. After an endless chain of unanswered rings, a machine finally picked up and invited her to leave a message.

  Feeling ridiculous, she did. "This is Liv—Liv Thor … er, Danelaw. I'm at the front gate. Could someone please come down and let me in?" After that, she tried Finn's cell number. He didn't answer, so she left a message similar to the first one.

  "Now what?" said the driver, looking put out, and remembering after a beat or two to add, with grudging respect, "Your Highness?"

  "Now we wait."

  The driver was not up for waiting. Not five minutes had passed before he announced that he didn't believe the iron fence could possibly run the entire perimeter of the estate. If she didn't mind, he'd find a way to get past it. He'd run on up to the castle on foot. In no time at all, he'd be back down with someone to open the gate.

  Balmarran estate looked pretty big to her, and she doubted the man could have even passing familiarity with the layout. She sent him a disbelieving glance. "No time at all. Right."

  "Highness, I don't mind confessing I've got a crack sense of direction and I'm real fast on my feet." He looked at her as if he'd go mad if he had to sit there and do nothing.

  She accepted the fact that she might go mad if she had to watch him while he sat there and did nothing. She waved a hand at him. "Oh, all right. Leave the keys."

  "Yes, Highness. Thank you, Highness." And he was off. He disappeared into the trees to the left of the road just as lightning flashed in the sky. Thunder boomed and fat "raindrops began plopping on the windshield. Within seconds, it became a downpour. Liv figured the impatient fool would get smart and come back.

  But he didn't. He was gone. And right then, as she stared at the gate, another man appeared just on the other side of it.

  He wore a pair of soaked black pants, black boots and a dripping black-hooded slicker. He seemed to have materialized out of the storm itself. Liv was sure she hadn't seen him coming toward her down the driveway—and he had the hood pulled over his head, so she couldn't really see his face. He was perhaps six feet tall, and very thin.

  The wonderful thing was, he had a key!

  Liv scrambled over the seat as he unlocked the gate and walked each side wide open. He signaled her through and she started up the car.

  When she got even with him, she rolled down the passenger window and leaned across to speak with him, though the rain gusted in over the seat, wetting the expensive leather and Liv as well. "Thank you so much."

  He nodded. She could make out his face now, beyon
d the poor shelter of the hood.

  Handsome in a gaunt, drawn way. And hardly more than a boy. Late teens, at the oldest. He shouldn't be out in this.

  "You have shelter, close by?"

  He only looked back at her—tongue-tied, perhaps deaf? Who could say?

  She couldn't just drive off and leave him standing there. She pushed open the door and gestured at the seat. "Come on. Get in."

  He backed off a step and turned his head sideways, like a wild thing scenting trouble.

  She made her voice even firmer and waved him in. "I'm getting soaked here. Get in the car."

  He hesitated a moment more and then he slid in beside her and pulled the door shut. Lovely. Water ran off him, pooling on the floor mat beneath his worn black boots, soaking the seat. He smelled like wet rubber from the slicker, and also like damp earth, kind of musky—not dirty, but not overly clean, either.

  "Here." She reached for the dashboard controls.

  "No need," he mumbled. "I'm not cold, milady."

  She turned on the heater anyway. Warm air flowed in around her feet. The windshield was fogging up, so she switched on the defroster. Instantly the glass began to clear and she could see her way. She sent her soggy passenger a smile. "I'm assuming if I just take this driveway, we'll eventually end up at the castle. Is that right?" He made a grunting sound. She decided to take it for a yes. "And your name is…?"

  "Cauley," he mumbled in the direction of his dripping shoes.

  Cauley.

  Of course. The wild boy, the groundskeeper's adopted son, the one whose heart Eveline had broken.

  She felt a surge of pity for him. "I'm Prince Danelaw's wife."

  He stiffened, shoved back his hood and stared straight at her then, pale gray eyes haunted looking, thin mouth unsmiling, wild, unkempt hair plastered to his thin cheeks. "Prince Finn's new bride…" He seemed far from pleased to make her acquaintance.

  "Er, that's right. But tell you what. Just call me Liv." She held out her hand to him.

  He didn't take it. "Eveline hates you."

  Oh, terrific. "Well, I'm sorry to hear th—"