by Ella Brooke
There’s a phrase for what I’m feeling; a perfect sentence that I know not many people can often say in their lifetime.
Peace of mind. Yes, that’s the phrase.
Nothing will ever beat this moment, and nothing will ever tear us apart.
THE END
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ANOTHER BONUS STORY
Wed to a Prince
By Sophia Lynn & Ella Brooke
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Wed to a Prince:
A Royal Romance
By Sophia Lynn & Ella Brooke
All Rights Reserved. Copyright 2016 Sophia Lynn.
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Prologue
As Emrys pulled Caitlyn to his side with one strong arm, and Caitlyn felt her heart pounding, the colors of the skyline bled together in a twilight smear of pink and blue. She warmed, and not just from the heat of his body against hers. The Seine was to their left as they walked toward the Arc de Triomphe. By the time they reached it, the daylight would be gone and the electric glow of the city would rise around them, casting shadows that danced seemingly in delight at their love.
Emrys leaned over to whisper in Caitlyn’s ear: “Don’t go.”
“I have to,” she protested half-heartedly. “My parents will expect me back—”
“You can call them.”
“And the new semester starts in a week!” Caitlyn protested, pushing her glasses up a little. She was tempted to take them off to clean them, but that would take two hands, and he’d already called her on cleaning them when she didn’t want to face him.
“How can you possibly choose Ohio over Paris? Over me?” Emrys teased in his lilting accent. His R’s just disappeared in every word, and it gave Caitlyn a chill to hear him speak. His dark eyes shone with amusement, but there was an unfamiliar tenor to his voice. Part of him meant the hurt he feigned. It wasn’t something she was used to hearing, not with his strapping build and confident swagger, the man who had swept into Caitlyn’s life this summer and pried her out of her tiny dorm room and made every day an experience.
Their hands swung between them, she in her loose skirt and peasant blouse, and he in ratty jeans, snug shirt, vest, and a beanie over his blond curls. Caitlyn looked up at his sharp jawline, the way his hair fell into his clear blue eyes. He was the most handsome man she’d ever seen in person, though he sometimes had the fashion sense of a turnip. It was still hard to believe that Emrys was real, and even harder to believe that he was interested in a short, shy girl from the Midwest who had barely dared to venture out of state for a study abroad program in France.
“Tell your father how educational it would be,” Emrys suggested. “That always works with my father. Tell yours what an apt teacher I’ve been.”
A deep blush spread across Caitlyn’s cheeks and ears. There was never any hiding it, but she brought a hand up to cover anyway, causing Emrys to laugh that deep, throaty chuckle of his and pull her flush to him. Her head bowed in embarrassment.
“Y-you’ve been an amazing teacher,” she murmured, her voice jumping up higher in emphasis. “You’re a real pro!”
Emrys laughed again and kissed the top of her wispy, strawberry blonde hair. It hung on either side of her head now, but the night before, it had been spread over his pillow. He twirled a finger around one of her long braids and leaned downward to kiss her forehead.
“Hey. Come here.” Emrys lifted her chin with two fingers. “I miss you already. No other woman has ever made me feel this way.”
Caitlyn shook her head. If her father could hear a guy six years her senior calling her a woman…But he couldn’t, and Caitlyn had hardly mentioned Emrys to her parents. She didn’t know what to say to them about him. She’d restricted their conversations’ topics to the academic and cultural parts of her trip. There was something about keeping Emrys to herself that made their affair even more exciting.
Little Caity Durst with an older lover in Paris. No one back home would have believed it! He wasn’t from Paris, or France, of course, but he knew the city like the back of his hand. If anything, she’d felt safer walking the streets with him by her side. He had encouraged her to try her French and find her voice here. He’d shown her places the students’ guide hadn’t even known existed. And then he’d taken her by the hand and shown her everything she’d been missing when she’d stayed home on Friday nights to study.
Now his hands moved again over her broad hips, and he kissed her. His lips were demanding, as always, and she shuddered a little at his intensity. The other people passing by took no notice, just as Caitlyn couldn’t notice them. When she was in his arms, feeling his hands moving over her waist, her hips, nothing else existed but the two of them.
“Stay, Cait,” Emrys insisted again.
“I can’t.”
“I’m proud of you for being able to say no.” His hand rested on the small of her back, just a hair shy of touching her ass. “I respect that, of course. But I still…I want you here.”
Caitlyn pressed her lips together and frowned. “Maybe we shouldn’t have started this…”
“I wouldn’t give up a moment of you.” Emrys heaved a sigh. “I’ll visit you, though. As soon as I can get away, I swear.”
Caitlyn twisted her fingers. “I just dunno how I’m gonna get through my day without talking to you. I’ve never had a guy who I could talk to like you.”
“Well, I’ll have to call you. And email.” He took her fidgeting hands into his and squeezed her fingers. “You’ll hear so much of my voice that you’ll be sick of me!”
“We can use Skype!” Her voice rose into an inappropriately cheerful squeak, and he chuckled. “And I’ll get my Emrys-fix from the WiFi! Until we can see each other in person again, anyway.”
Emrys flashed her a wide grin. It was the one that had initially disarmed her during her class trip to Nice. She loved his smile, especially the way it transformed his sullen face and made him almost seem like a different person.
“It’ll have to do.” Emrys shrugged. “Unless I kidnap you and take you back to my lair.”
“You could…” Caitlyn took his hands and swung him from side to side. “But then I’d have to mount a daring escape plan. It could get messy.” She wrinkled her nose when he pulled her close for another kiss. “I don’t wanna leave you, but I can’t abandon my life right now.”
“I get it.”
They didn’t make it to the Arc that night. Instead they stayed by the water, holding hands and kissing and talking until it was dark. Then Emrys walked her back to her dorm room. Caitlyn hopped onto his lap, determined to enjoy him until the moment the car came to pick her up. She would remember that night for the rest of her life.
At the Charles de Gaulle airport, they repeated their promises and goodbye kisses until Caitlyn had to go through security. Even then, she kept looking back at him as she went through the line, and each time, he gave her a wave, or blew a kiss. Finally, Emrys placed both of his hands over his heart, gazing back at her wistfully, and turned to leave.
Caitlyn watched as Emrys walked away, her heart full of sadness to see him go, as well as excitement for the moment they’d meet again.
Chapter One
Five Years Later
The chug of boats on the Hudson River filled Caitlyn’s ears, along with the sound of her own rhythmic breathing and the morning traffic on the other side. She smiled, picking up the pace of her run and feeling beads of sweat trickling down the back of her neck. She was glad she’d remembered the sweatband that now held back her strawberry blonde hair. The autumn air was cool against her skin. There was nothing like that first rush of endorphin
s in the morning. Though she didn’t usually experience it quite this early.
“Hurry up!” Melinda called back to her.
Caitlyn looked up and saw her friend laughing several steps ahead of her.
“Sorry.” Caitlyn picked up the pace. “If you keep sprinting off like that, how are we supposed to talk? And then what’s the point of being awake, or even alive, at five in the morning?”
Melinda wiped her brow. “Exercise, I’d guess?”
Caitlyn made a noise.
“It’s good for you.”
“But at what cost, Mel? What cost?!” Caitlyn pleaded.
Melinda laughed and looked over Caitlyn. “You sure complain a lot. I’m not sure I believe you run back home.”
“I like the trails better in Cincinnati. And not this early.”
“Pfft. New York is better than Cincinnati. Can you get a tattoo and a hooker at 3am in Cincinnati?”
“I wouldn’t want to do either of those things at any hour!”
Melinda laughed wickedly. Caitlyn fought her nature so she could speed up and leave Melinda in her dust. She loved Mel, she did, but they were two very different people. Caitlyn was really only out there with her this morning because Caitlyn was staying at Melinda’s apartment while visiting the city. After four days of being shaken awake at the ass crack of dawn, she’d finally given in.
But Caitlyn was a night owl by nature and preferred to work and exercise and anything else much later in the day. It wouldn’t kill her to come out with Melinda in the mornings while she was here, though.
Probably.
When they’d finished the trail, the two of them settled into a seat outside at a juice bar. Melinda would have to get back to the apartment and shower so she could go to work, but Caitlyn could do her work for the day back at the apartment ensconced with a latte and Melinda’s cats.
“So are you really not liking the city?” Melinda asked.
“I like it okay. I like visiting with you. It’s a bit crowded for my tastes.”
“I’m off tomorrow. We’ll find some better things for you to do. Oh! And I have tickets to that movie screening on Friday, and there’s an after party.” Melinda held her hands up. “Just a small one at a lounge, my little antisocial butterfly. We do have to dress up, but it won’t be loud and crowded like a club.”
Caitlyn sipped her Protein Buzz smoothie and leaned back in her chair. “What movie? Will Jaina be there?”
Melinda chuckled. “Yep. The girlfriend’ll be there. And it’s that sequel everyone’s been talking about. Roughhousing Frequency II.”
Caitlyn wrinkled her nose. “Maybe we could just go to the party.”
“Okay, even if that guy you hate is in the movie, it can’t be that bad. Plus it’s free, and it’s at one of those theatres where you can order drinks. Just ignore him!”
“I don’t hate him. I just think he’s overrated.” Caitlyn set her cup down and wiped the condensation from her fingers. “Does he have to be in everything lately?”
“That’s what happens when your career takes off. I mean, that actor whose face looks like a potato was in everything for a while. At least Emrys Sébire is a total hottie.”
“What would you know about a guy being a hottie?”
“Just because I have a girlfriend, who is hot by the way, doesn’t mean I’m blind. I swear to God that man is contracted to lose his shirt three times per movie and offer up an ass shot at least once.”
Caitlyn rolled her eyes. It wasn’t like she didn’t know that Emrys was attractive. He was just a lot more built than he’d been when she’d known him. And she’d never expected that after their wonderful time in France and all their promises to call and visit, the next time she’d see him would be three years later on the big screen.
She didn’t know what had hurt her more: the empty, silent days following her flight home when she’d still clung to the hope that Emrys would pick up his phone or answer one of her emails, or seeing his face one day during the previews to some stupid romantic comedy and finding out that everything he’d told her about himself had been a lie. Emrys had said that he was also a student. That he was from England. That he wanted to wrest as much happiness as he could from life, marry a nice girl, and settle down with children someday.
Once Emrys had started appearing in movies and his fans got busy on his Wikipedia page, the details about his life spread far and wide. He was not a student when he’d met her; he was from some small country in Europe called Cabeau, and he was the prince of the country.
Caitlyn had spent many nights praying for Emrys to come back into her life. Now it seemed like she couldn’t be rid of him. He was at once everywhere and completely out of her reach. Every time she saw him in the tabloids, it was like he was taking her heart in his hand and giving it another crushing squeeze. Caitlyn had told him absolutely everything about herself. He’d known the names of her parents, how her cousin had lived with them when his parents kicked him out of the house, the story of how her grandparents had met, and the name of the little independent coffee shop where she’d gotten her first job. Emrys had known her class schedule for the summer abroad program, and he knew enough about her academic program to guess that now she was working as an independent web designer.
But everything Emrys had ever told her was a lie. Caitlyn guessed that she shouldn’t be so shocked that he ended up as an actor.
“We don’t have to go if it really bothers you,” Melinda offered. “I just thought it would be fun to have someplace fancy to go.”
“No. You’re right. It would.” Caitlyn brushed back some stray tendrils of hair now starting to curl. “But I’m gonna need a couple of mojitos before the previews even roll because that asshole will probably be in half of them.”
Melinda squeezed Caitlyn’s hand. “Awesome. Luckily, no one in New York drives.”
“Then why the hell is there so much traffic?”
“No one smart in New York drives.”
After they had gotten back to Melinda’s apartment and Melinda headed off to work, Caitlyn showered and then settled in with her laptop, her to-do list, and a bag of chocolates that she dipped into whenever she crossed an item off her to-do list. As she worked, though, her mind kept wandering back to Emrys. Not movie star prince Emrys. The sweet, charming boy who had taken her by the hand when she’d been so fresh and new to the ideas of love and sex. He’d drawn her out of her shell and introduced her to so many things in such a short time, but then had been gone just as abruptly. It had taken her almost six months to realize it would never be him when she picked up the phone. It was more than two years before she’d given up hope that one day, maybe, he’d get in touch with her and give her a heartfelt apology and an explanation.
Caitlyn scratched the head of a little purring black cat. Marbles or Snowball. She couldn’t tell the difference between the two cats yet.
An explanation had never come, though. Even after Caitlyn had finally let herself accept that he had never loved her and didn’t care enough to call—hadn’t even cared enough to break up with her face to face—she hadn’t been able to make herself date much. It was so hard to trust guys. They were always hiding something behind their charming smiles and understanding eyes.
Marbles or Snowball purred thunderously and flopped down beside her. Caitlyn thought that when she got back to Cincinnati she should probably go to the shelter to get a cat; it would help make her apartment a little less empty.
Chapter Two
Emrys Sébire normally enjoyed any time he spent away from the courtly life of Cabeau. Unfortunately, PR events tended to put him in a foul mood. They were hollow. There was little opportunity to really speak one’s mind, especially for films like the Roughhousing series. They did keep his funds moving while he waited for better projects to come along—a necessary evil, in light of his father’s unyielding determination to withhold Emrys’s trust fund until he was middle-aged. He would have been happier, however, if not quite so many of his scenes had en
ded up on the cutting room floor. The result was a bit narratively messy, but they did find time for that extra car chase.
With a thank you to a rather skinny waitress, Emrys took a glass of champagne and headed outside. The lounge that the producers had secured for the party was quite upscale for what was essentially a junk food action movie sequel. The inside bar was lit along its base, and chandeliers revolved slowly, casting gentle, multicolored lights on the patrons. Even from outside, the lights made everything seem to glow along with the New York skyline. Each seat was less of a chair and more of an ergonomically designed abstract shape, and there was a long, narrow, rectangular pool by which several people sat, drinks in hand.
Everyone else seemed to be having a fine enough evening. Emrys recognized that part of his mood had to do with being a bit put out that the line for autographs hadn’t been very long tonight, but the audience for this series tended to skew to a certain breed of man, and that cut into his usual fan base deeply. He’d spent the first half of the evening chatting with costars and mingling with people in the industry who tended to perennially show up to these events. It was smaller than many he’d been to, but that fact in itself was a blessing.
“You’re lurking, Emrys,” Nina said from behind him.
Emrys turned to her with a frown. “I didn’t know you’d be here.”
Nina shrugged, pushing back her thick, black curls. “Just tryin’ to be social. There’s so much buzz around these films, so many big name stars attached.”
“What the American public consumes is inexplicable.”
“Don’t be a snob. It’s all about entertainment. Something to get the blood pumping.” Nina sipped her cocktail and sighed. “Be grateful to have a part at all. That’s what it’s about. Keep working, keep in the public eye. It’s worked for much lesser actors than yourself.”
