by Rachel Hauck
“Honest?”
“The preferred thing. Honesty over lying, yes.”
“I’d be on the plane tonight”—he swallowed, feeling lost for a moment in her intensity—“with you.”
She jerked around, facing forward with such force her ponytail slipped free. “I’m moving to a new shop.” Jumping off the table, she started for the barn, then whipped right and aimed for the road, then backtracked to the table. “Don’t you see? A shop . . . a new and bigger shop. Why would Mark suddenly offer his warehouse the same time you show up offering me a country?”
“I’ve no idea, I’m sure.”
“I–I have to think on this . . .”
“I’d expect nothing less. But, Regina, I’m not offering you a country in the same way Mark is offering you the warehouse. I’m offering your true inheritance.”
She paced around the picnic table. “I–I can’t, Tanner. I can’t leave Al and the business. I mean, things are looking up. We went into this venture together in good faith.”
“Regina, I understand you have a life. Have plans.” A watery sheen glistened in her blue eyes. “I do. And I’m sorry my mission is disturbing it.”
She glanced away again, touching her fingers to the corners of her eyes. “This is just too . . . crazy.” Regina cruised down the gravel and grass driveway toward the road, talking to herself. Tanner watched her until she disappeared from view between the light and the shadows, bolstering his heart that he’d not failed. Yet.
Removing his phone from his pocket, he tapped the king’s aide, Jonathan, a brief message.
No return 2night
TWELVE
The bluish-red hues of Monday evening’s dusk settled over Reggie’s house as she sat in the garage behind the wheel of Gram’s old Corvair, eating McDonald’s and listening to an oldies station on the push-button radio.
Comfort all around. She’d not deny it. French fries, chocolate shake, the Beach Boys, and Gram’s Corvair.
It’s where she came when she needed to think, pray, find harmony in her soul.
Drawing a long drink of cold chocolate richness from her straw, the sweetness cooling her turbulent emotions, she stared out the windshield through the open garage door toward the purple end of day and the amber rise of the streetlamp.
Who would help Mrs. Shaw with her flower beds if she went to Hessenberg?
“Care for some company?” Tanner peered through the passenger window.
Startled, Reggie steadied her racing heart with a deep breath. “Where did you come from?”
“Through the house . . . you didn’t answer the bell and the front door was unlocked.” He slipped into the passenger seat. “This is a fun old motorcar.”
“It’s was Gram’s. She bought it in ’68. Drove it for twenty years. Have you had dinner?”
“No, I—”
“They’re still hot.” Reggie passed him the fries.
Tanner reached for a few sticks off the top. “So this is what you do? Eat fast food in an old car?”
“Sometimes. When I need to go back to ground, figure stuff out.”
“Such an admirable quality, Regina. You take time to ponder a matter.”
“Heaven help the girl who didn’t ponder this matter. The one you dumped in my lap.”
Tanner took a few more fries. “May I ask you something? Why do you like old cars so much?”
Reggie set her milk shake on the console and reached for a napkin, wiping a bit of cold dew from her fingers. “After Mama died, Al had just retired and his wife, Miriam, had us over to dinner just about every night. Daddy loaded up Gram and me and off we went. Miriam was—and is—very kind to me. Motherly. Al had just purchased an old GTO to restore, so after dinner Daddy and Al went out to work on the car. I started tagging along to watch, helped if they let me. Miriam played gin rummy with Gram or watched TV.”
The words flowed easy and smooth, surprising Reggie because for the first time in seventeen years, she was vocalizing her memories. “The sounds of the garage, the clank of tools, the murmur of Daddy’s and Al’s voices, the gunning of an engine . . . it became home to me.”
“Home base.”
“After Gram died, I’d go out to the garage and sit in her car. For hours. Just thinking and listening to the radio, running down the battery.” She laughed softly. “Don’t you know I learned to use jumper cables early on.”
“I’m sure it was a difficult time for you, being so young, without a mum.”
“Then my dog died.”
“Then your dog died? I say . . .”
Reggie shook her head and gazed out the windshield. “Bonnie. A Sheltie. She was going on fifteen, so she had a good life. Just the timing was rotten.”
“Sounds like the makings of an American country song.”
“I’m saying . . .” she said, glancing at Tanner. “But no country song I ever heard ended with the girl being a real princess.”
“There’s a first time for everything. You should give it a go.” He seemed more relaxed than earlier. She liked this Tanner better than the formal, stiff, all-business one. He grabbed a few more French fries. It was as if he couldn’t quite decide who he was or what kind of man he needed to be.
“What’s your story, Tanner? Why did they send you?” Reggie reached for the volume knob as the announcer introduced Van Morrison and “Brown Eyed Girl.”
“My story . . . pretty boring. Parents. One brother. Boarding school. University. The law college—”
“You know, listing your life in bullet points isn’t telling me who you really are, Tanner.”
“—four years as a barrister, three as a staffer in the governor’s office, six months as Minister of Culture.”
“And yet I still don’t know why they sent you?”
“I know the entail.” He looked in the McDonald’s bag and took out a napkin, his tone back to a clipped, formal sound. “And I’m Minister of Culture.” He looked over at her, his face half in shadow, half in the light. “You, in essence, are our culture, Regina. The king needed an ambassador and he thought I fit the bill.”
“Are y’all friends?”
“We knew each other a bit . . . at university. Friends? I’d say not.”
“Do you, like, get fired if I refuse to go?”
“Lose my position?” He wadded the napkin into his palm. “No, but it won’t look smart on my record.”
“Then I’m sorry for putting you between a rock and a hard place.”
“As I am sorry for doing the same to you.” His expression sparked her heart with a strange new sensation. “You’re determined not to return with me?” he said.
No, not so determined. “Still thinking.” Would she return for Hessenberg’s sake or because she liked him?
Oh no, please, Reg.
See, Carrie was right. Reggie should’ve been boy crazy in junior high and killed all the juvenile love flutters. But no, she’d refused. So here she sat at twenty-nine infatuated with a man determined to ruin her life.
Ruin? No, he isn’t here to ruin anything. Reggie peered at Tanner to discover he was peering at her. She flushed with a blend of embarrassment and desire.
“What of your father’s advice?” Tanner said after a moment. “Have you spoken any more to him of this situation?”
“He says I should go.”
“Brown Eyed Girl” faded and “Love Me Tender” drifted from the speakers into the car.
“Ah, the king of rock and roll,” Tanner said with a slight bow toward the radio.
Elvis’s smooth, velvet voice swirled around Reggie, making her mellow and nostalgic.
Love me tender, love me true . . .
The intimate melody, along with Tanner’s presence, made her melancholy. Then her eyes met his and . . . Oh boy. She hit the chocolate milk shake hard.
“Regina, is there anything I can say or do—”
“How long would I have to stay?” She cranked the engine to charge up the battery. The old motor grunted and hissed, the
n settled down to a smooth idle. “We just got that huge warehouse, rent free.”
“Stay? In Hessenberg? Several weeks. A month. Maybe more. Until the entail is executed and you’ve taken the oath and accepted your inheritance.”
Anxiety burned under her skin. “What exactly is my inheritance?” Was this who she really was to be? “And this is all imminent, right?”
“Yes, and there are other details . . . the business of government. As I said, you’ll be Head of State and therefore required to call for a government to be formed. As for your inheritance, it is the throne and the Grand Duchy of Hessenberg.”
Each detail layered her anxiety with panic. “I inherit a country?”
“That’s what dukes and duchesses are, Regina. Owners of lands, regions. In your case, a whole island nation.”
“But I can leave?”
“We pray you won’t, but yes, you can abdicate.”
“Abdicate. I couldn’t have cared less about that word a few days ago. Now it sounds ominous, full of failure.”
“But it’s how you can return home.”
“Then what? What happens to Hessenberg? Anarchy again?” The weight of Tanner’s request, of the nation’s need, rested on her heart, growing heavier with each breath.
“Your government will take over.”
“My government? Even when I’m not there?”
“The one you established after signing the entail will carry on. And yes, there will be turmoil.”
Reggie pressed the heels of her hands to her temples, shivering, trying to imagine the impossible. “When I was a kid, there was a big dirt pile at the end of the road. A bunch of us would run down there and play King of the Hill. It’s the only ground I ever wanted to rule.”
“And did you?”
She laughed softly, remembering. “I was the reigning champ.”
“I rest my case,” Tanner said.
“Beating other kids to the top of a dirt pile is not the same as running, or helping to run, a country.” She had a wild thought and voiced it. “By the way, how do I know you’re not some international criminal making all this up?”
He stared at her for a moment. “You’ve the documentation to prove I’m not, but I suppose you don’t know for sure. However, rest assured, if I were, as you say, an international criminal, my target would not be a garage owner in Tallahassee, Florida.”
His tone, his inflection, his voice all smacked her funny bone. “Touché.”
“Regina, don’t misunderstand. I know this is not easy for you.”
The bass thump of “My Girl” buzzed the speakers. I’ve got sunshine . . .
“Not easy? Tanner, I don’t want to go forward, but bubba, I’m not sure I can just stay in place. Certainly not go backwards.” The core question of her heart surfaced and confronted him. “No matter what I choose, I know the truth and my life is forever changed. Go or stay, I’ll always know I am . . . was . . .” She swallowed, the word stuck in her throat.
“A princess?”
“Yes, a princess ever after.”
“Will you come with me to Hessenberg? Please?”
She peered at him, his question drilling into her heart, deeper and deeper, scoring her very foundation. She must go see. She had to try. For Gram.
With this new truth and revelation rattling around in her heart, how would she ever be satisfied with anything less?
At half past midnight, Tanner rode in the back of a Mercedes limo through the quiet city streets of Strauberg, bluish-white streetlamps tinting the rain-soaked night.
He’d made it home. With the princess. Once she decided to go, she charged through her world, leaving no doubt in her wake. Perhaps a set of confused friends and coworkers, but seemingly no doubt. She claimed she was visiting Hessenberg for a few weeks to “check this thing out.”
Watching her prepare for the trip, Tanner gained perspective on his charge. Regina processed things, the largeness of her destiny, one mental bite at a time.
Now she sat across from him, crushed into the soft leather seat, her eyes at half-mast. He wasn’t sure what turmoil churned in her heart and mind, but she appeared peaceful.
“Did you sleep at all on the flight?” he asked when she looked at him.
“Who can sleep at forty thousand feet over the Atlantic?” She sat forward, tucking her hands under her legs and peering out the rain-dotted window. “It looks so quiet out there.”
“This is Market Avenue, the business district of the city. There’s little activity after nine. Two streets over is where the nightlife happens. Restaurants and pubs.”
“The city has an old feel.” She moved to power down the window. A gust of cold, wet air swooped into the limo.
“If you think four hundred years is old, then so it is.”
She laughed and stuck her arm out the window, cutting the breeze with her hand. After a moment, she pulled inside, shivering, and raised the window.
“Are you glad to be home?”
“I don’t know . . . I rather enjoyed Tallahassee. I’d have liked to see a football game.”
“They are fun. My friends and I never missed one in college. Maybe next time you’re in town, in the fall, we can get in a game.”
“It’s a deal.” He warmed with the notion he might be in her future falls. “I played rugby myself in university.”
“Rugby.” She smiled with surprise. “Hmm, somehow I can’t see you in the middle of a scrum.”
“Yes, well . . . there you go.” He refrained from saying more, guarded against crossing the line between personal and professional. Too many times in the past twenty-four hours he had found himself bumping up against propriety. She made it too easy to talk, open up his heart, be her friend. It started the night she barged into his hotel with the fairy tale and the signet ring. Her wild-eyed wonderment and confusion about what was happening endeared her to him.
The limo slowed for a caution light, and the edge of the blue streetlamp lit the shadows in the back of the limo.
He liked her. There, heart, are you happy? He’d admitted something romance-related to his emotions. But make no mistake, he’d erected safety walls long ago, and they must be maintained. For personal security and professional decorum.
“Are you married?” she asked.
He focused on her as the car moved on, away from the city and toward the palace on the hill. “Pardon?”
“Are you married?” She pointed to her ring finger. “No ring, but that doesn’t mean anything these days.”
“I’m not. Married. No.”
“Divorced? Kids—”
“So many questions so late in the evening?” He tried to make light of it, deter her attention, but his words felt forced. He didn’t want to lie to her. But he could not confess his deepest and darkest sorrow. No matter how much he loved talking to her.
“Regina, I’ll have my assistant print out a schedule and information for you, including my phone number. But for now, I’ll come around in the morning after breakfast to collect you. We’ve a ten o’clock meeting with the king, Brighton’s prime minister, and the governor of Hessenberg in my office.”
“Wow . . . so many important people. And me.” She pressed her hand to her middle and blew out a low, slow breath. “Is it too late to change my mind?”
“Until you take the oath and are set in officially as Princess of Hessenberg by the king and archbishop, you can leave at any time without consequences.”
“Welcome to Hotel California.”
He laughed. “Hardly. You can check out, leave, and return home. But you’re here now, so you might as well give it a go. As you say, now that you know the truth, how can you return to who you were?”
The limo climbed and maneuvered through narrow country lanes, winding up a hillside.
“We’re almost to Meadowbluff Palace.” Tanner opened the window to the driver. “Please open the roof, Dickenson.”
The top panel over Regina’s head slid back and the moon peeked inside.
/> Regina drew a deep breath. “I smell the ocean.” She stood on the seat and stretched to see above the car. “Oh, we’re so high. The lights below are so beautiful.”
Tanner hesitated, then squeezed in next to her, watching as Meadowbluff loomed on the pearly horizon. He’d made it. Brought the princess home.
“What’s the name of the bay again?”
“Braeleon.”
“Braeleon Bay,” Regina repeated. “What does it mean?”
“I have no idea.”
“Fine Minister of Culture you are.” She bumped him with her elbow, rattling the stones in his emotional walls, then stretched farther over the top of the car to peer down. “It’s a straight drop.”
“We’re going up a mountain,” Tanner said. “From where the palace sits, a watchman can see the southern ports and all exposed roads. On the other side of that ridge”—he pointed to the dark line behind the palace—“there’s a watchman post for the northern ports and roads.”
“So the palace is a safe place.”
“Yes, guarded by the watchmen.”
The limo dipped with the road, shoving Regina against him. He wrapped his arm about her waist to steady her, then found he didn’t want to let go.
“We’re nearly there. Let me ring ahead to make sure everyone is ready.” He ducked inside the car, quite sure Regina could hear every boisterous beat of his heart.
The place around her waist where Tanner held on to her was still warm after he ducked inside the car.
She’d registered and tucked away how different Tanner’s touch felt from Mark’s, but for now her energy, her emotions, her thoughts were not on romance but on the palace and the night-scape ahead of her.
Meadowbluff, with its gables and turrets, was framed perfectly by the towering Cliffs of White just like in Gram’s fairy tale.
Reggie followed the straight line of the cliffs down to the water. A ghostly stream of moonlight draped across the surface of the bay and lapped against the shoreline, which was buttoned to the earth with a row of pearly-diamond lights.
Reggie ducked inside the car. “It’s beautiful.”
“Yes, quite.” Tanner read his iPhone without looking up.
