A Thoroughly Modern Princess

by Wendy Markham

  “Sick again?” Granger asked sympathetically, looking up from the Business section of the morning Times.

  She nodded and leaned against the kitchen counter to steady herself.

  “You should eat something,” Granger said, setting aside the paper and coming to stand beside her.

  She groaned at the thought of food and wished he would just leave her alone.

  “Here, this will help.” He opened a cabinet door and took out a box of saltines.

  He had stocked up on groceries last night, showing her each of his food purchases with a childlike delight he apparently didn’t reserve for toilet brushes alone.

  “No thank you,” she said, as he offered her a cracker.

  “It would settle your stomach,” he insisted, waving the cracker under her nose. “Just take a bite.”

  She opened her mouth to demur and found it full of cracker. “I beg your pardon!”

  “If you can’t feed yourself, then I will,” he said simply.

  She chewed and swallowed. “I am quite capable of feeding myself, thank you very much.”

  “You’re very welcome . . . and you may be quite capable, but you aren’t doing it. That’s my baby in there. I have to make sure he’s well nourished.”

  “How do you know he’s a he?” she asked.

  He shrugged, offering the package again. “All right, he or she.”

  “She.”

  “Have another cracker.”

  She wanted to refuse, but found that he was right. The bland starch had instantly eased the nausea. Suddenly she was famished. She helped herself to another saltine. And another.

  “Do you really have a sense that the baby is a girl?” Granger asked.

  In truth, she had no idea. But still vaguely irritated at Granger’s use of the male pronoun to describe the baby, she replied, “Yes. I’m fairly certain she’s a girl.”

  “Huh.” He fell silent.

  She concentrated on her crackers.

  “Emmaline, can I . . . ?”

  “Hmm?” Crunching, she glanced up at him and found him staring at her midsection.

  She stopped crunching and asked, around a soggy mouthful, “Can you what?”

  “Can I . . .” He raised his eyes to hers. “Can I feel the baby?”

  Flustered, she said, “I don’t know what you . . .”

  “I just want to . . .” He reached toward her and rested his large, warm hand over her lower belly.

  She was wearing the long-sleeved cotton T-shirt she had slept in, along with a pair of low-riding sweat-pants Granger had bought for her from the discount store. They were two sizes too big, but he insisted that they would fit her in no time. For now, no matter how tightly she pulled the drawstring, the waistband settled in the vicinity of her thighs, well below her navel.

  Which meant only a thin layer of cotton T-shirt separated Granger’s hand from her bare flesh. She swallowed hard, and nearly choked on the mouthful of cracker.

  “Are you all right?” Granger asked as she gasp-coughed. He didn’t remove his hand.

  And no. She wasn’t all right. Not with his fingers sprawled across her belly and his clean, soapy scent enveloping her nostrils.

  She nodded anyway. “I’m fine.”

  “It’s amazing,” he said quietly. “Isn’t it?”

  “That I didn’t choke on that cracker? Quite,” she quipped, desperately needing to lighten the moment.

  “No, that a tiny human life is right in there,” he said. “Can you feel anything? Can you feel him—I mean her—moving, or kicking?”

  “Of course not. She’s too small.”

  “How big does she have to be before she kicks?” He stroked her belly lightly.

  “I suppose she has to have legs,” she said.

  “There are no legs yet?”

  “I doubt it.”

  Emmaline cleared her throat and tried not to look into his eyes. But when she lowered her gaze, she only found herself staring at his lips, and that was even more disconcerting.

  Something was fluttering deep within her, and she knew better than to blame it on the baby. What she felt was the stirring of arousal, brought on by Granger’s deceptively gentle masculine touch. She wanted to pull away, to break the intimate connection between them.

  No—she didn’t want to. That was the last thing she wanted. But . . . she had to do it.

  Somehow, she found the strength to step back. To reach for the box of crackers and shove another one into her mouth, chewing noisily, desperately nonchalant.

  “Have you been around many babies?” she asked him, seizing the first conversational topic that entered her mind.

  “Never. I’ve never even seen one close up.”

  “Don’t you have any nieces or nephews?”

  A shadow crossed his face. “I’m an only child.”

  “I see.”

  “I had a sister, once, but . . .”

  “I’m sorry,” she said softly when he trailed off, staring at his Gucci loafers.

  For a moment, the only sound was the ceaseless dripping of the faucet, and, outside the window, traffic noise and the rhythmic throbbing of a jackhammer.

  Then Granger said, in a voice she had to strain to hear, “Her name was Charlotte. I never even got to see her, but . . . that was her name.”

  “You never saw her?”

  He shook his head. “She died a few moments after she was born. In the boating accident that killed my parents and my uncle when I was five years old.”

  Emmaline was speechless. Her mind raced. She had a sudden, dim recollection of having read somewhere, long ago, that Granger Lockwood had been orphaned in childhood. Why hadn’t the horrible reality of his plight sunk in until now?

  Because you’ve been thinking only of yourself, she scolded. You haven’t been able to get past your own troubles.

  Now it was her turn to lay gentle fingertips on him. She touched his forearm. “How tragic. I’m so sorry for your loss, Granger.”

  He lifted his head. She half expected to see tears in his eyes, but instead she found a resolute acknowl-edgment of her sympathy.

  “It’s all right,” he said. “It was a long time ago. And I never speak about it, so . . .” He inhaled deeply, exhaled heavily. “It’s just that I sometimes wonder what would have happened if things had worked out differently. If Charlotte had survived.”

  Emmaline imagined life without her sisters, and it was all she could do not to shudder. Genevieve and Josephine were the only two people in the world who understood what it meant to be the royal offspring of the king and queen of Verdunia. There was a certain comfort in sharing the burden and the privilege.

  But Granger had shouldered his burden alone.

  “You’re very lucky to have had a family who loves you,” he told Emmaline. “To have parents and sisters who are there for you when you need them.”

  She nodded, compelled to point out, “And you’ve had your grandfather. Surely he cares deeply about you.”

  “My grandfather cares deeply about Lockwood Enterprises.”

  “And my father cares deeply about the future of his kingdom, but—”

  “It’s not the same thing,” Granger cut in. “My grandfather merely sees me as an heir.”

  Emmaline’s mouth clamped shut as she thought about her father. Papa loved her—she knew that. Yet he was willing to have her enter an arranged marriage for the sake of the kingdom.

  What would happen to Verdunia now, if she didn’t marry Remi and secure an alliance with Buiron?

  Emmaline tried to summon a sense of royal duty—tried to tell herself that perhaps the best thing for her to do would be to return to Verdunia and go through with her marriage.

  But that wouldn’t make the baby go away.

  And it wouldn’t make Granger Lockwood go away.

  Until a few moments ago, when he had touched her stomach and she had glimpsed the raw emotion in his eyes, she might have been able to convince herself that he would be relieved if s
he went back to Verdunia, baby and all.

  Now she wasn’t so sure.

  “Do you know what would do us both some good?” Granger’s voice interrupted her thoughts.

  “What?”

  “Soup.”

  “Soup?”

  He nodded. “I’m hungry, too. I’ll make us some soup. Homemade—not the canned kind. Homemade will be better for the baby.”

  “Do you have a recipe?” she asked dubiously.

  “No, but how difficult can it be? Go ahead and relax and read the paper and I’ll whip up a pot of something healthy.”

  “I’ll help.”

  “You can rest.”

  “I’ll help,” she insisted.

  “Have you ever cooked anything before?”

  “Have you?”

  “The omelets I made for breakfast the other day.”

  Precisely. “I’ll help,” she said for the third time, and rolled up her sleeves.

  Soup.

  Of course they could make soup.

  As Granger put it, how difficult could it be?

  Hearing Prince Remi’s footsteps in the corridor outside his private sitting room, Princess Josephine checked her reflection in the window one last time.

  Yes, she looked ravishing indeed. Her dark curls were caught in a sedate bun suitable for a concerned sister who presumably had no idea that Emmaline was shacking up in New York with an American bon vivant. She wore a rather somber navy suit but it was well cut enough to show off her curves, and she had recently ordered her seamstress to shorten the skirt several inches to reveal more of her long, toned legs.

  “Dear Josephine,” Remi said, stepping into the room. “This is a pleasant surprise.”

  “I thought perhaps you might need a confidante at a time like this,” she told him, offering her cheek for his kiss. As his lips grazed a spot that was a good two inches from hers, she fought the urge to turn her head just enough to capture his mouth with her own. She couldn’t. At least, not yet.

  “Yes, I do need a confidante,” he said, stepping back from her with what she sensed was reluctance—a very good sign indeed.

  “Are you pining away for Emmaline, then?” she asked, crossing her fingers in the folds of her skirt.

  “Of course.”

  It was a lie. How could she tell him that she knew it was a lie? He didn’t want to marry Emmaline any more than Emmaline wanted to marry him.

  “Papa told you that Emmaline left a note?” Jo-sephine asked, just to be sure.

  After all, she couldn’t allow herself to fall for the kind of man who would be glad to be rid of his bride under any circumstances. If, for example, Remi believed that Emmaline might have been kidnapped by foreign nationals, she would expect him to at least show genuine distress.

  “Yes, he told me that she left of her own accord.”

  Josephine breathed a silent sigh of relief. So the man had integrity, just as she’d suspected.

  Yet he had the grace not to show a bit of anger—and he had every right to be royally peeved at what Emmaline had done.

  Josephine’s admiration for him blossomed into full-blown infatuation.

  “Please don’t take it personally, Remi,” Josephine said, laying her French-manicured nails on his silk sleeve. “Any woman in her right mind would be eager to marry you.”

  “Do you really believe that?” Remi asked, gazing into her eyes.

  “Of course. You’re handsome, and cultured, and brilliant—you’re one of the most eligible men in Europe, for goodness’ sake. You will have no trouble finding a willing bride now that Emmaline has dumped—I mean left you.”

  He sighed. “It’s not a willing bride I’m trying to find, Josephine. It’s Emmaline. Your father has instructed me to do everything in my power to bring her home.”

  “Does Papa really expect the two of you to go through with the wedding?”

  He averted his eyes. “For the good of both countries, we must.”

  Josephine considered that. What if she told Remi, right now, where Emmaline was?

  You gave your word that you wouldn’t tell, she reminded herself.

  Yes, and Emmaline gave hers that she was coming home—well, not her word, exactly. But she said she’d be back, and she hadn’t shown up. Apparently she couldn’t seem to tear herself away from her divine American lover.

  If you told Remi—

  But you can’t. You promised.

  Josephine sighed. “It’s noble of you, Remi. If you do find my sister, I only hope that the two of you will be very happy together.”

  He said nothing.

  Josephine said, “Well, I suppose I should go.”

  “Don’t go!”

  Startled, she looked up to see Remi doing his best to conceal blatant longing. Hope fluttered.

  “Perhaps you can help me,” he said, composing himself instantly.

  “Help you?”

  “Help me search for your sister. Who would know better where she might be than you would, as her sister?”

  “I should think you would, as her fiancé,” she couldn’t resist saying slyly. “But I’ll be glad to help you, Remi. Where shall we start?”

  “I thought perhaps she could be in Ameri—”

  “I was thinking New Zealand,” Josephine cut in. “Emmaline has always been fascinated by . . . by sheep.”

  “Sheep?”

  “Yes, she simply adores wool.”

  Prince Remi shrugged. “As I said, you know her best. Why don’t we talk over dinner? Are you hungry?”

  “Oh yes, I have a voracious appetite.”

  For you, my dear Remi. Only for you. And perhaps, someday, you’ll be able to sate it.

  And he had thought he was a slob.

  Granger had never seen anything quite like Princess Emmaline in action in the kitchen. She had been hesitant to dirty her hands at first, but once she became caught up in the spirit of culinary creativity, she was a whirlwind of creative inefficiency. It was obvious that she had never before chopped, minced, diced, or even stirred.

  Now, as he gazed from the olive oil slick on the stove to the scattered grains of rice on the countertop to the chunks of minced onion littering the floor, he shook his head.

  For all her prim and proper persnickety attitude, when push came to shove, the woman simply had no concept of how to clean up after herself.

  Granger, too, had been raised with all the comforts of supreme wealth—and yes, he’d had a full-time housekeeper all his adult life—but even he wouldn’t recklessly drip water from the tap to the soup pot, as she had repeatedly done, without grabbing a sponge to mop it up.

  He watched Emmaline lift the lid from the bubbling concoction and reach for a spoon to stir it.

  “Maybe I should add more water,” she mused. “It seems a bit thick.”

  “No! I like it thick,” he assured her, wiping up a puddle in front of the sink.

  “It smells delicious, doesn’t it?” she asked, inhaling the savory vapor, heedless of the spatters the boiling kettle was emitting.

  He nodded, rubbing his shoulders. He was sore from hauling around luggage and shopping bags and groceries—not to mention from sleeping on the floor all night.

  “It does smell good,” he agreed. “I never would have thought to put whole tomatoes into it. That was an inspired idea.”

  “My chef makes tomato-based soup quite often,” she said, replacing the lid with a clatter. She stretched up on her tiptoes, her T-shirt riding up to reveal a barely swollen midsection.

  He watched, fascinated, his mind conjuring the image of what she would look like a few months from now, her belly protruding with his child. Never before had he found the idea of a pregnant woman the least bit erotic, but now, with Emmaline . . .

  “Down, boy! Down!”

  Startled, he assumed that she had read his thoughts, until he looked up and saw her shooing Kramer away from the stove.

  “I think he’s hungry,” she told Granger, taking a wary step back from the panting
dog.

  “He’s always hungry. He probably needs to go out for a walk. It’s been a while. Come here, boy.”

  Kramer stayed put, looking up at Emmaline and wagging his tail hopefully.

  “I think he likes you,” Granger said, amused by the smitten expression on Kramer’s face. “You should pet him. That’s what he wants. That’s the only way he’ll leave you alone.”

  Emmaline reached out a tentative hand and gave the dog a perfunctory pat on the back of the neck. “Nice dog,” she said guardedly.

  Kramer stood on his back feet, rested his massive paws on Emmaline’s shoulders, and licked her face.

  She cried out in dismay, nearly falling in her haste to extract herself from the ardent canine embrace.

  “Kramer! Come here, boy!” Granger hurried over to collar the dog, who barked in protest.

  “I’m sorry,” Emmaline said, “but I’m just not used to . . .”

  “To being kissed by frisky dogs?” Granger grinned. “I guess frogs are more up your alley, huh?”

  “Pardon?” She had seized a dish towel and was furiously wiping Kramer’s saliva from her face.

  “You know . . . princesses . . . kissing frogs . . . Forget it,” he said, noting that she was hardly in the mood for lighthearted quips. She had turned on the hot water and was reaching for the soap.

  “Listen,” he said, “I’ll take Kramer and Newman out for a nice long walk while you get everything cleaned up. I have a feeling it’s going to take a while.”

  “You’re right. I should probably just take a hot shower,” she said, furiously scrubbing her cheek with soap.

  “I meant the kitchen,” he said, gesturing around them. “The mess.”

  She froze. “You want me to clean this up?”

  From her tone, one would think he had asked her to lick the decade-old grease spatters from the range hood.

  Granger bristled. “Well, since you can’t take the dogs out for their walk, I figured you could—”

  “But I wouldn’t know where to start.”

  “The sink would be a good place,” he said dryly, gazing at the heap of dirty dishes and utensils there. She had practically emptied the cabinets and drawers in her frenzy of creative cooking.

  “You want me to do dishes?” she asked.

  He nodded. “It’ll be fun. You’ll see.”