The Surprise Princess

by Patricia McLinn

  Amusement came into Hunter’s eyes, but didn’t reach his mouth. “Maybe later, Coach Draper. Right now, I want to talk to this young man. Brad, I’d like to have you in there as a witness, but you can’t say anything. Understood?”

  “I don’t like Katie going home alone. You can say it’s Ashton and the kid only went after a coffee mug, but—”.

  “You stay, help Hunter,” C.J. interrupted. “I’ll follow Katie home then head home myself if that suits you, Hunter.”

  “Sure.”

  “That good enough, Brad?”

  He nodded, because the feeling that it damned well wasn’t good enough was irrational and he knew it.

  “Call if you need anything, Hunter.” C.J. took off. His long legs would make up enough time on Katie that she’d be in his sight before she reached the parking lot.

  Hunter cleared his throat.

  “Brad, unless I hear something unexpected from this kid, I don’t see a serious threat to Katie’s safety. I have a good bit of experience with this, plus I ran it by my boss on the phone on the way up. I’m telling you this to try to put your mind at ease, not because we aren’t going to pursue it full-out. We are.

  “One more thing before we go in there, would you mind giving me a ride to Katie’s house when we’re done?”

  “What happened to the car you came up in?”

  “It’s not here anymore.”

  Which gave Brad a strong suspicion of how Hunter had gotten Katie to go home. He’d bet she’d gone to meet April, who’d dropped off Hunter, then driven to Katie’s house.

  ****

  Brad’s suspicion was confirmed in a little over an hour. A rental car was parked in front of the house. He and Hunter found April Gareaux inside.

  Katie let them in and gestured toward the kitchen. They’d probably have gone there without the gesture, drawn by mouth-watering smells.

  “Oh, good,” April said immediately. “Now that you’re here, we can have an early dinner, then go to the festival.”

  “Festival?” Hunter repeated with disapproval.

  “It’s the Ice-Out Festival. It’s to celebrate when Lake Ashton’s no longer iced in – get it? Katie’s been telling me about it. That’s why you couldn’t find a hotel room.”

  “That’s right. No rooms anywhere.” Hunter turned to Katie. “Any chance you can put us up tonight?”

  “Of cour—”

  “She’s putting us all up tonight,” Brad said. It wasn’t that he didn’t believe what Hunter had said about this not being a serious threat, but that didn’t mean he was letting her out of his sight.

  “I’m happy to have you stay here, April and Hunter. But I don’t need security,” she added pointedly to him.

  “What you need is a dog,” April said. “They’re great security.”

  Hunter coughed.

  “Okay, so ours aren’t great guard dogs, but they’d discourage someone from trying to break in.”

  “Nobody’s going to break in,” Katie protested. She swung back to Hunter. “After talking with Tim, I’m sure you know– Oh, did he give you more information? You didn’t get him in trouble with campus police, did you? Most students would have been tempted to make some money from a harmless prank. He’s a kid—”

  “A kid who scared you and invaded your privacy,” Brad said.

  Katie ignored him.

  Hunter said, “We let him go after he went over the details. We got his contact information, and, uh, emphasized the need for absolute discretion. More people, more leaks, more attention focused on you. Low-key is best. Coach Draper knows, but the other coaches—”

  “They won’t say anything,” Katie said.

  “Corston and Brewster don’t know much to say even if they wanted to.” Brad lifted the lid off a slow cooker, the source of some of the good smells.

  April chuckled, tipping her head to direct his attention toward Katie, who frowned fiercely at him.

  “Hey, I’m not saying they would say anything, I’m just being practical. What is this?”

  “Beef stew Katie made. Biscuits should be done soon,” April said. “And after dinner we can go to the festival.”

  Before Brad could say what a lousy idea he thought that was, Hunter said to April, “Remember, the reason you came straight here to Katie’s house was to stay out of the public eye.”

  “Unless that was a ploy to get me out of the office,” Katie inserted with a glint of mischief.

  “It was not,” Hunter said firmly. “If April’s recognized it’ll stir up talk about how much you two look alike. Do you want that, Katie?”

  “No,” she conceded.

  But April was saying, “Oh, we’ve got that covered.” She pulled a blonde wig and oversized gray hoodie from a bag. “Isn’t this perfect? Katie had the wig from Halloween. And with the hoodie pulled up nobody’ll see much of my face. And I have some truly awful makeup planned. You’ll hardly recognize me.”

  Hunter eyed the items, but all he said was, “No sense chewing on this until we have more information.” He cracked the oven door. “Though I wouldn’t mind chewing on something.”

  April laughed. “Subtle, Pierce.”

  Katie went into overdrive, preparing fruit salad with April, directing him and Hunter to move the table out from the wall and bring more chairs. Soon they were digging in.

  Conversation about anything but food flagged, not resuming until they’d each had a healthy wedge of apple pie with cheese on it.

  Hunter received a call as he finished and went outside to take it. They were cleaning up when he returned.

  “Nothing definitive,” he said in response to their questioning looks. “So far, there’s no indication anything more serious than trying to snatch the mug was involved.”

  “Good. Then we can go to the Ice-Out Festival,” April said.

  “No way,” Brad said.

  Katie frowned at him. “It was no—”

  “It is a big deal. What if whoever hired your pal Tim also hired other people to come after you?”

  “Good point, Brad,” Hunter said. “But that’s a reason for us to go — to flush out any more Tims, we’re both on hand. If Katie stays out of sight all weekend, we leave, then she returns to work next week, someone could try then.”

  He muttered.

  There was no way Katie could have heard what he’d said, but she must have figured out the gist because she declared, “I am not going to lock myself inside. And I am going to work Monday and every day after.”

  “Okay,” April said with great cheerfulness while he and Katie frowned at each other, “well, I’m thrilled we’re going to the Ice-Out Festival. What—”

  “In disguise,” Hunter interposed.

  “—I want to know is how it started?”

  Hunter groaned, but also put his arm around her shoulders and squeezed. “Of course she wants to know the history.”

  Katie told April, “I have no idea. It’s been around as long as I can remember.”

  “Started in the 1800s,” Brad said. “Both tracking the Ice-Out date and the festival. They still don’t take fancy scientific measurements or anything. They go strictly on observation, so it’s a more accurate comparison of now and then. In the 1800s, the day they could row a boat from a tavern across the lake to the Ashton campus was officially Ice-Out. That’s how the tavern owner delivered booze to campus, while avoiding officials. The first day in spring his employees could get across with the against-the-rules booze was a big celebration.”

  April had stopped drying the glass bowl the fruit salad had been in to listen to him. “That’s fascinating. How do you know all that, Brad?”

  “I took a class.”

  “On climatology?”

  “On local festivals.”

  Katie’s laugh came first. He turned toward the sound — toward her. Suppressing a smile, he pretended pique. “It was a real class. On how festivals reflect a community – ethnic groups, industry, geography, weather. All that.”

 
; April said, “Well, I’m glad we’re going to honor the great tradition of the Ice-Out Festival.”

  “Uh-huh. The tradition of celebrating sneaking in illicit alcohol to probably underage kids,” Hunter said.

  April stretched up and kissed him on the cheek, then said fondly, “My Mr. Law and Order.”

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  Hunter was eventually satisfied with April’s disguise – “only because it’s dark” – and they walked to the Meadow, where celebratory bonfires in safety fire pits along the shore blazed high enough to hastened the ice’s melting.

  Dancing and singing certainly were melting the students’ winter restraints.

  No one showed the least interest in their foursome. So they all tried Slapshot (getting the puck in the goal), which Brad won, and Bowling (using snowballs to try to knock down small pins), which Hunter won, and they agreed they were too old and too smart to attempt Bobbing for Ice Cubes.

  Fireworks over the lake capped the official festivities, though ad hoc parties could be heard all over campus.

  Walking back to the house, Brad was aware of April and Hunter holding hands, while he and Katie walked beside each other in silence.

  He was also aware, lying on the couch, looking at the night sky through the window no longer obscured by giant trees, of Katie down the hall in her bed. Warm and tousled and –

  No. That wasn’t why he was here. That wasn’t why he was in her life.

  Brad was up and out before the others stirred. He left a note on Katie’s kitchen table saying when he’d be back.

  He swung by his place for a shower and change, tossed necessities in a duffel and headed back.

  He could see Katie and April at the table finishing breakfast as he walked to the front door. On impulse, he tried the door without knocking. It opened and he walked right in.

  “I locked that door when I left. Why isn’t it locked now?”

  “Oh.” Katie put a hand to her heart. “You startled me. I guess I didn’t lock it when I got the newspaper.”

  “Somebody else might have done a heck of a lot more than startle you.”

  “If there was any cause for concern, Hunter wouldn’t have sent me back here to the house by myself yesterday.”

  “Coach followed you home.”

  Her triumph deflated. “C.J. did?”

  “Yes, and reported back to us that you and April were okay, which he could tell through the wide open windows.”

  He was aware of April watching them like an absorbed fan at a tennis match.

  “If you’re criticizing me for having wide open windows, you shouldn’t have cut down the trees.”

  “Curtains work, and you can open – or close – them.”

  She made a face, but before she could say anything, Hunter entered from the back.

  “News?” April asked.

  He hitched one shoulder. “Let’s all sit down.” When they had he said, “The short answer is we found the guy who was going to pay Tim for the mug. He really is a mechanic. In Milwaukee. Seems like an upstanding citizen other than this. Heard from a customer that someone was offering a thousand dollars for a sample of a woman’s DNA. We’re tracking down the customer and we’ll keep working this end. We’re working from the other end, too.”

  “What other end?” Katie asked.

  “Who’s willing to pay to get a sample of your DNA. Presumably it’s someone interested in knowing if you’re the lost princess of Bariavak.”

  “King Jozef—”

  “No,” April and Hunter said in unison.

  “He’s too good a politician to do anything so clumsy,” Hunter added.

  April frowned at him then said to her, “He would never do that to you – not only scare you that way, but take the decision away from you. He wouldn’t. He wants to spend time with you, to get to know you. He wouldn’t want that if he were going to force the DNA issue.”

  “Then why hasn’t he spent time with Katie?” Brad asked.

  “He’s got other issue’s he’s juggling.” Hunter held up a hand. “Yes, April, I’ll tell them the rest. And in fairness, I keep telling him it will bring down the media on her, so he’s held off.”

  “Eliminate King Jozef, and there’s still someone who wasn’t worried about scaring Katie,” Brad said. “Someone plenty clumsy enough to hire cheap and inept help.”

  “That’s exactly the clue we’re following up.” A glint of a smile showed in Hunter’s eyes. “I’ll keep this short, but you need to know that Bariavak’s situation is a little complicated. With the death of King Jozef’s daughter and the disappearance of his granddaughter, he was left without an heir. He instituted a provision that said he could name his heir from among a trio of family connections. His nephew by marriage, Prince Vatche, thinks he has the best chance, but he’s the one Bariavakians dislike the most.”

  “With good reason,” April said. “That’s a personal opinion, not the stance of the Department of State.”

  “State has no stance on the matter.”

  “Of course not.” April added to Katie and Brad, “He’s smarmy and—”

  “April.”

  She raised a hand in surrender, but slid in one last word: “Slimy.”

  “One of the other two connections made Prince Vatche look good. But Prince Stefan Carlos got himself killed not long ago in a jet-ski accident—”

  “His fault,” April said.

  “—and that ended that line. So King Jozef has had to dig deep to track the descendant of the third branch.”

  “International intrigue,” Brad muttered, with a glance at her.

  “Have you found this third candidate?” Katie asked.

  “Yes. But there are, uh, issues.”

  “Issues?”

  “Let’s just say the third candidate would be happy if you prove to be Princess Josephine-Augusta. So for now we relax here and let good people work the situation. I suggest we play a game of cards. Poker?”

  “Do not play poker with this man,” April warned the others. “He can bluff you out of your last possession or your last toothpick.”

  “Well, I have toothpicks, but no cards,” Katie said.

  Brad and Hunter gaped at her. “No cards? What games do you have?”

  “I don’t. I didn’t play games as a kid and – Oh, wait. Carolyn’s and C.J.’s kids brought over a game and left it here.” She went to the sideboard and pulled out a rectangular tin triumphantly. “Dominoes.”

  ****

  Hunter received one interim report that added more weight to the suspicion that King Jozef’s nephew by marriage was behind the mug-snatching effort.

  By that time, the dominoes competition had become fierce. Each game’s loser had to serve the others drinks and snacks.

  Katie and Brad had tied for last on the just-finished game, so they were in the kitchen getting popcorn and drinks.”I should have said this before, Brad. Thank you for everything you did yesterday.”

  “You’re welcome. And I’m impressed you didn’t add anything on about none of it being necessary.”

  “Don’t tempt me.”

  He grinned and she grinned back.

  “You were awfully hard on Tim, though,” she said.

  “As hard as I had to be to make him stop being an ass.”

  “Yet, I’d think you’d understand.”

  “Are you saying I’m an ass?”

  “No! I didn’t mean—” Then she saw the humor in his eyes. “Although at times… But I meant because you had a tough time as a kid, dealing with your mother remarrying, having a step-parent and then half-siblings. You rebelled.”

  He snorted. “I was a brat.” He considered that a moment. “And an ass. Who’s been telling you I had a tough time? I can’t believe Andy—”

  “She didn’t say much. And C.J. was—”

  “C.J.? Coach told you I had a tough time as a kid?”

  “Not in so many words, but—”

  He laughed. “I’ll bet not in so many words. Ah,
there you go again with the left eyebrow climbing.”

  “Did you know that raising one eyebrow can be learned? It’s a matter of training your muscles,” she told him triumphantly.

  “You should have read all the Google search results, Katie. That’s what some people say, but there’s strong evidence that the innate ability is inherited. Like wiggling your ears or being able to roll your tongue. Want to explore that?”

  She froze.

  Only for an instant. Then Hunter’s voice came from the other room, “Hey, are you two growing the popcorn out there?”

  They heard April shushing him, but by then they were gathering up the baskets and glasses and heading to the living room.

  ****

  By Sunday, even Brad looked relaxed. Even though she knew that couch couldn’t be comfortable for him to sleep on. She’d thought about him again last night. He’d have been so much better off in her spacious bed.

  Instead of her. Sleeping. Alone.

  Then, as she drifted asleep those thoughts intertwined with images of him in her spacious bed with her. Not alone. Not sleeping.

  “Why are you blushing?” April asked, folding a dishcloth after lunch.

  “I… I wasn’t aware I was.”

  April made a sound between a snort and grunt. It was disbelieving, knowing, and accepting. “C’mon, let’s go sit on the couch and talk. Brad will be back with the dinner groceries soon and Hunter’s going to be off that phone sometime.”

  “Okay, but … the chairs are far more comfortable than the couch. Poor Brad…”

  “Ahh. There’s that blush again,” April said as they settled into the chairs. “Okay, okay, I won’t give you grief about that. But there is something else I want to talk to you about. Remember how I said when we were talking in Bette’s office that I’d thought I had my life all figured out. Then my fiancé dumped me for his ex, I had nowhere to live, and I’d adopted Rufus, so I had a dog I was responsible for. Oh, and Leslie and Grady were gone and I was fed up with myself for relying on other people. So I took a leap.”

  “A leap?”

  She nodded. “Not as much about being a pretend princess as trusting myself. And now I’m going to trust myself by asking if you’ll come to our wedding next month in D.C. Please say yes.”