Princess In Denim (17 page)

"Good. Then I guess you're wondering why I'm here."

"I assume you came for the funeral."

"Right. Could you arrange a few minutes for me alone with my father? I have a few things I need to say to him."

"Hey, I'm queen, remember? I can do anything."

Moira grinned. "Don't get too cocky." She reached into her purse and pulled out a photograph. "I brought you a picture of your dog. I thought you might be worried about her."

Chloe accepted it and held it next to her heart for a moment, then laughed.

"What's so funny?"

"I was thinking about how Friday would've treated William if I'd brought her here. How is she?"

"She misses you. She sticks close to me, but she won't let me touch her. Now that you're in charge, you want me to send her to you?"

Chloe weighed the joy she would feel in having Friday back against the dog making the long trip alone in a crate, not knowing where she'd end up or when. "Let me think about it."

"Okay." Moira pulled out a piece of paper and handed it to Chloe. "I got a job," she said proudly. "That's the address where I'll be this summer. It's a dude ranch, and I'm the riding instructor."

"Uh, you do know, don't you, that you'll be teaching them to ride western?"

"Of course. I'm no dummy. And, thanks to losing a few bets with you over the years, I learned more about it than those dudes are likely to know."

"You need to impress the boss, not the dudes."

"Oh! You want to see his picture?" Moira rummaged through her purse as if she'd carried one her whole adult life. "It's in the brochure."

Chloe stared at the picture of the rugged cowboy and knew Moira was in way over her head. This guy would be able to tack a horse on the darkest night, probably learned to ride before he learned to walk and would see right through her.

"Handsome, isn't he?" Moira asked. "In a rugged sort of way."

"Well, he doesn't hold a candle to William, of course," she teased.

"I always thought he was a pompous ass."

"He must've outgrown it"

Just as they were talking about him, he appeared at the door, behind Emma. . "His Majesty has arrived to escort you, Your Majesty," Emma said. "If you're ready?"

"Almost. Moi— my friend Chloe will go with you, Emma. She asked a favor, and I'd like you to arrange it immediately. I'll wait here with His Majesty until it's taken care of."

"Yes, Your Majesty."

"Thanks," Moira said as she engulfed Chloe in their last hug. "Write me, okay?"

"Oh, yeah, that'll look good at the dude ranch."

"Oh, one more thing." Moira reached into her purse and, without rooting around this time, pulled out a box
of pop-ups and tossed them to Chloe. "Emma said you were dying for these."

Chloe caught it neatly, greedily. "Yum, strawberry. My favorite."

"Of course. What're friends for?"

When the door closed behind Emma and Moira, William said, "You and your friend are very close."

"Yes."

"You look very much alike."

Did he suspect?
"You think?"

"You could be sisters."

No, of course not.

"I always wanted a sister."

"We will have to be sure our first child has a sister."

"William..."

"Perhaps it is too soon after your father's death to discuss this."

"As a matter of fact, this is as good a time as any. Now that I'm queen, William, I'm calling off the wedding."

"But there is a contract."

"You can't enforce it."

He stepped forward and brushed the back of his hand softly across her cheek. "You are distraught."

Oh, puh-lease.
"I am entirely coherent." Coherent enough to know she wanted his love.

"We will discuss this again after you have had time to adjust to your loss."

She allowed him to pull her hand into the crook of his elbow and escort her out the door. "I won't change my mind."

"We shall see."

Chapter Nine

When Chloe and Moira had agreed to trade places, Chloe had planned on the freedom to indulge her first loves—studying and learning—by taking some college courses in Europe, but it was obvious that there were several reasons why furthering her education would have to wait. While a princess might get into a car and drive off to a nearby country for a week of classes, she didn't think it was going to be so easy to convince anyone that a reigning queen could commute. Travel was a problem in Ennsway, also, unless she was willing to major in pothole evasion. And her desktop was still covered with reports that she really needed to peruse.

In the meantime, she found the atrium as close to a field trip as she was likely to get. Armed with books from the castle's library, she ate breakfast in the sun-warmed room each morning and read up on native flora. She also had French-English and German-English dictionaries at hand, as only one of the books was in English. It was almost heaven.

And it just got better when a small lizard scurried across her table, down an iron leg and across the cobblestone floor. Chloe dashed back to the library for a book on fauna to help her identify her visitor. She made only one wrong turn in the whole round trip.

William sat directly across from her, a health-care journal open and ignored on the round tabletop in front of him. He sipped his coffee and watched Chloe with an amused expression. "You certainly acquired a thirst for knowledge while you were in the United States."

"Can't have too much knowledge," she mumbled as she read, her breakfast completely forgotten.

Humphrey entered the atrium. "Excuse me, Your Majesty." When both William and Chloe looked up at him, he clarified with, "Ma'am. There is a child who says you asked her to visit you." Chloe thought she must have looked stumped, because he promptly enlightened her. "She has brought a puppy with her."

"Oh, the little redhead from the day I arrived? The one who was afraid I'd take her puppy away?" Humphrey looked at her blankly, but Chloe knew she was correct. "Bring her in."

"Your breakfast is getting cold," William cautioned.

Chloe still hadn't gotten used to his presence, even though he'd shadowed her all week, still insisting he had to fulfill his promise to her father and keep her safe.

Now, instead of blaring her stereo to make him send her away, as she had in Baesland Castle, she lay in bed in the morning trying to think of ways to make him want her for herself. Of course, she knew that the only way to find a man really right for her was to
be
herself, the way William was himself.

And she liked everything she saw—in spite of his apparent amusement, he was interested enough to pull the reptile book over to his side of the table and study it—except his determination to marry her regardless of whether she liked it.

"Hello, Your Royal Majesty."

Chloe turned in her chair and saw the adorable little red-haired girl, whose arms overflowed with a bright-eyed black spaniel puppy. About halfway down into a curtsy, she lost her balance and the puppy scrambled free.

"You speak English," Chloe said with surprise.

"Little bit, Your Majesty," her mother said from the doorway. She smiled shyly and executed a perfect curtsy.

At least it was perfect by royal standards. By Chloe's, it was the silliest she'd seen yet. It made her wonder which had come first—curtsying or genuflecting? And had it been out of respect or to serve some egomaniac?

Chloe waved the mother forward, and she in turn sent her daughter chasing after the puppy until she caught it. "She wanted...to speak to you, so...I teach her...little bit. You understand?"

Chloe smiled. "Yes, I understand you fine. What's your name?"

"I am Hilda. My daughter is Anna."

"Hey, Anna, let me see your puppy," Chloe said, and when she got it, she let it wriggle on her lap and lick her chin.

Anna giggled by Chloe's knee.

Hilda frowned, wrung her hands and fidgeted from one foot to the other. "You are not afraid, Your Majesty?"

"No, of course not. Why would I be?"

"I know you are afraid of dogs."

I am?

Moira had been afraid of Friday. Now that Chloe thought about it, she'd never seen Moira pet a dog in the entire time she'd known her. "This is just a pup, Hilda. And besides, I like dogs."

"Her Majesty was very attached to her friend's dog in the United States," William related, "and it was quite a nasty thing."

Chloe couldn't believe he'd noticed. "Friday?"

"That disagreeable animal growled at me the entire time it was in my car."

"Oh." Chloe remembered telling Emma she'd hoped Friday didn't bite William's trousers, and prayed she wasn't blushing now at the thought. She hadn't given a fig for his suit. It was what was in the suit that she'd liked then. And still did.

William crooked his index finger, and Anna shyly moved to his side. Her shyness disappeared when he showed her the picture of the lizard and spoke to her in her own language. She leaned on his chair and looked up as he pointed at the tree it had climbed.

Already twenty-eight, Chloe knew she wanted children someday. She'd never gone so far as to picture her future babies, but suddenly she saw raven-haired, lapis-eyed children toddling around on the cobblestone floor, chasing a lizard. William would help them catch it, and she would show them how to identify it, then release it. Might as well put all that education to use somewhere.

If only he could love her, not feel obligated to marry her because he'd promised her father he'd protect her.

"Come, Anna," Hilda said. "I go work now."

"Do you work here, Hilda?"

"Yes, Your Majesty, in the kitchen. Anna is good." Hilda sounded as though she were trying to reassure her queen. "No trouble."

"Does she come with you every day?"

"No! Today only. My sister sick today."

Chloe figured mat meant no babysitter. "Let her stay in the atrium and play awhile. The puppy can't hurt anything in here."

Hilda looked uncertain.

"I'll have Humphrey bring her to you when I finish my breakfast."

Hilda frowned at the unfinished food on Chloe's plate. "You no like?"

With a wave of her hand at the table, Chloe indicated the books lying open there. "I saw a lizard."

"You afraid of lizard?"

Chloe laughed. "No, I wanted to see what kind it is."

Hilda looked quite skeptical that anyone would pass up a good hot breakfast for pictures in a book. Anna spoke, and her mother translated, her eyes beaming now. "Anna wants to know when you get married."

"Oh..."

"Soon," William answered over his coffee cup. "Very soon."

Hilda's nervousness disappeared, and she became quite animated. "The wedding...will be so beautiful. All the womans know it is better when you marry. Our children...will go school. To school. Our husbands...will work to fix roads."

Chloe was confused, and not by Hilda's halting English. "They can do that if I don't marry."

"No, you must marry His Majesty."

"Yes," he agreed with an amused grin, "you must."

Chloe kicked him under the table, but since she'd kicked off her shoes and was in her sock feet, he didn't even acknowledge it.

"His Majesty...will make Ennsway much better place to live. And he...will have more farmland. Ennsway farmland is good. Is good dowry."

Chloe looked at William and got a creepy feeling in the pit of her stomach. "You want to marry me for farmland?" She was glad she hadn't eaten much breakfast. "My father signed me away like...like a bushel of corn?"

Hilda continued as if Chloe's accusation had gone over her head, which it probably had. "Your Majesty, please, I ask question?" she asked William.

"Yes, Hilda." He seemed quite unruffled by Chloe's rising temper.

"Is true, you put man in dungeon to protect Her Majesty?"

Chloe glared at him. "You didn't!"

Hilda, beaming, clasped her hands together over her heart. "So romantic!"

"Yes, I did, Hilda." Through his smile, he muttered, "Thank you very much."

"That's barbaric," Chloe snapped.

He shrugged.

"It's archaic!"

Hilda frowned and fidgeted from one foot to the other, then apparently decided the atrium was not the place to be at the moment. "Anna, come!" She grabbed her daughter and the puppy and left Their Majesties to duke it out.

"Excuse me, but this
is
the twenty-first century," Chloe pointed out to William. "You can't have me because you signed a piece of paper, and you can't throw men in the dungeon because...because... Why
did
you?"

"He was responsible for your mare once she was saddled. He left his post."

Chloe slammed a book shut. "I'd hate to think what you'd do with a man if he actually committed a crime."

"I rather like the old way, myself. If a man steals, cut off his hand."

Only the twinkle in his eyes gave him away, or Chloe would have taken off for the United States without waiting for a plane. "I want to see him."

"Why?"

"A dungeon is cold and damp and filled with torture things."