Courted: Gowns & Crowns, Book 1 (23 page)

“But I also know how strange it is to not be in the middle of it. I will keep you posted, Kristos. You are, first and foremost, a soldier. You always were. Even if you dress a lot nicer now.”

Kristos smiled as he was meant to do, but his mind was already moving ahead to the events of the coming days. The ball was not merely a mating ritual for the royal family, as much as it felt like it. It also marked the first official gathering presided over not only by the king, but also the crown prince. Dignitaries of nearby nation states would be in attendance, along with any representatives foreign governments saw fit to include. Security would be tight, but it was a good exercise for what lay in store for him moving forward.

After that, Dimitri would return to the field, Emmaline and her friends would be released to continue the rest of their European vacation…and he would be alone, no matter what his matchmaking mother had planned for him.

Even he had his limits.

Chapter 16

“Em!” Nicki, predictably, saw her first, and for about the fiftieth time, Em silently thanked Queen Catherine’s foresight in not dumping her back into the middle of her friends before she’d had her morning coffee. She’d felt a bit like she was being returned to life from an alien planet. But now, seeing them around the pool, it was all suddenly right.

Nicki bounded up and hugged her hard, swinging her around immediately to tug her toward the others, who were also on their feet.

“You’re alive!” Lauren came forward next, adding her hugs, then Frannie. “You have to tell us everything, you know that, right? Everything completely. Did you take notes? Tell me you took notes.”

“I took notes.” Laughing, Em squinted up at the large, sloping ceiling of the inner courtyard. “You can actually get sun this way?”

“Solar panels,” Frannie confirmed. “The latest in sunbathing technology, allowing you to get your sun on without any prying eyes taking photos. It’s pretty much a miracle.”

“Look! There are the most incredible fruit and chocolate pastry things ever made by man,” Nicki said, tugging her to the low table. “And they even made a sort of blended power drink that I swear to God tastes better than anything I’ve ever had in the States.”

“Don’t get her started on the benefits versus downsides of castle living,” Lauren said, retaking her own seat, though she watched Em with keen eyes. “She’s been the biggest nuisance of us all.”

“Yeah, well, I’m warming up to it.” Nicki shrugged. “They have a complete training facility in the base of this place, which they finally let me use. I think the guards got tired of running after me down the hallways.”

“But where were
you
?” Fran turned back to Em. “We weren’t exactly worried, what with announcements almost on the hour provided by your security detail, but they wouldn’t give us any specifics.”

Security detail? That had to be Dimitri, but neither he nor Kristos had seemed to be slipping off to give regular reports. “Kristos drove us to a friend’s chateau north of the city. It was amazing. I’m sure we can find it online, but you would have loved it, Lauren. Mountain views all around, and even a waterfall off in the distance.”

“No beach, no interest,” Lauren said, waving her fingers in a “give me more” gesture. “So you stayed there until when—this morning?”

“We moved overnight,” Em said. More or less true. She snagged a glass and poured some of the brilliantly colored orange juice. “One of the media helicopters found us out, I think, and the royal family didn’t want to take the risk of us being caught again.”

“Yeah, that’s been a nightmare,” Nicki said. “Lauren here might be used to it, but every picture they posted of me made me look like a overbaked cream puff. We’ve been on the phone round the clock with parents and friends, letting them know we’re not in jail or whatever. It’s been crazy.”

“I called Dad,” Em said, then frowned. She’d called on the first night, yes, but there’d been no time to reconnect with him after they’d returned from Estral Falls. And once they’d hit the castle, she’d hardly been able to catch her breath. But still, she should have called them again. A good daughter would have called them.

Guilt returned with a vengeance, weighing down on her like a lead blanket. “I should call again, though. What time is it there?”

“Middle of the night,” Lauren supplied. “I wouldn’t call now. I texted the nurses, though—they said they’re both fine. Neither of them is really worried, and of course, your mom was happy once she understood you were with a prince. Even your dad seems like he’s in a lighter mood.”

That news should have made Em feel better, but it didn’t. Her mom would have enjoyed her stories, even if she couldn’t fully understand them. Em should have called from her room after the queen had left. But then she’d been caught up with the video and her writing—and then Kristos—and she’d been so, so tired.

She would call them today. And be home soon enough. And then she’d send her decline letter to Northwestern, and everything would be settled.

Squaring her shoulders against the still-faint pang in her heart at this almost-definitely certain decision, she nodded to Lauren. “What has this detour done to the schedule? Weren’t we supposed to be in France by now?”

“Cannes’s beach isn’t as nice as this castle.” Lauren’s wave took in the gracious pool area. “And remember, we’ve got a ticket to the Accession Ball tomorrow. Really, I couldn’t have scripted a better vacation for us—even if it does mean that Nicki’s going to have to wear a dress.”

“I’ll have you know that my shoulders
rock
in a dress,” Nicki said, picking up another piece of fruit. “I’m probably going to make the entire royal family faint in admiration tomorrow night.”

“Since when would that be a surprise?” Frannie had settled back into her lounge chair. “We’ve got our fittings in an hour, though, so you may want to lay off the juice.”

Em raised her brows. “Fittings?”

“Right?” Nicki grinned broadly. “I didn’t think you got fittings for anything but a wedding gown anymore. But they’ll have the jewelry we’re borrowing there too.”

They talked on, Em filling them in on the flight to the chateau with Kristos, the idyllic home in the mountains. When Nicki asked how far she’d gotten with the crown prince, she shook her head. “About as far as you’d imagine.” She laughed.

“I don’t know, I can imagine pretty far,” Frannie said, her dark eyes curious over the rims of her sunglasses.

“Well, not far enough to cause an international incident. How about that?”

“More’s the pity.” Lauren’s gentle expression softened her rebuke. “It would have made the perfect fairy tale, right?”

“Oh, like that’s what I would want to go back and tell my mom.” The sun beat down on them as they talked, lulling her into a quiet relaxation. Eventually Nicki took to the pool once more, creating a mesmerizing image as she moved strong and sure through the water.

Inexorably, Em’s mind drifted back over the morning—the night—the last few impossible days. And then her thoughts shifted further, to crisp-edged words on thick cream stationery with a university crest, inviting her to step back into a world she’d thought was lost to her. A world of music and study and performance. She let her heart open enough, bit by bit, until the ache of all she was saying good-bye to filled her up completely. A few tears leaked out beneath her sunglasses, but only a few. Her music had gotten her here, she whispered silently to that same heart. It would always be a part of her life, even without the grand swell of an orchestra, the rustle of all the long concert gowns, the quiet, excited plinks and plunks and thrums and ahhs of a group of performers preparing to hold an audience transfixed.

But was that all she was saying good-bye to, now? Unbidden, images of Kristos filled her mind. Kristos, his parents whom she’d just met, the castle, Theo’s, the falls, the beach. Not really hers to hold on to, and yet it all had become so vital, so real. She’d only just begun to experience life again—was she truly going to let that all go so quickly?

The pain crested a little higher, and she rode it, letting it stretch through her entire body and sing its quiet song.
It would be okay.
It would all be okay.

At length, the long, sleepless night caught up with Em, and even pain could not hold its sway within her. Eventually, she let her mind drift…and drift.

Seemingly moments later, she was startled awake by Nicki standing over her. “Yo, Em. You gotta get rolling. We’ve got to go to this fitting thing, but you haven’t picked out your dress yet. So you’ve been called on the carpet by Her Majesty, the queen.” She said the last with dramatic affectation, and Em squinted at her, trying to get her bearings as she pulled her sunglasses from her face.

“The queen? Why?”

“She helped us pick out all our gowns,” Frannie said, already standing and refilling her tote bag. “She’s got an incredible eye for it, I’ll give her that. But I couldn’t help thinking it was all merely a front for her to give me the third degree. So watch out for that.”

Definitely sounded like the queen she’d met. “Good to know.” Em stood, nodding at the two staff members who stood at the edge of the pool. “Are these our, um, handlers?”

“One for you, one for us, I suspect,” Lauren said. “They don’t let us go anywhere in the castle without a shadow. Nicki’s impromptu fifty-yard dashes have not gone over well, as you may imagine.”

“And none of you have been seen by anyone wielding a camera?”

“Not so much as a hint of it.” They walked around the pool, the water reflecting the cloudless blue of the sky visible through the angled solar panels. “I checked the news streams this morning too, and other than run-up talk for the Accession Ball, that story, she is dead. There was an awesome blog speculating that we’d all been killed by the royal family, but that’s about the only thing that’s still out there. They’ve made an official announcement that we’ll be attending the ball, but it’s pretty clear that it’s out of politeness. Which just adds to their royal cred, I think.”

“Talk about my fifteen minutes of fame.” Frannie sniffed. “I don’t think we even got fifteen seconds.”

“Yeah, whatever,” Nicki said. “At least your passports weren’t immortalized with a picture that made you look like a chubby escaped convict.”

They parted ways at the edge of the pool, and Em felt a pang of uneasiness as she watched them go. Couldn’t the queen have brought in additional gowns or whatever while the girls were getting their fittings?

When she was led to an unfamiliar part of the castle, she tensed up even more. Her escort opened the doors to a bright, airy space, with a high glass dome and a forest of verdant plants and flowers spilling out everywhere. Except for the foliage, it looked like a miniature model of the grand ballroom in the Visitors’ Palace, and she stopped, momentarily amazed by this lush splendor in the middle of the castle.

“Miss Andrews! I’m in the center of the solarium. Thank you so much for joining me here.” The queen’s voice rolled out over the small space, and Em stepped forward, trying to hide her grimace. As if she’d been given a choice.

Still, why were they meeting here? There didn’t seem to be racks of clothing anywhere close, and when she cleared the last leafy bower, she frowned, trying to make sense of what she saw.

A short man in a fastidious suit was turning the knobs on one of three violins that sat on the table before the queen, all of them polished to a high sheen. Em’s gaze went from them to the clearly delighted monarch. “Violins?” she asked weakly.

“I know it’s an imposition, and that you haven’t played professionally in quite some time. But—I was hoping you could play something for me? I haven’t had an excuse to visit the solarium in an age, and it was meant to be filled with music. It would mean so much.”

Em, of course, was already shaking her head. “It doesn’t work like that. I haven’t practiced in weeks—months, actually, not in any real way. The last composition I played was for seven-year-olds.”

“But would you mind terribly?” The queen glanced with meaning to the older man. “Solon here is a local music store owner, and being called to the castle caused him so much excitement. I told him you might play one of his violins, and he nearly fainted with joy.”

It was true. The short older man turned to her with bright eyes, bowing and saying something in his native language that of course she didn’t understand. Em immediately felt obligated to at least admire the instruments, and she drifted forward, her gaze falling on the nearest violin.

It was beautiful. Carved in long, clean lines, it practically begged to be played. When she touched it, the man burst out in excited chatter until the queen waved him to be quiet, laughing. “Carpathian spruce, he wants you to know. Very fine, very clear tones. He would be most honored for you to try it.”

“It’s been so long…” Still, the violin seemed to call to her, and she picked up the gorgeous instrument. Adjusting the chin rest slightly for her preference, she fit it under her chin. Solon, the music store owner, pressed a long, delicate bow into her hand, and she tried a few draws across the strings, the lovely tone submerging her further into the spell of the music. She glanced again at Catherine, who gave her an encouraging nod. Expelling a nervous breath, she immediately thought of her audition piece.

Her heart seized up.
No, no and no.
She couldn’t play that, she would ruin it, ruin this moment, ruin everything. That world was gone to her, she dare not even try it.

Beside her, the small music store owner watched her with worried eyes, his joy turning to concern, then even to dread.
No!
She could not ruin this.

Em shook her head slightly, readjusted her chin. Then she bent into “The Lark Ascending.” It had always been her favorite.