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My heart is knocking against my ribcage. Oh no, I think.
“Speculations are that you ran away after the announcement of your engagement, your highness. The people are dubbing you ‘The Runaway Prince’. Don’t you think that is a little irresponsible to your people?”
With each question, I sink deeper and deeper into my sneakers.
“Your highness, is the woman with you your new girlfriend? Is she the reason why you are refusing to marry the Lady Tatiana?”
How does Alex stand it?
It occurs to me that I’m in this for real. Standing by Alex in his hour of need means that I’ll be exposed to his lifestyle and this constant barrage of press. And they are certainly far from being deferential, royalty or not.
What have I gotten myself into?
3
The drive to the hospital is fraught with tension. We are seated at the back of a black Mercedes, an official state car, and we are heading directly for the Royal State Hospital of Moldovia.
Despite the somber mood in the car, I can’t help but peer out of the darkened windows. The streets of Moldovia are festive and filled with interesting stores, and the facades of the buildings are medieval French, like what you get during the Renaissance period – or at least, that’s what the postcards tell me. The Moldovians who throng the sidewalks are well-dressed, and the entire city has a French Riviera vacation-like atmosphere.
The shining Mediterranean Sea peeks through the buildings, and I can see the spread of the valley below and the yachts and tall boats bobbing in the water. Truly, it’s a sophisticated playground for the rich and famous.
Alex is pensive and quiet. I clasp his hand, and he clasps mine back, seeking comfort.
The aide in the front passenger seat turns. He’s a blond man with thinning hair and a high forehead. He wears shades, and coupled with the earpiece, he resembles a villainous agent from ‘The Matrix’.
“Your highness, since you have been away, I should warn you about recent events at the palace. Your father is in critical care at the coronary unit and your mother refuses to leave his side. Your sisters have been called home. The European press is having a field day speculating the reasons for your absence. The Lady Tatiana is furious, and the principality of Nuernberg has boycotted all Moldovian made products. There has been talk of war, though that is more tabloid speculation than fact.”
Alex’s mouth thins into a straight line.
“I merely took time away from my official duties, Mr. Jasper. I have every right to take a vacation.”
“That is the official palace line, your highness, but it doesn’t stop the speculations.”
“The press can speculate anything they like. Tatiana knows I was never in favor of this betrothal and yet she pushed her way through, getting her father to seek my father’s alliance without my consent.”
“Nuernberg is a very rich principality, your highness, and they are backed by Austria and Germany. Perhaps it is not wise to flaunt the reason for your refusal of Tatiana’s hand in marriage so openly in front of the press.” Mr. Jasper looks pointedly at me.
“Her name is Elizabeth Turner, Mr. Jasper. You will address her as such.”
“Yes, it is,” I squeak, eliciting a glare of disapproval from Mr. Jasper.
“There are other considerations, your highness, as you surely must know. I would prefer that Ms. Turner waits in the car with me while you visit your father at the hospital.”
“These are not the middle ages anymore, Mr. Jasper, and I have every right to refuse an arranged marriage. I warned my father about publicly announcing it, and he went ahead with it anyway. He thought he would cow me into going in line with an official announcement.”
“I would suggest you do not bring it up with him and your mother at the present. He has suffered much as it is.”
This pounds the nail back into Alex’s guilt coffin.
Oh, I had no idea it was all so complicated. If I had known, I would have suggested that I return to Chicago and he come alone to Moldovia. But that would mean leaving him in a lurch at his neediest hour, and I would never do that. Unless I’m complicating his life further by being here.
Alex senses my discomfort.
“I might be quite a while at the hospital,” he suggests, “so would you be OK if I get Jasper to accompany you back to the palace? I’ll be home as soon as I can. It’s not that I don’t want to show you off, but there will be paparazzi outside the hospital and my father is . . . well . . . ”
“Say no more. I’ll be OK with Jasper.”
“Excellent choice,” Jasper says smoothly.
I decide he is a bit of a prick.
We draw up at the hospital. The press, as Alex predicts, are already thronging the gates, and the police have set up a clear path so that vehicles going towards the hospital are not impeded. It’s a media circus out there. I had no idea it would be this bad.
We drop Alex off at a secluded entrance deep inside the grounds. Several aides and doctors in white coats are waiting for him.
“I’ll be back,” Alex says, kissing me.
“Don’t worry about me, take your time.”
He exits the car with a lingering look upon my face. A surge of love bubbles forth from my stomach, but I quell it before it can bring tears into my eyes.
Nothing will ever be the same for either of us again. I just know it.
*
Jasper accompanies me to the royal palace. I decide to make conversation with him, despite disliking him intensely. It’s just one of those things. Sometimes, you click with a person immediately. Well . . . this is not one of those times.
“Is Jasper your first name?” I say.
“It’s my surname. My first name is Conrad. I prefer to be called Jasper, however.”
“OK, Jasper.”
He turns to me, and his expression is rather lofty, as though he considers me far beneath his station.
“And what do you do back home, Ms. Elizabeth Turner?”
“Liz will be fine. I go to college.”
“Indeed. What courses are you taking?”
“Psychology.”
Jasper does not seem impressed. “How did you meet Prince Alexander?”
I really don’t want to go into that, but I’m too polite to say “None of your business” to Jasper. And I’m not really sure, where royals are concerned, if romances and flings are supposed to be the business of people like him.
I’m still not fully certain where I stand where Alex is concerned. Am I considered a girlfriend? We’ve traveled together and made love plenty of times, but he has never asked me officially to be his girlfriend. Or maybe I’ve been so out of touch with the romantic world that the times where people ‘officially’ declare themselves boyfriend and girlfriend are over.
And we have never said we loved each other. I’m not sure if you’re supposed to declare these things either.
I say to Jasper, “We met in Chicago.”
“Exactly where? It is my business to know, Ms. Turner, lest the press finds out. There’s nothing worse for the palace than not being equipped with enough information to do damage control.”
I’m in a conundrum. So much of what happened between me and Alex should remain secret. Especially our first encounter in the men’s restroom of the hotel I work in.
“I moonlight as a maid,” I say reluctantly.
Then – for Alex’s sake – in bits and pieces, I tell Jasper about how we met. He wants to know details. I hold back as much as I can. When I finish, Jasper seems none too pleased.
“A maid,” he says, as if it’s a dirty word. “You’re a hotel maid.”
“Correction, I’m a college student moonlighting as a maid to pay my fees. It’s no different from waiting tables at McDonald’s.” Why am I being defensive anyway? There’s nothing wrong in being a maid. Absolutely nothing wrong at all.
“Where you come from, Ms. Turner, perhaps there is no difference. But where the tabloids are concerned, Alexander and his family will not live this down if your relationship were to, let’s just say, progress to another level.”
My heart is beating fast. “What are you saying?”
Jasper removes his sunglasses. He has cold blue and very brittle eyes, as icy as a glacier.
“I’m saying, Ms. Turner, that it will be best for Prince Alexander and the Vassar family that you simply take the next flight home to Chicago and forget any of this ever happened.”
*
No.
I won’t do it.
No one has a right to tell me and Alex what we can or cannot do.
I’m now beginning to experience a little of what Alex is going through. Everything is couched in officious language – “good for the family”, “the people expect you to”. I’m starting to understand the seeds of rebellion within Alex and why he’s so determined to go against his father’s wishes in choosing him a bride.
