AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Loud,” shouted Hope, and at that moment Felicity realized the crowd outside had gone quiet.
She could practically hear the wind in the trees.
Her heart beat faster. Why the sudden silence? Had something awful happened, or was it a miracle?
There was one solid knock at the door, and Felicity thought wildly, it’s an angel. There could be no other explanation.
She straightened her shoulders. The knock was so different from the way the reporters pounded their fists on the door that she felt drawn to see who it was. Felicity squared her shoulders, filled with a strange hope, and went to look through the peephole.
What she saw on the other side wasn’t a reporter.
It was Rafael.
* * *
Rafael held his breath as the door flew open, revealing Felicity’s petite frame. Her blue eyes were wide, and she stuck her head an inch outside, searching for reporters.
He was frozen.
She was still just as gorgeous as she’d been when he first met her—and when she had left him behind. Her hair was pulled back in a bun at the nape of her neck, but tendrils had escaped around her face. He was torn—he wanted to look at the woman he’d loved, and wanted nothing to do with the woman who had broken his heart.
But he did want to see his daughter.
Felicity looked from side to side, then beckoned him in. “Come in, come in.” Then her eyes moved past him to the six men who had taken up their positions in the hallway. “Wow,” she breathed. “Nobody’s getting past them.”
“No.”
She stepped back, and he stepped inside.
They stood there together in the apartment’s narrow entryway. She was so alive. She was so…present. She stood right in front of him, close enough to touch.
She seemed to come back to herself, shaking off the stress of the reporters, and went into the apartment.
He followed close behind.
The main room they stepped into was a living room, separated from the kitchen by a pass-through bar with two barstools perched neatly in front of the countertop. Neat piles of envelopes were pressed up to one corner.
Rafael tried his best to catch his breath.
He turned back toward the living room, his heart in his throat, and there she was.
There they were.
Felicity stood in the center of the room, the little girl from the picture in her arms. She held Hope almost defensively, with her body turned slightly away from him, and once more shock rippled down Rafael’s spine. He thought he’d been prepared, after the long plane ride from Stolvenia and across the United States, but the sight of them together still knocked the breath out of him. Hope looked so much like her mother, with big blue eyes alight with curiosity. But there was also something of him in her face, too. He’d know it anywhere.
Rafael tried to shake himself out of it. What was he supposed to do? He didn’t want to overwhelm his daughter, or get too close, and the questions clanged in his mind.
But his emotions didn’t matter. What mattered—now and always—was what was best for his country. And right now, he was looking at the future of Stolvenia—the heir to his throne.
“This is Hope,” Felicity said softly, and then she took a tentative step toward him, then another, and Rafael forgot to breathe.
Felicity kept coming forward until they were within arm’s reach.
The future of Stolvenia, he insisted to himself. His only heir. She was a guarantee that the monarchy could continue, if only he could keep it together long enough to give it to her.
But all those weighty concerns dissolved under Hope’s curious gaze. She stared at him frankly. “Hi,” said Hope. “Hi, hi.”
“Hello,” he said, and then, without thinking, he stuck his finger out at her, almost as if they were about to shake hands.
