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Rafael swept back into her life, and everything was upside down, turned inside out.
And yet…now that they were away from her apartment, it seemed like the only decision she could have made.
Rafael had rented them two large suites at the Des Lux hotel in downtown Des Moines, which had the added benefit of having no front lawns the reporters could gather on. It had been peaceful.
This morning was another story.
Rafael had woken her early, knocking gently on the door, and she’d popped up, going immediately to answer it.
“Good morning,” she whispered, instantly aware of her ratty pajamas. Rafael was already immaculately dressed and radiating the kind of energy a man gets from a good exercise session—or another kind of session, she thought, blushing. “I set an alarm for an hour from now. Isn’t that enough time to get to the airport?”
He’d given her an encouraging smile. “It would have been, yes. For a private citizen.”
It had turned out that there was a lot more to “going to the airport” as part of the royal entourage than simply getting into the car and driving to the terminal. The moment Felicity stepped out of the shower, she was met by two women—one to do her hair and makeup and one who’d dragged a rack of clothes into the room behind her. For Felicity, she’d brought a selection of skirt suits in pastel colors. Every suit had a coordinating outfit for Hope.
She felt like she’d stepped into a tornado and came out the other side a more polished version of herself, wearing a suit that was nicer than anything she’d ever been able to afford. Her hair had been styled into a sleeker version of the bun she usually wore it in, with not a lock out of place, and her makeup was subtle but professional in a way that Felicity had never been able to pull off.
But there was still more to do. Traveling with Joy and Hope was an exercise in master planning.
Felicity swallowed a huff of frustration at the ongoing lecture of dos and don’ts. She’d walked onto a plane before. She’d even done it while wearing high heels before. And
all the rules for boarding the plane were less important to her than making sure all of Joy’s medical equipment was packed and ready to go. Not to mention, God help them if Hope’s Mr. Bear, the toy she was most attached to, didn’t get a seat.
Rafael kept breezing in and out of the room, looking perfect and unflustered as Felicity checked over her own bags as well as the bags for Joy and Hope one more time. It was easier for her to do it, since Joy couldn’t heft all the bags onto her lap by herself. She was with Hope in the second suite. But Felicity was running out of time.
“Are you all caught up on the protocol?” Rafael said.
He had always been a man of protocol, even when his father and older brother had been alive and he’d had no expectation of inheriting the throne. He would always be that man. Felicity couldn’t let herself fall for him again, knowing that she’d always be second to the rules of royalty.
Again, she wondered what she was getting herself into. But this wasn’t for her. This was for her daughter. All of this was. Stolvenia was where her daughter needed to be, so that was where they’d go.
She turned to face him. How could he be so oblivious? “I’ve got it. But I could use a little help here.” Felicity motioned to the room around her.
Rafael looked a little surprised. “How can I help?”
She scooped up Hope’s diaper bag from the floor and tossed it to him. “Make sure everything we’ll need is inside—especially Hope’s bear. You can ask Joy if there’s anything else missing, but we need to have it packed before we leave.”
“All right,” he said slowly, and Felicity turned back to Joy’s bags. It was going to be a long day if Rafael struggled with a simple task like packing a diaper bag.
And oh, he did. He walked slowly from suite to suite, peppering Joy with questions and packing the bag with all the speed of a hundred-year-old tortoise.
An hour later, they were miraculously in the car. Rafael sat next to her, running through all the airport protocol again. But Felicity couldn’t focus. Hope was squirming in her car seat, fussing, obviously tired. It was a little too early for a nap, but…where was the bear?
“The bear,” she said, cutting Rafael off midsentence.
“What bear?”
“I need Hope’s bear, from her diaper bag.”
“Oh…” Rafael looked around, but there was no diaper bag in the car with them. “It’s packed with the other things in the back.”
Felicity took a deep breath and tried to put this in perspective. It was only going to be her first press appearance with Rafael. So what if her daughter had a complete meltdown because a grown man hadn’t been able to infer that the diaper bag should be in the seat with them?
“Can you climb in the back and get it out?”
Rafael laughed. “No. With the press following us? That wouldn’t be a good look.”
She had been right. It was going to be a very long life.
