When it was just the two of them again, Griffin noted, “Hmm. Looks like a lightbulb might have gone off in your head.”
“Maybe,” Garrett admitted, then added, “but even if you’re right—”
“Can’t hear that often enough,” Griffin said with a grin just before popping a French fry into his mouth.
“—it doesn’t change the fact that Alex is a princess and lives in a palace for God’s sake. I live in a condo at the beach—”
“No, you don’t,” Griffin interrupted.
“Excuse me?” Seriously, he knew where he lived.
Taking another pull of his beer, Griffin said, “You don’t live there. You live out of suitcases. Hell, you spend more time on King Jets than you do in that condo.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Means you don’t live anywhere, Garrett. So what’s keeping you here?”
He just stared at his twin. Was he the only one who could see the problems in this? Alex was oblivious and now Griffin, too? “Our business?”
“More excuses.” Griff waved one hand at his brother, effectively dismissing him, then picked up his burger and took a bite. After chewing, he said, “We can run our place from anywhere. If you wanted to, you could set up a European branch and you damn well know it.”
His chest felt tight. The noise in the pub fell away. All he could hear was himself, telling Alex that he wouldn’t love her. That he couldn’t. The problem was, he did love her.
A hell of a thing for a man to just be figuring out. But there it was. He’d had to quit working for her father because he couldn’t take money for protecting the woman he loved. He had kept his distance from her because he couldn’t sleep with her knowing that he’d have to let her go.
But did he have to?
What if he was wrong? What if there was a chance a commoner might have a shot with a princess? Was he really ready to let Alex go without even trying to make it work? His brain raced with possibilities. Maybe he had been short-sighted. Stupid. But he didn’t have to stay that way.
His phone rang, and he glanced at the readout. Instantly, he answered it and fought the sudden hot ball of worry in his guts. “Terri? What is it?”
“Boss, I’m sorry, but you did tell me to stick to her and—”
“What happened?” In his mind, he was seeing car wrecks, holdups, assassins…
“She had me drive her to L.A. and—”
“Uh, Garrett…”
“Shut up,” he muttered, then to Terri he said, “L.A.? Why L.A.?”
“Garrett!”
His gaze snapped to Griffin.
Pointing to the bar, his twin said, “You need to see this.”
He turned to look. Terri was still talking in his ear, but he hardly heard her. There was a flat screen TV above the bar, the sound muted. But he didn’t need the sound. What he saw opened a hole in his chest. He snapped the phone shut and stared.
Alex was on the TV. But an Alex he hardly knew. Her long, thick hair was twisted into a complicated knot at the top of her head. Diamonds winked at her ears and blazed at the base of her throat. She wore a pale green dress that was tailored to fit her beautifully and she looked as remote as a…well, a princess.
Garrett pushed out of his seat, crossed the room and ordered the bartender to, “Turn it up, will you?”
The man did and Garrett listened over the roaring in his own ears. Someone shoved a microphone at Alex and shouted, “Princess, how long have you been here and why the big secret?”
She smiled into the camera, and Garrett could have sworn she was looking directly at him. His hands curled around the edge of the polished wood bar and squeezed until he was half afraid he was going to snap the thick wood in two.
“I’ve been in America almost two weeks,” she said, her voice low, moderate, regal. “As for the secrecy of my visit, I wanted the opportunity to see the real America. To meet people and get to know them without the barriers of my name and background getting in the way.”
People in the bar were listening. Griffin had moved up alongside him, but Garrett hardly noticed. His gaze was fixed on Alex. She looked so different. And already so far away.
“Did it work?” someone else shouted.
“It did,” she said, her gaze still steady on the camera, staring directly into Garrett’s soul. “I’ve enjoyed myself immensely. This is a wonderful country, and I’ve been met with nothing but kindness and warmth.”
“You’re headed home now, Princess,” a reporter called out. “What’re you going to miss the most?”
There was a long, thoughtful pause before Alex smiled into the camera and said, “It’s a difficult question. I loved Disneyland, of course. And the beach. But I think what I loved most were the people I met. They are what I’ll miss when I go home. They are what will stay with me. Always.”
She was leaving.
And maybe, he told himself darkly, it was better this way. But even he didn’t believe that.
The camera pulled away and an excited news anchor came on to say, “Princess Alexis of Cadria, speaking to you from the Cadrian Consulate in Los Angeles. I can tell you we were all surprised to get the notice of her brief press conference. Speculation will be rife now, as to just where the princess has been for the last week or more.
“But this afternoon, a private jet will be taking her back to her home country. A shame we didn’t get to see more of the lovely Princess Alexis while she was here.”
Garrett had already turned away when the woman shifted gears and launched into another story. Walking back to their booth, Garrett sat down, picked up his burger and methodically took a bite. There was no reason to hurry through lunch now.
“Garrett—”
He glared his twin into silence and concentrated on the burger that suddenly tasted like sawdust.
Twelve
Everything was just as she’d left it.
Why that should have surprised Alex, she couldn’t have said. But it did. Somehow, she felt so…changed, that she had expected to find the palace different as well.
Standing on the stone terrace outside the morning room, she turned to look up at the pink stone walls of the palace she called home. The leaded glass windows winked in the early morning sunlight and the flag of Cadria, flying high atop the far turret, snapped in the breeze.
She was both comforted and irritated that life in Cadria had marched inexorably on while she had been gone. But then, her emotions were swinging so wildly lately, that didn’t surprise her, either. Since coming home a week ago, she had slipped seamlessly back into the life she had so briefly left behind. She had already visited two schools and presided over the planting of new trees in the city’s park. The papers were still talking about her spontaneous visit to the U.S. and photographers still haunted her every step.