The Princess and the Duke Read online

  “Talked. Well—” Meredith’s eyes narrowed in thought “—we talked mostly about me. And business at the RII. The alliances. Everyone is working madly to nail the negotiations. I think he was quite exhausted, actually, though he’d never admit it. He doesn’t say much about himself. Ever. Have you noticed that?”

  “Your father has a particularly high respect for Colonel Prescott,” Marissa said. “I believe he’s a good man. But I cannot claim to particularly understand him.”

  “That makes two of us.” Meredith pressed her palms against the table and rose. “He loathes it when someone makes a point of his nobility, you know. In his mind he is a military man first, last and always. Not a duke. I can’t quite figure out why.”

  “For someone who doesn’t understand a man, you’ve certainly keyed into something.”

  Meredith shook her head, looking discouraged. “He makes no secret of it. I know he doesn’t neglect his duties to Aronleigh, but he really has a bug about it.” She shrugged. “That was it for the evening. We had a nice time, but I doubt there will be a repeat. Not only does he detest his own title, but he has an issue about mine, and frankly, trying to figure him out makes my heart hurt.”

  “Your…heart, dear?”

  “My head. I meant my head.”

  “Of course you did.”

  “So why should I spend any more of my time thinking about this? I’ve plenty on my plate as it is with my public engagements, not to mention my other duties at the RII. I’ve seen enough of Colonel Prescott in the past several days to last me quite a while, thank you.”

  Her daughter nodded decisively, as if she could control her emotions that easily. Marissa, however, knew better. She’d had thirty-five years of schooling in the confusing art of love, the pain of secrets and the necessity of learning that not everything in life was plainly black and white.

  She picked up her coffee, smiling softly, unaware of the tinge of sadness in the smile. “Of course, darling. Anything you say.”

  Chapter Eleven

  “And so—” Meredith smiled at the gathered crowd “—on behalf of my family and the entire country of Penwyck who owe a debt of gratitude for the service these men have given to us, it is my very great pleasure to announce the opening of Sunquest, North Shore’s own residential care facility for retired military personnel.” She held up the oversize clippers and snipped through the red, blue and gold ribbon that had been whipping in the brisk breeze where it was strung across the front of the brand-new building.

  The guests clapped, a few whistled, low thunder rolled overhead, and Meredith’s smile felt strained.

  She hadn’t known Pierce would be present at the dedication ceremony. His name hadn’t been on the list she’d been given earlier that day when the King had unexpectedly asked Meredith to take his place at the event. If his dark expression was anything to go by, Pierce hadn’t expected her to be there in the King’s stead, either.

  If she’d been confused by him before, now she was even more so.

  She’d barely finished speaking with the directors and other powers that be of the institution when Pierce came up to her, wrapping his hand around her upper arm and drawing her away. “Where is he?”

  Meredith frowned. Anger seemed to radiate from him. “Who?”

  He drew her farther from the other people until they were practically around the corner of the building. “Your father,” he said under his breath. “Where is he?”

  “Well, heavens, Pierce, I don’t know.” She tugged her hair back when the wind caught it. “I assumed it was something to do with the alliances. His office notified me something had come up that required his attention, so I came in his stead. What’s the problem? It’s not the first time I’ve stood in for him at a public engagement.”

  “It’s the first time I haven’t been informed,” he said evenly. “I have to make some calls. Don’t go anywhere.”

  She didn’t even have a chance to ask where she would go since she’d dismissed her driver—Pierce was already striding away.

  Meredith sighed. Every day that brought the alliances closer to completion meant one day more of tension for the parties involved. Not that there was much time for her to dwell on it, for the administrator and one of his staff physicians approached her and said the new residents inside were ready to greet her. They began on the third floor. Dr. Herrold had eyed her with some surprise when she’d insisted on meeting every patient who was willing to meet her. He quickly turned over the task to his associate, who’d been trailing behind them.

  “I thought he’d never leave.” Lissa Lowell grinned at Meredith the moment the administrator left them alone.

  “Dr. Lowell.” Meredith grinned back. “I thought I’d never have a chance to speak with you.”

  Her old college chum shrugged. “Herrold likes the glory and he’s a great administrator, but he’s not much for dealing with the individual patients. May I just say you look terrific? I saw Colonel Prescott whispering in your ear right after the ribbon cutting. He’s dishy. Sort of brooding, but very dishy.”

  Meredith laughed wryly. Brooding was right. Dishy was accurate, but a little too fluffy a word in her opinion. “We’ll have to get together and have lunch,” she told Lissa. “Soon. There’s so much to catch up on. I still can’t believe you’ve settled in Penwyck. You were all set to move to the United States.”

  “My fiancé lives here,” Lissa said simply, squeezing Meredith’s hand. “I wish you could make it tomorrow afternoon, though.”

  Meredith had received the invitation for the luncheon shower that was being thrown for the couple. “My schedule was already set,” she said. “I wish I could make it, too. I want to meet this man you threw over America for.”

  Lissa smiled understandingly. Then she got down to business, introducing Meredith to each and every patient. It was some time before they made it through the second and first floors and down to the main level where the recreation area was located.

  Meredith immediately spotted Pierce in conversation with a trio of elderly men sitting at a table over cards, but Lissa was drawing her over to another small group, all of whom were seated in wheelchairs. She introduced each man, and as they got to the last, Meredith looked at him. “Major Fox,” she exclaimed. “My goodness, what a pleasure.” From the corner of her eye, she saw Lissa reach for her pager and with a quick wave darted toward the elevator.

  The man beamed at Meredith, looking far more elderly than she knew he must be. “Your Royal Highness, I didn’t think you’d remember an old face like mine.” His voice was raspy, his skin paper white. A folded plaid blanket was draped across his knees, and he looked so thin that a dash of breeze might blow through him.

  “Of course I remember.” She pulled up a folding chair and sat down with the men. “You were the guard at the side gate for as long as I could remember.” She smiled, including the other men. “He always winked at my brothers and sisters and me behind our parents’ backs whenever we entered the palace.”

  “And you snuck me blueberry muffins from the kitchen on Sunday mornings before you went out for church.”

  Meredith laughed softly even as her heart broke a little for the man. It had been softhearted Megan who’d done the sneaking, not Meredith. “I think Chef thought Old Pierre was sneaking in from the gardens when he wasn’t looking and pinching the muffins in exchange for the blooms Megan would sneak from the garden and leave for Chef.” She sighed, shaking her head. “Those were the days.”

  The other men guffawed. “Listen to the lassie,” one said. “As if she’s so decrepit.”

  Meredith chuckled. “But Major Fox, you retired when I went away to university and I’d heard you’d gone to Majorco to live with your son.”

  The major nodded, making his oxygen tube jiggle slightly. “That I did. Didn’t much care for the boy’s wife, though. No sense of humor.” He shrugged his thin shoulders. “Penwyck’s my home. Born here. I’ll die here.”

  Meredith reached over and clasped h
is hand gently, careful to avoid the IV taped to his thin wrist. “It’s good to see you again,” she said softly.

  He smiled, looking weak and shaky enough that she worried he shouldn’t be sitting in the chair. “The colonel’s got eyes for ye, girl.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “The colonel. He’s over there looking this way, prob’ly expectin’ me to be telling you what a hero he is.”

  Meredith looked over her shoulder to see that Pierce was, indeed, watching them.

  “I remember when he wasn’t much more’n a whelp,” one of the other men said.

  Meredith’s smile widened at the thought of anyone calling Pierce a whelp. She still held the major’s hand, and she squeezed it lightly. “Stories? You’ve got stories? Oh, lovely.”

  Two of the men nudged each other with their elbows and laughed uproariously. “Stories are about all we got these days, miss. Er, begging your pardon, Your Royal Highness.”

  Meredith wanted to hug them all, they were so friendly and genuine. She sat, enthralled, as the small group told story after story, each one more outlandish than the next as they tried to outdo each other. Her sides ached from laughing at the antics they recounted.

  Though not all the stories were funny, as she heard about sons and daughters. Families who came and went. And as they talked, she noticed that Major Fox’s attention wandered. Sometimes talking as if he were actually back in those days, sometimes very much here in the present.

  “I’m sorry about your brother, Your Majesty,” he said, obviously mistaking her for her mother. “But it was a bad night in Penwyck, ye see. So confused.”

  “Majorco,” Meredith murmured softly. “Edwin died in Majorco.”

  Major Fox frowned, his eyes vague. “Majorco? My son is in Majorco.”

  “Yes.”

  His eyes were tearing, and she felt like crying right along with him. “You were so kind when my wife died last year, Your Majesty. I’ll never forget that. And His Majesty, helping me move to Majorco. I hadn’t been there since we took—”

  “Major Fox.”

  Meredith nearly jumped out of her skin when Pierce spoke behind her. She went still as a mouse when he rested his hand on her shoulder as he greeted the other men.

  “You want to know the story, Your Royal Highness,” Major Fox said suddenly, once more looking perfectly lucid. “You ought to be asking the colonel. He saved my life that awful night. Remember it clear as a bell.” He nodded, then frowned and began muttering about cats getting into his garden.

  Dr. Herrold signaled an attendant, but before the young man could wheel away Major Fox, Meredith leaned over and kissed the man’s papery cheek. “That’s for all those winks over the years,” she whispered, and he patted her head as if she were still a child.

  “Gentlemen,” Pierce addressed the remaining residents, “I hope you’ll forgive me for stealing away Her Highness, but she has another engagement this evening so I need to return her to Marlestone.”

  Meredith looked at him, hiding her surprise. She finished her goodbyes, made a point of speaking with Dr. Herrold about Major Fox’s accommodations, then joined Pierce at the door. “You need to return me to Marlestone?”

  He closed his hand over her elbow and escorted her from the building. “Herrold told me that you were intending to borrow a car to drive back. What happened to your driver? There was no report that he’d left you here unattended.”

  “You make me sound as if I’m the child Major Fox still thinks I am. I don’t need to be attended to, you know.”

  “Poor choice of words,” he said. Their footsteps crunched over the gravel drive as he headed toward an aging convertible. He opened the door for her and rounded the car, sliding behind the wheel and starting the engine with an annoyed look. “You can’t go around dismissing your driver, Meredith. It’s not safe. He’s the closest thing to a bodyguard you’ve got right now.”

  “Oh, please, Pierce. Penwyck has one of the lowest crime rates in the world.”

  “And you’re a jewel in the crown of Penwyck, not an ordinary citizen.”

  She shook her head. “There’s not a person out there with reason to harm me or my family.”

  “It wouldn’t be the first time.”

  Her eyebrows lifted. “Excuse me?”

  “Security is tightening every day the signing of the alliances grows closer. You know that. What on earth possessed you to let Bobby go for the day?”

  “Because it is his son’s first birthday today. Having him drive me about the country when he should be at home with his family was ludicrous. And I’d like an explanation of that comment!” Her voice rose as the tires bit over the gravel.

  “So why didn’t he call it in? The guards would have had somebody else out here to replace him in an hour.”

  “He did call, because I heard him. But Dr. Herrold kindly offered his help when he overheard Bobby’s protests, and I said there was no point in sending another car out for me. I made the decision, and that’s all there was to it. And since when has my family not been safe going about our business in the usual manner? Are there some intelligence reports that are saying otherwise?”

  “Any royal has to be concerned with personal security,” he said flatly. “I was speaking generally.”

  She was thoroughly irritated and certain he wasn’t telling her the entire story. “Well, then, what’s this about another engagement I have that necessitated my leaving so abruptly? I had Lillian clear my schedule when I had to stand in on this appointment.” She thought about the one engagement Lillian hadn’t canceled with George Valdosta, and her conscience niggled when she deliberately didn’t mention it. She wanted to know what was on Pierce’s mind.

  “The engagement is with me.”

  Her jaw dropped delicately, all other irritations vanishing like a puff of cotton caught in the rushing wind. “Indeed. For what, exactly?”

  His lips twisted. “Your enthusiasm flatters me.”

  “Now that’s the pot calling the kettle black,” she retorted, gathering her long hair in her hand. It would be a dreadful mess from blowing in the convertible by the time they made it to Marlestone. But she so enjoyed the open air, which smelled a little like the rain that had not yet joined the clouds or the thunder, that she didn’t even consider asking him to put up the top. Instead, she opened her tiny purse and pulled out a gold clip, which she shoved into her hair to keep it somewhat contained. “And, as it happens,” she said firmly, “I’ve decided not to see you anymore.”

  His glance at her was amused. “That’s what we’ve been doing, is it? Seeing each other?”

  “What would you call it?” They were leaving North Shore behind and heading along the narrow road that would take them through the highest mountains on the island. The road was well maintained, but it was very curvy, necessitating slower speeds. He drove well, his hands capable on the wheel. Everything about him was capable.

  She looked away, thinking that she’d been listening too much to Anastasia lately.

  “How about deliberately running into each other?”

  She sighed faintly, not wanting to admit to even the slightest bit of amusement. “You’re a complicated man, Colonel Prescott.”

  “Not particularly. I’m about as ordinary as they come.”

  She tilted her chin, eyeing him. “You’re joking, right?”

  “My mother was a schoolteacher. My father a minister. There was little money for university because pretty much everything they made went into the church, so I joined the army and got my schooling there.”

  “Just a simple man,” she murmured dryly. “Who ended up a colonel in that army, a member of the RET and the Duke of Aronleigh. Very simple.” His lips twisted, but he remained silent. “So, how did you save Major Fox’s life? Was it before he became a guard at the palace? Except I can’t remember a time from my childhood when he wasn’t assigned to the palace.”

  That, at least, merited a response. “Fox has Alzheimer’s disease,” he said. “He w
as confused.”

  “Only part of the time. Are you saying you didn’t save his life?” She figured it was more likely than not that Pierce had directly saved lives over the course of his military career. The King wouldn’t have awarded the man a vast dukedom for nothing, after all. But as Pierce’s area of expertise was intelligence, she knew that, by necessity, most details of his career were particularly secure.

  He didn’t answer.

  “It’s very beautiful through here,” she said, deciding that it was prudent, for now, to change the subject rather than pursue her hunch that the shadows in Pierce’s eyes had something to do with Major Fox. “I’ve always liked it in the mountains.”

  He shot her a quick look as if he didn’t quite trust her easy retreat. “I grew up near here.”

  “I know.” She tucked back a lock that had escaped her clip. “What is the event this evening?”

  Pierce wished he hadn’t fallen back on that excuse to get Meredith away from Fox. Now he had to come up with something, and the something he wanted was the something he always wanted.

  Him. Her. Together.

  “I have to attend a dinner party,” he finally said. “For the base.”

  “A dinner party that requires my attendance?” She crossed her arms, obviously piqued. “Can’t you simply ask me out in any semblance of a normal fashion?”

  “I tried that the other evening at the library.”

  “No, actually, what you did that evening was more in the form of a demand. ‘Have dinner with me.”’ She mimicked his low voice.

  “You enjoyed it well enough.”

  “True,” she admitted.

  Pierce knew it had to be his imagination that he could hear the soft rasp of her silk-clad legs as she slowly crossed them. The wind was blowing around them, and the car engine was loud, so hearing such a soft sound was impossible. A logical reasoning that did nothing to keep his senses from believing what they wanted. It didn’t help that her skirt was shorter than usual today. When she crossed those long, shapely legs, the charcoal gray fabric rode up above her knees.