Royal Date (17 page)

The girls took me to their rooms to show them off. Despite being in a medieval castle, they were very normal girl rooms. Lots of pink and purple and hearts and boy band posters and stuffed animals. Chiara had a collection of pictures on a bulletin board ripped from fashion magazines. She told me that she wanted to design clothes someday and showed me some of her sketches. She had talent. I didn’t know about the fashion part, but she could definitely draw. Much better than I ever could. My art consisted solely of stick figures.

After spending the entire afternoon together, the girls talked me into watching
Frozen
. We agreed to watch the movie in my room. I wanted to start writing down some notes about the time I’d spent with Nico. Not that I needed to, since every moment with him felt like someone had branded them onto my brain. And just thinking of him, pathetically enough, gave me the warm fuzzies.

On our way there, Serafina stopped short. “We should have a slumber party!”

“Yes, a slumber party!” Chiara said. “We could do each other’s hair and have facials!”

I was kind of looking forward to getting some sleep tonight, so I didn’t find that idea too appealing.

“I don’t know,” I said. They looked so disappointed.

“It isn’t fair,” Serafina said in a wobbly voice. “You spent all day yesterday playing with Nico. I want to play with you too.”

I tried to suppress the images of the kind of playing Nico and I had been doing. Her lower lip stuck out, and her mouth was trembling. I couldn’t resist once she turned those puppy dog eyes on me. She was definitely hitting below the belt.

“Okay. Why not?”

Chiara offered to order dinner for us to have in my room. I couldn’t imagine a life where room service was part of my daily upbringing. The girls promised to meet me back in my room so that they could get their pajamas on.

I changed into a soft black T-shirt and plaid flannel pajama bottoms and climbed onto my bed. Lemon had left me a note saying she had more meetings and then plans with Salvatore for that evening, which she punctuated with several exclamation marks and smiley faces.

Serafina ran into the room wearing a nightgown that had Olaf the snowman on the front, and Chiara arrived shortly after in blue silk pajamas. She had a laptop with her that she left on the floor next to the bed. I made a mental note not to step on it.

“Can I do your hair?” Chiara asked me.

“Sure.”

She started brushing while Serafina jumped on my bed. The two activities did not go well together. I was getting my head yanked all over the place.

“Have you ever been in love?” Chiara asked me as she started what felt like a French braid.

“Kat loves Nico,” Serafina said in between jumps.

“I do not love Nico,” I hurried to correct her. That was the absolute last thing I needed—for his little sister to run off and tell him that I loved him.

His teasing would be merciless and unending, I was sure.

“Everyone loves Nico,” she replied.

“Why do you ask?” I said to Chiara, desperate to change the subject.

“There’s this boy at my boarding school. Ethan. He’s tall and has blond hair and dreamy hazel eyes. He’s on the rugby team. I think I might be in love with him, but I don’t think he likes me back.”

Somebody needed to explain to the princess that a crush was not love. Something good for me to keep in mind as well.

“How old are you exactly?” I asked.

“Fourteen.” I had a momentary pang as I realized she was the same age I was the night I’d left home. How different our lives were that her big concern was whether a boy liked her or not and mine at that age had been where I would sleep for the night.

“Well, why wouldn’t he like you? You’re gorgeous and royalty.”

Chiara finished up my hair and came to sit in front of me. She crossed her legs and pulled them up to her chest, wrapping her arms around them. “I don’t know. I don’t know what to do. What to say to him, how to act.”

I was so the last person in the world to give her advice on how to get a guy.

“If he doesn’t like you then he’s a . . . I don’t know the word in English . . . 
come si dice
. . . ?” Serafina asked.

“A moron?” I offered helpfully.

“
Si
,” Serafina agreed. “A moron.”

“He’s not a moron,” Chiara said in a defensive tone. “Just . . . quiet. And sweet.”

“Why don’t you just tell him he’s your boyfriend? That’s what I did with Giovanni. I told him he was my boyfriend, and he agreed.”

If only life could really be that simple. I tried to imagine myself informing Nico that he was now my boyfriend and didn’t have a choice in the matter.

Problem was, I imagined he might agree the same way little Giovanni had.

“The best advice I can give you is to just be yourself.” Had I actually just said something so clichéd? Too bad Lemon wasn’t there. She probably had a book on how to get a boy to like you.

Chiara let out a moan at what I said and threw herself backward so that she was sprawled out on the bed.

“Mamma says she’s very melodramastic,” Serafina told me in a stage whisper.

“I am not melodramatic!” Chiara hit the bed with her hands and feet at the same time to punctuate her statement.

“How about we start the movie?” I suggested.

Serafina got the movie going while I grabbed the notepad and pen I’d left on my nightstand. I meant to write about Nico, but I kept doodling hearts and clouds in the column.

I was only seconds away from writing “Mrs. Kat Fiorelli” all over the page. Pathetic. I set my pen down on the bed in disgust.

Just because I was hanging out with a fourteen-year-old girl did not mean I needed to start acting like one.

We were on our third viewing of the movie. Chiara had fallen asleep on the far side of the bed, but Serafina was still barely awake, insisting that we had to finish it. She had cuddled herself against me so that I couldn’t move.

There was a knock on my door. “Come in,” I called out softly, not wanting to wake up Chiara.

The door slowly opened and there stood Nico. I think my heart swelled up two more sizes. I was so unbelievably happy to see him. Like in a puppy-dogs-wrapped-up-in-rainbows-frolicking-on-marshmallow-clouds kind of way.

His tie had been loosened, and he looked worn out. My feet itched with the urge to jump up out of the bed and run to him. I wanted to comfort him. Hug him. He looked like he’d had a hard day. The urge to be next to him, with him, both confused and surprised me.

“Stay out, Nico,” Serafina instructed him sleepily. “You’re not invited. Girls only.”

“I won’t come in, I promise,” Nico said, standing at the threshold. “How many times today have you watched this movie?”

I held up three fingers.

“You must be a saint.”

“That’s me, Saint Kat. Patron saint of midnight snacks and skiing accidents.”

He let out a soft laugh.

“Nico, cover your ears!” Serafina told him.

He willingly obliged, putting his hands over his ears with a mischievous glint in his eye.

“Don’t tell him about your Elsa costume for the ball,” she said. “It should be a surprise.”

I didn’t think Nico cared what my costume would be, or get why Serafina was concerned about him finding out. I told her I wouldn’t, and she finally closed her eyes. I paused the movie, and knew she was asleep when she didn’t whine for me to turn it back on.

Nico took his hands away from his ears. “Have my sisters spent the evening telling you all of my secrets?”

“Yep, now I know all about that love child and the gambling problem.”

He laughed again and I wanted to wrap myself up in his laughter. Which was a weird thing to want to do. But in my defense, I was very tired.

“You are my first stop. I came by to see if I you were available tomorrow afternoon.”

“Let me check my schedule.” I sat there for a second. “Yep, totally clear.”

A brilliant smile. “Excellent. Then I will see you tomorrow afternoon.”

I didn’t want him to leave. I wanted to talk to him. Hold him.

“I missed you today,” he said low and simply, right before he shut the door.

His first stop. Before his parents or his siblings or his advisors or his secretaries. I was his first stop.

And he missed me. I’d missed him, but my insides were turning into goo at the idea that he had missed me.

I needed to stop watching fairy tales because I was starting to believe that I was living in one.

There was basically no way I was going into the kitchen. But it was my regularly scheduled feeding time.

I wanted to sleep, but now the hunger and the Nico imaginings were keeping me awake. Which wasn’t helped by Chiara’s snoring or Serafina’s teeth-grinding.

That’s when I thought I heard a soft knock on my door. Was it Nico?

My heart started pounding again as I eased myself from the bed, trying my hardest to not wake up the princesses. I ran a hand over my out-of-control hair, contemplating a quick run into the bathroom to do some damage control.

But Nico liked the way I looked. Even when I was a mess.

I decided though that I would not let him in. I would make him stay out in the hallway. Where it was safe for both of us.

When I opened the door, there was no one there. The hallway was empty. I looked down and saw a tray. A tray that had a bowl of chocolate gelato, a spoon, and a little vase with moonflowers.

He did it again. Giving me all the feels. He had to be the most considerate, thoughtful man alive.

I brought the tray in and demolished the gelato at my desk, grinning like an idiot the entire time.

Things like this did not happen to girls like me. But it was happening. And it was kind of, I don’t know, glorious.

Full and finally sleepy, I went back to my bed and stubbed my toes on something. “Ow!” I hopped on one foot for a second, grabbing my hurt toes. The pain ebbed and I got down on my hands and knees to look under the bed to see what I had kicked. It was Chiara’s laptop.

I pulled it out and after I verified that the girls were still asleep, turned it on. Fortunately there was no password and it started right up.

I hadn’t been on the Internet since I’d arrived in Monterra. I opened a web browser.

I typed in “Prince Dominic Monterra” into the search box.

There were hundreds of thousands of hits. A lot about his charities, some about him being Europe’s most eligible bachelor, all the parties, balls, and premieres he showed up at. I clicked on the “Images” link. An entire screen full of drop-dead gorgeous pictures of Nico. So not only was he beautiful, but photogenic too? Gag. Well, not really gag. More woo-hoo.

But I couldn’t fully woo-hoo because all the pictures of him were with one over-the-top beautiful woman after another. Models, royals, celebrities, all clinging to his arm like he was the greatest thing since sliced bread. Which he obviously was, but I felt strangely possessive of him.

I clicked on the “Web” link and started reading some of the titles of the articles. One was called “My Night with the Prince.” I hovered the mouse cursor over the link, tempted beyond belief to click it.

It reminded me of what the king had said to me earlier. How women had used Nico. Probably to get paid for articles just like this one. His privacy had been violated all over the place.

My gaze flickered over to the drawer in my nightstand. And here I’d contemplated doing the exact same thing to him by taking pictures. I couldn’t be that person. I wouldn’t. The reporter had said he would be back in touch with me. I would wait until he was, and then I’d return the phone and the money.

If I were being honest, I could admit it made me just a little sick to give up that much cash. But then I imagined Nico’s face when he found out what I had done. That was worse.

He wanted me to trust him. Maybe I needed to be a person he could trust, too.

I shut the laptop and put it back on the floor. I wouldn’t read any articles or tell-alls about him. I didn’t want someone else’s words in my head. I didn’t want them running through my mind every time I talked to him.

There wouldn’t be any other voice but mine as far as he was concerned.

Nico didn’t judge me for my past. I wouldn’t judge him for his.