The Prince and I: A Romantic Mystery (The Royal Biography Cozy Mystery Series Book 1) (4 page)

“He wasn’t my boyfriend, not anymore,” I explain to Mr. Puyn two days later. No charity ball with the Prince for me, I was on a plane returning to New York.

I glance around at the dreariness and grime of the detective’s small office. A very large woman in a flower-printed muumuu sits next to me. She continues to hiss in my ear that I mustn’t reply to any of the detective’s questions.

“Yes, the two of you had broken up, isn’t that right? And he had moved in with a close friend of your
s
—
a Tatum Bouviers. They were about to be married, isn’t that correct?”

“If you want to know what Tatum Bouviers was up to, why don’t you ask her?” The muumuu lady says with a big Southern drawl. I have met her before. Her name is Emmeline Vance, and she is one of Schnellings’ many lawyers. I eye her up and down, and notice that her day-glow pink lipstick matches her muumuu spectacularly.

“I do believe it’s true, they were engaged. Someone told me they saw the two of them in Bergdorf’s picking out china,” I answer.

“And exactly who was that?” Sargent Puyn asks.

“An assistant at Schnellings, Mallory Barton.”

Sargent Puyn types this info into his computer.

“Oh and Kerry Winfrey saw them at Selfridge’s in London, but they weren’t picking out china. She said they were dropping some serious money though. Kerry Winfrey doesn’t work for Schnellings, she’s a historian friend of mine. She writes mostly about the Persian Kings, although occasionally she dips into the Medes.”

“They must have liked to shop,” Detective Puyn replies dryly. He’s a slight man, dark-skinned and very serious about his job.

“Hmm,” I brood darkly, “They must have.” Emmeline, who is sitting next to me, kicks me at this point. Obviously she doesn’t like the way I mumbled “hmm.”

“Were you upset at their impending nuptials?”

“Don’t answer that,” Emmeline jumps in.

“Not in the least,” I respond confidently. “I was sad initially, when Sean came home and told me it was over and that he was moving in with someone else. He packed up his clothes and left. But, totell you the truth, we haven’t been much of a couple in the last year or so. Sean has been living in England, doing his biography of the Prime Minister and I’ve spent a lot of time in New York. We really grew apart, I thin
k
—
”

When I break off, Emmeline jumps all over the detective, asking what the meaning of all these questions are. She insists that I can’t be a suspect because, as the police have already established, I was with my editor at the time of the murder.

“But you did find Mr. McKenzie dead? You were the first one on the scene?” Puyn asks.

“Don’t answer that,” Emmeline spits.

“I was. I was the first one to see him. He was just lying there, in a pool of his own blood. It was…” I cannot finish the sentence. I cannot even find the words to describe the horror of the scene.

“And then what did you do?”

“I screamed. I screamed and Herbert Townsend came running. He’s an accountant at Schnellings. He told me to dial 911, which I did, while poor Herbert turned Sean over and put him on the floor. He was yelling that we needed to do CPR. By then, my screaming had brought a lot of people running. There was a man at the party who rushed in and said he was a doctor. We let him through. He said Sean was dead. Still he and Herbert tired chest pumps… but there was nothing they could do…there was a hole in Sean’s face a mile wide and, oh God… there was no way anyone could survive that.”

“Well, I think you’ve heard enough from my client for one day,” Emmeline says reproachfully and jumps to her feet.

“I’m sorry if I’ve upset you, Ms. Rue, but I would like to return to my original line of questioning,” Puyn persists.

“She did not murder Sean McKenzie.” Emmeline looms over the detective, looking quite cross.

“Yes, but one more thing. According to your editor, Ms. Rue you and Sean McKenzie were college sweethearts, you’ve been together for seven years is that correct?”

“Yes.”

“And you are telling me that you were completely over him in the space of three months.”

“Completely.”

“Tell me, if you would, how does that happen? I’m just trying to understand how that works. The two of you were together for seven years, and then he comes home and tells you he’s leaving you for someone else, and three months later, you are completely fine with it all?” Puyn sits back in his laminate chair and crosses his arms.

“Well,” I begin slowly, “it happened like this. My father didn’t raise a fool. He’s one of the most well-known feminists of this generation. He has taught Women’s Studies for longer than you’ve been alive, Detective Puyn. And my father told me not to put up with nonsense from anyone. In addition, Sean left me for Tatum Bouviers, or as I knew her, Tatum Ford from high school. Whatever shred of love I felt for Sean died the moment I found out he left me for someone who was once my best friend. I cut off ties with both him and Tatum. And yes, I got over it all. That night at the gallery I went to congratulate him, to offer an olive branch of sorts. To let him know that I had moved on.”

“Well, that’s interesting, because we took a statement from a Leanne Trisk who insists she heard you screaming at Mr. McKenzie. I have it here.” Puyn shuffles his papers. “She said she heard something about you calling him a bastard and a spiny anteater or something?”

Emmeline sits back down and glares at me.

“I did shout something, right before I saw him.”

“So perhaps you weren’t completely over him.” Detective Puyn smiles triumphantly.

“If your case against my client is based on the use of the words ‘spiny anteater’ the judge will laugh the prosecution out of the court,” Emmeline states loudly and begins to study her nails, as if this is all a huge waste of time.

“I was tired, jet-lagged and yes, I called him something of the sort. But how could I have killed him? As you know, I was with my editor at the estimated time of murder.”

“We believe it may have been a professional hit.”

“What?”

“We believe someone may have been hired to kill Mr. McKenzie.”

“What makes you think that?” Emmeline snaps.

“Suffice it to say the murder was well done, many of the video cameras in the secondary stairwell and on the third floor were smashed, and the type of gun that was used is not easily obtained under today’s gun laws, etc.”

“You think I
paid
someone to murder Sean.”

“We have not ruled out anyone, Ms. Rue.”

It’s probably wildly inappropriate, but at this point I burst out laughing. Emmeline turns her big watery eyes on me as if I’ve gone mad.

“Have you checked my finances? Go ahead check them. I can barely afford my rent each month, how could I afford a hit man?”

“So you are offering to turn over your financial records?” Detective Puyn questions.

“Yes,” I answer while Emmeline shouts a loud, “No.”

I say yes again, and Emmeline intercedes telling Detective Puyn to get a search warrant if he wants access to my financial records. He states that he would be happy to obtain a search warrant and she responds something to the effect of “I’d like to see you try.”

“No search warrant, no financial records,” Emmeline states as if that is that. “And now, detective, I think my client has answered all your questions. If you’ll excuse us my client has a job to do. She needs to return to London.”

“That’s out of the question.” Detective Puyn holds firm. “We may need her for questioning at any time. We need her to stay in the city. I’m sure you can both understand.”

Emmeline shakes her head. “If she is not charged with anything, she needs to return to work.” She glares at Detective Puyn and flares her nostrils like an enraged bull. Honestly, I think she could pin the man down in nothing flat. Detective Puyn doesn’t look intimidated, instead he turns to me and says, “You are a person of interest in a murder case, Trudy Rue. Do not leave the city or I will have you arrested. Have a great day, ladies, Sargent Fritz will show you out.”

I stand up in a daze, surely this all a nightmare. Emmeline heads for the door, and I follow right behind.

“Lizzie, so good to hear from you,” the Prince says several hours later as he comes on the line. “You were greatly missed at the charity function the other night.”

I feel a whoosh of relief. Thank God I wasn’t fired from my job when the NYPD called me back to New York. Initially, Buckingham Palace sent a nasty gram to Schnellings informing them the biography was off. They stated that they didn’t want any of the controversy over Sean’s death to touch the Prince. Meg rang them up as soon as she received their message. She said she tried to do some fast talking, but the Palace held firm. The representative for the Palace informed her that,since the replacement biographer was now embroiled in a murder controversy, and the original biographer was dead, Buckingham Palace felt that their contract with Schnellings was null and void. Something must have changed thoug
h
—
perhaps Meg sicced the entire Schnellings’legal department on the
m
—
because a moment later, I received a phone call. It was Alastair saying I could continue with my job. He said I could conduct phone interviews with the Prince as long as I was not arrested. Then he immediately put the Prince on the line.

In the fog of being named a person of interest in the murder of my ex, it’s hard to know where to begin today’s interview. Phone to ear, I lean back on my bed and stare up at my clothes which hang from a rack over my head.

“I’m very sorry for the difficult position in which you find yourself, Lizzie,” Alex commiserates. “My legal team has told me that as long as you are not arrested for anything, the contract between the Palace and Schnellings is binding. So, go ahead, ask your questions.”

Questions? I haven’t had any time to formulate questions. I wouldn’t even know where to begin.

“How would you like future historians to characterize your reign?” I ask, spitting out more nonsense.

“I’m sorry, what?”

“Um, never mind. Silly question.”

“I never want to
reign,”
the prince insists. “Next question?”

There is an expectant pause.

“Um, well, I read about your childhood. Descriptions of you by your nannies etc. They were supplied by the Palace. Sounds like you were a very happy child,” I say lamely, trying to regain the conversation.

“I wasn’t,” he replies.

Oh dear, this is going poorly. As a historian, I find it much easier to study the Narmer palette, and then form an educated guess as to what the first king to unite Upper and Lower Egypt was like, rather than to be forced to interview a living member or royalty. The dead don’t argue, which makes them convenient to study.

“Oh?” I murmur, trying to get the Prince to open up about his childhood and feeling more like a shrink than a biographer.

“Well, as you know my brother died when I was four. I’m pretty sure I was happy up until that point.”

Right. Four. I hadn’t quite reached that part of the biography yet. I do know that Alex’s brother, the heir to the throne, fell from a high window at his grandmother’s estate.

“I’m very sorry about your brother.”

This time the silence is even longer than before.

“Look, Lizzie, I told Alistair when I agreed to this that I wouldn’t talk about that. Alright? The terms were agreed to by your publisher.”

“Right, right you are. I’m sorry, Alex, I was thrust into this position and I never read the contract, but we won’t put in anything that makes you uncomfortable. Why don’t you tell me about your mother?”

“Lovely woman.”

Somebody help me, I’m getting nowhere.

“She toes the monarchy line,” he adds. I have no idea what this means. “She’s a good woman. A good mother. She loves my dad and he dotes on her. I’d like to marry someone like my mom.”

Uh-huh, I need a little more to go on than this, but Alex is done talking about his family and turns the tables.

“So tell me, Lizzie, how about you?”

“What about me?

“Are you close to your mom?”

“Why, yes, she’s a wonderful mother. She’s a district court judge. She always worked full time. My father quit teaching for a few years to raise us. He’s currently a professor of women’s studies at Colorado College, but he’s taught at Cornell, Harvard, and Princeton.”

This kicks off a whole conversation about me. Where was I raised? What schools did I attend? What’s my favorite book, color, movie? The last thing the Prince seems to want to talk about is himself. After a while, we settle into a conversation about some of his favorite memories when he was a child.

“So you wrestled in the mud like you were a couple of pigs?” I find myself asking him as the digital clock on my windowsill registers nine o’clock.

“She cut off my hair, she scalped me. I was three. I looked awful. My parents made me wear a toupee until the hair grew back in. So one day, I paid her back by tackling her outside the stables.”

“No way, a toupee at age three,” I laugh.

“Well, my mom was too embarrassed to let anyone know that Rose had been left alone with me long enough to take a pair of scissors to my head. At the time my cousin was much older and wiser. She was five. She was playing hairdresser, you see?”

I lose track of time as Alex tells me all kinds of funny stuff about when he was a small child. How when they first told him that his brother was the Prince of Wales, he replied quite seriously, “The Prince of Whales, but how?” In another antidote he told me about when he explained the rules of the road to his parents.

“I told them that red meant stop and green meant go and white meant fall down on the ground and crawl on your belly.”

“That would have made for messy intersections,” I laugh.

“But seriously, Lizzie, compared to --who the devil have you been studying lately?”

“Croesus,” I respond quite seriously.

“Right, Croesus. Compared to Croesus, who probably did many interesting things--“

“He invented the coin for Ancient Asia Minor. Up until then, it was mostly barter.”

“Right, there you go, he invented the coin.”

“Yes, and it was a huge success. The King’s riches became legendary.”

“Exactly. What a kingly innovation. And after that kind of stuff, who cares about my cousin Rose scalping me? You know they’re only making you write this biography because of the horrid biography my personal secretary wrote about me.”

“Alistair wrote a biography about you?”

“Wow, Lizzie, I really like you. Where on earth did they find you? You know nothing about me. Don’t you watch the news? The biography wasn’t written by Alistair. It was my last personal assistant, Alfred Tarkins who wrote that piece of trash.”

My brain goes into overdrive. First of all, the Prince of Wales told me he likes me, and what single woman in the world wouldn’t let her imagination run away at this pronouncement? But then, the follow up to that, the part about me not knowing anything about him and not watching the news
—
that part stung. Although it’s true. If it happened after 1875, forget it. That’s as far as I got in my college history classes.

“You still there, Lizzie? You’ve gone quiet. I didn’t mean any of that in a bad way,” the Prince continues when I don’t respond. “I really do like the fact that you know nothing about me. It means you have no preconceptions. Stay that way. So many people see me on TV or in the tabloids, and they think they know me. You’re an open book and an open mind…..oh, hold on a second,”

In the background I can hear a woman’s sultry voice.

“Time to go already?” Alex asks her.

“I’m sorry, Lizzie, I’ve got to go. It’s really late here. Or should I say early.  Would you mind if I call you back? I promise I will, as soon as I get a free moment in my schedule.”

He says all this with a quick goodbye. In the background I hear the woman purr, “Who are you talking to?” As soon as Alex hangs up, I am dressed and out the door. I don’t care if it’s late at night. This is New York. There’s an all-night bookstore in Times Square. I scour the place searching for the Prince’s “unofficial biography.” As soon as I find it, I race home and read in bed. I click my tongue several times in disapproval as I devour the book’s two-hundred pages in less than an hour. Is it true? Is the Prince’s past really this checkered?