The Runaway Princess (12 page)

“Well, I feel stupid.” I kicked a stray stone back into the flowerbed. “I mean, it was
rude
.
I
was rude. There’s no way I’d have said some of the things I said about Rolf if I’d known you were related to him.”

“You haven’t said a thing I don’t agree with.” He wiped a hand across his face. “I just assumed you knew who we were. Most
people
do. Sorry, I hate the way that sounds. Surely Jo told you about Rolf when you were planning the guest list?”

“Well, if Rolf had
been
on the guest list, maybe she would have done.”

“Of course.” Leo looked embarrassed now. “But what about when I saw you for dinner? Didn’t she say something then? Didn’t anyone at the party mention it?”

There was something about his assumption that everyone at my own party knew who he was
except me
that made me feel even more of an outsider.

I lifted my chin. “I’m friends with Jo, but I don’t exactly move in the same social circles as she does. But she told me everything the other night. We Googled you.”

More images of Leo and Flora slid sideways into my head, and I struggled to push them out.

“You Googled me.” He groaned, almost like a normal person. “Oh, tell me you didn’t. What did you find?”

“That you’re a ski-champion prince with a personal fortune and an ex-girlfriend who is the spokes-bum of Lady F jeans.”

Leo gave me a level look. “I’m a fund manager.”

Oh, that was a bit much. I couldn’t stop myself. “Just a fund manager?”

“Just a fund manager?” He pretended to look outraged. “It’s a full-time job, I’ll have you know. I’m there from eight till eight most days. Don’t believe everything you hear about bankers. Some of us work pretty hard for the money.”

For some reason, that annoyed me more than the car and being sent for.

“No, you’re not a banker! You’re a prince! Why didn’t you just
tell
me that I’d just had a drink with the ninth most eligible prince in Europe?”

He winced. “Up to ninth, eh?”

“Rolf’s seventh. I don’t know what they grade it on.”

It came out a bit too sharp and I hated myself for messing it all up so badly. This wasn’t how it had gone when I’d rehearsed it in my head all last night, but again there was no way of going back and trying it with more diplomatic phrasing. Jo had suggested some easy ways of getting this conversation over and done with, but they all needed to be delivered with her breezy confidence. And deep down, I knew I was overreacting. This wasn’t about Leo being a prince—it was about someone not being who they’d led me to believe they were. I had a real loathing of that, for good reason.

Even if we did get the gardening contract now, I thought unhappily, it would just remind me, every day, of how I’d cocked up this whole situation.

“Not that it matters,” I said, too quickly. “Ted and I have no objections to taking on royal clients. We just like to know for … security reasons.”

“But that’s not what you’re …” Leo gave me a clear look then pressed his lips together. “Shall we have a walk?” Before I could answer, he’d started to crunch down the gravel path that ran around the flowerbeds.

I considered not following him, but I had the sickening feeling I’d been melodramatic enough already. And I found it easier to talk while walking, or gardening, or doing something else entirely, so maybe it was for the best, to get the air cleared.

We walked in silence for a few paces; then Leo dug his hands into the pockets of his overcoat, and shot me a guarded look from under his lashes.

“I’m sorry if I made you feel stupid,” he said. “Really, I am. Most people make a huge deal about my family background, and to be honest, I find it embarrassing. When I realized you didn’t know, it was so refreshing to be starting off without any of the usual assumptions that I didn’t want to …” He paused, searching for the diplomatic word.

I plowed into the silence. “I’m sure you’d have given it away eventually. Some mention of the palace. A spare scepter in the back of the Range Rover. A supermodel in the summerhouse.”

Leo stopped. The unexpected vulnerability in his eyes sent a shiver through me. “I meet a lot of girls who know
exactly
who I am. Not what I’m like, or what I do, just who I am. They know everything about me before they meet me, but they’re not the kind of girls I’m interested in meeting. They want to meet a prince. Not necessarily me.”

“Rolf doesn’t seem to have a problem with it.”

Leo rolled his eyes. “No. But I don’t want to meet the kind of girls Rolf likes to hang out with. Jo being the honorable exception, of course.”

“She’s not that keen on hanging out with him.”

“That’s why I like her. Because she doesn’t care about the title, just the man. And …” He hesitated, then the words spilled out. “I’m not like Rolf. I mean, Rolf’s not as bad as Jo thinks he is, and as I said the other night, a lot of it’s an act, and I do love the guy, but just because we’re related doesn’t mean I am
anything
like him. …”

Leo didn’t finish, but I understood the conflict in his face so well that something leaped out of me.

I touched his arm and said, “I understand that just because you share the same genes as someone doesn’t mean you have to be alike. You and Rolf couldn’t be more different. There are people in my family that I can’t even believe …”

This is not the moment to bring up Kelly.

I stopped myself, just in time, but he was turning to me with a relieved expression in his eyes and that familiar connection I’d felt before crackled between us.

“Leo, I wish you had told me,” I said seriously. “I already worry enough that I’m putting my foot in it somehow. I mean, Jo seems to know everyone, and how they met and where they went to school, and—”

“Look,” said Leo, “would you have treated me any differently if you’d known?”

I shook my head. Then nodded, confused. Then shook it again. “No, but—”

“You would. You’d have been uptight. You wouldn’t have told me about the Tube stations, for a start. See?” he half-laughed, as I reddened. “Amy, I don’t know what websites you’ve been reading, but my life really isn’t all fancy balls and flybys. I bet on a day-to-day basis it’s not so different from yours.”

“Oh,
come on
!” I protested. “You’ve got a driver!”

“Well, there’s a reason for that.” He started walking again, casually tucking my arm into his as he did so. There were at least four layers of clothing between us, but the contact still made me feel warm inside. “Driving in London’s a nightmare when you don’t know it very well. And parking—have you tried parking round here? Of course you have. You park your van every day.”

“I do. I’ve got a resident’s permit for Westminster. It’s one of the reasons Ted lets me do the driving—where there’s parking permits, there’s power.”

“But you drive round town all day. That would scare the pants off me.”

I allowed myself a glimmer of pride, but tried not to let it show. “You don’t get a special prince permit?”

“That is a very sore subject. We had a diplomatic permit up till last year, but Rolf ran up over five grand in various fines, congestion and otherwise, and it’s suspended till the bill’s settled. Dad won’t pay it, Rolf refuses. Mom would pay it, but Rolf’s too scared to tell her. Meanwhile, I have to have a driver.” He looked at me pointedly. “Which I pay for myself, to save the arguments. Now, does that sound like the glamorous life of a royal family to you? Or just a normal bloke who doesn’t want to drive in
London
?”

My irritation was ebbing away with every glance Leo gave me. His eyes kept flicking my way, as if he was genuinely anxious about my reaction. I was bad at maintaining a huff.

“It wouldn’t have made a difference to me,” I said. “My mum’s met Princess Anne, you know. We’re like this with the Windsors.” I held up two crossed fingers. “Great Yorkshire Show, 2001. She said Mum’s Eccles cake was ‘perfectly fruited.’”

When Leo realized I wasn’t trying to wind him up, he smiled, and an echo of Wednesday night’s romance sang back at me. He had a way of locking my gaze that made everything else go out of focus in the background.

“Can you forgive me?” He tipped his head. “I’m so sorry for not being up-front. From now on, I’ll tell you everything you ask me.”

“As long as there’s nothing else you’re holding out about. Like, you actually own this square?” I knew I should shut up and let the moment breathe, but I couldn’t. “Like, you’re actually a vampire? Or married?”

Oops. Too far.

“I’m not married, or a vampire. But in the interests of full disclosure, yes, my family does own this square. But no, wait, I should also say we’ve owned it since it was built on a particularly unfashionable bit of marshland. My great-great-great-whatever owed the developer a favor, so put up the cash. It was a lucky break. We’re a notoriously lucky bunch, the Wolfsburgs. We got most of the family fortune gambling, one way or another.”

I shot him a sideways glance. “Luck is banned in our family. My dad says the harder you work, the luckier you get.”

“Well, I believe in fate,” said Leo. “If Mom hadn’t given me orders to keep Rolf under control that weekend, then I wouldn’t have followed him to your party, and he wouldn’t have wrecked your balcony, and I wouldn’t have met you.”

He paused, and I stopped walking. I felt as if Leo were looking all the way through to the secret me inside, with the arguing voices and practiced conversations, and he didn’t seem to mind. He smiled, and shivers ran up and down inside my many layers, tingling up to my scalp.

Very gently, he put his hands on my arms and leaned forward, until I could feel his warmth against my half-frozen cheek.

Shut up, Amy,
warned the voice, even though for once I had no intention of saying a thing.

He paused like that for a moment, as if he wanted to give me every opportunity to say
Oi, no
. But I didn’t say no. I didn’t say
anything
.

And then he leaned forward and pressed his lips against mine, and kissed me very gently on the mouth.

I closed my eyes, leaned forward, and kissed him back, as if I were in some sort of dream, and tried to impress every single breath and touch and smell onto my brain for later. He smelled of that herby cologne, and tasted of coffee, and his lips were really soft, like the underside of a perfect nectarine, and I could smell hyacinths and the pale-gray tang of wintry city air around us.

After a few delicious seconds of exploration, Leo pulled away and I was left, my eyes still closed. I didn’t want to open them. I didn’t want this moment to end.

He cupped my jaw with his hand, and stroked the smooth skin under my ear with his thumb.

“Your eyelids are moving,” he observed. “Are you thinking?”

Not another one who claimed to be able to see my brain working. What was it about my face?

I squinted, and saw him studying me with an amused expression. “If you treat all your gardeners like this, I’m not surprised you’re in charge of the gardening committee.”

“And I was thinking you were stunned by the romance of the moment.”

“I thought you were summoning me to a business meeting about your herbaceous borders.” I paused and opened my eyes properly. “What, um …” Awkward. But necessary, I reminded myself. “What, um …”

“Yes, I need your advice about my garden. But mainly I wanted to see you again.” There was something touchingly hesitant in his tone, as if he wasn’t quite sure what my reaction would be.

“The two aren’t mutually exclusive, you know.”

Leo pulled me close, kissed my forehead, and then slipped his arm around my waist. “How about we separate them out? Do you want to come over and see the garden plans, and give me a quote on the work as my garden consultant—and then let me take you out for dinner as a date?”

“That would be great,” I said. “I mean, on both counts.”

“Excellent,” he said, and I was quite glad of the gravel chip of reality that had once again worked its way into my boot, because even in the watery light of day, Leo’s garden felt more like a waking dream than like real life.

J
o took the news of my lunch-date/business-meeting/prince-kissing better than I’d expected, given that we were both still suffering the aftershock of Rolf’s latest attempt to win her attention: a crystal-studded iPod loaded, as it turned out when we plugged it into the speakers, with Barry White’s greatest hits and a playlist called, chillingly, “One Night with Rolf.”

“I’m so glad you’ve finally let some romance into your life!” she cheered, bouncing us both up and down as we tried to wipe away the mental image of Rolf sprawled over satin sheets miming along to “I’m Gonna Love You Just a Little More, Baby.” “What are you going to tell your mum and dad?” She mimed me on the phone and did her useless Yorkshire accent. “Hi-ya, Moom. I kissed a prince and I liked it!”

“I’m not,” I said at once. “I’m not going to tell them anything. They get very …”

I hunted for the right word. Mum and Dad weren’t the sort of puritanical parents who refused to believe I was no longer six, but they were naturally protective. Plus I was now living in London, home to serial killers and handsome caped men with twiddly mustaches and evil intentions. The first few times I’d been out on dates with Jo’s friends, my mum had made me phone home to reassure her (by which she meant,
my dad
) that I was safely at home and not tied to a train track with my purse stolen, or similar.

Jo arched her eyebrow. “Very what? Very excited? Very involved?”

“They get very protective,” I finished.

“Ah, but you’ll
have
to give them plenty of notice if you’re going to hook your own royal boyfriend.” Jo waggled her fingers. “They’ll need a while to set up their own multimillion-pound Internet business, for a start! And you need to get your mum booked in for her skinny jeans fitting if she’s going to compete with Carole Middleton!”

I stiffened. The protectiveness went in both directions in my family. If Jo had actually met my mum, in addition to the long phone chats they’d had, she’d have known that there was about as much chance of Mum getting into Carole Middleton-esque skinny jeans as there was of me getting into the Vatican’s fast-track seminary. It was something else we never talked about, and another reason why my parents had gone from being pillars of the community in Hadley Green to very private people in Rothery.

Jo sensed my sudden awkwardness and released me with a playful swat.

“Oh, I’m just teasing. I’m pleased you’ve found the one gent in London who wouldn’t try to have his wicked way in a locked garden. He honestly didn’t try to grope you under the pergola? Wow.”

“Let’s not get carried away,” I said, more to myself than her. “It’s dinner. And a garden with possible beehive opportunities for Ted.”

“The romance. Divine.” She looked wistful for a moment; then the familiar Jo came back. “Do one thing for me, though, darling?”

“What?”

She picked up the sparkly iPod between her perfectly manicured fingers as if it were one of Badger’s poo bags. “Ask Prince Charming to tell Prince Rogers Nelson to knock it on the head before I send
my
stepbrothers round there to scrub out his tiny mind with soap and water.”

*

I
didn’t normally share the ups and downs of my private life with Ted, but I had to explain where the sudden flurry of work had come from. Our new contract with Trinity Square Residents’
Association—
several hours a week, plus planning—made a great start to our business expansion plans. I could expand my design portfolio, and, Ted was particularly pleased to hear that Leo was amenable to letting us put some hives and flowerbeds up on the roof of his four-story townhouse.

We climbed up to Leo’s roof one morning the following week—Leo was at work, but he’d left the key with his housekeeper (Aggie, Scottish, very stern, “probably ex–secret service,” according to Ted, who suddenly seemed to know a lot about royal bodyguards)—and while Ted busied himself with his new laser tape measure and muttering about hive access, I sneaked a moment to take in the perfection of the scene. The flat roof space with its thick redbrick chimney stacks was ideal for hives, but also offered a stunning aerial view of the city. I could have stayed there leaning against the fire escape for hours, gazing out at the curling terraces and thumbprint parks and the church spires poking through the bare-branched trees, but Ted was more alive with interest than I’d seen him in ages. It was almost certainly the prospect of introducing more gadgetry into his working day.

“Four hives here … Maybe some wildflower beds here around the chimney stack. …” He looked up and caught me gazing dreamily at a water butt. I was daydreaming about dancing on the rooftop with Leo and watching the sun come up over the private garden, but obviously Ted didn’t know that. His voice was providing a soothing sound track of
blahblahblah
to my choreography.

“Hello,” he said sarkily. “Are you listening to anything I’m
saying
?”

“Er, yes?” I said.

Ted carried on clicking his measuring whatsit. “You know what would really help? If your dad could come down and set this up for us. I know roughly what I’m doing, but he’s the bee expert.”

I chewed my lip. “Um, I don’t think that’s going to happen.”

“Why not? He could invoice us for the train fare, if that’s an issue.”

“It’s not that,” I said quickly. “My parents aren’t … big on London. Anyway, I’m going home for Dad’s birthday in a few weeks’ time. I’ll talk to him then. I’ll get a whole list of stuff we need.”

Ted’s face lit up at the mention of “stuff.” Sometimes I thought he’d only gone in for gardening because it required more heavy equipment than teaching.

“Anyway,” I said, “don’t you want to know about the rose garden? It’s fascinating—so many old varieties, from all over the place. I’ve been making a list of the original roses, and not all of them are going to be easy to get hold of.”

Ted beamed his laser tape measure over to the massive chimney stack and scribbled down a figure.

“Are you listening to
me
?”

“Yeah, course. Roses. Lots of them.”

“It was planted so cleverly, for color
and
fragrance, in so many layers,” I went on, because I was almost as dazzled by the meticulously sketched plans as I was by Leo. The thought of bringing it back to life, with some updating, was making me giddy with excitement. “The varieties were arranged so the place must have been a cloud of gorgeous scent from April through—what are you doing?”

“Working out how much this roof space is worth per square foot. Do you have
any
idea how much this house would be on the market for?”

This was possibly the first time Ted had ever used the quantity surveying portion of his course, and it made me feel awkward. I’d never wondered how much the houses we worked at were worth. I knew they cost millions, and that the rooms I glimpsed through the sash windows were stunningly designed; but I also noticed that the staff lurking in the background often seemed bored, and the residents never seemed to have much time to enjoy the shady green oases I created for them in the precious pockets of outside space. The white Kensington mansions like this one of Leo’s had always felt like a different world from the one I lived in, one I wasn’t actually envious of because it wasn’t a life that I wanted. Or had had anything to do with, until now.

“No.” I pushed myself off the railings. “And I don’t need to know either, thanks. Let’s measure for the wildflower beds.”

The gardens in the center of Leo’s square were worthy of Kew, but I was secretly thrilled that he’d allowed me to create a hidden corner of wildness up on his roof, where no one would ever guess there were poppies and buttercups and long grasses.

*

W
hen I met Leo for dinner a few nights later, he was surprisingly interested in my notes about the rare roses I’d tracked down—or at least, if he was pretending to be interested, I was keen to believe he meant it.

“You don’t have to ask questions,” I said with a blush when I realized I’d been rhapsodizing about the delicate perfumes of old English tea rose varieties for so long that the waiter had had to be waved away twice.

“But I
am
interested,” he insisted with an eager smile. “The roses are my favorite part of the gardens at home.”

“At home … in the palace?” I was going to have to practice saying that until it sounded a bit more casual.

Leo nodded easily, and poured me some more wine. “There are formal gardens all round the palace and they’re all themed. You’d like them. My great-grandmother was very keen on
gardening—she was one of those pioneer women who had to be doing something. There’s an English country garden for the English side of the family, and an Australian garden because she was from Australia, and an alpine rockery part for the German side.” He grinned. “Good job we’re a mongrelly sort of family—gave her plenty to do.”

“Were they gardens you could go in? Not just for show?” I asked, trying to imagine what it must have been like, growing up in a stately home.

“Oh, definitely. We spent hours there as kids because we weren’t allowed to run around inside. The head gardener used to lay treasure hunts for us—it’s still disappointing for me that chocolate eggs apparently don’t grow under rosebushes.”

“It can be arranged,” I said, pretending to make a note on my pad.

“Can it?” His eyes twinkled. “It might make me do more gardening.”

“It all sounds very fairy-tale. Well, it would be, with the
castle.
”

I’d seen pictures of the Wolfsburgs’ Nironan castle on the Internet. I wasn’t going to let him pass
that
off as a holiday home.

Leo shrugged. “We didn’t think of it as a castle; it was just where my grandparents lived. Our apartment there is quite modern, not like the state rooms that tourists can go round. I liked the gardens best, though. Some of my happiest childhood memories are of lying on the grass with my cousins, watching clouds and drinking this mint tea that my grandmother used to make. Just the smell of hot mint takes me right back. Very embarrassing when I get misty-eyed in Turkish restaurants.”

I couldn’t stop myself smiling at the romance of it all. The fact that Leo loved the gardens more than the palace made me like him even more. We’d reached that stage of falling upon shared interests as if we were the only people in the world
ever
to hate black currant Jelly Babies, and childhoods in gardens was Amazing Coincidence number eighty-one, after proper cotton hankies (love of), recorder (as first instrument), etc.

“I’m like that with lavender! Dad used to grow it for the bees, and every time the dogs ran through the bushes you’d get a gorgeous gust of lavender on the breeze. I plant it everywhere I live, in pots, so I feel at home.” It was lovely sharing things with Leo. I couldn’t think of the last person I’d talked to like this. “That’s why I like planting herbs in people’s window boxes—I think smells are such a big part of memories, even in London. Cut grass, and rosemary, and sweet peas. I like the idea of tying them into people’s lives so that whenever they smell hyacinths or something, they get that nice
aaah
memory.”

Leo smiled soppily at me as if I’d said something profound, and I felt self-conscious. “What?”

“I love the way you talk about your job,” he said. “It’s so much more than getting the perfect lawn for you, isn’t it?”

“Ted does lawns. I want to create somewhere peaceful for clients. Somewhere they can go to get away from everything. Somewhere they can see that no matter how crap their day was at work, this little plant will keep growing, and even though that tree looks dead now, in three months’ time there’ll be green shoots, and in five months’ time there’ll be apples again. It’s good to be reminded of the seasons in London. Smelling the roses now and again is good too. You can’t stop and smell the roses unless you’ve got some to smell.”

That was definitely a family thing. Dad had said it a lot, during the grim times after the move, his face set with defiant dignity—“The tree might look dead, Amy, but the roots are still there. It’ll be flowering again before you know it, love.” He hadn’t needed to add, “And so will we.” I heard it anyway.

I pushed down the fierce pang of homesickness for Dad, and our old garden, and those familiar things. Leo was talking, his hands moving animatedly, long fingers playing with the silver saltcellar.

“We’ve got some amazing photo albums of my great-
grandmother
directing operations in her gardens,” he said. “Someone’s written ‘Rolling up the royal sleeves!’ underneath one photo, although to be accurate, she’s in a crinoline and an enormous veiled hat, with about forty sweating workmen behind her, trying not to fall over her various Pekinese dogs.”

I blushed. “I’d really love to see that.”

“I’d love to show you the gardens—you’re the only person I know who’d appreciate some of the rare plants they’ve still got. I mean, I’d love to show you the whole island.”

Leo looked up at me with the sweet sideways glance that sent the blood shooting faster through my veins. He did everything else with the easiest confidence I’d ever seen—ordering food, directing Billy, tipping—but sometimes, like now, a self-consciousness peeked through, as if he wasn’t quite sure how I’d react.

“Are you inviting me back to your place?” I said cheerfully, without quite thinking it through.

“I suppose I am. No, I’m inviting you back to my
palace
.”

We grinned, and it hung in the air between us. I shivered: I’d been chatted up before, but never on such a glamorous scale. I’d wished for something new, but this was more than
new
.

“Just the gardens, mind,” he said seriously. “You have to pay extra to get into the castle.”

I thought for one awful, crushing second that he meant it, and then a mischievous smile twinkled into his blue eyes, and I swatted him, the same way that Jo swatted me.

*

L
eo kept finding excuses to call me, and I kept finding excuses to discuss plans for his garden, and pretty soon we were seeing each other nearly every day, even if it was just for a lunchtime coffee in the frosty square while Billy read the
Racing Post
in the Range Rover.