The Improperly Pregnant Princess

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“They taught it to us at the group home. Part of our health-and-safety training.” Shane moved her gently aside as a messenger’s bicycle whizzed past, its bell ringing. “Probably they figured we ruffians might give the counselor a heart attack.”

“What’s the connection to air freight?” she asked as they strode with their long legs in sync.

“While I was in high school, I got a part-time job at an air-freight company at Long Beach Airport,” Shane said. “The owner, Morris O’Day, suffered a heart attack my third day on the job. While everyone else was waiting for the paramedics, I administered CPR.”

“You saved his life?” CeCe asked.

“So Morris believed,” Shane said. “Once he recovered, he took me under his wing and taught me the business.”

“You must have impressed him in a lot of ways. He wouldn’t have wasted his time on you otherwise.” The teenage Shane, although no doubt slighter of build and less polished, must still have been a force to reckon with.

“We became friends,” he said quietly. “Morris took the place of the father I’d scarcely known. My mentor, that’s how I describe him to people, but he meant much more to me than that.”

“You’re speaking in the past tense,” CeCe said. “Did he die?”

“Five years later, when I was twenty-two, he suffered another heart attack.” Shane’s pace slowed. “That time, I couldn’t save him. Later, I was astonished to learn that he’d willed me the company. The assets were mortgaged and the planes were outdated, but it gave me a start.”

“He didn’t have any family?” CeCe couldn’t imagine such isolation. “How sad that he didn’t have a wife or a child. He worked so hard and then he had no heir.”

“He did have an heir—me,” Shane said crisply.

CeCe saw that she’d offended him. “Of course. You meant a lot to him.”

“I’ve had to blaze my own trail. So did Morris,” Shane snapped. “I guess that’s hard for you to understand.”

“What do you mean? I’ve had to…” She stopped herself in midsentence.

She’d intended to say that she’d had to work hard, but so what? There was no denying that her path had been paved. Much as CeCe hated to admit it, she would never have become executive veep at twenty-nine if she weren’t the owner’s daughter.

She knew that, with her drive and organizational abilities, she’d have made a success of herself one way or another. Not on the scale that Shane had, however, or at least not as rapidly. For one thing, she couldn’t get by on five hours’ sleep a night, as he was reputed to do.

They reached the west side of the park and headed for her apartment building a block away. CeCe wished she could undo the offense she’d given by her thoughtless remark about Morris.

Making truces came so easily to her sister Amelia. If only CeCe could borrow a pinch of her kind nature before it was too late.

“I didn’t put things very well,” she said, by way of preamble.

“You said what you meant. There’s no need to apologize for the fact that you and I look at the world from very different perspectives.” Shane spoke in an even, impersonal tone. “We’re about as different as two people can be. I don’t hold that against you, and I hope you don’t hold it against me, either.”

“It doesn’t sound like you’re leaving much room for us to meet in the middle,” CeCe said.

“Was there ever any hope of that?”

She had to be honest with him, and herself. “I guess not.”

In front of her building, they shook hands formally. “I’ll keep in touch about the negotiations with Wuhan Novelty,” Shane said, and walked away.

CeCe drank in the sight of his broad shoulders as he cut through the slow-moving tide of pedestrians. Her palm tingled where it had touched his moments before.

If her grandfather still wanted her to be queen after he learned of her pregnancy, she might not be handling the Wuhan negotiations, CeCe realized with a start. That meant there was a scary chance that she might never see Shane O’Connell again.

When she glanced back at the street, he’d disappeared.

Chapter Four

On her way up to the apartment, CeCe noticed that the royal guards weren’t patrolling with Charlotte’s regular staff. That meant her grandfather must still be at the embassy, thank goodness.

She needed time to sort out the turmoil in her mind. There were so many decisions to make, and despite her reputation as a take-charge executive, she had no idea how to make them.

Against her better judgment, she yearned to bring Shane into the picture. He’d just made it clear, however, that he saw no common ground between them, outside of their business alliance.

This would be the right time for most women to ask their mothers for advice. Unfortunately, CeCe knew exactly what Charlotte would say: (a) The man isn’t right for you, (b) Of course you’ll be queen, and (c) You’re what?

Under the circumstances, she was glad to learn from Hester Vanderling that Charlotte had gone to the office. According to the housekeeper, Amelia was in her room, working on her computer, and otherwise the vast apartment was practically empty.

“The cook and her assistant have to work late tonight to prepare a special dinner for your grandfather, so your mother gave them the morning off,” explained Hester.

The housekeeper and her husband, Quincy, the Carradigne’s butler, occupied private quarters. Since they lived on the premises, they were usually around although, like now, not necessarily on duty.

“Could we talk?” CeCe asked.

“I’d like that.” Hester gave her a pleased but slightly puzzled smile.

Although she’d confided in Hester a lot in her younger years, CeCe rarely turned to her these days, believing she ought to handle her own problems. However, Hester, with her gentle nature, loyalty to her native land of Korosol and devotion to the Carradigne girls, might have exactly the perspective CeCe needed.

They went into the kitchen for coffee. From the broad terrace came a scuffling noise.

“What on earth?” said Hester.

“Got you, you skulking scumbag!” roared the voice of Quincy Vanderling.

“Oh, dear!” Hester pressed a wall button to summon security. “We’d better find out what’s happening.”

“It sounds like Quincy caught an intruder.” No one had ever penetrated Charlotte’s guards before. Or had the butler taken one too many nips of kitchen sherry and tried to tackle a pigeon? Quincy had his vices, but a better butler couldn’t be found.

CeCe hurried into the breakfast nook. Through the wide-open French doors, she saw the husky butler wrestling a darkly tanned man with short brown hair. In his forties, the intruder was thin but muscular and easily held his own.

“He was in the kitchen!” Quincy panted when he spotted the women. “I chased him out here and caught him!”

The fellow stopped struggling and turned toward CeCe. “Hello, princess,” he said with oily familiarity. “Why don’t you call off this old geezer before he injures himself?”

Winston Rademacher. CeCe hadn’t seen him in several years, but it was hard to mistake that creepy smile and those shifty eyes that always seemed to be squinting.

From the other side of the terrace, two guards raced toward the pair. “Hold on,” CeCe called, stepping outside. “It’s my cousin Markus’s adviser.”

Quincy dropped the fellow’s arm. “You work for Markus Carradigne? Why didn’t you say so?”

“No one gave me a chance.” Rademacher tugged on his wrinkled coat sleeve.

“What are you doing here?” CeCe demanded.

His gaze met hers, then veered away. “Looking for the king. I’m in New York on Markus’s business while he’s tending to his affairs in Korosol.”

“He was snooping, is more like it,” retorted Hester. “I’m sorry, Miss CeCe. I shouldn’t have said that, I suppose. Now, come inside, Quincy. It’s cold out there.”

“Call off your dogs, will you?” Rademacher sneered at the guards and strode toward CeCe.

On the few previous occasions when she’d met him, he’d struck CeCe as a dangerous type. She hoped Markus had researched the man’s background.

Right now, his attitude offended her, and he’d had no business bypassing security on his way up. Still, it would give unnecessary offense to her cousin if her guards bodily ejected his confidant.

“You may go. Please check the locks on the back and side stairs,” she told the two men.

That was probably how he’d broken in. In addition to connecting the apartment’s two floors, the staircases served as emergency escape routes down through the building, although the heavy intervening doors could only be opened from the Carradigne side. “Quincy, you were very brave. Thank you for defending us.”

“It was completely unnecessary.” Rademacher oozed past CeCe into the kitchen.

“Mr. Rademacher.” Her sharp tone halted him as he headed for the coffee carafe. “Your behavior is unacceptable.”

“Is it indeed, princess?” Despite the supercilious tone, he hesitated.

“You had no business sneaking into this apartment without announcing yourself to the guards. The king is not here. I suggest you look for him at the embassy, and I suggest you do it now,” CeCe said.

Resentment flashed across his face, and was instantly replaced by obsequiousness. “Whatever you wish, princess.”

“I’ll show you out,” said Hester. Quincy accompanied her, watching Rademacher’s every move.

A short time later, Hester returned alone. “We put him on the elevator,” she said. “What an unpleasant man.”

“Is your husband all right?” CeCe was fond of Quincy, a former handyman whose devotion to his wife and to the Carradignes was beyond question.

“He’s better than all right. A scuffle like that makes him feel young again.” Hester smiled. “Now, let’s have that coffee.”

They took their mugs to the breakfast table and sat facing each other. Outside, boxed evergreens on the landscaped terrace blocked the cityscape.

Memories from years past drifted comfortably over the scene. There’d been summer days when blooms transformed the terrace into a lush paradise, and rainy days when the nanny entertained the three girls with hot chocolate and Korosol folktales.

“What’s on your mind?” asked the housekeeper.

CeCe released a long breath. She had to tell someone her news, and the longer she waited, the harder it would get. “Oh, Hester, I’m pregnant.”

Her old friend blinked in surprise. “Well! I don’t know what…You know, it might be the best thing for you.”

“What?” CeCe had never expected this reaction.

“It’s time you figured out you’re a woman. You’ve been denying your feminine instincts ever since your father died,” Hester said.

“I have not!” she flared.

“It was as if you thought you had to be the man of the family,” said her friend, undeterred by the outburst. “For a while, you refused to wear anything but pants. It nearly gave your mother fits.”

“I remember that.” CeCe had assumed her behavior must have represented a typical preteen phase. Perhaps, though, there was some truth in the housekeeper’s observation. “But, Hester, this isn’t the right way to rediscover my feminine instincts, as you call them, even if I wanted to. It’s a disaster!”