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Parker would send the prince packing and things would get back to normal.
Parker, Cara and Shey, three college friends, worked together at the coffeehouse, Monarch’s, and Titles Bookstore. No guys to muddle things up.
Shey remembered the night they’d come up with the names for their two attached stores. Parker had supplied the financial backing for the venture and they’d wanted to do something to acknowledge their royal friend. They’d all three laughed as they passed the bottle of wine and talked about the future—theirs and the stores’.
Shey had never had women friends before Parker and Cara, but if she’d been asked who’d she’d pick as friends, she would never have said a princess and someone like Cara, a quiet, soft-hearted woman.
Truth be told, when it came down to it, she hadn’t picked Parker and Cara at all…they’d simply meshed. Three people who’d connected and become friends. Friends who were closer than most families.
The prince’s arms tightened ever so slightly, reminding Shey of her unwanted passenger, jolting her from her thoughts.
* * *
Tanner Ericson knew that coming to Erie and collecting his fiancée was going to be a challenge. Marie Anna’s father had told him she might be a bit reluctant.
He’d prepared himself for all kinds of scenarios. But never in his wildest imagination had he thought he’d be whizzing down the city streets on the back of a motorbike driven by a most intriguing woman.
Short, spiky red hair and an attitude that screamed back off. This Shey Carlson was a tough, beautiful woman.
He inched a bit closer and tightened his arms around her waist, not so much because he was worried about falling off her motorbike, but because he liked the way she felt against him.
Eventually she turned off the four-lane street they’d been riding on, and much too soon they were pulling up to the curb.
She cut the motor and Tanner climbed off the bike. He took off his helmet and handed it to her.
“This is it,” she said.
He could hear in her voice that this place, with its small brick storefront, was special to her. The building had two doors. Over the right-hand one was a sign that read, Monarch’s Coffeehouse. It had a small crown tilted over the M.
The other sign read, Titles Bookstore. The same crown was over it, as well.
“Marie Anna’s here?”
“Parker owns the stores, along with Cara and myself. We’re all partners.” Shey started toward Monarch’s. “Come, on, Your Highness.”
He was accustomed to being called Your Highness but he preferred going by Tanner. Of course, he understood the necessity of his title or a more formal means of address when in Amar. But he was in America now. There was no need to stand on formalities here. Not with this woman.
“Tanner,” he said. “Call me Tanner.”
She didn’t say anything, just kept right on walking.
There was nothing for Tanner to do but follow.
He entered Monarch’s and found a blond woman talking to a dark-haired man.
It had to be her—Marie Anna.
He studied the woman he’d pledged to marry.
She hadn’t changed all that much. Yes, she looked less styled: her blond hair was pulled into a messy ponytail and she had on a pair of neat khaki pants and a light blue top.
This was the woman he was going to spend the rest of his life with.
Tanner still had a hard time swallowing the fact that he had agreed to marry a woman he really didn’t know. But it was for the good of Amar.
He’d been lectured since birth that his first obligation was to his country. Small principalities like Amar and Marie Anna’s Eliason, could easily become lost in today’s world. By joining forces, the two small countries might have more clout. So in the age-old custom, he’d allowed himself to become engaged for political purposes.
At least, in public that was the reason he gave. In truth, he was just tired. Tired of women who merely wanted his title, his money. Women who thought they wanted to play princess, until they realized being a princess entailed very little play and an awful lot of hard work.
He was done.
After Stephana, he’d realized he’d never have a normal relationship with a woman, one built on mutual respect and—well, he wouldn’t admit it out loud, but the romantic in him craved a relationship based on love. But he’d simply come to the conclusion that it wouldn’t happen. That’s why he’d agreed to marry Marie Anna—Parker. She understood the intricacies of being a royal in modern society. Their union would be good for their countries.
If he couldn’t have what he wanted, then he’d settle for doing something that would be beneficial for Amar.
“Princess Marie Anna,” he said.
She stared at him and frowned.
“It’s Parker,” was her reply. “It’s been a long time, Tanner.”
“Too long,” he said, smiling at her.
There was no answering smile, as a matter of fact, her frown deepened to a scowl.
Two beautiful women had scowled at him in the last hour. Tanner didn’t like it.
“Not long enough,” she muttered.
Okay, so the pleasantries had been dealt with, time to lay his cards on the table. “Your father sent me to bring you home.”
“I am home.”
Tanner didn’t remember Marie Anna—Parker—as being so stubborn.
“Back to Eliason,” he clarified.
“You’re welcome to go back to Eliason or Amar on the very next plane out of Erie. But I’m staying here.”
“That’s it?” he asked. “I flew all this way to see my fiancée—”
“I am not your fiancée.”
He could hear the finality in her voice, but ignored her comment altogether and continued. “—and all you have to say to me is leave?”
“That’s about the shape of things. And speaking of leaving, I’m on my way out. You don’t mind closing up, Shey?”
“Of course not,” Shey said.
Tanner had almost forgotten about his bike-riding escort.
Almost, but not quite.
He was pretty sure that having met Shey Carlson, no one could ever entirely forget her.
Shey nodded in his direction and asked Marie Anna, “What about him?”
“Would you give him a ride to whatever hotel he’s staying at?” she asked.
“Sure,” Shey said with a shrug.
“Hey, watchdog, are you coming?” Parker asked the dark-haired man who’d been silent till now.
“Uh,” was his terribly articulate response. “Sure thing,” he said. “How about I drive?”
“Sounds good to me since I took the bus.”
“The bus?” Tanner asked. “My fiancée is riding public transportation?”
First Parker sends Shey to collect him at the airport, then she denies their engagement and now she was talking about riding a bus to work?
“You don’t have a fiancée,” Parker replied, “but if you were referring to me, then yes, I take public transportation. My father shut off my access to my trust and I’m broke. So I sold the car.”
“But, but…” he said, not sure what to add.
“Don’t worry about it,” the other man said. “I’ll see that she gets home all right.”
“Home,” Parker said to Tanner. “I’m home and you need to go home. Go back to Amar. There’s nothing for you here in Erie—especially not a fiancée.”
She walked out of the store followed by the dark-haired man.
The door slammed behind them with a certain sense of finality.
“Well, princy, that went well.”
“Tanner. My name is Tanner. If you can’t remember that, and insist on addressing me formally, Your Highness will suffice. Princy does not.”
Shey laughed. “Don’t get your boxers in a knot, princy.”
“Is it over?” came a soft voice from a small archway that led into what had to be the bookstore.
The woman was shorter than Shey. Curvier. Her hair was brown and she wore it in a simple shoulder-length bob.
“It’s over,” Shey said. “Cara, this is Parker’s supposed Prince Charming. I use the word supposed because so far, I haven’t found him all that charming.”
“Tanner,” he said. “Please, call me Tanner, Miss…”
“Phillips. Cara Phillips, but Cara’s fine.”
“Cara,” he said, rolling the R slightly. “It’s a lovely name.”
“Thank you,” she said, smiling at him. “I’m sorry you had to come all this way for nothing, Tanner.”
“It’s not for nothing. Parker will be going home with me.”
“She agreed?” Cara asked, looking surprised.
“No,” Shey snapped.
“But she will eventually,” Tanner added. “She’ll see that our marrying makes sense.”
“Do you love her?” Cara asked.
“Pardon?” Tanner replied.
“It’s a simple question, Your High—Tanner. Do you love Parker?”
“Marie Anna, uh, Parker, and I are extremely well-suited. We both grew up knowing we have a duty to our countries. We were friendly when we were younger. I’m sure we’d be compatible.”
“Compatible is nice,” Cara said, taking a step closer, her expression earnest as she continued, “but love is important. Do you love her?”
“I’ll learn to love her.” Even as Tanner said the words, he hoped they were true. He wouldn’t want his child, their future children, growing up in a loveless home.
“I know that there are any number of things you can learn,” Cara said. “Most things, in fact, you can learn with simply a good mind and a good book. But love? You can’t learn to love someone, you can’t just study them hard enough and discover you love them. There has to be a spark, something to build on. You’d know if you and Parker had it. We’d know if you had it. You don’t.”
Tanner had thought he liked Parker’s friend Cara far more than Shey, but as she voiced his hidden fear, he found he much preferred Shey’s cut-to-the-chase comments to Cara’s softer, more insightful ones.
“How dare you walk in and think you can know what I feel?” he asked, assuming his best royal tone, one that was guaranteed to make people think twice before arguing with him.
But Cara didn’t back down. Didn’t even blink. “I dare because Parker is my friend. I dare because I’ve seen what a compatible relationship looks like. I dare because I may not know you, but I do know that having power and money doesn’t make a person happy, love does. You deserve that as much as Parker does.”
“I—”
She cut him off with a small, soft smile. “Good night, Shey. I was ready to lock up next door when the commotion started. Now that it’s over, I’ll be going. I’ll see you in the morning. And it was nice meeting you, Tanner.”
With that, Cara turned and walked back into the dim bookstore.
“Wow,” Shey said. “I wonder what’s got into her?”
“What do you mean?” Tanner asked.
“I mean, that’s the longest string of words that I’ve ever heard Cara utter in front of a stranger. In front of most people she knows well, for that matter.”
“Lucky me,” Tanner grumbled.
He’d like to totally discount everything the woman had said as nonsense, but he couldn’t. She hadn’t said anything he hadn’t thought himself.
“So now what?” he asked his reluctant hostess.
