“Good!” Toby said. “And we can light a few to make sure they don’t drip. I don’t want to have to scrape all that wax off again like I did the last time. If it hadn’t been for Graydon—”
She took a breath.
Millie put her arm through Toby’s. “It takes time, dear, but you will forget him.”
“It seems that in the last few days my memories of him are even more intense. It almost feels as though he’s calling me to him.”
“Then perhaps you should go to him.”
“Not possible,” Toby said as she went down the stairs ahead of Millie and got her car keys.
It was the day before Victoria’s wedding that Toby came apart. She awoke early and went downstairs to the kitchen. As she made herself a pot of strong, dark tea, she heard the TV on in the downstairs sitting room. Millie must be up already. She took her drink and went into the room.
Millie was on the couch watching a live CNN broadcast from Lanconia. She glanced up at Toby. “I keep hearing mention of this country and I saw that this was on. Do you know what it is?”
Toby’s throat seemed to swell up as she looked at the television screen. There was a large room with a red rug, gold lighting fixtures, and what looked like blue silk brocade on the walls. In front were over a dozen tiny chairs with people in suits, the women with hats on, all of them with either pen and paper or a camera. At the back were TV cameras. “It’s … I assume it’s the engagement ceremony,” Toby said.
Her common sense told her she should leave the room and not watch what was about to happen. But she couldn’t make herself leave.
When Millie patted the seat beside her, Toby walked around the couch and sat down, her tea mug clutched in her hand.
The CNN broadcaster said that Prince Graydon of Lanconia was about to enter the palace room with Lady Danna Hexonbath, and he was going to make the announcement of their formal engagement.
“Graydon?” Millie said, looking at Toby. “This isn’t your Graydon, is it?”
When Toby didn’t answer, Millie took the mug from her and put it on the coffee table. Toby’s heart was pounding, and like someone hypnotized, she stared at the screen.
After several long moments, out came the prince, as tall and handsome as she remembered. On his arm was Lady Danna, and she was as beautiful as Toby had always feared.
“They look very happy together,” Millie said, sadness in her voice.
“Rory has always loved Danna,” Toby whispered.
“Rory? Who is that?”
Toby came out of her trance and she stood up abruptly. “That is Rory, not Graydon.”
She stepped away from the couch, her hands to the side of her head. “No no no no! He cannot do this to me.”
“Do what? I don’t understand.”
“Graydon! He’s going to make me have to be the villain.”
“I’m sorry,” Millie said, “but I don’t understand what you’re saying.”
Toby pointed at the TV. “That is not Prince Graydon. That is his brother, Rory. Graydon is going to come here and say he’s going to give up his throne for me!”
“Oh,” Millie said. “Are you sure of that? That seems rather drastic. But if he does do that, what are you going to say to him?”
“That he can’t do it, that’s what,” Toby said. She tried to calm down. “Maybe I’m wrong. Please watch that and see if they show someone they think is Prince Rory. If he’s not there, then he’s probably on his way here. I’m going upstairs to get dressed, then I’m going to the site.”
She muttered, “Damn you, Graydon!” all the way up the stairs.
By the day of the wedding, Toby was telling herself that she’d been wrong about everything. The day before, she’d jumped at every sound, expecting Graydon to step out from behind every door.
But as the day wore on and he didn’t appear, she began to settle down. She and Millie had wine with dinner and Toby went to bed early.
Today was the wedding, it was just six A.M., and she was already at the site. She wanted as much time as she could get to make sure everything went smoothly. Yesterday had been crazy, with many people arriving at the airport and expecting to be driven to their hotels. Toby had enlisted every cousin Jared had to drive people wherever they wanted to go.
As soon as Toby parked behind the chapel, she lifted the back door of her car so the waitstaff could get to the supplies she’d brought. Millie had a friend who was a calligrapher so the seating cards been hand lettered. In fact, Millie had added a lot of touches to the wedding that Toby had never thought of. They’d run everything past Victoria for approval, but she’d just waved her hand and agreed.
Victoria was so involved in the novel she was writing that she paid little attention to her own wedding. Toby had been concerned that Dr. Huntley would be hurt by her neglect but he was very protective. “She is writing Valentina’s story and she feels it,” he said. “Inside her, she knows the story. When she has it on paper, she will return to us.”
This morning Toby saw an email that Victoria had sent late last night. The book was finished and she said she was going to sleep for about twelve hours. “My soul is at last freed,” she wrote.
As Toby looked around the grounds, she searched for what still needed to be done. The tent was up, furniture stacked inside, and the chapel was packed with little chairs. “Opera chairs,” Millie called them. “They’re what they put in the boxes at the opera: hard, tiny, supremely uncomfortable. They don’t want their patrons falling asleep.”
Toby had smiled at the name. After this was over, she wanted to sit with Millie and ask about her life. But so far, she’d not had a chance to do that.
Some lights were hanging down from a tree and a ladder was leaning against the trunk. Toby was concerned that when the crews arrived, someone might walk into the wire. She pulled the ladder out, opened it, and climbed up to the top to fasten the strand of lights as high as she could reach.
“I knew I’d find you here,” said a voice she thought she might never hear again.
Many emotions went through Toby at once: happiness, anger, longing, love. She tried to remain calm but when she took a step down, she missed the ladder and fell backward.
Graydon caught her in his arms.
All thoughts of being sensible left her as she looked into his dark eyes. As Lexie had once said, Graydon’s eyes were smoldering.
Her arms went around his neck and her lips on his, their tongues meeting.
“I couldn’t bear my life without you,” Graydon said as he kissed her face, his arms holding her off the ground, so tight around her she could hardly breathe. “I missed you every moment.”
Toby was kissing him back. She’d never thought to see him face-to-face again, certainly never to touch him. He was so warm, so familiar, so much a part of her.
She felt that he was walking but her mind was too full of his caresses, the pure joy of being near him again that she wasn’t sure what was happening.
It was when he put her feet to the ground but never stopped kissing her that she began to come to her senses. He had moved them back into the trees, away from the chapel and the tents, and he was unbuttoning her shirt. Graydon was going to make love to her—to Toby, not Tabitha—here and now.
It took a strength she didn’t know she had, but she pushed him away to arm’s length. Graydon’s eyes were like dark pools of desire, and he pulled her back to him.
“No,” she whispered.
“You’re right. We’ll go home,” he murmured, his face in her neck.
“Yours or mine?” she asked.
“Yours. I’m going to stay here. With you. Forever.” His head was bent toward hers and he seemed to consider what he’d said as something that was already decided.
Again, she pushed away from him. “You can’t do that!”
This time Graydon seemed to hear her, but he just smiled. “It will be all right,” he said in a soothing voice. “You don’t need to worry about anything. I’ve taken care of al
l of it.”
“Have you?” Toby asked, her hands on his shoulders, arms extended.
“Yes.” Graydon smiled sweetly. “Rory and I worked out a plan. Let’s go somewhere private and I’ll tell you everything.”
“Private? Like my bedroom? We make love, then lie in each other’s arms and you tell me what you and Rory have planned for my future?”
“Exactly!” Graydon said with a grin. “You and I always have agreed about everything.”
Toby stepped away from him. “I want to make sure I fully understand this plan. I made a fool of myself when you were here by trying to get you to go to bed with me. But you refused.”
“I had to return to my own country and I didn’t want to take your maidenhood.”
“But it’s okay to do so now?”
Graydon smiled. “The plan includes that you and I get married. Today. I did some research and you and I can walk to the Nantucket courthouse, get a license, go upstairs, and a judge will marry us.”
“We wouldn’t have to bother with all this?” She waved her hand toward the tents and the chapel that could be seen through the trees.
At her tone, Graydon got his first inkling that Toby wasn’t overjoyed with what he was saying. “We can have a huge wedding later,” he said quickly. “At the palace.”
“Oh? And what will be the name of the person I’ll be marrying?”
“We need to talk about all that. I may have to continue being my brother.”
Toby took a step toward him and there was anger in her eyes. “I want to know about Danna. Does she know who she’s marrying?”
Graydon stepped back. “Remember how you said I should ask Danna what she wants? That was brilliant! When I asked her, she had some rather strong opinions.”
Toby took another step toward him. “What did Danna say?” She wasn’t sure but she thought maybe Graydon’s face was turning red.
“She, uh … It seems that she’s always known who was me and who was Rory, and she said she had never really liked me. According to her I’m a ‘sword stuck in its sheath.’ It’s a Lanconian saying and it means—”
“I can guess. Did she refuse to marry you?”
“Yes,” Graydon said.
“So Danna dumped you and you came running to me. And now you’re offering me a two-dollar wedding and a lifetime of living a lie and of hiding. If it’s ever found out that you abandoned your kingdom for me, an entire country will hate me. Maybe the world will hate me. There will be books written about how I enticed you, a man who was groomed to be king, away from your destiny.”
Graydon’s face lost the soft, pleading look. His shoulders went back, his body rigid. He was The Prince. “I didn’t understand. You want to be made queen.”
“Oh, right. Then just your family will hate me. And if the truth of you and Rory is revealed, Danna’s father will pull out of Lanconia and the country will be impoverished. And it will all be my fault.” She lowered her voice and when she spoke, everything she felt was in her words. “What I want is for you to be king.”
Instantly, Graydon lost his rigid stance and he went from being The Prince to the man she’d come to love. He put his hands in his pockets and leaned back against a tree. “You’re right, of course.”
When he looked at her, his eyes were so full of misery that Toby almost went to him.
But she didn’t. “You shouldn’t have come here,” she said softly. “I was just beginning to think I could actually live without you.” In spite of her good intentions, there were tears gathering in her eyes.
“Have you thought about me in these last weeks?” he asked. “At least some of the time?”
“Thought about you? No, I didn’t. I lived and breathed you. I felt you in my heart, inside my soul. The air, the sun, the moon all reminded me of you. My body and my mind craved you, ached for you. I couldn’t stand hearing your name or your country’s. I couldn’t even bear to search out Tabitha or Garrett. Every—” She looked at him.
Reaching out, Graydon pulled her to him, but this time it wasn’t with passion. She folded her arms up inside his, her cheek on his chest and she could hear his heart pounding. It was as though she could feel his despair, his sense of helplessness—which exactly matched her own.
“Tabby and Garrett lived long and happy lives,” he said softly. “I couldn’t bear to search out their history either, but Lorcan and Daire did, with Aunt Jilly’s help.”
“Your Headless Horseman act saved them.”
“No,” he said, as he kissed the top of her head. “You did, in spite of me. You begged Valentina and Parthenia to allow no doctor near you. When Dr. Hancock wouldn’t come to Nantucket, Garrett hired another one. Your friends locked him in a closet.”
“Did they?” Toby asked, smiling against his chest. “And the baby?”
“Big fat boy followed by two more boys and a girl, who Valentina wrote was as beautiful as her mother.”
“Did the children grow up to be happy?” she whispered. There were tears on her cheeks.
“Our descendents helped the world. A great-granddaughter campaigned to reform orphanages in New York. In World War II a great-great, et cetera, grandson saved an entire shipload of soldiers. Senators, governors, teachers, physicians, a famous female pilot, they’re all there now, thanks to you. To us.”
Toby nodded against him. “That was what we were meant to do and we did it.”
“Yes,” he murmured, his face buried in her hair, and she could feel the dampness from his tears. “In fact, we have a contemporary descendent, a young woman, who is in rather bad circumstances right now. Since she didn’t exist until recently, I thought I might introduce her to a cousin of mine, Nicholas. It’s said that he was conceived in 1564. They might understand each other.”
She knew he was trying to cheer her up. “Graydon, I—”
“Sssssh,” he said. “We won’t talk of this anymore. Today, we’ll be as we were. Tonight we will dance in the moonlight and drink champagne.”
“One last time,” Toby said.
“Yes,” Graydon whispered. “The very last time.”
Toby was in the big tent, the seating chart in her hand, and putting the place cards where they belonged. She and Millie had ordered used paperbacks of each author’s work, then spent several evenings cutting and pasting pages. They made napkin rings and backs for the seating cards, and wrapped little boxes of chocolates in the author’s own words. For the nonwriter guests, they’d used Victoria’s books.
It was nearly four and it wouldn’t be long before the guests started arriving in costume for the ceremony. Victoria’s daughter, Alix, was going to oversee everything in the chapel, but Toby was to go home and dress before the guests showed up.
She dawdled over her tasks, straightening vases of baby roses, making sure the little nests made of shredded book pages contained enough seashells, checking the table that held the many awards to be given out, and talking to the caterers, who were beginning to set up. What she didn’t want to do was go home where she wouldn’t be surrounded by people.
She hadn’t seen Graydon since the early morning. She didn’t know where he was staying—or even if he was still on the island. Part of her wanted him to be there with her, but the larger part hoped she’d never again have to say goodbye to him. It hurt too, too much!
When her phone buzzed, she took it out of her pocket and saw a text message from Millie saying she needed to come home and get dressed. I’LL DO YOUR HAIR, she added.
The tears that were so close under the surface threatened to come out, but Toby blinked them away. Sometimes she felt that she’d spent her life searching for a real mother, someone to listen and care and—
“Grow up!” she said aloud as she put her phone back in her pocket. It wasn’t as though she’d gone into this with Graydon without being warned. Lexie had told her not to. And—Toby told herself to stop thinking, then got into her car and drove back to Kingsley Lane. Millie met her at the door.
“If we don’t
hurry and get you ready, we’ll miss the ceremony.” Millie had on her magnificent dress with all its silver trim. Her hair was elegantly arranged, and sparkling out of it was a tiara that looked as though it were made of real diamonds.
“You look great,” Toby said.
“And you look like your dog just died. What happened?”
Maybe it was the quiet or maybe it was the familiarity of home, but Toby’s emotions took over. “He’s here,” she whispered.
Millie opened her arms and Toby fell into them, the tears nearly choking her. Millie held her for a while, then half pulled Toby up the stairs to her bedroom.
“You talk while I get you ready,” Millie said. “And start at the beginning. How in the world did you meet a royal prince?” Millie wouldn’t let Toby sit down but pushed her toward the bathroom and told her to take a shower. “But don’t get a drop of water on your hair. We don’t have time to get it dry.”
“Graydon loves my hair,” Toby said.
Rolling her eyes, Millie pulled back the shower curtain. “Get in and wash the sweat off of you.”
Toby obeyed and Millie stood outside and listened.
Once Toby began talking, she didn’t seem able to stop or even slow down. She started at their meeting at Jared and Alix’s wedding. “It was Rory who made Graydon swear to tell me he was a prince.”
“And Rory is the brother?”
“Yes. Supposedly, they’re identical twins, but Graydon is smarter, better looking, and just, well, more adult.”
Millie hid her smile as she pulled the strings on Toby’s corset. “So Graydon only planned to stay for a few days?”
“Yes, but then Rory broke his wrist and Graydon had to stay longer.” She sat down on an ottoman while Millie unbraided her hair and brushed it out, and told of Lorcan and Daire arriving. “They didn’t like me at first. I think both of them thought I was after Graydon because of who he was, but he set them straight.” Toby told how they’d bowed before her.
“He sounds like a storybook prince. Surely there is something wrong with him.”
“You mean the way he thinks he can do everything and that he needs no one else on earth? He bossed poor Rory around so much I sometimes felt sorry for him.”