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Authors: Nell Stark

BOOK: The Princess Affair
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“Hello, Father.”

“Hello, Alexandra.” He used her full name—always had and always would.

“How are you?”

“Fine. I can’t speak for long right now, but I wanted to remind you of the reception at New College in Oxford on Wednesday evening—the one your brother was originally supposed to attend.”

Resentment soured the taste of champagne that lingered on Sasha’s tongue. He could never resist an opportunity to put her in her place. Always a bridesmaid and never a bride.

“Yes, I remember.”

“I expect you to be punctual and professional. Please don’t do anything to embarrass this family to the Rhodes Trust or to Oxford, Alexandra.”

Sasha gripped the kitchen counter until her knuckles turned white. “Good night, Father.”

She turned to find Arthur leaning against the wall. Without a word, she pressed the phone into his palm.

“I take it he was an ass?”

“Isn’t he always?” She crossed her arms beneath her breasts and exhaled slowly, as if by doing so she could deprive her anger of its fuel. “I know you’ll be off doing the right thing, and that it makes you happy. But selfishly, I wish you weren’t deploying. Without you here, I have no buffer.”

“Sash. I’ll be doing Search and Rescue in Scotland, not MI6 in Afghanistan. I’m not going far. You’ll be fine. Lizzie will help.” The buzzer rang, and he smiled. “Speak of the devil. That must be her.”

Delight suddenly trumped Sasha’s frustration. “Lizzie came down from Cambridge? Just now?”

“Left a pub crawl with her mates and hopped on a train, just for me.” Arthur flashed the megawatt smile that always charmed the media.

As they waited for Lizzie at the door, Sasha resolved to tamp down the remnants of her anger. This was the last night in many months when she’d be able to share the company of her siblings and their closest friends. For the next few hours, she could put aside her frustrations and celebrate her brother’s accomplishments among people who truly
saw
her—who loved her for who she was, not who they wanted her to be.

The trick was believing she deserved it.

Chapter Two
 

Mist shrouded the city streets, lending a ghostly touch to the orderly lines of the neo-Georgian façades lining Grosvenor Square. As she stood in the loose crowd of her peers that had gathered beneath the hotel awning, Kerry Donovan watched the fog curl its tendrils around stone balustrades and Corinthian columns, claiming the buildings for some ethereal, spiritual realm. Smiling at her flight of fancy, she sipped from the steaming coffee cup that warmed her palms.

“How on earth can you be happy at this ungodly hour of the morning?” Harrison Whistler was clutching his own, larger cup as though it could hold him upright. A mop of shaggy dark hair curled around his ears to brush the sheepskin collar of his coat, and his bloodshot eyes testified as to how he had spent his night.

Like him, Kerry had begun the previous evening at a reception for the incoming class of Rhodes scholars sponsored by the American embassy, where she’d had the chance to meet the American ambassador to England and several other high-ranking consulate officials. The event had been her cohort’s official sendoff; having completed their initial orientation in the capital, they would continue on to Oxford. There, they would be greeted by members of the Rhodes Trust who would help them to settle in to their respective colleges before the start of the academic term.

Kerry patted the muscular shoulder of her new friend in a show of sympathy. “I called it quits after dinner. Where did you end up?”

Harris flipped his hand over to reveal a club’s imprimatur just below his knuckles, and Kerry felt a twinge of regret that she had chosen to miss the group’s festivities. Friendships and allegiances were being formed without her, and while she didn’t want to become embroiled in the group’s burgeoning politics, neither did she want to be pegged as a loner. Not the easiest of balancing acts.

“The Lightbox, apparently.” Harris grimaced. “Don’t ask me where it is or what it looks like. Though do tell me if you have a surefire hangover remedy.”

“You’re not going to like it.”

“Try me.”

“Sweat. An hour on a stationary bike, though I imagine an erg machine would work just as well.”

He let out an explosive sigh. “You’re making me queasy.”

Kerry shrugged, grinning. “Told you.”

“Masochist. That’s what I get for asking the goody-two-shoes.”

Her smile evaporated, ephemeral as the mist. Harris was joking, but even so, the moniker stung. Since arriving in London almost a week ago, she had kept herself firmly in check. While most of her peers had made a favorable first impression, she still barely knew them. Even Harris, who had pulled her into an embrace and called her “sister” at their very first reception in New York, was still too much of an unknown for her to risk letting down her guard.

She was no goody-two-shoes. The restlessness felt like mercury rising, like cumulonimbus clouds building in her brain. She needed a night like the one her peers had just experienced, but first she needed to be settled. Secure.

Kerry inhaled the mist into her lungs, willing it to soothe her nerves. Soon. Tonight, she would fall asleep in her room at Balliol, the college that would be her home for the next three years. In the morning, she would meet members of the university’s architecture program. She would buy the right books and get a pass to the library. She would learn the lay of the land. Then, she could relax.

A charter bus pulled up to the curb, “Oxford” emblazoned on its marquee. After handing her bags to the driver, Kerry climbed up the steep steps. The odor of exhaust mingled with the tired smell of the upholstery inside, and the collage of scents catapulted her back in time to high school. Sophomore year—the last year she had taken the bus before inheriting her grandmother’s long-nosed Buick. For a moment, the world shifted sideways and she became that girl again: the tall, broad-shouldered girl who could only find grace on the soccer field. The intense, studious girl ridiculed by teammates for her large vocabulary. The model child who habitually bewildered her family by excelling at everything.

On the bus rides to school, she’d made a habit of going over her notes from the previous day’s classes. On the bus rides home, she had gotten an early start on her reading assignments. Every once in a while, she had allowed herself to look out the window at the rolling hills and daydream about what it would feel like to go away to college. Her parents had stopped their own schooling after high school. Her sister had done a year at the local community college before getting married. Her brothers had forgone higher education altogether to join their father in his roofing business. Kerry couldn’t explain her ambitions, and they made her feel like a changeling. But she could as easily stop dreaming as she could keep herself from breathing.

Really, she’d been about as perfect as it was possible for a daughter to be. There had been no boyfriends for her mother to fawn over, but between school and soccer, Kerry hadn’t had the time to date even if she’d wanted to. She had worked hard, played hard, and earned a spot on both Princeton’s campus and its women’s soccer team. Loans, financial aid, work-study, and several outside scholarships had made it possible for her to attend.

At Princeton, she found Gothic spires and acclaimed faculty and new teammates. She also found Virginia. Virginia, who had taken the seat next to hers on the first day of their humanities class—who had admired the doodles in her notebook as their professor droned on about Plato’s allegory of the cave. Virginia, with her spiky, pink-tipped hair and outrageous T-shirts and infectious laugh. Virginia, who had kissed her under the budding cherry tree outside the School of Architecture on the first day of spring. Virginia had endured life in Kerry’s closet for almost two years before finally walking away. And who could blame her? She deserved someone who would hold her hand in public and invite her home for Thanksgiving.

Virginia’s absence accomplished what her presence never could. The loss of the only person who had truly seen her—and loved what she’d seen—shook Kerry to the core. Her closet was no shelter from the storm; it was Plato’s cave, full of shackles and shadows.

Finally, she found the inspiration to confess herself to her Irish Catholic family. In the time it took to speak four simple words, she fell from grace. Her mother quoted Romans. Her father quoted the Pope. Her sister proclaimed her “disgusting.” Only in her two brothers did she find some measure of compassion.

But at least she was free.

Kerry slid into the seat next to Harris, who groaned as he pressed his forehead to the cool window. The cascade of memories had set her own head to pounding and she leaned back, closing her eyes. She was not that uncertain, frightened girl—not anymore. She had faced her fear. She had lost Virginia, but won the Rhodes. She had purpose. She had loftier goals now, along with the means to fulfill them. Life stretched before her, a corridor of open doors extending past the horizon. So what if she was lonely?

She opened her eyes when Harris stirred beside her. As the bus pulled away from the curb, he swallowed down the dregs of his coffee in a series of noisy gulps, and she had to smile. Built like a bear but gentle as a kitten, he reminded her in many ways of her brothers. Had he suffered when he’d finally come out? Had his fellow rowers ostracized him or joined ranks around him?

Only when he blinked his red eyes and said, “Do I look that bad?” did Kerry realize she was staring.

“You’re fine.”

“Liar.” Harris massaged his temples. “I’d better pull it together by tonight. We’re meeting Princess Sasha, remember?”

Kerry nudged him with her elbow. “I think you’re supposed to address her as ‘Her Royal Highness Princess Alexandra.’”

“I like Sasha better. Sassy Sasha. Try saying that ten times fast.”

“You’re incorrigible.”

Harris laced his hands behind his head. “Actually, by all accounts
she’s
incorrigible. The gossip rags claim she’s bi.”

“The gossip rags also claim the Rapture is happening next week. For real this time.”

He rolled his eyes. “Does that mean you’re not going to let me try to fix you up?”

Kerry had to laugh. “Me? With a British princess? You’re delusional.”

“Why not?”

“For one thing, I’m utterly plebian. A commoner. Besides, isn’t there some kind of prohibition against the royals carrying on with Roman Catholics? Even lapsed ones?”

“They got rid of that. And so what if you’re not a Rockefeller?” He cocked his head, squinting. “Who could resist those cerulean eyes and fiery hair? Or that chiseled jaw? Or your tight—”

“Enough!” Laughing, Kerry covered his mouth to stop his rhapsodizing. At his baleful stare, she pulled her hand away. “Like I said. Delusional.”

“You need to learn to take a compliment.”

His dark eyes held a serious expression, and she looked away. Harris, she was learning, could be like a dog with a bone when he sensed a touchy subject. She scrambled for a way to distract him.

“Forget Princess Sasha. Yesterday, I overheard Anna and Kieran debating which of our group is most likely to become president.”

He immediately warmed to the topic. “Good one. Don’t tell me. I want to guess…”

 

*

 

Two hours later, the bus pulled in front of the Rhodes House, an impressive colonial structure that had been built in the early twentieth century in memory of Cecil Rhodes. Kerry took in the sight eagerly: the portico’s tall Ionic columns, the rotunda topped by a copper dome, the slate roof peeking up behind several wide parapets. As they entered the building, she looked around eagerly. The rotunda was bedecked by royal blue banners emblazoned with the university’s motto:
Dominus Illuminatio Mea
.

“Can you read Latin?” Harris had evidently noticed the direction of her gaze. “What does it mean?”

“God is my light.”

“Are you still a believer?”

Kerry crossed her arms beneath her breasts in a protective gesture as automatic as it was unnecessary. Harris’s eyes held no hint of judgment, only curiosity. She didn’t have to put up shields against him. He was on her side.

“My head is agnostic. But my heart…” She gave him a half-smile and shrugged. These days, that was all the answer she could offer. “You?”

Before he could reply, the group was called together by a lean, dark-haired man wearing a crisp white collared shirt and gray slacks. His tie was several shades darker than the blue of the banners, and a pair of round glasses drew attention to the freckles that liberally sprinkled his nose. He introduced himself as Brent, their primary liaison with the Rhodes Trust.

Anna stood on her toes and leaned into Kerry’s space, hands fluttering. “He looks like Harry Potter!”

Harris gave her an incredulous look. “He’s much more attractive than Harry Potter.”

Apparently, that was a heretical thing to say, because she huffed off to report her epiphany to a more receptive audience. Kerry shot Harris a bemused glance before falling in behind Brent for a tour of the House. As he led them past the large hall where Einstein had once delivered a lecture series, the extensive library dedicated to Commonwealth and African Studies, and the spacious dining room, he answered questions about the facility and explained their privileges. Kerry could hardly wait to take advantage of them and make this incredible space her own.

The tour concluded in one of the reading rooms. A middle-aged woman dressed in a dark gray wool suit, her hair pulled back severely into a bun, awaited them behind the podium. Brent joined her as the remainder of the group filtered inside.

“I’m very pleased to introduce you all to Mary Spencer, Secretary of the Rhodes Trust,” he said before stepping aside.

“Good afternoon, and welcome to Oxford University.” Speaking in a rather nasal tone, Spencer over-enunciated each syllable. “On behalf of the Trust, we are delighted to welcome you, the newest class of scholars. For the past several months you have celebrated your success, but now it is time to rise to the challenges that await you. You are all not only representatives of the Trust, but of the United States of America. As you embark upon your studies, remember to acquit yourselves in a manner becoming your status.”

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