A Princess Next Door (Rothman Royals Book 1) (9 page)

I shook against him, trying to hold back sobs and failing
utterly. I’d known this was coming—from the first day we’d arrived here. Jack
would never want to have even a little of his life dictated by my world, by my
family, and I just couldn’t cut them out of my life the way he wanted me to.

I’d never believed in star-crossed lovers in the world
today, but I’d been wrong. I was living out one of those doomed scenarios right
now.

And the worst thing was I’d known it from the beginning and
had still let it happen to me.

To us.

“I’m sorry, Jack,” I managed to choke out. “I just can’t…do
what you want me to do. I can’t give up them—and all of this.”

I could feel something shudder in his body for just a
moment. Then he said gruffly, “Okay. Okay. I do understand. But I think it’s
probably smarter for me to go. Staying the whole week would just make it
worse.”

I knew he was right, but it was a terrible thing to hear him
say. He was leaving. Going back home to his apartment in Minneapolis—where we’d
spent so much time together.

And I somehow knew I would cancel on the seminar and send
for my belongings, so I wouldn’t have to go back again, so I wouldn’t have to
see him and experience everything I’d lost.

“Yes,” I finally murmured. “That makes sense.”

He kissed my temple very gently. “I’ll check on flights this
afternoon. There should be something leaving tomorrow.”

***

The rest of the day passed in a
blur. The hike back. Lunch. Croquet. Tea. Dinner. I managed to make it through
everything, but I was barely aware of what was happening. The ache in my heart
was too consuming to focus on anything else.

When it was finally bedtime, I took a bath and changed into
my nightgown, telling myself it was better this way. Jack had found a flight
for tomorrow morning. After he left, it would get easier. I could remember who
I’d been. I could find a place in my world again. I could be a Rothman, a
princess of Villemont.

I wouldn’t have to be Amalie, hopelessly in love with Jack
Watson.

Maybe I could take art classes online so I wouldn’t have to
give up everything.

It would be okay. I would recover. A month-long fling with my
next door neighbor wasn’t likely to be the only love of my life.

It was okay. I didn’t regret being with Jack for the time
I’d had. Even hurting this way had been worth it.

I would move on. And always look back on these weeks as a
rich, passionate mountain-top experience—too high and too intense to sustain
over the course of a lifetime.

But I couldn’t quite let it go yet. If I was going to say
goodbye to Jack, I wanted to genuinely do so—not leave it to the silent, aching
looks we’d been sharing.

It was dark outside and quiet in the palace when I left my
room and walked down the empty hall until I was standing in front of the door
to his suite.

He was in there, probably in bed. Big and handsome and
strong and warm and funny and clever and
human
.

And after tomorrow, I’d never see him again.

I shook with silent sobs for a moment, letting the truth of
it wash over me.

When I’d recovered my composure, I knocked on his door. Jack
opened it after a minute, wearing nothing but a pair of pajama pants.

There was a silent question on his face.

“I needed to be with you,” I explained, trying to sound
normal and utterly failing. “One more time.”

His face twisted briefly, all the proof I needed that he was
just as torn up about our decision as I was. He pulled me into the room,
glancing down the empty hallway before closing and locking the door.

He took my hand and led me to his rumpled bed.

The lump returned to my throat as I climbed onto it. “Thank
you for everything,” I said, a little stiffly. “These weeks with you have been…amazing.
I’m going to miss you so much.”

“Me too.” The words were almost distant, but I knew he
wasn’t really being cool and standoffish. He felt things so deeply. His
expression might be stoic, but the haunted anguish barely leashed in his eyes
was heartbreaking. I had to turn away from it.

“I’m sorry it has to end this way,” I continued, my voice
breaking once more on the last word. “That we didn’t get any more time.”

The bedroom was filled with a heavy silence as I waited for
Jack’s reply.

For just a moment, I felt a flicker of irrational hope—the
same flicker I'd felt on the bench in the city this afternoon. However
unrealistic an attempt at a relationship between us might be, I knew I would
jump at the chance if Jack made even the slightest signal that he wanted to try
it, if he thought he could deal with all my baggage.

It wasn’t him, though. He let people make their own
decisions. He’d never try to stop them or pressure them otherwise.

He wasn’t going to try to pressure me.

As if in confirmation of this fact, Jack finally said, “I
know. We’re just from two different worlds, like you said.”

I swallowed hard. “Anyway, I hope you know how much this time
has meant to me. I mean, it might be—” I cut myself off as a wave of grief
washed over me. I sucked in a raspy breath and managed to compose myself. “It
might be the best weeks of my life.”

Despite my best efforts, tears stung my eyes, and a couple
even slipped down my cheeks. I swiped them away impatiently.

Jack’s face was suddenly tense, so tense it made me afraid.
He seemed to shudder with some sort of intensity. Then he bit out, “Me too.”

For some reason, his curt response—and everything it implied—proved
my undoing. I started to shake uncontrollably, and my face contorted as I tried
desperately to hold back sobs.

Jack made a gruff sound in his throat and stretched out his
arms in invitation. I moved into them—letting him gather me to his chest, hold
me against him, press kisses into my hair.

I shook against him for a few moments, breathing him in and
trying to take comfort in his warmth and strength. Rather than dwelling on the
fact that this was the last time I’d ever feel him this way.

My sobs eased after a minute, but I didn’t try to pull away.
I just started to kiss his shoulder, then his neck, then his jaw. Until I found
and claimed his mouth.

He opened easily to my kiss, adjusting my body in his lap so
I was straddling his hips and then pressing my upper body against his. The kiss
was slow and deep, and I felt like I was drinking him in. Jack’s hands stroked
over my hair and my back until he finally settled on my bottom.

After a few minutes, I felt him harden against my groin, and
I moaned as I wedged a hand between our bodies to find and squeeze his erection
through the thin fabric of his pajama pants.

Jack grunted against my mouth as I fondled him. My nipples
were erect beneath the cotton of my gown, and they brushed against the hard
lines of Jack’s chest. I squirmed above him, even as I kept reminding myself
that this was goodbye.

“Amalie?” Jack rasped, pulling his mouth away and leaning
his forehead against mine. His breathing was hot and uneven.

“Yes,” I said, intuitively understanding his unspoken
question. “I want to. Once more.”

My emotions were still too close to the surface for me to be
as wet as usual, but I was aroused enough for comfortable penetration. And I
wanted to do this. I wanted to make love to Jack.

One last time.

My nightgown was already bunched up around my hips, so all
we had to do was free Jack’s erection from his pants and push my panties aside.
Jack held himself in place, aligning himself at my entrance, and I lowered
myself, sheathing his hard flesh with my body.

We both moaned at the full penetration. Then I twined my
arms around his neck, and we fell into another kiss, our lips and tongues
clinging and stroking as I started to rock rhythmically in his lap.

He felt so big against and beneath me. So strong. So hot. So
Jack. And, letting my need and the sensations guide my motion, I felt like I
could never get enough of him.

I knew I had to let him go.

“Goodbye,” I mumbled against his mouth, holding him as
tightly as I could and feeling tears aching in my eyes. “Goodbye, Jack.”

He grunted, his fingers digging into the soft flesh of my
bottom. His neck jerked slightly, breaking off the kiss. Then he buried his
face against my neck. “Goodbye,” he said, panting against my skin.

I clung to him desperately as the sensations rose up with my
grief. I clung to him with my arms, my legs, my lips, my everything, and I
tried to hold myself back from climax.

Didn’t want this to end.

It would end. He would leave. Tomorrow, he’d be on his way
to Geneva and back to Minneapolis. Back to his life. It was reality. I could
feel its pull, its inevitability aching in my heart.

My rocking became faster, clumsier as I pressed messy kisses
on the side of his head, on any part of him I could reach.

“Amalie,” Jack said, lifting his face to capture my mouth
again. His voice was thick and hoarse, the sexiest and saddest thing I’d ever
heard. His hips bucked up against my pelvis, and his body grew tighter and
tighter as the frantic motion of our bodies intensified. “Amalie,” he breathed
against my lips.

My head fell back as pleasure welled up inside me,
hopelessly tangled with sorrow. Both spilled over. Tears streamed down my face
as my spine arched involuntarily. “Jack!”

Jack tried to wipe away my tears with his hands and his
lips, but the gesture caused me to shake even more helplessly.

I was crying now. And about to come. And the clash of the
feelings was terrifying and powerful and the truest embodiment of my conflicted
heart.

Jack kissed me one more time with clumsy, unfocused passion.
Tremors had started to run through his body as he tried to rein in his release.

Then I came, sobbing, clutching him, riding out the waves of
pleasure as his control broke beneath me and he fell into climax too.

We gasped and slumped together against the pillows, holding
each other in an urgent grip that softened as our bodies relaxed.

Neither of us spoke for several minutes.

When I glanced at the clock again, I knew I needed to get
back to my room before anyone saw me here. It would lead to one more argument I
simply didn’t have strength for.

I shifted on top of him, and Jack immediately loosened his
embrace.

“You can sleep here with me tonight, if you want,” he said
softly, his voice still a little hoarse.

“No. I better not.” I felt another lump in my throat, so I
swallowed hard and rubbed at the tear streaks on my cheeks.

Jack just nodded, his eyes lingering on my face.

I managed to get off the bed and smooth out my nightgown.
Then I went to my own room and cleaned myself up a little. But I didn’t take a
shower. I didn’t want to wash Jack from my body.

I wanted to feel him on my skin for as long as I could.

The next morning, when I went
downstairs at my normal time, my mother wasn’t in the breakfast room. Her absence
was so strange that I simply stood in the doorway and stared at her empty seat
for a long moment.

My head was even fuzzier and more aching than it had been
the morning before. I’d gotten almost no sleep, and I’d cried most of the time.

“She had a headache last night,” a voice came from the
direction of the sideboard. “She’s probably sleeping in.”

I turned my head to see Victoria, looking pale and pretty
and sober, her plate full of fruit and bacon. I hadn’t seen my sister hardly at
all the day before, except at a distance during lunch and croquet. She hadn’t
said a word to me.

“Oh.”

“You look terrible,” Victoria added, scanning me from head
to toe.

“I feel terrible.”

“I thought you were blissfully happy. Isn’t that why you
turned your back on us?”

“I didn’t—” I cut off the words, partly because I knew they
were futile and partly because my throat was closing up. I’d gotten too little
sleep and had been bombarded with too much emotion. I might cry at any moment.

Victoria took my halted comment as if I’d actually said the
words. “That’s what it feels like,” she murmured, turning around to pour
herself a glass of milk. She’d always had strange eating habits—at least as far
as I was concerned. She never drank coffee or tea, and she drank milk with
every meal, even at fancy dinners when everyone else was drinking wine.

It had never fazed her a bit—the idea that other people
would think she was strange. I suddenly envied her, wishing I could be the same
way, brush off other people’s opinions like they were nothing but lint on my
sleeve.

“I’m sorry it feels that way,” I said at last. “I truly am.
But I’m doing the best I can. I’ve ended things with Jack because I couldn’t
give you all up.” My voice cracked as I said the words, as I made them really
real
.

Victoria gave me a quick, searching look. “You have?”

“Yes. Are you happy now?”

“No, I’m not happy. You obviously aren’t, and I still have
to marry Edward.”

“You do not have to marry him. They can’t force you,
Victoria. Just tell them you won’t.”

“I don’t believe you understand the state of our finances.
Someone needs to do something.”

“There are other options—”

“No. It’s a done deal. I spoke to Edward yesterday, and the
decision is made.”

“Victoria—” My eyes were filled with tears now—for my
sister, not for me.

“It will be fine,” she said mildly. “We can live separate
lives. Since he barely speaks to me, it’s not like he’s going to be constantly
bothering me. Someone had to do something. It’s not the end of the world.”

“I never wanted that for you,” I said at last, pulling
myself together.

“What kind of world do you think we live in? Since when has
anyone gotten everything they want?”

They didn’t. I knew that was true, as well as I knew
anything. Happiness was always negotiated by making the best of what was
offered.

“I want you to be happy,” I told her.

“I will be. I think I will be. Doing things to help my
family makes me happy.”

“There’s a difference between doing things to help them and
letting them force you into something that’s not right.”

“Who’s to say what’s right? This feels right to me.”

“Okay. I don’t agree with it, but I’ll accept it, if you
mean that. So maybe you can understand how what feels right to me might not
look like what you want it to.”

“I thought you said you broke up with Jack.”

“I did.” I closed my eyes for a moment against the pain. “I
did. He wanted me to give you all up, give up my identity almost completely,
and I just couldn’t do that. But nothing else has changed. I’m still not sure
the life that’s best for me is the one where I stay home and let Mother make
decisions for me.”

Victoria’s expression had changed. She didn’t look quite so
cold, as if something I’d said had truly struck home for her. “What will you
do?”

“I don’t know. I want to keep taking classes in art
history—get a graduate degree. I’m going to figure out a way to make that happen,
one way or another.”

“Maybe you can.” Victoria paused, still standing near the
sideboard and holding her untouched plate. “He truly wanted you to give up your
family? I thought he seemed…different than that.”

“I don’t know. He said he didn’t want me to do that. But he
wanted nothing to do with you all—and nothing to do with Villemont or my
position here. I don’t see how a relationship could work if one of us closes
such an important part of the other’s life out.” As I spoke, a few tears
streamed down my face, the acknowledgement that no matter how hard it had been,
I’d made the right decision.

It might work in melodramatic novels and movies. It might
even feel romantic. But my life, my identity, my history, my family was just as
important as his was. It had just as much value. And he didn’t seem to
understand that.

“It couldn’t,” Victoria said softly. Then, without warning,
she put her plate on the table and started out of the room. Before she left,
she touched my arm very lightly. “I’m sorry. I could see how you felt about
him. But you need a man who loves
all
of you, one who will make
sacrifices for
you
—not expect you to make them for him.”

I shook with silent sobs as my sister walked out of the
room—feeling better and broken at the very same time. Before I could recover,
someone else came into the room. I was blinded by tears but could make out
Jack’s big body and broad shoulders.

Then I felt him, as he pulled me into his arms.

I cried against him, even though he couldn’t possibly know
what was the matter with me.

“I’m sorry,” I choked out, after a minute. “I feel like I’m
falling apart. It’s just that Victoria—”

“I know. I overheard.”

I cried again at the knowledge that he’d heard what we’d
said and he must have been hurt by it.

I didn’t want him to be hurt.

I was finally pulling myself together and wiping away my
tears when Jack said, “Amalie.”

His arms were still around me, and I looked up at him,
seeing a deep emotion twisting on his face. “Jack?”

Before he could get any more words out, someone else entered
the breakfast room.

“Good morning, Amalie,” my mother said. “Young man, would
you please remove your hands from my daughter?”

Jack blinked in surprise. “I was just—”

“I don’t care what you were doing,” she continued in a
clipped tone. “This is a public room.”

“Stop it,” I burst out. “Just stop it! He wasn’t doing
anything inappropriate. I was upset, and he was comforting me.”

Both Jack and my mother looked surprised by my tone.

“This is a public roo—” my mother began.

I didn’t let her finish the sentence. “I don’t care if it’s
a public room. I don’t care if we’re on the royal balcony and the whole of
Villemont can see us. You don’t get to dictate what he does.”

“I’m not—”

“Yes, you are. Exactly as you try to dictate my life. And
it’s just wrong, Mother. It’s just wrong. I love you. And I love Father and
Henry and Victoria and Lisette. And I love Villemont, and I want to play a part
in public life here. But you’re backing me into a corner because other things
are important to me too. I’m going to go to graduate school and study art
history, and you can’t stop me from that. And you can’t stop me from loving
Jack if I want. And if you keep it up, you’re going to push me away, when I
know that’s the last thing you want.”

My mother looked absolutely stunned. “You’ve never spoken to
me like this before.”

“I know,” I said, in a milder tone, wiping away a few stray
tears. “I’m sorry if it’s rude, but I just can’t go on this way. There has to
be some way for me to be part of this family and for me to still be…
me
.”

“You’re a princess. You aren’t just a regular girl.”

“Then there has to be some way for me to be both.”

Jack was standing silently beside me, and I had no idea what
was going on in his mind. And I realized it didn’t matter if he thought I was
crazy, or if he was leaving me in an hour, or if my mother thought I had staged
a revolt.

I’d finally done the right thing.

“Life is never as simple as that,” my mother murmured, not
quite as bold and polished as normal. “Not for a Rothman.”

“I understand that,” I replied, “but some things are simpler
than we think.”

I felt like I was on the verge of breaking down, and there
was really nothing else to say. My mother had gone to get her coffee and was
clearly starting to pretend the entire conversation had never happened.

I’d never gotten my coffee. Or my breakfast. Or even sat
down. But I turned around and left the room anyway.

I was too flustered to wait for Jack, to talk to him, to
even see what he would do now, to do anything but hurry down the hall to give
myself space to think.

I nearly ran into my father and Edward Farmingham Channing
IV. I had no idea what the younger man was doing here so early, but I assumed
it had something to do with negotiating the terms of his marriage to Victoria.

My near collision flustered me even more. I gaped up at my
father.

“The Guard is getting ready to strut,” my father said, not
responding at all to my state of mind, which must be obvious by my expression.
“Come watch with us.”

Each week, the Royal Guard did an elaborate processional—compete
with drums and pipes—mostly for tourists. But my father made a point of
watching at least once a month, as a show of his appreciate for the Guard.

I’d intended to invite Jack to watch the “strut,” as my
father had always called it, but I’d forgotten all about it in the face of
everything else.

Unable to speak through my emotion, I just walked with my
father and Edward to the side door where we took our places on a well-guarded
platform, where we could have a good view of the proceedings. The courtyard was
full of tourists, and the Guard began as soon as my father gave a wave of his
hand.

I stood on the platform and tried not to cry. I should have
just gone to my room. Now I was trapped, and I had to pretend to smile and wave
at the observers.

I hoped Jack was all right. I’d left him all alone with my
mother.

“Amalie!”

The familiar voice bellowed out over the noise from the
procession, and I knew at once who it was, even before I turned to see Jack
hurrying down the front steps of the palace.

The row of marching guards was in between me and Jack, so he
had to stop, even when he saw me.

“Amalie!” he called again, something intense on his face
that I could see even across the distance and the commotion.

I made a funny little noise in my throat as I saw him try to
get through the procession. I could even see him muttering something in
frustration. Maybe, “Damn it. What the hell is going on?”

“Your young man seems to have something to say to you,” my
father said, perfectly calm as he always was, with just the slightest note of
amusement in his tone.

“He’s…he’s…” There was no way I could finish the sentence.
Deep emotion ached, rose in my chest as I watched Jack try to get around the
Guards to reach me.

“He looks like he might explode at any moment,” Edward
murmured.

I could barely even register surprise that Edward had
spoken, had noticed someone else, because I couldn’t look away from Jack. He
did look like he was going to explode with some sort powerful urgency that
compelled him.

Finally, he made a wordless sound so loud I could hear it
from the platform and pushed his way through the row of guards. All of the
gathered tourists were staring at him, but he didn’t appear aware of them at
all.

He strode toward me and had almost reached the steps to the
platform when he was stopped by the extended swords of two guards who were
positioned in front of my father.

For a moment, I thought Jack would actually try to fight the
guards, but my father said mildly, “Let him through,” and the guards returned
their swords to their upright, ceremonial position.

I stared at Jack dazedly as he approached me. He reached to
take both of my hands. “Amalie,” he said hoarsely. “Baby, please don’t do
anything stupid. I know I’ve been selfish and close-minded and that you’re
really upset about everything, but you can’t marry this asshole. You
can’t
.”

My mouth dropped open, and my eyes moved briefly to Edward,
who was blinking in surprise.

I opened my mouth to speak, but no words came out.

“I’m not going to marry her,” Edward said after a minute,
when I still couldn’t speak and it looked like Jack might just drag me away.
“I’m going to marry Victoria, and I’d never marry a woman who was in love with
someone else.”

It was Jack’s turn to blink. He looked from me to Edward and
then to me again. “Oh. Good. I’d thought so, but then I saw Amalie up here, and
I thought…I was afraid…” He trailed off. “You’re not going to marry him?”

“Of course not,” I rasped, my hands trembling in his. “But I
thought you didn’t believe in applying pressure.”

“I don’t.”

“You just made a huge scene in front of all these people. You
called Edward an asshole. You called me baby in front of my father. This feels
like pressure.”

Jack’s mouth twisted slightly. “Well, maybe I’m desperate
enough to apply a
little
pressure. But only when absolutely necessary.”
He glanced over at my father self-consciously. “Can we talk somewhere else?”

I was too confused and excited and thrilling with something
like hope to be of much help in this situation. But my father looked like he
was trying not to laugh. “I think you’d better, young man.”