“Political immunity doesn’t mean you have to cause trouble in every country you visit, Xander.”
“I do what needs to be done, Simon,” Xander boomed.
“Forgive my impertinence, Your Highness. Of course, you’ll have the information by tonight. I am merely suggesting that, due to your father’s health issues, you may want to stay out of the news.”
“My father is as healthy as a horse and as sly as a fox. He’ll probably outlive us all. He saw my thirtieth birthday approaching and thought I had forgotten my duty and the importance of it. I have not. I will return home with my future queen, Simon. Just as our laws demand.”
“She can’t know anything until you have her here. And you’ll have to be smart about how you take her. The world has changed since your father kidnapped his choice. There were no cell phones back then. No Internet. Don’t let the side project you mentioned bring suspicion upon you when she disappears. That is, if she is your choice.”
“She is,” Xander said without hesitation. He remembered how her brown eyes had flashed at him with defiance and how sweetly she had submitted to his kiss. If she was indeed a virgin, she was more than he’d hoped for — truly a unicorn in the modern world. His blood began to pound as he remembered how she’d felt pressed against him. Bedding her would not be a chore.
The idea of abducting his future queen and winning her heart was still unavoidable but now had become quite exciting. Previously, his feelings on the subject had been irrelevant.
Reanna Fielding’s time in the United States was about to come to an end.
Chapter Two
The alarm near Reanna’s bed went off. She hit the snooze button without opening an eye. She didn’t want to wake up from her dream yet.
She was standing confidently beside Xander. Her hair was loose and in perfect waves cascading over her shoulders. No lab coat today. She was in a simple black dress that fit her like a second skin, and because it was a dream, she didn’t feel self-conscious. She also didn’t teeter on the four-inch heels.
She had tried to wear something similar once to a work-related awards ceremony. She couldn’t remember which award she had won, but with painful clarity she could remember everything about how uncomfortable she had been that night. Her dress had crept up and down like a creature who had taken on a life of its own, requiring constant adjustment. The heels she had chosen that evening were the reason she’d tripped on the rug and gained a round of laughter instead of applause from her peers.
Forget about them, she told herself. This is a dream. And in a dream anything is possible — even Xander.
In her light sleep state, she rolled over and sighed as she imagined Xander’s eyebrows rising with admiration as she made one witty remark after the next. She leaned in, fluttered her eyelashes at him, and her insides soared when he leaned in and said, “You’re beautiful.”
“Thank you,” she said and sneaked another look at him.
“I’ve never felt this way about any woman.” He pulled her into his arms.
“You don’t have to say that,” she said lightly, amused but retaining her sophistication.
He took her face between his two hands and brought his lips so close to hers she could feel the heat of his breath as he spoke. “I mean it. I’ve never wanted any woman the way I want you.”
Reanna licked her bottom lip in anticipation. She put both of her hands behind his neck to pull him closer . . . closer . . .
Her alarm went off again. She made an unhappy, frustrated sound deep in her throat and slammed her hand down on the snooze button. Instead of giving her a reprieve, it changed its tune and mercilessly rang again and again. She hit it then threw it across the floor, still ringing, but now with two distinctly different tones.
Oh, crap. My phone.
She answered her cell phone and scrambled from her bed to silence her alarm. “Hello,” she said and then tripped over the edge of her blanket and hit the floor with a painful slide. “Shit.”
“Reanna? Are you okay? What’s going on over there?” her friend Kendra asked in a concerned rush.
Her alarm continued, taunting her. In final desperation, she opened the back and removed the batteries. “Nothing. I’m fine.”
“I’m coming over. You are not spending your birthday alone.”
“No, please don’t. I have to go to Hartford today to pick up some files. I won’t be home most of the day.”
“I miss you,” Kendra said with the sigh, “and I’m worried about you. I don’t understand why you don’t come back to work and just tell those assholes off. Or go to human resources. I’ll go with you. You don’t have to hide in your house. Don’t let them win.”
Reanna stood up and adjusted her nightgown. “You don’t understand, Kendra. I don’t care about them, any of them. I care about this project. I have been able to get more work done here in my lab at home than I ever could have there with all of the distractions.”
“I want to believe you. I just picture you all alone at your house every day. It’s not good for you, Reanna. You avoid people enough as it is.”
“I’m not alone in my house all day. I work alone here just like I worked at Biostern. Then I go out.”
“Really? Where do you go?”
“I go to the bookstore every day for lunch.”
“Sitting by yourself in the back of the bookstore doesn’t count as getting out. You have to go someplace where you can meet people.”
“Is this where you tell me it’s not healthy for a woman my age not to be dating? Kendra, I don’t have a mother, and I don’t need one.” Reanna regretted the words as soon as they left her mouth. Kendra was the closest thing to family Reanna had ever had.
Kendra was quiet for a moment, then continued on, sounding more determined. “This isn’t about dating. I am not letting my best friend become a hermit again. Do you remember what happened in postgrad school? You stopped answering everyone’s phone calls, even mine. And then you started having your groceries delivered. I know why you hide, Ree. It’s me, Kendra. We’ve been friends since your first foster placement. I know exactly how many people have disappointed you. You deserve better than you’ve had. I’m not giving up on you — ever. I don’t care how many times you push me away. I just wish I knew how to get you to fight for what you want.”
Reanna shuffled with her phone to her small kitchenette and started brewing coffee. She didn’t want to think about her past or her situation at Biostern. She was also uncomfortable with displays of emotion. But she understood Kendra was sincerely worried about her. “You know I love you, Kendra, but I’m not you. I have to figure this out in my own way. I can’t confront them. It would be my word against theirs. I won’t put myself in that position again.”
“You’re not a child anymore, Reanna. You would win this time.”
“Maybe.”
“Reanna . . .”
Reanna poured her coffee and decided it was time to change the subject. “Did I tell you I met a man at the bookstore?”
“What? When?”
“Yesterday.”
“I would only know about him if you had answered my phone call last night. I’ll let that go for now, though, because I really want to hear this story.”
Reanna sipped her hot, black coffee and took a moment to remember him before answering. “He was genetically intriguing, an unexpected composite of features that complemented each other in an aesthetically pleasing way.”
Kendra chuckled. “In other words, he was hot.”
Closing her eyes for a moment, Reanna let the Xander of her dreams blend with the man she had met at the bookstore, and she let out a long yearning sigh. “Oh, yes.”
“Did you talk to him?”
Reanna opened her eyes and blurted, “I kissed him.”
“Holy shit. You kissed a man yesterday in a public place? Where is my friend, Reanna, and what have you done with her?”
Reanna leaned against the kitchen counter with a huge smile spreading across her
face. “I told you not to worry about me. Just because I’m working from home doesn’t mean I’m going back to how I was in college. I don’t want to be that person again either.”
“Oh, Reanna, I am so freaking happy for you. You have to tell me everything. Do you have time to get together for breakfast this morning?”
“No, I really do have to drive down to Hartford. But maybe tomorrow morning?”
