Princess Wanted - The Complete Book Set: An Alpha Billionaire Prince Trilogy (6 page)

“You seem pretty sure of yourself.”

“I’m right, aren’t I.” It wasn’t even a question.

Jody pondered. She did not want to back down, and for all Chris’s confidence, if she insisted that she had a boyfriend there was no way he could prove otherwise. And there was always Pete. It seemed rude to use him that way, but then again she hadn’t definitely said no to him yet.

“There’s a man who’s interested in me.”

“I’m sure there are quite a few.”

“There’s a particular man who’s interested in me.”

“By my count that makes two of us,” said Chris. “You could at least give me an equal chance.”

Jody walked on.

Chapter Three - Texas

“D
ad, you’re not listening!” Chris insisted down the phone. “I’ve never seen a horse like this. I did some research and this girl’s Uncle is Syrus Crane!”

“Is that name supposed to mean something to me?” Most men who owned three hundred horses take more than a passing interest in the subject, but for Chris’s father, the stable had sort of come with the job. There are more and weightier things for a King to concern himself with than who leads the world in race-winning horses, and if there aren’t then he’s really not much of a King to start with.

“Syrus Crane!” Chris repeated, as if doing so would make a difference. “I’m pretty sure this Silmarillion is descended from Sagebrush and Desert Flower.”

“Are you coming home?” asked the King.

“Yes,” Chris enthused. “And I’m bringing the horse with me!”

“Please don’t” his father implored. “Three hundred is enough.”

“This one horse is worth three hundred.”

“Not to me, it’s not.”

“If I get this horse,” Chris played his trump card, “I’ll be able to pay back my debts.”

There was a pause from the other end of the line before the King spoke again. “How do you intend to get it?”

“The girl likes me. I’ll take it from there.”

“Christof,” there was no mistaking the stern tone of fatherly remonstration, “come home. I am telling you now that what you seem to be suggesting… no good comes of toying with a girl’s emotions.”

“It’ll be fine.”

“Don’t make me fetch your mother.”

“I just need a bit of money to get me to Texas,” Chris ignored the threat.

“Why?”

“Because that’s where the horse is.”

“I mean, why do you need money from me? You have money of your own.” The dark tone in which these words were spoken made it clear that the King knew very well why his son needed money, but wanted to hear Chris say it.

“I lost a little bit of it,” Chris admitted.

“A little bit?”

“Just a little bit.”

“How much is a ticket to Texas?” the king enquired.

“Not that much.”

“And yet you do not have enough money to get there, despite having only lost a little bit?”

Chris sighed – he had walked into that one. “Maybe a little more than a little.”

“How much, Christof?”

Chris drew in a deep breath. “A hundred seventy five thousand US dollars.”

“How much is that?” the King preferred to work in his country’s own currency.

Chris told him.

“How much?!” his father’s yell nearly deafened Chris. “Christof, get yourself back here immediately. Now. On the next plane.”

Chris shrugged. “I can’t afford a ticket.”

Chris could easily picture the restrained rage in his father’s face. “I will send mo… I will send a ticket. You can pick it up at airport check-in. But get back here.”

That, Chris thought as he hung up the phone, was typical of the man: to not even trust Chris to buy his own ticket! That was, more than anything else, what was missing in their relationship: trust. And no relationship can thrive without trust. Someone has to make the first move and offer that trust unconditionally, and it struck Chris as very sad that his father would not be the bigger man. He picked up his ticket at the airport and traded it in for an internal flight to Texas, still bemoaning the sad lack of trust between his father and himself.

There was, Jody had to admit as she stared out across the paddock, something about Pete. For starters, from the Stetson on his head to the tips of his boots, Pete was a factory-assembled ‘Horseman’. But there was more: there was the jawline that seemed to have been chiseled from granite, the chest too broad to be contained by any shirt (he lost at least two buttons a day), and as he bent over to pick up a bale of hay, Jody could not stop her gaze from lingering longer than she would have liked. Yes, there was
definitely
something about Pete. In fact there were a whole lot of things about Pete, many of which were fun for a girl to watch. Which explained why Jody was far from alone in leaning on the paddock fence as Pete went about his daily chores - virtually every woman who worked at the Crane Stables seemed to have wandered by at just the right time. Many of them were probably too old for Pete, some of them were certainly too young, and more than a few were far too married. But there were also more than a couple who probably fancied their chances with Pete. Good looking girls too, and girls who would have happily garroted Jody had they know that the object of their adoration had asked her out. They would also have told her that she needed her head examining for not saying ‘yes’ before he had even finished asking the question.

They might have had a point. At times like this, simply watching the man at work, Jody was hard pushed to come up with a reason to say ‘no’, or indeed pause before saying yes. And she had not paused, she had said ‘let me think about it’. Think about what? Surely the fact that she was here staring said something. Of course, Jody drew a line between herself and the other assembled gawkers: she had actual reason to be here, she was here for work. The fact that she ended up watching Pete was mere coincidence (and a bit of perk, she had to admit). She was not the fully paid-up member of the Society of Pete Worshippers that all the others were. But right now, as Pete bent over again, she was struggling to understand why she wasn’t. Had it been a purely physical attraction then perhaps she could have taken the high road, but alongside his overwhelming masculinity their nestled a soft-spoken, ‘aww shucks’ demeanor that made Pete also one of the sweetest guys Jody had ever met: kind to animals, good with children, modest, polite and respectful to women. Never mind being a blueprint for the perfect horseman, he was a blueprint for the perfect man.

And yet there was something else about Pete. Something that Jody daily tried to put her finger on. She could never do it of course. The reasons to go out with Pete were right there: impossible to miss. The reasons not to, however, were nebulous and uncertain, based more on gut instinct than anything definite.

Maybe it wasn’t him; maybe it was her. Maybe she did not like the idea of being the same as all the other girls, drooling over the big, manly man. Maybe she wanted to get to know him better, he had only been at the Stables for a month. Maybe she had met someone else whom she could not get out of her head…

Maybe. But deep down she thought not. There was
something
about Pete. She wished that she knew what it was.

“Hiya Jody.”

It was later that day, evening closing in, when Pete caught up to her, touching his hat in respectful greeting and shooting her that shy but winning smile.

“Hi Pete.” He really was a very attractive man, and yet that something still niggled at Jody. She felt it all the more so when it was just them, one on one, as if there was something right in front of her that she could not see.

“I was wondering if you’d given any more thought to…” He shuffled his feet. “You know.”

Jody nodded. And when suddenly presented with him it seemed so ridiculous. He was a breathlessly nice man, the sort of man every girl wants. She should have been counting her blessings and here she was making up imaginary objections.

“A drink might be nice.”

The look on Pete’s face was enough to convince Jody that she had done the right thing – he looked so happy, like he thought he was the luckiest man on earth. That was quite a way for a man to look at you.

“Tomorrow night?”

“Suits me.”

Pete grinned. “We’re gonna have the best time. I promise.”

There was an awkward moment as neither seemed to know quite how to end this pre-date skirmish.

Finally Pete said, “Well… I’ll see you tomorrow.”

Now she had actually bitten the bullet, Jody felt pretty good about the decision but there was still a knot on uncertainty in her stomach and a little voice in her head that screamed, ‘You idiot! What did I tell you!’. Maybe that was just nerves, but she still felt the need to talk things over and, fortunately, she knew the best listener in the world.

Behind the main stables the ground gave way to a steep slope, at the bottom of which a stream ran. It was here, in a little paddock with a few older horses for company, that Catcher lived. He came as soon as Jody called and eagerly bit into the apple she had brought him.

“What do you think?”

Catcher looked up from his apple.

“I’ve got to at least give him a chance haven’t I?”

Catcher shook his mane.

“I mean, if I don’t do that then I’ll never even know. And if it feels wrong then it’s not like there has to be a second date.”

Catcher seemed to agree.

“Everyone – or pretty much everyone – deserves the first date don’t they? Everyone deserves a chance.”

Catcher whinnied.

“That’s good advice.”

Jody spun around. The man’s voice had come from behind her and she now saw a figure walking down the slope towards her, indistinct in the gathering gloom. The figure slipped, falling on its behind and sliding few feet before coming to a halt.

“You Majesty,” said Jody, unable to suppress a smile.

“Highness actually,” said Chris, as he got back to his feet. “How did you know it was me?”

“You have an unmistakably regal bearing when you fall on your ass.”

Chris marshalled what dignity he could. “It takes years to learn, you know.”

“How did you get in here?”

“We’re outside.”

“I mean into my Uncle’s property.”

Chris shrugged. “Nobody stopped me.”

One of the things about being royalty is that you get used to going where you please, and so Princes walk with total confidence wherever they go. It is surprising (and slightly terrifying) how far that attitude will allow a person to get before someone finally says ‘Do you have any id?’

“Why are you here?” Jody asked.

“Well,” Chris said expansively, “we left things a bit up in the air concerning our potential future so I thought I’d better follow up. Nice to hear that you’ve made the decision in my favor – I assume it was me you were talking about.”

“It was not,” said Jody.

“And yet,” Chris continued undeterred, “the same questions might apply to our situation. So I’ll call it a win. Who’s this?”

“This is Catcher.”

“He’s of the bloodline.”

Which was true of course, but Jody made a mental note that Chris was not the expert she had thought if he put Catcher in the same league as Silmarillion.

“Not a racer,” Chris continued, disproving Jody’s judgement on the instant. “Just a nice horse.”

Jody shook her head. “I really can’t tell the difference between when you’re sincere and when you’re bull-shitting me.”

“I’m always sincere.”

“That you are definitely not.”

Chris acknowledged this. “Okay, fair enough. But I do like the horse.”

“He seems to like you.”

Catcher was always a bit nervous around people other than Jody, perhaps a result of being forever the odd one out, but with Chris he seemed entirely comfortable.

“Maybe he recognizes a kindred spirit,” said Chris. “I know what it’s like to be the runt of the litter.”

“Now that was sincere.”

They stood for a long moment, both with their hands in Catcher’s mane, until, for a split-second, their fingers touched and Jody pulled away. She was surprised to see that Chris had done the same. For someone who was trying so hard, and with such arrogant confidence, to get her to go out with him, he seemed as nervous as she was.

But this was no time for dishonesty. “I’m seeing someone.”

“Oh.”

Jody looked quizzically at Chris. “No sharp comeback?”

“This time you were telling the truth.”

“How do you know?”

“Practice.”

“You ask out a lot of women with boyfriends?”

Chris seemed to consider the question, or his answer, or perhaps just whether or not to lie.

“Yes,” he finally admitted.

“And when they say ‘I’m seeing someone’, you back off immediately?”

“Almost never.”

It seemed almost as if proximity to Catcher was acting like a truth serum on Chris. “But with me…” Jody began.

“You’re different.”

Suddenly Chris seemed to snap out of a trance, looking up and about him and then back at Jody.

“I should go.”

“You don’t have to.” And Jody could not believe what she had just said. She did
not
make dates with two different men within an hour. Although they were just ‘dates’, nobody had used the word ‘exclusive’ and… She shook the wicked thoughts out of her head. That was no way to treat a nice guy like Pete.

“No, I should.” Chris seemed to be battling with inner demons of his own. “I’ll… It was nice meeting you.”

He walked briskly back up the hill slipping as he went.

Jody watched until he was out of view.