Royal Bastard (Instantly Royal 1)

She gave him a sympathetic smile. “Don’t get caught up on fault. Think about outcomes. Is this the one you wanted?”

“Absolutely. I never wanted to be on that dreary island in the first place.”

“Funny way of showing it by getting on an airplane and going there,” Mrs. Damerschmidt said, sarcasm dripping off each word.

“She wore me down.” All those texts. The emails. The sheer determination to get her way.

The older woman nodded knowingly. “A good woman will do that until you see the truth.”

“And what truth is that?” This was getting ridiculous.

“You tell me.”

The truth? All he knew now was that everyone had secrets. His grandfather had kept his locked away in a room with old letters and photos of a family he’d torn apart. Brooke? She’d had hers, too. She wanted to repay Bowhaven for coming to her rescue when she’d been at her lowest by doing whatever it took to save the village—even if that meant convincing a stubborn American to get on a plane to England. Discovering his mom’s secret had left him raw. The woman in the letters loved him, he never doubted that, but she’d hid the truth about his father, about what happened. He was the only one without any secrets. He was who he was. A man alone and who was absolutely 100 percent okay with that. He didn’t need a family. Or a village. Or Brooke. He would be just fine on his own as always.

He opened his mouth to tell Mrs. Damerschmidt exactly that, but it wasn’t what came out. Instead, it was his own secret that he’d kept from himself.

“That I was looking for home,” he said, the words coming out like a revelation he’d known in his gut all along. “That I was looking for people who would love me. That I was looking for a place where I’d be wanted.”

“Sounds to me like you found it, too. And on top of that, you found someone who loves you like my Jerry loves me…like I love him.” She held up her left hand and the tiny sliver of a diamond shone in the light from the small overhead bulb. “Forty years.” She patted him on the shoulder. “Falling in love is a horrible thing to have happen to a person. It’s ugly and scary and it makes you want to run a

s fast as your feet will take you some days. But it’s worth it—if you have the balls to go out and claim it.” She tapped a finger on the dog collar spread out on his tray table. “Even Rufus knew that.”

He swiped the collar off his table and stuffed it into his pocket. “You’re wrong.”

She had to be. Otherwise he’d made one of those I’ve-wrecked-everything mistakes his grandfather had told him about. The old man couldn’t be right. Not about this.

Mrs. Damerschmidt turned in her seat to face front. “Keep telling yourself that fairy tale and maybe you’ll start to believe it.”

Nick kept his mouth shut. A voice over the intercom announced his flight back to America was about to board. He should be standing up, getting his carry-on bag, and prepping for boarding. Instead, he was sitting there feeling a little like a man who’d just been sucker punched by the sinking realization that the older woman was right. The dog collar poked him in the thigh. It didn’t really fit in his pocket, but he couldn’t stand to look at it another second. Stupid thing would probably never work anyway. Mrs. Damerschmidt was probably right—even pooches knew when love was right in front of their snouts. He tried to imagine how the sound of Brooke’s voice could be even half as good as having her with him. It didn’t even come close. Realization sank into him, making his bones heavy with certainty.

Canine or human, we know love when we know it. Even jerks like Nick Vane.

Nick started in his seat. “I’ve gotta get back to Bowhaven.”

Mrs. Damerschmidt cracked her eyes open and grinned at him. “That’s my boy. Go get her back.”

…

Turned out Brooke’s naked bum didn’t have to wait until the next week for national exposure. Thanks to the beauty of the internet, her arse was available in 300-dpi online by teatime two days later. Some twat had even giffed it so that all the photos flowed together in one twenty-second video.

“Brilliant,” she muttered to herself as she placed her mobile down on the pub’s bar so she didn’t fling it across the room. “Just bloody brilliant.”

“Problems, poppet?” her dad asked, setting a perfectly brewed cup of tea in front of her like manna from heaven.

“A multitude.” All of which were not suitable for discussion with one’s father, especially not at the Fox when half the village was here toasting their newfound fame as a filming location. Luckily they were all too busy chatting amongst themselves to pay attention to her and her dad for the moment.

Her dad took off his glasses and used the hem of his shirt to rub the already clean lenses. “Is it about Nick?”

Was it about Nick? Yes. No. Maybe. Absolutely, because if she hadn’t fallen in love with the man child, then she wouldn’t have forgotten to close the window curtains and the pervy photographer wouldn’t have been able to get a shot of her shagging her boss’s son.

“What makes you think it would be him?” The question didn’t sound convincing even to her own ears.

Phillip put on his glasses, which now had a visible smear on the right lens, and poured his own cup of tea. “Because I have eyes and a brain and I know my girl.”

“Then you know she can’t get anything right.”

“I don’t know anything of the kind.”