Epilogue
Duncan
“My daughter told me to dance with you,” I say to Lorelei.
She turns, and I swear, my breath catches like I’m an impossible teenager.
I’m not.
Seventy is approaching at an equally impossible rate, but looking at Lorelei makes me feel years younger. Decades.
Like a teenager.
I’m used to seeing Lorelei in her austere suits, all in shades of grey, blue and basic black. Blouses buttoned to her chin, skirts a regulated two inches below her knees, always with horrible nylons, like she’s wearing a military uniform.
She’s a beautiful woman when she’s dressed for work at the castle. But when she’s not?
Stunning.
Thick dark brown hair peppered with grey, cascading past her shoulders instead of caught up in a no-nonsense bun. Pale blue eyes outlined and mascaraed. Lips slick with a shiny gloss instead of the pale pink she favoured in the castle.
Beautiful. And all mine.
Maybe.
“The daughter who is currently enjoying a very public display of affection?” Lorelei asks with a twist of her lips. Those lips…
I should not be feeling this way about this woman now.
But I have been. For a long time.
I’m distracted by a quick glance behind me, where Sophie is currently in the midst of a kiss with Ashton Carrington. Not only are they kissing in the middle of the dancefloor during the Sea Queen Ball, but he’s holding her. Cradled in his arms like some kind of baby, or pet cat.
Sophie is neither, and—
It is cute, though, considering the broken toes.
That Ashton caused.
Not really, if Sophie’s theory is correct and he never even hit her in the first place.
“Thank you for calling it a PDA,” I tell Lorelei, offering her my hand. “Saying they’re making out in front of everyone makes me a little queasy.”
Lorelei smiles. “Such a father. Does this mean they’re taking their relationship public?”
The queasiness is sticking around. “I wasn’t aware they had a relationship.”
“They spend all day together, every day. What do you call it, Duncan?”
“A nuisance?”
Lorelei laughs, and the sound of it makes the sight of Sophie and Ashton doing… whatever it is they’re doing… almost worth it.
I’ve known Lorelei Theissen since she first came to work at the castle, too long ago to count the years. I was intrigued from the start, but it took six long months for me to even win a smile from her.
Lorelei was grieving the double loss of her husband from cancer and leaving her son and daughter behind in boarding school in England. Magnus had insisted she bring them with her to Laandia, but she hadn’t wanted to disrupt their lives any more than they already had been.
I had been grieving myself—not my marriage, but being estranged from my daughters.
Ex-wife Signe had done her best to fill Stella and Sophie with poisonous thoughts, to an extent I hadn’t been aware of until years later.
Plus, Spencer was also in boarding school abroad, so I thought I could commiserate with Lorelei about missing our children.
I thought wrong.
She wanted nothing to do with me, other than a polite, we-both-work-for-the-king-of-Laandia association.
That was a new one for me.
I’ve always been told I was good-looking, and sixty-seven romance novel covers have proven it. Plus, any record covers from the band always had my face front and centre, despite Magnus being the frontman.
It wasn’t until I came to work for Magnus as his advisor that I came to be seen as more than a pretty face.
I think that’s why I have a problem with Ashton Carrington. Other than the fact that there’s a high potential of his breaking Sophie’s heart, that is. Ashton reminds me of myself, and how I used to skate by on my looks.
Ashton has his father’s money to fall back on as well, which I never had.
But I have spent enough time dwelling on Ashton, and the time he is spending with my daughter. Sophie is a grown woman, responsible and independent. She’s smart, she’s capable, she can handle a man like Ashton Carrington.
A quick peek over my shoulder tells me they are still kissing.
She looks like her mother, and I wish she didn’t.
I groan. “Please dance with me and save me from watching that.”
“Do you really think it’s a good idea, Duncan?”
Lorelei’s response gets my full attention. “Why wouldn’t it be?”
Lorelei and I have been skirting around each other for years now. Or at least she has. I’ve known what I’ve wanted, but convincing her it was a good idea has taken time.
And this—I understand her hesitation.
Standing together is one thing. Because the king and royal family are in attendance, Lorelei and I standing together is as if we’re chaperones at a dance.
But if we danced…
It would be like a young person changing their relationship status on social media. It would be making a red-carpet debut.
It would be telling the town that we were together. At least, that we want to be.
“Your wife is here,” Lorelei says in a low voice, the words sounding crisp and curt with her accent.
“Ex-wife,” I correct. “Please don’t ever refer to her as my wife.”
“She organized the event. Do you think it’s fair—?”
“You shouldn’t concern yourself with what is fair and what’s not when you speak of my ex-wife.”
I don’t mean to sound so sharp, but if Lorelei is refusing to be seen with me because of some respect for Signe… I take a deep breath. And then another.
I drop my hand. “Lorelei. I would like to dance with you, and I don’t really care about who might be watching, or what they might say. If you are so concerned with that, then maybe this—us—isn’t as important to you as I thought it was.”
Lorelei’s lips pinch together. “Don’t say that.”
“But it has to be said.”
She doesn’t respond. “I’ve waited for you for years.
I’ve waited and watched, and bided my time, trying to give you the time and space you needed.
And finally, when I was about to give up, you tell me you feel the same way.
But saying and doing are two different things.
” I lean forward so we can’t be overheard.
“This needs to be said—it’s time to put your money where your mouth is, Lorelei. ”
She inhales sharply.
“I’m going to interrupt Magnus and dance with Tema. You know where I am if you would like to join me this evening. And if you don’t, I’ll know where I stand with you.”
“You’re giving me an ultimatum?”
“I think I might be. Your daughter knows about us. My daughter knows about us. Most of the castle knows about it. I don’t understand your reluctance to show the town we have feelings for each other.
And please don’t tell me it’s because of some respect you have for my ex-wife because we’ve been divorced for years. Maybe she would even be happy for me.”
“You don’t believe that.”
“I don’t. But I stopped caring a long time ago.”
And then I walk away.
I wish I’d known Lorelei before she began her service for Laandia, and before she worked at Buckingham Palace. Would she have become a different woman, or would there still be a stiff and unyielding exterior hiding a soft centre?
I know about the soft centre.
It took time to break through the formalities, the walls she’d carefully constructed. When Lorelei came to Laandia, I saw her as a challenge.
She challenges me, but it’s so much more than that now. Lorelei Theissen is a strong, capable woman who cares and gives herself to those in her life, at times to the detriment of herself and her own needs and wants.
And I’m in love with her.
I wish I had known her when she was younger, but I know she wouldn’t have given me the time of day. I was a borderline juvenile delinquent in my youth, lucky enough to have caught the friendship of Prince Magnus.
His father hated me, which is part of the reason I took it upon myself to convince Magnus to take the throne when he didn’t want to.
Together, we’ve made Laandia a good country.
It might have cost me my marriage, and years of missing my daughters’ lives, but I’m proud of what I’ve—we’ve—accomplished for Laandia.
And now after, years of hard work and sacrifice, I want something for myself. I want a life.
I want Lorelei.
I make it four steps before I realize what an idiot I’m being. “No,” I say as I turn around.
Thank God that she hasn’t moved.
“There is no ultimatum,” I tell her, retracing my steps. “There would never be. I’m being an idiot.”
Lorelei gives me a tight-lipped smile, but I see the relief in her eyes. “I have to admit, that was a bit of a surprise.”
“You know what I want.” I resist the urge to take her hand, to take her in my arms. “In the last few years, I’ve watched my children fall in love.
They have found their forever person, and I’m so happy for them.
But is it asking too much that I want the same thing?
” I take a deep breath. “I love you, Lorelei, and it’s time we started a life together. ”
Lorelei meets my gaze, her blue eyes awash with tears, but smiling.
A true smile that clutches at my heart. Because maybe…
“I want the same thing,” she says in a low voice. There is a pause, and it sparks between us. “I want it with you.”
She takes my hand.
“I loved my husband, and I never imagined I could feel the same way for someone after I lost him. And I don’t, not exactly. I love you in your own way. In our way.” Lorelei takes a deep breath. “And I think it’s time everyone knows it.”
She offers me her hand, and I take it.
I want to take all of her, sweep her off her feet like Ashton did to Sophie, but I know Lorelei will have none of that. “May I have this dance?” I ask, bowing over her hand.
“You may have all my dances.”
“Good.” I take her hand in mine, finding the small of her back with the other. “Good.” She rests her hand on my shoulder, and we begin to dance. “It’s about time,” I whisper into her ear.
“I know.” And she smiles, her light blue eyes twinkling. Already, there are stares and whispers as we sweep across the floor.
But there are smiles, too.
Magnus actually claps his hands.
Duncan gets his happy ever after!
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