Chapter 36
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
LEO
Leo arrived back at the apartment laden with multiple shopping bags from the hardware and grocery store. It was a good thing he had pawned some old laptops and palace trinkets, since they couldn’t very well wait for the insurance company to cover a fix for Emma’s door.
He knocked, and Emma answered the door a minute later.
“I thought we were going to have to send a search party after you.”
Maybe he had been a little cavalier about exploring a new country without an international phone plan.
“You know,” Leo said as he stepped over the threshold, “I’ve always heard how rude New Yorkers are. But everyone I’ve met has been so kind.”
Emma took some bags from him and walked down the hallway toward the kitchen. “Well, if a stupidly attractive six-foot-three European man asked me where the ‘loo’ was, I’d probably fall all over myself to help him too.”
When he followed her into the dining area, Leo was greeted by the sight of purple-and-gold streamers—the national colors of Lynoria—and a birthday banner that looked like it had been cut out of a Diet Coke box.
No one had ever made him a birthday banner before.
“What’s all this?” he asked. For some reason, he was having a hard time swallowing.
“It’s not much, but we want to celebrate you. I’m really happy you were born. And I’m sorry your parents are being total dickbags right now, but I’m also selfishly glad it led you here.”
He pulled her into his arms. “Me too.”
The anxiety that had whirled in his chest since he left Lynoria finally quieted.
This was all he needed. The girl of his dreams in his arms. The sweet smell of something delicious cooling on a rack.
Car horns honking outside while Christmas lights glowed and streamers danced in the wake of the HVAC.
It was foreign yet intimately homely all at the same time.
“Shouldn’t you be doing your exercises?” Emma said pointedly.
He glanced into the living room, where Lisa was sitting on the couch with a smug look on her face.
“Yes, dear,” she said, picking up a set of light dumbbells.
Leo released Emma and dropped the hardware bag on the kitchen table. Wood, screws, lightbulbs, and painting supplies spilled out.
“Oh, you didn’t have to…” She gestured at the paint supplies.
He threw his hands up. “I’m freeloading here. Let me contribute the only way I know how. Though I can’t believe you don’t have a measuring tape. I had to get one that measures in inches.” He said the last word like it was an epithet.
“How did you afford all this? Weren’t you cut off?”
“I pawned some things,” he admitted. “It’s not a permanent solution, but hopefully it’ll get me through to January. How can I help?” he asked when she pulled a can of San Marzano tomatoes from the bag.
“Just sit. Relax,” she said. “It’s a long flight. You must be exhausted.”
“I’m fine. Got a pencil?” He picked up the hardware supplies, took the pencil Emma handed him, and set to work.
An hour later, the house smelled like rich marinara sauce.
He set down a drill and pulled on the new doorframe with all his might.
It didn’t budge. Extra-long screws now kept everything in place, but even that didn’t feel like enough.
He couldn’t keep her safe here. Especially if he didn’t live here.
He was standing on a precipice. There was nothing for him at home anymore. Maybe he could move to New York. He could find a job, watch over Ruby while she was at NYU. This solution had the obvious bonus of more time with Emma. A real chance for the two of them, not just a holiday fling.
But who would hire him? He was a prince in name only (PINO?) with no real work history, whose only skills were fixing things by watching YouTube videos and holding town hall meetings.
His shoulders slumped. He was ignoring the bigger truth. The people of Lynoria needed help. Their need had to come before his want. He owed it to them to give it his best shot. He would find a way to greenlight this project with or without his family’s support. Somehow.
“So, Leo, how long will you be staying with us?” Lisa broke him out of his self-reflection.
He tested the deadbolt for the third time. “Uh, well. I’m not entirely sure.”
“Wonderful. You’re welcome to stay as long as you need.”
“Thank you,” he said.
The visit was making him emotional in so many ways. He ached to be part of this tight-knit family. They had been a twosome for so long. Who knew if there was room for anyone else?
“Dinner’s ready,” Emma announced.
Leo vacuumed up the sawdust, then walked into the dining area to find a tablecloth, candlesticks, and the most beautiful pot of spaghetti he’d ever seen. His stomach growled. He had been so wound up from the day of travel and ass-kicking, he hadn’t even noticed how hungry he was.
They sat around the table for almost two hours, talking, laughing, and devouring the spaghetti and homemade garlic bread Emma had whipped up.
“I didn’t know you were such a good cook as well as a baker,” he said as he collected their plates.
“Eh, I do okay.”
“I’m completely useless,” Leo mused. “I can barely boil an egg.”
“I can teach you. Since you’ll be without a royal kitchen soon.”
“Right,” he said. There was so much to think about, and everything was up in the air. He didn’t want to think about it all right now. “So, what’s the Christmas tradition this evening?”
Emma and Lisa looked at each other. “Christmas charades,” she said. “I hope you stretched.”
Though a cultural barrier prevented some of the charade success—he was too afraid to ask what a Grinch was—it was a lovely, warm evening full of laughter and holiday joy.
For the first time, he was beginning to see the appeal of Christmas.
Here, in the confines of this tiny garden apartment in Brooklyn, Christmas wasn’t about a sold-out toy or the latest tech device.
It was about togetherness, family. Creating memories that would be cherished for a lifetime.
It was something that stayed the same while everything else was up to the mercy of change.
And maybe there was something a little magical about that.
The fatigue was wearing on him by the time Lisa mimed a snowball fight—a tradition that thankfully traversed the cultural continental divide. A yawn shook his entire body.
As if in response, Lisa yawned too. “Emma, I think I’m going to turn in early tonight.”
“Oh, sure.” Emma jumped up and fetched her mother’s walker.
“Anything I can help with?” Leo asked.
“We’re fine, thanks,” Emma said.
“Good night, Leo. I’m so grateful you decided to drop in,” Lisa said earnestly on her way down the hall.
With Lisa safely in bed and the dogs taken out for the last time, Leo slipped between Emma’s sheets while she finished brushing her teeth.
There was something so right about being in her bed, the scent of her all around him.
She cracked the door open and tiptoed into the room, peeking at him.
He opened his arms, and she slid into them like some cosmic jigsaw had designed her specifically to fit there.
Even though he’d been disowned by his parents, his entire life was in upheaval, and he’d had to knock Emma’s father unconscious, it might have been the best birthday he’d ever had.