How to Find a Prince
Sneak Peek
The shortcut through the cultivated field, it turns out, happens to be a long cut. And, standing in mud to my ankles in my ruined Christian Louboutin boots and black wool tuxedo, my SUV is undeniably bogged down past the axles.
Actually, it isn’t my SUV at all. Which is another problem.
In fact, it’s Prince Auggie’s beloved Land Rover.
Which, technically, he might not know I borrowed.
And quite possibly, I took it for a bit of a spin.
Out of sheer necessity, in my defense. And it’s true, if you want to get technical about it, that Cambridge is what you might call a haul from Windsor Castle.
Details I can’t really be arsed about. I was planning to replace the petrol.
Besides, it’s not my fault Auggie left his keys helpfully hanging on a hook labeled “Auggie” at Windsor Castle, with a Land Rover emblem on his key ring. Or his Land Rover parked outside the back door, where I could find it all too easily.
Which brings me to the present moment.
“Well, shit.”
I’m definitely going to be late to tonight’s gala. And having mud splatter to the knees is certainly not part of the dress code. I lean over slightly to peer under the SUV. Not that there’s much of a gap to peer under. Mud, definitely. Still up to the axles. Soggy.
It’s what I’d call far from an ideal situation.
Straightening, I scratch my jaw. This is rather a predicament.
And a predicament I have no obvious life skills to help me with.
I can’t charm the Land Rover out of the mud.
There isn’t anything nearby to hook to the winch to.
As if I know the first thing about winching.
That’s all Auggie’s territory. I need to get the Rover back to Windsor Castle before he realizes it’s missing, and I can’t very well return it covered in mud and straw because that will tip Auggie off.
Who knows how closely he reads his odometer.
He must be too busy for that sort of thing.
Glancing around, there are pastures and fields and a stand of trees over in one direction that didn’t look too far away.
Which could mean people, like a village.
Possibly a protected wood. It provides shelter from the Cambridgeshire winds across the open landscape as a windbreak.
At any rate, what trees mean is people. People who might be able to help me.
The trouble is I’m meant to be at a reception within the hour.
A reception for my job where I happen to be the events manager, a role I’ve had since last year after two years as an assistant at the same firm.
After all, being third in line to the throne does come with some royal duties, but I need to pay my way.
Or as much as I can, anyway, living in a palace.
Which is a bit of a blow to the budget, but happily, I have roommates—castle mates?
—and the King’s supplement and some taxpayers’ dollars for the upkeep.
Shit. I’m going to need to ring my boss, Jenna, and attempt an explanation. Who will be very grumpy indeed. With a sigh, I pull my phone out of my pocket and call.
“James. Where the hell are you?”
Not an auspicious start. “Sorry, sorry. I’ve, er, been caught up in a spot of bother.”
I squint at the Land Rover as if it has betrayed me personally.
“This is no time for bother. I needed you here fifteen minutes ago.”
“You’re telling me.” With a shake of my head, I lean against the side of the green Rover beneath the dazzle of the sun. It’s turning out to be a warm day for even a light wool tux. I loosen my bow tie with a hand. “I’m afraid I won’t be able to make it. Or, on time, anyway. Possibly at all.”
“What’s happened?”
“It turns out I’ve had a little fuss with a friend’s vehicle, which I borrowed to get to the event tonight.”
“And, dare I ask”—Jenna’s voice has a tinge of long-suffering pain—“what happened to your SUV?”
I wrinkle my nose. “It’s deep in a hedge, last I saw.” And I have the scratches to prove it, as I earlier wrestled the door open and pushed my way out into the hedge and through it to get to the road.
“James.”
“To be fair, I’m not pleased my vehicle is in a hedge.
It needs extricating. I swerved to avoid sheep on the road.
Damn things were in the curve. It’ll have to wait ’til another time because I didn’t want to be late.
Which is why I borrowed another SUV to get to the event.
” No need to mention it’s the Crown Prince’s SUV.
No good will come of that. Does Auggie have insurance?
Are there special rates for the future King?
Or special premiums? “As it turns out, I’m down two vehicles today and up to my knees in mud. In my tux.”
“James. This really isn’t the time. We’ve been working on the gala all year.” She sounds plaintive and dangerously close to a wail. There’s a huff of frustration across the line.
“Since the last gala, I do recall.” My lips twitch. “I’m very sorry, Jenna. I’ll do my best to get there. Sorry, must dash.”
“James, I’m warning you—”
I hang up and tuck the phone safely away in my chest pocket.
This is a sad state of affairs. Which is an ongoing trajectory of a sad state of affairs.
And I can’t call Frankie to get me, my ex.
Because Frankie’s off happily living his life in London.
Without me. And too far to get here in time to help.
As if Frankie would be any good in this situation and know what to do.
Actually, he’d be brilliant at it because the man’s a genius.
And my good friend Theo is now off kinging in Copenhagen, as one does.
He also has—or had—a knack for scrapes and also for getting himself out of them.
But, at any rate, Frankie’s finished with me.
And even as friends, we’re on a break. His request.
Even princes can have broken hearts. And do.
I shove the thought aside. Thinking of Frankie definitely won’t help the situation. And this wasn’t an accident, not exactly. A misadventure. Could happen to anyone. Including commoners. Which, one might say, would put me on the level with regular people with regular problems. Very grounding.
After another glance around, I start the laborious effort of trekking across the deep muck, which threatens to suck my boots into its depths.
I pray the dress laces hold on what had once been very nice boots.
But there’s a moment, when I’m at least fifty meters from the vehicle and headed towards a fence line, where my chest tightens and tears threaten.
Today, to be honest, has been a lot.
It’s not an accident. Not like an accident that claimed my parents’ lives when I was small, leaving me and my brother orphans at ages five and three.
Though, technically, the hedge today was an accident.
I did hit it hard enough for the airbag to go off.
Something I don’t want to think too closely about how much worse it might have been.
Probably Auggie knows too much about hedges after his incident on Renaissance Man, the now notorious reality TV show.
I’d rather think about reality TV than being orphaned or thinking about how upset Jenna is going to be, in a long list of people who are currently irritated with me.
Besides, if I keep moving, whiplash can’t catch me.
And then, I catch a glint of light, and I lift my head as I reach the fence line. In the adjacent, fallow field, a pickup heads towards me along the twin ruts on the other side of the fence. I brighten.
Cue the cavalry. I straighten and walk with purpose.
I walk along the fence till I reach a crossing place and climb over the fence at the stile. Pausing, I glance down at myself. It’s worse than I thought. My wool trousers are mostly mud trousers, and I’m sweating. I slip out of my jacket and tuck it under my arm.
When the pickup pulls up in front of me, I give a wry smile. “Hello.”
The two men simply stare at me. The passenger’s eyes widen in recognition. I know the look: prince out of context.
“Hop in the back,” says the man behind the wheel gruffly in a Scottish accent of some kind. “We’ll drive you to the conference.”
“Stuart, I don’t think it’s good form to tell a prince to ride amidst the hay bales.” The other man, the one who recognized me, also has a Scottish accent. And it’s true enough there’re both hay bales in the back of the pickup and that I’m a prince. As for good form, I lost that some time ago.
“You’re imagining things, Fergus. You’ll need your eyes checked. No prince with any sense would be wandering Cambridgeshire getting stuck in a field.”
I cough delicately. “I don’t mind getting in the back. I’ve, er, lost my ride.”
“Aye, I see that,” says Stuart. “The sun shining off the SUV in the middle of the field was a dead giveaway.”
“I’m very sorry about your field. I didn’t think it was so wet. Or so… deep.”
“It’s not my field,” says Stuart, rather curtly.
He has blue eyes and a stern look. A scattering of freckles lies across his nose, and he has a set jaw.
His chestnut-brown hair’s rumpled. He wears a check flannel shirt, likely a concession to the earlier rain, rolled up to his forearms. Not a convenient time to clock he’s an attractive man.
He holds my gaze while a shiver ripples down my spine.
“But if it were,” he continues sternly, “I would have a lot of things to say to you right about now.”
“Fair.” I hold up my hands. “Terribly sorry. I can walk, I don’t mind.”
“I’ll hop in the back—” says the other man.
“He’s too muddy to get in the cab of my pickup,” Stuart protests instantly.
“No, no, it’s fine. As you were. I insist.” I walk around to the back of the pickup and clamber up, plopping myself in between two hay bales over the rear axle. Weight for better traction, I assume. Or possibly to feed livestock. Who can say what they were up to.
As I sit there, braced between the bales, the truck starts moving again.
It makes a careful turn at a wider area along the track, and it occurs to me I don’t have the faintest clue what kind of conference I’m being taken to.
Maybe it’s a cult. I don’t have any clue who these men are, despite picking up their names are Stuart and Fergus.
Should I have asked for ID before I become their next human sacrifice?
All I know is that I’m a far cry away from my gala. And a further cry from Windsor Castle. And, rightfully, feeling and looking like a proper mess. And I don’t know where to even begin to get myself out of trouble.