Chapter Twenty-Two
Gabriela looked around her space. It had no air conditioner, of course, and she was hot and sweaty, dusty from rearranging furniture and unpacking the boxes that had arrived from New York.
The apartment, in the center of Madrid, reminded her of her New York apartment, tiny and humble. Still, it was close to her new job at an up-and-coming Spanish clothing company.
The first thing she had done after she had left Hermosa Mariposa was resign from the House of Falcon.
The only thing she was going to take from her phone call with her old boss was his very good suggestion that Madrid would be a great location for her.
Other than that, she was divorcing herself, finally and completely, from the interests of the royal family, and from the influence of Queen Katalina.
“She’s a hostage taker,” Gabriela muttered to herself. For a moment, she felt a wash of pity for Enrique—and for Marcello—so great that it felt as if it might overwhelm her.
But, she had discovered—for the second time in her life—grief did not overwhelm, much as she might have wished it did. Much as she would have liked to have taken to her bed and done nothing but weep, and sleep, she could not indulge in such weakness.
And it was unworthy of a woman who had been strong enough and courageous enough to do the right thing for the man she loved, even at great cost to herself.
Though Guido and Maria were devastated by her choice, wasn’t Guido the one who had told her to ask the right questions of love?
So even though grief resided in the background of every single thing, and every single breath, life insisted on going on.
There was a new position to adjust to, there was a new city to learn to navigate, there was a new apartment to settle into, there were the necessities of life that had to be dealt with, whether a person felt like it or not.
A knock came on the door. Her new neighbor had offered her houseplants, and she’d said yes.
To some it might have seemed having plants to care for was a pathetically small undertaking after the life she’d left behind, her weeks back in her home, but to her it was huge to say yes to something to care about, something to look after.
She glanced down at herself. She was in Enrique’s shirt, the one that she had kept from the cat-rescue day.
She had on nothing else, but the shirt trailed to nearly her knees, providing more coverage than some of the dresses she owned.
Still, for a moment, she debated opening the door in such an outfit, but it was only her neighbor, after all.
But it was not her neighbor.
When she opened the door, Enrique was standing there. Marcello was with him. Marcello, with a great cry, let go of his father’s hand and wrapped his sturdy arms around her, wetting her bare legs with his tears.
She crouched before him, and gathered him in her arms. How could they do this to her? How could they weaken her when she needed to be strong? That little boy against her, sobbing, made her feel as if she could never be without him—them—again.
But then, it seemed as if there was only one reason they would be here, and it would explain Marcello’s sobs.
“Guido?” she asked.
It was probably a terrible mark against her character that even as she contemplated a great tragedy unfolding, her heart sighed that it was Enrique who was here.
The man she wanted, impossibly, to lean on as life’s storms gathered and hit and receded and then gathered again, the man she wanted to share her burdens with, just as she wanted him to share his.
She had been trying to reach her parents for two days, and there had been no answer. She had hoped, foolishly, that it meant Guido was feeling better, that they were both getting back to their normal lives, traveling, visiting friends and relatives.
“No, no, Guido is fine.”
“My mom?”
“Your parents are fine.”
She looked up at him more deeply then, the circles under his eyes, the gauntness in his face, the shadow of a beard around his mouth and on his cheeks and chin.
She had never seen him anything but impeccably groomed.
“Enrique, what’s happened? Is it your mother?”
Again, her heart reached toward him. Would she be the one he came to if he needed comfort?
She knew the answer was yes.
“No, the Queen is…” He stopped, chose his words carefully. “…just as she always is.”
“We’re here for me,” Cello whispered against her, her shirt—the Prince’s shirt, had Enrique noticed that?—already damp with his tears.
“Are you all right?” she asked, terrified. What did this mean? A health problem?
“I am now,” Marcello said. She lifted him to her hip and he leaned his head, hard, on her shoulder. Marcello was getting bigger, and yet she felt as if she could carry his solid weight forever. She heard him slurping on his thumb.
“I wanted to come see you privately, but as soon as he got wind that I was planning to visit you, he attached himself to my leg and would not let go.”
Enrique looked at his son in her arms and smiled a smile of such tenderness it threatened to melt her whole world.
She had to steel herself against these feelings, these longings. Why had he come here, both he and his son knocking down barriers that she needed to keep in place?
Enrique, sensing how heavy Marcello was in her arms, held out his arms, and she put the boy in them. He gazed down at his son’s face, the most gorgeous smile on his lips.
The kind of smile every woman dreamed of seeing on the face of the man she loved as he looked at their children.
“He’s totally exhausted,” he said.
“You can go through and put him on my bed,” she said. She watched as Enrique navigated her space. It seemed ten times as tiny as it had a few seconds ago.
She looked down at her shirt. His shirt. She touched her hair. The truth was, she was an utter mess. And now, with Marcello taking over the only bedroom, she couldn’t very well go and put herself together.
She suddenly discovered she didn’t want to. Her legs were not cooperating, anyway. She sank down on the sofa, and a moment later Enrique emerged from her bedroom. He came and sank down beside her.
“He seems restless. I don’t know if he’ll stay in there. He’s beyond tired.”
“Why have you come here, Enrique?” she asked.
“I can’t do it alone.”
He was here to try and get her back into the House of Falcon’s fold. He was here because he needed help with Marcello.
“You want me to come back?”
“Yes,” he whispered.
“Darla isn’t enough?”
“Darla?”
“The nanny?” she said with a touch of impatience.
“You think I’m asking you to come back as Marcello’s nanny?”
“Aren’t you?”
“No, I’m asking you to come back as his mommy.”
Her breath stopped in her chest. She took in his face, her mind grappling with what she had just heard.
She could see the truth in his face, and his absolute love for her. For the first time since she had left the island, something in her that she did not know had been tense relaxed. He looked unbelievably and uncharacteristically flustered.
“This is going all wrong. I want you to come back to me as my wife.”
“Did you just propose to me?”
“No! Not officially.”
“Enrique, I thought Bettina—”
“Stop!” he said. “I’m not having another woman’s name come up at my proposal.”
“But she was arriving—”
“Stop!” he said again. Then, with a shake of his head, “This is not going to plan.”
“You are not marrying Bettina?”
“Of course not! What did you think all that courting was about? The dinner on Santiago, the picnic, the dancing? Could you possibly have missed the fact I was wooing you?”
“But you didn’t want anyone to know. It all seemed very secretive, all those very private solo outings.”
“I wasn’t ashamed of you, if that’s what you’re implying. I was protecting you,” he said. “Had it gotten out that I was seeing you, the press would have been on you like hounds after a fox. I wanted to give you special moments before that happened.”
“Maybe,” she suggested, “you were protecting me from your mother. But she found out, anyway.”
“And despite my warning her not to meddle in my life, she invited Bettina to Hermosa, without my knowledge, certainly without my consent.”
“And offered me a new and better position at the House of Falcon.”
He looked very angry at that. “The Queen has been made to understand my position.”
“You’ve spoken to your mother?”
“I have. We have her blessing.”
She felt a shiver go up and down her spine. She would not have wanted to be the Queen from the look on his face. She actually felt a little sorry for the monarch.
“But aren’t there many considerations?” she asked, making one last effort to be brave, to put the needs of the kingdom ahead of her own. And his. “Don’t you need to marry into your own level of society? For the good of Hermosa Mariposa?”
“Why would I have been courting you if I had not already considered all of that?”
“I—I—I don’t know.”
“You better not think,” he told her softly, “I was grooming you for a lifelong relationship in the shadows.”
Something in her was unfolding like a flower before the sun as she accepted this was true. There was nothing left to fight. He had already anticipated the battles and addressed them.
“I think there would have been more kissing involved if that had been your agenda!”
“How could I give in to the temptation to kiss you and still be honorable and decent, the man Guido would expect his son-in-law to be?”
“It seems to me,” she said, a bit wryly, “you gave in to temptation rather easily.”
“A goddess shows up in my bedroom! How can a mere mortal fight such a thing? Besides, by then I already knew the direction I was going in.”
“And that was?”
“Asking your father’s permission to marry you, of course. Really, I should not have been surprised that with you, very little goes according to my well-laid-out plans. Not even this,” he said, a bit dourly.
“I’m sorry.”
“You’re not. You’re getting ready to burst out laughing.”
“I’m just happy, Enrique.”
“Well, let’s proceed, then. I have your father’s permission.”
“My parents know?”
“Of course!”
“That’s why they haven’t answered their phone in days. My mom might trust herself to keep a secret, but not Guido.”
“Gabriela! Please! Let me do this.”
“Oh, Enrique,” she said, as one last doubt bubbled to the surface, “what if they don’t like me?”
“Who?” he asked, genuinely astonished.
“The people. Enrique, I am not what anyone would expect of a princess.”
“I think you are wrong, there. I think the people of Hermosa Mariposa will embrace you all the more because you are truly one of them. I think, in very short order, they will come to see everything about you that I have seen. Your inner and outer beauty, your humor, your compassion, your delight in life. I could not ask for a more perfect princess to be by my side, and neither could they. Now, will you let me get on with this?”
“All right,” she said, waving her hand at him, trying to be regal about it at the same time as trying not to giggle at his earnestness. “You may proceed.”
Still grumbling about things not going according to his plan, Enrique took a deep breath, gathered himself and then got off the couch. He went down on one knee before her, and slipped a jewelry box from his inside suit pocket.
He opened the hinged lid of the box.
She gasped at the beauty of the ring, delicate, butterfly shaped, sparkling with diamonds and sapphires.
“Papa?”
Neither of them had noticed Marcello come back out of the bedroom.
Both Enrique and Gabriela let the pure magic of that word wash over them.
“Yes, I’m here,” Enrique said gently. “We’re both here. We’ll both always be here for you.”
Marcello’s eyes fastened on the ring box.
“Is that candy?” he asked, darting forward.
“No.” Too late, Enrique tried to hold the box up out of his son’s reach.
But Marcello had the ring. When his father made a frantic grab at it, he popped it in his mouth.
“No!” Enrique cried. “Marcello, you’re much too old to be putting shiny things in your mouth!”
“But it’s candy,” Marcello said defensively.
“Cello, spit that out! Right now,” Gabriela said, trying to keep her voice calm.
But Cello, panicked about the imminent loss of his treasure, did not spit the ring out, did not appear to notice it was not a sweet treat, at all. He swallowed.