A Royal Marriage

The young officer hung up the phone. Anxious to get in her two cents worth before his attention was distracted by the awe-inspiring figure in the overcoat, Rachel started to speak, her rehearsed lines tumbling out. The officer held up a finger, asking her for a moment, and then pressed down the radio control in front of him and called some incomprehensible code into a large silver microphone.

“Now,” he said pleasantly as if they were discussing the wonderful spring weather, “you were saying your sister is missing. When did you last see her?”

“I haven’t actually seen her for some time,” Rachel said. “But we talk on the phone from time to time, and write. I haven’t been able to reach her. I feel like something’s wrong.”

“Oh,” he said. “A feeling.”

Rachel glanced over her shoulder to see if the well-dressed man was waiting impatiently for his turn at the counter. She was surprised to see he had taken a chair right next to the desolate-looking chap in the work clothes, and was talking to him in a low tone.

A lawyer, then, she thought. But the lines of his face had softened with unmistakable compassion. Surely one who dealt with human tragedy all the time would not be able to manage that. The young man in front of her seemed a perfect example. Still, the compassion on that attractive stranger’s face was like a ray of light in this bleak place, and it gave her the courage to go on. She turned back to the counter as the man in the dark overcoat was sliding a cell phone from his inner pocket.

“I’ve written her,” Rachel said. “I’ve been trying to call her for weeks. I came back to Thortonburg to see why I couldn’t get in touch with her, and she’s not at her apartment. The papers were all stacked on her porch, her mail was overflowing out of her box. A neighbor came by to collect them and said she thought Victoria was due home last week.”

“Due home? So she has been away? Did you know about that?”

“Actually, I didn’t, but—”

“Your sister is probably just having a good time somewhere and extended her holiday. Isn’t that a possibility?”

“Why isn’t it a possibility that I’m right and she’s missing?” Rachel asked with a bit of heat. Still, that was exactly what her father had said when she had talked to him about her concerns. That he vaguely recalled Victoria saying she was going on holiday.

“What would make you think she’s missing? I mean, besides your feeling?”

“Rachel? Is that you?”

Rachel’s heart fell. Though her father had suggested if she had to be silly enough to report her sister’s supposed disappearance, she should go to Lloyd Crenshaw, his old pal in the police department, she had resisted the idea. But there was Lloyd, having come through an outer door directly into the office. The papers on the desk tilted more dramatically, but did not topple, as he bulldozed by them.

A bulldozer, she thought. He had always reminded her of a bulldozer, and the police uniform did nothing at all to improve his short, squat stature.

“Lloyd,” she said weakly, trying to hide the fact that he was the one person she hadn’t wanted to see. “How are you?”

“Fine. My, if you don’t look just the same! I thought you might have thickened up a bit. You know, with the baby and all.”

Rachel smiled tightly. Lloyd Crenshaw and her father had been friends for as long as she could remember. Still, she had resisted the idea of making a report to him, not just because Lloyd had always made her uneasy, but because Victoria had always detested him.

“Are you going to look after this?” the young constable asked, making no attempt to hide his eagerness to be free of her and her intuitions.

“Look after what exactly? You don’t have a problem, do you, my dear Rachel? Surely you just got home!”

There seemed to be something fake about his joviality, but then there had always been something a bit fake about him. A smile that touched his lips, but never quite made it to his crafty little brown eyes.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw that the well-dressed man was now beside her at the counter.

“My sister is missing,” she told Crenshaw. She could hear the strain in her own voice.

“Sir?” she overheard the young constable. “How may I help you?” His tone, as she had known it would be, was brimming with both deference and eagerness to be of service.

“Good evening,” the man said. His voice was deep and pleasing, the confidence he exuded appearing again in his tone. “My name is Damon Montague.”

He spoke softly, but Rachel lost Lloyd Crenshaw’s attention immediately. His gaze swiveled to the taller man. “Prince Damon Montague?” he asked.

“That’s correct.” He nodded briefly at Crenshaw, and then looked back to the young constable. “I’ve had a slight problem. My—”

“A problem, sir?” Crenshaw asked. “We’ll get on it right away. Let me get the report form and—”

“Please.” A gloved hand was raised, and Rachel found herself once again caught in the light of those eyes. They held both apology and sympathy, and his glance told her he found Crenshaw’s obsequiousness amusing.

Rachel, how can you see all that in a glance? she chastised herself.

“I couldn’t help but overhear the young lady’s sister is missing. She seems to be feeling some distress. I think that warrants your attention far more than an antenna broken off my vehicle. Constable—” he squinted at the young man’s name tag “—Constable Burke looks more than capable of taking my complaint.”

“Yes sir,” Constable Burke said with such enthusiasm, Rachel felt a strong desire to smack him.

“So, your sister is missing? Victoria?” Crenshaw said loudly, turning back to her with a great show of concern that was, she suspected cynically, more for Prince Montague’s benefit than hers. “What makes you think that? Your father hasn’t mentioned it to me.”

“He’s never exactly made Victoria one of his priorities,” Rachel said. Certainly not when they were children, so why would he bother now?

“Don’t be silly. He always loved you both madly.”

She took a deep breath. She had not come here to be called silly, or to be mocked for her feelings. Though Lloyd Crenshaw and her father had been friends, no one could ever say with such certainty what went on in another’s home, behind closed doors. And behind closed doors, her father had been hostile to her sister, a fact that had caused Rachel to feel bewildered and guilty and caught in the middle because he had favored her so markedly.

“In fact, now that I think about it, I’m sure your father said Vicky was going away on a holiday.”

Another thing her sister detested was being called Vicky.

“I think there’s something wrong,” Rachel said. “Victoria usually tells me when she’s going away. Her neighbor said she had gone away, but that she should have been back by now. I’m telling you, my sister is missing.”

She was not happy that the last came out with a squeak that showed how very close to tears she was.

“What would you like me to do then, dear?”

“Whatever it is you usually do when someone goes missing,” she said, her voice raw.

“Well, if you insist then, we’ll do a missing person’s report, but really, Rachel, Vicky has always been a bit of a wild one.”

She stared at him, flabbergasted. She could feel tears of frustration and fear building pressure behind her eyes. Her sister was not “wild.” Not in the least. Headstrong, yes. Adventurous, maybe. Spirited, definitely.

But wild, and all the things that implied?

“She is not!” she snapped with such vehemence even she was taken aback. She met Crenshaw’s eyes, and the flatness in them filled her with a feeling of defeat. She looked down at her trembling hands. “Please,” she said, “please help me.”

And help came. From the most unexpected of sources. Suddenly she felt the brush of that expensive overcoat against her shoulder, and saw a glove quickly slipped from the strong and warm hand that covered hers.

The sensation was shocking, unexpectedly delightful, like coming to a place of warmth and comfort after a long and lonely trek through the cold.

How long since anyone had offered her such a simple human gesture of support? How long since she had been touched?

Far too long. All the stresses and strains of single motherhood now seemed to be pushing from behind her eyes, too, this tenderness from a stranger breaking the dam of control she had built around her heart.