Once Upon a Princess. Holly Jacobs

      Chapter Three

      “I didn’t really take the bus this morning. I walked. It’s only a few blocks,” the princess—Parker—admitted.

      Jace had known that. He’d been trailing her as she’d left her house that morning and walked the few blocks to Monarch’s.

      She’d obviously forgotten she was his assignment, which meant she forgot that he knew where her house was. He didn’t remind her as she gave him directions. He preferred that Tanner be the focus of her ire, not him.

      As they turned onto Front Street, she said, “That’s it,” and pointed.

      Jace eased into the driveway of the neat, two-story brick home. It wasn’t quite a castle, but it was a beautiful house.

      “It’s nice,” he murmured.

      “Uh,” she said, “not the house. The garage.”

      He knew that, as well, of course.

      He knew the house belonged to a local manicurist who worked at a small beauty store across from Monarch’s. And that Parker had moved into the garage apartment three years ago.

      What he didn’t know and hadn’t been able to figure out is why a princess, a woman who could buy and sell half of Erie, chose to live in a garage apartment.

      Her father had prevented her access to her money, and Jace could have understood if she’d moved in recently. But she’d moved in right after college.

      “Why?” he murmured.

      “Why what?” Parker asked.

      He hadn’t meant to ask the question out loud. But since she’d overheard, he figured what the heck and asked, “Why do you live in a garage?”

      “Over the garage. There’s an apartment.”

      “But you’re a princess. Why would you live over a garage? You could live anywhere.”

      “Where should a princess live?” she countered.

      “Never mind,” he muttered.

      He wasn’t going to say that a princess should live in a castle. It was too cliché.

      “Come on,” she pressed.

      “Forget I asked.”

      “I know you’re thinking it. You know you’re thinking it. Go ahead, tell me. You might as well.”

      “You’re going to make me say it out loud, aren’t you?” he asked, though he knew the answer.

      Parker was the kind of woman who was going to make him say it, who would keep pushing and prodding until he actually spoke the words and embarrassed himself in the process.

      “Yep.”

      “Fine,” he blurted out. “A castle. A princess should live in a castle. I bet your family has one. A big one like Windsor Castle, right?”

      “Yes, we have a castle. Europe’s full of them. They’re practically a dime a dozen. People there don’t get as excited about them as Americans do. Ours isn’t as big as Windsor, but it’s big enough that we’ve never run out of guest rooms. Not that it matters to me anymore. You see, I don’t live in Eliason, I live in Erie. And I have an apartment over a garage. Do you want to make something of it?”

      Jace knew that Parker was raring for a fight. And as annoyed as she was that he’d been hired to watch her, he suspected that she was more annoyed about her fiancé showing up in town.

      Jace prided himself on being a wise man who knew how to pick his battles. And this wasn’t a battle he wanted to fight. So he simply said, “No, I’m not going to make anything of it.”

      “Good.” She opened the door and got out of the car.

      Jace followed suit.

      “What now?” she asked.

      “You going to invite me up?”

      “Why would I do something like that? We’re not friends. You’re my stalker.”

      “I am not,” he said. “Your father hired me to make sure you were okay.”

      “My father hired you to spy on me.”

      “No. He’s just worried about you. He cares about you. And maybe I want you to invite me in so I can check out your place and feel better knowing I was doing my job.”

      “That’s what I am—a job. Well, you can report to your boss that you watched me go in the door. I’m going to assume that’s enough for him.”

      “Hey, far be it from me to get in between whatever problems you’re having with your father, but—”

      “Don’t you see, you’re right in the middle. You’re being all chummy in the car, all let-me-make-sure-you’re-safe, as if you care about me, as if you know me. But you don’t. You said it before—I’m a job. I’m just a file in your cabinet and a paycheck for a job well done. We’re not friends. You don’t know me.”