The Secret Princess. Elizabeth Harbison
looked so serious that she had to stop and think. “Maybe—maybe—I would agree to this crazy plan. But I would need to have pretty hard evidence.”
He looked amused. “You’re very like your mother, Amelia.”
“It’s Amy,” she corrected him absently.
“No, it’s Amelia. Princess Amelia Louisa Gretchen May.” He smiled sadly. “However, your parents simply called you Amé.”
“Amé,” she repeated, numb. The name, as he pronounced it, held some resonance for her. It echoed through cobwebbed chambers of her memory. Amé. Amy. She could almost hear it. It was easy to see why the paramedics had assumed the woman was saying “Amy.”
For her own part, Amy had not spoken a word for the first four months after the accident. After ruling out autism, psychologists had attributed her silence to the trauma. If Mr. Burgess’s story was correct, though, it could conceivably be because she hadn’t understood the language.
But that was impossible.
Wasn’t it?
“Are you all right?” he asked, concern etched in his features. “Can I get you some water? Do you have brandy here?”
Despite her shock, she had to smile at the idea of having a bottle stashed somewhere. “No, I don’t. I’m okay. It’s just…obviously, this is all a bit of a shock. Not that I believe it,” she was quick to add. “But I’m willing to listen if you’ll tell me everything.”
He nodded. “I will. But not now. You look very tired tonight.”
Now that he mentioned it, she was exhausted. This brief conversation had taken a toll on her energy. Besides, she needed time to call her parents, to get their advice and opinions. It was late now, but she’d call, anyway. “Can you come back tomorrow morning? With this proof you say you have?”
“Of course. For now, why don’t you let me take you home? I have a car right out front.” He gestured toward the wide plate-glass window, through which Amy could see a long black limousine parked out front.
“No, thanks. I only live a couple of blocks away and, frankly, I could use the walk.”
“It’s quite inclement,” he pointed out.
The snow was falling heavily now, billowed by the occasional gust of wind.
“Then you’d better get that boat out of here before it gets stuck,” Amy said. “Come back tomorrow. I’ll be here from 10:00 a.m. until at least five or six.”
“I’ll be here early. I hope you’ll be ready to go.” Before she could object, he raised a hand. “Just in case the evidence is sufficiently persuasive to you. You must be open to that possibility.”
He was a hard man to refuse. “Okay. I’ll try. But I’m not making any guarantees.”
“Very well.” He gave a short bow. “Until tomorrow.” With one last lingering gaze, he turned and left the shop. The driver hopped out of the car to open the door for him, but he waved him off and opened it himself. He looked back at the shop before closing the door behind him, and for one insane moment, Amy wondered if she’d dreamed the whole thing.
Then the wind blew again, pushing the door open. Amy ran to close it. The small spots of cold snow that landed on her skin assured her that she was awake.
She closed the door and turned the dead bolt. How was it she’d managed to forget to do that earlier? She always locked the bolt after she turned the sign to Closed.
She leaned her back against the door and closed her eyes. The only thing wrong with his story—the only part that didn’t tug at her heart—was the part about being royal. If he had come along telling her he had evidence of her biological family and that they lived in Cleveland, she would have been thrilled. But this business of royalty tipped the story into the realm of fairy tale, making it something she couldn’t entirely believe.
Yet…what if it were true? What if the wind outside had brought something magic along with it, something other than snow and power failures?
A handsome stranger.
And her own past.
Chapter Two
Franz Burgess, known as Will to his friends, went outside into the damp, cold air and got into the waiting limousine. He’d hoped to feel relieved by this point, but he’d known, going into this, that he might be disappointed. With everything he knew about Amy Scott—and he knew a great deal—he should have known her intelligence would make her cynical, at least give her a cynical reaction to his story.
One thing he had not known, or prepared himself for, was his own reaction to her. From the moment he’d laid eyes on her he’d been captivated by her. He could have stayed all night, watching her eyes flash when she spoke, listening to her voice, observing her movements and the way her clothes hugged the soft contours of her body.
It wasn’t simply that she was attractive. He had plenty of access to beautiful women. At times, he was even tired of beautiful women. They all seemed so vacant. But Amy Scott was different. Her coloring was like that of many women from his country, the pale skin and faintly pink cheeks. Yet she had something different, something extra. It was an unexplainable quality of magnetism that he’d rarely encountered. It was easy to imagine himself watching her for many years to come.
If only he could persuade her that the story he’d told her was true. She was so perfect for the role. Her sharp intelligence, combined with her beauty, would make her an excellent princess. Yet she was skeptical. And despite financial difficulties that he knew about, she was strong enough to resist the temptation of being told she was a princess and would thus have no more bills and debtors to worry about.
So he was going to have to bring out documentation, to try to convince her to accompany him back to Lufthania. It wasn’t going to be easy, he knew that already. But he’d budgeted time for that possibility.
However, he hadn’t budgeted time, or prepared himself mentally, for the possibility that he couldn’t convince her. That would be a disaster for him. Yet it was looking entirely possible that he wouldn’t be able to. He didn’t know what he’d do if she didn’t come back to Lufthania with him.
His entire life depended on it.
The first thing Amy did after Franz Burgess left was call her parents. They both got on the line and for half an hour they discussed the situation. Amy was surprised that her parents didn’t immediately dismiss the idea that she might be a princess.
To the contrary, her mother was ready to believe it. “I’ve always thought you were more regal than most people,” she said.
“What are you talking about?”
“Well, you were never too fond of doing the dishes, and it was darn near impossible to get you to clean your room.” She laughed. “I always thought it was a queen complex, but princess will do.”
Amy was glad for the levity. In the end, they agreed that Amy would see Franz Burgess’s evidence in the morning and make a judgment based on that. If he was on the up-and-up, they reasoned, he must have some pretty compelling evidence. She could hear him out and call them back with the additional facts.
Meanwhile, her father would call the Lufthania embassy and see if he could verify the existence of Franz Burgess.
After that, they would decide together what Amy should do.
This plan made Amy feel a lot better, and she spent the rest of the night looking for any information she could find on Lufthania.
First, she checked her stock for any books that might make even slight mention of Lufthania. Since it was a very small country and didn’t hold the international cachet of, say, Monaco, no books were devoted to it entirely, but she recalled several references to it in some of the books on Germany and Switzerland. It was little more