Read Online Princess Ever After (Royal Wedding Series) by Rachel Hauck - Free Book Online Page B

correcting her.”
    “What about telling me?” Reggie demanded. “Was there any use in telling me?”
    “To be honest, Reg, it didn’t make much sense to me. A princess? For real? I thought about telling you when you were seventeen, like Sadie said, but we talked it out and, well, it sounded kind of silly. Maybe we had no proof, no way of really knowing.” Daddy shook his head, shoving away from the table, and walked into the family room for some peppermints.
    When he returned, he offered one to Mr. Burkhardt, who refused with a kind, “No, thank you.”
    “She said something else to you that day, Noble, didn’t she?” Sadie stood nearby, a bowl in her arm, stirring a mixture with a big silver spoon.
    “What? What did she say?” The need to know, to understand, pressed against Reggie’s ribs.
    “More of the same.” Daddy popped a peppermint in his mouth and reached for another one. He was lean and wiry from working hard his whole life. His dark hair was thick and black with only a subtle hint of gray. And when he laughed, his blue eyes twinkled. “She was a good woman, your gram.” His eyes glistened. “I miss her. Anyway, just as I was leaving her room that night, she said, ‘Nobel, you let her go when the time comes, hearme? She’ll restore the kingdom.’ Then she muttered again about you being her princess.”
    “Restore the kingdom?” Reggie’s voice rose with wonder. “What does that mean?”
    “Exactly. I dismissed it,” Daddy said. “Thought maybe she was quoting lines from Star Wars . We’d just finished a marathon weekend with Sadie’s nephews.” He glanced back at his wife. “Remember that, Sadie?”
    “Daddy, you didn’t at least look into it?” Reggie ran her fingers through her hair. She really wanted a shower with slick, warm water running down her face, washing away the remains of motor oil. The remains of this conversation and she needed to think.
    Gram . . . Hessenberg . . . the entail thing . . .
    “No, Reg, I’m sorry, I didn’t. Connecting Gram and you to a royal house in Europe was like assuming a man could build a ladder to the stars. Impossible. I knew Alice Edmunds for fifteen years and she never, ever hinted at being a royal other than what I just told you. Nor did your mama.”
    “The truth is, Alice Edmunds was a royal.” Mr. Burkhardt peered at Reggie. “And your daughter is her heir. Alice was right. Your daughter is the one who can restore Hessenberg to its sovereign status. Return us to our own kingdom, as it were.”
    In silence, Daddy fixed his attention on unwrapping his next peppermint. “Are you telling me that time is now, Mr. Burkhardt?”
    “Yes, sir, I am.” Mr. Burkhardt motioned to the documents on the table. “It’s all there. The agreement between Brighton and Hessenberg ends October twenty-second at midnight. If there is no heir to the Hessenberg throne, Hessenberg will be absorbed entirely by Brighton as a province, much like Normandy into France, and Tuscany into Italy, and lose her status as a sovereign nation. Forever. Unless Hessenberg is willing to go to war and spill blood for her independence. Which at this point is not an option.”
    Reggie stood to pace around the table. “I should hope not, Mr.Burkhardt.” She wearied of addressing him so formally, but as long as he called her Miss Beswick, she was going to call him Mr. Burkhardt. “Why can’t you just void up the entail? The men who made the agreement are dead.”
    “This is not a school-yard, spit-in-your-hand agreement, Miss Beswick. It’s legal. Binding. With all the rights and restrictions of any law and upheld by a European court. We cannot just void the entail. America has not voided your constitution because the men who penned it are dead.”
    “I don’t understand why this is so important. You’ve been ruled by Brighton for a hundred years. What’s wrong with Hessenberg becoming a permanent part of Brighton?”
    “If it’s all the same to you,”—Mr.