Royally Yours Read online

“Hey,” Ellie said. “You hungry?”

  The goats ignored her.

  “Merry Christmas, Ellie.”

  She turned to see Eric standing there in his pajamas, his coat around his shoulders.

  “You’re up early,” Ellie said, giving him a hug.

  “I could say the same to you,” Eric replied. “Couldn’t sleep?”

  “No.”

  “Me either.” He exhaled. “Did you see the Santa gifts?”

  “Yeah,” Ellie said. “I think there was a brand-new laptop in there for me.”

  Eric let out a low whistle. “It’s incredible that she spent all that money.”

  “Why?”

  Eric rubbed his eyes and took a deep breath. “Ellie, Mom’s going back to work at the hospital.”

  “Why?”

  “We have to shut down the store,” Eric explained. “We’re going bankrupt.”

  Ellie clapped a hand over her mouth. The goats let out a noise of surprise, distracted from their eating by the change in emotional atmosphere. “Are you serious?”

  Eric sighed. “I tried to revamp everything, get online sales going. But it was too late even four years ago. We’ve barely been hanging on. Why do you think I live at home?”

  “Why didn’t you tell me about this?” Ellie asked, deeply perturbed. “You kept me out of the loop. We’re twins, Eric! We never keep each other out of the loop. It’s the unsaid promise of our relationship. It’s foundational to who we are!”

  “Dad insisted. So did Mom. We didn’t want you coming home to try to help. There’s nothing to be done, Ellie. We’re shutting down.”

  Tears streamed down Ellie’s face. “This is horrible. Terrible. And I didn’t even know about it.”

  Eric shrugged, pulling her into a hug. They stood there for several minutes, Ellie’s head buried in her twin brother’s strong chest. She finally pulled away from him. “You know,” she said slowly, “there’s a silver lining in this. You can do what you want now.”

  Eric smiled sadly. “I’m getting a job at the lumber mill to help pay off all of Mom and Dad’s debts.”

  “No,” Ellie said. “You can’t. You’ve got to get out of this town, Eric. You’ve been stuck here your entire life!”

  Eric smiled sadly. “It’s not meant to be, Ellie. Maybe in a couple of years I can start over and see what happens.”

  Ellie’s phone rang. She glanced at it. “That’s the timer for the cinnamon rolls. We should go back inside.”

  “Ellie,” Eric said as she walked away.

  “Yeah?”

  “Grandma told me about Melody. You’ve gotta go to her. A phone call won’t be enough.”

  Ellie shook her head. “I can’t. I can’t afford to fly all the way over there—”

  “I’ve got some savings. Call it my last hurrah before my entire paycheck starts to go to Mom and Dad.”

  “I can’t take your money.”

  “You can take mine,” said a voice from the barn entrance. It was Blanche. “I have zero living expenses and I’m going to die soon anyway.”

  “Grandma!” Ellie exclaimed.

  “I’m joking, I’m joking. But seriously, I have the money. Take my credit card and go buy yourself a plane ticket.”

  Ellie hugged her. “You’re serious, aren’t you?”

  “It’s the silver one in my nightstand. I only use it for emergencies.”

  “Grandma, I don’t believe it.”

  “Consider it a Christmas present from me. For the next five years.”

  Ellie kissed her soft, wrinkled cheek. “I love you, Grandma.”

  “I know, chicken.”

  Ellie suddenly shrieked. “The cinnamon rolls! The timer went off minutes ago.”

  “I took the rolls out of the oven. They smelled done.”

  “What would I do without you, Grandma?”

  “I plan on living forever so you don’t have to find out.”

  CHAPTER FORTY-TWO

  Eric drove Ellie to the airport, leaving Blanche, Tom, and Lily home alone for several hours. There was a plethora of empty flights for Christmas Day, even considering the blizzard that was threatening to close the airport later that night.

  Lily sat knitting in the quiet living room. “Well, there goes our Christmas plans.”

  “We’ll do presents when Ellie gets back, don’t you worry, Lily,” Tom said, not looking up from his newspaper.

  Blanche was on her iPhone playing Candy Crush. “It’ll still feel like Christmas once everyone’s home again.”

  “I know, it’s just that everything was all prepped and ready to go,” Lily said dejectedly.

  “I seem to remember one Christmas morning where you, Tom, and the kids didn’t show up on time.”

  “Our car broke down!”

  “A likely story,” Blanche quipped. She glanced out the window. “Looks like the storm is moving in a little bit early.” Flakes of snow were already spitting down outside. She texted Eric to see if he was okay. “Looks like Eric is nearly home.”

  “He shouldn’t text while driving,” Lily intoned.

  “He was at a stoplight,” Blanche replied. “The one at the bottom of the hill.” She put down her phone. “I better make some more coffee.” She puttered around the kitchen, drying mugs and unloading the dishwasher while she waited for the pot to finish. A few minutes later, the doorbell rang.

  “Looks like Eric forgot his house keys again,” Lily said.

  Tom grunted. “I keep telling him to get a key ring that attaches them to his truck keys, but that boy won’t listen to me.”

  “I’ll get it.” Blanche ambled from the kitchen to the front door, holding onto the walls as she went. She opened it.

  Eric was standing there with his arm around a woman. “Look who I just found getting out of a very expensive taxi?”

  Blanche gaped. “Melody?”

  CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

  Ellie was on the plane with her phone turned off by the time Melody had gotten to her house, unbeknownst to her. Ellie flew from upstate New York to New York City and had to sprint to get to her terminal. There was no time to check her phone.

  She managed restless sleep on the long, long flight overseas. This was her first time leaving the country other than going to Canada as a child. Her excitement mixed with nerves woke her up just as the plane was landing. She glanced out the window, but all she could see was a small cluster of lights. It was night time in Madrana.

  She pulled her duffel bag out of the overhead bin and made her way into the airport. There were taxis lined up, and she hopped into one.

  “Where to?” asked the driver in slightly French-accented English.

  Ellie took a deep breath. “To Pierpont Castle.”

  “It’s closed to tourists, ma’am. They’re only open until five, and it’s Christmas Day anyway. They will reopen again tomorrow.”

  “It’s fine,” Ellie said. Her stomach fluttered with nerves. Was it fine? Could she just show up? What would she say? “Hi, I’m your daughter’s ex-girlfriend. Is she here by chance?”

  They drove down cobblestone streets in what looked like a quaint little European town. All of the shops were shut down for the holiday, but Ellie was already making a mental note of which places she wanted to patronize before she left. She just hoped she’d be making those visits with Melody and not alone.

  The castle was only a little bit outside the town, on a high hill overlooking the red-roofed stone buildings. Ellie looked up through the sun roof to see the stars. They were even brighter here than they were at her parents’ house out in the country.

  “You want me to wait?” the driver asked with a grin. “It’s cold outside and you’re not going to get very good photos in the dark.”

  “Yeah,” Ellie said. “Wait.” She gulped. The castle was lit up like a Christmas tree with white lights coating the stone exterior. It was monstrously huge, bigger than any building Ellie had ever seen. She couldn’t believe that Melody had grown up there. She opened th
e taxi door and walked up to the wrought iron fence. It was absolutely freezing outside. There were security cameras everywhere along with a guard ensconced in a glass box. He was sleeping, a pastry half-eaten on a napkin sitting on his lap. Ellie took a deep, steadying breath and rapped on the window with her fingertips that were burning from the exposure to the cold.

  The guard awoke with a start. He blinked at her, confused, and rolled down the glass window to speak to her. “Oui?”

  “Hi, um. I don’t speak French,” Ellie said sheepishly. “I’m…I’m Ellie Mayhew…and I’m here to see Melody…um, Princess Melody. Is that her title?” She was suddenly blanking on the hours of research she had done over the last few days. “I’m her-her friend. From the United States.” She felt a stone sinking in her stomach. What was she doing here? This was a fool’s errand. She should have just called Melody, damn what Eric had said about a phone apology not being good enough. Now she was standing in the freezing cold looking like a freak stalker as her cab driver laughed at her in French.

  “Miss Ellie!” the guard said. “Yes, yes. Do come inside. I apologize. I’m always a little foggy-headed when I wake up.” He pushed a button and the gates began to open. “Welcome to Pierpont Castle.”

  Ellie gaped at him in utter shock and amazement. “You-you know who I am?”

  “But of course I do! Get inside before you freeze to death.”

  Ellie walked back to the taxi and grabbed her bags. The taxi driver was staring at her in shock. “You know someone here?”

  “I do,” Ellie replied with a wide grin. “Merry Christmas.”

  She left the taxi driver gaping at her and walked through the gates and around the circular driveway to the massive front doors. Ellie felt more than a little like Belle arriving at the Beast’s castle. The double doors were made out of a thick, weather-worn oak. She picked up the brass lion’s head knocker and rapped on the door twice.

  The guard must have called ahead.

  The doors opened.

  “Great to see you again, ma’am,” said Herschel with a broad grin. “I’m so happy you could be here.”

  CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

  “She’s not answering her phone,” Eric said, putting down his iPhone. “But she had a tight connection to make at JFK. I guess she’ll answer when she’s landed in Madrana.”

  “You know this all could have been avoided if you’d just texted one another earlier,” Blanche said with a wry smile.

  Melody put her head in her hands. She was sitting on the couch next to Blanche. “I didn’t feel like a phone apology would suffice.”

  Blanche patted her leg. “What you need is a good foot rub while you talk. Take off your socks.”

  Melody blinked. “Is this a joke?”

  “No joke,” Lily explained with a smile, setting down a cup of steaming hot tea. “She loves giving foot rubs to the people she loves in her life.”

  “Take the opportunity,” Eric said. “They’re the best foot rubs this side of the Mississippi.”

  Melody pulled off her socks and set her feet on Blanche’s lap, who was ready with the lotion. “Now, tell us how you came to be here.”

  Melody took a deep breath and launched full-force into her story. “I’ve been traveling something like twenty hours. I think I left my body somewhere in Greenwich Mean Time.”

  Everyone laughed appreciatively. Tom had even set down his newspaper to listen to her.

  “I was at my parents’ cabin up in the mountains with Herschel, my mother, and father. It was there that I realized I’d made an enormous mistake and had to see Ellie immediately. I didn’t even think of calling her; I wanted to apologize in person.”

  “Ellie’s the one who made a mistake,” Blanche interjected. “She left you.”

  Melody shook her head. “I can’t blame her. I was going to tell her, honestly, I was. I just didn’t get to it before Jason did.”

  “Dick,” Eric added.

  “Eric,” Lily said softly.

  “What, Mom? He is a dick. From everything I’ve heard anyway.”

  Melody smiled. “He’s right. Jason’s a tool. So anyway, there was a snow storm coming. I barely made it out in time. Then my connection was canceled in Heathrow so I took a train to Paris to fly out of there. Only there were no seats on the flight. I paid some guy eight hundred Euros to take his spot on the plane.”

  “You didn’t!” Lily gasped. “Oh, all of this trouble and bother and Ellie’s not even here.”

  Melody grimaced. “It’s not ideal.”

  “But now we’ve got an Ellie replacement!” Eric said. “And we can open all the presents!”

  Blanche was still rubbing Melody’s feet. “I think that’s a fine idea.”

  “But we don’t have presents for Melody.”

  “She can open Ellie’s. Ellie won’t mind, will she?” Eric asked the room at large.

  “I can’t possibly take Ellie’s presents away from her,” Melody said.

  “You wouldn’t be. You’re just opening them,” Blanche said. “Come on, Lily. Don’t wear that face. You wanted a family Christmas on Christmas Day. This is what you get! Take or leave it!”

  Melody shot off a text message to Herschel to send him back to the castle. Someone familiar should be there for Ellie’s arrival, Melody thought.

  After that, she had a grand, if unusual, family Christmas.

  CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE

  “She’s not here,” Herschel said, answering Ellie’s unasked question as she stepped into the warm castle. The entryway was so big there was a fireplace in it.

  “She’s not?” Ellie’s heart sank. She pictured Melody in the south of France with that leggy Italian woman.

  Herschel grinned. “There seems to be a bit of a mix-up.” He took her bags and began walking up the grand staircase that was carpeted in red. “Miss Melody flew to New York. And you flew here. Eric was trying to get in touch with you but your phone must have been off for your flights.” They turned down a long corridor of doorways. “At any rate, once Miss Melody had figured out what was happening, she texted me immediately. I was up at the winter cabin with the Queen and Sir Bryant.”

  Ellie slapped her hand to her head. “I interfered in your vacation.”

  “If you’ll keep it between you and me, ma’am, it’s never much of a vacation when Queen Regina is around.” Herschel glanced around the empty corridor. “Like I said, please keep that between us.”

  “Of course,” Ellie said. Her head was spinning as she took in all this new information and the sights around her.

  Herschel stopped at what seemed to be a random door on the right and pushed it open. “After you, ma’am.”

  Ellie stepped inside and gasped. The bedroom was the size of her parents’ entire house. There was a king sized, four poster bed covered in crisp white linens, a full sitting area in front of a fireplace so big Ellie could have stood up inside it, and an office area that held a retina-display iMac. It was turned on and glowing in the dimly-lit room.

  “This will be your room while you stay here,” Herschel said, setting down her duffel bag on the settee at the end of the bed. “And Miss Melody is awaiting your FaceTime phone call on that computer over there. I thought you might be more comfortable taking a long call on the computer where you could sit comfortably without holding a phone up to your face. Do you want to freshen up first?”

  Ellie was still stunned. “Um, I guess I could use a little face wash. The plane makes me feel so disgusting.”

  “Certainly. The bathroom is just through those doors there. No one will bother you for the rest of the evening except for Patty, who will leave a little midnight snack outside your door, alright?”

  “Alright.”

  “And pull this tassel by the bed if you need anything else.” Herschel pointed to the largest tassel hanging by the door. “It’s an old intercom system, essentially. Are you quite alright, Miss Ellie?”

  Ellie rubbed her eyes and inhaled deeply. “I’m sorry if I’m being we
ird. It’s just…I’m standing in a castle right now. I wasn’t expecting to be doing that three days ago.”

  Herschel nodded. “My first day here went similarly to yours.”

  “Do you get used to it?”

  Herschel smiled at her kindly. “Not really. Now, let me leave you. I know Miss Melody is tired but eager to see your smiling face. I wish you the best of luck in here. It will all go splendidly, I promise you that.”

  “Thank you so much, Herschel. For absolutely everything that you’ve done for me. I’m sorry again I interrupted your holiday.”

  “Merry Christmas, ma’am.”

  “Merry Christmas.”

  Ellie splashed her face with water and changed into a flowy top. There was no point in taking her sweatpants off; Melody wouldn’t see her from the waist down. She took her millionth deep breath of the last twenty-four hours and sat down in the office chair. It was the most ergonomic, comfortable chair that she’d ever sat on in her life.

  She hit a few keystrokes and pulled up FaceTime and entered Melody’s number. The seconds it took for the call to connect felt like sixteen lifetimes. But it finally did connect.

  And Melody answered.

  CHAPTER FORTY-SIX

  “Hey,” Melody said, adjusting her cross-legged stance. She was sitting on Ellie’s bed, a tray of freshly-baked cookies and hot tea to her right. Blanche had insisted on providing provisions for the phone call. “You look great.”

  “It’s the middle of the night here. I do not look great, don’t lie.”

  “Hey, I can’t be looking all that much better. I’ve been traveling even longer than you have.” Melody laughed nervously.

  “You look beautiful,” Ellie replied. “Stunningly beautiful, as always. Are you sitting on my bed?”

  “I am. And it’s even better than that. I’m using your brand-new retina display Macbook Pro.”

  Ellie slapped her forehead. “I ran out on the Christmas gift opening! My mom must be devastated.”

  “She wasn’t, not too badly. They all decided I could open your gifts on your behalf.”