“Why are you staring at me?” Mrs. Theissen demands. “I’m not about to tell you not to see him, if that’s what you think.”
I lean back at her outburst. “How did you know?”
She smiles, and it’s not her regular polite curve of the lips, but smug. Satisfied. “Five children, plus your brother. I may not have raised the royal family, but I’ve seen them through enough to be able to guess what they’re thinking.”
“I think you did kind of raise them,” I say slowly. “Especially after the queen…”
“They were devastated,” she says in her no-nonsense way. “I did all I could to help them through it, but it was never enough. But the one who truly broke my heart was your brother when he came to live here with your father. Both of them.”
I start when she mentions my brother. My father. Because to me, they’re not part of the royal family. They’remyfamily. But I might be the only one who thinks of them like that. “I don’t think it was an easy divorce,” I manage.
“It was leaving you and your sister,” she corrects. “I know it’s a challenge finding your place in Lord Laz’s life after so long, but you need to know how desperately he loves you. You and your sister. And how he wanted to keep you with him, but he thought it best you stay with your mother.”
“How do you know that?” I ask. “You can’t guess what he’s thinking.”
“He’s told me several times.”
“You’re close to him?”
Mrs. Theissen sips her tea, and I watch her, trying to guess what she’s thinking. “Yes,” she says. “I believe I am.”
I study the older woman. She’s close to my father, when I still feel like there’s a barrier between us. I feel like he wants to be a father, but doesn’t really know how.
And I’m not sure how to be the daughter he wants.
It was always like that with my mother—she’s demanding and exact and determined others will only see her at her best. Which means Stella and I must be at our best, because we are a reflection of her.
That’show I’ve been raised and I’m not sure how to do anything different. But my father is light-years different from my mother, which should make it easier.
It really doesn’t, though.
“Do you think—?” A knock interrupts, and before I can say come in, my father pushes the door wide.
“Hi sweetheart,” he begins, a warm smile on his handsome face. “I thought—Lorelei.”
Who is he—? For a moment, I don’t know who he means and then—
“That’s your name?” I ask Mrs. Theissen. “I mean, I’ve never known your name. It’s so—”
“I know,” she says ruefully. “Gilmore Girls. But I was around long before the show.”
It’s a pretty name. It shouldn’t surprise me that Mrs. Theissen has a pretty name, but it does. For someone who seems so practical, I would expect something like Ruth or Agnes.
It also shouldn’t surprise me that Dad knows her first name, but again, it does. I’ve never heard him call her anything other than Mrs. Theissen. “What are—oh! You’re having tea.”
I’m not sure why Dad seems so excited at the idea. But he can’t stop smiling, and Mrs. Theissen’s cheeks are pink, and she’s smiling… everyone is smiling…
They’re smiling at each other.
Oh.
Oh, wow. Really?
Dad is smiling at Mrs. Theissen like she’s giving him a reason to look at her like that, and she’s smiling right back at him. Granted,because of Dad’s past as a rock star as well as a model, most women seem excited to be greeted by my father.
To make it even more surreal, there’s another knock on the door.
“Your Majesty?” I ask with disbelief at the sight of King Magnus at my door. Granted, it’s not the first time he’s visited me, but with Mrs. Theissen, and Dad, and now the king…
