Page 35 of Some Like It Royal

“You won’t have to. Just get me the message. I’ll get her here to pick them up.” He left it at that and hit the unlock button on the car remote before stepping outside. Alyx sat in the passenger seat and was belting herself in before he got his side open.

“We have a couple of other opportunities here,” he began, but she flattened a palm against the air.

“No. No more digging. This isn’t about the past. This is about your business and my ‘princessing’ it up for you. If we head to the airport now, maybe we can get an earlier flight back.”

The conversation ended there. She didn’t talk. Didn’t press Play on the music. Instead she sat stiff and distant, her gaze away from him, all the way back to the airport. They managed to trade their tickets and boarded a flight less than an hour after leaving the social services office. Each time he tried to touch her arm or her hand, she pulled away from him. She sat as far away from him as the first-class seat would allow, her arms folded and her attitude closed off.

He waited until they were in the air to send some messages via his phone. He told Martin to get the P.I. back on the case. If those boxes were out there, they needed to be found. He also wanted him to scour the news sites and personal social media pages of anyone who may have known the Dagmars.

Shemight have been too young to have social media account of her own at the time but that didn’t mean pictures couldn’t have made their way online via old family friends. Her parents had to have had jobs. His people would contact coworkers, former neighbors—anyone who may have a link. When the stewardess came by to offer drinks, Alyx didn’t look away from the window.

At LAX, she deplaned ahead of him but maintained a touch-me-not distance that forced his hands to stay in his pockets. By the time they reached his car, his nerves screamed for a return to the camaraderie that marked the beginning of their trip.

The freeze-out remained in place all the way home, where she disappeared into the garden, and he was left to watch her from a distance. By dinner, his teeth and his temper were both on edge. When she picked at her food and refused to look at him, he’d had enough.

“You’re pissed and it was a bad day. I get that?—”

“Really?” Heat snapped from the words, and she slammed her fork down. “I’m sorry, what foster home did you grow up in? What happened to all of your family valuables? You look like your father, and his father. Youknowyour family.” The chair fell over as she pushed it back violently and rose. “You hired me to do a job and I’ll do it. But you don’t know a damn thing about me, rich boy. You haven’t lost everything that mattered and become a cog in a wheel of a system that didn’t give a damn about you.”

“No, but I buried my father when I was a kid.” He tossed his napkin on the table. “I grew up in trailer parks and I ran away to video games because it was better than watching my mother try to drink herself to death. We lived paycheck to paycheck when she worked and on my father’s pension when she didn’t. I wasn’t born with a silver spoon in my mouth. Yeah, I’m lucky, I knowexactlywhere I came from. I know what failure tastes like and every single thing I have I earned—by busting my ass.”

Exhaling hard, he tried to stuff his temper back in the bottle but like the genie it was out. Alyx stared at him and he clenched his hands, counted to ten and let them go again. “No, I don’t know what being a foster kid is like and I’m sorrier than you’ll ever know that was your childhood. But all I’ve done is try to help.”

“I—” Her voice hitched and a fresh sheen of tears sparkled across her eyes before she turned away. She gripped the back of a chair, and he was torn between going to her and leaving her be.

He kept screwing up with her.

“I’m sorry today sucked for you.”

“It pretty much sucked for you too.” She sniffled, wheezing a half laugh, half sob.

“I don’t know.” He raked a hand through his hair to keep from grabbing her like he wanted. “It had waffles.”

Her shoulders shook and the last dregs of his anger drained away, leaving a bitter aftertaste in his mouth. Taking a step forward, he started to reach out to her. “Alyx…”

But the face she showed him might have been damp with tears, but also watery laughter. “You’re right, it had waffles. I have a bit of a headache. You mind if I go on up?”

Yeah. He minded. But she needed a break. And maybe he did too. “Not at all. Sleep well.”

“You too.”

Moodily, he stared at the remnants of their uneaten dinner, then finally headed into his office. Maybe he should do what she asked—butt out of her personal life, keep it all a business transaction.

That way they both got what they wanted. Right?

* * *

He wasasleep on the sofa in his office when a newspaper slapped against his chest. Opening his eyes, he found Victor glaring at him. A hard line knitted the man’s brows together. Sitting up slowly, he peered at him. “What’s wrong with you?”

“I could ask you the same question, since trouble has erupted in paradise.” He pointed to the photo on the front of the social section. Daniel sighed.

It showed Alyx marching away from him and his own confusion mirrored in the grainy photograph. The caption read “Has Spherecast billionaire already crashed and burned his secret romance with ‘Russian’ princess?”

“Well, shit.”

“My thoughts, precisely,” Victor scolded. “You have made my job infinitely harder, Mr. Voldakov, and the two of you will have a lot to do to make up lost ground here.”

Daniel tossed the paper onto the coffee table and stood. “Leave it alone. We’ll take care of it.” He should have been paying attention for a photographer. Hell, he’d forgotten about the “job” in his worry for her. She’d shut him out but good.

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