Read the book: «Annie And The Prince»

Chapter One

Why was she feeling so apprehensive? Annie wondered. She sighed and leaned against the train window, watching the Alpine countryside whip by as they sped toward Lassberg, the capital of the tiny European country of Kublenstein. True, things hadn’t worked out well with her hotel in Paris, and Germany had turned out to be more expensive than she could afford. But now she was headed to Kublenstein two days earlier than expected so she could get the lay of the land before meeting her new employers.

It would be nice. She hadn’t been on a real vacation since she was six and had gone to a local amusement park a couple of towns over from her Maryland home. Since high school she’d just been treading water, working to stay afloat and to pay the never-ending cycle of bills. All of that would change, now. She had a good job in what was apparently a wonderful household in Europe. It was just what she’d always dreamed of.

But as the train rails rattled under her feet, she dissected her plan for the hundredth time and couldn’t see one thing in it that should make her stomach feel like it was full of bats.

The train lurched and a young man with pale blond hair and a large rucksack on his back knocked against her, spilling hot drops of coffee on her blouse. “Very sorry, ma’am,” he said, with a light Scandinavian accent.

“It’s okay,” she said quietly, but he had already moved on, not having waited for a response. She pushed her heavy reading glasses back up the bridge of her nose and rummaged through her bag for a tissue. She hated being called ma’am, especially by people who were only a few years younger than she was. And how did he know to speak English? She must look very American.

She dabbed at the coffee with a sigh. The stain remained. She balled the tissue up, put it in the trash receptacle, and tried to return her attention to the book in her lap, but it was difficult. The train was noisy and hot, and so humid that the air almost felt damp against her skin. The coffee stain did.

After one or two unsuccessful tries to concentrate on the book in her hand, she set it back down in her lap and let her mind wander to more familiar thoughts of home. If she’d stayed, she’d be in her small, chilly apartment now, watching the news and eating leftover Chinese food. In the morning, her alarm would go off at 6:50 a.m. and she’d shower and drive to work. Not that that was totally unfulfilling. As librarians went, she was an exceptionally good one. She always enjoyed helping students find more creative ways to look at their assignments. She encouraged them to take the harder route in order to learn more and she loved to help them find strong role models in heroic characters from literature.

Unfortunately, at Pendleton that was often considered ‘pushing the envelope’ and she’d been told more than once by members of the very conservative board of directors to leave the teaching to the teachers.

It was distinctly possible that if she hadn’t resigned when she did the board would have asked the headmaster, Lawrence Pegrin, to dismiss her. Lawrence had had some stern words for her about her tutoring methods more than once, though she suspected he secretly approved. In fact, when Marie de la Fuenza’s husband had contacted the school looking for a suitable English tutor and nanny, Lawrence had suggested Annie without hesitation. In a private conversation he’d assured her that if it didn’t work out she could return to Pendleton, regardless of what the board of directors wished.

That was some comfort, though not quite enough to make her relax now. It was almost as if she was having some sort of premonition, but she couldn’t decipher it. Was something horrible about to happen? Or something wonderful? It was such a fine line between excitement and fear.

Looking at the passing scenery, Annie thought if a fairy tale could come true, this would be the place for it. The mountains stretched high toward the steel-gray sky, huge triangles of shadow and snow. Ancient evergreens with white snow fingertips stood indomitably, as they had done for thousands of years. It was a landscape for the Brothers Grimm, as dreamy as clouds, yet with a healthy hint of the gothic snaking through the hazy shadows of the deep woodlands.

As the miles of icy black forest rolled by she looked around at the other coach passengers. There seemed to be thousands of them, and at least half looked like college students, faces aglow with the excitement of travel and with voices loud and enthusiastic.

Suddenly Annie felt claustrophobic from it all. If she had to stay in this hot, crowded car for one more moment she’d stop breathing. She decided to see if there was another car farther up with fewer people.

She shoved her book into her bag, got up and hauled her two suitcases onto the link between cars where there was a tiny bathroom. The air was cooler immediately. She’d rather stand here for the rest of the trip than go back to the crowded coach car, though it was probably against the rules. Unfortunately, she’d have to shlep her heavy bags with her through the cars until she found someplace else to sit.

But first she was going to try to get rid of the still-damp coffee stain on her shirt. She slipped into the minute bathroom and wedged the door open with her foot so she could keep an eye on her bags. The stiff paper towels were practically water resistant, but she was able to get most of the coffee out of the fabric. What was left, she noted with a sigh, was a huge collection of watermarks.

She stepped out of the bathroom and went to an open window between the cars and breathed in the frigid air. She took another deep breath and hoisted up her bags again, opening the door to the next car with her shoulder. It was strangely empty and deliciously quiet. She realized immediately it was a first-class car. The private cubicles were tempting with their closed doors, cushioned seats, and tiny wall lights giving off a warm glow against the chill gray landscape outside. It was impossible to resist. On impulse, she decided to go into one of the compartments and languish there as a first-class passenger until they got to Lassberg or until someone kicked her out. After all, it wasn’t like stealing. If she didn’t use one, it would just go on being empty.

Suddenly she noticed an extraordinarily handsome man in the compartment before her. He was alone. It was obvious no one was coming back to sit with him. Something about his posture suggested detachment. Isolation. She craned her neck to try and see his hands. No ring, just as she’d guessed.

She caught her breath. If only she were the type of woman a man like this would look at twice. Dreamer, she chastised herself. She hadn’t been the type to catch a man’s eye in all of her twenty-five years, and it wasn’t likely to happen now, especially with an Adonis like the one she was looking at.

Still, she had been swept up in the fairy-tale atmosphere of the Alps and the memory of Joy’s prediction. Why not go with it, just for another moment? She touched her finger to the door. “Maybe you’d be my Prince Charming,” she said under her breath, her words fogging the glass. “If fairy godmothers really existed.” She gave a slight laugh. “And if it wasn’t so heinous for a modern woman to want a Prince Charming.”

The man’s profile, illuminated by the little orange glow of the reading lights, was arresting. The nose was straight and long, his cheekbones beautifully pronounced and his jaw was square and strong. His gleaming hair was as dark as Heathcliff’s in Wuthering Heights. She couldn’t tell what color his eyes were, but the lashes were long and dark and she was certain his expression was brooding.

On the surface he looked like an ordinary guy, wearing an old pair of jeans and a ragged wool sweater. It seemed a little strange that he was in first class—he could almost have passed for one of the students in the other car except that he was older. There was a regal quality about him that gave Annie the impression that he was right at home in the elegant accommodations.

Clack clack sheesh clack clack sheesh, the train rumbled beneath her feet racing across the miles of picturesque countryside. The door to his compartment was open just a crack. Someone with more nerve than Annie would have walked right in and sat down.

She nearly laughed at the very idea of herself doing something like that. It was completely unlike her. If she did it, if she could gather enough nerve just to go for it, it would be baptism by fire, but—

“Excuse me, miss, may I have your ticket please?” a cheery, loud German voice called behind her.

She whirled around to face a short, round, uniformed railroad employee. One hand was filled with passenger tickets that he’d already collected, his other hand was extended toward Annie expectantly.

“Yes…I…” Her face flamed as she thought, for one wild moment, that he might have known what she’d been contemplating. She fumbled awkwardly through her purse, looking for the first-class ticket she knew wasn’t in there and hoping for the coach-class ticket that should have been. She switched from English to German and said, “One moment. It’s in here somewhere.”

She glanced up and the train employee lowered his brow.

“Really.” She dug some more, feeling more hopeless by the second of ever finding the ticket. “I bought it right before I got on board in Munich.” She prayed silently that the Greek god in the private compartment wasn’t watching. He probably was, after all the door to his compartment was nearly all glass and she was right in front of it.

The train conductor shifted his weight and crossed his arms in front of him. “Come now, miss, you can purchase your ticket on board. It’s four hundred marks.”

Annie felt her blood drain to her feet. “Four hundred—” The train suddenly lurched and she lost her balance, teetering momentarily against the door to the mystery man’s compartment before it flew open, sending her sprawling onto the hard metal floor in front of the man himself, her glasses clattering on the floor beside her.

“I’m sorry.” Annie felt around for her glasses and, finding them, put them on. She met the man’s eyes, which were green and even more intense than she possibly could have imagined, and mentally shrank to about two inches tall.

The man shifted in his seat, watching with what appeared to be some interest. Those incredible eyes flicked from her to the angry-looking train official and back again, but he said nothing.

“I’m so sorry.” Annie scrambled to her feet, and tried to smile.

He smiled back and cocked his head slightly, as if questioning what she did for an encore. “Quite all right,” he said smoothly.

He took her breath away and made her lose all track of what she was going to say. “I was…”

The train employee cleared his throat, an unpleasant reminder of the other presence in the compartment.

She turned to him and said, “I’ve got my ticket here someplace.”

Both men looked at her, so she made another attempt at finding her ticket in her bag. It was nowhere to be seen. In English, she muttered a mild oath that would, nevertheless, have gotten a student at Pendleton sent to the headmaster’s office.

The ticket collector frowned. “I’m afraid you’ll have to purchase a ticket, miss.”

“She said she has a ticket already,” the other man said, in a voice as rich and smooth as crème brûlée. His German was slightly accented, but Annie couldn’t tell what the inflection was.

“Policy, sir.” The little round face grew redder. “I don’t make the rules, I just enforce them.”

“That won’t be necessary,” the Adonis said. He hesitated for a moment, then reached for a small leather backpack at his feet. He nodded at Annie. “Please, allow me.” He pulled out several large-denomination bills.

“No, no, I can’t let you do that,” Annie objected, digging in her purse for the four hundred marks.

“But I insist.” Her unlikely hero gave a cold nod to the other man. “Please bring her bags in here.” He started to hand some bills to the man but Annie, who had been hurriedly counting out the four hundred, handed her money to him first. “Thank you anyway,” she said to the Adonis.

He held her eyes steadily, just a touch of a smile on his lips. “Certainly.”

The rail employee started to speak, but his mouth shut suddenly and he poked his head forward to study Annie’s knight more closely. “Wait a minute…Don’t tell me you’re—”

The man looked down suddenly, like a reflex. “Thank you so much for your help. That will be all.” With that dismissal, he looked away, heedless of the ticket collector’s stare.

The train worker left, scratching his head, and muttering, “Of course it’s not him, he wouldn’t be here,” without even a glance back at Annie.

Annie studied the man wondering who the conductor had thought her companion was. He kept his face slightly averted. Whoever it was that he looked like, he didn’t seem to want to talk about it. Probably some obscure European movie star. He certainly had the looks for it. More to the point, he was turning her insides to melted butter, and she’d better stop gawking at him.

“Thank you for your offer of help,” she said, and began to back toward the door. “I apologize for this intrusion on your privacy.”

He gave a shrug. “It’s no problem. I’m only sorry that man was such an unpleasant ambassador to my country. You are American?”

She stopped and nodded, wondering if he expected her to stay.

“Please,” he said, answering her unasked question with a wave of his hand. “Have a seat. I’d welcome the company, unless you have someplace else you have to be.”

“N-no. Thank you.” She sat, mesmerized by him.

“I wouldn’t want you to take home the impression that Kublenstein is unfriendly to strangers,” he said, with a devastating smile.

“I won’t, I absolutely won’t,” she said. There was a moment’s silence, so she added, “I really do have a ticket, or at least I did…”

“I believe you.”

But she wasn’t sure if he really believed her or not. “My name is Annie, by the way.” He didn’t answer right away, so she prodded him, “And you are…?”

He watched her for a moment, wearing an expression she couldn’t quite read. “You don’t know?” he asked after a long minute.

A tickle ran over her skin, like a cool breeze. It was a feeling she’d had before, always when something big was about to happen. She had that sense now, that his question held more significance than it appeared to. “No,” she said simply. “Should I?”

He smiled. “No, of course not. I simply thought I’d—I’d already said.” He shrugged, but looked suspiciously like the cat that ate the canary. He extended his hand to her. “I am Hans.”

She took his hand, smiling at the warmth of his touch. Joy’s premonition of her meeting someone came to mind again and she nearly laughed. Well, in a way, Joy had been right. “It’s nice to meet you.”

He kept his grasp on her hand, seemingly distracted. “Believe me,” he said, his smile broadening. “The pleasure is all mine.”

Suddenly she was overwhelmed by his handsomeness and the intensity with which he leveled his gaze at her. She looked down and cleared her throat. “I have to say, I’m not normally so clumsy…or so careless as to lose my ticket. It must be jet lag or something. It’s my first time in Europe.”

“Really?” He sounded genuinely surprised. “Your German is quite good.”

She felt a flush rise in her cheeks. “Thanks. My grandmother was German and she spoke it to me for the first five years of my life.” She was rambling. She always rambled when she was nervous. “I’ve wanted to come visit her homeland for as long as I can remember.”

“I see.” He nodded thoughtfully. “So why have you decided to visit now?”

“First, I finally had enough money saved up to come. I almost wasn’t able to do it at all, but then I got a job and…” She let her voice trail off, realizing she was starting to ramble again. “Anyway, here I am.”

“Here you are.” He continued to look at her in a way that made her squirm.

A short silence filled the car.

Annie had an inexplicable urge to fill it. “You know, I really don’t know how I lost my ticket. I put it with my passport in this secure zipper pouch right here—” she lifted her purse and unzipped the side “—so I could be very sure where they were. There must be a hole or something—oh.” She pulled the ticket out of the pocket and felt her face grow hot. “That’s strange. Why on earth wasn’t it there before?” Annie was seriously disconcerted. She’d searched the pocket thoroughly. It was almost like magic.

When she looked up, Hans was wearing a questioning expression.

“I know this looks strange, but I really didn’t do it on purpose.”

He looked amused. “I wouldn’t think so.”

An awkward silence stretched between them and after a few moments Annie asked, “So…are you stopping in Lassberg?”

“I am.” He nodded, eyeing her. His words sounded careful. “I live there.”

“How lucky for you. It’s a lovely countryside.”

“Yes, I agree.”

She looked out at a mountain ski run. “Do you do a lot of skiing, living here?”

He shook his head. “Unfortunately, I don’t get out that much. My…work…prevents it.”

She looked at him and smiled. “You’re out now.”

“I am, but it’s for business. Every month or so I take a trip like this into the countryside for a few days, but even then I don’t take much time for recreation.”

Annie would have given anything for a job that involved such a lovely perk as train trips across the Alps. “What is it you do?”

He hesitated, then said, “I work for the civil service. It’s not very interesting. What about you?” It was a slightly abrupt change of subject. “Are you going to be vacationing in Lassberg?”

“Well, for a couple of days. After that…” Perhaps because of her fatigue, Annie found herself wishing he’d ask her out. She immediately brought her fantasy into check. She didn’t even know the man. He was a stranger on a train. With that in mind, she didn’t go on to tell him she’d be taking a job as a private English tutor in Lassberg in a few days.