Real-Life Prince Charming: A Friends To Lovers Romance Read online

  “What do you want? I think that we just finished our conversation on the phone, so why are you here?”

  “Is that what you expect, that I'm just going to listen to what you had to say and not have anything to say back? As long as you’ve known me, Amber, I can’t believe that you would really think that.”

  “I don’t know you at all, Frank.”

  She paused for a moment, deciding something, and finally just asking me again what I was there for. “Just say what you’re going to say, Frank.”

  “How about you start what with why all of a sudden you're acting this way?”

  She blew out a breath and shook her head. “I just got in a little while ago and I am really tired. I wasn't lying about that. I don't lie like you do, Frank. I hung up the phone with you because I really wasn’t interested in continuing on with the conversation. I am still not.”

  I just couldn't figure out what it was that she knew, that made her act that way. Could she know about Caroline, somehow? I had worried about telling her about Caroline because I thought that it might ruin things. Maybe it already had.

  I would like to think that she would understand that it was something that I had to do. I was just confused. This didn't seem to make much sense to me, and I was the one that wanted answers now.

  All I knew I could do at this point was come clean. It wasn't going to be pretty, but then maybe we could just move on. I could at least stop worrying about it. If she wasn't going to accept Caroline and the decisions that I had made, there wasn't really much I could do about it. There would be no more questions of what-ifs, it would just be what is.

  “The way you're talking makes me think that you found out something about me and my home life.”

  She shook her head. “Your home life? Is that when you call it? What exactly is this?”

  I agreed that it was, but I couldn't see what exactly had her upset.

  “Like I said, I don't know what it is that you think you know, but you should tell me so that we can talk it out.”

  She looked really serious for a moment and wanted to know if she could ask me one question. One question didn't seem that bad. One question no matter what it was, I could deal with. And I told her that, of course, she could.

  “Do you swear to me that you will actually answer me honestly?”

  It seemed a little more important after making that promise, but I was still pretty sure that it was what I was going to do, anyway. I had nothing to lie about, after all. Nothing except Caroline, and Caroline could be easily explained. I kept hoping that it was all just going to work itself out.

  “Yes, ask me whatever you want to ask me, and I will tell you the truth. I haven't lied to you yet.”

  She scoffed at me and said that she knew better.

  It took her several moments to formulate the perfect question in her mind. When she finally did say something, all I could think was that it was finally time to come clean. I had expected a five-part question, but that wasn’t the case at all. It was rather simple, and it was just another example of why I was so into her and her personality.

  “Do you have a daughter?”

  “That is not as easily answered as...”

  She cut me off and said that she didn't want to hear it. I was a little surprised because she never really talked to me like that before. It was quite obvious that I had upset her in a very big way. Why was having Caroline such a horrible thing for her? Did she not like kids or something?

  Shit. I never even thought of that.

  “I don't want to hear the reasoning. I just want an answer. Yes or no, do you have a daughter?”

  I could see how bothered she was by all this. I didn't want to answer her in that way. It just wasn’t as simple as her question implied. It didn't look like she was going to let me get much out about the reasoning of why I had her or more importantly, why I hadn’t told her. It was all not going to end well.

  There was nothing else I could do but tell her the one option that I had.

  “Yes, I have a daughter.”

  And, apparently, that was all she needed to hear. She immediately told me to leave. She didn’t blink an eye while she was doing it, either. I was stunned at her change of attitude, but it was clear that she wasn’t going to change her mind. She really did want me to leave. She wasn’t joking like I wanted to believe she was.

  “Are you not even going to give me a chance to explain?”

  Amber shrugged and told me that there was no point in that.

  “You have a daughter that you didn't even think to tell me about. That is all the answer that I need, now, isn’t it? I can’t trust you because of it, so that’s why I hung up on you. There is no reason for us to go forward, because now I have to wonder what else you haven’t told me about.”

  I didn't agree with that assessment at all. It felt like there was a lot more that we needed to talk about. A lot more. Why was she being so stubborn?

  I tried to get her to reason with me, but instead of listening to anything I had to say, she finally just asked me to leave again. It wouldn't have been hard just to throw it out there, before she kicked me out. But I think I was just surprised more than anything. She was acting so differently than I was used to. It made no sense to me. What had her so angry? Surely it wasn’t because I had helped out an old friend years before?

  So, I left. What else could I do? She obviously didn't want me around her, and she was looking at me like I had killed her best friend. It didn't feel like something that was going to be easily fixed. It felt like just one more problem between us. I was really starting to hate that.

  I made my way back home and couldn't believe that it had turned out so poorly. I had all these high hopes for what that meeting was going to bring about, but none of that happened. I was way off.

  It didn't bring us closer. It didn't make her hear me anymore. All that had just happened was I had lost her again. I can't even begin to describe how painful it was. I knew this time for sure that I’d lost her. I just still didn't understand how I’d lost her or why, but that hollow feeling inside of me was back. I knew the truth. The why didn’t really matter.

  16

  Amber

  I tried to keep it together as long as I could, but as soon as he was gone, I started hyperventilating. Why had that been so hard? It felt like my heart had just been ripped out of my chest.

  I was just calming down when Gemma called me back. The people that I had met with the day before wanted me back to go over some of the basics. If I hadn’t had such a horrible meeting with Frank, I probably would have insisted that I needed a little bit of time in between, but I didn't need it now. I didn't really need anything but time and space away from Frank. Being close to him was too complicated. Hampton was looking less and less desirable by the moment. I had actually wanted to hear his excuses why he didn't tell me, why he would do such a thing, but I knew that whatever he told me I wouldn't believe. If he could lie to me about having a daughter, obviously, he would lie to me about anything else. I think the saddest part was that I knew I would never be able to trust him again. Getting out of Hampton and putting some distance between us sounded like a really good idea. I told Gemma to find me a flight. I wanted to get back as soon as she could manage.

  “You weren't there very long.”

  “No, but I was here long enough.”

  “Are you going to tell me what happened?”

  “Maybe one day. I'm honestly still trying to figure it out myself.”

  I felt like an idiot. It was bad enough to fall for him when I was fifteen, believing all of his lies about how we were going to be together forever.

  But how could I be so stupid at my age? I should have known better, and it just stung a little bit more.

  The next morning, I had a flight at about nine o'clock, so I went to the local diner to grab something to eat before I left. It was still nostalgic, and even though it brought back memories of Frank, I was pretty sure that everything was going to. The whole to
wn reminded me of Frank.

  I was sitting in the booth, putting cream in my coffee and trying not to think of the man that would not stop running through my mind. All in all, I was on my way to recovery, especially knowing that I was going to be out of Hampton very shortly. Then, I wouldn't have to worry about any of it.

  It appeared, though, that Hampton was not done with me. My humiliation was not complete yet, and I once again got to see from a distance his daughter, or at least the one that I thought was his daughter.

  She came in with the same older woman, and this time I was really paying attention to them, because I thought I knew who they were. This was his daughter and his wife.

  The wife, right off, did not look like somebody that Frank would be with, or at least I couldn’t see him with someone like her. Maybe I thought that because she was so much different than me. She was older, maybe like ten or fifteen years, and not to be mean to the woman, but she seemed a little dumpy. It wasn't somebody that I would have imagined him being with. He had always liked a bit more pizzazz, and this one wasn’t cutting it.

  The little girl, though, she looked more like the mom than she looked like Frank. Honestly to me, she didn't look like him at all. It made me wonder if I had the right people, until I heard her talk, and then I became even more confused. It was obviously the same little girl and it had to be his daughter, but she was calling the woman Maria, instead of mom. That may be a bit more normal for teenagers, but a little girl that age would most likely call her mother just that, mother. It felt off to me and before I could figure out anything else, they had picked up a to-go order and were leaving. Where was it they were going?

  I was watching them go and the waitress must have noticed, because she said something about how it was so sad.

  “Sad? What do you mean?”

  “Well, I don't mean to gossip...”

  That's how she started the sentence and I knew that she was definitely going to follow it up with a whole lot of gossip. Usually, I didn't want to hear it. I hadn't been in town in years, but this gossip I needed to hear. What I was going to learn from it, though, I had no idea.

  “Well, it's just sad because the little girl's mother died when she was first born and the father that should have took her in, decided that he didn't want to. It was a big to-do here in town, of course. He wanted to put the child up for adoption, and his friend Frank stepped in. Frank did not want to see that little girl go to foster care, you know. He was only about nineteen at the time when he took her. He has done such a good job with her.”

  I felt like my brain was going to explode. Literally. Everything that I thought I knew was wrong and I just felt horrible about it. I had been so mean to Frank, and here he was, just as sweet as I knew he was going to be. He had always been a good person. Always helped people. Why had it been so easy to think so ill of him?

  I felt like there was a life lesson in there somewhere.

  “So, that's not even his daughter? What about that woman?”

  “No, he's not even related to her. He was just friends with the mom and dad. I'm not really sure what happened to the dad. Matt was from here, maybe you remember him, but as soon as Frank took Caroline, Matt just took off, and we haven't seen him since.”

  “And the woman?”

  “I think she's the maid or something like that. Maybe she's the nanny. I don't know. Frank's got way too much money, so he probably has one of each. She's just the woman that takes care of her and takes her to school while Frank is at work. Sometimes she watches Caroline overnight, but not that often. He's been single for years. Everyone thinks that he's been single since he took on that little girl. Nobody would blame him. It sure looks like he has his hands full.”

  I was literally speechless. That's not exactly something that I'm known for, being quiet and all, but what was I supposed to say to that? The waitress didn't expect me to say anything. She didn't know the inner turmoil that was going through me at the moment. All she knew was that I needed some more coffee and she brought me some. How could a complete stranger named Gail completely change everything in my life with just a few words?

  As I was leaving now, I was debating if I should call Gemma back and tell her that I didn't need the plane ticket. I needed to go speak to Frank, that was a given. How long it was going to take and what was going to come out of that conversation, was still up in the air. It wasn't something that I could just rush over there and do in ten minutes and then leave again for ten years. Because it was Frank and because we had this history together, and because I had been such an asshole, I knew that I was going to have to come up with a good plan. A really good plan.

  I was sitting at my grandfather’s house, trying to come up with a plan, when I heard a knock at the door. First, I jumped up because I thought that it was Frank. He was the one person I needed to talk to. I needed to explain to him how I could have been so wrong and then apologize profusely and hope that he forgave me. It wasn't exactly something that I wanted to do, but I knew it was something that I needed to do.

  It wasn't him, though. It was my grandfather’s lawyer bringing me the last of the paperwork. I had talked to him about putting the house on the market, but now, once again, I didn't know what to do. Everything hinged on a conversation that I needed to have with Frank. Everything had been fixed with one conversation with the waitress. It didn't seem that hard to comprehend that one more conversation would change it again. Which way, though, I had no idea. Nothing was making any sense, now. Everything that I thought I knew, twice I'd been wrong. I didn't know if I was able to do it a third time.

  After the lawyer left, I was still trying to figure out what to do. I almost hoped that it was Frank that had come over earlier. It would have been easier. I would have been forced to say something to him, especially now that I knew the truth. I also had to call Gemma and tell her that I would take care of my own plane ticket. I didn't know when I was coming back. I wasn’t ever this wishy-washy, but I had no idea what to do next. No plan.

  Gemma was worried about the new deal that was just struck, but I wasn't. If I was going to stay in Hampton, I had more than enough room to set up shop. It would not be the idea that I was looking for, the great fashion house in Paris, but maybe...

  That was the problem. All of it hinged on a man and I didn't like that. Leaving Frank, though, was just as bad of an option. It really did feel like there was nothing good that I could choose. Either way, I was going to mess it up somewhere.

  So, instead of worrying about what was going to happen next, I needed to focus on the one thing that everything was depending on. Whether I wanted it to be hinged on a man or not, really didn't matter. If there was a way that Frank and I could be together, I wanted it to happen. I had wanted it to happen for ten years, and I felt like walking away again would have been a huge mistake. I almost had because I didn't understand, but now that I did, how could I just pretend like all of these feelings I had would just go away? Or like they already had? They certainly hadn’t for me, and if he could forgive me, I really hoped that his feelings for me hadn't gone away for him, either.

  When I finally did get up the courage to call him, it was rather late and he didn't answer. I didn't know if he was sleeping or if it was because he didn’t want to talk to me. I can't say that I would have blamed him if it was the latter.

  I left a message, though, I didn't say much in the message. I wanted to talk to him face-to face, or at least on the phone when he was on it. It seemed tacky and kind of cowardly to say all of it in another message.

  I waited for him to call me back, but he did not before I went to bed. When I got up in the morning, there weren’t any phone calls from him then, either. Of course, my mind considered the worst. He was probably mad at me because I wouldn't let him get two words out the last time. I had just jumped to conclusions and made everything worse.

  When he didn't call me for the third day in a row, I started to get a little antsy. I didn't want to just go over to his house, especially kno
wing that he had a child. I didn't want to be that woman. That crazy woman that couldn't let things go, but I at least wanted to say what I needed to say, for my own mind to settle. I needed to apologize for jumping to conclusions and I needed to ask for his forgiveness. Whether he wanted to give it to me or not was his decision. I can't imagine him being that easy on me, though.

  I didn't leave another message because I didn't want there to be a bunch from me. I really hoped that first one would do it, but when he didn’t call back, I had to decide if I wanted to maybe appear crazy by calling him again. Instead, I found out where he was working and decided that maybe I should just stop by his office. Then, we could figure out what to do next.

  Going there felt like I was taking a chance. He might not want me to show up. He might not want to see me. Of course, I didn't want to think that was true, but I definitely knew that it was an option. It wasn’t an option that I wanted, but I wouldn’t have blamed him if he wanted to go down that path. I really had been quite horrible to him, considering what I knew now.

  I couldn't think about that, though. Instead, I just pushed ahead and hoped that I was making the right decision. I didn't want to give up whatever was going on between us. I felt like it was a good thing and all I had to do was apologize. Was it really that hard?

  “Hi, is Frank in?”

  “Do you have an appointment?”

  Considering that I was talking to his secretary that had his schedule right in front of her, I think she knew that I didn't have an appointment. I wasn't going to let that slow me down, though. It had taken this much to get me to the door. Now, I wasn't going to walk away. Not until I had done what I came here to do.

  “I don't, but he'll want to see me.”

  I said it with the confidence like I actually knew what I was talking about, when in reality, I really didn't know if he wanted to see me or not. I didn't know if I would want to if I were him. That was really hard to acknowledge.