A March Bride (A Year of Weddings Novella) Read online

  Daddy’s heart checkup went smooth as a whistle, but Mama fought him on his diet. “Can’t be eating no fried catfish and hush puppies for dinner every week.”

  But Susanna struggled to listen, to engage. She was busy looking at the signs. Was this marriage really going to work?

  By the time the call ended, Susanna was confused, tired, and suffering from a full-blown bout of homesickness.

  “What’s going on at home, Suz?” Nathaniel asked. “Is Granny all right? Grace?”

  “No, I mean, yes, technically they are all right. But everything is going wrong.” Susanna recapped the call, working to sound rational and reasonable when she felt like weeping.

  “Love, I’m sorry.”

  “It is what it is.” The mantel clock chimed midnight. Susanna fixed her gaze on Nathaniel. “I want to go home.”

  “Agreed.” He moved to sit next to her. “How about I adjust our honeymoon plans? We’ll travel to St. Simons Island first thing after our wedding. Stay at my, our, cottage. Then we can go to our secret destination.” He gave her a wicked smile, sweeping her close to him, kissing her cheek.

  The honeymoon plans were his alone, and Susanna made a game of trying to lure the information out of him. Nathaniel played along, pretending she’d guessed correctly, or worse, that he’d let their destination slip from his lips.

  Yes, we’re going to Dollywood! How did you guess?

  In truth, he was a man of steel when it came to keeping secrets.

  “I want to go home now, Nathaniel.”

  “Now? The wedding is three weeks away. We have engagements on our diaries. The last time we coordinated our schedules, yours was fairly booked. I think you have a final fitting and wedding arrangements to approve.”

  “I don’t care.” She stood, trembling, shaking from a cold she couldn’t define. “I know it makes me sound loony, but I need to go home.” Unchecked tears now spilled down her cheeks. “I miss everyone. I miss Granny. She’s eighty-five years old. Complications from pneumonia could be devastating. And . . .” She gave him a long, steady glance. “I need to think.”

  “Think? About what?”

  “What you’re asking me to do. Give up my citizenship. I never really thought about it before, but, Nathaniel, I’m literally giving up everything. By the time we’re married, I won’t recognize myself.”

  “I realize that, but there’s no need to run off.” He stared away from her, his jaw tensing.

  “I need some time. Some space.”

  “Have your space. Take some time. But flying to America is rather drastic, don’t you think?”

  “I’m not flying to America, Nathaniel. I’m going home.”

  He sighed, long and heavy. “Will you come back?”

  She pressed her hands beside her temples, her head starting to throb with emotional pressure. “I don’t know.”

  “Susanna, we’ve been on this course for nearly ten months. And now you ‘don’t know’?” She could see the passion in his voice reflected on his face and in his eyes. “What is it you don’t know?”

  “I don’t know what I don’t know.” Her thoughts and reason deflated like a carnival balloon. “It’s all coming down to the wire. This is it. Forever. No one from my side of the family is coming except Daddy, Mama, Avery, and Daddy’s sister and her husband.” Susanna eyed the tea cart, which also contained an ice bucket of water bottles. She reached for one, twisting off the cap. “Now my granny can’t come, nor my best friend. It makes me wonder.” The heat of panic crawled across the base of her neck. “Then you bring up my citizenship and I just wonder if all of this isn’t some sort of sign. Like I’ve ignored all the others and God is throwing me one last clue.”

  “You can’t be serious. The citizenship writ is a sign not to marry me? Gracie and your granny’s health issue are signs for us not to wed?”

  “Well, what would you think if you were me?” She knew in her head that she was not making one bit of sense. But her heart said, “Soldier on, sister.”

  She took a long sip of water, trying to quench the parched place deep in her soul.

  “This is ludicrous. Look at everything that’s gone well, Susanna. Our wedding plans have fallen into place. The people of Brighton are embracing you. I daresay the citizens of the world are embracing you.”

  “People hate me too. A friend from home sent me a link to the latest Susanna hate blog.”

  “Blimey, why do they send you those blasted things? Do they think you want to see them?” He paced around the chairs. “I can’t believe you’re drawing our whole relationship into question. Teach me to fall in love! This is Adel all over again.”

  “Excuse me, but this is not Adel all over again.” Susanna intercepted his path to confront him. “Adel never had the challenges I’ve had. She was only concerned about her privacy, and frankly, she’s not done a good job of keeping her life out of the papers anyway. I resent the comparison.”

  “What would you have me believe? I’ve no choice here, Susanna. If you marry me, you must be a Brighton citizen and a Brighton citizen alone. The only other option is for me to abdicate—”

  “Never.” Susanna flashed him her palm. “You abdicate and this wedding is off for sure. I won’t be responsible for the crumbling of the House of Stratton.”

  “Then what are we arguing about?” He pressed his hands on the back of a wing chair. “And by the way, I’m not Adam Peters toying with your heart until something better comes along.”

  “I know, I know.” Susanna downed the last of her water.

  “Do you? Because sometimes I believe you’re still that girl on the beach waiting for him to propose.”

  “Yeah, and sometimes I believe you’re the terrified lad who proposed publicly and got humiliated. And who started to think that no woman would want you because her life will never be her own.”

  “And? Am I wrong? That’s precisely what you’re saying to me now. That nothing of yourself will remain once you become a Brighton citizen and marry me.”

  Susanna conceded with an exhale. He was right. So what was bothering her? Really? She’d weighed the cost when she said yes to Nathaniel. She’d understood it meant leaving her life behind and beginning a new one in a new kingdom, with a new name and a new destiny.

  But then the “Not Attending” RSVPs started rolling in and there was one thing after another. Pile on after pile on.

  And something dark hovered over her heart.

  “I don’t even know what I’m doing here,” she said barely above a whisper as she picked at the water bottle’s paper label. “Nathaniel, what do you want with me? A plain ole common Georgia girl with red clay on her feet and sea salt in her blood.”

  “Is that the core of this issue? That you don’t feel worthy? Susanna, you’ve seen me at my worst. You’ve seen my life. How can you question your value to me? I love you, Georgia girl.”

  “But don’t you wonder? How can we make it? Marriage is hard enough without mixing cultures and nationalities, not to mention social classes.”

  “This? From an American? Your great melting pot nation was built on cultures and nationalities mixing. On tearing down the walls between social classes.” He sighed and pressed his hand to his forehead. “Susanna, I’m beginning to think you really don’t want to marry me. All these excuses—”

  She set her water bottle down and crossed to the window. “I just feel homesick, like I’ll never be myself again. I feel lost in the swirl of you, of the royal family, of the wedding. It’s more about you and Brighton than you and me. Every other day I hear a story about how the people are afraid of my influence. How I’ll turn you into an American.” She raised the windowpane, ushering in a fresh, cold blast that shoved aside the stale, tepid air in the room. “I guess that’s what the writ is about, huh?”

  “How long have you been feeling this way?”

  She shrugged. “I’m not sure I knew until now.”

  Her confession of doubt opened door after door of fear, uncertainty, an
d dread. What if she gave up everything, even her citizenship, and the marriage failed?

  “For now, please, I need to go home. Go back to ground zero, get my bearings, and sort out what I’m feeling.”

  “All right.” His heavy exhale revealed his hurt. “But you fly on Royal Air Force One.” Nathaniel reached for his jacket and headed for the door. “Just tell me you’re coming back, Susanna.” He paused at the door, his blue eyes wet and shining.

  “I think so.” She twisted the antique diamond ring around her finger. “But I don’t know.”

  Nathaniel regarded her for a moment and opened the door. “I’ll have Jonathan make the arrangements.”

  Susanna knew Jonathan, Nathaniel’s aide and friend, would call within the hour to discuss details, searching for details that went beyond a proposed departure time and which Georgia airport she preferred. He’d want to know what was going on. All without asking outright.

  “Nathaniel,” she said with almost no volume. “Thank you.”

  “Thank you?” He shook his head. “I already regret agreeing to this.”

  The sound of the door slamming as he took his leave echoed in Susanna’s heart the rest of the night.

  On Monday afternoon Nathaniel muddled through his daily routine of scheduling and correspondence.

  In truth, he thought of nothing but Susanna. His mood drifted toward an ever-widening, swirling black hole of fear. At any moment, he might collapse within himself, never to be seen again.

  Like the time he leapt foolishly into the murky, cold waters of Roose Lake his frosh year at university. He sank beneath a quagmire of roots and weeds and barely found his way to the surface. His lungs nearly burst for want of air.

  She’d been gone three days, and try as he might, he couldn’t clear himself of the blasted, dark foreboding creeping through every molecule of his body: She’s not coming back.

  But she must. She simply must. However, the velvet pouch in his pocket warned him otherwise.

  Rollins, the Parrsons House butler, had found Susanna’s engagement ring on her dressing table the morning of her departure for home.

  When he brought it to Nathaniel, his heart nearly stopped. Was she actually planning to stay in America?

  Settle, mate.

  Susanna had also left behind her favorite shoes, the gold Louboutins she wore to his coronation ball. And pictures. All of her family photos remained in her suite parlor and her bedchamber.

  Surely she would return to Brighton. He inhaled long and slow. And she’d reclaim her ring.

  Yet he could not deny her arguments about royal life. It was not easy. Susanna was giving up everything to marry him. Was he worth it?

  Since the day she arrived in Brighton as the king’s fiancée, the media immersed her into her own murky waters of scrutiny, nitpicking, and faultfinding.

  Anything to sell papers or draw in viewers. All three Brighton news outlets sent crews snooping around St. Simons Island, searching for the underbelly of Susanna’s American life and family.

  One talk show tabloid spent a week, a whole week, on her relationship and breakup with the American Marine hero Adam Peters. Only half of the story’s details were even partially true.

  But despite the downsides of being associated with Nathaniel, Susanna was setting the world on fire. All on her own.

  A billion viewers were estimated for their wedding. News outlets who’d all but forgotten about Brighton royalty battled the King’s Office royal red tape for permits to send broadcast crews for the wedding.

  Once Susanna mentioned in an interview that she loved the Scripture, “The joy of the Lord is your strength,” every bookshop on the island promptly sold out of their Bibles. News presenters read Nehemiah 8:10 on air, and a children’s choir performed a song based on the verse.

  Her very presence boosted Brighton’s economy. The fashion designers merely mentioned a frock they’d designed for her and online orders crashed their servers. Tourism was up last quarter by 5 percent.

  “Knock, knock.” Nathaniel’s brother stuck his head inside the office doorway.

  “Stephen, what brings you round this time of day?” His afternoons were consumed with rugby practice. He’d been playing for the national team since his return from Afghanistan where he served with the Royal Air Force.

  “Came to see you.” Dressed in slacks and a shirt, his black hair flowing loose about his sturdy face, he looked more and more like their Leo-the-Lion dad. Stephen crossed the wide, sunlit office and sat in a chair across from Nathaniel’s desk. “You look horrible.” Tact? Not with his little brother. “Not sleeping, are we? How are things with Susanna? Have you heard from her?”

  “We’ve spoken once, but otherwise we seem to be missing each other.” Nathaniel drummed the pen in his hand against the desk and stared at the financial report in front of him. Seeing but not seeing. “What are you about today? No practice?”

  “My ankle is still bothering me. I’m taking some time off.”

  Nathaniel glanced up. “Time off? For a sprain? That doesn’t sound like you. ‘Play through the pain,’ you always say.”

  “Yeah, well, not this time.” Stephen stared at the floor, then at Nathaniel. “I came to check on you. Is everything all right?”

  Nathaniel looked toward the tall, narrow window where the sunlight dimmed behind a cloud. “I don’t know.”

  “How can you not know? You’re getting married in a little more than a fortnight.”

  “Two weeks and four days.”

  “Spoken like a man in love,” Stephen said. “I’d be counting the days too if I was marrying someone like Susanna. But here’s my question for you. What are you doing here if she’s there?”

  “Giving her space. She’s only gone home for a few days to see her granny and her friend Gracie. Besides, I’ve work to do, Stephen.”

  “What of this business about her American citizenship?”

  “I see you’ve spoken with Mum, the family crier.”

  “She said Susanna might not want to give up her citizenship. Pretty bold of Brock Bishop and his party to tack on the writ.”

  “Yes, but I agree with them. Not because I mistrust Susanna, but for our descendants and the future of the throne.”

  Stephen whistled, leaning forward on his arms. “She must feel betrayed, Nate. You’re no better than our ancestors who authored the Marriage Act to keep royals from marrying foreigners.”

  “I disagree.” Nathaniel rocked forward in his chair, resting his elbows on the desk. “Marry whom you will, but the spouse of a Brighton royal must be a Brighton-only citizen. It’s not too much to ask for the spouse of a royal in line to the throne.”

  “But you must see her side. She’s doing all the giving, all the changing.”

  “I realize that.” Nathaniel sighed and recapped his Parrsons House conversation with Susanna to his brother. “She is overwhelmed.” He moved to the window. The first of spring’s green leaves had started budding on the oaks lining the palace grounds. “Rollins found this. Brought it to me this morning.” Nathaniel pulled the pouch from his pocket, dangling it from his fingers. “Susanna’s engagement ring.”

  Stephen whistled again. “She left it behind?”

  “On purpose or not, I don’t know, but Rollins found it on her dressing table.” Nathaniel slipped the ring back into his pocket and it burned like a hot coal. “I don’t know what I’ll do if she doesn’t come back.”

  “Big brother, snap out of it. Go get her. Don’t sit around hoping for the outcome you want. It’s been three days. I can’t believe you’re not packing to leave. For pity’s sake, you’re a king. Act like one. Look at you, pouting like a helpless child.”

  “Just what do you suggest? I wing my way to St. Simons Island, grab her by the hair, and order her home?” Nathaniel returned to his desk. “You should’ve seen her face when I told her she had to renounce her American citizenship. She’s already put up with leaving her home, her career, family and friends, taking on all the
burdens of marrying a royal, but this last request required the only thing she really had left of herself.”

  “Balderdash. She’s plenty left of herself. Her faith. Her love for you, and yours for her. Her talent as a landscape architect, her way with people. Get over there and remind her of those things. For pity’s sake, act like a king. Remind her that she’s a princess. Remind her that you are worth all she’s giving up. Remind her of who she is with or without her American citizenship. Do what needs to be done to win her heart. She loves you, Nate. You need her. I daresay we all need her.”

  Nathaniel squinted at his brother. “Fine speech, but does she need us? I can’t imagine why she’d want to marry me with all the trappings I come with. It can be a privileged life, but also brutal and hurtful. Someone actually e-mailed her a link to a blog dedicated to hating and criticizing her. The blog title is not worth repeating in polite company. And what do you think I’ve been doing since she moved to Brighton but reminding her of the very things you mentioned?”

  Despite his words of protest, Nathaniel had spent the weekend talking himself out of exactly the kind of plan his brother was suggesting. Part of him ached to put his schedule in the rubbish bin and go after her, while the other part convinced himself to leave her be and give her the courtesy of space. She’d come round when she was ready. Right?

  “Go get her. Tell her in no uncertain terms. If you ask me, you’re not giving her enough credit.”

  “Really? Then why did she leave?”

  He shrugged. “Perhaps she was a bit overwhelmed. What bride isn’t? Let alone one becoming a part of our family. But you leaving her be is just confirming all of her fears. I say again, go after her.”

  “I’m not sure one human heart can love another as much as we are asking of her.”

  “Blimey, Nathaniel, you’re a blasted cynic. Mum wasn’t born and raised a royal, but she adjusted to royal life quite well.”

  “She was the daughter of a lord who groomed her to marry a king. And you know full well she struggled with the press in the beginning. But in her day there was no paparazzi. No blogs. No Twitter. No twenty-four-hour news cycle. There was a barrier between the press and the royal family.”