Four Months Three Words (Months Words Decisions Duty Book 1) Read online

  Four Months, Three Words

  Copyright © 2020 by C.W. Farnsworth

  All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the author except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the products of the author’s imagination or, if an actual place, are used fictitiously and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The author acknowledges the trademarked status and trademark owners of various owners of various products referenced in this work of fiction, which have been used without permission. The publication/use of these trademarks is not authorized, associated with, or sponsored by the trademark owners.

  This book may not be resold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you wish to share it with. If you are reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should return it to the seller and purchase your own copy.

  Thank you for respecting the author’s work.

  To everyone who helped me get here.

  You know who you are.

  BOOK DESCRIPTION

  High expectations are nothing new to Jace Dawson or to Princess Vivienne, but everything else about their lives is completely different. He’s striving to achieve his dream of playing professional football. She’s been constrained since birth from everything except preparing to rule a small country. His family’s farm in Nebraska is struggling financially, while she’s accustomed to the opulent walls of a palace. He’s arrogant and determined; she’s capricious and aloof.

  Unprecedented revelations suddenly push Vivienne even closer to the throne, but also provide her with the opportunity to experience what she’s always wanted more than anything: normalcy. An intricate plan sends her to Lincoln University. There, she discovers American royalty wears football jerseys instead of crowns the moment her newfound anonymity first encounters Jace. Both Vivienne and Jace are used to being treated with deference, but refuse to extend it to each other. She finds him conceited and exasperating, while he’s intrigued by her temper and unveiled contempt.

  He has no idea she’s actual royalty, and she doesn’t care everyone else treats him like he is. One semester of freedom is all Vivienne has before returning home to eventually rule. One season is all Jace has left to ensure his own future and that of his family.

  Neither of them can afford to feel more than annoyance towards the other, but as they each see glimpses behind their respective facades, that may be more difficult than either anticipated. Impossible, even.

  PROLOGUE

  As soon as we emerge from the church the cheers begin. I clutch my mother’s hand tightly, overwhelmed by the flashing lights and exuberant sounds. Tugging at the hem of my satin dress with my free hand, I glance over at the two tall men in black suits standing next to us. I usually find their towering presence annoying, but I’m suddenly grateful for it.

  My father strides ahead of us to the metal barricade that lines the crowded street, shaking hands and passing off gifts to the agents that flank him. My mother begins to tug me along the carefully arranged stone path, but then halts to speak to someone. I don’t bother looking up to see who it is.

  A small, blonde-haired boy who looks to be my age catches my attention as he walks over, carefully clutching a small bouquet of flowers. My mother stops speaking, and the woman she’s been talking to leans down to talk the boy.

  “Give the flowers to the princess, Charles,” she urges him.

  The boy thrusts out his tiny hand, offering the bouquet to me. I don’t move, so my mother squeezes my hand in a silent command. I reluctantly grab one end of the ribbons streaming off the sides of the elaborate bow holding the stems together, and let the vibrant blossoms dangle carelessly against my bare leg. Their floral aroma engulfs me.

  “Aren’t they the sweetest?” the woman asks my mother.

  I don’t give her a chance to reply. “Can’t we go home, Mother?” I ask, my tone a tad whiny. I’ll be scolded for it later, but I’m eager to leave after having to sit quietly for the past couple of hours.

  Predictably, my mother looks at me with vexation. “Vivienne, we’re in public,” she whispers to me. I let my own frustration seep across my face in response.

  Her expression softens slightly. “Are you feeling all right?” she asks.

  “I’m tired,” I reply truthfully.

  “Fine. Anders?” she calls, and one of the men trailing us appears at her side immediately. “Put the princess in the car,” she instructs him.

  I’m shuffled between the two, and then ushered away towards the long line of black cars parked to the side of the church. When we reach the middle one Anders swiftly opens the door and lifts me into the backseat. The movement jostles my precarious hold on the bouquet. Rather than tighten my grip, I relax my fingers, and watch as the ribbon slips out of my grasp and the bouquet falls to the gravel ground.

  I slide across the smooth seat and relax as soon as the door is shut behind me, hiding the abandoned flowers and crowds from view. I stretch out across the cool leather and enjoy the muffled silence after the din outside.

  Tucking my hands underneath my chest, I listen to the uneven thuds of my heart as I wait for my parents.

  CHAPTER ONE

  When I was little, I thought my life was ordinary, boring even. I thought everyone lived in palaces, had staff tend to their every need, wore elaborate, itchy dresses, and was greeted by cheers whenever they emerged from said palace, or anywhere else.

  I can’t pinpoint the exact moment that changed. It evolved as a gradual realization when I grew older and was exposed to more and more the outside world had to offer.

  It began with a creeping awareness that most of the things I simply accepted as normal life were actually reserved for a select few, and was compounded at age ten when I finally recognized no one else in Marcedenia lived the same way that we did.

  I was born with a congenital heart defect that required corrective surgery immediately and then a couple of additional times during my childhood. Thanks to my poor circulation, I spent most of my early years traipsing through the palace corridors draped in several woolen blankets to ward off the constant chill. My perpetually frigid skin earned me the moniker of “Ice Princess” from the palace staff when they thought I couldn’t hear them. My aloof demeanor probably contributed to the nickname as well.

  My heart finally received a clean bill of health at age ten, which prompted my enrollment at the most exclusive and elite preparatory school in the country, Bridgemont Academy. Up until that point I was tutored privately at home, and my interactions with anyone my own age were limited to the children of dukes and lords at a few exclusive events.

  While the main justification for this perpetual isolation was my poor health, I knew my parents were also wary of the risks the outside world posed to me in particular, as their sole heir. As a result, they surrounded me with a constant rotation of nannies, tutors, and security that became a fixed presence in my everyday life.

  An hour at Bridgemont Academy was all it took to permanently abate me of the notion that my life was ordinary in any way. Even among the offspring of the most privileged, wealthy, and powerful citizens in the country, my status was unchallenged. Instructors didn’t discipline me. My peers looked at me with awe.

  No one wanted to risk angeri
ng the future queen.

  I took full advantage of the leniency, essentially doing as I pleased, especially once I realized my security detail would only intervene if they thought I was in physical danger. The deference I was treated with was flattering, but it was also boring.

  Eight monotonous years later, my final days at Bridgemont Academy are rapidly approaching. This fall, I am expected to start my university years at Edgewood College. It is a prospect I am dreading.

  Although the shift to university means I will be living on my own for the first time, albeit in a heavily guarded apartment with round-the-clock staff, my classmates will largely remain the same stuffy, serious, and spoiled group I’ve spent the past eight years with. The few peers who are remotely interesting have been deterred by my omnipresent security.

  Adding to my already apathetic feelings about attending Edgewood College, three days ago I learned of my father’s Alzheimer’s diagnosis. Since it was detected early the doctors expect it will be at least five years before he begins experiencing any of the more serious symptoms. Hopefully longer, if he responds well to their treatment plan and medications.

  The prospect of watching my jovial father slowly lose his mind is both incredibly devastating and selfishly terrifying, since his diagnosis means the couple of decades of relative freedom I expected to have as the back-up are now gone.

  My days as a princess now have a set expiration date. The countdown to becoming a queen has begun.

  My father’s diagnosis prompted a rapid reshuffling of the future plans for the monarchy. Now, when I finish university in four years, while my fellow classmates decide on future careers and celebrate the end of academia, I will be preparing to rule the country they all reside in before my father’s condition becomes public knowledge.

  I resigned myself, from the very first day at Bridgemont Academy, to the fact that amongst the many privileges my charmed life as royalty offers, freedom is not one of them. My entire life was pre-determined for me before I even took my first breath.

  Being the sole heir to the throne offers limited opportunities, but still slightly more agency than the ruling monarch. I hadn’t realized how much that distinction mattered to me until I learned how soon it will disappear.

  Just hours ago, I was hit with the second bombshell of my week, when I found out the antiquated law requiring a female heir to be married in order to become queen still applies to me. My father sought to abolish it as soon as he became king, and he finally convinced the misogynistic men comprising the Royal Council to change it. It was officially signed two days after my birth.

  Turns out I missed my chance at ruling solo by forty- eight hours.

  My parents decided not to tell me before, hoping they would be able to find a loophole, or that I would be already married and middle-aged before having to take the throne.

  In light of recent events the first is looking unlikely, and the second impossible.

  Faced with recent revelations, I feel as though I’m clutching a bunch of balloons whose strings have just been snipped, and am stuck watching the colorful circles float away with no chance of ever recovering them.

  I was disinterested in attending Edgewood College before, but the past few days have been more than enough to change my feelings on the topic to strongly averse. Learning the next four years will be my last without the constraints and obligations of being monarch makes the prospect of having to spend them at Edgewood College sound all the more dreadful.

  Since I have no alternatives, there’s nothing I’d like to do more than consume a copious amount of whiskey. I’ve spent the remainder of day since the marriage bomb was dropped contemplating a plan to sneak out tonight. My chances of actually leaving the palace grounds are low, and my intentions for doing so are entirely selfish, but the allure of alcohol and complete solitude is too tempting to ignore.

  Dinner with my parents is a mostly silent affair. The occasional clink of crystal or clatter of china are the only sounds that resonate in the massive dining hall meant to seat a hundred. My father sits at the head of the table, with my mother and I on either side of him. I know my parents are as worried and overwhelmed as I am, but I can’t muster the words to comfort them yet as I grapple with my own feelings regarding recent events.

  When the strained supper finally ends, I sneak back into the kitchen corridor, where I snag a black hooded jacket from one of the lockers belonging to the kitchen staff. I manage to slip through the back kitchen door and outside without anyone spotting me. The cool night air is tinged with the scent of fresh rain, and I inhale deeply as I emerge from underneath the overhang into a heavy downpour.

  I shove my hands inside the pockets of the borrowed jacket, and discover one contains a keycard for the back gate, which will speed up my exit exponentially. The shiny new SUVs I spotted earlier are still parked in a row by the service entrance.

  I snag the keys from the top of the back right tire and climb inside the driver’s seat. All of the palace’s cars are typically stored in the main garage, but these were just delivered earlier today, and haven’t been moved yet. I let out a sigh of relief when the engine roars to life immediately, and then pull my phone out and power it off so my security team won’t be able to track me.

  The driving rain ensures the evening security guard remains in the booth adjacent to the massive wrought iron gate. He simply waves me through after I scan the keycard. I’ve given no thought to my destination beyond it being an escape from both the physical confines of the palace as well as my own troubling thoughts.

  I drive along the dark, wet streets, alone in a car for the first time, until I spot a grungy pub that suits my current mood perfectly. The obscure location has the additional bonus of being one of the last places anyone would expect to encounter a member of the royal family, significantly lowering the odds of anyone besides my annoyed security team ever knowing I even left the palace.

  I park and walk inside. A long wooden counter spans the entire length of the pub, where I order a glass of whiskey before taking a seat in the booth situated furthest from the front door. There are only two other patrons in the stodgy bar, and I use the rain as an excuse to keep my dripping hood up to cover my most distinctive feature: long strawberry-blonde hair.

  I sit there for a while after my jacket has dried, and long enough to down two more glasses of amber liquid. I stare across the dimly lit pub at the rain streaking down the outside of the dusty panes of glass, my mind blissfully blank. The dark wood that constructs almost every visible surface is surprisingly soothing, and I feel the stress start to leach away as the whiskey warms me from the inside out.

  I’m contemplating whether I should call my security team to come retrieve me now or if I should savor the rare moment of freedom a little while longer when the front door swings open for the first time since I entered.

  A boisterous group of five boys walk inside the previously silent pub and head over to the long counter. I watch them closely, intrigued by the chance to observe normal teenagers. They push and jostle each other in an attempt to order first, tossing around teasing remarks as they do. I don’t realize how intently I’m staring until one of them turns away from the counter to survey the rest of the pub. He immediately meets my intrigued gaze. I look away immediately and curse internally at having drawn attention to myself.

  I pull my phone out of my pocket and power it back on. I learned the very first time I snuck out of the palace to go for a run in the surrounding woods it is a necessary step in order to have more than a few minutes to myself. Immediately, the phone lights up with dozens of missed notifications. Sighing, I unlock the phone and tap on Michael’s name, figuring he’s the member of my security team least likely to yell at me.

  He answers on the first ring. “Princess, where are you?” he questions angrily.

  “Just track me,” I reply, and then hang up.

  I’m in no mood for pleasantries, and slightly buzzed. Alcohol tends to make me even more impertinent than usual. I al
so have no idea where I actually am. I didn’t even take note of the name of the pub.

  I set down the phone on the table just as two of the boys leave the group huddled around the barkeep to amble over to me.

  One of them slides into the booth across from me with a friendly grin, while the other leans casually against the wooden divider.