Zoe blurted with such joy, Alex was speechless.
“Hi, Zoe. Did you want to say good-night?” “Yes.”
“She thought you were gone,” Alex whispered in an aside.
Dottie nodded. “Why don’t you get in bed and I’ll read you a story. Then I have to go to bed, too, because you and I have a big day planned for tomorrow, don’t we?”
Zoe’s lips turned up in a smile. “Yes.”
Like magic, his daughter crawled under the covers. Dottie pulled up a chair next to the bed. “This is the good-night book. See the moon on the cover? When he’s up there, everyone goes to sleep. Freddie the frog stops going ribbbbbit and says good-night.” Zoe laughed.
Dottie turned the page. “Benny the bee stops buzzzzing and says good-night.” She showed each page to his daughter who was enchanted. “Charlie the cricket stops chirrrping and says good-night. Guess who’s on the last page?” Zoe didn’t know. Dottie showed it to her. There was a mirror. “It’s you! Now you have to say good-night.”
Zoe said it.
“Let’s say the g again. Mr. G is a grumpy letter.” Zoe thought that was hilarious. “He gets mad.” She made a face. “Let’s see if we can get as mad as he does. We have to grit our teeth like this. Watch my mouth and say grrr.”
Alex was watching it. To his chagrin he’d been watching it on and off for several days. After half a dozen tries Zoe actually made the grrr sound. He couldn’t believe it. In his astonishment his gaze darted to Dottie, but she was focused on his daughter.
“You sounded exactly like Mr. G, Zoe. That was perfect. Tomorrow night your father will read it to you again. Now Dot has to go to sleep. I’ll leave the book with you.” She slipped out of the room, leaving the two of them alone.
Zoe clasped it to her chest as if it were her greatest treasure. Alex’s eyes smarted because lying before him was his greatest treasure. She fell asleep within minutes. As soon as she was out, he left the room knowing Sofia was sleeping in the adjacent room and would hear her if she woke up.
He strode through the palace, intending to talk to Dottie before she went to bed. Hector met him as he was passing his grandmother’s suite on his way to the other wing.
“The queen wants to see you before she retires.”
His brows lifted. “You wouldn’t by any chance be spying on me for her, would you, Hector?”
“I have never spied on you, Your Highness.”
“You’ve been spying for her since the day Stasi and I were born, but I forgive you. However, Stasi might not be so forgiving once he’s crowned, so remember you’ve been warned. Tell the queen I’ll be with her in ten minutes.”
He continued on his way to Dottie’s apartment. After he knocked, she called out, “Yes?”
“It’s Alex.”
The silence that followed was understandable. He’d never used his given name with her before, or given his permission for her to use it. But considering the amount of time they’d been spending together since her arrival at the palace, it seemed absurd to say anything else now that they were alone. “Would you be more willing to answer me if I’d said it’s Zoe’s father, or it’s your Royal Highness?”
He thought he heard her chuckle before she opened the door a couple of inches. “I was on the verge of crawling into bed.”
Alex could see that. She’d thrown on a pink toweling robe and was clutching the lapels beneath her chin. “I need to talk frankly with you. Zoe has decided you’re her new mommy. She got hysterical tonight when I tried to tell her otherwise.”
“I know. She’s told me on several occasions she wishes I were her mother. This happens with some of my youngest students who don’t have one. It’s very normal. I just keep telling them I’m their teacher. You need to go on telling her in a matter-of-fact way that Princess Teresa was her mommy.”
“I did that.”
“I know. I saw the photograph and see a lot of the princess’s beauty in Zoe. What’s important here is that if you don’t fight her on it, she’ll finally get the point and the phase will pass after a while.”
“That’s very wise counsel.” He exhaled the breath he’d been holding. “You made a breakthrough with her tonight.”
“Yes. I’ve wanted her to feel confident about one sound and now it has happened.”
“How did you know she would do it?”
“I didn’t, but I hoped. Every success creates more success.”
Talking through the crack in the door added a certain intimacy to their conversation, exciting him. “Her success is going to help me sleep tonight.”
“I’m glad. Just remember a total change isn’t going to happen overnight. Her vowels are coming, but G is only one consonant out of twenty-one. Putting that sound with the rest of a word is the tricky part.”
“Tricky or not, she mimicked you perfectly and the way you read that book had her spellbound.”
“There was only one thing wrong with it.”
“What’s that?” He found himself hanging on her every word, just like his daughter.
“It didn’t have a page that said the prince stopped rrrrruling and said good-night.”
Alex broke into full-bodied laughter.
Her eyes smiled. “If you’ll forgive me, you should do that more often in front of Zoe, Your Highness.”
“What happened to Alex? That is my name.”
“I realize that.”
“Before I leave, I wanted you to know that I’ve worked things out with my internal affairs minister so I can eat dinner with my daughter every night. From now on he’ll take care of the less important matters for me during that time period.”
“Zoe’s going to be ecstatic!” she blurted, displaying the bubbly side of her nature that didn’t emerge as often as he would have liked to see.
“I hope that means you’re happy about it, too, since you’ll be joining us for our meals. Good night, Dottie.”
“Good night, Alex.”
She shut the door on him before he was ready to leave. After being with her, he wasn’t in the mood to face his grandmother. As he made his way back to her suite, he thought about his choice of words. The only time he’d ever faced the queen was when he’d been a boy and had a reason to feel guilty about something.
Tonight he had a strong hunch what she wanted to discuss with him. After Zoe’s nightmare, now he knew why. If she’d told Yiayia that Dottie was her new mommy, nothing would have enraged his grandmother more. She would have told Zoe never to speak of
