Arriving (Royalty Series Book 3), page 1
Arriving
Royalty Series Book #3
NICOLE PYLAND
PYLAND PUBLISHING LLC
Copyright © 2023 Nicole Pyland
All rights reserved
The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.
No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.
ISBN-13: 979-8-88696-016-7
Arriving
Royalty Series Book 3
Alice, a small-town teacher who had lost her parents years ago, had always felt out of place. There was just something missing in her life that she could never seem to identify. When a man showed up to tell her that she was the long-lost daughter of a King and Queen who had been exiled from their country and were now dead, Alice didn’t believe him.
Nora, a Major in the Royal Protection Service of Kleinland – a small island nation in the North Sea – had always fought for the crown, including the war that was lost to the rebels. While Kleinland was now being run by a dictator, who’s intent on ruining her country, Nora volunteers to find and bring back the nation’s rightful heir, a teacher in America named Alice.
Alice is hesitant to believe and claim her title as Queen of Kleinland, but the Major could be very persuasive. She’s also very attractive, and Alice is wondering why she’s never thought of a woman the way she’s thinking about the Major when she should be focused on trying to oust a dictator with his army and regain control of her new country.
To contact the author or for any additional information,
visit: https://nicolepyland.com
By the Author
Chicago Series:
• Introduction – Fresh Start
• Book #1 – The Best Lines
• Book #2 – Just Tell Her
• Book #3 – Love Walked into The Lantern
• Series Finale – What Happened After
San Francisco Series:
• Book #1 – Checking the Right Box
• Book #2 – Macon’s Heart
• Book #3 – This Above All
• Series Finale – What Happened After
Tahoe Series:
• Book #1 – Keep Tahoe Blue
• Book #2 – Time of Day
• Book #3 – The Perfect View
• Book #4 – Begin Again
• Series Finale – What Happened After
Boston Series:
• Book #1 – Let Go
• Book #2 – The Right Fit
• Book #3 – All Good Plans
• Book #4 – Around the World
• Series Finale – What Happened After
Sports Series:
• Book #1 – Always More
• Book #2 – A Shot at Gold
• Book #3 – The Unexpected Dream
• Book #4 – Finding a Keeper
Celebrities Series:
• Book #1 – No After You
• Book #2 – All the Love Songs
• Book #3 – Midnight Tradition
• Book #4 – Path Forward
• Series Finale – What Happened After
Holiday Series:
• Book #1 – The Writing on the Wall
• Book #2 – The Block Party
• Book #3 – The Fireworks
• Book #4 – The Sweet Escape
• Book #5 – The Misperception
• Book #6 – The Wait is Over
• Series Finale – What Happened After
Fire Universe:
• Book #1 – The Fire
• Book #2 – The Disappeared
Stand-alone books:
• Reality Check
• The Show Must Go On
• Future Wife
Young Adult / New Adult:
• The Moments
• Love Forged
• Pride Festival
Anthology:
• The Meet Cute Café
(a collection of 8 interconnected love stories featuring couples of different ages and backgrounds)
Erotica:
• Once a Month
Contents
Title Page
Copyright
Arriving
By the Author
PROLOGUE
CHAPTER 1
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 6
CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER 8
CHAPTER 9
CHAPTER 10
CHAPTER 11
CHAPTER 12
CHAPTER 13
CHAPTER 14
CHAPTER 15
CHAPTER 16
CHAPTER 17
CHAPTER 18
CHAPTER 19
CHAPTER 20
CHAPTER 21
CHAPTER 22
CHAPTER 23
CHAPTER 24
CHAPTER 25
CHAPTER 26
CHAPTER 27
CHAPTER 28
CHAPTER 29
CHAPTER 30
CHAPTER 31
CHAPTER 32
CHAPTER 33
CHAPTER 34
CHAPTER 35
CHAPTER 36
CHAPTER 37
CHAPTER 38
CHAPTER 39
CHAPTER 40
EPILOGUE
Next in series
By the Author
Afterword
About The Author
PROLOGUE
The North Sea was the shallow, northeastern part of the Atlantic Ocean, located between the British Isles and the mainland of northwestern Europe. It covered two hundred and twenty thousand square miles. It was bordered by Great Britain, the Orkney and Shetland Islands, Norway, Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, and France.
It had been one of the most important European fisheries. It also served as a shipping zone among European countries and between Europe and the Middle East. Even more relevant today, though, were the reserves of petroleum and natural gas beneath its seafloor. Whenever something was in abundance, and someone needed it, there would always be conflict, and the North Sea had had its share of conflict. However, without the North Sea allowing people to share ideas, goods, and people, the cultural development of Europe might not have been possible – or, at least, would not have been as fast, and the world today could’ve been vastly different.
Most people knew about the countries of northern Europe. They knew about Great Britain and much of its history, including the royal family that had shaped much of Europe as well, but they usually didn’t know about a small island nation right in the middle of the North Sea. It had been passed around as a colony and territory of many of the northern-European countries since the Vikings just like food at a family dinner. Someone wanted the mashed potatoes, so the dish was passed around until they could take their fill. Like the mashed potatoes, the island had known mostly war since it was first sighted and claimed. In the years since it established its own independence, they’d only known civil war over the government the country had versus the government the people wanted.
A monarchy was established there because it was all people knew from their former occupiers, and it ruled for over a hundred years before the civil war broke out. The people wanted change – they wanted a constitutional monarchy or no monarchy at all – and the royal family went into hiding more than twenty years ago before they were officially exiled and scattered to different parts of the world despite having done nothing to deserve being removed from their country by force.
The new government was formed where a president was put in office, and that same President had found a way to win every single election ever since, despite many candidates putting up a great effort to claim the title. He’d also managed to ensure that there was no law around the number of terms a president can run for, enabling him to remain in office for as long as he lived. That was, at least, until now. The country was, yet again, ready for change. The man ruling the small nation had effectively become a dictator – a King if not in title – and he had done little to ensure the happiness and prosperity of his people, choosing to spend money on homes, vacations for his family, and other items of luxury.
Unfortunately, there wasn’t much the nation could do without going to war again, unless they took advantage of the fact that, for the first time in their history, the party opposing the President was in power. The election was fast-approaching, and there was a chance they could stabilize the nation under a new leader, an entirely new government. That was the plan, at least. What the people of this country didn’t know was that there was someone; there was a plan. There was a young woman in another country who had no idea who she really was and what she could mean to this country. Someone was about to tell her, and that could change everything.
CHAPTER 1
She watched the young girl sitting by herself at the cafeteria table, eating apple slices from a plastic bag and looking toward a table filled with pre-teens talking and laughing during their lunch break. Alice could relate. As the young girl finished her apple slices, Alice watched her get up to toss her trash away and then leave the cafeteria, likely for a moment alone in the bathroom before the bell rang. Alice used to do the same thing. When she
got older, she thought back on that routine and wondered about it. She’d already felt alone at the lunch table surrounded by people, and she’d hated that feeling. Yet, she’d sought it out in a bathroom moments later, that time alone. It usually lasted only a minute or two before other girls would come in to use the restroom in preparation for their next class, but Alice had always cherished and hated her minute of solitude at the same time. None of the other girls back then seemed to need it. They all had each other, and that was enough for them.
When Alice would go home after school, she usually disappeared into her bedroom to play the keyboard her parents had bought her, trying to compose something herself, but it had always sounded like garbage when she would play it back. She’d given up on her dream of being some famous composer or musician before her fourteenth birthday. She’d lie in bed, staring up at those stars she’d stuck to her ceiling, turning off the lights to see their full brightness even in daytime. She’d just never felt right. She hadn’t been sure why, but she was certain she was the only girl who felt that way. As an adult, Alice knew how wrong she’d been. Every single teenager felt that at some point, and likely, stared up at their ceilings wondering why they felt so alone.
“Hi, Sarah,” she said, walking toward her classroom.
“Hi, Miss Smith,” Sarah replied solemnly.
“How was your lunch?” Alice asked as she now walked beside the young girl.
“Fine.”
“And are you ready for the test tomorrow?” Alice asked her.
“I think so,” Sarah replied, shrugging a shoulder.
“You’ll do great. No trick questions, I promise,” Alice told her, giving her a smile.
“Okay,” Sarah said. “I have to get books from my locker.”
“I’ll see you in class,” Alice replied.
Sarah walked past the room and to her locker, which she unlocked, and Alice watched her for a minute. Then, she turned to see another young girl a grade above Sarah also standing at her own locker, removing books. She was wearing headphones. They both pulled out their books, closed their lockers, and walked to their next classes before the end of the lunch period. Alice silently hoped they’d find each other someday and band together in their loneliness, forming a friendship that would help them both make it through middle school. Then, she darted inside her own classroom before a hundred kids pushed their way into the hall, trying not to be late for their next class.
◆◆◆
“I just wish I could – I don’t know – sprinkle magic fairy dust over all of them and tell them they’re not alone; they will make it through their teenage hormones and come out the other side with only a small amount of baggage,” Alice said later over drinks with her friends. “Some of us have a little more, but it’s not all that bad.”
“I only just got out of my gay rage stage, like, last year,” Stan joked.
“You’re thirty-three years old – if that’s true, I’m really worried about you,” Bexley replied. Then, she looked over at Alice. “The problem is that when we try to tell them this stuff, they only see us as ‘old people in their thirties,’ who can’t possibly relate, so they dismiss it.”
“I know.” Alice rolled her eyes. “I just see her sitting by herself, and I think of how I was back then. I didn’t meet you guys until college. And I kind of came out of my shell freshman year, but–”
“Junior year,” they both said together.
“What?” Alice laughed.
“You came out of your shell junior year,” Stan stated, taking a drink of his custom cocktail that he made for himself.
“Yeah. Freshman year, you were really quiet and just kind of hung out with us. Then, sophomore year, you were a little better, but it wasn’t until we all moved in together junior year that you finally opened up.” Bexley placed a hand on top of Alice’s. “But we understood why, honey.”
“We knew you were a keeper, so it was worth waiting for you to really come into your own,” Stan added.
Alice thought back to her last two years in high school, and that familiar feeling swept over her, as if there was a breeze on the bar’s outdoor patio. She was right back there. The car accident was fresh in her mind again. The loss, the feeling of having no one else in the world made her tremble, despite it being a warm night and her having had two glasses of wine already. She remembered it all like it was yesterday.
“You okay?” Bexley asked.
“I’m fine,” she lied.
“So, I think the guy from last week is back,” Stan noted, looking past them toward the outdoor bar.
“You have got to stop hitting on your customers. Not every guy who comes here is gay or into men,” Bexley told him.
“It’s a gay bar,” Stan argued, looking around the bar he’d opened two years prior. “If he’s in here, he’s likely at least entertaining the possibility.”
“Or, he’s here with his friends,” Bexley retorted.
“He’ll at least understand my confusion, then,” Stan reasoned, standing up. “I’m going to go impress him with my bartending skills. He’ll ask me about said skills, and I’ll tell him I worked my way up the bartending ranks until I finally saved up enough to build this place. He’ll take a drink of whatever I come up with, love it, and make out with me in the back office until I suggest we go back to my place.”
“Which, conveniently, is right next door,” Alice said, laughing at him.
“Exactly,” Stan replied. “Do you want me to send over another drink for you guys?”
Alice and Bexley always drank for free at Stan’s bar. They’d helped him build the place by painting, sanding, staining, putting furniture together, and doing just about everything else. Alice was certain some of her blood was probably trapped somewhere in the hardwood floor and that she’d lost a nail between layers of shellack on one of these tables. Stan gave them a free-for-life discount, which neither woman took advantage of.
“I’m good,” Alice replied. “Go have fun.”
“Oh, I will,” he said.
“When will he grow out of this phase?” Bexley teased as Stan walked off.
“Likely – never. He has an endless supply of attractive men now.”
“And he’s so pretty,” Bexley joked, making Alice laugh. “Hey, are you really okay? You went somewhere before, didn’t you?” Bexley checked.
“Where I always go when I think about way back when,” Alice replied, finishing her wine. “And I should get going now. I’m exhausted, and I have papers to grade.”
“You’re not going to help me find someone tonight?” Bexley asked.
“Bex, you’re in a bar. You’re not really a fan of one-night stands or casual flings.”
“So? Maybe I’ll find my future bride tonight.” She looked around the bar.
Alice laughed and said, “What are the odds of that happening while Stan has EDM playing inside and I see no women outside?”
Bexley groaned and said, “I know. It’s been a very long time, though, Al. Like, I need to get laid soon, or I think my parts will just start hibernating.”
Alice laughed again and replied, “I don’t need to know that, but I also don’t think that’s how it works. If you really do just want sex, there’s a group of women that just walked in. Go buy one of them a drink and see what happens.”
“Oh, to be a straight woman,” Bexley commented. “You really think it’s just that easy with women?”
“I have no idea,” Alice replied, standing up. “Are you okay? I can stay if you need me.”
“No, I’m fine. I’m just going to sit here for a minute to see if anyone approaches and might want to buy me a drink.”
“Well, I hope you meet your future bride tonight.”
“Me too,” Bexley replied, looking up at her. “Where is she, Al? I’m thirty-three years old. I want kids. If she doesn’t show up soon, I’ll have to go the whole ‘Tina Fey in Baby Mama’ route – which isn’t a bad route; it’s just not the one I thought I’d be taking.”
