Chapter 11

Out of the corner of his eye, EJ noticed a disturbance in the curtains lining the front windows of the cottage. His head turned fast enough to catch sight of Antonietta quickly jerking them back closed to conceal her face. She must have spied them along with her brother when they got out of the car and opted to not join them outside. After all, she'd already stubbornly informed him that she had no interest in meeting this woman who was supposedly her mother. He knew he would have to watch Nicole closely for quite some time during this whole relaunch but he was really more worried about their daughter's cooperation than hers. Antonietta did just about all short of kicking and screaming in response to everything he instructed her to do. She wasn't used to being told no and she had certainly not grown accustomed to listening to him, especially when his father and Kristen coached her not to.

Nicole and Alex were getting along famously. Their son was now stroking Nicole's hair in a similar fashion to the way he would pet the Wallace's cat, though he was quite sure that unlike Chester, Nicole would not attempt to claw him in response. Nicole would never do anything to hurt him. He expected nothing but her full cooperation from this moment on.

He approached them and let his arm drape across Nicole's shoulder. "Come on, let's go inside." Although it wasn't all that late, it had already been dark for a couple of hours and a deep chill had begun to settle in. They were going to be very busy over the next few weeks so he couldn't risk any one of them getting sick.

"Is she here," Nicole asked anxiously as she strode through the door, still holding Alex, he'd held open for them.

A quick survey of the room found Antonietta to be nowhere in sight. "Why don't you have a seat here with Alexander, and I'll go find her."

"I think she's in the guest room, dear."

EJ had been so preoccupied worrying about Antonietta he hadn't even acknowledged the presence of Helen Wallace, Arthur's wife and temporary caregiver to his children while he was off getting everything together.

"Thank you," he offered briskly, but politely as he strode toward the indicated room with haste. His fist rapped softly on the closed door.

"Antonietta? May I come in, please?"

"Is that you, father?"

"Yes, darling," he replied, rolling his eyes in response to her tone. He could tell by her exaggerated voice that it wasn't his daughter who was responding to him. He was speaking to Princess Antonietta Rigoletti of Sicily, who was of course the fairest of them all. She'd taken on this persona, though only when interacting with him, shortly after he'd taken them and ran. He could only pray it was just a phase. "May I come in?"

"May I come in, what?" she shouted back, in a high-pitched, sing-song voice.

"Oh yes, of course, excuse me. May I come in, your majesty?"

The door flew open to reveal the princess herself, dressed in all her splendor. The light blue Cinderella play dress that she wouldn't leave home without was almost too small but she wore it with as much pride as Cinderella herself on the night of the ball. She was at least another two inches taller as she had apparently raided Helen's closet and helped herself to a pair of silver and rhinestone heels, along with some lipstick and rouge from god only knows where. Her waist-length wavy blonde hair had been neatly styled, presumably by Helen, into one, long intricate braid which cascaded down her back, just like that of her most favorite Disney Princess, Elsa.

He smiled at the sight of her. From the first day he saw her he couldn't look at her without seeing Nicole. It was his first meeting with her that had begun to stir his memory. When he'd looked into her eyes he knew he'd looked into them thousands of times before. His first memory of Nicole had come to him later that night in a dream. He'd remembered how happy she was the night he propsed, for what should have been the third and final time and how he was more content than he'd ever been in his entire life. After that, everything else came trickling back in a matter of days.

If only he could have explained everything to Antonietta sooner. He would have been able to slowly ease her into the situation instead of ambushing her and her brother and whisking them away into a frenzied mess. With time he could have given her great detail about her mother, and assured her that both he and Nicole loved her dearly and would have never abandoned her.

He knew that she desperately wanted to believe him. He didn't need to be a psychologist to determine what thinking her parents had abandoned her had done to her. Getting through to her was just a matter of learning how to penetrate the wall she'd built up around herself and he couldn't think of a better person for the job than Nicole who was herself an expert on the subject.

He bent down to kiss her and she reacted by taking two steps backwards.

"You must ask permission to approach the princess," she scolded him, waving a star shaped wand in front of his face.

"I beg your pardon, my lady. May I please give you a kiss?"

She held out her hand out to him and raised her nose in the air. "You may kiss my hand, knight."

In the living room, Nicole couldn't help but overhear the exchange. With Alex now busy chasing the Wallace's cat around the room, she couldn't help herself. She dared to sneak a peek although she knew that it would probably be better for her to wait and crept quietly down the hall, pausing to peer through the open doorway of the room where she would finally, after almost eight years, get to see her daughter in the flesh.

"Noooooo," Princess Antonietta screamed, jumping into the knight's arms and directing his attention to the hall. "Save me! Save me from the wicked stepmother!"

Nicole didn't know which emotion would be the one to surface but somehow she found herself chuckling instead of crying.

"Alright, sweetheart, come on. That's enough, we can play-"

"Quick! You've got to find Maximus-"

"Antonietta!"

Their little girl frowned after sensing the tone in her father's voice meant that he was done playing for the night. "What," she finally offered, grimacing with displeasure as she folded her arms across her chest, still laying in his arms.

He walked her over to Nicole, but she managed to squirm her way out of his arms and onto her feet before they got too close.

"Your dress is very pretty," Nicole commented, dropping to her knees to get as close to eye level to her as possible. She wanted so badly to just grab her and hold her as she'd been able to do with Alex, but she didn't dare. She suspected it might still be some time before she could even try.

Her compliment proved to at least buy her some time. Antonietta was now standing before her, mere inches away, studying her every bit as intensely as Nicole studied every detail of her adorable little face.

EJ got on his knees to join them, carefully positioning himself so that he did not appear to be taking sides. "Sweetheart, you remember how I told you-"

"Yes, I know, she's my mother," she interrupted flatly.

"Yes, that's right."

"Honey, I know how confusing this all must be for you," Nicole offered, speaking as soothingly as she could. "Whatever you're feeling right now, it's ok. I don't want you to feel like whatever you're feeling is wrong. It's ok to be unsure, or scared, or mad even."

Antonietta smiled but the look in her eye, her tone as she spoke, and her choice of words and the fact that she stated them with such conviction portrayed a different emotion entirely. "Good, because I HATE you!"