I held out one arm to block my mother, and another to block Nick. “But we can fight back, Your Majesty,” I said. “We can discredit him.”
“I recorded what he said to them,” Lacey added. “It’s hateful.” She proffered her cell phone to Eleanor, who looked down at it like Lacey was trying to give her a used tampon. Lacey slowly withdrew her hand.
“Which part of his story can you prove was inaccurate, Rebecca?” Eleanor asked, crossing her arms over her chest.
I cleared my throat. “On the recording he makes it very clear that revenge was his driving force, and he, er, he talks a lot about resenting being a good little royal foot soldier…”
Eleanor’s tone was caked in sarcasm. “So your grand plan is to reveal that a man who lived close to the monarchy for his whole life, with access most people only dream of, finds it to be oppressive.”
I couldn’t find the right words. Eleanor had twisted our logic until it cracked and broke.
“You are correct that it’s our word against his, ma’am,” I conceded.
“And your word is worth what in this scenario?” Eleanor asked. “No, don’t answer that, you’ll only embarrass yourself. And you will say nothing,” she said, flicking her hand in the direction of my mother, whose blood pressure was clearly still on the boil.
“Gran, I won’t stand for—” Nick began.
“YOU WILL ALL BE SILENT.” Eleanor’s voice exploded through the room as if she’d barked into a megaphone. “This family”—she paused for emphasis—“answers to something greater than bonds of blood. Our priorities cannot be so quaint. We maintain control. Never complain, never explain.” She straightened, as if her posture were not already immaculate. “Nicholas and Rebecca, you will cancel your honeymoon and work at the pleasure of your queen until I am satisfied you have deflected public attention from Rebecca’s indiscretions.”
“Don’t punish Nick for my—” Freddie began.
“I’ll deal with you later,” she said. “But right now, we shall go out onto that balcony. Whether there are a hundred people or a hundred thousand people, whether they are scornful or celebrating, we will wave and smile and play the parts our birthright demands. And then we will grit our teeth and do our jobs, and prove that everything within the House of Lyons is humming along as it should be.” She narrowed her eyes at me and Nick. “But Rebecca is on borrowed time. She must earn every minute she gets, or so help me God, I will void this union and exile her to purgatory. I will not allow this harlot to be our undoing. Have I made myself clear?”
Nick stared at his grandmother for what felt like a year. “Crystal,” he said.
Eleanor’s tone brightened. “Now. Shall we to the balcony?”
Everyone tried to settle into the masks they’d developed for public consumption. The balcony door had magically opened despite my not being aware of any staffers in the room, and as we glided toward it, I saw Eleanor pluck Lacey’s phone from her hand.
“One more point of business,” she said.
And she smashed it under the heel of her signature sensible pump.
“What the hell,” Lacey blurted out.
Eleanor brushed her hands together in a “that’s that” gesture that reminded me, ridiculously, of Mary Poppins. “Be a dear, Edwin, and scoop that up.”
Nick’s grip on my hand tightened. He exhaled hard through his nose, then slid a look on his face that even I couldn’t read.
“Do you trust me?” he breathed.
I nodded, and we stepped outside. The crowd had dissipated by about half, and those that remained were too far away for us to hear—but we could see the sea of smartphones, and feel their almost scientific interest in what the next act of this drama would be.
And then Nick dipped me into the most passionate, lengthy kiss that balcony had ever seen, as if we’d decided our wedding night should begin as publicly as our marriage. When we broke apart, I realized no one else had followed us outside. Edwin was gawking at us from halfway behind a curtain.
“Now what?” I breathed. “Do the people need to see me climb you like a tree?”
“Rebecca, Duchess of Clarence,” he said. “If I may be so bold: Fuck all of this. I want to take my wife on a honeymoon. Are you in?”
I grinned. “Damn straight, Your Highness.”
And with a jaunty wave to the masses that remained, Nick and I had turned on our heels and marched straight through the Balcony Room, down the stairs, and out to our waiting car. We’d said not a word to the people we left behind.
Not even to Her Majesty the Queen.
“What if the stress of our running away did this to her?” Nick fretted now, turning to me. “I can’t believe the last thing she saw me do was paw at you. I was so angry. I really hated her that day. And now…”
My stomach flipped. “I can’t pretend that wasn’t bad,” I told him. “But it also wasn’t the only thing that ever happened between you. There are more good memories than bad.”
“Are there?”
“She told me how special she thought you were,” I said, leaving off the bit where she had done so in the context of implying that I was unworthy of him.
Nick leaned his head against the leather back seat of the Range Rover. “She’s the only monarch most of the country has ever known,” he said. “What will we do?”
There was nothing to say to that. My mind was a whirl of images of Eleanor, and worry for Nick. We’d only been the Duke and Duchess of Clarence—or, since we were in Scotland, technically Baron and Baroness Inverclyde—for about a nanosecond. The next step up, which had weighed on Nick his whole life, had felt
