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More than anything, she longed to see the emotions darting over his face.
“I love you.” Sam felt a little like her sister during a press conference; like she was pretending things were fine even as they deteriorated around her.
“I didn’t realize you still wanted to do premed. I mean, I remember you used to say that in high school….” The unicorn and elephant were bobbing up and down in opposition, so that Daphne was low while Ethan was high.
She was glad to know that they could do more than bicker with each other. They could share things; could be earnest, and playful, and fun. The way friends would be.
“Excellent. Connor!” Anna called out. The smile slipped from Beatrice’s face, and a roar of white noise filled her ears.
“Of course it’s been a bumpy year—we lost our king.” My father, Beatrice wanted to cry out.
“The needs of Texas,” Anna repeated, an eyebrow raised. “How much do you really know about those, Your Majesty? Have you seen the price of gas lately? Do you know how little money I have to pay our public-school teachers? Are you aware that a terrible heat wave this summer strained our electric grid to the breaking point, and we need an overhaul of the entire system?”
Their horses had slowed, as if sensing the magnitude of this conversation.
I don’t know exactly what the solution is,” Beatrice admitted, “but I feel confident that we can find it if we work together.” A bird called somewhere in the distance, underscoring her words.
“Hey, Bee,” Connor said softly.
They stayed like that for a moment longer, their hands clasped, and Beatrice knew it would be the last time they ever touched.
“I meant what I told you when we last said goodbye. I’ll always be here if you need me.” Beatrice had no memory of that statement, yet hearing it made the world feel a little brighter.
“Can I see?” “Not yet.” He abruptly shut the notebook, blinking as if emerging from a creative haze. It reminded Sam of how Nina looked when someone interrupted her reading.
Sam couldn’t help it; she began to laugh. The sheer fun of what she was doing seemed to stretch out space within her chest, making her feel light as air, the way she used to feel when she was a child and anything seemed possible.
“But you have a plan!” “I have a goal. And I know you have one, if you can just clarify what it is.” “That sounds easier said than done.”
“Would you rather have known your destiny from birth, like your sister?” “No,” Sam said automatically.
Sam looked at him: the handsome line of his jaw, the green flecks in his amber eyes, his hair loose and tousled around his ears. Attraction flared between them like heat, and she knew from Liam’s expression that he felt it too.
“In daylight it feels so sharp, all the historic buildings squeezed up next to modern glass ones. And at night when the streetlights click on, it’s too harsh. It feels more approachable at twilight, more gentle. It’s the only time this city has ever really felt like home to me,” she admitted.
No matter how fiercely she loved her family, her role as future monarch had always held her at a slight distance from them. Her life was dictated by the Crown, and the Crown didn’t love her at all.
“What are you thinking about?” When she didn’t answer, he added, “Want to think out loud?” Think with me, his eyes pleaded.
She saw the carefree teenage version of him: the Jeff who once showed up to a black-tie gala with a hundred helium balloons. He proceeded to tie a balloon to everyone in attendance—to Nina’s bracelet, to the back of his tails, to his grandmother’s tiara. (Nina would never forget the way it had lifted that tiara just half an inch above the pouf of Grandma Billie’s hairstyle.)
“So you’re just costars in the show? You’re not dating?” “Okay, stop right there,” Nina said hotly. “You don’t get to be angry with me.” Jeff’s eyes widened. Quite possibly no one had ever spoken to him this way in his life.
Some part of Nina wanted to laugh at the sheer absurdity of this conversation. Were she and her royal ex-boyfriend seriously debating levels of princeliness?
“Oh, Jeff” was all Nina could say.
Typo!
That was the thing about people who had known you since childhood: they understood you in ways that you didn’t even understand yourself. They could hurt you better than anyone, even when they didn’t mean to.
“He seems very normal,” her mamá chimed in, eyes fixed on Nina. “There weren’t any tabloid reporters here tonight.” Nina heard the criticism of the Washingtons folded into that comment.
“Nina!” Jamie came bounding toward her. He saw her parents and grinned eagerly. “Hi, you must be the Gonzalezes. It’s so nice to meet you. I’m Jamie.” He spoke easily, without any pretention or artifice, and Nina saw even her mamá’s eyes soften. He was winning them over.
“What do you think, Rebecca?” the queen added. “Absolutely.” Daphne’s mother reclined on a nearby couch, a half-empty champagne flute in her hand. If the queen had suggested that Daphne shave off all her hair, her mother would have nodded in fanatic agreement.
Rebecca Deighton glanced up sharply, recognizing the lie. She knew perfectly well that her daughter didn’t have any friends—no real ones, anyway.
The space had such a cheerful, lived-in feeling, unlike the Deightons’ kitchen, which was all cold white marble and stainless steel.
Rei went to rinse her mug in the sink with an ease that suggested she’d been there many times before.
I’m getting married in ten days.” Her last sentence echoed with ringing finality.
Teddy reddened a little as he added, “I guess it wasn’t that big a deal, since the wedding never happened, but it must have meant something to Michael.”
“We had said I love you.” Teddy’s words were so soft that she almost didn’t hear them, not that it mattered.
They turned slow circles until the colors of the evening began to blur together—the greenhouse flowers on the tables and bar, the deep jewel tones of women’s gowns, and the sleek black of men’s tuxedos.
Her face was already tipped so close to his. When they kissed, it was featherlight, almost a part of the dance.
I smiled
Sam was especially proud of what she’d gotten Jeff—she’d returned to Costco for the inflatable tennis net—and Beatrice: a coffee mug that read I’m a Royal Pain Without Caffeine.
Cute!
“It’s good to see you, Miss Samantha,” he said gruffly. So she was Miss Samantha now. Sam wondered who had decided that.
Her family was all gathered in the living room, clutching tumblers of whiskey sour, which dug a bittersweet pang into Sam’s heart because that was her dad’s signature drink.
Daphne, who looked as perfect as always in a cranberry-red cocktail dress, was the first to look up and notice Sam. She must have made a small noise, because Jeff followed her gaze and went still. “Sam?” It was only one word, but it hurt. He sounded shocked, almost confused, to see her.
“Merry Christmas,” Sam said feebly, unnerved by Jeff’s silence. He must have sensed Sam staring at him, because he finally looked up from his drink, seemingly at a loss. “Um, yeah.” Um, yeah? That was all she got from her twin brother at the holidays?
Daphne used to be flattered by all this. There had been a time, not long ago, when she would lie awake during sleepless nights and scroll through the various Daphne-related items on the internet. Every time she searched her own name and found more merchandise—action figures, CGI avatars meant to look like her, an oven mitt printed with her wedding ring—it felt as satisfying as drinking from a cool bottle of water, slaking her bottomless thirst for attention.
Her mother’s bottle-green eyes, the same green as Daphne’s own, narrowed. “I don’t trust you to handle things anymore. Not after you interfered with the Duke of Virginia and lost us our titles.” “You mean, when Father lost our titles?” The slap was so unexpected that at first Daphne didn’t process what had happened: that her mother had pulled back her hand and struck her across the face. Her cheek burned. Tears sprang to her eyes, not so much from the pain, but from shock. Her mother certainly was a believer in tough love, but she had never hit Daphne before.
The mark on her face already looked normal, and Daphne felt irrationally angered by this, as if her body was betraying her by healing so quickly.
It hadn’t escaped her notice that her mother wasn’t able to say I’m sorry.
The shock on Nina’s face was so immediate and intense that Daphne felt a prickle of surprise.
“But you’ve been trying to break us up!” Nina sighed wearily. “Do you accuse everyone of that, or just me?” “Just you. Who else has the motive or the ability? Not that you could pull it off,” Daphne added quickly. “But you could do some damage trying.”
“You have the rest of your life to do the all-you-can-drink thing at a hotel bar,” Daphne said firmly, and began sorting through the dresses. There was nothing like evaluating other people’s fashion choices to help you escape your own problems.
And oh my god, what is this color? Puke?” she asked, at the same time Nina quipped, “Vomit-colored?”
But the real pièce de résistance was the flower ceiling. Standing in the room, you looked up at a rich carpet of ombré roses, which started at deep red and cascaded through all the shades of pink and blush until they finally became ivory.
Pretty!
