“Yeah, sure. Just let me grab my coat.”
It’s less than a minute before we are bursting out of the front door of the building. I’m still processing everything, and I’m getting more annoyed by the second.
“Who does Anna think she is?” I say, grimacing.
“What happened?” Pippa asks, pushing a strand of her wild red hair out of her face. “And where are we going?”
Screwing my mouth to the side, I pull out my phone. “I need to find a place that rents fancy dresses.”
“Oh! I know a place. And it’s not far away. Come on. You can tell me what happened while we walk there.”
I hand her the invitation while we walk and talk, doinga brief round of what happened upstairs. Pippa’s eyes widen.
“Oh my god,” she says, clutching her stomach. “What a bitch! She’s never acted like that before.”
I scrunch up my face. “She was jealous.” I look at Pippa. “That’s what it was, isn’t it?”
She nods slowly. “That’s what it sounds like, yes. I had no idea that Anna felt so strongly about getting close to the royal family.”
I exhale, sliding her a glance as we rush across a crowded street. “It won’t be like that with us though, will it? I mean, you know the royal family way better than I do. You’ve been hanging out with them for years.”
She smiles at me. “No, it definitely won’t. Even if you end up marrying Stellan?— “
My jaw drops. “No way! That would never happen in like a million years!”
She shrugs off my protests. “We will see.”
“No. No way. There are a million things about myself that I want to keep private… especially about my past run-ins with the law. The last thing that I should do is spend a hot second swooning over Stellan. Besides, he’s an ass.”
Pippa rolls her eyes and points across the street. “Look, there’s the shop.”
She points to a little display window with five elaborately dressed mannequins, each garment a totally different color, each one as fancy as the next. Pippa taps the glass over a peach taffeta ballgown with sweetheart neckline. It’s embroidered with what must be a thousand pink and white and peach flowers. “That is gorgeous.”
“Oh man. I was thinking of something more like… above the knee, black, and slinky.” I make a face. “Come on, let’s go inside.”
Pippa opens the door and ushers me inside. I’mimmediately overwhelmed by racks and racks of dresses in every color imaginable. Silk and taffeta and crinolines are all stuffed together in the little shop, piled so high that I can’t even see to the back.
“Oh, I—" I start.
A short, balding man with the most stylish spectacles and a gray silk suit pokes his head through the stacks. “Kan jeg hjælpe dig?”
Pippa grabs me by the elbow, bowing her head. “English, if you please? We are here to get her a dress to wear tonight.”
“Ah!” he says, waving us further in. “Come. We will find good dress.” He looks at me, measuring with his gaze. “Where you go?”
“A royal function. I assume I need cocktail attire.” I mimic a dress that falls above the knee. “Something black.”
“Ah yes!” he cries. “Black cocktail. Black cocktail. Good,ja. Come, please.”
He vanishes back behind a rack of dresses. When I hesitate, Pippa pushes me forward. “I’ve done this like a hundred times. Come on.”
I shoot her a look and then wedge myself around a rack of dresses. I’m surprised to see a little changing room set up and a wooden counter holds an old fashioned cash register. A collage of brightly colored dresses cut from magazines adorns the wall behind the register.
“Hold please,” the shopkeeper says, holding up a finger. While we stand there, still taking everything in the shop in, he disappears again. When he comes back, he has an armful of short black dresses.
“Black cocktail!” he cries, shooing me into the changing room. “Here, you look. You…” He thinks. “You pick.”
He holds up each dress for my inspection. I wrinkle mynose. “How about… this one… this one…” I let him cycle through a couple more. “Ooh, and that one. That should be good.”
