They rode out together through the south gate and along the bridle path that ran through the parkland, not the woodland path, not the route Florence had taken. Alexandra didn't ask and Vic didn't suggest it and neither of them acknowledged the choice. It sat between them like a third rider, invisible and heavy.
The security detail followed at a distance, two officers on horseback who kept a professional gap but whose eyes never stopped scanning the treeline and the hedgerows. Alexandra didn't look back at them. She'd spent her whole life being followed by people whose job was to keep her safe, and theirpresence was as familiar and unremarkable as her own shadow. She kept her eyes on the path and the sky and Sebastian’s ears pricking forward as he settled into a steady trot.
The parkland was beautiful. Rolling green hills dotted with ancient oaks, the grass cropped short by the deer that grazed here, a stream winding through the valley where willows trailed their branches in the water. The air smelled of warm grass and earth and the faint clean sharpness of the stream. They rode in silence for ten minutes, the only sounds the hooves on the packed earth and the creak of leather and the birds calling from the hedgerows and, once, the distant bark of a dog from the castle grounds, one of the labradors, probably harassing poor Audrey.
It was the first time Alexandra had been out of the castle since the morning Florence was taken, and the space, the sheer physical space of the landscape, the sky above her, the ground beneath Sebastian’s hooves, the wind on her bare arms, made her chest loosen for the first time in days. She could breathe out here. Not fully, not freely, but enough.
Vic broke the silence. "I can't stop seeing it." Her voice was rough. "The car. The driver. Florence waving at me from the back seat. I see it every time I close my eyes."
Alexandra looked at her. Vic's jaw was tight and her eyes were fixed on the path ahead and her hands on the reins were steady but white-knuckled.
"I should have stopped it," Vic said. "I should have known. The credentials looked right and Jennings confirmed them but something was off, Alex. The driver wouldn't look at me directly. He kept his head turned, his cap pulled low. And I thought — oh, he's just being careful, he's security, they're always like that. But he wasn't being careful. He was hiding his face." She swallowed. "Something in my gut was telling me to wait, and I didn't listen.I let a stranger drive away with your daughter because a man in a high-vis vest showed me a badge and I believed him."
"Vic—"
"Don't tell me it's not my fault. Please." Vic's voice cracked. "I know everyone's been saying that and I know they mean well but I can't hear it right now because it is my fault. I was there. I was the adult. Florence was in my care. I lifted her onto Percy that morning and I promised her we'd have a brilliant ride, and then I watched someone put her in a car and I did nothing. I stood on that path and I waved back."
Alexandra pulled Sebastian to a walk and Vic matched her pace. They were at the top of a rise now, the castle visible behind them and the valley spread below, and the wind was warm and carried the smell of grass and wildflowers.
"Do you remember the night before the wedding?" Alexandra said.
Vic blinked. "What?"
"You sat in my dressing room at three in the morning and told me that if I was marrying Erin, you were gaining a sister, and if anyone ever tried to hurt our family you'd be there. You were very drunk."
Vic's mouth twitched. Not quite a smile. "I was absolutely fucking hammered."
"You meant it, though."
"Every word."
"Then you need to hear this. What happened to Florence was not your fault. It was the fault of the people who planned it and executed it and used genuine credentials to fool everyone, not just you. Jennings was fooled. The security system was fooled. Helena's entire operation was penetrated by people who knew exactly how to exploit it. You were standing on a bridle path with a child and a horse and a man who showed you the rightpaperwork. What were you supposed to do? Refuse and risk a confrontation with Florence right there?"
"I was supposed to protect her."
"You have protected her. Every weekend she's spent here, every ride, every game in the garden. You've been protecting my children since they were born, Vic, and one terrible thing doesn't erase that."
Vic's chin trembled. She turned her face away, toward the valley where the willows swayed and the stream caught the sunlight in bright silver flashes, and Alexandra could see the tears running down her cheeks even though Vic was trying to hide them. She was wiping them away with the back of her riding glove, fast and rough, the way she did everything, as though tears were a problem to be solved rather than an emotion to be felt. Her horse, sensing the shift in its rider, tossed its head and stamped.
"I want to help," Vic said. "With the search, with anything. I can't just sit here and ride horses and pretend everything's normal while Florence is out there."
"Then help. Talk to Erin. She needs people she trusts and you've always been one of them. She is in pain and she lashed out at you, but she knows deep down this is not your fault.”
Vic nodded. She sniffed hard, swiped her eyes one more time, and gathered herself with the determination of a woman who was not accustomed to falling apart and did not intend to make a habit of it. "Right. Yeah. I'll talk to Erin."
"And Vic? I'm glad you're here. Genuinely."
Vic looked at her. Her eyes were red-rimmed but the fierceness was coming back. "I'm not going anywhere, Your Majesty."
"Don't you dare call me Your Majesty. You lost that privilege when you threatened a paparazzo with a riding crop."
Vic's laugh was surprised and raw and not entirely steady, but it was a laugh, and it was the first one Alexandra had heard from her since the morning Florence was taken.
They turned the horses back toward the castle and rode down the hill together, side by side. Sebastian picked up his pace as they neared the stables, keen for his hay no doubt, and Vic's mare matched him stride for stride. The castle rose ahead of them against the blue sky, its stone walls warm with afternoon light, the flag still flying at half-mast.
"Thank you, Vic," Alexandra said as they slowed to a walk. "For riding with me. For being honest."
Vic glanced at her. Her eyes were clearer now, the raw guilt still present but tempered with something that looked like resolve. "Thank you for not pretending it's fine. Everyone keeps telling me it's fine and it's not fine and hearing someone actually acknowledge that is. Yeah. It helps."
