“So that’s it, then?” I didn’t know what else I wanted to hear him say. An apology would have been a nice start, but that was hardly Xavier’s way.
He looked over his shoulder as he opened the door. “You’ll make a great king, Oliver. A much better one than I would have been.” And with that he left the office, the door quietly clicking shut behind him.
I sank down onto the rug, lowering myself onto my back. The ceiling seemed to spin above me as I stared up in shock.
As a boy, I had often laid on the floorwhen I was overwhelmed, not quite understanding in my young mind that it was a way of literally grounding myself.
Now, my boyhood habit kept me from crawling out of my skin as my mind whirled.
Shit, shit, fuck, shit, fuck.
The last three months had been one long exercise in undoing the publicity damage Xavier’s unexpected abdication had caused, and this news was set to upend all of that. The Wexstone tabloids were not nearly as brutal as those in the United Kingdom, but with the American media in the mix? There was no way this wasn’t going to become an absolute shit show.
I flipped through our family history in my mind, trying to recall the last time someone had publicly had a child out of wedlock and coming up empty. It might be the twenty-first century, but us royals were held to a different standard than everyone else. There was no doubt in my mind that the news of this baby—especially when the media inevitably tied it back to Xavier’s abdication—would upset quite a few people.
I sighed deeply and closed my eyes. It seemed not that long ago that I had simply been a working royal. Not carefree, exactly, but leading what was, all things considered, a relatively quiet life. Now here I was, taking the throne in a matter of days and responsible for managing the fallout of my brother’s choices. And, you know, leading a country.
It had been hard not to resent Xavier over the last few months, and that resentment was only becoming harder to suppress. We had never been close in the way that Knox and I, or even Rosie and I, were, but I couldn’t see how our relationship would recover after this.
Shaking my head, I contemplated my next steps, mymind returning to my expected engagement in—I checked my watch—fifteen hours.
I knew who I wanted to propose to. Fuck, I had known deep down who I wanted to propose to from the moment she was announced as a participant in the competition. It wasn’t just that she would make an incredible queen, though that was certainly an indisputable fact in my mind.
No, the truth was that she had held my heart for years. She was the woman I had subconsciously compared all others to for nearly a decade.
But getting her to agree? That would be another hurdle entirely.
I stood up, grabbed my coat, and formulated a plan as I slipped out of my office.
I had to set my glass of wine on the coffee table before I spilled it all over my green velvet couch. “I’m sorry, you were what? Catfished?” I asked through fits of giggles.
“No! Dick-fished!” Dash said from the other side of the couch. “The dick he sent me pictures of was not the dick he showed up with! I was expecting a bratwurst and got a Vienna sausage. The tiny ones that come in the can,” he huffed as he collapsed against the back of the couch.
“Oh my God, I’m dying!” I grabbed my stomach as I cackled again.
Dash narrowed his eyes. “I want you to know that I would not be laughing this hard at you if roles were reversed.”
I snorted. “Bullshit!”
He finally joined in on my hysterics until we both had tears streaming down our cheeks.
“So, what did you do? Did you leave?” I asked, wiping my eyes with the sleeve of my sweatshirt.
“Yes! If he’s not confident enough to send me pictures ofhis own dick, then he’s definitely not going to be able to handle all of this.” He waved a hand over his toned, olive-skinned body.
“Exactly. Know your worth.” I grabbed my wine from the table and took a sip, confident that I could finally drink again without making a mess. Shadow, my enormous black Maine Coon, jumped up in my lap, glancing at me warily as if he wasn’t sure if I was going to erupt in a fit of laughter again.
“So, tell me about how the competition is going,” Dash said after taking a bite of pizza. For the past several years, we had spent Christmas night together. Neither of our families were big or had a lot of holiday traditions. Dash’s mum practiced a combination of Shinto and Buddhism, and I spent Christmas morning with my parents, exchanging presents and enjoying a leisurely brunch. Christmas evening had become Dash’s and my time to get together for wine, pizza, and gossip.
“There’s really not much to catch you up on.” I set my plate down on the coffee table and ran my hand over Shadow’s head, scratching him behind his tufted ears. “Since Birdie left the competition, I’m really not sure who Oliver is going to choose.”
“Hmm,” he said. “From what you’ve told me, I would have guessed Renata, but not after he had her escorted from that party at Lexington Manor. Which, by the way, was the highlight of my year.”
“I know he didn’t do it for us, of course, but man did I feel some vindication from the terrible way she treated most of the other contestants. It was nice to see her get knocked down a few pegs.”
“Cheers to that!” He raised his wine and we clinked our glasses together before taking a drink. “As usual, the pizzaand conversation was amazing. But I have to call it a night. I am exhausted.”
I looked at the clock on my mantle and realized we had stayed up later than planned. It was well past eleven and I needed to be up in just over six hours to get showered and ready before our call time for the proposal ceremony. Not that it mattered much if I didn’t look my best; Oliver certainly wasn’t going to be proposing to me. I just had to smile and wave for one more day.
