It’s a whole cycle.
“She’s safe to fly,” the doctor says, and the knot in my stomach tightens. As eager as I am to get out of here, I didn’t go through all of this just to be kicked off the continent without a definitive answer to the marriage questionora final conversation with Theo. The least he can do is say goodbye.
I trade my gown for the jeans, the boots, and the corset, because what the hell. If I’m going to be in the tabloids, I may as well make an impression. Brooke catcalls me as I strut around the hospital bed, and we’re about to leave for good when a nurse stops me in the hall.
“Wait! We have something of yours.” She rifles through a drawer behind the nurses’ station and retrieves my ring.Theo’sring. My knees go wobbly as she drops it into my open palm. “The chain is broken, but I saved this for you.”
“Thanks.” I struggle to get the word out. I feel three pairs of eyes bore into me, so I clear my throat and push the ring into my pocket. “Ready to go?” I ask my mom.
“Have you heard from Theo at all?” she asks softly.
“Nope! Should we go? Let’s go. How do we get out of here?” I turn to the nurse for help. If I don’t stop this conversation now, I’ll cry off all of Louise’s hard work right before the paparazzi see me for the first time. If that happens, I could become a meme that will haunt me for the rest of my life.
“There’s a decoy car waiting for you out front to trick the photographers, and two more cars waiting out back where you won’t be seen,” the nurse says as she leads us through a hallway.
“Who arranged for the cars?” I ask.
“I can’t say, but they’re waiting for you right out there.” She props the door open with her foot and gestures to a blacked-out Bentley.
“Damn.” Naomi looks at me sideways with a growing smile. “Do you think it’s him?”
My stomach fills with butterflies.
I look back at the nurse with my eyebrows raised.
“It was nice to meet you, Your Highness,” she says with a wink and a quick curtsy.
I’m suddenly dizzy. None of this feels like real life.
I walk on shaky legs to the car. Someone steps in front of me to open it, and I slide into the car with bated breath. I look up, and instead of Theo, I come face-to-face with Richard Graves.
CHAPTER32
DAYS UNTIL THE CORONATION:THREE
Right now, Richard Graves is my least favorite person in all of England. No, Great Britain. Scratch that, Theo’s press secretary is my least favorite person in the entire United Kingdom. (And I’m definitelynotconfused about the difference between those three places… just don’t quiz me on it.)
“What are you doing here?” I ask as the car door shuts behind Naomi. I turn to look out the rear window and see my mom and Brooke getting into the second car. Great. Maybe Naomi and Iareabout to beTaken,and the reason Theo is getting such negative press is because his secretary has been busy plotting our deaths instead of feeding puff pieces to the tabloids.
“I am always in service to the Crown,” Graves says, and I’m reminded that the Crown and the monarch aren’t necessarily the same thing. He could be here for a dozen different reasons, and Theo might not even know about it.
“Where are we going?”
“Don’t worry about it. Everything has been arranged,” Graves says.
“What if you’re trying to kidnap us?” I ask dramatically, and I feel somewhat better when Graves scowls.
“Why would I want to do that?” he asks.
“Because you hate me!”
“I don’t think we have to worry about our safety,” Naomi says as her eyes grow wide.
“Why not?”
She nods out the window. I look up and see the gates of Buckingham Palace. “Because everything the light touches is your kingdom.”
I elbow her in the stomach.
