“Is this honestly necessary?” Nick hisses, but his brother is already off up the stairs, and we are forced to follow and stand together and wait for Freddie, of all people, to raise a glass to our future. I glue on my smile and search for friendly faces—Cilla, making a delicate gesture to remind me to stand up straight, and Mom, standing next to her wedding date, my aunt Kitty, who arrived in London two hours ago and looks simultaneously jet-legged and wowed. And a few feet away, there’s Pansy Larchmont-Kent-Smythe grilling Gemma Sands about something Gemma clearly finds tiresome, and Bea with Clive and Paddington.
I gasp so loudly that Nick actually turns to me.
“Clive is here,” I tell him through clenched teeth. “Don’t look. Nick. You looked.”
Nick draws himself up to his full height. “That’s a lot of cheek, him coming here.”
“He must not think I’ve told you,” I say slowly. “He probably banked on me not knowing how to get him disinvited, and he’s trying to scare me.”
Clive gives us both a carefree wave as Freddie gets the masses to quiet their chatter. Freddie objectively looks handsome, but his face is drawn. I wonder what he and Nick did all afternoon while I had people meticulously combing my brows and zapping my tearstains.
“Welcome, all, to what promises to be a ripping weekend,” Freddie says. “I shall keep this brisk and save the saucy bits for tomorrow. Gran won’t want to miss the visual aids.”
A titter travels through the crowd.
“As the elder brother, Nick got to do everything before I did,” Freddie says. “Or so he thought. He officially learnt to drive first, but I banged around Balmoral in Father’s car two weeks before Nick’s first lesson. He was allowed to drink at family dinners before I was, but I’d already spent ages stealing the glasses people would set down and then quaffing them under the table. And he thinks he was the first to—wait, hang about, can’t say that one out loud.”
The group chuckles en masse.
“But tomorrow, he really will reach one milestone ahead of me,” Freddie continued. “Not that I’m in any kind of hurry to catch him. I’m having rather too much fun with the, er, bridal interview process.” Freddie is playing the playboy prince to the hilt. Even his bow tie is slightly askew. “But as far as that goes, I’ve been bravely doing the work of two. Because Nick was hit with a bolt of lightning eight years ago and he’s been lost to the ladies of the realm ever since.”
Nick twitches, imperceptible to anyone but me.
“I’ve had a front-row seat for this entire courtship. In fact, remind me to tell you all why Bex punched me the first day we met, although I assure you, I deserved it,” Freddie says. “’Course, you lot hide the Daily Mail behind those copies of the Financial Times, so you know quite a bit’s happened between now and then. But I started writing this speech in my head after that very first bashing—and there have been others, don’t you worry—because I saw then exactly what I’ve seen every single day since, in good times and rough. Together or apart, Bex and Nick have quite simply always belonged to each other.”
The crowd gives an appreciative sigh; there is a smattering of applause. I am in torment.
Freddie clears his throat. “And that’s what everyone’s really looking for, isn’t it? The kind of love that makes clichés ring true. It’s a jackpot that is nearly impossible to hit.” His voice is getting shaky. “So what’s truly special about tomorrow’s milestone is that it’s once-in-a-lifetime stuff. Nick may be useless at the Times cryptic, but that’s just letters on a piece of paper. He already solved the only riddle that counts. He found something I didn’t fully believe existed until I saw it with my own eyes, and I will be forever in his debt for giving me yet another reason to strive for more. To be the man that he is.”
Freddie is now struggling. Beside me, I see a tear snake out of Nick’s eye. I take his hand and we cling to each other so tightly that our knuckles turn white.
“By this time tomorrow, my dear friend Rebecca will be a full-fledged member of The Firm. We will teach her the handshake, and she will be stuck with us,” Freddie says, composing himself. “And thank God, because there is no better person to entrust with the care and keeping of my very best friend, my brother, and our future king. Please raise your glass and drink with me to Nicholas and Rebecca.”
“To Nicholas and Rebecca!” the crowd echoes, and then there is warm-hearted applause. Freddie and I make eye contact as we each hug him in what I hope is not too stiff a manner. I did my best, Killer, his face seems to say.
“Nick.” I reach for him.
Nick places his hand on the curve of my waist and leans into me. “Not now, Bex,” he whispers. “Just…not now.”
And then Advanced Pleasantness is back, and he’s off to accept a firm handshake from his father—it is damning that, between the two of us, Richard is the more soothing option—and I know that Nick is right. However much time he needs is what I have to give him.
“Wonderfully touching,” beams the Crown Prince of Sweden as I reach the lawn again. “The three of you seem so close.”
Over his shoulder, Clive gives the most epically false look of affection and wiggles his mobile phone at me. I feel the world spin a little.
“Thank you, Your Highness,” I tell him. “In fact, I need to take a private moment. To collect myself.”
I make my way inside the palace and into a cool hallway that is deserted except for footmen with trays of cocktails and platters of appetizers and giant piles of homemade Cracker Jack. I had intended to locate a quiet bathroom, just to be alone, but suddenly I find myself walking down the Marble Hall and past PPOs Stout and Furrow, who are guarding the Ministers’ Staircase, and up through the silent, dimly lit palace, past the public rooms, back toward the private living quarters. I don’t even register exactly where I’m going until I get there.
Emma, clad in a floral silk bathrobe, is in her chambers—cozier than the Queen’s, and neat as a pin—playing solitaire on a folding TV tray. Doctors deemed her too fragile for tonight’s party, but she’s been getting a fair amount of visitors since she arrived from Cornwall on Tuesday. Nick has come every day; so has Pansy Larchmont-Kent-Smythe. Lesley is sitting in a wing chair, working on some knitting, and stands when I open the door.
“I didn’t expect to see you until tomorrow, Your Grace!” she says.
“Trust me, I am so not anyone’s Grace.”
“Soon enough, soon enough,” Lesley says. “Is the party over? Can I get you a cuppa?”
“No, thank you, Lesley. I just wanted to say hello.”
“Well, I’ll leave the two of you in peace for a bit, then,” Lesley says, bustling into the next room. “I’ve got ever so much to do if I want to finish this blanket before Prince Edwin’s new baby gets here. And you’ll be next!” She waggles a motherly finger at me as she pulls the adjacent bedroom door closed behind her.