“Right, now that I’ve done my patriotic duty, I’ve some choice words for Giles in the saddlery and he’s not going to like them,” Bea said. She eyed Lacey sipping her drink. “Do try not to pocket the Waterford.”
I almost wanted Bea to stay, so that I could delay this inevitable Freddie conversation a bit longer, but when the door clicked shut behind her I knew there could be no more stalling. Lacey and I were heading into uncharted twin territory: I’d always been content to take a backseat when she needed to shine, and she’d never had to step back and return the favor. But Nick had begged Freddie to tone it down and it hadn’t made a difference, so Lacey would have to step up.
I weighed carefully what to say. Maybe I could just be casual. Maybe she’d bring Freddie up organically, apologetically, and I wouldn’t have to put my foot down at all.
“So Lace,” I said, deliberately taking a long time to zip my boots over my jeans. “How was New York? I didn’t know you were back.”
“I like giving you and Nick space when I can,” she said. “Freddie had a room at The Dorch that he wasn’t using.”
“Uh-huh.”
“I slept alone, Bex.”
“Uh-huh.”
“What’s got you in such a mood?” she asked, sitting down on a tufted ottoman.
“This paparazzi stuff is really bumming me out,” I said.
“Well, it shouldn’t,” Lacey said, draining her glass. “You’re world news, after all. And speaking of news, I have some that ought to cheer you up. I’m staying.”
I blinked. “You’re what?”
“Isn’t it awesome?” she asked. “I just started thinking about it, really seriously, and I realized that I’m not enjoying med school. The thought of going back and spending the next however many years locked in a lab…” She shuddered.
“But you’ve been talking about med school since we were fifteen,” I said incredulously. “It was awesome of you to put it on hold to help me, but it seems crazy to give up completely.”
It was, in fact, totally unlike my sister to do that. Lacey simply never quit something before she mastered it.
“It’s not giving up. It just didn’t feel right anymore,” she insisted. “Look, if you must know, my grades haven’t been so great. It’s hard to concentrate because I miss you so much, and I’m not happy there the way I am over here. So I told NYU that I’m done.”
“But what—”
She held up a hand. “I’m way ahead of you. I had an interview with Whistles the other day to be one of its new buyers. That would be a lot more fun than studying the inner workings of the colon anyway, and it means no more transatlantic flights and months apart. We can get the band back together, once Nick gets out of his mood. You and me and Freddie and Nick…”
I leaned forward to rest my elbows on my thighs. At the sight of my face, Lacey stopped talking.
“I thought you’d be more excited,” she said, genuine hurt in her voice. “Do you not want me here?”
“No! It’s not that, it would never be that,” I insisted.
And it wasn’t that; not really. But I could no longer pretend the problems that came with Lacey would dissolve once she went back to her real life—and it gutted me that she might’ve done this hasty one-eighty on her future in service of something I now had to ask her to walk away from entirely.
My hands shook. Asking her to pick me over Freddie was effectively telling her that she played second fiddle to Nick. And yet I couldn’t see any other way. I needed them both.
“You can’t keep seeing him,” I blurted.
She held my gaze. She knew the score. “It wasn’t a date. We were just talking at a party,” she said evenly.
“More like Racy Lacey snuggling up with Freddie in public again,” I said, sitting back up. “And then you add us running through London, and you taking an extra ten minutes to pose in front of Harrods on the pretense of a photographer complimenting your shoes.”
Lacey opened her mouth immediately and then closed it. “Yeah, I was enjoying that,” she grudgingly admitted. “People want to talk to me, Bex. It’s flattering! I don’t know why everyone’s so uptight about it, or about Freddie, for that matter. He’s not the one who’s going to inherit the throne someday. Let him enjoy his life.”
“No one has ever accused Freddie of not enjoying his life,” I said, my lips twitching. “It’s coming from the top, though, Lace. It’s not coming from me.”
“Isn’t it?”
I froze on that. Because she knew me better than anyone else, and she had me.
“Maybe it is coming from me, too,” I said. “Because everything that keeps you in the papers keeps me in the papers, and you know that whenever I’m in the papers, it’s a problem. Everything you and Freddie do ties back to me and Nick, then to Richard, then Eleanor. It goes up the chain, and then comes back down on me again twice as hard.”
“You’re exaggerating,” Lacey said.
“I’m not. The last time you and Freddie went out together, Marj lost her mind,” I said. “I believe her exact words were, ‘All this cavorting with American twins looks like a bloody beer commercial.’”
Lacey rolled her eyes. “That old crank. She doesn’t get it. We’re twins. We’re connected.”
“But we’re not a package deal, Lacey,” I said.
Her shoulders sagged. Her whole being sagged. I think even her hair uncurled a little bit.
“We used to be,” she said.
I flashed on one of those Best Friends charms, the kind that splits in half so you can each wear a piece. I gave Lacey one when we turned ten, and we still keep them in our wallets. But the thing about them is, even when you hold them back up to each other, they never look whole again. Once broken, there’s always a crack.
“I hate this,” I whispered.
“I know,” Lacey said, and I could see she meant it.
“You know I wouldn’t ask if—”
“I know,” she repeated.
“But you’re right that I can’t do this without you. And I don’t want to,” I said. “Can you do that, though? Can you be here, but stop with Freddie, and the press, and just…be my sister?”
Lacey glanced over at the dress she would be wearing to Nick’s party, hanging in a bag, ready to be sent back to our place. It was sexy as hell and it fit her like it was born on her body.
“Well, I can’t promise he’ll be able to control himself when he sees me in that,” she said, aiming for lightness. “But he’ll have to learn.”
She scooted next to me and drew me into a hug. “I’m sorry if we made it harder for you, or for Nick,” she said. “Of course I’ll be there for you.”
“Thank you,” I whispered into her hair.
“I am going to miss him,” Lacey confessed, pulling back. She let out a short laugh. “Other than the fact that he’s hotter than the sun, I think it was just fun to imagine the Porter twins having this whole crazy adventure together, you know?”
“Lace, we’ll always be a team,” I said.
“I hope you’re right,” she said. “And besides, I’m going to be living here now. I should pledge my allegiance to the future queen.”