My feelings whipsawed between sadness and euphoria during those few days Nick and I had together before the Navy reclaimed him, but he didn’t seem to mind. He took care of me. He let me cry. He kept me fed, and hydrated, and brought me frozen spoons for my puffy eyes; mostly, we spent more than half our time in bed and the rest of it doing only the essentials so that we could get back into bed—as if we owed it to ourselves to recoup every single lost touch.
“I am the world’s biggest idiot,” Nick said, kissing my back the second morning. “We could have been doing this all along. I made a bloody mess of things.”
“Give me a little credit. I worked hard to help screw things up,” I said. “Like wasting all that energy on Gemma, for one thing. I’m guessing you didn’t know she’s a lesbian, either?”
Nick’s eyes widened.
“I caught her with Bea,” I told him.
“Bea?”
“In a tree house,” I added.
“Cripes, I don’t know which part of this story is more interesting,” Nick said, bemused. “I had no clue. I’ve known them both my whole life. Gem was my first.” He looked thoughtful. “You know, I honestly never considered trying to have it off with her until after you and I broke up. And even that was partly because you were out wearing those cruel bikinis. But she wasn’t interested. I assumed I’d just been that crap when I was fifteen. Perhaps I was. Perhaps I revolted her.”
“Why do guys always assume women being lesbians is about them?” I asked. “It’s not like quitting pasta because of one bad burned lasagna.”
“Touché,” he said, grinning. “I think a bloke just hopes that if he’s someone’s last, he provided a lovely send-off.”
We laughed, but remembering Freddie’s similar reaction gave me a guilty pang. I had zero remorse about ignoring the Clive incident, but Freddie was Nick’s brother, his best friend, his teammate in that chilly hierarchy of a family.
“Speaking of Gemma,” I began. “We can’t ignore the past two years. Things happened. With other people. I need to tell you—”
He held up a hand. “Freddie told me about Three Testicles Guy. That’s all I can take.”
“It was three nipples,” I said, “and I should have known Freddie wasn’t to be trusted.”
Nick wiggled to a sit. “Seriously, I will be happy to discuss the particulars of our time apart.” He paused. “Well. Not happy. I’ll do it, if that’s what you want, but I can’t think what good will come of it. I didn’t take a vow of chastity when we split up, and I certainly didn’t expect you to, either.”
“We can’t pretend it doesn’t matter, though.”
“Did you kill someone?” Nick asked.
“No.”
“Have a love child?”
“Not that I know of,” I said.
“Good. We could’ve made that work, but Barnes would’ve needed a raise,” he said. “Eat any babies?”
“Not for ages.”
“Root for the Yankees?”
“Now you’re just being disgusting,” I said.
He smiled. “Then I sincerely don’t care. Nothing counts except what we do now.”
I looked at Nick and knew he meant it. And if I said that one particular petty sin out loud, it might spin us back into the dark place we’d just left, so instead I kissed him and buried it deep.
Next to him, on the bedside table, my phone rang. Nick picked it up impulsively.
“Hi, Lacey,” he said, then chuckled. “I don’t know why I answered this. Sorry.”
“Nicely done,” Lacey said when I came on the phone. “I just read an article in Cosmo about the importance of the Grief Bang. It’s when you deal with bereavement via a sexual affirmation that you yourself are alive. Nick is an extremely classy Grief Bang.”
“Well, it’s not exactly a Grief Bang,” I said, looking over at him. He had pulled out a folded cryptic crossword from his wallet. “I think we’re back together.”
“And no more bossing you and Freddie around,” Nick said loudly, for Lacey’s benefit. “Ring him whenever you like. Part of the New World Order.”
“Did you get that?” I asked.
“Hard to miss it,” she said, a little flatly. “Tell him not to write checks the Crown can’t cash.”
“Nah, you heard the man. Live and let live,” I said. “Grief bang and let grief bang.”
“If you say so,” she said. “Well, I just called to see how you’re doing. Obviously, you’re in good hands. Maybe I will call Freddie.” There was a pause. “I’m glad something good came out of all the sadness. Just promise me there’ll still be room for all of us.”
“I promise.”
“I really am happy for you, Bex.” Her tone was light again.
“I know. I love you, Lace.”
When we hung up, I turned and looked at Nick. “So this is really happening.”
“As long as you’re in,” Nick said, putting down the crossword and reaching across the bed to take my hand.
“I’m in,” I said.
“Then there is one thing I’d like to do straightaway, before we go any further. Before I have to go back to my ship.” He swallowed hard. “I want you to meet my mum.”
*
Since her disease eclipsed her mind, Emma, Princess of Wales, divided her time at Richard’s behest between verdant Trewsbury House in Gloucestershire and a cottage in Cornwall overlooking the water. Emma had loved the sea, but Osborne House—where they’d met and fallen in love, of a sort—was too impractical for Nick and Freddie to visit. Cornwall, on the other hand, is the duchy of every sitting Prince of Wales, so no one blinked when Richard bought himself a bolt-hole there. Nick enjoyed the four-hour trek, which he routinely made in rented cars to avoid press scrutiny, and so we set off the next day in a boring, borrowed white sedan, expertly tailed by PPO Popeye. It was the first time I’d sat next to Nick in a car instead of under a blanket in the back.
“I don’t know quite how to prepare you for this,” Nick said as he shifted gears. “She’s always different. Sometimes she doesn’t seem to know I’m there. Sometimes she’ll talk, although it won’t make sense. Sometimes she’ll get angry, and sometimes there will be times where she seems like herself…” He cleared his throat. “But they’re illusions, really. Like a stopped clock being right twice a day. Whatever’s happening in her mind accidentally lines up with the real world for a split second and I can see what…things might have been like.”
I rubbed his shoulder. He smiled before turning back to watch the road.
“It’s nice being based near her,” he said. “I see her loads. I don’t think Freddie’s been lately, though, and Father never bothers at all.” His tone was cross.