Malice at the Palace (The Royal Spyness Series Book 9)

 

THE GREAT DAY arrived. I decided to squander part of my casino winnings on a smart new royal blue two-piece and matching hat with a feather in it. Darcy received an invitation to sit beside me in St. Margaret’s, Westminster. It was a fine, crisp day and the couple looked splendid, and happy. I hoped that their happiness would last. As Marina walked up the aisle with her train and veil flowing out behind her I couldn’t help fantasizing about my own wedding. Would I someday be married in a place like this? With Darcy waiting for me up at the altar and the choir singing? I suppose it’s every girl’s dream, isn’t it? I confess to taking an occasional glance at Darcy, sitting beside me. Once I found him looking at me and he smiled.

 

After the ceremony we went to Buckingham Palace for the reception. The Prince of Wales was there, looking sulky without Mrs. Simpson. She certainly would not have been welcome. When the happy couple came past him George clapped him on the shoulder. “Your turn next, old boy,” he said. “Or are you going to turn into a grouchy old confirmed bachelor?”

 

“You know very well what I want to do,” David said in a clipped voice. “If this blasted family would stop badgering me and trying to live my life for me.”

 

“Ah, but the big difference is that you’re going to be king and the rest of us aren’t,” George said. “I think it’s time you buckled down and did your duty, old chap.”

 

“Talk about the pot calling the kettle black.” David gave a brittle laugh. “I don’t have nearly as much buckling down to do as you.”

 

“Ah, but I’m doing it. I’m going to be a thoroughly good boy from now on, and a devoted husband.”

 

“I’ll believe it when I see it,” David said. He looked around. Marina was being kissed on the cheek by some elderly Continental royal lady. “By the way, whatever happened to Bobo?”

 

“She’s dead, old chap. Drug overdose, they say,” George said.

 

“That was a piece of luck for you, wasn’t it?” David muttered. “Not the sort of thing one would want the blushing bride to hear about.”

 

 

 

THE HAPPY COUPLE departed and the rest of us took our leave of the king and queen.

 

“Your turn next, eh, young Georgie?” the king asked.

 

“We’ll have to see, sir,” I replied, trying not to sneak a glance in Darcy’s direction.

 

Darcy and I took a taxicab back to Kensington. “It seems a pity to waste a free evening,” Darcy said.

 

“I’d better go and change out of this new outfit into something more eveningy,” I said. “And I’ll hang it up myself before Queenie can ruin it.”

 

“No, don’t change. We’re going out. You look just perfect for where we’re headed.”

 

“All right.” I gave him an excited smile.

 

“I’ve borrowed a motorcar,” he said. “Come on. What are you waiting for?”

 

It wasn’t the ragtop Triumph he had borrowed once before but a sleek Armstrong Siddeley.

 

“This is rather posh,” I said. “From whom did you manage to borrow a motorcar like this?”

 

“I have my connections,” he said with a mysterious smile.

 

I climbed in beside him. Darkness had fallen and a mist hung over the Round Pond.

 

“So where are we going?” I asked.

 

“You’ll see.” He was grinning.

 

We drove. City lights flashed past us. Up the Edgware Road to the Finchley Road past Golders Green. City lights gave way to rows of suburban houses, little high streets with people queuing to get into picture palaces and loitering around corner pubs.

 

“We’re going out of London?” I asked.

 

He nodded, still staring straight ahead.

 

“To a friend’s place?”

 

“No.”

 

“You’re being annoying, Darcy O’Mara.”

 

He grinned, still staring at the road, which was now down to the occasional streetlight overhead. I felt a knot of excitement and apprehension. Had Darcy decided we had waited long enough and was he taking me to a hotel for the night? In which case didn’t people normally head south to places like Brighton or the New Forest instead of to this northern fringe of the city with only the industrial midlands ahead? It didn’t seem particularly attractive, but maybe he had a special place in mind. . . . The knot in my stomach grew. Was that what I wanted? A picture of Belinda, sitting alone at that clinic on the coast, suddenly flashed into my head. And Bobo, who was forced to give up her child, and Princess Sophia, whose ghost wandered the palace looking for the child who was taken from her. It was true that my circumstance was different from theirs. I had Darcy. He wouldn’t desert me. He’d marry me if the unthinkable happened. All the same . . .

 

“Darcy,” I began. He glanced across at me. “I don’t want . . . I mean, I want it to be right. The time to be right.”

 

It was as if he read my thoughts. “It will be,” he said.

 

“Because, you know . . .”

 

He took a hand off the steering wheel and covered mine with his own. “It will be,” he said. “I understand.”