Majesty (American Royals, #2)(98)
“You don’t need it back.” His voice was rough with unshed tears. “I swear that I’ll keep it safe. Everywhere I go, that part of you will come with me, and I will guard and treasure it. Always.”
A sob escaped her chest. She hurt for Connor and with Connor and because of Connor, all at once.
This wasn’t how breakups were meant to go. In the movies they always seemed so hateful, with people yelling and throwing things at each other. They weren’t meant to be like this, tender and gentle and full of heartache.
“Okay,” she replied, through her tears. “That part of my heart is yours to keep.”
Connor stepped back, loosening his hand from hers, and Beatrice felt the thread between them pull taut and finally snap. She imagined that she could hear it—a crisp sort of sound, like the stem of a rose being snapped in two.
Her body felt strangely sore, or maybe it was her heart that felt sore, recognizing the parts of it that she had given away, forever.
“You’re such an amazing person, Connor. I hope you find someone who deserves you.”
Again he attempted a crooked smile. “It won’t be easy on her, trying to live up to the queen. For a small person, you cast quite the shadow,” he said, and then his features grew serious once more. “Bee—if you ever need me, I’ll be there for you. You know that, right?”
She swallowed against a lump in her throat. “The same promise holds for me, too. I’m always here if you need me.”
As she spoke, the steel panel began to lift back into the ceiling.
Beatrice straightened her shoulders beneath the cool silk of the gown, drew in a breath. Somehow she managed to gather up the tattered shreds of her self-control, as if she wasn’t a young woman who’d just said goodbye to her first love—to her best friend.
As if she wasn’t a young woman at all, but a queen.
The steel-reinforced doors lifted without a whisper of a sound.
They seemed so heavy that they should have groaned and creaked, like the portcullis of a medieval drawbridge being raised in battle. Yet Nina heard nothing except a low, hissing silence.
A Revere Guard appeared in the doorway. When he lifted his hand, the gossip rumbling through the room was abruptly cut off.
“The palace is secure; there’s no need to panic,” he began—but his next words were drowned out by a stampede of footsteps.
The guests cried out breathless questions: where was the threat, what about the royal wedding, were they free to leave. The Guard seemed helpless to stop the sea of frightened people rushing past him and out into the hallway.
Nina realized that she was still clutching tight to her mom’s hand, and quickly let go. “You all right, sweetie?” Julie asked, glancing over.
Nina’s mamá, standing on her other side, rested a hand on her daughter’s back in silent reassurance.
“I’m all right.” Nina plucked nervously at her gown. Why wasn’t there any circulation in here? There were too many people, crowding the room with their shrill complaints. Nina hadn’t seen Ethan since she’d left to find her parents; she wondered if he was still toward the back of the room. And where was Sam? The Guard had said the palace was secure—that meant the royal family was all safe, right?
“Sorry, I just need some space,” Nina muttered. Her parents nodded in understanding as she joined the flood of people headed out the ballroom’s main doors.
She jostled blindly down the hallway, past oil portraits and carved side tables and iron sconces, past Guards and footmen who spoke in low tones, too preoccupied to worry about her. Finally, a few doors down, Nina turned in to an empty sitting room. She collapsed onto a couch, slumping forward and closing her eyes. At least now she could breathe.
“Oh. It’s you.”
At the sound of that voice, Nina went hot and prickly all over.
“Excuse me.” She hurried to stand, but Daphne had planted herself before the door like a human barrier. A strange series of expressions darted over her face: surprise and dismay rapidly giving way to a hungry, avid sort of calculation.
Nina knew that look didn’t bode well for her.
“Don’t run off just yet. There’s something we need to talk about.” Daphne smiled like a lion, bold and beautiful and utterly deadly. It shattered what remained of Nina’s self-control.
“I already did what you asked, and broke up with Jeff! You’re here as his date, Daphne. You won,” she said acridly. “Can’t you just leave me alone?”
Daphne made a show of stepping aside. Her smile never faltered, but it became, oddly, more relieved. As if Daphne was secretly thrilled to speak openly, without any pretense at being the polite, well-mannered Daphne Deighton that the world knew and loved.
It struck Nina as oddly pitiful, that she was perhaps the only person with whom Daphne could be herself.
“Of course I’ll leave you alone,” Daphne sniffed. “I can assure you that this isn’t pleasant for me, either. I just felt like I should warn you, from one woman to another, about Ethan.”
Nina wasn’t sure how Daphne knew about her and Ethan—whether Jeff had told her, or whether Daphne had seen them holding hands in the throne room. She found that she didn’t especially care.
“It’s none of your business,” she tried to reply, as calmly as she could.