The Controversial Princess (The Smoke & Mirrors Duology #1)(127)

“Please.” Uncle Stephan jumps to my defense, the only person who I know will. “That’s enough.”

“Please leave us,” Mother demands, casting her watery gaze around the room. “I would like a moment with my daughter.” No one argues with the Queen Consort, everyone immediately leaving the room quietly. “You can stay, Helen.”

Helen stops and looks over her shoulder, confusion evident on her face. She waits until everyone is gone before she turns to face my mother. “Catherine?”

My mother’s head tilts, thoughtful, and Helen’s confusion turns into worry. “I know, Helen,” Mother says. “I know your little secret.”

What?

Helen rushes across the room to us, noticeably panicked. “Catherine, please.” Her hands, full of crumpled tissues, grab my mother and turn her away from me. Instinct has me intervening, not liking the force being used by my sister-in-law, whether she’s grieving the loss of her husband or not.

“Helen,” I yell, pushing her away, yet she pays no attention to me, muscling me out of the way to get to my mother.

“Catherine, I beg you. Please.”

My mother’s face gives nothing away, her eyes taking in her frantic daughter-in-law as she begs and pleads.

“What’s going on?” I ask, my attention bouncing between the two women, one bordering deranged, one completely impassive.

“Nothing,” Helen snaps, shoving me away. “Nothing’s going on.” Her eyes bore into my mother, something definitely passing between them. What?

I seize my mother, taking her from Helen’s clutches to pull her away, staggered when my sister-in-law fights with me. “Helen, get off,” I shout, wrestling her off Mother, her motionless form being pulled back and forth between us.

“Enough,” Mother yells, startling me into stillness, as well as Helen. She points a fire-filled, angry glare at her son’s pregnant wife, who cowers, her head shaking, as if in denial. Then Mother casts her eyes to me, eyes that are usually soft and friendly, but are now hard and determined. She points to Helen’s midriff, prompting Helen to cover it with her palms protectively. “That baby is not your brother’s.”

My mouth falls open in utter disbelief, my eyes flying to Helen’s. She crumples, defeated, and starts sobbing again. “What?” I know I heard right, but shock has taken my ability to string a sentence together.

“Catherine.” Helen sniffs, backing away. “Please don’t.”

Mother, stone cold, wanders away and takes a seat on the couch. “What do you think is going to happen, Helen? Your unborn child takes the throne? It’s inconceivable.” Cold eyes find a wilting Helen, while I stand, motionless, trying to allow this bombshell to sink in. “I remained quiet, but did you think I didn’t know? You might have fooled the King, but you most certainly did not fool me. Eight years trying to conceive and nothing. And now by some miracle, you’re pregnant?” She laughs coldly. “The only question I have for you now, dear daughter-in-law, is who is the father? Because I sure as hell know it isn’t my son.”

Hearing my mother say the word hell is alarming, a show of her anger, even if she’s speaking void of emotion. I watch, rapt, unable to comprehend what I am hearing, as Helen backs away, tears streaming. “Catherine—”

“The throne belongs to my children. You are neither my child, nor is that baby you are carrying my grandchild.”

“I was desperate,” Helen blurts, her words only just audible through her broken voice. “Our future hung on it. The pressure from the King was getting too much.”

“I don’t doubt it for a moment.” Mother turns away from her daughter-in-law, as I unravel what I’m learning. As far as the world is concerned, with John gone, Helen’s unborn child is now the King or Queen of England, and a Regent would be carefully selected to reign in its name until they come of age. But we are not in the sixteenth century anymore. Not that it matters, since Mother has just revealed the shocker news that Helen’s baby is illegitimate.

“I’ll be banished,” Helen whimpers. “I’ll have nothing. I’ll be hated. Please, Catherine.”

“The only people who know of your betrayal are Sir Don, David Sampson, and us in this room.” Mother looks to me and then Helen. “I plan on keeping it that way. So we will avoid the scandal by bypassing my unborn grandchild. This is the twenty-first century. A child ruler would be ridiculed by the public. Laughed at. The monarchy is already under enough fire without giving the haters ammunition to shoot us down even more.”

What my mother’s saying suddenly hits home. Bypass the next in line? Bypass Helen’s unborn child? “Where’s Eddie?” I ask, my hand reaching for my neck, feeling his suffocation as if it is my own. If the crown is bypassing Helen’s unborn child, then it will be landing on Eddie’s head. “Mother, does he know?”

“He knows,” she sighs.

My worry amplifies by a million. My God, he’ll be devastated. He wanted the crown as much as me.

Not at all.

“So where is he?” The urgency coursing through me is increasing by the second, my need to get to my brother making me panic. He will hate this. I need to find him. Comfort him. “Mother,” I yell, losing my patience. Her reluctance to answer me is positively maddening.