by S. A. Gordon
“Yes,” Alix said firmly. “You and Margaret were just always too busy being mean to me to notice.”
“We were not!” David said, injecting what he hoped was a note of indignation into his voice. “We were just … playing.” He smirked.
“The two of you …” Alix shook her head. “Thick as thieves. And I was left all alone.”
“Oh, poor Alix—all the responsibility and nowhere to hide from it. Is this the part where I’m meant to feel sorry for you?”
She glared at him and then poked out her tongue.
“Where’s Margaret?” she said, leaning back in her seat and crossing her legs. “We’re here. She should be.”
“She had a thing.”
“A thing?”
“A—” He waved his hand around. “A dinner thing. Some charity.”
“You mean she gets to wear an evening gown and have her hair and make-up done while we’re sitting here like slobs?”
“Speak for yourself,” David said. “I’m wearing a very expensive pair of Italian woolen pants.”
“Well … ‘slob’ is a relative term, obviously. I’m wearing Stella.”
“McCartney?”
“Is there any other?”
“Are we really having this conversation?”
Alix smiled faintly. “I guess we are.”
“And Rita does her own make-up now,” David said. “Just so you know. You’re the only one who’s allowed to have a make-up artist.”
“I only have that when it’s something really big!” Alix said with faux outrage. “Otherwise I do it myself. Anyway …” She shifted in her seat. “Margaret needs to get used to budgeting. Once I’m Queen she’ll have to fend for herself. Prime Minister’s orders.”
David sighed. “Unless she’s the only one of us who has children, right? If that dashing young Hal knocks her up? Then she gets bumped up.”
“Oh, she’ll be fine,” Alix said. “Mummy left us money, remember?”
“It’s not that. It’s the thought of her being made … different, somehow.”
“It’ll happen to you too, Your Royal Highness,” said Alix. “You’re the spare. Once I have children—”
“If you have children.”
Alix glared at him. “When I have children, your worth plummets. Just remember that next time you want a favor.”
David chuckled. “All right, Queen A. I shall. In the meantime, I shall luxuriate in the status of being your one and only.”
He bent down to pick up the bottle of water by his chair, drinking slowly before replacing it.
“I met someone,” he said quietly.
Alix sat up straight. “What do you mean?”
“I met … someone.”
“You mean … someone who might get it? Who might not run screaming from this life of ours?”
He cocked his head. “Maybe.”
“But?”
“But we’ve only had one date and she’s in New York, and now I’m here and who knows what will happen?”
“So—what? How did you leave it?”
“I saw her on Monday night. Tuesday I was here. That’s it.”
“You haven’t contacted her since?”
“No.”
“David.”
“What?”
“She’ll think you aren’t interested.”
“It’s not that. You know it’s not that. I’m here. I can’t be anywhere else. And on the strength of one very good date, I can’t ask her to come here, can I?”
Alix shrugged. “Why not?”
“Because that’s … ludicrous.”
“Is it? You’ve never said this to me about someone before. Not even when you met Christy.”
“Yes, well, we know how that turned out.”
“You were young. Younger. She didn’t want to be a princess. It’s fair enough, David.”
“Does Jack want to be a prince?” David said, his eyes flashing.
“That’s irrelevant,” Alix snapped.
“No, it’s not,” David said quietly but firmly.
“Jack is a good fuck,” she said under her breath, glancing to the door. Jack was standing outside, as was Stan. “That’s all.”
“Don’t underestimate him. I know I was a bit high handed with him the other day but that was just because I was worried about Papa. He’s … he’s a decent fellow.”
“David—he’s a commoner.”
“And so is Caitlin. By the way, ‘commoner’ doesn’t have to mean ‘common.’ It just means we have to negotiate with our … handlers a little bit more. You know they think it’s easier when we fish inside the company pond, although I have no idea why.”
“Caitlin, is it?” Alix looked triumphant. “Do you have a thing for girls whose names start with C?”
“Oh, shut up.” David glowered.
“Darling, don’t be like that.” She leaned over and gripped his forearm. “I’m teasing. I haven’t had anyone to tease for so long. Don’t deny me the pleasure now you’ve returned.”
“What about Rita?”
Alix pouted. “You know how sensitive she is.”
He smiled. “Yes, but she’s adorable.”
Alix withdrew her hand. “Oh, you two,” she said grumpily.
David looked at her. “You know that we love you,” he said. “And we will support you, always. You know that, yes?”
“I …” Alix sighed. “I do.”
“That sounds like doubt.”
“Not in you.” She looked at him, her eyes almost wild. “Never in you.”
“Then who?”
She looked at the King, immobile in the bed. “In myself.”
“Alexandra Elizabeth Diana, don’t you ever think that,” David said, as firmly as he could muster.
Alix blinked, several times. “What? Why?” she said.
“You are going to be the monarch one day. You are eminently capable of being the monarch. But I will help you. Our sister will help you. You know that you can trust us, until the end of time. We are a family. If necessary, we rule as a family. But you are the boss of us, and don’t you ever forget it.” With that, he grinned.
“Oh.” Alix sighed with relief. “Thank you,” she said sincerely.
David nodded once.
“Now,” she said, shifting in her seat so that she could see him properly. “Tell me about Caitlin.”
David picked up his water bottle again and drank slowly.
“She’s not like any woman I’ve ever met,” he said thoughtfully. “She’s confident, like she knows who she is and doesn’t care what other people think about her—and you and I both know how rare that is.” He glanced at Alix and she nodded, then frowned in the direction of their father.
“But she’s vulnerable, too. In the same way …” He looked at the bed and sighed.
“In the way Mummy was?” Alix’s voice was soft.
He nodded. “Is that weird, though? That I’m attracted to one of my mother’s qualities when I see it in someone else?”
Alix shook her head. “It’s normal. I think science would back me up.” She shrugged. “Or something. At any rate, we’re all attracted to what we know.”
David glanced at their father. “Ah, yes—I just realized that Papa and Jack have the same coloring—skin and hair.” He wiggled his eyebrows at his sister, then laughed as she made a face.
“Caitlin,” she prompted.
“Right. Well. I met her on the beach at Sag Harbor. Just this random encounter. But I’d seen her before, in this bar in Manhattan. I was meeting a date.”
“A model.” Alix rolled her eyes.
David pursed his lips. “Why wasn’t that a question?”
“Because she sold her story to the tabloids, silly. She even named the bar.”
He pursed his lips again. “I’ve been a fool.”
“Why?” Alix said, frowning.
“For not realizing that that could happen.”
“She didn’t say anything mean.”
“It’s the fact she said anything at all.”
“It happens, Day.”
He made a face.
“Yes, I’m calling you that again too. All right?”
He shrugged and then blew her a kiss, receiving a poked-out tongue in return.
“Anyway … What are we meant to do—never have anything to do with anyone? Are you worried that Caitlin will talk to the press?”
“Not at all,” David said quickly, and he knew it was true. “That’s just it—that confidence she has, it’s the mark of someone who doesn’t need validation from others. Those sorts of people like it, of course—who doesn’t—but she’s not the sort of person who needs a tabloid to validate the experience we had together. She wouldn’t need to know that all these people had read the story. She just didn’t react to me like anyone else ever has.”
“In what way?” Alix regarded him curiously.
David gave a short laugh. “She talked to me like an equal. Like I was just some guy she met.”
Alix smiled. “You were.”
“Thanks, that’s helpful,” he said sarcastically. “But you know what I mean—when do we ever meet people who treat us like that? Who aren’t the slightest bit nervous about us? Even the people we grew up with, the people who work for us, act like they need to be deferential. With the odd exception, of course. But it’s ridiculous.”
Leaning on her elbow, Alix breathed steadily as she appeared to contemplate what he’d said.
“It’s not, actually,” she said at last. “Ridiculous, I mean. We represent something for them. It’s the role, the title, they’re nervous about, not us.”
“But from our point of view, what’s the difference?” David said with a note of exasperation. “We’re the people they’re talking to. Or, rather, the people they’re too nervous to talk to.”
“I don’t know if there’s a difference,” Alix murmured. “But Caitlin …?”
David sighed heavily, then smiled, and there was sadness in it. “She treated me like a man, not like a prince. She just didn’t seem to want anything from me apart from me being myself. It was unsettling, really—for a little while I wondered who ‘myself’ was. I’m so used to playing a part.”
He frowned as he looked toward the bed. “Papa?” he said anxiously.
Alix’s head snapped around and she stood, then she and David moved toward their father.
“Papa?” David said again.
The second in line to the throne and his sister watched as their father’s eyes fluttered open. Usually a bright blue, they seemed watery and unfocused.
“Darlings,” he said croakily. “I’m so happy to see you.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
David gazed around his apartment and grimaced. He’d declined his father’s offer to have the place remodeled, rationalizing that he’d be spending a fair bit of time overseas and he could overhaul the furnishings once he’d decided to settle back in the UK. That, of course, had been at a time when he had thought he could choose what happened during the next few years of his life. His father was still quite young and there had been every chance Alix would marry and have children before she became Queen; David had, therefore, believed he had ages to be a part-time royal, performing duties whenever his father’s office told him to and spending the rest of the time enjoying the privileges of his station in life. He had known what the press were saying about him—that he was lazy, that he wasn’t taking his role seriously—and partly he thought they were right. He had, indeed, been hoping to coast between the lines of his father’s reign and his sister’s. He had thought that if he played things the right way he could be a minor royal in his father’s court and an even more minor one in his sister’s. It was, however, time to reassess. Starting with his residence.
The previous occupants—his grandmother’s cousin and his wife—had died several years before, within a few months of each other, and the place had stood empty since. It showed: the furnishings were old-fashioned and the wallpaper had faded. The apartment was full of the faded chintz that had been characteristic of the homes of a particular generation of entitled people, but it did not suit him. Not that he wanted a hideously modern, hard-edged bachelor pad. He just wanted something … new. Something that was his. And, as it looked like he was staying in the city for the foreseeable future, he’d best get on with it. The money had been allocated—his father had told him that—and even though David could pay for it out of his own pocket, the place belonged to the Crown and, thus, it had to be decorated by the Crown.
David sighed and sat down on one of his great-uncle’s favorite couches—covered in brown corduroy, it used to also be infested with dog hair from his uncle and aunt’s Labradors. They had instructed the household staff to not clean up the dog hair too often, as they “liked the place to have a doggy smell.” The place had actually been run by the dogs, if David was to be honest about it. Now, he was surprised to discover that he missed the dogs and he missed that doggy smell; the dogs had gone to his father when the old couple had died, and had lived out their years at Windsor, quite happily doing nothing much at all. But he wished they were here. He realized that this was the first time his life hadn’t had dogs in it. They’d always had them around—two spaniels that had been his mother’s pets and mourned her accordingly, as well as dogs that belonged to various estates. Since he’d been “doing his own thing,” as Alix liked to say, there had been no dogs. The fact that he was pining for them now made him wonder if he was secretly middle aged.
“Gawd, the place needs a do-over,” Alix said as she and Margaret wandered in from their tour of the other rooms. “Christine and Neddy had a certain theme, didn’t they? Not right for you, Day.”
“I miss the dogs,” David said with a mournful tone as he leaned his head back on the couch.
“The dogs!” said Margaret. “Those smelly old lazy things that only wanted to eat all day?”
“They were sweet,” David protested.
“Sweet?” Margaret snorted. “They’d have chewed off your hand if they were hungry enough.”
“So, what do you want to do?” Alix said, her tone brisk.
“You mean, do I want to move in here?”
“Well, it’s yours.” She shrugged. “And we’re just across the courtyard. Why wouldn’t you want to be here?” A wink followed.
“Oh, goody, we can all sit around drinking moscato and swapping stories about handsome boys we’ve known from Eton.” David rolled his eyes. “That’s why, Alix.”
“I think you meant to address that remark to Margaret,” Alix said.
“Actually, I don’t think it’s right for me either,” Margaret said huffily. “It’s clearly been a long time since you’ve hung out with us, David. We’ve moved on from that stage of our lives.”
“Yeah, but David hasn’t,” Alix snorted.
“What on earth do you mean, Alexandra?” said David.
“You’ve been in the US drinking cocktails and shagging women whom you’ve chosen for their looks alone.” Alix lifted her chin in what seemed like a gesture of defiance. “How is that different to what you’ve just accused me and Margaret of doing?”
David lifted an eyebrow. “You may have a point. But let’s not get too carried away with accusations.”
Alix nodded and then walked over to a window that looked out over a walled garden. “It’s pretty down there,” she said, then wrinkled her nose. “Needs a bit of an overhaul, though. Some of those bushes have gone feral, by the look of it.”
“According to you, I know all about feral bushes,” David said, smirking.
Alix’s mouth made an O and Margaret blushed.
“So I should be right at home here, yes?” he continued.
“Dirty scoundrel,” Alix said, but she looked amused. “Yes, you should be at home. And you’ll need to make this a home because you can’t go anywhere.”
“I know that,” David said quietly.
“Papa’s too sick for any of us to be anywhere else.” She bl
inked rapidly. “And I need you.”
“I know you do,” David said, walking to her and putting an arm around her. “I’m not going anywhere.”
“But what about …” Alix sniffed and looked out the window again.
“What?”
“That American girl,” Margaret said.
“You two just gossip about everyone, don’t you?” David said, but his tone was kind.
“Only you,” said Margaret as she walked over to David and lay her head on his shoulder. “You’re the only one with an exotic foreign paramour.”
David sighed and gazed out the window himself. “I’ll have to forget about her, won’t I?”
“That seems a shame,” Alix said, muffled.
As David turned back to her, he looked quizzical. “We don’t all have to give up something we want, Alexandra.”
Alix nodded as Margaret regarded them both curiously.
“Look at the time,” Alix exclaimed. “We have to get ready for that state visit.”
David smiled. “Oh, yes, of course. The Norwegians?”
“Belgians,” Alix said with a definitive nod. “And I think Liechtenstein as well.”
“Tiaras at twenty paces, then, ladies.”
David stood and offered the crook of each elbow to his sisters. “And I get to look fancy too.”
The trio began to walk jauntily but it wasn’t long before, separately and unseen by each other, their faces assumed expressions of concern and fear.
*
“Your Royal Highness,” said the rakishly thin man who was standing just inside the door.
“Oliver,” David said, holding out his hand as the man bowed his head and then engaged in a handshake.
“Your Royal Highness,” said the older woman next to Oliver, who offered the prince a beaming smile.
“Beverly!” David kissed the woman once on each cheek before she had a chance to curtsey.
“Thank you for coming, sir,” said Oliver, gesturing to one of the seats placed around a small round table.
“I don’t believe I had a choice, Oliver,” David said, looking quizzically at the man.
“Sir,” Oliver said flatly, sitting on David’s left as Beverly sat on his right.