Wicked Queen

by Geneva Lee

“I didn’t want to get him in trouble. Of course, he probably doesn’t want to stress you out. I shouldn’t even be talking about it.”

  Now I was the one who felt guilty. “I haven’t told him,” I confessed. “I started to the other day and then there was the whole mess with Anders. We were distracted.”

  “And you’re avoiding telling him,” she accused.

  “Avoiding telling him what?” a sharp voice cut into the conversation. She held out a water bottle and I grimaced.

  I’d forgotten to stay put, but Georgia hadn’t missed my exit from the party, even if I hadn’t seen her follow. This was why I hadn’t realized that I was constantly being surrounded. I strained my eyes around the dark courtyard looking for others but all I saw were drunken aristocrats who didn’t look like they’d be much use in a crisis. But Georgia would always be nearby and I should have remembered that.

  It helped that she’d worn a jet black evening gown with sleeves that hugged her slender arms to the wrists. It might have been modest camouflage, except for the neckline, which cut so low that it revealed her navel. She blended well into the night while standing out. Much like Georgia, it was the perfect contradiction.

  “Eavesdropping?” Belle asked, obviously trying to distract her from what she’d heard.

  “Catching up with friends.” Georgia’s crimson smile was wolfish. “And you two are loud, anyone can hear you.”

  My eyes flickered around the garden wondering who had heard what. I twisted the cap off the bottle and drank it quickly.

  “We’re talking about baby stuff,” Belle said. “No one cares.”

  We both gave her an incredulous look and she backtracked immediately. She lowered her voice to a whisper. “Okay, I guess they do, but it wasn’t interesting pregnancy stuff.”

  The other day, there’d been ten stories about what antacids Georgia had been spotted buying me in a pharmacy. This was much more interesting.

  “Are we being watched right now?” I asked Georgia.

  She gave me an are-you-stupid look.

  “Can we go somewhere that we aren’t being watched?”

  “I think that’s the loo and your bedroom,” she said flatly.

  I was glad some things were still sacred. If I had to pick, those would be the two exceptions I’d ask for. “The loo, it is.”

  Using the loo for a clandestine conversation turned out to involve clearing out the entire bathroom first, which made me feel horrible, and then planting guards in front of the door.

  “Happy?” Georgia asked after she’d checked the stalls one final time. “Now out with it.”

  “It’s nothing.” I silently begged Belle to save me. She was usually good for a quick lie, but she shook her head.

  “You might as well practice. Georgia is almost as scary as Alexander is,” Belle said, crossing her arms as she leaned against a sink.

  “I promise you that I am much scarier.”

  “Not helping,” I told her. I pretended to study myself in the mirror, but since we’d been at the party for all of an hour, there was nothing to fix.

  “You can’t keep it from him. The doctor’s going to be doing house calls soon and he’s going to say something,” Belle argued.

  “He can’t,” I reminded her. “If I tell him not to.”

  Belle’s lips tugged down at the edges. The look of disappointment made me feel worse.

  “What’s going on?” Georgia asked in a low voice.

  I’d nearly forgotten she was here, but when our eyes met I realized I wasn’t walking out of this room without coming clean.

  “What’s going on?” she repeated, edging closer to me, until she’d backed me against the wall. “You’re keeping something from Alexander that has to do with a doctor—are you sick?”

  It took me a moment to process her sudden anger. She had me against a wall—literally. “I actually believed you when you said we were friends.”

  “We are,” she informed me. “She’s the one who takes you shopping and helps you match your purse with your shoes. I’m the one who loses sleep when you’re on the outs with Alexander and walks behind you to watch your back.”

  Belle’s eyes had rounded to full moons, and she took a small step towards us. “You should tell her. It’s not going away.”

  And that was the problem. It wasn’t going away. I couldn’t cover it up or ignore it. I would have to face this—all of us would—and the moment of reckoning was nearly here.

  “Pretend that she’s Alexander,” Belle suggested. “It will be practice.”

  Georgia looked as though she hated this idea, but she didn’t contradict her.

  “Tell me,” her voice softened but the command was still implicit.

  “There’s a problem.” I sniffled, trying to keep myself from crying. If I was going to break down telling Georgia how would I ever get through telling Alexander? I set my shoulders and willed myself to be calm, reminding myself that everything would turn out well. “The baby’s heart isn’t right. He’s going to need surgery when he’s born.”

  “Are you fucking kidding me?” Georgia shook her head, her mouth open. “How could you keep this a secret?”

  “We weren’t sure. I had to see a specialist.”

  “When did you find out there might be a problem?” She asked.

  “A couple of—”

  “I really hope you’re about to say minutes,” she hissed. “You’ve known for days?”

  “Weeks,” I said weakly.

  “What were you thinking?” she demanded.

  “You do a really good impression of Alexander,” Belle said, “but I think she needs our support not our—”

  “That’s how you do friendship.” Georgia spun to face her. “My version has slightly more accountability.”

  “I know I should have told him.” Her reaction had shocked the tears from me. Now I was starting to feel angry.

  “Even if you couldn’t tell him, I needed to know. Your team needed to know.”

  “You answer to Alexander—” I began.

  “And you,” she added. “We keep secrets for a living and if the Queen has a secret, we will keep it. Do you understand? When you wanted to go to Windsor, I didn’t call him. I don’t repeat our conversations. But I needed to know this. How can I protect you if I don’t know that there’s a serious health concern with the baby? What if there was an accident and no one knew?”

  “I’m sorry,” I said softly. It hasn’t occurred to me that my team needed to know. It had felt like a private matter, but there was no real privacy in my life anymore. Why couldn’t I accept that?

  “It was stupid and reckless.” She shook her head. “I expected better of you. You’re usually the smart one.”

  She stormed toward the door and Belle and I looked at each other.

  “Give me a moment,” I called to Georgia as she opened the door.

  “There’s an entire squad of fools drooling to throw themselves between you and a bullet. I need to think.” She paused as she stepped out of the door. “Clara, tell him or I will.”

  It wasn’t an empty threat, and I knew it.

  “That went well,” Belle muttered.

  I slumped against the tiled wall, cradling the baby growing inside me. “She’s right. I didn’t want to deal with it, so I tried to ignore it. I made excuses for why it was okay to keep it a secret. The whole time I’ve been putting the baby in danger.”

  “You’ve been going to your appointments. You’re taking care of yourself,” Belle said firmly. “Maybe you should have told them, but there’s no use hating yourself for the past.”

  “I have to tell him,” I said, “as soon we get home.”

  I wouldn’t ruin Sarah’s birthday by springing this on her brother. Georgia knew now, so in the unlikely event the information was needed, she could pass it along.

  Was that how I wanted Alexander to find out? In an emergency?

  “Come on, let’s find your husband. You’ll feel better around him.” Belle ur
ged me back onto my feet and kept me steady as I slipped my heels on.

  But I wouldn’t feel better. Not until this had been dealt with.

  * * *

  It took Belle two passes to fix my smeared mascara. I didn’t mind. I’d rather be stuck in a restroom than smiling and pretending everything was fine.

  “Ready to enter the fray?” Belle asked when I’d run out of ways to stall us.

  I shook my head and she smiled sympathetically. We both knew that there was only one way out of here and it meant going back to the party.

  Outside the door, I paused to thank the guards, who’d begun to look a little nervous. We’d only made it a few steps toward the hall that led to The Raphael Gallery when a simpering voice said, “About time,” a bit too loudly.

  I closed my eyes and grabbed Belle’s arm before she could confront Pepper. This night just kept getting better and better. But Pepper, ever the sadist, wasn’t about to let us off the hook so easily.

  “It’s really rude to make everyone wait out here so you two can attempt to apply make-up. Accept a lost cause when you see it, ladies,” Pepper called over, but none of the women waiting around her laughed. Not even Sarah, who’d been stuck waiting out here with her friend. There wasn’t so much as a nervous titter among the lot of them. Pepper frowned.

  “Feeling unappreciated?” I asked her coldly. I wanted to tell her that no one wanted her here, but tonight was about Sarah and I wasn’t going to ruin it for her. Even if her best friend was a twat.

  “I don’t know,” she said, her eyes narrowing. “How does that feel? I’m sure you have experience.”

  “Stop,” Sarah said, dragging her to the loo as others filed in, eager to get away from the catfight.

  Next to me, Belle dropped her voice, “I know what you said, but—”

  “No,” I said firmly. I wasn’t going to let my pregnant best friend take a swing at Pepper, even if I would have paid to see Pepper’s reaction.

  “Please,” she whined.

  “What’s the matter?” Pepper called as Sarah tried to hustle her past the door. “Clara got you on the short leash?”

  My hands let go of Belle voluntarily, unable to hold her back anymore, because sometimes a cat fight was in order.

  Before Belle could reach her, Sarah stepped between them and rounded on her friend. “You’re her guest.”

  “I’m your guest.” Pepper’s lower lip stuck out a little as she battled her shock over Sarah’s reaction. “I told you that these two are trash.”

  “Yeah, I know.” Sarah took a deep breath, glancing between us and Pepper as if making a choice. “But I’m beginning to think you’re the trash.”

  Pepper let out a strangled cry and lunged for Sarah, who looked too surprised to get out of the way. I held Belle back from getting involved, gesturing to the security guards who had already caught Pepper by the shoulders and were pulling her away. She fought them for a second before realizing it was a lost cause.

  “Your Highness?” The guard prompted Sarah, waiting for instructions before realizing his mistake and looking to me.

  I shook my head and pointed to Sarah. This was a decision I would leave up to her. She hesitated for a second before ripping her eyes from Pepper. “I think you should leave.”

  Pepper protested as they led her away from the scene of her meltdown, and Belle waved at her as she went.

  “You know what happens to trash, Pepper?” Belle called. “It gets taken out.”

  “You enjoyed that too much,” I muttered to her.

  “It might have been better than the time I broke her nose,” Belle admitted.

  “You broke her nose?” Sarah stared at Belle in awe. “I thought it looked different. I’m sorry about what she was saying. I don’t know why she hates you so much.”

  Belle and I looked at each other and began to spill the running list.

  “I broke her nose.”

  “She was after Alexander.”

  “She broke up my engagement, but Philip dumped her,” said Belle

  “Then I called her out for sleeping with your dad.”

  “But before he dumped her, he begged me to take him back. And then I told her that.”

  “And she was completely banned by Alexander for selling stories to the media.”

  “Holy shit,” Sarah said, her eyes moving between two invisible points at her feet like we’d overloaded her brain.

  “Sorry,” I said, clapping a hand over my mouth, “I probably shouldn’t have told you all that stuff, especially about your Dad.”

  “I’m glad you did. That’s…” she couldn’t seem to come up with a word of appropriate magnitude.

  “Mental?” Belle offered as we headed back to the party.

  Sarah nodded. “To start with. Why did you invite her?”

  “She’s your friend and this is your birthday.”

  Sarah looked like she might start crying, so I pulled her into a hug. “By the way, we’re absolute shit at parties. I’m never throwing you another one.”

  “Everything goes wrong,” Belle agreed.

  “My wedding?” I said.

  “Legendary,” Belle said. I shot her a look. “I didn’t mean that in a good way, but you know…”

  “So I should have a good time?” We’d gotten Sarah to laugh, and I breathed a sigh of relief. Just because this night was turning into another failed party for the ages didn’t mean it should be the same for her.

  “I, for one, would like to find my husband and make him dance with me,” Belle said devilishly, “and I’m pretty sure that every single guy down there is waiting to dance with you.”

  We reached the gallery just as Anderson drifted into view wearing a black tuxedo. Sarah snorted and cocked her head in his direction. “Any more single guys that are also my half brothers? I’m little wary of flirting with strangers these days.”

  “That’s the only one.” I stopped myself from adding that we know about. I didn’t want the poor girl to be perpetually single.

  “Maybe we should go in another way,” I suggested, looking for a different entrance.

  “That’s the only way that does not involve a ridiculous amount of stairs and walking,” Belle said flatly. “He’s not going to bite you.”

  “But he wants to, right?” Sarah held up her hands when we glared at her. “I’m just trying to keep up. Sorry.”

  “Don’t let him see me,” I told them as we strolled into the party.

  “Sure,” Edward said slinging his arms around Belle’s and my shoulders. “No one will notice the three most beautiful women here walking back into the room. Excellent plan. Have you considered becoming a criminal mastermind?”

  “I don’t want it to be a thing,” I explained.

  He shook his head. “Then don’t let it be.”

  Stepping in front of us, he held out a hand to his sister. “Fancy a dance? I can point out the available ones and steer you away from the gay ones.”

  “Traitor,” I said as he guided her away.

  “Oh, um, there’s Smith,” Belle said, biting her lip.

  I sighed and shooed her away. Anders hadn’t spotted me, so I skirted the dance floor, searching for Alexander. I was about to give up and hunt down someone with an earpiece, who would definitely know where he was, when a strong hand caught my shoulder.

  “There you are.”

  I spun around with a smile, forgetting to account for my belly, which brushed against him.

  Anderson grinned, his eyes finding the floor as he put distance between us. “I’m afraid that was my fault.”

  “It was…don’t worry about,” I said breathlessly.

  “I was hoping you would dance with me,” he said.

  “Is that…?”

  “It’s your sister’s idea,” he said quickly. “I need to show that we all get along, so they don’t think that we hate each other.”

  I wasn’t certain that dancing with Anderson was going to send that impression, and I doubted Lola had expli
citly made that suggestion. But since my best friends had abandoned me, I couldn’t come up with a reasonable excuse.

  Anderson and I walked to the dance floor and he put an arm around me.

  “It’s a bit hard to take my waist at the moment,” I said apologetically.

  “At my first primary school dance, the teachers went around pushing us apart so we weren’t too close,” he said. “This makes that a lot easier.”

  I laughed along with him, wishing it could always be simple and easy between us. But until he’d figured out that I was off the market permanently, I worried that wouldn’t be the case. “You spoke to Lola?”

  “Yes,” he said, taking a deep breath. “She’s a bit bossy.”

  “She is a handful, but she knows how to run with this crowd.”

  “Did she help you?” he asked.

  “I sorta leapt into the deep end.” By the time, I’d realized that my relationship with Alexander was more than a fling, I’d already figured out how to tread water. “I should have asked for her help. She works with Belle on her business, and she’s always run interference for me when my mother gets too involved.”

  “It sounds like you have an interesting family dynamic.” He smiled.

  “And it’s still not as strange as my husband’s.”

  “Tell me about it. A year ago it was me and my mum and now?” He looked around the room. “This isn’t my world.”

  “I know how you feel,” I said, “but this isn’t their world, either. You’ll see. We’re actually terribly boring people…”

  “With private jets, family estates, and Crown Jewels.” He lifted an eyebrow, calling my bluff.

  I tilted my head. “Yes, but the rest of the time…”

  “Thank you for the dance,” Anders said, releasing me and taking a step back, “but I think someone is cutting in.”

  I didn’t have time to ask him who before he spun me into my husband’s waiting arms.

  Chapter 27

  Alexander

  Clara’s breathless surprise matched how I felt every time I saw her. I nodded politely to Anders. It was the least I could do if he was going to show he’d learned his place. Not that I appreciated seeing my brother’s hands on my wife in any context, but as I’d was unavailable, I’m glad she wasn’t standing alone. She eyed me through her lashes apprehensively as I clasped her hand and we began to sway.