American Royals (36 page)

“What do you want me to say? Yes, Daphne hit on me at New Year’s, but I turned her down, told her that I was with someone else now.” He shook his head in disappointment. “Come on, Nina. I thought you would at least be gracious in victory.”

“Being gracious,” Nina said darkly. “Sounds like yet another of the many things that Daphne can do, and I can’t.”

The darkness felt tense and heavy, and somehow more ominous than before. Nina struggled to breathe. Then something Jeff had said clicked into place.

“You
did
tell Daphne. Even if you didn’t tell her my name,” she insisted. “After you told her you were seeing someone, she clearly figured out that it was me. Then she sent the press to my dorm!”

“Do you realize how paranoid you sound?” Jeff asked, incredulous. “Daphne hates the press. She would never do that. I know she can come on strong, especially to someone like you, but she wouldn’t hurt me like that.”

It wasn’t lost on Nina that he’d said
hurt me.
Not
us.

“To ‘someone like me’?” she repeated, stunned. “You mean, a
commoner
?”

“Of course not. I just meant, someone who hasn’t known Daphne for years.”

“You met me when we were six,” she reminded him. She didn’t have to add that it was much longer than he’d known Daphne.

Jeff glanced down at the tip of Nina’s shoe, peeking out from beneath her gown. “Daphne and I ended on good terms. We’re still friends. Whatever she said to you, I’m sure it was well intentioned.”

Was he seriously taking her side? “I can’t believe you ever dated her. She’s awful.”

“Why are you being like this? I’m with
you
now. What does it matter what happened in the past?”

“Because I don’t think it’s actually
in
the past!” Nina burst out. “Daphne clearly isn’t done with you—and from the way you’re defending her, maybe you aren’t done with her, either!”

She tore her hand away from Jeff’s grip. “She’s a manipulator, Jeff. She’s been lying to you from the beginning.”

“Nina—”

“It’s absurd that I’m supposedly the gold-digger, when it’s really Daphne. I like you
in spite of
your position, and Daphne likes you
because
of it!”

The prince’s jaw tightened. “Daphne and I dated for almost three years,” he said. Nina recoiled a little at the reminder. “I think I would have known if she was lying to me that whole time.”

“No. You’re just too blinded by her looks to see it,” Nina insisted. “She’s been playing you, Jeff. Using you. She should win an Oscar for this, because it’s the performance of a lifetime—making you think she cared about you, when all she cares about is being a princess!”

“So now you’re accusing her of being a sociopath,” he said quietly.

“Exactly! She faked your entire relationship, and if you can’t see it, you’re even more foolish and shallow than I used to think you were!”

Nina stared determinedly out at the city, furious with herself for crying, but it was too late.

If only she had proof of what had happened in the bathroom. But it was her word against Daphne’s. And if Jeff was going to choose Daphne’s side over hers … well, she had her answer right there.

Jeff let out a breath. “I don’t want to make you any promises that I can’t keep, about marriage or where this is going. I’m not trying to mislead you in any way. All I know is that I want to give us a fair shot.”

“We
did
give us a fair shot, and it didn’t work,” Nina said quietly. “I can’t handle all of this. The reporters, the constant scrutiny, the fact that your ex-girlfriend is determined to get rid of me—even the fact that your lawyer emailed me a
relationship contract
—it’s too much.”

Jeff didn’t answer right away. He seemed stunned by her words.

“Nina …,” he said at last. “If it was just us, if I was a normal guy, would things be different?”

Of course they would,
Nina wanted to say, except that the very notion was nonsense. The thought of him as a so-called
normal guy,
as one of the disheveled college kids who worked for his beer and pizza money, was ridiculous. Jeff could only ever be the Prince of America.

Just as Nina could only ever be a commoner.

“It won’t ever be
just us,
Jeff.”

He nodded. “I really am sorry.”

She turned a tear-streaked face to him. “Me too.”

They stood there, both of them leaning toward each other, but not touching.

“I guess this is it, then,” Jeff said at last. “See you around.”

He dropped a final kiss on her brow, more like a friend saying goodbye than a boyfriend. Then he walked back into the palace, the doors shutting behind him with a definitive click.

Nina leaned her elbows onto the railing. Her stomach had seized in an undeniable cramp, as if all the pain and sadness in her body were wringing her like a towel, twisting tears from her eyes.

She needed to get out of the palace, and this time, she wasn’t coming back.

I am not jealous,
Samantha reminded herself, as she drifted around her sister’s party like a stray snowflake. It felt petty to be jealous at a time like this. Beatrice’s engagement was a matter of state, a
dynastic
decision, and their father was dying—and compared to that, it felt selfish for Samantha to be yearning for Teddy. There was so much more at stake here than her own teenage heartbreak.

Her rational brain knew and accepted all of this, but that didn’t make it any less painful.

At least Nina and Jeff seemed happy. They’d been attached to each other all evening, smiling goofy lovesick grins. Sam didn’t see them on the dance floor anymore, though. Probably they had slipped off to be alone.

The person she did keep seeing, no matter how consciously she tried
not
to, was Teddy.

Ever since their conversation in the Crown Jewels vault, she and Teddy had done an admirable job of avoiding each other. It seemed like he was traveling back and forth to Boston anyway. When she did see him, Sam murmured a polite greeting and quickly moved on.

But tonight Teddy seemed to be everywhere. Sam realized that some stupid part of her was tracking his movements, with a low hum of alertness that seemed to operate under the surface of her consciousness.

He looked gorgeous in his tuxedo, his blond hair slightly longer than it used to be—gorgeous, and utterly off-limits to her. Sam gripped the stem of the glass so tight that it left an indentation mark on her fingers. She had almost,
almost
come to terms with the fact that she was giving him up. That decision had been much easier when he wasn’t right in front of her.

There were plenty of other young men at this party, if she wanted to distract herself. Sam forced herself to whirl across the dance floor with them, one after the other: Alastair von Epstein, Darius Boyle, and the infamous Lord Michael Alden, who’d defied his family’s wishes and became a professional swimmer. He was even cuter in person, with that perfect white smile that was all over cereal boxes and toothpaste commercials.

Samantha was certainly dressed for flirtation. Her dramatic red trumpet gown matched her vivid lipstick, and her hair tumbled in curls down one shoulder, ruby studs glinting in her ears. It all had a glamorous, old-Hollywood feel.

She made a concerted effort for a while—looking up at Michael through lowered lashes, laughing at his jokes even when they weren’t funny—but her heart wasn’t in it.

“Sam, can I talk to you for a minute?”

Beatrice had come to stand behind her, uncharacteristically alone.

“Of course,” Sam replied, curious. She followed Beatrice to a corner of the colonnaded terrace, behind a towering spray of white peonies in a cut-glass vase. A young man in the uniform of the Revere Guard shadowed their movements, eventually settling along the edge of the ballroom.

“What happened to your other Guard? The tall, dreamy one?” Sam didn’t recognize Beatrice’s new security detail.

“Connor?” Her sister let out a strange breath that was almost a laugh, her voice higher-pitched than normal. “He’ll be back. He was just on temporary leave.”

Something was different about Beatrice tonight. The moonlight struck living sparks from the prongs of her tiara, cast a pale glow over her face. She looked softer and more beautiful than Sam had ever seen her.

Beatrice glanced around their surroundings, making sure no one could overhear. Then she leaned in close. “I’m calling off the engagement,” she said abruptly.

“What? But—
why
?”

“You were right; Teddy and I aren’t in love. We shouldn’t make this kind of commitment, not when there are other people out there for us. People we
could
fall in love with,” she added, with a significant glance toward Sam.

“What about everything you said, about how you need to get married before—” Sam stopped herself from saying
before Dad dies,
but Beatrice understood.

“I’m going to talk to Dad tonight, as soon as I can get a minute alone with him. I know he won’t be thrilled,” she admitted. “But hopefully he’ll come to understand.”

Sam glanced back toward the ballroom. At all those hundreds of people, who’d come to celebrate the love story of Beatrice and Teddy.

“You’re sure?” she whispered. The wind howled in her ears, drowning out the laughter and gossip of the party. “You’re really going to tell the world that you’ve changed your mind?”

Beatrice shook her head with an irrepressible smile. “Who cares what the world thinks? The only people whose opinions should count right now are our family’s and Teddy’s.”

It was such an un-Beatrice answer that Sam could only blink, speechless.

The wind tugged more insistently at the skirts of their gowns, pulling the pins in their hair. Still neither of them moved.

“I can’t believe you would do this for me,” Sam managed at last.

“I’m doing this for
us.
There’s so much that you and I can’t control about our lives, being who we are, but there’s no reason we should have to make this kind of sacrifice.”

That was when Samantha knew.

“You’re seeing someone else,” she guessed.

The expression on Beatrice’s face—surprise and nervousness at being caught out, but most of all a bright, beaming excitement—was confirmation enough.

“Promise me you won’t say anything until I’ve talked to Dad.”

Sam wanted to take her sister’s hands and squeal in excitement. To think that careful, duty-bound Beatrice had been carrying on a clandestine love affair. “Who is it? Anyone I know?”

Beatrice’s smile faltered. “You’ve met him, yes,” she said slowly.

“Is he
here
tonight?”

When Beatrice nodded, Sam glanced breathlessly back toward the party, wondering which of the young men inside was her sister’s secret boyfriend.

“It’s not going to be easy,” Beatrice said hesitantly. “This guy … he isn’t as eminently suitable as Teddy.”

“Few people are.” Sam tried to make a joke of it.

“He’s a commoner.”

Sam blinked in shock. Now she understood why Beatrice had asked all those weird questions about Aunt Margaret. She wanted to know what would happen if she couldn’t stomach marriage to any of the young men on their parents’ list. If she followed her heart instead.

“I know,” Beatrice went on, reading Sam’s expression. “It’s less than ideal. What can I do?”

“You’ll figure it out. Just … one step at a time. Focus on getting out of your engagement with Teddy first, before you try to get into another one.” Sam tried to sound encouraging.

She had no idea how her sister was going to manage something as utterly unprecedented as marrying a commoner.

Beatrice sighed. “I’m not really looking forward to sharing the news with Dad. Or with the media. I wonder what the protocol is, for breaking off a royal engagement. Has that even
happened
before?”

“Oh, sure!” Sam exclaimed. “In the nineteenth century more weddings were called off than actually took place. It happened all the time when political alliances shifted.”

“Great. I’ll tell Dad we can look back at Edward I’s broken engagement as a precedent.” Beatrice gave a strangled laugh, then fell silent. “The people are going to hate me for a while.”

“Maybe,” Sam conceded. “Or maybe they’ll be proud of you for knowing your own mind, and being brave enough to put a stop to all of this.”

Beatrice nodded, though she didn’t seem convinced.

Sam’s eyes drifted back toward the ballroom. “Does Teddy know yet?”

She remembered Teddy’s remark when he told her that Beatrice had proposed:
You can’t say no to the future queen.
He would never have been able to break their engagement himself—not with the fate of his family, his entire community, on his shoulders.

But if Beatrice called it off, there was nothing the Eatons could say in protest.

Sam’s sister shook her head. The golden light from the party played over her profile, gleaming on one of her earrings, casting the other half of her face in shadow. “You’re the first person I’ve told.”

She might be overstepping, but Sam had to ask. “Could I be the one to tell him?”

“I thought he deserved to hear it from me …,” Beatrice began, then seemed to change her mind at the expression on Sam’s face. She smiled with unmistakable relief. “Come to think of it, maybe you
should
be the one to tell him. Isn’t it the maid of honor’s job to handle wedding complications?” She said it lightly, as if calling off the wedding of the century was nothing more than a garden-variety
complication.

Sam threw her arms around her sister. “Thank you.”

And despite her efforts to avoid Teddy all night, despite the fact that she’d just spent the last ten minutes out here on the terrace, Sam realized that she knew exactly where he was.

He stood near the edge of the dance floor, surrounded by a semicircle of well-wishers. Sam beelined toward him. She felt suddenly like she was floating, like an infectious fizzy joy had lifted her off this planet altogether and she would never come back down.

Teddy glanced up in surprise. He clearly hadn’t expected Sam to seek him out tonight. Neither had she, until now.

“Beatrice wants to see you. I think to take more photos,” she announced loudly. Then she angled her head away from the crowd, so that only he could read her lips.
Coatroom, five minutes,
she mouthed, and sashayed away before he could question her.

He was there in four.

She’d been pacing back and forth in her anxiety—well,
pacing
wasn’t the right word given the confines of the space; she could only take one step in each direction. She kept thinking of the last time she’d been in here with Teddy: at the Queen’s Ball, back when she’d still been the heedless girl who chugged a beer in a coat closet. Back when all she’d known about him was his name and the warmth of his smile.

“I shouldn’t have come.” Teddy stood uncertainly in the doorway.

“What are you, a vampire that needs to be invited over the threshold?” Sam tugged him inside, shutting the door behind him. “It’s okay, I promise.”

“Sam, no.” He retreated a step, his hand already on the doorknob. His code of honor struck Samantha as something rare and fine, a remnant from a previous century.

“Beatrice is going to break off the engagement.”

Sam was alert to his response, so even in the darkness she saw Teddy’s stunned, wide-eyed expression. He let his hand fall slowly from the door. “What?”

“She’s calling off the wedding,” Sam said again.

“Did she tell you why?”

“Because she loves someone else.”

“Ah,” Teddy breathed. “I thought she might.”

“You … what?”

He shifted his weight, causing the lush furs behind him to rustle and sway with the movement. Sam forced herself to stay still, though every atom of her body buzzed with his nearness.

“There were times when Beatrice got a distracted look on her face. And I knew she must be thinking of something else—or some
one
else,” Teddy said slowly, and shrugged. “She never smiled like that about me.”

“Teddy …” If only there were a light in here—she needed to
see
him better, try to figure out what he was thinking.

“Not that I blame her,” Teddy went on, his voice rough and unreadable. “Since I was doing exactly the same thing.”

He was talking about her—wasn’t he?

It took every ounce of Sam’s self-control not to venture closer. “So you aren’t disappointed?”

“Honestly? I feel relieved. And happy for your sister, that she’s found someone she loves. She deserves that.”

The cloakroom was very quiet, as still as the sumptuous furs that hung around them. Sam felt hyperaware of every inch of darkness that separated her from Teddy.

His voice cut through the silence. “What happens next?”

“Beatrice is going to talk to our dad tonight, tell him her decision. Then I’m sure they’ll get Robert involved, figure out the best way to break the news—he’ll probably make you do another interview, or maybe a press conference. And you’ll have to give back all the presents stacked in that room.
And
cancel next weekend’s cake tasting,” Sam added, in that nervous rambling way of hers. “I was really looking forward to that.”