by Anna Bloom
I spluttered my wine everywhere as it shot up my nose and dribbled out onto the tablecloth. “A what?”
“That was Henry’s grandmother’s if I recall correctly. A heart and a crown. Story is that the King’s consort gave it to her as a promise of his heart.”
My mouth went dry and I carefully placed my glass down on the table. I held out my wrist. “Help me take it off. I shouldn’t be wearing it.”
“Nonsense. My son gave it to you, and I know he wouldn’t have done it lightly.”
My mind reeled. We’d only been together one night, that wonderful day in Guildford followed by the evening where I’d stolen away to his warehouse unable to stay away from him any longer.
My heart ached so heavy in my chest, I had to force myself to sit up straight.
The queen cleared her throat. “So, Leia, do you have any idea what you would like to do with your time?”
I only had one answer and it shot out of me automatically. “I want to help people. It’s the only thing I’ve ever wanted to do.”
Isabella eyed me curiously. “Is it true you lived at a homeless shelter?”
“Bella!” The Queen’s cheeks coloured but I offered them both a wry smile.
“I’m guessing your background checks have already dug up all the dirt I have.”
Margaret Beaufort had the grace to drop her gaze. “It’s a necessity and not one we take lightly.”
I nodded. Somehow having the palace invade my privacy wasn’t on the same level as having the press digging. I picked up my glass and tried that dainty sip thing again.
“The night my mother died, I didn’t know where to go. I’d sat in the police station for hours. No one in the flats wanted anything to do with me. My mother had hardly been popular and those she had been popular with weren’t people I wanted to go to.”
“It must have been awful.”
I shrugged. “It sounds terrible, but she’d never been a mother to me. Not really. I’d survived purely by luck. The week before I’d discovered I was pregnant, and it had, well.” I trailed off. I couldn’t articulate the sheer fear that had filled me. The knowledge that I was going to be just like her, that there was a good chance I’d fail someone just like she’d failed me.
“And your father?”
I chuckled, almost hysterical. “I’m guessing you haven’t found out who he is either.”
“No.” The Queen looked at me boldly.
“You won’t. I don’t think she ever knew. He was probably some guy who helped feed her habit.”
Silence hung around the table.
“I’d say you know the people you want to help.” The Queen’s eyes glittered with water.
“How, if I never get to go anywhere?”
“No one is keeping you prisoner. All we ask is that you are safe.”
“So I can go to work?”
She laughed and shook her head. “Probably not every day, not unless you want to bring Bermondsey to a standstill.”
“I’m not Oliver.” I frowned.
“No. You are far more interesting. You are the woman who captured a prince’s heart. One of the people, a true-life people’s princess. You are the one who can make that into a reality.”
I nodded, somehow she managed to make it sound easy, like I could actually do it.
On a whim, I turned to Isabella who had the bottle of wine in her hand in the process of filling her glass to the brim. “I don’t suppose you fancy coming to work with me, do you?”
She glanced up, surprise across her face. “Me?”
“Sure.” I shrugged.
I didn’t know what filled Isabella Beaufort’s days, apparently work wasn’t it.
“Okay.” She gave me a smile and straightened her back.
“You know, Leia. It’s not just Bright Futures, that needs you.” The Queen raised her own glass.
“No?”
“Of course not. There are hundreds of charities out there. All of them desperate for exposure, just the way you once were before Oliver turned up.”
I flushed as I remembered the way I’d behaved on our first meeting.
Isabella laughed loudly. “See, Mum. He did say she was the rudest woman he’d ever met.”
The Queen chuckled and shook her head. “If we’d known all these years he just needed a woman to be rude to him, it would have made things so much simpler.”
I slunk down in my chair, but the Queen shot me a sharp glance. “A princess never slouches.”
I sat up ramrod straight unwilling to be the one to point out I wasn’t a princess. I was just a girl from Hackney having lunch with the Queen.
At six in the evening, I lurched back towards the apartment. I’d never remember a single thing I’d been told, but two things had been totally clear: the King’s say was utterly final, and don’t fuck up. Those were my two take away lessons.
I had staff now.
And high-heeled shoes—which I’d never wear.
And I needed to throw away all my jeans and only be seen in skirts that didn’t go above my knee.
Oh and the King’s word was final… did I mention that already? Assuming he actually ever spoke to me.
I let myself into the apartment, wondering for a moment why nothing seemed to have keys. The doors were just unlocked; but then I guess the soldiers stood on guard at all the external doors put off would-be burglars.
“I’m home, my feet are killing me, and I think my face might be frozen like the Joker’s for all eternity.”
I lurched in and then drew to a halt.
Oliver sat at the kitchen counter, looking utterly fucking divine in a navy lamb’s wool jumper and dark jeans. His dark head was propped in his hand as he studied a notebook, a biro poking out between his lips.
He should be illegal. I’d put him in a tower like Rapunzel’s if I could. That way I’d be the only one to be able to see him look like that. Just call me the number one royal stalker.
“You came back.” He swept a searching glance over me. “Nice hair.”
I lifted my wrist. “Royal heirloom?”
His lips quirked and my heart began to race in my chest, booming my blood through my veins. “Where’s Daisy?”
“Asleep. She fought it, but I thought it best. Dad had her in the stables showing her mucking out.”
“Your dad?”
“He’s quite taken with her I think.”
For a moment I didn’t want to think about the King. Or the to-do list of engagements I’d been given—people I needed to talk to while they eased me into official life—or the fact that tomorrow I’d have a lady-in-waiting, although what she was waiting for I couldn’t tell you. Or the fact that next week I’d be seen out in public with the royal family but none of them seemed to see the issue with the fact the press still scandalised the charity worker who dared to date a prince.
I just wanted him.
Only him.
In the sort of way that if I didn’t touch him there and then life might just cease to exist.
I stalked forward, sliding my hands into the dark strands of his hair. His lips smiled against my mouth. “Is this your apology?”
“You can call it what you like.” I rushed my words, my mouth fastening to his, breathless and hungry. I tugged on his arm, silently asking him to follow me to the bedroom with the giant four poster I’d only slept on once but was now considered mine.
With electricity crackling in the air around us, he followed me down the hall to our room. I pushed on the door and pulled him in after me.
Inside, I pushed on the door. He watched me with a hooded gaze, and filling myself with the strength of my desire, I pushed through my reservations. Holding his stare, I worked the fly on his jeans, running my palm against the length of his hard-on.
Then without over thinking, I sank to my knees, my hands levering on the denim and pulling it over his hips. If I’d looked up it would have been comical to see the future king with his jumper still on and his large erection bouncing in my
face. But I didn’t want to laugh. Didn’t want to do anything other than own him.
Reaching out, I grasped him firmly; then leaning forward, I flicked the tip of his hard-on with my tongue, relishing the soft sensation of his skin. “Leia,” he whispered, and it empowered me, made me take him in, drawing him into my mouth, savouring the feel of his shuddering against my touch.
Settling onto my knees I slid him in and out of my lips, pulling tight, flattening my tongue to make more room for him.
“Fuck.” He grabbed my head, controlling my movements as he tied his fingers into the roots of my hair.
A deep and dark pain shot between my legs as the power that I held rushed through me. He might be a prince, the future King of England, but right in the moment he was mine, brought to a shuddering standstill with my mouth, my actions.
He pulled me back and with his hands still in my hair, he lifted me to my feet. He turned me quick, pushing me against the bedroom door, kicking his feet out of his jeans so he could push one knee between my legs. I groaned. Desperate for him, it almost consumed me. His teeth nipped at my throat; his mouth hot as his fingers ripped off my shirt. The buttons pinged everywhere, but he didn’t stop to evaluate the damage. It just made me hotter, painfully so. My bra went next. When I was naked from the waist up, my body caught in some painful place between the heat of desire and the cool air of the room, he sank to his own knees. I pressed back into the cold wood of the bedroom door, my legs trembling as he yanked down my jeans and hooked my knickers to the side, fitting his mouth between my legs. Using his hands, he spread my legs further apart, and then his tongue stroked deep within me, running backwards and forwards. I groaned loudly and clamped my hand over my mouth. His tongue swept relentlessly across my core, and I shivered and trembled against the future king’s face.
Finally when I whimpered, my fingers grasping his hair, my legs almost incapable of holding my weight, he pulled back, straightened and then lifted me up, almost throwing me onto the bed as he climbed on after me, pulled my legs wide apart and then thrust himself deep inside.
I cried out, a wild tide of desire almost crashing off me the moment he slid inside.
“Fuck, I love you.” His fingers pulled at my hair, tilting my mouth to his.
I couldn’t answer though. My eyes were screwed shut, and I clung onto his shoulders as I swept out on a tide of soul shattering bliss.
A bang woke me and I sat up with a start. Ollie slept next to me and without thinking, I slipped out of bed.
Tiptoeing through the apartment, I sought out what could have made the noise but then gave a little shriek as a bang landed from the other side of the main door again.
A voice whispered from the other side. “For God’s sake, Bella, what are you doing out here?”
Bella? I walked for the door and opened it a crack, peeping through, finding John and Isabella the other side. Bella seemed to be wearing pyjamas—she obviously didn’t adhere to that rule.
“What are you doing?” I hissed, glancing back into the apartment.
“Getting some air.” Bella waved her hand at me and then fell sideways into John’s arms.
“Shit, is she drunk?”
He shrugged, his face guarded. “I heard her clatter down the stairs. She moves fast.”
“Do you want to bring her in? I could make her a coffee.”
I didn’t really want John in the apartment. The bloke was a sleazeball, albeit a royal one, but I couldn’t help but offer. “Ollie’s asleep.”
He smirked. “Funny that you call him Ollie. No one else would have dared.”
“It was Daisy who started it.”
He nodded at me, speculation swirling in his gaze.
“Shall I go and wake him up?” I asked. Bella seemed asleep. I wanted to reach out and touch her, to feel her skin. My alarm bells jingled but John’s face told me it wasn’t my place.
He snorted with derision. “He won’t help.”
“What are you talking about? Of course he will. I’ll just go and grab him; it will be easier with both of you.” I motioned to the dead weight Bella pressed into his side.
“Oh, Leia. You are so bloody innocent. I can almost smell it coming off you.”
“I can assure you I’m not.” I pulled in the edge of my pyjama top realising I stood in front of the middle prince in not much more than a pair of knickers and a vest top.
He gave a small shake of his head and then hoisted Bella up, so he held most of her weight.
“What was she doing here anyway?” I asked as he managed to turn them both back to the pathway.
“She just misses her brother.” He shrugged and I watched them walk away.
Well that was weird.
I went back into the apartment and slipped back into bed unable to stop myself from wondering just what was going on around here.
Eleven
“Does this look okay?” I turned and took in the view of the dress in the full-length mirror.
“I don’t remember there ever being a time when you gave a shit about such things.” Molly frowned but I stuck my tongue out at her.
“I’ve never gone anywhere where the whole word will be watching and waiting for me to fall over.”
Emilia stepped back and looked at her creation. “No one is waiting for you to fall over, Leia.”
I smiled at her. The dress she’d designed, which the palace seamstress had run up for me, was beautiful. A pale rose-gold it shimmered when I moved. Demure and discreet it gathered in pleated folds from my waist while my back and arms were covered in a see-through gossamer.
Her sentiment was misplaced through. There were a whole lot of people waiting for me to fall over. It had been a week since we’d arrived here, flown back from Cornwall, but I could sense the predators waiting for me to fall.
Marcus bemoaned the headlines daily: Royal lover kept in comfort at the public’s expense had been yesterday’s.
The points remained low.
The palace at Oliver’s request had confirmed a ‘royal acknowledgment of Prince’s committed romance’ but my move into the palace with Daisy, which had supposed to remain a discreet secret until more than a week had passed, hadn’t remained secret for long. News got out it seemed, no matter where you lived.
Oliver had kept the papers away from Daisy and me, but Molly had no qualms about keeping things real. Public outrage at frivolous royals had been the one to sting. Oliver couldn’t be less flashy if he tried. Sure he had the cars, the security team; but we didn’t even have our own cook for our apartment and so far I’d given Vanessa Croft, my supposed lady-in-waiting, very little to do. Honestly, I didn’t want her, it seemed ridiculous, but apparently having staff to help with one’s needs when one lived in a palace was the rule. But then I hadn’t left the palace yet… yet…
Daisy looked up at me from Molly’s lap. Her dress was black velvet and utterly adorable. Tonight, the three of us would go to the Royal Variety Performance as a family.
So long as no one saw me puking with nerves into my handbag it should all be okay.
Marcus had made it clear we couldn’t hide anymore. It was Oliver’s duty to be seen to do the right thing.
Freya had made it more than clear that she wouldn’t allow her boss’ point score to drop any lower than it had.
Oliver for all the world didn’t seem to give a shit about points. And that’s why I loved him.
“Just remember what Norma said, Mummy. Smile, shake hands, and then move on.”
I glanced at Molly and caught her biting her lip. “Don’t laugh.”
“Sorry.” She did try—and failed—not to laugh. “Just don’t fall over, Leia. Please.”
“Why can’t you come with me?”
“Because I’m not a person of royal personage.” She mimicked Norma’s tone.
“John’s single.” I pointed out.
“John’s an ars—”
“Whoa, stop!” I gestured at Daisy and Molly clamped her words down.
“You don’t need me anyway. Look at you, you’ve got underwear that fits, you walk around in posh boots and smart skirts. It’s amazing what can change in a week.”
I glared at her and made her chuckle. If there was one thing in the last seven days I was truly thankful for, it was being able to bring Molly into my new life with me. I missed everyone else at the office, I missed seeing Nana every day, although she still came most afternoons just out of force of habit from always picking up the school run, but it wasn’t quite the same. Time had no meaning in the palace; it was as I thought, life had become a moment of Sundays.
It wouldn’t last though. Daisy started her new school on Monday. I don’t know who was more nervous.
“Are you ready? The cars waiting.” Oliver popped his head around the edge of the door. “Oh, wow. Leia.”
I grinned and gave him a twirl. “It’s amazing isn’t it?”
He nodded, his Adam’s apple bobbing for a moment. “Come, I’ve got someplace I need to take you before we leave.”
Molly snorted and I shot her a glare. “You are so childish.”
Oliver laughed and Molly had the grace to blush. “Thank you, Molly, but actually I’ve noticed Leia’s outfit needs a little embellishment.”
Emilia opened her mouth to protest but Oliver shot her a wink, which was enough to steal the words from most women’s mouths.
He held his arm out for me. “Leia, if you please.”
I was actually going to do this. I was going to go outside, officially his girlfriend. The papers were going to shred me alive.
Molly, maybe sensing my hesitation, lifted Daisy off her lap and stood, coming up to my side. “Leia, I know I’m your biggest piss-taker, but honestly, you’ve got this.”
“Of course she has. I’m not going to let her fall.” Oliver sounded so sure, so positive that this could only turn out one way, that for a moment I almost stopped wanting to hurl into the nearest wastepaper bin.
I walked to him on wobbly legs and he turned to Daisy. “Are you okay to stay with Molly for a moment?”
She pouted but nodded.
His fingers slipped into mine, so right, so homely, and I let him lead me out of the dressing room and through the apartment. Outside, the cool night air rushed against my skin and he handed me the sheer, rose-gold organza wrap that went with the dress.
