Just as he’d done in the cabin, Connor gathered her in his arms and carried her, still shaking uncontrollably, to his bed.
Beatrice buried her face in his chest and sobbed. She couldn’t bear the thought of letting him go. Not now, not ever. She clutched tighter at him, her hands digging so fiercely into his back that she was probably leaving scratch marks, as if she could forcibly anchor them both here, in this moment. Connor said nothing, his hand stroking the dark sheet of her hair.
She couldn’t bring herself to share the whole truth with Connor, but maybe she could tell him part.
“My dad has lung cancer,” she whispered into his shirt, now wet with her tears. “He doesn’t have much time left.”
Connor pulled back a few inches and gazed into her red-rimmed eyes. His face was blazing with love. But no matter how adamantly he Guarded her, some threats weren’t physical. Some things he couldn’t protect her from.
“Oh, Bee,” he said softly. “I’m so sorry.”
There were no other words, but Beatrice didn’t need them. She stayed folded in the safety of Connor’s embrace, letting the tears flood through her. She thought she might shatter from how nice it was, to simply be held by someone who loved her.
Out there in the rest of her life, Beatrice had to be unwaveringly strong. But here, for just a little while, she could set down her burden, could lean on Connor’s shoulders and close her eyes.
Even after her sobs subsided, she kept her arms wrapped around him, relishing his quiet strength.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered.
Her face was still pressed against Connor’s chest, so that she felt his answer rumble softly through her. “You have nothing to be sorry for.”
She leaned back and wiped at her eyes. Her face was streaked with tears. “I came in here to seduce you,” she said, with a strangled laugh, “and then I cried all over you instead.”
“Let’s rain-check the seduction, please,” Connor replied, and then his tone grew more serious. “You know that you can cry all over me anytime. I’ll always be here for you, Bee.”
Beatrice nodded, though she wasn’t quite certain that was true. Not once Connor found out that she and Teddy were engaged.
She looked at him for a long, searing moment, trying to fix his face in her mind, as if she were pressing her father’s Great Seal into a medallion of wax. And then she leaned in to kiss him.
She focused on the feel of his mouth, the roughness of his cheek against hers, committing every last detail to memory—so that someday, when she was trapped in a political marriage, she could look back on this moment, and remember what it felt like to be truly loved.
SAMANTHA
Sam trailed along the downstairs hallway, lost in thought. She was debating whether to head over to King’s College and try to see Nina.
Sam hadn’t been able to get hold of her friend since the news about Nina and Jeff broke. She’d been calling and texting nonstop, but the only response Nina had sent to all her messages was Thanks for checking in, but I’m not ready to see anyone.
I’m not anyone, Sam had wanted to reply. I’m your best friend. Or at least she’d thought she was.
Best friends didn’t keep secrets this big from each other, did they?
Sam had to admit, she’d felt an initial twinge of weirdness at the knowledge that her twin brother and her friend had been hooking up for weeks without telling her—had been sneaking around the entire trip to Telluride, right under Sam’s nose. It was a little hurtful that she’d found out about their relationship from the tabloids, the same as the rest of America.
But that initial flush of discomfort was followed by an overwhelming wave of protectiveness. The tone of these articles, not to mention the comments, was absolutely vile. Sam wanted to publish a rebuttal, or better yet go on television and tell everyone what Nina was really like—but the palace’s press secretary had put a gag order on her and Jeff the moment the story broke. The best Sam had been able to do was post a flurry of comments in support of Nina, under a series of aliases.
She’d tried to get some answers from Jeff, but he just had a lost-puppy look about the whole thing. Apparently Nina wasn’t answering his calls, either.
The first morning after the articles came out, when she hadn’t heard anything from Nina beyond that single text, Sam had asked her protection officer to drive her to the Gonzalezes’ house. She’d elbowed past the scattered paparazzi to ring the doorbell. When Nina’s mamá answered, she took one look at Sam and shook her head. “She went back to campus.”
Sam nodded. “Thanks. I’ll head over now.”
“I don’t know if that’s the best idea,” Isabella said uncertainly. “Having you there might only make things worse.” She cut her eyes toward the paparazzi, who were still gathered on the front lawn like scavengers surrounding their prey.
“Oh—all right. Will you tell her I came by?” Sam had shoved her hands into the pockets of her down-filled jacket.
That was three days ago, and Sam still hadn’t heard anything from Nina.
She paused now at the entrance to the Grand Gallery, a long room lined with portraits of all the American kings, in order. At this end stood the massive painting of George I after the Battle of Yorktown, smiling benevolently, one hand on the hilt of his sword. Next came his nephew George II, a bit pasty and narrow-eyed for Sam’s taste, and then his son King Theodore: the one who died as a child, whom teddy bears—and probably Teddy Eaton—were named for. And so on, all the way through the official regnal portrait of Samantha’s own father, George IV.