The moment she’d returned from the New Year’s party at Smuggler’s, Daphne had sent Natasha the tip about Jefferson and Nina. She’d even figured out which dorm Nina was living in, so Natasha could stake it out; all it had taken was a bit of online sleuthing and a phone call to the school. She knew the Daily News couldn’t run a story like that without photographic evidence.
“It wasn’t that difficult,” Daphne replied. “The commenters did most of the hard work for me.”
Daphne knew there was no easier target than a so-called social climber, which was why she’d urged Natasha to take that angle in the article. Predictably, the internet roared in outrage that anyone would set out to ensnare their beloved prince. Some of them went so far as to claim Nina’s parents had planned their daughter’s entire life for this purpose: that Isabella had taken the chamberlain job specifically to throw her daughter in the prince’s path. That girl is like a weed, one commenter wrote. She’s ugly to look at and has a ferocious ability to climb.
Daphne didn’t feel especially sorry about what she’d done. Nina had brought this down on herself by going after the prince, when everyone knew he belonged to Daphne.
There were plenty of other, more anonymous boys in America—millions of them, in fact. Didn’t Nina understand that to date someone as high-profile as Jefferson, she would necessarily become a public figure herself?
If she couldn’t take the pressure, she should have stayed out of the big leagues.
“When are you seeing Jefferson next?” Rebecca cut into her thoughts. “You should find a way to bring up this party.”
Daphne pretended to blow on her nails, her mind racing, but she couldn’t think of an easy way to lie. “I actually haven’t heard from him,” she admitted.
There it was: the reason Daphne felt this vague and caustic discontent. She had done everything in her power, had schemed and blackmailed and knocked out her competition, and still Jefferson hadn’t reached out. What was he waiting for?
Rebecca’s eyes drifted to her phone, where she was scrolling through several gossip blogs. Her eyes widened at something she saw.
“Perhaps this is why.” Her mother’s voice was dangerously quiet as she held out her phone. Daphne reached for it with trepidation.
It was a blurry cell-phone pic of Nina and Jefferson, taken last night at a college party.
“He went to a frat party with her?” Daphne forced herself to breathe, trying not to scream. “Well—after all these articles, no way will the palace let him date her.”
“He isn’t the heir to the throne. He has more leeway than Beatrice.” Her mother frowned. “Daphne, you’ve completely lost control of this situation.”
“I—y-you were just saying I did a good job—” Daphne stammered, but Rebecca’s fierce look quelled her protests.
“That was before I knew what an utter disaster it is.”
Panic flooded Daphne’s synapses. “I don’t know what else to do! I can’t just throw myself at him; I tried that at New Year’s and it didn’t work.”
Rebecca turned toward her daughter with an impassive glare. “There are two people in that relationship. If you aren’t getting anywhere with the prince, then it’s time to try another approach.”
When Daphne understood, she felt almost sick. She couldn’t imagine seeing Nina Gonzalez again. She despised her.
“Daphne, you can’t just sit around waiting for something to happen. Nothing ever gets accomplished that way,” her mother hissed. As if Daphne didn’t already know that.
Rebecca leaned back in her chair, running her hands along the edges of the magazines in her lap to arrange them in a perfect stack. “Haven’t you learned anything from me? Never attack a rival unless you can finish them off completely. Either finish the job, or don’t start it in the first place,” she said quietly.
Daphne nodded, but her thoughts had drifted to Himari, lying in a coma for almost eight months now. Either finish the job, or don’t start it in the first place.
What would happen if Himari ever woke up and told the world—told Jefferson—what Daphne had done?
BEATRICE
Beatrice couldn’t sleep.
In the week since she and Teddy announced their engagement, their schedule had moved at a breakneck pace, crammed with dinners and speeches and charitable visits. Just this morning their entire family had gone to a homeless shelter across town. Beatrice barely had time to get her hair and makeup done afterward, for her engagement photo shoot with Teddy: to take the pictures that would be reproduced on all their wedding merchandise. Pillows and paper dolls, coffee mugs and playing cards, and of course the limited-edition royal engagement stamps: all of it would be plastered with their faces. It felt a bit ridiculous, but Beatrice knew better than to refuse any of the licensing requests, not when the latest estimates projected that her wedding would boost the economy by over three hundred million dollars.
Honestly, she was grateful for the busy schedule. She felt like one of those sharks that needed to keep swimming in order to stay alive. As long as she was in a meeting with members of Congress, or discussing the wedding, or even just smiling at someone, she could momentarily forget that her dad was sick—that her time as queen was coming so much sooner than anyone would have imagined.