Chapter 9
ALEX
Alexandra had always loved Balmoral in winter.
It wasn’t something she said aloud much—loving anything publicly came with risks—but privately, secretly, it was her favourite place in the world.
A place the monarchy hadn’t flattened or polished.
A place where her family had laughed and bickered and played cards by candlelight.
A place where the walls weren’t full of cameras or courtiers. A place where she could breathe.
And right now she desperately needed to breathe.
The castle behind her still hummed with noise: Vic shouting about meal contingency plans, children thundering through hallways, staff rushing to re-anchor the top-heavy Christmas tree. The air inside had grown thick with the kind of frantic tension unique to royal holidays.
She tugged her scarf higher and stepped out into the cold.
Snow drifted down in big, lazy flakes, clinging to her lashes. The sky was a hazy grey, the light soft, muted. The forest that bordered the grounds had turned into a cathedral of white. Everything was quiet.
Or it should have been quiet.
But the moment Alex closed the door behind her, six shapes erupted from the nearby kennels—like small, furry missiles launched by eager enthusiasm.
“Hello, my darlings,” Alex said as spaniels and labradors collided with her legs.
There were three black labradors, two golden spaniels, and one very excitable cocker with a single floppy ear who immediately tried to climb up her coat.
“Yes, Juno, I see you,” Alex said, laughing despite the weight in her chest. “I see all of you.”
“Thought you might need backup,” Erin’s voice floated from the doorway.
Alex turned.
Erin stepped out, closing the heavy door behind her. She’d thrown on her thick navy coat—the one that hugged her shoulders in unfairly flattering ways—and her dark hair was stuffed under a knit hat that didn’t match anything but somehow suited her perfectly.
“You brought the dogs,” Alex said.
“Technically,” Erin said, “the dogs brought themselves. They saw you and staged a breakout.”
As if in agreement, the cocker spaniel barked enthusiastically and began digging a hole in the snow for no apparent reason except joy.
Alex smiled.
But the smile slipped at the edges. Erin saw it immediately.
“I thought,” Erin said gently, stepping closer, “that maybe you needed some air.”
Alex nodded. “I needed something.”
Erin offered her arm.
Alex took it.
The contact—simple, warm through layers of wool—hit Alex with unexpected force. She hadn’t realised how much she’d been craving it. Touch. Proximity. The heat of Erin’s body beside hers.
They began walking slowly, the little pack of dogs bounding ahead, kicking up snow, weaving in wild loops.
For a while they said nothing.
Snow crunched under their boots. Bran trotted loyally at Erin’s side like a shadow.
Juno periodically returned to deposit sticks at Alex’s feet.
Alex missed Audrey, their Great Dane- but her health hadn’t been the best since she was getting a bit older and they had deemed it too far for her to travel to Scotland for the holiday. Alex loved Balmoral’s resident dogs.
The cold nipped Alex’s cheeks, sharpened her breath.
“You all right?” Erin asked quietly.
Alex exhaled. “I don’t know.”
Erin didn’t push. She just walked beside her, letting the silence stretch comfortably.
Alex always forgot how easy it was to be quiet with Erin. No one else made quiet feel safe.
After several minutes, Alex spoke. “It wasn’t just the tree,” she said. “Or the turkeys. Or Vic’s nervous breakdown.”
“No,” Erin said. “I didn’t think it was.”
Alex nudged a bit of snow with the toe of her boot. “It’s everything. All at once. The storm. The expectations. The fact that we haven’t had a moment alone in… how long?”
“Months,” Erin said softly. “Properly alone? Months.”
Alex swallowed. “I hate that.”
Erin’s breath clouded in the air. “I hate it too.”
They reached one of the small bridges that crossed a narrow stream—its surface partially frozen, thin sheets of ice cracking at the edges where the water still moved beneath.
Alex paused at the railing, resting her gloved hands on the cold stone. The dogs scattered, sniffing at rabbit burrows.
Erin stood beside her.
“I feel…” Alex hesitated, searching for the word. “Disconnected.”
Erin’s jaw tightened. “From me?”
Alex’s voice went small. “No. Not from you. From… us. From the version of us that isn’t constantly putting out fires.”
Erin looked out at the snow-laden branches beyond the stream. “I know.”
“I miss you,” Alex whispered. “Not just the sex. Though I miss that more than is remotely dignified.”
Erin huffed a laugh. “Same.”
Alex turned to her, watching her breath fog the air, watching the way she stared at the horizon with that worried, guarded look she’d been wearing too often lately.
“You’re distant,” Alex said.
Erin stiffened. “I’m trying not to be.”
“I know,” Alex said gently. “But you are.”
Erin’s eyes flickered down to the ground. The dogs padded back, sensed the shift in mood, and flopped down nearby, forming a loose half-circle around them like a canine honour guard.
Alex reached out, brushing the back of Erin’s glove with her fingertips. “Talk to me.”
Erin exhaled slowly, the breath shaky.
“I’m tired,” she said finally. “More tired than I’ve ever been.
I feel stretched in every direction at once—bodyguard instincts firing every time a door slams since the threats in the summer, parental instincts firing every time the kids sneeze, and every moment I look at you—” She broke off, jaw clenching.
“Every moment?” Alex prompted softly.
Erin nodded once. “Every moment I look at you, I want to touch you. Properly. Hold you. And it’s like there’s always someone watching or calling or knocking or falling out of a tree.”
Alex snorted, then sobered. “Erin…”
“I don’t like this distance,” Erin said. “It feels like failing.”
Alex felt her throat tighten. “You have never failed me.”
“Sometimes it feels like all I do is fail,” Erin murmured. “I can’t keep the kids from running riot, I can’t keep Vic from panicking, I can’t even protect you from everything—”
“You did protect me,” Alex said. “You always protect me.”
Erin shook her head. “That’s my job.”
“And your love,” Alex said quietly. “These days it is your love, not your job.”
Erin looked down at her gloved hands on the railing, snow gathering on the sleeves of her coat. “I’m scared,” she admitted.
Alex’s breath caught. “Of what?”
“That this is what our life is now,” Erin said. “Constant crisis. Desperately trying to be the best parents we can be. No time for each other. No intimacy. Passing each other like colleagues with different shifts. I’m scared that wanting you… hurts too much.”
Alex felt something fracture inside her. A small sound escaped her—half gasp, half sob—and Erin’s head snapped up, alarmed.
“No, love, I didn’t mean—”
Alex stepped closer. “You’re allowed to say it. I feel it too.”
Erin stared at her, snowflakes melting on her lashes.
“I miss our bed,” Alex whispered.
Erin swallowed. “I miss your hands.”
“I miss your mouth,” Alex said, voice trembling.
Erin looked wrecked. “Alex…”
Alex slipped one gloved hand up to Erin’s cheek, cupping it gently. Erin leaned into the touch like she’d been starved for it.
“Do you still want me?” Alex asked, hating how vulnerable her voice sounded.
Erin looked shocked. Then heartbroken. “Alex—God—yes. Of course I want you. It aches. I want you so badly it feels like a wire pulled tight inside me.”
Alex let out a shaky breath. “Then we find our way back.”
Erin’s eyes flickered with doubt. “How? Where?”
“Here,” Alex whispered. “Now.”
Before Erin could respond, Alex leaned in on her tiptoes—very slowly, giving her time to pull away, to say no, to remain the professional Erin Kennedy who always prioritised safety and propriety and duty.
Erin didn’t move.
Not away. Not even a millimetre.
Snowflakes drifted around them. The dogs sat silently, as though sensing something reverent unfolding. Even the wind stilled.
Alex’s lips brushed Erin’s cheek first—a soft, tentative touch.
Erin exhaled shakily.
Alex kissed her there again, just below her cheekbone, then lower, near the corner of her mouth, tasting snow and warm skin.
“Alex,” Erin whispered.
Alex’s hand slipped from Erin’s cheek to her jaw, thumb stroking lightly.
“Tell me to stop,” Alex murmured.
“I don’t want you to stop,” Erin breathed.
So Alex kissed her.
It was slow, deep, warm despite the cold. Erin’s mouth opened under hers with a soft, needy sound that Alex felt all the way to her bones.
God, she had missed this. Missed the taste of her. Missed the way Erin kissed like she was trying to memorise something she feared losing. Missed the strength in Erin’s hands as they gripped Alex’s coat, drawing her in.
The kiss burned hot in the frozen air—months of longing compressed into a single moment.
When they finally broke apart, foreheads touching, both breathing hard, Alex felt like something inside her had reconnected.
Erin’s voice was barely a whisper. “I needed that.”
“Me too,” Alex said. “More than you’ll ever know.”
Erin laughed softly, breath fogging the air between them. “This is ridiculous.”
“What part?” Alex asked.
“All of it,” Erin said. “The snow. The dogs. The emotional monologue by a river. This feels like a BBC Christmas special.”
“Don’t ruin it,” Alex murmured, but she was smiling.
Erin pressed another small kiss to Alex’s mouth. “I won’t.”
They stayed like that for a long moment—holding each other in the falling snow, the dogs resting quietly around them, the castle a distant silhouette behind the trees.
Alex felt warmth return to her chest—slow, fragile, but real.
A flicker of hope.
“What now?” Erin asked softly.
Alex took her hand. “Now we walk back. Slowly. And when we go inside… we fight for our minutes. Together. Every chance we get.”
Erin nodded, squeezing her hand. “Together.”
They turned back toward the castle, the dogs bounding in joyful circles around them.
For the first time since arriving, Alex felt like she could breathe again.
Like snow had stopped settling on her shoulders.
Like the weight she carried—Queen, mother, partner, symbol, caretaker—felt a little lighter because Erin was walking beside her, not behind her.
The storm hadn’t ended.
The chaos hadn’t settled.
But something inside her had shifted.
Erin had kissed her back in the snow.
And it felt like the beginning of finding their way home to each other again.