Chapter 21
Chapter Twenty-One
Bryce
The backseat of the SUV felt like a padded cell.
It was all dark windows and stale leather, with the faint, clinical tang of my own cologne clinging to the collar of my jacket like a reminder of the man I was supposed to be.
I’d spent the better part of the day being paraded in and out of meetings at Whitehall, lectured by men who had perfected the art of scolding as if I were a reckless political appointee instead of a man who had dedicated twenty years of his life to the diplomatic service. My head throbbed.
Winfield House rose into view as we cleared the gates, lit like a massive, tiered wedding cake at the edge of Regent’s Park.
Usually, I found comfort in the sight of it—gracious, sprawling, and almost absurd in its stateliness.
It was a piece of America anchored in London soil.
Tonight, however, it looked like a fortress I hadn’t asked for. A gilded cage.
I pulled my phone from my bag, my thumbs feeling heavy and clumsy on the glass. My message to Arthur was intentionally brief.
Not coming to the gallery tonight. Staying at the Residence. I’m drained and would only be horrible company.
The words looked harsher than I meant them to be once they were sent.
They weren’t the truth, either. The truth was that I wanted nothing more than to be with Arthur, feeling his laughter muffled against my neck.
I wanted his reckless, stubborn belief that the world couldn’t keep us apart.
But I was wrung out, brittle as parchment.
I was terrified that if I went to him now, the sharpness of my mood would cut him, too.
The car rolled to a silent halt. The protection officer opened my door with a low, “Sir.” Cameras hadn’t followed us through the gates—thank God for small mercies—but I still ducked my head as if lenses were waiting in the shrubbery.
The air smelled of damp grass and old stone as I stepped out into the chill.
Winfield’s long, elegant windows glowed against the rain-dark sky.
Inside, Mrs. Ashcroft was waiting in the foyer.
She was as unflappable as ever in her navy cardigan and pearls, but the way she smoothed her hands over her skirt betrayed her.
“Mr. Ambassador, how are you holding up?” she asked, her voice soft. “We’ve all seen the headlines. I was… well, we were all worried, sir.”
I gave her what I hoped was a reassuring smile. “I’m fine, Mrs. Ashcroft. Just tired. It’s been a hell of a day.”
“Would you like anything? A light supper, perhaps? The chef kept some of the trout warm.” She hesitated, the tiniest crack appearing in her professional reserve. “Or… a hot bath. To relax and forget the day entirely.”
The suggestion made something tight in my chest finally loosen. “A bath sounds perfect, Mrs. Ashcroft. Thank you.”
She nodded and vanished with quiet, ghostly efficiency, leaving me alone in the high-ceilinged hall.
I didn't go upstairs immediately. Instead, I wandered toward the library, my favorite room in the house.
It was a sea of floor-to-ceiling shelves, Persian rugs, and the faint, noble smell of beeswax polish and old paper.
It was a space designed to impress visiting dignitaries, but to me, it always felt like the lobby of the fanciest hotel in the world.
Winfield House never felt like a home; it felt like part of the costume I was required to wear.
I went to the crystal decanter on the sideboard, pulled out the stopper, and poured a double of the smoothest bourbon we had.
My hand shook as I raised the cut-glass tumbler.
I stared at it for a long beat, smelling the oak and the smoke, then set it down untouched.
I wanted my mind clear tonight, not fogged. I poured a glass of ice water instead.
I sank into a deep leather wingback chair and pressed my palms to my eyes until I saw stars. Never in my life had I felt so utterly split in two.
On one side: Arthur. The first person who had ever made me feel like Bryce instead of The Honorable Bryce Fielding Lewis.
He lit up corners of my soul I hadn’t even known were dark.
On the other side: the unrelenting, cold glare of the world, the screaming headlines, and the brutal certainty that my career—the one thing I’d built with surgical precision and immense sacrifice—was slipping through my fingers because our love had been exposed to the light.
The voice of the President’s Chief of Staff, echoed in my head.
“This isn’t a prep school mixer, Lewis. You’re the face of the United States in the U.K. Act like it, or we’ll find someone who will.”
My phone buzzed on the side table. I grabbed it too quickly, my heart already hammering against my ribs. It was a message from Arthur.
I miss you. I understand you need peace and quiet. Mummy and I spoke at length, and now I want to sleep for the next year. I love you.
Three words. They cracked me wide open. My throat tightened until it physically hurt to swallow. Why was it that the first time I’d truly let myself love someone, the entire damned world seemed to line up in battle formation against us?
My thumbs hovered over the keyboard, then moved with a mind of their own.
I love you, too.
The screen lit up again almost immediately. This time, it wasn’t a text. It was an incoming call. I nearly dropped the phone when I saw the name on the caller ID.
Dad.
He never called. Never. If he needed me, he wrote a formal letter on heavy cream stationery or, more often, sent nothing at all, relying on the tacit agreement that I’d come home to Richmond for Christmas and Easter, exchange polite, hollow words over a roast, and go back to the life he didn't quite approve of but tolerated because it carried the weight of respectability.
If he were calling now, it couldn’t be good.
For a second, I considered letting it ring out. I could pretend I was asleep, or in that bath Mrs. Ashcroft was preparing. But I knew the man. He would keep dialing until I gave in and answered. I pressed the green button, my palm clammy against the screen.
“Dad?” My voice came out raw, thinner than I intended.
There was a long, deliberate pause before he answered. When he spoke, his drawl was measured and soft—that specific, melodic cadence of old Virginia money.
“Bryce, son,” he said. “How’re you holding up?”
The simple, paternal question nearly undid me. I pressed the heel of my hand against my eyes, but it was useless—the tears welled anyway. A tiny, jagged breath slipped out, humiliating in its helplessness.
“Dad, this is… it’s too much. I didn’t sign up for this.” The words tumbled out before I could filter them. “I chose this life to serve my country, not to become a circus act for the tabloids.”
On the other end, I heard him sigh. “Your mother’s been beside herself,” he said finally. “She worries. You know how she is.” His voice softened by a fraction, a rare crack in the granite. “We both do. But you ought to know, Bryce—we support you.”
I closed my eyes and leaned my head back against the cool leather of the chair. Support. It was more than I’d expected from the Lewis patriarch, yet far less than I actually needed. Still, my throat ached with a sudden, sharp gratitude.
Silence stretched between us, long enough for me to hear the faint clink of ice against glass on his end.
I could see him perfectly: in the study in Richmond, the heavy velvet curtains drawn against the night, one hand resting on the arm of his worn chair, the other steady around a tumbler of bourbon.
Then, in that quiet, devastatingly deliberate way of his, he asked, “Is it worth it?”
I blinked, the word echoing in the empty library. “What?”
“This relationship. With the Prince.” He didn’t sneer the word—a Lewis never sneered—but he said it like something exotic and entirely impractical.
I swallowed hard. My father and I had never spoken about my personal life. Not like this. The sudden intimacy of the question felt like being caught in a house where the walls had suddenly vanished. “Dad…”
“Maybe,” he said carefully, “you ought to take a step back. Look at the big picture, son. You’ve worked your whole life to reach this summit.
Being the Ambassador to the Court of St. James’s is no small thing—it’s an honor.
Do you really want to throw that legacy away for this man?
For a situation that is, let’s be frank, entirely inappropriate for a man in your position? ”
The words hit me like icy rain. They weren’t cruel; they were worse. They were rational. They were the kind of Virginia logic that no amount of emotion could easily dent.
It all came rushing out then, the dam finally breaking. My voice cracked, and I said the thing I hadn’t dared say to anyone but Arthur. “I’ve never fallen in love before, Dad. Not really. Not like this. And now I don’t know what the hell to do.”
Silence. I could hear my own heartbeat, a reckless, uneven drum in my ears.
Had I gone too far? My father was a man of restraint, of polished manners and carefully curated words.
Our family name was engraved on historical plaques, not splashed across the Daily Mail.
We had a signature on the Declaration of Independence, for God’s sake.
And here I was, sounding like a crumbling wreck.
When he spoke again, his voice was lower, gravelly. “Bryce, I love you. You know that. But I can’t tell you what to do. You have to make your own choices.”
The ache in my chest swelled until I couldn't breathe.
“If it were me,” he went on, his voice gaining that steady, brick-by-brick weight, “I’d think very carefully about where you are, and where you see yourself in ten years.
You’ve worked too hard to let it all slip through your fingers for a moment of…
intensity. Slow things down. Take a breath.
Think about what you want for yourself. Truly want. ”
His words were heavy, settled into the room like fog. They carried the gravity of a man who only spoke when the world was tilting.
I pressed my palm to my eyes again. I wanted to argue—to tell him that love wasn’t a cold calculation, and that Arthur wasn’t just "that prince" but the person who had finally made the world look like it was in color after forty years of gray.
But I stayed silent. Silence was the only thing keeping me from breaking apart entirely.
A muffled voice rose in the background on his end—my mother, calling him from the hall.
“I’ll be there in a minute, Sarah!” my father called back, his accent sharpening as he raised his voice. Then, back to me, quieter: “I should go.”
I gripped the phone tighter, desperate for just one more minute of his voice, even if it was hurting me. “Dad… I love you.”
“I love you too, Bryce. Get some sleep.”
The line went dead with a soft click.
I stared at the dark screen, seeing the ghosted reflection of my own exhausted face. The house was deathly quiet now, save for the rhythmic tap of rain against the tall windows. Mrs. Ashcroft was no doubt upstairs, the bath waiting. My glass of water sat untouched.
Was Dad right? Was I being a fool to risk my reputation for a man I'd known for a handful of weeks?
I lifted the phone one last time, staring at Arthur’s message until the letters blurred into a single streak of white.
I love you.
And the question lodged itself in my throat, merciless and sharp: What was I truly willing to lose for him?