Epilogue
DELPHINE
ONE MONTH LATER
The palace has been chaotic for weeks. Wedding planners have taken over the north wing. Fabric swatches cover every surface in the main sitting room. I watched my mother discuss the differences between ivory versus champagne for forty-five minutes. They looked the same to me.
I slip down the corridor toward Louis’s quarters, dodging a woman carrying an armful of flower arrangements and nearly colliding with a man wheeling a rack of suit options. The royal wedding is a month away, but you’d think it was happening tomorrow based on the panic around here.
Don’t get me wrong; I’m not complaining. When it’s busy like this, no one pays attention to me, and I tend to get away with a lot more.
I find Louis in his study, standing at the window with a glass of scotch in his hand.
He’s watching the gardens, where Addison is walking with our mother.
They’re arm in arm, which still seems surreal.
Two months ago, my mother had her dragged out of the palace and banned from Montclaire.
Now they’re actually friends, and they get along quite well.
“Looks like everyone is in love with Addison,” I say from the doorway.
Louis turns and smiles when he sees me. “Oh, they go back and forth about everything, but they enjoy it.”
“Two stubborn women who refuse to back down. I can’t imagine why there’d be conflict.”
He laughs and crosses to the bar cart, pouring me a glass of wine without asking. He knows what I drink because he caught me plenty of times in my teenage years sneaking bottles from the cellar. He never told on me.
“What’s on your mind?” he asks, handing me the glass.
“I’m hiding from the wedding planning, the dress fittings, the guest-list debates, and the seating-chart drama.” I take a long sip of wine. “Mother tried to involve me in the napkin discussion this morning. Napkins, Louis. There are seventeen options. I don’t give a fuck about it.”
“Only seventeen? She must’ve narrowed it down from the last time we spoke. There were well over fifty.”
I groan, sinking into the leather chair by the fireplace before tucking my legs beneath me.
This study has always been my favorite room in the palace.
It smells like old books and leather with the faint trace of our grandfather’s pipe tobacco, even though no one has smoked in decades.
When I was a teenager, I used to hide in here while Father worked.
I was reading erotica and listening to conversations I definitely shouldn’t have been hearing.
That’s how I learned most of the family secrets. It was never through official channels, but by quietly observing. Almost everyone forgot I was in the room because I was so much younger than my brother, and most people were focused on him.
“How’s Father?” I ask.
“Good. The doctors confirmed last week that he’s officially in remission.” Louis settles into the chair across from me, smiling. “He’s going to be okay.”
“I’m happy that you were able to convince him,” I say.
“It wasn’t me. It was Addison.”
“I’m grateful that you joined me in New York at that gallery. I think about how different life would’ve been had you waited in the car. The opportunity was narrow and almost missed.”
“Serendipity,” Louis says. It’s the only way anyone can explain what happened between them. “So, you still snitching and telling Dad everything?”
I roll my eyes at him. “I didn’t tell him everything. He asked the right questions, and I couldn’t lie.”
And he did what he always does. He watched and waited, allowing Louis to fight his own battles.
“I need to talk to you about something,” I finally say, slamming down the rest of the wine.
Louis raises an eyebrow. “That sounds serious.”
“It’s not—well, not really.” I set my glass down and sit up straighter. “I want to move to New York for a little while before I’m needed here for royal duties.”
The silence stretches between us. Louis doesn’t look surprised or concerned. He studies me with that intensity he’s developed over the past few months, the one that makes him seem older than he is.
“When?” he asks.
“After the holidays.”
“For how long?”
“A year, maybe less, maybe more.” I take a breath.
“I want to get away and fly under the radar. I’ve been thinking about starting a blog.
Maybe some content creation about living in New York as an undercover princess.
But nothing that screams princess in hiding, just me figuring things out and documenting it from my lens.
” I pull at a loose thread on the arm of my shirt.
“Everyone is happy right now. You and Addison are planning this massive royal wedding. Father is in remission. Mother is so distracted by the wedding that she barely notices what I’m doing. It feels like the right time.”
Louis leans forward and grins. “Are you not happy here?” he asks.
“I am, but everyone has their thing,” I say.
“You have Addison, the crown, your entire life mapped out in front of you. Mother has her causes and her committees. Father has his recovery, his legacy, his power. And I have …” I trail off because the truth is, I don’t know what I have.
I’ve spent my whole life being the backup plan, the wild card, the princess who couldn’t be controlled.
But I’ve never figured out what I actually want.
I shrug. “That’s the problem. I don’t have anything. ”
“You need to go find yourself,” Louis says.
“You’re not going to try to talk me out of it?”
“Why would I do that? I love New York. It’s the second place on earth I’d live.”
“But—”
“Delphine,” he cuts me off, his voice gentle, “you’ve spent your entire life being the rebellious princess who causes problems.” He shakes his head. “You need to figure out who you are outside of these walls. That’s not running away. That’s growing up.”
I blink hard because my emotions are starting to bubble under the surface.
“I’ll need to ask Father for permission,” I say. “I’m nervous.”
“He’ll say yes.”
“You don’t know that.”
“I don’t. But I don’t see why he’d have any issues.” Louis smiles. “Last week, he shared with me that he could see how restless you were. Father had his year abroad before he took on royal duties. He’ll have no issues allowing you to have yours.”
The door opens, and Addison enters; her hair is windswept from the garden walk. She stops when she sees us, looking between Louis and me with curiosity.
“Am I interrupting? I can come back,” she says.
“No, no. Please join us.”
“Delphine wants to move to New York,” Louis says.
Addison’s face lights up. “Really? When?”
“After the wedding and holidays,” I explain. “New year, new me energy.”
She crosses the room and perches on the arm of Louis’s chair; her hand finds his shoulder. “You can live in my loft. It’s furnished and sitting empty. Plenty of space, great light, tons of room.”
“I appreciate the offer, but your place is known to the paparazzi. Not exactly the greatest when I want to try to fly under the radar while I’m there.”
Addison nods. “Fair point. They’d spot you too easily there.”
“You should go ask Father right now. He’s in a great mood today,” Louis says.
“Really?” I stand. “I should before I lose my nerve.”
“He’s in his study,” Addison says. “He’s been there all afternoon, pretending to read while actually staring out the window.”
“That’s his thinking pose,” Louis tells her.
I roll my eyes, but my heart is pounding as I move toward the door. This is it. The conversation I’ve been rehearsing in my head for weeks. The moment I ask for permission to become someone other than Princess Delphine of Montclaire.
“Delphine,” Louis says.
I turn back. My brother is watching me with pride.
“Your happiness always has my support,” he says. “Whatever happens in there, whatever he says, I have your back. And I want you to have fun and figure out who you are. But promise me you’ll come back eventually.”
“Of course I will.”
“I’m serious. You have duties here, responsibilities that can’t wait forever.”
He pulls me into a hug. Louis holds me tight, and I let him because we both know everything is changing.
“Thank you,” I whisper.
“Let me know what he says,” he tells me, and I promise I will.
I slip out of the study and make my way to the other side of the palace. I pass portraits of people I’ve never met. Many of them lived and died within these walls without ever knowing what existed beyond them. That can’t be me. I refuse to let it be.
Father’s study door is cracked open, and I pause outside, watching him through the gap. He’s sitting by the window, a book open in his lap, but he’s still focused on the gardens. There’s color in his cheeks and a clarity in his gaze that was missing during the worst of the treatments.
I knock softly on the doorframe.
“Delphine.” He smiles when he sees me. It’s the one that makes me feel like I’m still his little girl. “I was wondering if I’d see you today.”
“Yeah? Scared I wouldn’t give you the royal tea?”
“I know everything that happens in this palace with or without you.” He closes his book and sets it aside. “But I’m happy to see you. Come. Sit with me.”
I move to the chair beside him and tuck my legs under my body as I sit. The fire crackles as the afternoon light fades into dusk.
“What’s on your mind?” Father asks.
“I’d like to formally request leave for a year. I’d like to move to New York.”
“Move? That’s what this is about?” Father smiles. “Where will you live?”
“I’m not sure yet. But I want to go under one of my aliases after the holidays.”
His eyes study me. “And what will you do?”
“I’ve thought about anonymously sharing my life online.
I want to live my life. Be free. Figure out who I am.
” My eyes are burning, and this time, I don’t try to stop the tears.
“I don’t know why I’m getting emotional.
There’s also a part of me that doesn’t want to leave you. Not after everything. Not when you—”