“I Love It” - Icona Pop Charli XCX
The best way to cope with finding out your husband may potentially have a love child? Work. Always work. Since I saw those old photos of Henry, I’ve gotten less than eight hours of sleep. In two days.
The other key to successfully dealing with such a situation? Put it as far from your mind as you can. You’re Svalbard, it’s Antarctica.
Every time my brain wants to pull me in the direction that would lead to analyzing what it might mean, I yank it back to the present with excuses, reasoning, and threats if I have to. I refuse to allow it to be true, and therefore it isn’t.
Maisie steps into my office after a brisk knock on the door. I glance at the clock. How is it only nine? I’ve been sitting here for four hours already.
She sets the green box on my desk and takes a seat. “This week’s letters are ready to go.”
We discuss my upcoming schedule, any press mentions of the royal family that have been made since yesterday, and how the documentary is progressing. She gives me instructions on a few of the forms in the box, then leaves me to it.
I have no idea how I’ll survive her sixteen-week maternity leave.
I open the box, which has held important documents for Wesbourne monarchs for over a century.
Someone on staff makes sure it’s always polished and that the hinges on the lid don’t squeak.
That familiar cedar scent wafts out, still there after all these years.
As promised, Maisie put the stack of letters on top of the other papers in the box.
She collects them throughout the week, then sorts through them and sets aside the ones she thinks I’ll be interested in, either for responses or entertainment purposes.
I’ve been staring at reports and proposals for hours, and my brain is begging for a break, so I pull the first one out of its pale green envelope.
Madam the Queen,
My name is Elizabeth Gable. I hope this letter finds you well.
I am writing about a matter of some sensitivity. Four years ago, I became pregnant. I gave birth to the sweetest little boy, and we are both doing very well. I never had any intention of contacting the father, as I did not think he would be interested in knowing he had a son.
However, recent events have made me reconsider this stance. My son is struggling with attachment issues, and I believe the influence of his father could be of some help in this case, not to mention the importance of having two parents whenever possible.
I sincerely hope you do not think me forward in coming to you with this.
When you visited Hampshire Street on the 11th, you became real to me.
I felt like you might be the kind of person who would understand and maybe even sympathize with my situation.
You were so sweet with Axel that I suddenly had hope that we might be able to form some kind of plan together.
This brings me to the purpose of this letter. Please know that if you choose not to respond, I will not take any further action. I do not intend to cause you alarm, but I believe you should know that your husband is the father of my son.
It happened many years ago. Axel is now three years old. We are happy together and ask nothing of you but the chance for him to get to know his father and perhaps have him, and you, if you so desire, in our lives.
Yours sincerely,
Elizabeth Gable
Something falls out of the envelope and into my lap. I let out a reflexive gasp. It’s a photo of little Axel smiling at the camera. There’s a tiny gap between his teeth, just like Henry’s.
My chest feels like it’s going to explode. I toss the letter and photo on the desk and stand up. What in the bloody hell is happening?
I walk to the window, but the bright sunlight on the gardens does not help. A giant ball of nausea is tossing and turning in my stomach like a ship in a storm.
My throat is suddenly parched. I reach for the water tumbler on my desk, but I miscalculate the distance, and the whole thing spills across my keyboard. “Bloody hell,” I mutter, tossing some tissues onto the mess.
The muscles in my jaw are strung so tight I get an instant migraine. I use my thumb and index finger to massage them while my other hand reaches for my phone.
“My office. Now,” I tell Preston when he answers.
He’s here less than two minutes later. I hand him the letter and photo and turn back to the window, biting my nails as he reads.
One of the gardeners is trimming the hedges in the Parterre Garden.
The snip, snip, snip of his shears is comforting, as if reminding my heart of the rate it should be at, so much slower than the one it’s currently keeping.
Preston clears his throat behind me, and I turn to face him. He tries to hand the letter back, but I shake my head.
“I don’t want it.”
Laying it on the desk, he takes a step closer. He towers over me, even though I’m in heels. “What do you want to do about it?”
My arms are clutched around my middle like a kid on her first day at a new school. I drop them and clear the cobwebs and any emotion from my voice. “What do you think I should do?”
He draws his brows together and picks the letter up again, scanning it. “Is it credible?”
I shrug, mainly to loosen my shoulders. “How should I know?”
He studies me. His eyes make him appear to always be smiling, even when he’s not, as though he’s in on some joke the rest of the room isn’t. It’s not helpful at the moment.
“I imagine this isn’t the first time a letter like this has been sent to the palace?” he says.
“There have been a few in the past couple of years.” My voice is finding its strength again.
I know the wheels in his head are spinning. This is what Preston does—he takes bad news and spins it for good, like the little man in Rumpelstiltskin who spun straw into gold. His job is dependent on keeping the royal family looking as spotless as possible.
“You have two options,” he says, hands perched on his narrow hips.
“Either respond to this woman or don’t. If you choose to respond, you can either thank her and tell her you’ll give it some thought—at which point you will promptly forget about it—or you can meet with her to find out what she wants. ”
I shake my hands to rid them of the numbness creeping over me. “I don’t want to meet with her.”
“Then don’t. It says here she won’t take any further action if you choose not to engage.”
“Do you think that’s the right choice?”
“She’s not threatening to go to the press with it. If you want to hush this up, she’s giving you the option to do so.”
“You’re right.” I brush my fingers over my clammy forehead. “This woman clearly saw an opportunity and took it. We don’t have proof that she’s telling the truth, and if word of this got out . . .”
Preston lets out a barking laugh. “Then that would be a different story altogether.”
The royal family’s policy when it comes to requests and outlandish claims is simple: no comment. By not denying or affirming anything, we allow these rumors to die out as quickly as they started. But that doesn’t mean it wouldn’t cause a media circus if something like this were to get leaked.
“You don’t think she’ll change her mind and go to the press, do you?” I say.
“It’s unlikely. Like you said, she saw an opportunity and decided to take it. She has zero proof that Prince Henry is the father of her child. Even the photo isn’t hard evidence. You’d be surprised at what you can do with AI these days.”
I nod in agreement while my head chants Liar!
Maybe no one else on my team stood close enough to the boy to mark the striking similarities between him and Henry, but I did.
And that is no AI-generated image. I also know my husband.
I’m less familiar with his checkered past, but I know enough to be fairly certain the chances that this woman is telling the truth are about sixty to one.
“Would you feel better talking to him about it?” Preston asks.
“Who?”
He waits a few beats, then says slowly, “Prince Henry?”
“No.” I shake my head so hard my hairpins loosen. “No, definitely not.”
Adelaide’s words choose that moment to float back, warning me that nothing good will come from keeping things from him. Under normal circumstances she’s right. But this is Henry we’re talking about.
The man has no regard for his image whatsoever. He spent ten years living like a party king, ruining his own reputation just to keep me away from him in an effort to protect me.
He fixates on things like a germaphobe with a hand-washing compulsion. If he knew he had a child, that would be the only thing he could focus on. It would overwhelm every other part of his life.
I would lose him for good.
Even though I’m fairly certain this lady is telling the truth and that Henry has a child out there, I’m 110 percent positive of something else: Henry can never, ever find out about it.