Chapter Ten #3
‘I dream of my family, sometimes,’ she said. ‘I dream of them alive. It’s a strange mix of memories and imaginings. Of then and now, or what would be, if they hadn’t died.’
He made a soft noise, which she took to be encouragement. Or perhaps she didn’t even need that? Maybe she just wanted to tell him about this, because it was so heavy in her mind.
‘You know, I often wonder why I survived,’ she said, the words wiped of emotion even though the sentiment was so heavy.
‘You were in the car with them,’ he said, the words gentle.
She nodded. ‘They, and the driver, all died instantly. It took emergency services an hour to free me. I was in the car with them and I couldn’t—I couldn’t—’ Breathing became difficult as the panic gripped her.
‘You couldn’t do anything.’
‘I couldn’t wake them,’ she said, turning around in the circle of his arms, to face him.
The look of understanding and compassion on his features was almost her undoing.
‘My mother just looked as though she were asleep. My father and brother less so.’ She closed her eyes, wishing she hadn’t had so long to commit their images to memory.
‘That is a truly dreadful thing to experience.’ He lifted one hand to her cheek, stroking her there softly. ‘I would give anything to take that away from you.’
Her lips moved in an imitation of a smile. ‘If only that were possible. But it’s a part of me, of who I am. Everything I am because of what I lost.’
His eyes narrowed, but she barely noticed. She was in her own world, reliving that pain, her past.
‘Ever since they died, I’ve stayed the course. I’ve been this.’ She gestured to herself, but a small frown quivered on her lips. ‘I have known what I need to be, to whom and I have done exactly that. From the moment they died, I was no longer a person, so much as a princess.’
‘You are always, always a person,’ he said.
‘Not one who’s free to live her own life, to make her own choices.’ Her throat hurt as she swallowed. ‘I know people meant well.’
‘No teenager should have to do what you did. To be in the spotlight after such an awful event…’
‘You remember?’
‘It was international news. You were everywhere I went then, too.’
Her lips twisted at the truth of that. She’d been hounded by paparazzi whenever she left the palace.
‘I don’t know if the photographers were hoping I would break down, that they would catch me in a moment of weakness, but I was determined no one would ever see that.
The country was in shock. I had to be strong for them.
It’s what my parents would have wanted. It’s what my brother would have done. ’
‘He was older?’
‘He was supposed to be king,’ she said. ‘I was never meant for this.’
‘And yet you’re such a natural.’
‘Not like Mikkel,’ she said, smiling softly when she thought of him.
‘For me, I’m—’ She sucked in a deep breath as she realised how close she was to admitting something she never spoke of.
But this was Javier and, for whatever reason, she did trust him.
The snow began to swirl around them faster, creating the impression that they really were in their own little world.
One of magic and intimacy, on which there could be no meaningful intrusion, simply because they didn’t want it.
‘Yes, Your Majesty?’ he prompted.
‘It’s all an act. When I’m in public—No, all the time.
Even in the palace. I’m playing a part. I’d always had a public persona and a private self, the version of who I was behind closed doors.
But once they died, my private life became sort of public.
Servants gossiped. The head of my Regency Council was always there.
I had security with me around the clock, because of the fact I became the sole heir to the throne.
’ She shook her head. ‘I wasn’t given the space and time to grieve, much less be myself. ’
‘What about friends?’
‘I wasn’t really able to see them after that. My life became all about the crown.’
He made a deep noise of disapproval. ‘I’m sorry that no one in your life saw it as their role to care for you, as a person. Not just a future queen.’
‘My parents would have said that the duties to the country come first and they’d have been right. It’s just what it is.’
He looked as though he wanted to say something to contradict that, but she shook her head once, lifting a finger to his lips.
‘It’s why this short time with you means so much to me, Javier.
We both know it’s temporary and why it has to be that way.
But you’re the first person in a long time who’s made me feel like I’m someone beyond the crown.
Who’s made me feel seen and valued. I don’t need these beautiful earrings to remember you, because that feeling will stay with me always.
’ She stood onto the tips of her toes and kissed him, no longer able to feel the cold of the snowy night because, in his arms, she was flooded with warmth and pleasure.
In his arms, not that she’d let herself acknowledge it, she felt utterly, perfectly complete.
It was a Christmas miracle, but it was also something she was impossibly glad was almost at an end.