Chapter 6
Six
“Well, this is . . . something.” James regarded Lauren as she half sat, half deflated into a chair in the conference room.
“Quite something. Indeed.”
Lauren held up her hand. “You’re being very loud right now.”
“I’m barely murmuring.”
“Ooh, that. That was loud.”
Harriet came into the room next, holding a pile of file folders (what on earth was in those folders? As soon as she stopped
wanting to die, Lauren was going to teach Harriet the meaning of digitization and its benefits in modern society). “Good morning!” she cheerfully sang out.
Both Lauren and Joy, who had appeared a moment earlier—and looked, frankly, way too fresh-faced for someone who had been dancing
on a table with a bartender a mere six hours earlier—hissed in response. “Harriet, bless you, but please no,” Joy said, then
passed one of the lattes in her hand to Lauren, along with a bag from Leon. “Here you go. Half of that is mine, don’t get
any ideas.”
“Well!” James said. “I see you two had some fun last night.” Through the fog of her hangover, Lauren thought that he looked a little envious. “Celebrating being thankful, I assume?”
“Sure,” Lauren mumbled as she blew into the lid of her coffee and took a sip. “Joy, you’re a hero. You had the ability to
go get breakfast and put on makeup?” She shook her head in appreciation. “You might be a saint. I’m going to have the pope look into it, but I
feel confident about your chances.”
“Oh God, no,” Joy said. “Uber Eats. Worth every penny. I got sausage muffins, too.”
Lauren whimpered with happiness.
Violet, who was sitting at the end of the table with her ever-present phone in her hands, didn’t even look up at them. “It’s
like watching your mother be hungover on New Year’s Day,” she muttered.
“I’m only like five years older than you!” Lauren started to protest, but then winced and reached for the bag, deciding to
take up Violet’s misplaced ageism at a later date.
“Good morning, everyone!” Eugene boomed as he came into the room, a suited older man following closely behind him. “Harold
Cockburn is joining our meeting as we discuss logistics of the US state visit. Lauren, I assume you’re ready with updates.”
It was definitely not a question, and luckily Lauren was. She nodded. “It’s great to finally meet you in person, Harold. I
can email our latest notes to you right now,” she said. Harold was the private secretary to the Strathearns, who are based
at Kensington Palace, though he seemed to spend more time at BP than at his own office—usually complaining to Eugene.
He nodded primly as he sat down. He seemed like Eugene’s more robust-looking twin, at least in poise and attitude, the kind of person whose waistcoat was buttoned a little bit tighter than it needed to be.
Across the table, Lauren could see Violet giving him a less-than-pleased look before she turned back to her phone.
“He’s always so rude.” Violet’s text pinged through to her laptop.
“Fantastic,” Lauren wrote back.
“Joy,” Harold said, looking at his phone. “Nice to see you again.”
“And you, Harold,” she replied, giving him a smile that could only be described as “painful.”
“Joy and I were in touch over a case at Scotland Yard a few years back,” Harold said to Eugene. “Some of those Occupy protesters
got it in their heads that the Strathearns would consider listening to their list of demands and attempted to take matters
into their own hands.” He smirked to himself. “They’re gone and the Strathearns are still here, so I suppose we all know how
that worked out.”
Of all the mornings. Truly.
Judging from Joy’s face, she felt the same way as Lauren and Violet. “Well, fortunately,” she said, sitting up in her chair
so that she was eye to eye with Harold, “we were able to de-escalate the situation, and of course, this was many years ago.”
She sounded sharp, no-nonsense, and Lauren realized that not only was Joy good at her job, she was probably also a great mom,
too. “Now, shall we get started?”
“Plans have been emailed,” Lauren confirmed.
“Then let’s begin,” Eugene said, clearly enjoying being in charge of this meeting.
“Right now, we have the Prince and Princess of Strathearn having tea with the president at Kensington Palace on the Thursday
of his visit,” Lauren said. “The press lineup will be one TV camera, one photographer, and one photo camera, so it should
be a fairly intimate event. Plus most of the other media will be covering the state banquet that night, so they’ll be prepping
for that and—”
“Will they be watching the speeches live in the room?” Harold interrupted.
“No, we’ll have everything set up on a live feed in a separate room here at BP,” she said.
“Good,” he said. “Keep those jackals in their own pen.”
Lauren thought of Oscar.
“They also of course need to apply to cover the event,” she continued. “I’ll field inquiries until the week before and then
will confirm accreditation. There’s limited space, so—”
“I’ll also be part of choosing that list,” Harold said, and at this point, even Harriet seemed to be frowning at him, which
probably didn’t bode well for Harold.
Lauren glanced at James, then Eugene. “Um, I don’t feel that—”
“I’ve been working with the Strathearns for nearly twenty years, and you have, forgive me, been here for approximately twenty
minutes.”
Every single pair of eyes in the room shifted to Lauren.
“I may have been here for, as you so kindly put it, twenty minutes, but that doesn’t change the fact that I do know what I’m
doing in regards to my job. In fact, this isn’t the first state visit that I’ve been involved—”
“From the American perspective—”
“The only perspective that matters right now with regards to media arrangements is mine, and yes, in fact, it is American.”
Now it was Lauren’s turn to interrupt him, and if she was being honest, it felt damn good. “But it’s also a perspective that’s
in full service to my job and to my coworkers and to the institution that has trusted me to represent the monarchy to the
highest of standards, which I have done and will continue to do.”
Lauren’s Messages app flashed up. It was Violet again, this time with just the boxing glove emoji.
“Cockburn,” Eugene said quietly. “Lauren will handle this. If your assistance is required, rest assured, it will be sought.”
“Fine,” he said. “What’s next on the agenda?”
Lauren was still both smarting from the argument and reeling from Eugene’s defense of her when Violet said, “Coverage of the
Duke of Exeter has gone through the roof, he’s on every cover. We tried to stop them on the grounds of privacy, but the National Record managed to print old photos of him and his ex-wife on a beach, declaring him His, um, ‘Royal Fineness.’”
Joy covered her mouth to keep from spitting out her coffee.
“Well, thank you, Violet, for that important update,” Eugene said.
“He’s been so good for engagement,” Violet said. “Just that one visit Lauren arranged has brought in more traffic than any
other member of the family since I started here eighteen months ago.” She looked directly at Mr. Cockburn as she said that
last bit.
“Well, hopefully this doesn’t descend into some sort of competition for clicks. The monarchy has thrived for eleven hundred
years without TikTok,” Harold said as he stood to signal the end of the meeting.
“Actually, Harold,” Joy said, “while I have you here, I wanted to discuss the community outreach opportunity for the Strathearns
I emailed you about—”
“Of course,” he said. “Email my office and we can set up a meeting.”
“Yes, well, your office seems to have some difficulty answering their emails.”
“Everyone has a lot on at the moment,” he replied.
“Of course, who doesn’t.” Joy’s voice didn’t sound like she was asking a question. “But I really need a response on this if
it’s to work—”
“As I said previously, contact the office and we can set up a meeting. I’ll let them know to look for it. Thank you all for
the updates, everyone, varied as they were.”
He seemed to be waiting for someone to reply, but instead they all just looked at him. “Thank you, Cockburn,” James said.
“I’m sure we’ll see each other soon.”
“That man,” Joy said to Lauren after the meeting as they headed down to the BP staff cafeteria. “Everyone on the team at Scotland
Yard hated him, too.”
“I don’t want to talk about Harold, I want to talk about Hugo!” Lauren said. “The fact that Harold delayed this conversation
makes me dislike him even more. Tell me everything, or at least everything you’re comfortable sharing.”
Joy laughed a little as they walked through the wood-paneled entrance area—complete with its displays of gifts to the Queen
from around the world—and into the main canteen. It had been designed to look like a real restaurant, but the harsh lighting
and cheap furniture weren’t fooling anyone. Underneath a wall of blown-up menus from previous years at Buckingham Palace,
Balmoral, and Windsor Castle were a stack of trays, and Lauren and Joy each took one as they surveyed their options.
“I’m not a big fan of kiss and tell, but let’s just say it was a nostalgic reunion,” Joy said. “Nothing serious, but it was a lot of fun. I got home, showered and changed, and came into work, so I am both knackered and starving.” She asked for the stuffed pepper fajitas.
“I love this for you,” Lauren said. “This is how we should celebrate Thanksgiving every year from now on, you and me at Annabel’s.”
She surveyed the cafeteria options, then also took the fajitas and something that kind of resembled a salad.
“Well, if that’s what your holiday is like, then I can see why everyone would be thankful.” Joy shot a dirty smile at Lauren, who laughed
and pretended to punch her in the arm.
“I can say that going from Hugo last night to Harold Cockburn this morning was whiplash I did not need,” Joy added as they
progressed down the line. “A few years ago, we were in a meeting and we all started discussing our Christmas plans, and Harold