Sam should have known that her family would try to scare her into compliance. And perhaps she was being stubborn, or difficult, but she couldn’t bear the thought of letting them stuff her behind the high stone walls of Loughlin House as if she’d been excommunicated.
“Never mind, I’ll figure something out,” she started to say, but Caleb shook his head.
“I’ll still bring you to the palace, of course. Just wanted you to know what you’re up against. And, if you plan to keep going incognito, I have some advice.”
Going incognito—was that what she was doing? Sam guessed so.
“I’m listening,” she told him.
“Your hair is a huge help; don’t dye it back. You’re already good at using hoodies,” he added, nodding to how she’d pulled the hood of Nina’s sweatshirt low over her face. “Baseball caps work great, too. Glasses are surprisingly effective. I can get you some other disguises if you’d like—mustaches, false chins, pregnancy bumps…”
“I don’t think a pregnancy bump would help my cause,” she said drily, and Caleb smiled.
“Fair enough. The main thing is to avoid eye contact. People are inherently self-absorbed; half of them walk through life staring at their phones these days anyway. If you’re somewhere crowded like a metro car, just keep moving, and look down. You’ll be fine.”
“What if I used a British accent?” Sam asked, speaking in what she liked to think of as a plucky Eliza Doolittle voice.
Caleb was visibly fighting not to laugh. “Maybe stick to the haircut.”
* * *
Sam hurried down the corridor in the direction of the Media Briefing Hall, marveling at how eerie the palace felt without the usual bustle of tour groups. It was too quiet, like being on a school campus when everyone had gone home for the holidays.
When she heard voices coming from around the corner, Sam started forward, hoping to find Beatrice—but it was Jeff, and their mother.
“Oh, Sam.” Queen Adelaide rushed forward, pulling her daughter into a hug so tight it nearly crushed the air from Sam’s rib cage. “I’ve been so worried about you.”
“I’m sorry, Mom.” Her words were muffled into her mom’s chest.
Adelaide took a step back but didn’t let go. She kept a hand on Sam’s elbow, as if afraid that the moment she released her, Sam would sprint off into hiding again. “Why haven’t you gone to Loughlin House? It’s so much safer there than Nina’s dorm room!”
“Can I please just come home?” Sam replied. The question was plaintive and raw, causing her mom to shift her gaze uncomfortably.
Jeff let out a heavy breath. “It’s not that simple. With everything going on…we need some time before we can figure out how to handle your return.”
“I didn’t realize I was something that had to be handled,” Sam shot back.
Her mother flinched. “Please, Samantha, just until after the engagement party. Then we can find a way to ease you back into things, okay? It’s simpler like this, I promise.”
When her mom’s meaning had sunk in, Sam drew in a breath.
“You and Daphne are having an engagement party?” she asked Jeff. He flushed, but nodded. “And I’m not included because I’m not royal anymore?”
“Sam, it’s not really up to me, okay? It’s a state occasion—”
“I’ve been to hundreds of state occasions,” she reminded him, but Jeff cut her off.
“That was before!”
Before she’d run off, and lost her HRH, and become the black sheep that her family no longer knew how to handle.
Sam retreated a step, then another. “Fine. I’ll get out of your hair.”
“Sam, please,” Jeff started to say, but she turned and ran off, just as everyone apparently expected her to do. She took the stairs two at a time and hurtled down the hall to her room—her old room, she supposed, since she wasn’t welcome here anymore—and threw clothes into a suitcase, just wanting to get away, out of this nightmare world where nothing made sense and no one seemed to care about her. She had become a ghost in her own life.
It wasn’t until she reached the door that led to the royal family’s private garage that Sam remembered her car was still parked at King’s College, in Nina’s student spot.
She slumped against the back of the door and pressed her hands to her eyes, fighting an onslaught of tears.
“Are you okay?”
The young man who stood before her wore the palace valets’ uniform of navy pants and a white shirt, but Sam would have recognized him anywhere. “Oh my god,” she said slowly. “Liam?”
A light danced in his brown eyes, which glowed with mesmerizing flecks of green. “I wasn’t sure you would remember.”
She wiped quickly at her eyes and stood up straighter. “As if I could forget breaking out of the palace in a garbage truck.”
“Garbage-truck joyrides, you never forget your first,” he deadpanned.
Sam had met Liam the night she and Jeff graduated high school. He’d helped her sneak out of the palace and taken her to his band’s concert—and then Sam had left on her gap-year trip the next morning, and never saw him again.
They had kissed that night, too. It felt a bit like cheating, that she was standing here remembering the feel of Liam’s lips on hers, but she couldn’t help what she’d done before she and Marshall started dating.
“What are you doing at the palace? I thought you quit,” Sam asked, then winced. She hadn’t meant for Liam to know that she’d gone looking for him.
When she and Jeff came back to town, she’d discovered that Liam no longer worked in the kitchens. She’d even dragged Nina to Enclave, that venue on the east side where his band had played—this time with her security team’s knowledge and a tedious sweep of the space beforehand—but there was no sign of him.
“Our band headed to the West Coast,” Liam explained. “Things didn’t work out, obviously. I came back to Washington a month ago.”
Right after she and Marshall had fled to Hawaii.
“It’s good to see you. I mean—I’m sorry that your band didn’t make it. But I’m glad you’re okay.” She eyed his uniform as she added, “And you’re a valet now?”
He grinned. “I finally got promoted from garbage duty. The hours are more flexible, which is a huge help. Some of your snobby guests tip in hundred-dollar bills.”
Sam refrained from pointing out that the guests who tipped that way might hope that Liam wouldn’t just take them home, but would go home with them.