“They’re terrible?”
“They’re nudes.” She pursed her lips but failed to hide her smile. “Queen Tatiana posed for all of them.”
Teddy barked out a laugh. “For the record, if you start to feel the urge to paint, I’m happy to model—but only if you burn every last painting.”
“Deal,” Beatrice managed. Then she glanced back at the turkey painting, and her laughter died.
“What I was trying to say is that King Benjamin’s accident changed him. I’m worried that mine changed me, too,” she confessed.
Teddy studied her for a moment, his eyes so impossibly blue, full of concern and sorrow. “Bee, of course it changed you. How could it not?”
“But I don’t want it to have changed me!”
“Why not? Change isn’t something to be afraid of.” He hesitated, then added, “I, for one, think that the accident made you braver.”
“But I’m afraid of so many things,” Beatrice protested.
“Being brave doesn’t mean you aren’t afraid. It means you refuse to let your fears guide your actions.”
Beatrice wondered if he was right. In her old life she’d followed the dictates of protocol to a T, and now she was seeking votes on a congressional bill, chasing down senators on their ranches.
“I love you.” She hadn’t consciously decided to say it; the words seemed to float from somewhere deep in her chest.
Teddy pulled her close. “Oh, Bee. You must know that I love you, too.”
Their kiss began soft, tender, and sweet. Beatrice laced her hands behind Teddy’s head, playing with the threads of his wheat-gold hair, her entire body melting into the kiss without a thought. She made a sound deep in her throat and tightened her grip on him, until after a moment, Teddy broke away.
He closed his eyes and tipped his forehead against hers. “I love you so much, Bee,” he said roughly. “When I heard about the accident, it was one of the scariest moments of my life.”
At first his words didn’t sink in. When they did, Beatrice went very still. “What do you mean, when you heard about the accident?”
Her security team had done an extensive, and very discreet, investigation into the car crash. They had wanted to make certain it wasn’t an assassination attempt. When Beatrice saw the folder on her desk, she’d skimmed the first few paragraphs: …poor road conditions, variable lighting…Driver worked an overnight shift the night before and was likely exhausted; he should have clocked out…. no evidence of foul play…
Somehow, Beatrice had never considered the implications of the fact that Teddy wasn’t in the car with her.
“Teddy. Where were you when the accident happened?”
He must have heard the distress in her voice, because his expression clouded. “At the airport. You were headed there, too,” he added softly.
“Why weren’t we in the same car?” she asked, and frowned. “And where were we going? I wouldn’t have left the League of Kings before the farewell breakfast.”
Teddy hesitated. Beatrice found herself holding her breath, her pulse beating too fast. The air felt heavy with her sudden premonition that they were on the cusp of something big, something that might break them.
“I was on my way to Nantucket. We had argued that night,” he admitted reluctantly.
“About what?”
“It’s not important. All that matters is that you’re okay—”
“Tell me,” she commanded.
He winced. “We were struggling to figure out what my role would be in our marriage. I…the thing is, I didn’t have much to do while you were at the League of Kings conference.”
“How did our fight end?” she whispered.
“We were going to work it out! We had just decided to take a little bit of space.”
“A little bit of space,” Beatrice said hollowly. Teddy started to reach for her, but she pulled back.
“Bee—I almost lost you once. I can’t bear to lose you again,” he pleaded. “I love you. I would give up everything for you.”
But she didn’t want him to have to give up everything.
A loud, screaming confusion roared in her ears. Teddy had been so stable, so constant, that without even realizing it, she had come to lean on him, trusting that he could handle it. Learning that their relationship wasn’t as solid as she’d assumed—it felt like the rug had been pulled out from under her.
“I have to go,” she mumbled, and fled back to the Grand Gallery before Teddy could see the tears in her eyes.
The rehearsal dinner was winding to a close. Footmen circulated through the room, pouring coffee and serving cherry tarts with dollops of whipped cream, a traditional Washington family dessert.
Daphne’s face hurt from smiling. All night well-wishers had given toasts to the happy couple: mostly Jefferson’s high school buddies and family members, though a few of Daphne’s old classmates had gone up to the microphone to gush about how fantastic she was. Daphne wasn’t actually close with any of those girls—they just wanted to be able to brag that they had participated in the royal wedding—but it was almost nice, feeling like a normal bride who had friends to toast her. Even her father had mustered up a father-of-the-bride toast, full of such trite and generic platitudes that Daphne could only assume he’d pulled it from the internet.
The evening was nearing its conclusion when Daphne’s skin prickled with sudden awareness. Gossip had begun hissing through the room like a winter wind; many of the guests were staring at their phones in shock, whispering to their neighbors. A momentary panic stabbed through Daphne—had Gabriella leaked the truth about her and Ethan after all?—but then she realized that her mother was smiling a narrow, catlike smile.
“Was this you?” Rebecca asked, holding her phone toward Daphne.
The headline on the landing page of the Times read Duke of Virginia Engaged in Multimillion-Dollar Fraud Scheme.
Daphne sucked in a breath and kept reading.
The FBI has opened a formal investigation into His Grace the Duke of Virginia, who stands accused of stealing millions of dollars from various government accounts under his care. A federal judge has frozen the duke’s assets and placed him on a no-fly list….
“It looks like I underestimated you,” Rebecca went on softly. “Well done, Daphne.”
For years Daphne had been striving for that note of pride in her mother’s voice, and now that she had finally earned it, she just felt hollow. She didn’t especially care what Rebecca thought anymore. Perhaps when her mother had slapped her, it had knocked Daphne’s compulsion to please her right out of her brain, the way you might shake the last candy from a box.