“Thanks for coming out here. I needed to get my bearings somewhere I could breathe.” Beatrice sighed. “Daphne and Jeff have decided to call off the wedding.”
Teddy glanced over sharply. “Oh my god. Is Daphne okay?”
Something about his phrasing gave Beatrice pause. “They decided this together, you know. It wasn’t like Jeff dumped Daphne at the altar.”
“Sorry, I shouldn’t have jumped to conclusions,” Teddy said clumsily. “I just always thought that Jeff was dating Daphne out of…inertia, maybe. He trusts her, and he really cares about her, but I never got the sense that he loves her. Or at least, he’s not in love with her.”
“Oh,” Beatrice managed, startled by his bluntness. She hadn’t noticed Jeff having any reservations about Daphne, but Teddy was always so perceptive.
He tugged his wool hat lower over his ears. “Daphne, though, was really invested in the relationship. I hope she’s doing okay.” Teddy hesitated, then went on: “I know how much it hurts, to think you’re marrying one of the Washingtons, only for the whole thing to be called off at the last minute.”
At the mention of their canceled wedding, tiny flames of something—regret, or a poignant sort of heartache—kindled to life in Beatrice’s chest.
“Teddy, about last night…” She hesitated, suddenly desperate to explain. “Things have been terrifying ever since I woke up in the hospital. I couldn’t have navigated any of it without you.” Her eyes flicked up to meet his. “But I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t afraid.”
“Of what, Bee?” he prompted.
“I don’t know how to do this! I’ve only ever loved one person aside from you.” And she and Connor had never been in a real relationship, or at least, not a public one.
Beatrice was used to practicing for everything she did. She liked to study, to anticipate problems before they arose. She had been trained in negotiation and contracts, in people management and public relations.
But no part of her education had trained her to be a good partner.
“I’m worried that my job will always get in the way of things,” she said softly. “That it has made me…selfish.”
“You’re the least selfish person I know!”
“Not selfish on my own behalf, but on behalf of the Crown. My entire life I was told, over and over, that the Crown came first. That everyone’s needs must be subjugated to it, even—or especially—my own. It hasn’t exactly left a lot of room for romance.”
She attempted a weak smile, and failed. “I did love Connor, and there’s a part of me that will probably always love him.” He was a living link to the girl she’d been before she became queen: the version of herself she’d left behind when her father died. “But I’m in love with you, Teddy,” she added, repeating the words he’d just used about Daphne and Jeff. “That is something much bigger.” And exhilarating, and far more frightening.
Teddy’s blue eyes deepened in the sunlight. “You just said you love me, but you’re looking at me like you’re about to say goodbye.”
“Because I love you so much that it terrifies me. Teddy—I don’t know how to bring you into this life without hurting you! I’m always going to be torn between our relationship and the Crown. I’m like the mermaid from the Hans Christian Andersen story, only half-human. The part of me that belongs to the Crown…it’s not mine to pledge to anyone. Even to you.”
Tears rose to her eyes as she added, “The reasons we fought, the night of my accident, are all still here. I hate that you had to give up your legacy for me.”
“I would do it again in a heartbeat.”
“But you shouldn’t have to! You deserve a real, full life, with someone who can spend lazy mornings in bed with you, and attend Little League soccer games without it being an issue of national security. I can’t even travel like a normal person! I will never be able to stroll around the Duomo eating gelato.”
“Oh, Bee.” Teddy sighed. “I don’t want any of that, if I can’t have it with you.”
Her protests faltered as he took her hands in his. Despite the cold, his grip was warm and certain. A gentle breeze picked up, lifting the hairsprayed curls on her neck.
“I’m guessing you don’t remember that mug you found at Walthorpe, the one with Penelope’s picture on it?” Teddy asked.
For some reason, the name made Beatrice’s hackles rise. “Is Penelope your ex-girlfriend?”
Teddy nodded. “If I’d wanted an easy, uncomplicated relationship, I would’ve kept dating someone like her. But we broke up for a reason.”
“Teddy, everyone wants easy and uncomplicated,” Beatrice protested. “No one deliberately signs up for problems and—and—friction.”
“I do. I like the friction.” Somehow Teddy made that sound a little bit flirtatious. “I want the kind of love I have with you: extraordinary, breathtaking, wondrous love. It might be difficult at times, but the best things in life always are. Nothing worth having comes without a bit of effort.”
“What are you saying?” she whispered.
“I’m saying that you’re worth it. I’m not letting this mermaid swim back to the sea. I love you, all of you—including the Crown and everything that comes with it.” Teddy’s voice grew husky as he added, “I know better than to try to pick and choose the pieces of you to love.”
Franklin was barking cheerfully in the distance, collecting stray sticks from the orchard and then dropping them again. Beatrice was still holding tight to Teddy’s hands.
“How do you know we won’t fight about those things again?”
“I’m sure we will fight about them,” Teddy admitted. “We’re only human. We have to just trust that we’ll find a way through it.”
Beatrice thought of what Louise had told her last night: that love, in its own way, was a form of faith.
She thought of what she’d said to the Duchess of Texas, about learning to trust—and lean on—other people. She’d been talking about politics, but didn’t the same thing apply to love? When you were in the right relationship, you were stronger together than you were on your own.
Beatrice pulled Teddy close and kissed him.
It was the kind of kiss that reverberated through her body like church bells, as if the fundamental rightness of it was clanging somewhere in her heart. Beatrice let herself savor every detail of the moment: the delicious sensation of Teddy’s lips on hers, the way his arms wrapped around her, steadying her from behind.