of Lacey, and ordinarily, I’d have assumed she did it for a laugh. But today it feels like a threat. When my phone vibrates again, I half expect it to be her.
It’s not.
YOU CAN’T PRETEND NOTHING HAPPENED.
That much is abundantly clear. I just wish I had more time to think. Tomorrow morning, I am supposed to walk Westminster Abbey’s three-hundred-foot aisle, wearing the biggest skirt of my life—the gown has its own room at The Goring—and pledge myself for eternity to Prince Nicholas of Wales, a king-in-waiting. I cannot tremble. I cannot twitch, even if Gaz weeps that high-pitched wail of his. I cannot disappoint, I cannot bend, I cannot break, because two billion people will be watching (one of whom might even be that tired, retired Cinderella, who hopefully won’t recognize the kid who once regarded her with so much skepticism). So, no, I can’t pretend nothing happened. But if I acknowledge it out loud…
My phone lights up and I jump so violently that I almost drop it.
“Morning, love,” my mother says, in the England-via-Iowa accent she’s adopted. The press has nicknamed her Fancy Nancy. “I’m actually looking for Lacey. Is she there?”
I snort.
“Bex, no swining,” Mom says, parroting a pun of Dad’s.
“The Daily Mail says she got a spray tan for three hours yesterday. Wherever she is, I’m sure she’s happy. And orange.”
“Cut it out, Rebecca.” That was a hundred percent American. My mother’s faux accent always disappears when she’s irritated. “You’re getting married tomorrow. Do your twin thing and apologize and fix it.”
Irritation strains my voice. “I can’t apologize if I wasn’t wrong.”
And I wasn’t, not about that. I’m squarely in the wrong now—Mom has no idea—but then again, so is Lacey, and I can’t always be the one to lay down my sword to keep the peace. Especially not when I’m under attack.
I hear a fumbling at the suite’s front door. “Mom, I have to go. The Bex Brigade is here.”
Within seconds the room is swarmed by stylists, seamstresses, security officers, and all manner of other Lyons operatives. I shove the blackmail-worthy photo deep behind a seat cushion. Out of sight, out of mind.
“Cheers, Bex, you look like microwaved shite,” chirps my personal secretary, Cilla.
“I’m just overtired.” It’s technically not a lie. “Actually, is it okay if I take a few more minutes?”
Cilla cocks an eyebrow, then nods briskly and hands me my usual stack of newspapers and tabloids. I excuse myself to my bedroom and fan them out on the paisley comforter. I’m everywhere. The Guardian’s front-page piece, GREAT BEXPECTATIONS, is about international wedding fever. WE’RE SO BEXCITED!, screeches The Sun, before handicapping what I’ll wear down the aisle. HALF HUMAN HALF CHEESE WHEEL BORN TO LEICESTER COUPLE: Mother Weeps, “I Always Knew We’d Brie Blessed,” claims the Daily Star, dwarfing a blurb about whether I’d forced Nick to get hair plugs. The goofy photo they picked to illustrate this makes me smile. I haven’t slept beside Nick all week, and I miss him—his bedhead, the snores that could dwarf a thunderstorm, the way he can’t fall asleep unless we are touching. I even miss that he always burns the first waffle he toasts. I fell in love with a person, not a prince; the rest is just circumstance.
The problem is, it can be hard to remember that. Which is how I got myself into trouble.
A text comes through: TIME IS RUNNING OUT.
With a thump Lacey bursts into my room, atypically ashen considering how much money she spends never to be that color. I am so startled to see her that I can only blink as she slams the door and leans breathlessly against it. She feels so far away from me even though she’s standing right here.
“I did something,” Lacey begins, not quite making eye contact.
So did I, but of course she already knows that. Once upon a time, I would ask for her help, us against the world. Now, it’s her against me, and the world probably will pick her side.
I might be Cinderella today, but I dread who they’ll think I am tomorrow. I guess it depends on what I do next.
Part One
Autumn 2007
“O then ’tis! O then, I think no joy’s above
The pleasures, the pleasures of love.”
—King Charles II, “The Pleasures of Love”
Chapter One
If you believe my unauthorized biography, The Bexicon, Nick fell in love with me at a pub on my first night at Oxford, and angels burst into song while rose petals fell from the sky: