American Royals (29 page)

Beatrice couldn’t sleep.

In the week since she and Teddy announced their engagement, their schedule had moved at a breakneck pace, crammed with dinners and speeches and charitable visits. Just this morning their entire family had gone to a homeless shelter across town. Beatrice barely had time to get her hair and makeup done afterward, for her engagement photo shoot with Teddy: to take the pictures that would be reproduced on all their wedding merchandise. Pillows and paper dolls, coffee mugs and playing cards, and of course the limited-edition royal engagement stamps: all of it would be plastered with their faces. It felt a bit ridiculous, but Beatrice knew better than to refuse any of the licensing requests, not when the latest estimates projected that her wedding would boost the economy by over three hundred million dollars.

Honestly, she was grateful for the busy schedule. She felt like one of those sharks that needed to keep swimming in order to stay alive. As long as she was in a meeting with members of Congress, or discussing the wedding, or even just
smiling
at someone, she could momentarily forget that her dad was sick—that her time as queen was coming so much sooner than anyone would have imagined.

She could forget that the Guard trailing her movements wasn’t Connor, but Jake.

But the forgetting never lasted long enough. Because everything in the palace now reminded Beatrice of Connor: of the wicked edge to his humor, the quick, sure grace of his movements. The way his blue-gray eyes lit up every time he saw her.

Even though there were more people than ever at the palace these days, even though she now had a
fiancé,
Beatrice had never felt so alone.

She got out of bed and went to open her windows, to gaze at the net of lights that glittered over the capital. The streetlamps blazed in straight, clean lines around the rectangle of darkness that marked John Jay Park.

Her stomach growled resentfully. Teddy’s family had come over for dinner tonight, to discuss next week’s engagement party, and Beatrice hadn’t had much of an appetite. She’d forced herself to swallow a few bites of her swordfish, but it felt like shards of glass in her stomach. Luckily no one had noticed—just as no one seemed to look past her false smiles, to notice the shadow that lingered in her eyes.

With a heavy sigh, Beatrice pulled on a robe and headed downstairs to the kitchens. The stainless-steel appliances and sleek black cooktops gleamed invitingly. No one was here at this hour: the first sous-chefs and busboys wouldn’t arrive until six a.m.

She opened the refrigerator, about to grab one of the containers of leftovers that the cooks always kept here for just this situation, only to pause. She didn’t want the cold remnants of tonight’s dinner. For once in her life, Beatrice would cook something for herself.

After a few minutes of clattering around, she unearthed a massive saucepan. She poured water into it and set it on the stove to boil, fumbling with the knobs. What was that mesh thing Connor had used to drain the cooked pasta? And where in this vast kitchen was she supposed to
find
pasta, anyway?

That night in the cabin felt like it belonged to another lifetime, another Beatrice. How simple everything had been back then, before she knew about her father’s condition. Before she’d had to give up Connor.

She braced her palms on the counter, her breath coming in short, panicked gasps. And finally—now that she didn’t have to keep that fragile smile on her face, now that there was no one around to see—she let herself cry.

“Beatrice? Are you okay?”

Samantha stood in the doorway, wearing a robe identical to Beatrice’s; their mom had given them as Christmas gifts this year. Her hair was pulled into a messy side ponytail that made her whole head look lopsided. Typical Samantha.

Beatrice hastily wiped away her tears. “I was trying to make pasta,” she admitted. “What are you doing here?”

“Same thing as you, I guess. I didn’t eat much at dinner.”

“Oh.” Beatrice felt suddenly tentative and uncertain around her sister. In all her own discomfort at the meal with Teddy’s family, she hadn’t really thought that it might be awkward for Samantha, too. But wasn’t she over Teddy by now?

Sam kicked one fuzzy slipper idly against the other. “Remember the time we came in here before a state dinner and accidentally knocked over that enormous cake?”

“They had to send someone out at the last minute to buy fifty tubs of lemon sorbet,” Beatrice recollected. That was back before her grandfather died, when she could get away with behavior like that. “We got in so much trouble that night.”

“We were always in trouble,” Sam countered, and shrugged. “At least, Jeff and I were.”

The water in the pot began to boil. Beatrice made a helpless noise and turned back toward it. She still hadn’t found any pasta.

“I think there’s some mac and cheese in the pantry,” Sam pointed out.

“Which pantry?” Beatrice knew about the crystal pantry, the silver pantry, the china pantry—

“The one with food in it.” Sam sounded almost amused. “Here, I’ll look for it.”

Beatrice tried to hide her surprise at Samantha’s offer. “That would be great, actually.”

Her sister ducked into the pantry, emerging moments later with a blue-and-white box labeled MACARONI AND CHEESE: ROYAL ADVENTURE! The flat noodles were shaped like tiny tiaras and stars, as well as a girl in a ball gown that Beatrice suspected was meant to be
her.

“Whoever’s in charge of restocking has a sense of humor,” she heard herself say. Sam lifted an eyebrow but didn’t reply.

Neither of them spoke as Sam ripped open the box, poured the noodles into the hot water, then drained them several minutes later. She measured out butter and milk from the fridge before stirring it with the powdered cheese sauce.

“How do you know all this?”

“It’s just mac and cheese; anyone can do it,” Sam pointed out, then winced. “Sorry, I didn’t …”

“It’s okay. We both know I’m not anyone normal.” Beatrice laughed, but there was no humor in it. She hated how helpless she was at such simple domestic tasks. She hated that this life had ruined her for a normal one.

“Most of cooking is just following the directions. It really isn’t hard.”

Then I should be great at it,
Beatrice thought plaintively. All she ever did was follow instructions.

Sam scooped the pasta into two cereal bowls and grabbed a pair of spoons, then hiked herself up onto the counter to sit with her feet dangling over the edge. After a moment Beatrice followed suit. Well, it wasn’t as if they were about to carry late-night mac and cheese into the formal dining room.

The macaroni was delicious, its warm cheesiness curiously comforting. Beatrice wondered what Connor would say if he saw the princesses like this—sitting atop the kitchen counter, eating royal-shaped mac and cheese.

“What is that on your finger?” Sam’s voice echoed around the cavernous kitchen. “Are you not wearing your ring?”

Beatrice glanced down at her left hand, so blatantly bare where the enormous diamond should have been. If you looked closely, you could see the faded Sharpie line that Connor had drawn there.

“I take the ring off at night when I wash my face, to keep the soap from getting it dirty,” she lied. “I must have accidentally left it on the ring stand by my sink.”

Every night Beatrice slipped off that ring the instant she was alone. It was too cold, too heavy, its enormous weight almost too much to bear. It felt like it belonged to someone else and had been given to her by mistake.

“Do you love him?”

Sam’s question caught her so off guard that she almost dropped her ceramic bowl.

“I’m just trying to understand,” Sam persisted. “In your room that day, after you proposed to him, you seemed so unhappy. I keep watching you and Teddy at all your engagement events, waiting for either of you to say
I love you,
but you never have.”

Beatrice shifted on the counter. Samantha was far more observant than the world gave her credit for.

“I just wish it had been anyone but Teddy. At least if it was someone else …” Sam trailed off before she could finish, but Beatrice knew enough to fill in the blanks.

If Teddy were free of their engagement, then at least
one
of the Washington sisters might be happy.

Beatrice had assumed that Sam was flirting with Teddy out of spite, or simply because she was bored. She hadn’t realized her sister’s feelings ran so deep.

Beatrice twirled the spoon between her fingers. It was heavy, engraved with fruits and foliage all the way down the handle. “I’m sorry,” she told her sister. “I wish things were different.”

Sam’s eyes blazed. “Then go
make
them different! Get unengaged to Teddy so you can both move on with your lives!”

“I can’t just get
unengaged
to him.” Beatrice rolled her eyes at Sam’s made-up word. “Not now. I would be letting everyone down.”

“Who, the PR people and party planners? In case you forgot, they work for
you
!”

“It’s not just them,” Beatrice said helplessly.

“What is it, then?” Sam’s face went a hot, indignant red. “If you don’t love Teddy, why are you rushing to the altar?” Her temper had always been like this, cruel and lightning quick. Beatrice felt her hold on her emotions starting to fray.

“I know it might seem fast, but I’ve given this a lot of thought, okay? I really am trying to do the right thing for this country.”

“And what reason does the
country
have for needing you to get married right now?”

Beatrice felt suddenly dizzy. “Stability,” she insisted, “and continuity, and symbolism …”

“You’re just saying a bunch of meaningless
words
!”

“Because Dad is
dying
!”

Beatrice hadn’t meant to say that. She wished she could snatch the sentence from the air and swallow it back into her chest, where its razor-sharp wings had been beating furiously for weeks. But it was too late.

“What?” Sam’s hands gripped the edges of the counter so tightly that her knuckles turned white.

“He has cancer,” Beatrice said miserably.

“What?” Sam repeated, with an audible gasp. “What do you—how can—why didn’t he tell us?” she managed at last. A tear trailed down her face and fell into the bowl of macaroni that lay forgotten in her lap.

Then Beatrice was crying too, as the story spilled from her in a jumbled mess: their father’s fatal diagnosis, the reasons he had for keeping it to himself—and what he had asked Beatrice to do.

Samantha set her mac and cheese aside with a jarring clatter and threw her arms fiercely around Beatrice.

It was the first time they had hugged like this in years. Beatrice hadn’t realized, until this moment, how much she’d missed her sister.

“I can’t believe you’ve been dealing with all of this.” Sam reached up to fiddle with her ponytail. “You’ve held it together so well, I never would have realized that you were upset.”

“Sometimes I think I hold it together
too
well,” Beatrice said softly. She hated that her siblings thought she was cold or unfeeling. Just because she’d been brought up to keep her emotions hidden didn’t mean that she never
experienced
those emotions.

Sam nodded. Tears still glistened on her cheeks. “I’m glad you told me. No one should have to carry this kind of burden alone.”

“That’s what being the heir to the throne is. Being alone,” Beatrice said automatically. Walking alone, sleeping alone, sitting alone on a solitary throne.

Even once she married Teddy, Beatrice knew, she would still feel alone.

A gentle hum emanated from the refrigerators. The overhead lights fell in wide beams over Samantha’s features.

“Do you ever wish that you were someone else?” Beatrice asked, after a while.

“I always used to wish I was you. Because I’m utterly pointless, while you are literally the point of everything.” Sam tilted her head to look at Beatrice in confusion. “But you shouldn’t feel that way. Why on earth would
you
want to be someone else?”

Beatrice had never thought that Sam might be jealous of her—that Sam would actually prefer to be the heir.

“Because I didn’t ask for this.” Beatrice heaved a breath. “Trust me, I realize how lucky I am to have been born with this kind of privilege. But I’m still jealous of everyone else in the country, because they get to choose what direction their lives will take. Other kids can dream of being astronauts or firefighters or dancers or doctors,” she said helplessly. “But no one in my life has ever asked me what I want to be when I grow up, because there is only one possible future for me.”

“Beatrice,” Sam asked, her eyes wide. “Do you even
want
to be queen?”

“Wanting has nothing to do with it,” Beatrice reminded her. “I am a Washington, just like you, and becoming the queen has always been my future. My road is laid out before me, but yours doesn’t have to be. You have options, you have freedom, that I never will.”

They were both quiet at that.

Sam reached for her sister’s hand and gave it a squeeze. “Remember when we were little, and I used to sneak into your closet to steal your clothes?”