Chapter Thirty

LORD CLARENCE PICTURED COSYING UP TO BOMBER MONTHS BEFORE ATTACK

Christopher Abbott-Montgomery, Earl of Clarence, has been having a secret affair with close friend Aoife Marsh, one of three suspects arrested at the site of the Modern Music Museum bombing that claimed the lives of eight people and has left His Majesty the King in critical condition.

Photos of the pair cuddling at a local pub last November have surfaced, months after they met through mutual friends at Oxford University, and a member of the couple's inner circle has confirmed the relationship.

"Everyone knows Christopher and Aoife have been sneaking around, spending the night together and snogging in dark corners when they think no one is watching," says the source, who wished to remain anonymous. "He's tired of the constant drama surrounding Evangeline, and when he's had too much to drink, he always goes on about how she won't let him touch her after what that Jasper bloke did to her. I guess he finally got tired of waiting. I know I would."

Clarence, 19, is currently rumoured to be a suspect in the bombing, along with his girlfriend of seven months, Evangeline Bright, illegitimate daughter of the King, who was specifically thanked by the Army of the British Republic for her participation in the terrorist attack. Both the Home Office and the Palace have declined tocomment on the duo's connection to the ongoing investigation.

—The Daily Sun,17 January 2024

AN HOUR LATER, JENKINS AND I walk down the hallway of the hospital together as every single person—staff and guard alike—eyes me like I'm about to pull a grenade from my pocket and lob it into the nearest crowd.

It's jarring, to say the least, and it leaves me both queasy and questioning why I'm here in the first place. "Does my mom know?" I say softly as we pass through yet another checkpoint of the seemingly infinite layers of security that surround my father.

"She doesn't know anything about the investigation or the claims against you and Lord Clarence," says Jenkins at a volume that matches mine. "You may tell her if you'd like, and perhaps it would be good if you did. But I didn't want to do so without your permission."

The thought of telling my mother that the world thinks I helped plan the bombing is enough to make me wish I had a vomit bin. "Not yet," I mumble, and Jenkins nods, mercifully leaving it at that.

As we approach my father's hospital room, both protection officers at the door shift their stance as they scrutinize me. I try to pretend I don't see their hands twitch toward their hidden holsters, but they're not exactly subtle about it.

"Gentlemen," says Jenkins as we stop in front of the room. "Miss Bright is here to visit His Majesty."

The larger of the two steps toward me. "All visitors are required to be searched—"

"We've been searched three times already, as you very well know," says Jenkins. "Both the palace and Home Office have already determined that the claims against Miss Bright are baseless, and that she is not a threat. Do you know something we don't?"

The protection officers glance at each other, and one picks up a walkie-talkie to mumble something into it. A burst of static responds almost instantly, and he grimaces.

"Lovely," says Jenkins, as if this has all been settled, and with a grudging nod, the first guard opens the door for us. If the situation were any different, I'd be fascinated by this rare display of Jenkins's power. But as we enter the room, all I can do is stare at my father's prone and broken body, and my mother's hunched form on the small sofa that's situated a few feet from the edge of Alexander's bed. A new nurse sits at the computer, scribbling something down on a clipboard, and while she nods to us both in greeting, she returns to her work immediately.

"Whenever you're ready to leave, let the protection officers outside know, and someone will come to escort you," says Jenkins. "There's no rush, though, darling. Stay as long as you'd like."

I nod, but even though I want to be here, I'm not sure how much I can take. A heaviness surrounds this place, muffling any sense of the past or the future, and even though I knew exactly what to expect, it still feels like another world.

My mom looks up then, and her eyes are distant, like she's focused on something no one else could ever possibly see. The haziness clears up after a beat, however, and she manages a smile.

"There you are, Evie," she says, beckoning for me, and I notice a large open sketchbook resting on her lap. As I cross the room to join her, she clears a place for me among the pencils, brushes, and various other art supplies that always seem to follow her wherever she goes, and to my surprise, I notice the paint set Kit gave her for Christmas.

"You're really using that?" I say as I ease down beside her.

"This? Of course," she says, opening it to show me the half-empty tubes of paint. "It's incredibly useful. Your Kit has excellent taste, you know."

I try to smile, but I still can't manage it. Part of me knows I should tell her about the Abr's claims and about the picture with Aoife, but even if I wanted to, I don't know how. She'll find out eventually—there's no way to hide the accusations of murder and treason from her forever—but for now, her ignorance is a balm, and I need it more than I realized.

"Are you okay?" I say. "Do you have your medication with you? Is everyone treating you all right? Have you been eating?"

My mother pulls me closer and kisses my forehead. "I'm perfectly fine, sweetheart, don't worry. Jenkins is making sure I have everything I need."

Of course he is, and I make a mental note to thank him. "How is Alexander?" I say, glancing at the bed and the beeping machines presumably keeping him alive. She sighs.

"There hasn't been much improvement," she admits. "But he isn't getting any worse, either, and that's the important part. It can take a while for the swelling to go down, and until it does…"

She trails off, and instead of finishing, she rubs my back for a moment before focusing on her sketchbook. It's only because she isn't trying to hide it that I let myself look at the unfinished drawing, and when I do, I'm startled to see my own toddler face peering back at me.

I can't be older than two or three, and I'm laughing, all baby teeth and chubby cheeks as someone tickles me. The hands are large and nothing like my mother's, and as soon as I spot the rough sketch of a signet ring on the pinky, I realize they must beAlexander's.

"Wow," I say as my mother defines the knuckles, her pencil moving so quickly that it looks like she's revealing what's already there beneath the blank page. "Did that really happen?"

"Of course," she says, and she pauses long enough to flip back a page. There's another picture, this one of her and Alexander sitting in what I recognize as her backyard in Arlington, and she's filled in the garden with bursts of watercolor. They look young in the painting—just a few years older than I am—and it seems so real that it's almost like I'm staring into her memories.

"That's beautiful," I say softly, as if speaking too loudly will ruin it somehow.

"It's nothing," she says, but her cheeks grow pink as she turns to a third drawing. It's a detailed study of Alexander's sleeping face, whole and well, and his fingers peek through toward the bottom of the picture, laced with someone else's—my mother's, no doubt. He's young in this one, too, but as she moves to another page, there's a near-identical drawing, and this time, there are lines around his eyes, and his hairline isn't as thick as it was in his twenties.

One by one, she shows me each of the nearly two dozen drawings, all memories of their history together. By the time we reach the very first sketch, my vision is blurred, and I blink hard before taking in the details of a large building with remarkably detailed Gothic architecture. A girl—my mother—sits on the edge of a fountain in the foreground, sketch pad in hand, as a figure that can only be my father walks toward her. His face is hidden, but I'm struck by the look in her graphite eyes. Somehow, my mother's managed to convey an entire lifetime of love and joy with only a few pencil strokes, and I brush the tip of my finger against the page, far from any spot I might smudge.

"This is the day Alex and I met," she says, leaning her head against mine. "I used to think the idea of love at first sight was a fairy tale, but from the moment I laid eyes on him, I knew he was it for me."

"He told me the same thing about you," I say quietly as I gaze at those pencil figures, who have no idea what kind of heartbreak and tragedy are lying in wait for them. "Do you regret it at all? Going to Oxford, I mean. Meeting him. Maybe if you hadn't…"

"If I hadn't met him, I wouldn't have you," she says. "And even if Alexander and I hadn't worked out, even if he'd never spoken to me again after you were born, you're worth every moment of it, Evie. Good, bad, devastating—I'd do it all again a thousand times over if it meant bringing you into this world. You know that, right?"

My mom peers at me with such naked vulnerability that I nod, even though I don't know this. Even though I can't imagine that I really am worth the pain and suffering she's faced. She must see my uncertainty, because she sighs and sets the sketchbook aside.

"I hate that you only remember the worst parts," she says, clasping my hand between both of hers. "My mother—your grandmother thought it was best for me to keep my distance from you while I was still recovering. And she was right at first, especially…well, especially in the immediate aftermath. But it robbed you of seeing the good parts, too, even when they were messy and might've seemed like our darkest moments from the outside looking in."

"Like what?" I say, not entirely sure I want to know. Hearing her talk about Alexander makes me ache in a way I can't entirely face, but it's a good kind of pain, too, I think.

She hesitates. "For instance, when I was hospitalized after…well, after what I did to…what happened to you, I didn't see anyone for months. I refused, and I was…" Her throat tightens, and she glances at Alexander for a split second. "I was in a bad place. But your dad visited me every week. Every single week, he would take a red-eye from London, and he would sit in the visitors' lounge, waiting for me to come out."

"He did?" I say, but I'm not surprised. Nothing about how much they love each other surprises me anymore.

"He did. And eventually I started to look forward to it, even though I refused to see him. Just knowing he was there…during a time when I hated myself more than anyone else ever could, it gave me something to live for. And I think he knew that. I think he knew how much I needed him, even though I couldn't admit it. But when I did…when I finally worked up the courage to see him, he didn't blame me for hurting you. He didn't tell me what a terrible mother I was, even though I deserved it."

"You're not—" I begin, but she squeezes my hand.

"I thought I deserved it at the time," she amends. "But your dad made sure—still makes sure—that I know he didn't believe it. He made sure I knew that he understood what had happened, and all he wanted was to help me heal."

She looks at him again, and even though he's lying motionless on the bed, covered in bandages and bruises and stitches that will undoubtedly leave scars, there's no fear in her eyes. Just a depth of love I can't even begin to fathom.

"Now it's my turn to make sure that he knows I'm here for him," she continues, "and that I'm not going anywhere. And I won't pretend it's not one of the most difficult things I've ever done, seeing him like this, not knowing if he'll ever wake up or be the person he was before. But in a way, it gives me the chance to love him the way he loved me then, as painful as it is. And there's nothing more worthwhile than that. So no, I don't regret any of it," she says, turning back toward me. "How could I? You're the brightest stars in my sky, and without you, life wouldn't be worth living."

I don't know what to say to that, and so I just hold her hand as she shifts closer to me.

"All I want now," she says, "is for the three of us to have the chance to make new memories. Alexander's fighting to stay—I know he is, just like he's always fought for you and me. But even if he…even if he doesn't make it, even if these memories are all we'll ever have together, I'll always be here for you, Evie. I won't ever be able to make up for the time we lost, but I also won't ever leave you again. Okay?"

"Okay," I whisper, resting my head on her shoulder. Maybe it's the weariness, or maybe it's the number of times I've cried in the past five days, but suddenly all I want is to believe that she really is a permanent part of my life, in a way she's never been before. It seems like some distant dream—like a fantasy I'll never really have—but in that moment, leaning against her and listening to the soft sound of the beeps, I desperately want to believe it.

"Evangeline."

My eyes fly open as the sound of my name seems to filter through the air, little more than a soft whoosh as a distant door closes. "Did you hear that?" I say, sitting up straight, and my mom frowns.

"Hear what?"

"Someone said my name," I say. "I heard it earlier, too, in—"

I cut myself off, but I can already feel the concern radiating from her. For a long moment, I listen, waiting to hear it again, and I'm so focused that when she touches my hair, I jerk away.

"Do you want to talk about it?" she says with gentleness I can't stomach, because I know what she's thinking. It's the same thing I've been afraid of ever since the voices began, and my mouth goes dry.

In the weeks and months that followed, Laura Bright was diagnosed with schizophrenia, a lifelong mental illness that often has a genetic component.

They're the words from the Daily Sun article that revealed my mother's history and diagnosis to the world. At the time, it was a not-so-subtle swipe at me, considering the paper is owned by Robert Cunningham, who was convinced I'd killed his son. But that sentence is seared into my brain, and finally I admit to myself that I'm terrified it might be right.

Auditory hallucinations. Paranoia. Confusion. The absolute certainty that I'm seeing something that no one else will admit is there. I feel like I'm standing at the edge of a cliff, painfully aware of my mother's worried gaze, and at last I bury my face in my hands.

"I've been…hearing things," I say softly into my palms. "Mostly whispers when I wake up and go to sleep at night. Sometimes they say things, like my name, or—or threats." I bite my lip, but now that I've admitted it, the words spill out of me like a waterfall. "And the flowers Ben's been sending me…he's behind this, Mom—I know he is, but whenever I try to tell someone, they make me feel like I'm—I'm—"

"Paranoid?" she offers quietly. "Imagining things? Connecting dots that aren't really there?"

I nod and finally work up the courage to look at her. "Nothing feels right anymore," I say thickly. "But I'm also so sure I'm not making any of it up that—I don't know what to think. I don't know what's real."

My mom sighs and gathers me in her arms, her auburn waves tickling my nose as I breathe in the scent of her. Even after nearly a week at Alexander's bedside, she still smells like home.

"You've been under an enormous amount of stress lately, Evie," she says. "It would take a toll on anyone. We'll find someone to help you sort through this, all right?"

I nod, though my heart feels like it's being squeezed in a vise. "But what if it's not just stress? What if…?"

While I can't force the words out, my mom understands. "Then we'll make sure you have the care you need," she says. "It'll be okay, sweetheart, no matter what happens. I promise."

There's no fear or pity or disappointment in the way she says it. Instead, she's so calm about it, so matter-of-fact, that even though I'm all but clawing at the walls of my own mind, I let myself believe her. And for the first time since the bombing, I relax. Not entirely—not when I'm feet away from my father, whose chest rises and falls only because a machine is breathing for him—but enough that the crushing weight of anxiety inside me lessens to the point where, at least for the moment, it's bearable.

My mom nuzzles my hair. "Why don't I head back to Windsor with you tonight?" she says. "We can spend a little time together. Watch a movie, maybe, if you're up for it."

"Don't you want to stay with Alexander?" I say warily.

"I'll let Constance know so she can sit with him. He won't be alone."

And while I know I should say no—that every minute she's away from him, she'll only worry—I selfishly don't want to. Because even during all those years on my own at boarding school, even after everything Jasper did to me, even in the thick of the shooting and the bombing and every awful thing that's happened lately, I don't think I've ever needed her more than I do right now.

"Okay," I say. "But we'll be back tomorrow morning, all right? First thing."

"First thing," she agrees, and she kisses my hair again as we settle into silence, both of us lost in our thoughts as we listen to the steady beat of Alexander's heart.