“Come in, E.”
She knows it’s me.
Of course she does.
My stomach is a pit of anxiety as I step inside. Our eyes meet, holding for an uncharacteristically long moment of total silence. I don’t know quite what to say to her; I’m sure she feels the same.
After all, I’ve just learned her mother attempted to kill me, and had her thrown in jail.
Just a normal day as a Lancaster.
There’s no question that Chloe already knows — in the time it took Galizia to drive me back to the palace, the news broke on social media. Pictures of Lady Octavia Thorne, the former Consort of Germania, being led out of Easter Sunday services at Windsor Abbey in handcuffs by the Queen’s Guard went instantly viral.
The irony of my social media manager seeing her mother trending on Twitter is not lost on me.
I don’t know what to say — whether to apologize or try to explain. Chloe and her mother were not close. And yet… she was still her mother. She might never forgive me for this. She might hate me for the rest of her life.
“I’m so fucking sorry, E,” Chloe blurts, before I can say a word.
“You’resorry?” I blink. “Why the hell are you sorry?”
“How could I not be? My mother tried tomurder you. I’m ashamed to call myself a Thorne. I’m ashamed to even look you in the eyes. God, you must hate me…”
“Chloe, stop! Stop. I could never hate you.” I shake my head. “In fact, I thought you might hate me.”
Her eyes go wide. “Why would I hate you?”
“I did just have your mother arrested…”
“And..?”
“She’s your family.”
“E.” She crosses to me and grabs me by the shoulders, shaking lightly. “Youare my family. That woman was never more than a birthing vessel to me.”
Tears gloss over my eyes as I step forward and throw my arms around my sister. I’m so relieved, I could sob.
“I thought—” I choke. “I thought maybe this was going to drive a wedge between us.”
“I thought you might not want me around, anymore. Daughter of a traitor and all.”
“Don’t be an idiot. You are nothing like Octavia.”
She hugs me tighter. “Thank god for that.”
We cling to each other for a while, taking comfort in the embrace. The anxiety stirring inside me slowly dissipates. Eventually, we move to sit on Chloe’s bed, each processing our own thoughts in silence.
I keep replaying the coronation over and over in my mind.
Linus, taking a sip of his champagne. Toasting to the future. Falling to the platform, froth forming at the corner of his mouth as poison hijacked his system.
It was the scariest moment of my life — at least, at that point in time: holding my father in my arms. Thinking he was about to die.
Now, looking back with all the facts, it’s strange to realize he was not the intended target. That, if not for a mix-up with the champagne flutes, I would’ve been the one dying on that platform.
One bloody sip.
“At least now, we finally have some answers,” Chloe says after a while, breaking the silence. “We know who’s been killing off the royal family.”