Page 64 of The Impossible Princess
My chest tightens and I groan, lifting my arms, expecting her to launch herself into them, crying her eyes out all over my pressed shirt if she needs to. The queen will have to take me as she finds me.
But when Clara stands, clasping and unclasping her hands, I drop my arms to my sides. I’m not sure what she needs. The silence stretches on, and unease spreads through my stomach. We’ve never been at a loss for words.
“Our meetings have gone highbrow,” I say in an attempt to lighten the mood. I glance over the formal gardens, imagining her in layers of petticoats and me in an elaborate waistcoat.
She doesn’t laugh—doesn’t even smile. I pace closer and I’m only an arm’s length away when she halts me.
“We have to stop this,” she nods. Her breath catches oddly, and the skin of her neck and face are washed in uneven red. My brows lower. Whatever is going on, I know she’d feel better—hell,I’dfeel better—if only I could hold her and we could get to the bottom of it. Her mother must have put her through a nightmare yesterday.
“Stop the TV program? I don’t think that’s possible,” I smile. “We still live in a constitutional monarchy.”
Her tongue darts along her lower lip before she lifts her chin and says in well-enunciated Sondish, “I brought you here to tell you that it’s time to conclude our relationship. We can’t keep seeing each other.”
Her words are a sucker punch, stealing my breath, knocking me on my heels before I’ve had time to raise my fists. But she spoke so clearly, and when I hear her words, really hear them, understanding rushes in on me.Vede. She wasn’t ready. I moved too fast. I botched everything.
Too fast? A bitter breath leaves me. I knew after twenty seconds that Clara was it for me. I knew it on the terrace of the ambassador’s house. I knew it standing next to her car under a summer sky making a ridiculous bargain. I knew it last year when my mouth dried up at the sound of her voice and I realized I couldn’t carry on with a tepid, half-hearted relationship.
This can’t be the end of us.
I lean against a balustrade, the sun at my back. I shove my hands into my pockets, careless of creases. “I get it. It’s a bad time. We’ll go back to friendly dinners,” I suggest. Maybe if I’m relaxed, give her time to think, she can clarify what she means.
“No, that’s a bad idea,” she says, clarifying me right off a cliff. “It always was.”
“Dinner was a bad idea? Come on, Clara.”
“Come on, Max,” she echoes, her tone exhausted, half-pleading, as though I know the script and won’t stick to it. In that fraction of a second, she is herself again, emotions breaking past the manners, but my relief is short-lived. “It hasn’t been just dinner for a long time, not for either of us. There’s enough footage and photos to keep the press busy for months.”
The press. The mere mention of them makes me want to launch a cruise missile at every green Ciprio in Sondmark.
“They should have to explain why they made it their business to sit out on a lake day after day with a long lens, spying on a young woman’s social life. It’s disgusting. They should apologize.”
She tilts her head. “That’s not how it works. That’s not how it ever works.” She swallows and takes a shaky breath. “We don’t get to ask for fairness when they lay us out on a metal table, dissecting every part.”
“Then let’s beat them at their own game because breaking up isn’t going to stop this. We can get out in front of it, scoop the reporters, and put out our own story about malicious stalking.” It’s a plan. Not a great one, but it’s something.
But Clara takes a hard swallow and closes her eyes. “You don’t understand, Max. Most hits we just have to absorb—the internet site with a countdown clock to my 18th birthday, rumors about Alma’s engagement, vile claims about my father’s background. That the Palace is crafting a response should tell you how big this mess is. They think we faked the Violet Presentation.”
“Stultes es.That’s asinine.”
“It isn’t when the prime minister is facing a credible challenge from the opposition party and needs to drum up popular support. By this time next week, half the country will be talking about how useless and spoiled I am, wondering why we don’t dethrone my mother.”
A breath breaks from my lungs. The queen. “Your mother married a man with links to a fascist state. She navigated her own life when it mattered. Why can’t you?”
Clara gasps but lifts her chin. “Don’t bring my father into this. I’m the one at fault. I had no business getting into a relationship with you when I knew things would take me in another direction.”
“Things? Is that a euphemism for your cousin’s son?” My control is slipping but I feel like a tree petrifying in the forest, turning to stone. My mouth is dry and my hands long to touch her, to close the distance between us and persuade her to forget who she is. It’s worked before.
But her mouth forms a line. “I’m not dropping this so that I can be with anyone else.”
“Not even your mother?” I shoot back, bitterness in every word.
She flinches, turning her face to the sun. “Until I’m established, my duties to the Crown are paramount. I’d forgotten that.”
“I made you so cross-eyed with lust that you took your eye off the ball? Try another one, Clara. You’ve had your wits about you. I haven’t kept you from your duties.” I should take her explanations and go. I should make this easy for her. But I can’t.
I reach for her hand and take a drag of air, “Clara, I need you to be brave for us. Fight. I’ll fight with you.”
For a moment, there is perfect stillness. Even the ocean seems to hold her breath. We balance there so long that I begin to hope. Then she slowly pulls her fingers from mine, crossing her arms over her stomach.
