Page 114 of The Heir Apparent
I looked at Dee. “I’m here to talk about the night my mother died, and I want to explain why I am unable to wear the crown,” I said. “But there’s something else I need to tell you. It’s time the British people knew who their future king really is.”
CHAPTER THIRTY
31 December 2023
I woke up as the plane glided over Boomer Bay, sparkling in the summer sun, and then landed among the pine forests that surrounded the airport.
It was a perfect Hobart day. Despite the heat, I walked across the tarmac in my hoodie, breathing in the pure Southern Ocean air. I knew I was home when I watched, bleary-eyed, as a fibreglass seal statue glided past on the baggage carousel. Children with Australian accents dodged me as they ran around my feet. Sniffer dogs inspected my backpack for illicit apples.
I felt Jack’s proximity like a cosmic tug. He was down the road, across a few paddocks, and behind the gates of the Jennings vineyard. But I knew I couldn’t think about that. I pulled my hood forward so it nearly covered my eyes. No one had recognised me yet, not in the hotel where I spent twelve hours with Dee, and not on the two subsequent flights to get home. But Hobart was a small town, where it was common to run into old friends at the airport, so I kept my eyes on the floor.
As soon as I turned my phone back on, it rang.
“Hey,” I said quietly.
“Last leg okay?”
“Yep, all fine.” I peered at the hole in the wall where bags were starting to emerge. “Any more updates?”
“Well,” Mary said, sounding pleased, “Dee called Davide Rossi, and he agreed to give her an interview.”
My stomach lurched, and I looked at the people around me. Their eyes remained on the carousel as they waited for their bags.
“But Dee won’t pay him,” I said. “She’s not that kind of journalist—she works for a paper of record, not a tabloid.”
“I know. She was as surprised as you are.”
A couple jostled to the front so they could pull a suitcase from the conveyor belt. Their little girl peered up at me curiously, and I turned, wandering further down the carousel where I would be away from the crowd.
“I don’t understand why he’d do it.”
“She gave him a call, expecting he would just hang up. But she said he agreed to an interview on the spot. He wasn’t looking for payment, he just wanted to be truthful about what happened,” Mary said. “According to Dee, he said he’d never seen a mother and daughter who loved each other more. He called you ‘bellezzaandcarina.’”
I let out a shaky breath and closed my eyes against the pain at the core of me. It was difficult to imagine that anyone could forgive me. But maybe James was right. Maybe I needed to forgive myself first.
“What happens now?” I asked Mary.
My bag finally appeared, and I struggled to drag it to my feet.
“Annabelle’s and Amira’s interviews are done, so Rossi is the last piece of the puzzle,” she said. “The paper will have to talk to their legal team and then give Richard adequate time to respond, so I imagine the story will be out in about a week.”
I heard her hesitate.
“The palace will come after you hard. You know that, right? Their only option will be to try to discredit you.”
“I know.”
It felt like I had slowly edged the pin from my old life. Now I was watching the spring-loaded striker smashing against the fuse, lighting a tiny unstoppable spark. In a week’s time, I would be stripped of my titles by parliament. But as Richard stepped over me, I was ready for him—I would be the explosive rolled at just the right moment, at just the right angle, detonating beneath his foot.
Soon everyone would know that he had tried to blackmail me. They would know that Papa and Annabelle spent years living in fear of Richard. And while Amira had spoken in support of Annabelle and me, she had shared no secrets of her own. The truth of Louis and Kris’s relationship wasn’t our story to tell. Maybe one day everyone would know how happy they were—after we were all gone.
“Why are you doing this?” Dee had asked me in the hotel room, her pen poised over a scribble-filled notepad. “Are you trying to topple the monarchy?”
I was silent for a while, unsure of the answer. I had once believed I could change things from the inside. But if Granny was right, the crown had already decided whose head it was destined to land upon. There was a reason it briefly floated towards me—if only so I could nudge it away from Richard and towards Demelza.
“I’m doing this because I can’t live with the lies anymore,” I said to Dee. “My only option is to be honest about everything I’ve done and everything my uncle has done. The people of Britain and the Commonwealth deserve the truth. What happens next is up to them.”
Outside the airport, the heat was dry and stifling. I pulled off the hoodie I’d used to hide my face.
