Page 38 of Wicked Queen

Chapter 14

Alexander

I threw the morning tabloids on Sarah’s breakfast plate, which she was enjoying well past noon. That probably explained how the girl in the photos looked so well-rested after a night of drunken partying.

“I suppose it doesn’t matter how perfectly they cook the eggs if there’s newsprint in them.” Yolk dripped from the pages as she picked them up with a look of disgust.

“I thought you’d want to take a look up your skirt, since half of Britain already has.” The cover of the top paper included a rather unflattering photo of her on her ass somewhere in East London.

“Lighten up. You used to take me to that club.” She shrugged, lifting her tea cup to her lips. “You sound like Dad.”

I looked to the heavens. If there was a god, he would grant me patience. I felt like her father, because she was acting like a child. “I stopped going to that club years ago.”

“When you got married, right? When you became boring. When you grew up,” she spat the words at me.

“Yes, Sarah, life went on without you. I’m sorry we didn’t all wait for you to come home.”

“But you didn’t even wait for me to wake up. You told everyone I was dead.” She stood and put herself on equal footing. “I’m just showing everyone I’m not.”

“You’ve been home one day—” I began.

“And I went out one night.” She dropped back into her chair with a trembling lip. “Do you know what I did when they let me have a phone—and after they showed me how to use the damn thing? I looked up my friends. Married. Kids. Divorced. Dead. I know life went on without me. You can’t imagine what it was like just to miss so much.”

“Not all of your friends have moved on,” I said. She was right. She’d been home one day and I’d jumped all over her.

“Pepper,” she said with meaning, “and you’ve disinvited her to my house.”

“She brought that on herself.” I would listen to Sarah, but that didn’t mean I wouldn’t correct her.

“Did you know I had a boyfriend before the accident? He’s married to some cunt in Devonshire.” Tears swam in her eyes. “About the only thing I have going for me is that I have money and no responsibilities because I have no job, no education, and, oh, yeah, my dad is dead. But, hey, I’m second in line to the throne.”

“Third,” I corrected her gently.

“Of course,” she said with a snort. “Soon to be fourth. Your perfect wife is procreating.”

“She welcomed you into our home.” My patience was wearing thin and bringing Clara into things stretched it further.

“She had no choice!”

“Yes, she did. It was up to her.” If Clara had said no, that would have been the end of the matter.

“She really has you whipped.” Sarah stared at me like she’d woken up with new eyes.

“First, no one says ‘whipped’ anymore. Allow me to catch you up on that. Next, I wouldn’t underestimate my wife.”

Sarah shook her head, frowning with what looked like sympathy. I realized too late that she’d misunderstood me. “I knew she had to be a conniving bitch. Married with two children—she tricked you. I did the math, she got pregnant so you would marry her. You don’t have to lie. Are you sure the baby is even—”

“Shut up,” I said in a low voice. She was teetering on the edge of saying something I couldn’t ignore. “I don’t deserve Clara or my daughter. They are the most important people in my life.”

“Is that supposed to mean something?” she hissed. “No one else warrants much thought, do they? I notice you didn’t come to visit me when I woke up. Every day, I learned some terrible new fact and all that information came from strangers.”

“I wanted to keep the press away.” Brex had told her as much, but my absence spoke louder than any message, it seemed.

“You wanted to keep them from finding out what you did, but you can’t shut me up, Alexander, and you can’t lock me away. I’ve had enough of that for a lifetime.” She stood, grabbing her tea cup. “If I want to dance naked on the streets for the next six months, I will. I’m an adult now.”

I wanted to tell her to act like it, but we were interrupted by Norris’s arrival. A man in a navy blue suit followed behind him. I clamped my mouth shut, not wanting an audience for our disagreement. Their presence had a similarly stupefying effect on Sarah. She stared at our new guest with ravenous eyes until they fell on his wedding band.

“Excuse me,” she huffed and sauntered down the hall.