Page 70 of Consume Me

“Edward could.” I tried to imagine what I would do if my brother took Clara’s life. There would be no forgiveness. There would be no peace. Nothing would ever be the same. I knew that.

“I will take the blame,” Norris decided. “A brother shouldn’t bear that burden.”

“I’ll bear it all the same,” I said. “I can’t lie to him. I have to tell him.” I’d learned that lying to someone you loved could destroy everything. I couldn’t pretend or make up a story. I had to come clean and face the consequences.

“There’s something else you should know. I expect it was part of the plan.” Norris cleared his throat, searching for words that wouldn’t come.

The pause gave me time to remember the papers I’d stolen from the file during our raid. I pulled them out and opened them. “I found these. It seems like they were doing testing on you. Sarah said they did the same on her. I haven’t asked Clara yet. What are they doing? Why? Do you have any idea?”

“That makes sense.” He turned toward me, drawing my attention for a moment from my child. “I never wanted you to find this out. I promised her I would keep a secret until the day I died. It was our secret—the one bit of happiness your father could never take from us.”

My mouth went dry. I stared down at the strange diagrams clearly labeled with his name and matched up with two other sets.

“Your mother and I…” He took a steadying breath before plunging on. “We fell in love. We were never certain. There were never any tests, but Elizabeta believed that Sarah was my daughter.”

I stared at him, every thought in my head halting at once.

“We suspected Edward was my child as well. Those tests appear to confirm it.” He hung his head. For the first time in my life, Norris couldn’t meet my eyes.

But I wasn’t angry at him. Shocked? Yes. Full of questions? Obviously. This man had been like a father to me more so than my own had ever been. “And me?”

He looked a little sad as he answered. “I’ve always looked at you like a son, but I didn’t meet your mother until after you were born. You are the only one of Albert’s children with a legitimate claim to the throne.”

A curious mix of disappointment and understanding settled over me. Suddenly, so many things made sense. My father’s callous treatment of my siblings. His hatred of me. It must have killed him to see me with the man who’d stolen his wife—but only if he knew. “Did Albert…?”

“Yes and no. He knew about the affair. He had plenty of his own. It didn’t bother him until Sarah was born. He suspected what Elizabeta knew,” Norris said simply. “We guarded that knowledge with our lives.”

“And somehow MI-18 found out about it.” It was a lot to process in a day that was already full of overwhelming events.

“I’ll tender my resignation tomorrow. Today I would like to watch over your family,” he said quietly.

“Like hell you will,” I roared. “I can’t blame you for being a man. You were a better father to me than he ever was. This isn’t a job. You can’t quit family—and you are family.”

We would be forced to face this later. We’d have to confront the harsh reality of what this meant to who we were and how it would affect the ones we loved. But nothing changed the simple fact that family was built through love, not blood. Stepping toward him, I embraced him as a father, as a friend, as family.

Chapter 27

CLARA

My family arrived the following morning with fanfare that I could hear from the hallway. I didn’t know who told them we were here—it was probably BBC One. I’d opted to stay through the night to be close to William and receive extra IV fluids. Now I wished I was home where I could avoid the spectacle. Even Madeline Bishop couldn’t get into the palace if I told her no.

“Bollocks,” Alexander muttered from the chair, woken from his nap. He’d only been sleeping for an hour while Brex and Norris guarded the neonatal unit. The hospital was working on setting up a private room so we could all be together. I’d been aching to hold William, having only been allowed to touch him with protective gloves since the surgery. Now I was grateful we hadn’t been moved to our space yet. “Is that your mum?”

“I fear it is.” He was close enough that I could reach over and tousle his hair. When he wasn’t with William, he was always near enough to touch me. He wanted me at arm’s length so he could hold on if needed.

“Should I send them away?” Alexander turned worried eyes on me. He was still deferring to my desires, which was so unlike him that it left me flustered.

I knew he was trying to give me back the perception of control, but wasn’t that all any of us ever had? The illusion that we called the shots? The last few days had taught me that wasn’t the case and regardless of how he treated me now, I’d learned that lesson the hard way.

“Poppet?” he prompted when I didn’t answer.

“Might as well get it over with.” Some things simply had to be seen through. I’d survived child labor. I could survive seeing my family. Alexander stood to move to the door and I panicked. “I don’t want them to know what happened!”

A muscle ticked in his jaw, but he nodded. He’d told the doctor some of the last week’s events because she’d forced him to with her questions. There was no reason that anyone else needed to know.

Alexander had barely stepped through the doorway when the Bishops burst in. It was such an ordinary thing—balloons and presents and smiles—that I burst into tears.

My mother stopped in her tracks, frozen by my response. Then her eyes slowly swept the room. I knew what she was looking for and what she wouldn’t find. I didn’t have the energy to explain.