Page 35 of Heavy Crown

The urge to hug him is almost overwhelming. Whether I should be hugging Kane or Alex, I’m not sure. When Alex wants something done, it happens. I’ve never known a man who was able to direct life so smoothly, even from a distance.

“Thank you!” Marching back to Derrick, I sling the suitcase onto the bed. I heave armfuls of clothes into the suitcase while Kane and Derrick look on. From the bathroom, I stuff my toiletries bag with everything essential. Whatever I leave behind doesn’t matter at this point. Away from Derrick is my objective.

“Rory, are you really going to leave like this? We’re not going to talk this out?” He tries to tug me into his arms, and Kane tenses. “Come on, babe. We’ve been together for two years.”

The babe grinds on my memory of the other night, and I grit my teeth. “There’s nothing to talk about.” Two years of my life, down the drain. The reality of how deeply, how epically, we’ve failed hits me, and tears sting the back of my eyes. I ruined my relationship with my father for this, for him. I alienated my family and friends for him.

Maybe I should go home. Grasp the life my parents planned for me with both hands and hope I never meet another Derrick.

I pause my packing, a T-shirt in my hand, and close my eyes. Was he always like this? So self-absorbed?

Derrick takes my silence as consent, and he drags me against his chest.

“Don’t.” I shove him and throw the shirt into my suitcase. “Just don’t.” I press down on the lid of the suitcase, and I try to tug the zipper closed, but there’s too much in the case.

Kane comes to my shoulder. “You press down. I’ll zip.”

Between the two of us, we wrestle the case closed while Derrick does nothing but stare at us with his hands in his pockets.

“I’m not giving up on us, Rory.” Derrick follows us to the door. “Whatever I have to do to get you back, I will.”

With a sigh, I whirl on him. “All you had to do was keep your dick in your pants. That’s it. Cheating is a hard line for me. Once or a hundred times, it wouldn’t matter. We can’t come back from this.”

I drag my keys out of my pocket and place them in his hand. There’s nothing left for me on the ring—every single key, from the apartment, to the car, to the golf course is a string to Derrick.

When I close the door behind me, the last tie between us severs. There’s a weird ache in my chest—not heartbreak, but more like disappointment. I had so much faith in us when I moved here, and this is how it ends.

“Follow me.” Kane leads us toward an emergency exit door with my suitcase at his side as though it weighs nothing. He must work out. “The car is at the bottom of the stairs.”

“Thanks.” A deep shuddering breath escapes me.

A weight I didn’t allow to settle while I rushed around my former apartment rests on my chest. No matter what happened the last two years, I had Derrick.

Now, I really am on my own.

fifteen

Alex

I pause the video and rewind it on my computer. How many times have I done this? I’ve lost track. How much of my day has been wasted rewatching Dumbass Derrick cock up the one thing he was asked to do? Not something I intend to calculate. I’ve never been this distracted by a press conference gone wrong.

Who can’t remember two words? “No comment” is not a hard phrase to master. My brothers and I have been saying it since we were old enough to speak.

We needed the two of them, together, and for her leave out the back exit while everyone waited for her at the front. Let the press infer what they wanted from the long, limitless visit.

Royal PR was precise on the sequence. Press snaps photos of Derrick and Rory. No comment from both. They disappear upstairs. Kane picks her up at the emergency exit. A perfect diversion from their obtrusive questions about me and Rory.

The narrative would be turned into a discussion about cheating, taking back an ex, and whether Rory and Derrick had reunited and not about what was brewing between me and the Canadian.

To some extent, the reunited exes appear to have become the story, but I hate how it’s come about.

In the video I’ve memorized, Dumbass Derrick has his hands all over her. But the part I keep rewinding is where she curls into him as though he’s a life raft in a stormy ocean. The person who almost literally dumped her into the sea isn’t a savior. Rory understands that, doesn’t she?

My assumption, based on my own ethics and the few conversations I had with her, was that she wouldn’t take him back. The Crown was subtly building a false narrative about Rory and Derrick so she could live and work for us largely in peace.

Except now my brain is in overdrive, wondering whether she might reunite with him, whether she wants to take him back. I rewind the video again.

Kane reports to my parents until the coronation, which is a year from now. I couldn’t grill him about Rory’s trip to the apartment. His text telling me Derrick wasn’t following the narrative was him doing his job. The interference I ran after that could raise the king’s and queen’s eyebrows even farther. Another lecture about royal duties, protocol, tradition, and not leading on vulnerable women isn’t on my agenda again for the rest of my life. No way I’m penciling in another diatribe from my parents because I can’t prevent this protective instinct from swelling, crowding out everything else in my life.