AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Hell, who was she kidding? It’d be lights out before the opening credits finished crossing the screen.
But she could feel Tasha staring at her. “What?”
Tasha’s brows rose to meet her sideswept bangs. “Considering your mood, I’m not sure if I should show you this, but... I think you’d want to know about it.”
Dani had heard there was a time before social media. She’d give anything to experience the world back then. When every minute wasn’t a potentially life-changing land mine, ready to blow.
“What now?”
Tasha grimaced. “It’s Samantha Banks.”
Dani threw up her hands. “Don’t even joke about that.”
Since the eruption of the scandal involving Banks and Prince Julian, the palace had been working overtime to prevent discussion of it from gaining traction. Anytime the hashtag #PrinceJulianSparkleAffair was trending on social media, it would suddenly disappear and be replaced by something far more positive about the royal family.
#RoyalFamilyRules #JulianandFiona #BabyWales
Social media worked hard. Queen Marina and her staff worked harder.
Other than learning that Banks had tried to sneak into Nyla’s movie premiere, Dani hadn’t heard a peep from her or her Sparkle Sammies. And, at least in the media, Dani had been vindicated. Someone had come forward with the unedited video, proving what Dani had said all along and causing calls for Banks to be canceled on multiple platforms.
Dani hoped the young woman had learned her lesson.
“Is Samantha talking about me?” she asked.
“No,” Tasha said, her tone slightly bemused.
Thank God.
“Then I don’t care.”
“Are you sure? Because this is ju-say,” Tasha said, drawing the word out into two sassy syllables.
“Oh, what the hell.” Dani took the phone.
She almost choked when she saw the headline:Royally Knocked Up?
The article linked to a TikTok of Samantha Banks walking into a high-end baby boutique. As Britney Spears sang her iconic intro, “Oh baby, baby,” on a loop in the background, the video cut from a profile image of Banks thumbing through tiny clothes on a rack to looking at baby toys to staring longingly down into an empty crib.It ended on a torso shot of her—in a Union-Jack T-shirt!—cradling her still flat stomach and looking beatifically into the camera.
Dani shot widened eyes at Tasha. “No!”
Tasha shrugged. “She never explicitly says, but if you look at the comments, when people asked, she replied with these cryptic responses like, ‘Spring is a time of rebirth,’ and ‘Guess we’ll see in March,’ with a baby emoji... and a crown!”
Dani bracketed her head with her hands, attempting to process this new information.
Samantha Banks was trying to claim she was pregnant with Julian the Prince of Wales’s baby?
Holy shit!
Chapter Eight
“There’s an uproar over the news that Prince Julian may be expecting more than one spare to the throne. Speculation is growing that American singer Samantha Banks has named HRH as the father of her unborn baby. A scandal of this magnitude will be hard for the royal family to overcome. Many are doubting whether the Prince of Wales can ever be king. Just another in a long line of scandals making headlines and further damaging a monarchy in crisis. Abigail Tindyre, BBC News.”
“The queen has to be shitting bricks right now,” Dani said, the twinkle in her brown eyes clear through the screen of his phone.
Jameson laughed. “I wouldn’t know. We’re not that close.”
Her responding chuckle caressed his heart. “Good point. And to think... she’d been worried about me!”
