The Crown(71)

“Eikko, please explain to him. I have to follow through with my Selection. Tell him he’ll never need to doubt me.”

Eikko rattled off my appeal quickly, but Henri’s expression remained undeterred.

“Please,” I pleaded, grabbing onto his arm.

His expression was incredibly sweet when he spoke. “I say no.” He picked up my hand and gently pulled off my engagement ring.

The room started turning fuzzy at the edges. I was minutes away from a live announcement, and I’d just been jilted.

Henri grabbed my face, looking deeply into my eyes. “Love you,” he vowed. “Love you.” Then he turned and clutched Eikko’s arm. “And love you. My good friend. Very good friend.”

Eikko swallowed, looking ready to cry from Henri’s words. Through most of the last two months, all they’d had were each other. Forget what this moment meant for me. What did it mean for them?

Henri pulled us both in close. “You being together. I make your cake!”

Despite my worries, I laughed. Looking into Eikko’s eyes, I ached to let go and give my heart the one thing it truly wanted. But I couldn’t get past my fear.

I scanned the room, searching for the one person I needed right now. When I found him, I turned to my boys. “Wait here. Please.”

I ran across the studio. “Daddy! Dad, I need your help.”

“Sweetheart, what’s wrong?”

I took a deep breath. “I don’t want to marry Henri. I want to marry Eikko.”

“Who?”

“Erik. His translator. I’m in love with him, and I want to marry him. And even though he hates having his picture taken, I want to take a thousand so I can put him on my wall and wake up to us laughing every day, just like you do with Mom. And I want him to make me doughnuts, just like his mom does for his dad. Even if I have to let out all my dresses. And I want us to find our own thing or maybe find out that our own thing is everything, because I feel like if I have him, even the stupid stuff would matter.”

He stood there, mouth slightly agape.

“But a word from you and I’ll never mention it again. I want to do the right thing, and I know you’d never let me do something stupid. Tell me what I should do, and I won’t question it, Dad.”

He looked up at the clock, his eyes still wide with shock. “Eadlyn, you only have seven minutes.”

I followed his gaze, and he was right. It was seven ’til.

“So help me. Tell me what to do!”

After a stunned second, he turned back to me and pulled me out the studio door.

“We all know that you wanted to move fast because of Marid, and I think there’s some value to your line of thought. But you can’t let one bully decide the rest of your life. Trust me. You don’t have to announce anything today.”

“That’s not the point. I want to be with Eikko so much it hurts, but I’ve done so many selfish, idiotic things in the past that I fear the people won’t forgive me if I break even the tiniest rule. I can’t bear to let them down, Dad. I can’t bear to let you down.”

“Me? Let me down over a silly little rule?” He shook his head. “Eadlyn, you come from a long line of traitors. You couldn’t let me down.”

“What?”

He smiled. “Your brother running off to France was technically enough to start a war over. I think he knew that. Did it stop him?”

I shook my head.

“Your mother,” he said with a laugh. “She conspired with the Italian government to fund the Northern rebels, a move that would have sent her to her grave had my father found out.”

I stood there, stunned.

“And me? I’ve been keeping someone who ought to be dead alive for over twenty years.”

“The Woodworks?” I guessed.

“Ha! No, I forgot about them, though officially they were pardoned. It’s actually someone much more dangerous in the eyes of the monarchy.”

“Dad, I don’t understand.”

He sighed, looking up and down the hall, checking for spying eyes, before quickly unbuttoning his shirt. “I’m afraid there’s only one way to explain this.” He turned around and swiftly shoved his shirt down along with his suit coat.

I gasped in horror as I took in my father’s back. He was covered in marks, some wide, as if they’d healed without any treatment, and some skinny and puckered. There didn’t appear to be any uniformity to the marks except that they all must have come from the same cane or whip.

“Daddy . . . Daddy, what happened to you?”

“My father happened to me.” He pulled his shirt back on and buttoned it as fast as he could, speaking in a rush. “Sorry I never took you to the beach, honey. I just couldn’t do it.”