Ten days later, Hannah felt like a voyeur, watching the King look at his fiancée, Princess Laia, across a lawn full of guests at the palace. It was a look full of a million things, but one of which was painfully familiar, the same expression she’d seen on Lukas’s face when he’d made love to her. Intense. Possessive. Driven.
It was an annual party thrown for the palace and front-line staff and was always hugely popular, with fireworks at the end.
Hannah was still raw from Lukas’s abandonment. She hadn’t taken his car back to Santanger, she’d called a taxi. It had been petty but satisfying. And since then she’d been caught up in the whirlwind of looking after Princess Laia, who had endeared herself to everyone with her kindness and down-to-earth attitude.
In fact, sometimes Hannah wondered how she could be so down-to-earth. It was almost as if she hadn’t been brought up a princess. A crazy notion.
But now the King was lifting the Princess up into his arms and something inside Hannah felt so raw at the sight of their love that she had to turn away, hide, but one of the King’s aides stopped her and said, ‘The King wants to take Princess Laia out for dinner on his motorbike. She needs to change.’
Hannah swallowed her emotion. ‘Of course, I’ll take care of it.’
This was excruciating. Facilitating a love story happening right under her nose as her heart broke more and more every day.
Up in Princess Laia’s rooms a short while later, the Princess looked at the casual garments Hannah had laid out. Hannah just said, ‘Trust me, it’s what you need to wear.’
At the look of excitement on the Princess’s face though, Hannah’s emotions overflowed. The Princess noticed, coming over, ‘Hannah? Is everything ok?’
To her horror, Hannah started crying in earnest and the Princess put her arm around her, leading her into the bathroom. In fits and starts between apologising, Hannah said, ‘I’m so sorry, Princess Laia, but I’m just so happy…to see you and the King…like this. My mother worked here too for the last Queen, who was so unhappy. The atmosphere was always so tense and sad…and I’m just so happy for you both…and for us. You really…love each other and things will be so different now.’
Princess Laia wiped Hannah’s tears and said, ‘You’re a romantic.’
Hannah realised in that moment that she was, and that she didn’t want Lukas’s treatment of her to make her cynical like him. She said defiantly, ‘Yes, I am and I’m not ashamed of it.’
Princess Laia took Hannah by the shoulders and said, ‘Good for you. Don’t ever lose it.’
But, the following day, Hannah woke to the news that the royal engagement was off. Princess Laia had already left Santanger on an early dawn flight back to Isla’Rosa without even saying goodbye to Hannah.
And suddenly, it was as if the universe was conspiring to mock her for believing for a second that such a thing as romance and love existed, because patently, it didn’t and she was a fool.
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