“Thank you, James,” I said in the car. “Your video was heartbreaking and incredible and everything Edgar and I needed to hear.”

“I’m a saint. Remember that when I ask His Highness for a pay rise.”

Marc, Alison and the rest of the staff were lined up, waiting for me in the great hall just beyond the palace entryway.

“We were all shocked,” said Marc. “But mostly in a good way.”

“Have you any notion of your response?” asked Alison. “Because I’ve prepared a range of press releases.”

“I’ll let you know. But thank you.”

The security team joined us.

“Aren’t you glad we let you have sex with His Highness?” said Ian.

“Did you bring us anything from America?” asked Lucky.

I quickly distributed the mini bags of chips, peanuts and Oreos I’d pocketed from the plane, and the guards cheered.

I was about to ask for Edgar’s location, but I knew where he’d be.

I bounded up many carpeted staircases, only slipping twice, just to make everyone gasp and speculate, “What if on his way to give His Highness an answer, Carter suffered a concussion?”

I reached the top floor. I adjusted my clothes, to appear dignified and worthy of a milestone occasion, but I settled for being slightly less creased from the flight. I strode down the hall to the nursery, the place where Edgar was most himself.

I knocked, and Edgar’s voice answered, “Yes?”, as if he was in a meeting and didn’t want to be disturbed.

Inside, all of the furniture had been uncovered. The room had been thoroughly dusted and polished, the woodwork gleaming, the air smelling of lemon and pine. All the curtains had been opened, with sunlight streaming through. This was no longer a haunted retreat, but a welcoming, comfortable aerie, alive with history and the promise of hanging out, snacking and wearing sweats. Edgar wasn’t forgetting the past but building on it.

Edgar was standing near a window. He wasn’t smiling, not yet. He was torturing me.

“Your Highness?” I said.

“Can I help you?”

“That was so incredibly embarrassing. Proposing to me in front of the entire world.”

“That’s why I did it.”

“I thought—I thought you were going to abdicate.”

“I considered it.”

“What stopped you?”

“James’s story was extremely powerful. And I weighed the loss of never having my face imprinted on a ten-pound note. And then I thought about you.”

“Okay, but before we go any further, I need to say something, about Callum—”

“I get it. He’s very attractive. In a cheap surfer dude sun god sort of way.”

“And I was so scared.”

“Scared of what?”

“Of everything. Of doing that interview. Of your grandmother. Of letting you down.”