Page 113 of Scandal Queen

Watching Ollie walk in split me straight in half. Kill me now.

His back straight like a rod, his face set in a mask, he ignored Freya and Marcus and held his hand for me. Silently I stepped to his side and we walked from the room straight down the corridors and into a car that waited for us by the back entrance.

We sat in silence the whole way through London, through the crowds of waiting press and into the palace gates. Bill drove the car straight to Fenmore and Ollie unfolded himself from the car and walked straight up the path to the cottage, never once breaking stride.

Then and only then, once the door was shut and we were in our home did his facade crumble. He leant against the door, his body shaking as I pressed myself into him trying to hold up the weight of the man I loved. We clung to one another, neither of us speaking until his shudders slowed to trembles and his lips pressed into the sticky skin at the base of my neck.

“Thank you.” Another kiss. I wanted to slide into it and never surface again. Just wanted us to always be a kiss that never ended, so we’d never have to talk, never have to say anything that would hurt, see things that would hurt.

“I love you. I love you.” I said the words over and over again, holding him as tightly as I could.

“Leia, are you okay?” Janine whispered down the phone.

“No. Okay isn’t a word I’d use.”

“I’ve got Molly here; everyone came over when we heard the news.”

“Janine, I can’t.”

A pause stretched between us and I held in a choked sob. Red tape. Red fucking tape everywhere.

“The statement said she’d just died.”

“No details are being released.”

Another beat of silence.

“How’s Oliver?” Any other time I’d have loved the fact my once boss and frequent life saver now called Prince Oliver by his first name. So much had changed in so little time.

Now everything had changed forever.

“Not good.” My throat tightened.

There was a rustling sound and then Molly spoke. “Babes, I feel you need me.”

I snorted a laugh, but it was mainly snot. “I do, but not now. The palace is on lock down. Daisy is coming back with Nana because Ollie wouldn’t have it any other way but that’s it. No one in or out.”

“Do you need to talk? I hate not knowing what’s going on. I don’t know what to say.”

“I can’t.”

I could hear Molly smacking her lips together and could visualise her expression all too easily as she thought of something to say.

“I’ll call you. I promise.”

“Okay.”

I hung up, unable to say another word and put my phone back in my pocket. With a deep breath I turned into the library. The day didn’t want to end, it just stretched forever and ever and ever.

The room hung in silence. John sat with a whisky in a tumbler, his shoulder every so often shaking.

The King sat with his back to the room, his face towards the window with the curtains drawn shut. Every curtain in the entire palace had been drawn. The outside world no longer existed.

I sat back at the other side of the Queen and picked up her hand. “That was Janine, she sends her condolences.”

The Queen looked at me, without actually seeing me at all. “That’s kind of her…” she drifted off a bit. “I should have listened to her. She told me to send her for help.”

John looked over. “Mum, she committed suicide. It wasn’t an accident.”