Battle Royal by Lucy Parker

Chapter Twenty-One

St. Agnes Accident & Emergency

Around Ten O’Clock

Seconds, minutes, and hours tend to blur together within these walls.

Sylvie carefully carriedthe cup of steaming hot tea back from the small kitchenette. She sat down next to Dominic, on chairs that made the backbreakers at Hartwell Studios seem like plush recliners, and put the cup into his hand before he could refuse it. “Just a little bit. Please.”

Dominic’s lips turned up very slightly, but it wasn’t a smile. “Good old England. When in doubt, when in crisis, when awake—a cup of tea.”

“Look, it’s a thing for a reason.” She leaned in to touch her lips to his cheek. Against his skin, she whispered, “She’s going to be fine. The paramedic said it was mostly her arm. The cut over her ribs wasn’t deep.”

He flinched slightly, his hand tightening around the cup and threatening to squeeze boiling-hot water over his hand. She put her fingers over his, stroking him.

“She’ll be okay. I promise you, she’ll be fine. I don’t think they come much stronger than your little sister.”

The silver in his hair and beard, the fine lines around his eyes, all seemed more pronounced under the harsh hospital lights. Her heart aching, all she could do was hold on to him.

“She’s been through a lot,” he said harshly. “More than I realized. Gerald spoiled Lorraine, treated her like a fucking princess. I thought he’d do the same for Pet. I let myself believe she would be okay there. I failed her.”

“You were a kid.” She took the tea and set it on the floor before it spilled. “Dom, you were just a kid. You couldn’t have done anything more. She’s okay.”

“She’s hurt. And I think I’ve been the last straw.”

“No, you’re going to be a part of the wonderful life she has coming for her now.” Sylvie held his darkened gaze squarely. “We all walked very different paths that have converged together in this hospital tonight, and we’ll all be there for one another going forward.”

She could just imagine what cynical rejoinder that statement might have prompted from him in the past. Now, he looked at her for a moment, before he reached out and cupped her head, pulling her forward to kiss her mouth.

“I love you.” Stated so simply, as a straight fact, without emphasis or frills. So perfectly Dominic, and so unexpected just then that she could hardly breathe, let alone speak.

Her hand was resting on his thigh. Her fingers tightened, hard, on the muscle flexing beneath her palm.

“Mr. De Vere?” A nurse with a calm face and compassionate eyes came to join them, and Dominic took Sylvie’s hand as they both stood at once. “We’ve moved your sister to a private room, as requested, and you may see her now.”

“Is she all right?” he asked, his fingers tight around Sylvie’s, and the nurse—Dahlia, according to her badge—nodded.

“The cuts to her arm were deep and required stitches, and it’s possible she’ll have some residual tendon damage that may require physical therapy. But the wounds to her side were superficial. We’re giving her a course of strong antibiotics to ward off any possible infection from the blade, so she’ll be in for a night or two, but she’ll be just fine.”

Dominic exhaled, but the tension remained in his body, and Sylvie didn’t think it would begin to drain away until he’d seen Pet for himself. His mind was at least able to focus enough that, as they followed Dahlia to Pet’s room, he asked with a small frown, “You said Pet has a private room as requested? I didn’t—”

“No.” Dahlia looked back at them with a raised eyebrow. “I believe that request has come, shall we say, from quite high up the chain? We’ve also been warned of an increased security detail tonight. Your sister has one or two VIP visitors requesting entry.”

Rosie and Johnny.

The royal couple had been whisked away with the rest of their relatives in the pandemonium that followed the evacuation and Helena’s arrest, but Rosie had already rung Sylvie’s phone twice to ask for an update on Pet.

Dahlia brought them to the small room with Pet’s name beside the door, and stepped back to let them past.

Sylvie also tried to hang back and let Dominic have some privacy with his sister, but he still had her hand in his and he didn’t let go.

They walked in together and found Pet propped up against the raised head of the narrow bed. Her right arm was heavily bandaged, resting against a pillow, and a few smaller plasters were visible under the neckline of her hospital gown. Without her red lipstick, she looked very young and very pale, but she smiled when she saw them.

With her left hand, she was spooning brown goo into her mouth that Sylvie hoped was chocolate. She spoke around the plastic spoon. “Please tell me nobody cut my dress off. It’s genuine twenties vintage and it cost a fucking arm and leg. I can get blood out, but if someone shredded my baby, I’m livid.”

Dominic shook his head. Both in answer to her question and in admonishment. “An arm full of stitches and that’s your first question.”

Pet shrugged her left shoulder. “Hey, I have morphine and chocolate pudding. I’m good.” The lightness left her face as she looked into his eyes. “Really. I’m okay.”

The clock on the wall tick-tick-ticked in the silence.

Then Dominic walked forward swiftly, bent over the bed, and put his arms around his sister. He was very careful not to bump even the tiniest of her cuts, but his hold was nevertheless firm and encompassing.

Over his shoulder, Sylvie saw the tears rush into Pet’s eyes. Very carefully, she put down her spoon and reached up to put her arm around her brother’s neck.

Their first hug in twenty-five years lasted for a long time.

Sylvie started to back out of the room, keeping her steps light, and both De Veres spoke without looking up. “Don’t even think about it.”

Rolling her eyes, she went and sat in a chair on the other side of Pet’s bed. At least the chairs in here had cushions. Useful to have royals pulling strings.

As Dominic straightened, Pet bit her lip. “Dominic.” Her voice sounded strange. “Lorraine rang me this afternoon.”

He hooked the other chair with his boot and pulled it closer, wincing as the legs made a terrible screech against the linoleum.

“Funny, that’s the noise my soul makes when I see her number in my call log,” Pet cracked.

He couldn’t help a small grin, but he looked at her expectantly, with a certain grimness. “What did she want?”

“To complain about her life, mostly. Sounds like everyone else she knows is wisely avoiding her, including her husband. She also tried to talk me into investing the money you gave me from Mum’s estate into a start-up. I think she’s having an affair with some tech bro who’s conned her out of her share.”

Dominic absorbed that for a microsecond. “You’re too smart to even hear out the pitch.”

“Correct. I have other plans for that money, anyway. But she also talked about you. Bad-mouthing you as usual. Ungrateful cow. She . . . wasn’t happy to hear that we’re back in touch.” Pet hesitated. Then, as she touched the skin above her bandages, lightly rubbing, the words fell out in a rush. “Is it true that when you left home and came here to London, you took me, too? That Gerald tried to have you charged with abduction, when you were just a little kid?”

Even when Dominic’s face revealed nothing at all, Sylvie thought she had some grasp on what was going on behind that studied blankness now.

He was rapidly considering if telling the truth here would further damage Pet’s idea of her family.

There had been too much deception lately.

As she watched, he came to the same decision.

“Yes. It is true.” His words were taut. “I can’t begin to tell you what a fucking light you were to me in that house. This funny, clumsy, loving baby. When I couldn’t take any more, when I hadto leave, I took you with me. I brought us both to Sebastian, and with thirteen-year-old logic, I thought he could keep us both. It didn’t work out that way. And when Sebastian took you back there, and came home with the certainty that you would be happy with Lana and Gerald in a way I hadn’t been—that was the only way I could reconcile that outcome.”

Pet was crying silently.

Dominic reached out and took her left hand, squeezing her fingers.

“I’m sorry,” he said, very evenly, “that didn’t turn out to be the case. More sorry than I can ever say. But I will say it again: it was never true that I turned my back on you without a second thought. It was never true that I didn’t care about you. I loved you. I still love you.”

Pet took a shuddering breath and took the tissue that Sylvie held out to her.

“And I love you.” Her smile wobbled to life, casting beautiful lights into her wet brown eyes. “Big brother. Which is why I’m asking you one last time if you’ll accept the money Lana left.”

She correctly interpreted Dominic’s expression. A shortsighted person standing five kilometers away without their glasses could have correctly interpreted Dominic’s expression.

“Not as your money,” she added. “As mine. I’d like you to take it and give me shares in De Vere’s in return. It’s always been a family business, and I’d like to be a small part of that.”

“You are part of that, without needing to put money in,” Dominic said, but he was studying her now with both the big brother and the businessman faces. “You’re serious.”

“Yes, I am,” she said, very firmly. “I’ll pay market value on the shares. You’ll let me come up with some social media campaigns and general promo ideas to help De Vere’s continue on a strong trajectory. You’ll invite me around for a family dinner every fourth Sunday. And I will keep at least a couch length from your demon cat at all times.”

A bubble of welcome laughter was rising in Sylvie’s chest, and something in her own body relaxed as she saw the amusement slipping into Dominic’s eyes.

“Is that the full list of demands?” he asked mildly.

Pet tilted her head, considering. “Don’t check the small print, because there may be something about a lifetime supply of chocolate in there, but basically—yes.”

“Then—yes.”

She had been fiddling with the top of her bandage, but her head lifted. “Really?”

“Really.” He smiled faintly. “Does this mean you want to work in the bakery full-time, too?”

“Oh God, no.” Her return smile was rueful. “As fond as I am of you, bro, I don’t want you as a boss. And as I’ve said, approximately six hundred times, I like being a PA, and there’s no full-time vacancy in your joint.”

“That’s fortunate,” a new voice said from the door, and they all turned as Rosie and Johnny knocked belatedly on the frame and came quietly in.

They were flanked by Johnny’s huge, muscular, silent PPO, who stopped at the door. He was as towering and menacing as ever—and he was holding, in one massive hand, a tiny teddy bear.

Sylvie tore her gaze from the incongruous sight as Rosie went on, “Johnny is in need of a new PA. A full-time, permanent position with excellent renumeration and travel opportunities, that we’d like to offer to you.”

Pet had gone understandably flustered, having the royals arrive at her sickbed. At that, her mouth literally dropped open.

“We already checked you out and you have fantastic credentials. You also have a lovely personality, we both feel comfortable with you, and I suspect you’d not only be very good at this job but enjoy it very much.” Rosie’s hand went out and linked securely with her fiancé’s. “And you might have saved the life of the man I love tonight.”

When they looked at each other, their faces said everything.

Rosie finally recollected they weren’t alone in the room and dragged her eyes back. “Tonight put a lot of things in perspective. It was a pretty strong reminder of what’s truly important. What I was lucky enough to find and will never throw away. And I can never thank you enough.”

Pet shook her head. “You don’t have to thank me. But what’s going to happen to Helena?”

The security team had taken Helena out of the room before the police were called, but they hadn’t needed to restrain her. After she’d cut Pet, she’d gone completely limp, her face frighteningly empty.

Even in the horror of it all, Sylvie had felt intensely sorry for her, and a similar concern was evident in Pet’s voice.

It was Johnny who answered. “She will get the help she needs.”

Looking at him now, standing tall and exuding both protectiveness and compassion, Sylvie thought there was every chance he would defy expectations and become an indispensable asset to the royal family.

There was no doubt at all he would be a loving and supportive husband to the woman beside him.

“And I told the fucking leech press trying to take photos of Helena and Pet exactly what I thought of them,” Johnny added.

Rosie winced slightly.

Of course, there was an equal chance that Pet would have her hands full working for Johnny, if she took this job. By the look on her face, that contract was going to be signed.

Behind the royal couple, in the shadow of the door, Johnny’s PPO took a step forward, and Rosie turned with a start.

“Oh my goodness, I’m sorry. This is Matthias Vaughn, the head of Johnny’s protection team. He’s off shift now, but he wanted to speak to Pet.”

Pet’s eyes widened as Matthias came farther into the room, within sight of the bed.

The bodyguard stood looking at her, his wide chest rising and falling a little too quickly, the only sign of disturbed emotion in his body.

“If I’d been doing my job correctly, you wouldn’t be here now.” He had one of the deepest voices Sylvie had ever heard. His words were clipped, not wasting a syllable. “I apologize.”

“It was a split-second distraction, an unavoidable human reaction to the fire alarm,” Rosie began, and Matthias shook his head in an abrupt motion.

“That ‘split-second distraction’ can be—and tonight almost was—the difference between life and death. I made an error. It won’t happen again.” He looked back at Pet as he repeated, his voice defying the laws of physics and anatomy to become even deeper, “It’s my fault you were hurt.”

He paused—and then he thrust his hand out.

The room had gone very quiet.

Pet’s eyes traveled from his face to the little teddy bear on his palm. It was wearing a waistcoat with a teeny-weeny pocket square.

At Sylvie’s side, Dominic’s eyebrow had lifted. She watched with total fascination as the very tips of Matthias’s ears turned red.

“I . . .” It was not impossible this was the first time the man had ever been remotely flustered. “The gift shop was closed. They didn’t have much at the corner shop—”

His fingers closing around the bear, his hand started to fall away.

Pet shot forward, sticking her own hand out and almost dislodging the drip in her arm.

After another hesitation, Matthias stepped forward to give her the bear, and she lay back against the bed, holding the toy tightly against her chest.

“Thank you.” Her smile was sudden and blinding, and the bodyguard moved one shoulder in a rough, apparently uncontrollable jerk.

With a stiff nod, he bowed to Rosie and retreated very quickly from the room.

Pet had been determined to find a new path. Wherever her life went after today, it was shaping up to be interesting.

Rosie smoothed out her smile before she addressed Sylvie and Dominic, slipping back into her professional princess gloss. “We’ve made a decision about the cake.”

Sylvie drew in her breath. She hadn’t expected that, not tonight. Her eyes went immediately to Dominic, and they exchanged a long look.

Whatever happens, it changes nothing between us.

They didn’t even need to say the words aloud.

“I know it’s late and it’s been a sh-shit of a night,” Johnny said, “but we wondered if you’d like to accompany us back to St. Giles. We won’t take up much of your time.”

“We’re happy to schedule a meeting for tomorrow.” Rosie spoke emphatically on that point. “But a lot of things seem to have come to a pass tonight. Lines have been drawn. It seems fitting that this part of the journey also now comes to a close.”

She looked at the three of them. At Johnny.

“And I hope,” she said, “that the best parts of our respective stories begin from here.”