Page 110 of Scandal Queen

He shook his head and steeled his expression. “No. Sorry, that’s not true. Bella… It’s Bella, she’s overdosed.”

“Oh, oh fuck, shit.” I leapt from the bed and scrambled for my clothes I’d left folded on the chair last night. “Let’s go. I’ll text Nana so she knows where we are when she wakes up.”

“I’ll brief security.” He pulled out his phone and dialled a number. A ghost of a smile flickered across his face. “Thank you. We will be down in a moment.” He hung up and opened the door.

“Bill?”

“He’s already up. There’s press coverage on television already.”

“What, how?” I stumbled after him down the stairs.

“Because the damn press are camped outside the palace gates and the ambulance had to go in and out.”

I reached for his arm. “It will be okay, Ollie.” I lied though. I of all people knew that things like this didn’t always turn out well.

“What the fuck was she thinking?” He pushed his hand through his bed hair and made it stand at all angles.

To my surprise Nana stood in the kitchen making Bill a cup of coffee. Bill looked tired, but then so did Ollie. They must have arrived back late last night and it wasn’t yet dawn.

Nana stepped up and wrapped her arms tight around me. “I got up for a pee and saw the news headline on my phone. It said emergency vehicles had been seen in St Mark’s?”

“Is that all they’ve said so far?” Ollie barked.

“Yes.”

His phone rang again and his skin drained to an ashen grey. “John?”

My heart pounded.

Ollie’s lips tightened. “I’m leaving now.”

I turned for Nana. “Look after Daisy, and please don’t let her see the television.” I flicked my glance at Bill. “Are the gates clear?”

“Yes, Ma’am.”

“Okay, let’s go.”

I pulled Ollie towards the hallway from the kitchen, trying to get him to move. He weighed like a stone boulder that had been in position since the beginning of time.

Bill opened the back doors of the car and I pushed Oliver inside and then followed him in. The car seemed strangely calm.

“Ollie. Please…” I caught his face in my hands and made him turn to meet my gaze. He blinked slowly.

“She’s not going to make it.”

“We’ve been here before, just a few months ago with Daisy, and it went okay. Everything will be okay.”

He shook his head and then the prince began to cry in my arms as the car moved through the gates of Greystone and we went back to London together; only this time I had no idea what we would find.

Twenty-Six

Cameras and reporters surrounded the entrance to St Mary’s hospital. I wondered why the ambulance had come here. I didn’t think it was the closest, but now really wasn’t the time to ask inane questions. Now was the time to grip hands and just hope for the best, to pray to whatever it was, or whoever it was that had kept Daisy alive that they would do the same to Bella.

In my heart a lead weight ached deep down. In my head, the memories of Christmas Eve and the way she’d looked under the blanket on the sofa while her brothers dressed the Christmas tree, ran around and around in my head.

I should have spoken up.

Should have expressed my concerns.