“Who knows?” said Tessa. “I’m starting to think they’re all out to get me.”
“At least you have your security people,” said Angela, squeezing her daughter’s arm. “I think they’ll be more vigilant from now on.”
“I hope so. They haven’t exactly done a great job so far.”
“Maybe you should talk to the police,” Odelia suggested. “Tell them about the stone thing, and the poisoned tea. They have resources we don’t. And they can protect you and put the word out. The killer will probably think twice before trying again if he or she knows that the police are onto them.”
“Out of the question,” said Angela. “Tess’s position is iffy as it is. If the public became aware there’s a killer out to get her, there will be a big scandal. The Queen will personally kick her out of the family and the country.”
“Dante would never allow that,” said Odelia.
“Dante would have to choose between staying married to my daughter or having a place in the royal family.”
“The Queen would never do that.”
“Oh, yes, she would. There’s a precedent. The Queen’s uncle married an American widow and was forced to abdicate and was pretty much ostracized.”
“That was a long time ago,” said Odelia. “The times have changed.”
“I wouldn’t be so sure. A murder scandal? That’s the last thing this family needs. No, this has to stay under wraps. It absolutely must. Right, Tessa?”
Tessa nodded distractedly. She was pale, Odelia thought, the whole thing clearly getting under the young woman’s skin. Which wasn’t surprising.
“Okay, fine,” she said. “Chase and I will figure it out.” And the cats, she thought. Though so far they didn’t have a lot to go on. Then again, they’d only been there for a couple of hours.
“Tomorrow I have an important speech I need to give in town,” said Tessa. “Will you join me? It would mean a lot if you did. And you, of course, Mom.”
“We will be there,” said Odelia.
“Of course, honey,” said Angela. “I won’t leave your side for a second.”
“Thanks—and sorry about all of this. When I got married to Dante I never dreamed…” She stifled a muted sob.
“Oh, honey,” said Angela, rubbing her daughter’s back. “You couldn’t have known things would get so bad.”
Tessa nodded, and the three women stared at the reporter, who was still defending his constitutional right to take pictures of a royal, for his own benefit and that of his bank account.
Despicable man, Odelia thought. How could he live with himself? He didn’t look like a murderer, though. But when she thought that camera he aimed at Tessa and the baby could very well have been a gun, she shivered.
“You really need to talk to your cousin,” she said. “This should never have been allowed to happen.”
“I will,” said Tessa. “For the sake of Silvy, this absolutely can’t happen again.”
As if she understood, Silvy sneezed, and the three women smiled. At least there was one little ray of sunshine in Tessa’s life.
Chapter 15
The house was quiet and not a creature stirred except for four cats and, possibly, one dog. Though I imagined Fluffy was sleeping contentedly, that swath of fabric she’d ripped from the reporter’s pants between her paws.
Odelia had left the door to the room open, so we could come and go as we pleased. She would have done the same with the window that led out to a wraparound terrace but that wouldn’t have been wise. Besides, all the windows had security locks on them, and they were all connected to the security system that fed into the security room at the back of the house, where activity had been ramped up after the disastrous incident with the reporter.
Odelia and Chase were watching an interview with that very same reporter, where the man railed virulently against Tessa and demanded she‘fall in line or bugger the hell off,’ which apparently meant she had to go away.
“British English is such a strange language,” Dooley commented. “Bugger the hell off. That sounds so weird and so funny at the same time.”
“It does,” I agreed. “But I don’t think he meant it to sound funny.”
Otis Robbins also claimed Tessa was the worst thing that had ever happened to England in its long history. He claimed she was up there with Adolf Hitler and the bubonic plague. It all seemed a little over the top to me. How could a sweet American girl be worse than Adolf Hitler or the bubonic plague? It only proved to me that the British tabloid press was cuckoo.
Odelia had explained there were essentially two types of media in this country. One was the quality press, who adhered to journalistic integrity, and the other the tabloid press, who just wrote whatever, whether true or false, and seemed to have it in for Tessa, whom they liked to accuse of every evil under the sun, as if she was the worst criminal ever to set foot on English soil.
“Poor Tessa,” said Harriet now. “To have an entire section of the population pitted against her. Do you think she’ll be able to survive out here?”
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “These tabloids are apparently read by millions of Britons, so they’re turning her into a target for all of those readers.”
“I doubt whether every single reader who picks up a so-called tabloid believes every word they write, though,” said Harriet, sensibly.
“Even if only a fraction of them do, Tessa has a serious problem.”
“I think she needs to move back to the States,” said Brutus. “It’s obvious they don’t appreciate her here, so why stick it out? That’s just crazy.”
“I agree,” said Harriet. “She should move back to the States and enjoy a wonderful life with her new husband and their newborn baby.”
“But she can’t,” I said. “Dante has a lot of royal duties here.”
“Like what?” asked Dooley.
“Like… I don’t know. Probably he has to cut a lot of ribbons and open a lot of county fairs and stuff like that.”
“I don’t think he’s going to miss cutting ribbons,” said Brutus. “And if he does, there’s plenty of ribbons for him to cut in the States.”
“Yes,” said Dooley. “There are lots of nice ribbons in Hampton Cove. He can come and live next door and cut ribbons to his heart’s content.”
“It’s not just the ribbons, you guys,” I said. “He probably has a lot of other duties, and besides, he’s going to miss his family, isn’t he?”
“He can Skype,” said Harriet.
“Yes, he can Skype,” agreed Dooley.
Speaking of Skype, just then we heard a familiar voice. It was Marge.
“Hey, honey,” said Marge. “How’s the jet lag?”
“Not too bad,” said Odelia. “What time is it over there anyway?”
“Around dinner time.”
“Yes, we were just going to start dinner,” said Tex. “What time do you have?”
“Middle of the night,” said Odelia. “We had a big scare just now, and we’re all a little shook up.”
“An intruder tried to snap pictures of Tessa and the baby,” Chase said.
“How horrible,” said Marge. “I hope the police arrested him?”
“No, they haven’t,” said Chase. “Apparently he had every right to shoot pictures, and there’s not a damn thing we can do about it.”
“You need to watch out, honey,” said Tex. “I just read a story about how the English hate us Yankees so much they’ll do anything to get rid of us.”
“I’m sure it’s not as bad as all that,” said Chase with a laugh.
“They don’t like Tessa, though,” said Marge.
“I think a lot of people love Tessa,” said Odelia. “Only the tabloids don’t. Unfortunately they have the biggest megaphone, which distorts the picture.”
Gran had snuck into the room and sat down next to Odelia and Chase.
“Hey, honey,” she said, adding after a long pause, “and Tex.”
“How do you like England so far, Ma?” asked Marge.