“What?”
“Easier for whom?” she asked. “You or me?”
“I am not going to debate this with you.”
“I merely want to understand. I had such a wonderful time with you this evening. We had a wonderful time. You cannot tell me otherwise. You need to at least tell me—”
“I do not need to do anything. I decide!” he thundered. “I have decided. I am your King.”
“Oh.” Charlotte lurched back, and somewhere, somehow, she located her pride. “My mistake,” she said with crisp indifference. “I thought you were just George. Forgive me, Your Majesty.”
She curtsied.
But then he said her name. He said it with regret, as if he cared.
As if she mattered, when she knew plainly that she did not.
When she spoke again, her voice was scrupulously polite. “May I withdraw, Your Majesty, or was there something more you wished to say to me?”
But if her voice was demure, her gaze was not. She kept her eyes on his throughout, refusing to be the one to break the connection.
“Charlotte,” he said. “This is for the best.”
“Of course, Your Majesty. Whatever you wish.”
She stared at him. And then once he’d gone, she stared at the staircase. She took a breath. Tried not to cry.
Queens did not cry. Wasn’t that what she had decided earlier that morning?
Good God, was it just this morning that she’d been in a carriage with Adolphus? That was a lifetime ago.
She looked down the long corridor. Which room was hers? George had motioned, but he had been so angry. She couldn’t tell where he’d been pointing.
She squared her shoulders. She was not useless. She could find her own bedchamber. But when she started walking, she sensed a presence. She sighed. Brimsley. It had to be.
She said his name.
He materialized as if from smoke. “Yes, Your Majesty.”
“You are here as well. In this hallway.”
“I am wherever you are, Your Majesty.” He held up a candle, illuminating her path.
“Right.” She sighed, but the air tripped through her throat, and it sounded as if she might cry.
“Your—”
“I am fine, Brimsley.” She had to cut him off. She could not bear it if he asked after her welfare.
“Yes, Your Majesty.”
“My room,” she said, trying very hard not to allow her spine to slump. “It is this way?”
“Yes, Your Majesty. The open door at the end of the hall. I am happy to show you.”
“You need not follow me.”
“But I shall, Your Majesty.”
For the love of God. “Stop calling me Your Majesty.”
Brimsley looked pained. Or maybe constipated. “You are the Queen of Great Britain and Ireland, Your Majesty. I cannot call you anything else.”
She sighed. Deeply. “Well then, stop following me.”
“I cannot do that, Your Majesty.”
“Is it against the law for me to kill you?” she muttered under her breath.
“What was that, Your Majesty?
She straightened. “As your Queen, I order you to stop following me!”
Brimsley’s expression did not change a whit. “It is my sworn duty to take care of you, Your Majesty. At all times.”
“I do not want you here.”
She wanted George. But not the man who had brought her to Buckingham House. She wanted the man from the garden.
Just George.
She thought he had been her George.
“I hope in time you will become used to me, Your Majesty,” Brimsley said.
“Wonderful,” Charlotte said, utterly exhausted. “We can spend the rest of our lives together.”
She let him lead her to her room, and then she let her new maids prepare her for bed. And then, when she was finally alone, she lay in the middle of her giant bed and stared up at the exquisite stitching on her glorious canopy.
She closed her eyes. “I should have gone over the wall.”
Brimsley
Buckingham House
11 September 1761
Brimsley loved his new job.
He had been given a completely new uniform with a gold brocade vest, and the move to Buckingham House meant that he was at the top of the belowstairs hierarchy. Who could be more important than the chief servant to the Queen?
He might not sit at the head of the table in the servants’ quarters—that was the butler—but he was at the butler’s right hand.
He selected the choicest cuts of meat for his plate when they ate. He never had to worry about there being enough pudding for everyone because there was always enough pudding if you were the second person to be served.
Everyone looked at him differently, too. The maids no longer looked down their noses at him. Now he looked down his nose at them, even the ones who were taller, which, to be honest, was most of them.
Fish face, his ass. He was on top of the world.
The new queen had yet to appreciate his many virtues, but to be fair, not even a week had passed since the wedding. She was adjusting to her new life, just as Mrs. Pratt had said she would need to. But at least she wasn’t stuck over at St. James’s, where Princess Augusta was still firmly in charge. Brimsley was quite certain the Queen would be happier here at Buckingham.
Once she adjusted.
If she adjusted.
Which she would. He would make sure of it.
Her days were much as Brimsley had anticipated:
She rose.
She was dressed.
Her hair was styled.
She ate breakfast.
She looked out a window.
She ate lunch.
She read a book.
She was ushered back to her room where her clothes were changed and her hair was restyled for dinner, and then she went to the long, formal dining room, and ate dinner.
Some days she read the book before she looked out the window.
She seemed a little bored, to be honest, but Brimsley would have traded places with her in an instant. A life of leisure? Of gorgeous clothing and elaborate coiffures and only one’s favorite foods?
He wouldn’t have been able to fathom it except he watched her live it every day.
He spent a great deal of time trailing her as she explored Buckingham, and it was during one of these jaunts that she suddenly stopped and said his name.
He stepped forward. “Your Majesty.”
“What is in my engagement diary for the week?”
He was not sure he heard correctly. “Engagement diary, Your Majesty?”
She turned to face him. “I assume there will be charity visits? The poor. Or orphans?”
“There are no orphans, Your Majesty.”
Her regal brows rose. “No orphans, Brimsley? In all of London?”
He coughed. Somewhat painfully. “None in your engagement diary, Your Majesty.”
“Can we put some there?”
Brimsley had a vision of himself, physically lifting small orphans and placing them next to the Queen.
He did not enjoy this vision.
“I would not think this is the best week for orphans, Your Majesty.”
The Queen let out an impatient noise. “Very well, then. I know I must meet with my ladies-in-waiting. That is important. And there is much to take in here. The art. Seeing the galleries of London. I have always loved theater and music. Are there concerts in my engagement diary? Operas?”
“Your Majesty.”
She stared at him expectantly.
“There is nothing in your engagement diary, Your Majesty.”
“How can that be?” she demanded.
Brimsley felt his toes curling in his boots. He had a desperate urge to fidget, and he never fidgeted. It was one of the reasons he’d been promoted to this role. Or so Reynolds had told him, and Reynolds seemed to know everything.