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Kit and I hit the hard ground in a heap, his body pressed against mine, and I let out a yelp of pain as my left shoulder seems to bear the brunt of our fall. But Kit covers my mouth with his hand, stifling any sound, and I stare at him, my eyes wide.
What the hell is going on?
Another crack cuts through the still morning, and the tree trunk seems to explode a foot above our heads, showering us with wood chips.
Those cracks aren’t breaking branches, I realize as cold horror spreads through me.
They’re gunshots.
Kit catches my eye, and he must see my sudden surge of panic, because he presses his finger to his lips, and I manage a jerky nod. Only then does he remove his hand from my mouth, and he pulls out his phone to type a quick message, his body still covering mine.
My heart is pounding so hard that my chest hurts, and the edges of my vision slowly turn black from sheer terror. But as I lie perfectly still, my muscles taut while I wait for the next shot, I notice a dark red smear on the shoulder of Kit’s tan coat. Maybe it’s denial, or maybe just adrenaline, but for a split second, I can’t wrap my head around what I’m looking at. When it hits me, however, all the air leaves my lungs, and the world seems to lurch sideways.
“Kit.” His name is barely a breath, though it’s enough to grab his attention. He follows my gaze, his brow furrowed, but his confusion turns to wild-eyed fear as he hastily shifts his weight off me. He’s still hovering, barely an inch above me as his hair falls into my eyes, and he slides his hand between us to undo the buttons of my coat.
What are you— I mouth, but he’s pushing my lapel away from my chest, and then I see it. A scarlet stain blooming in the cream of my sweater, just below my shoulder.
It’s not his blood. It’s mine.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Sandringham Estate has gone into lockdown this morning after multiple ambulances and law enforcement vehicles were seen speeding onto the grounds. No further information is available at this time.
—Breaking news alert from the BBC, 9:41 a.m., 24 December 2023
I DON’T KNOW HOW LONG we lie there on the forest floor, Kit’s body covering mine as he presses his hand to the wound in my chest, trying to stanch the blood that flows with horrific ease. Time doesn’t seem to mean much anymore, and even though I’m aware of the pain spreading through me, deep and unyielding and unlike anything I’ve ever felt before, my mind is strangely blank.
Eventually, almost like an afterthought, it occurs to me that the gunshots have stopped. Kit’s brown eyes are locked on mine, and his lips are moving, but even though I can hear the low murmur of his voice, my brain can’t comprehend what he’s saying. Maybe I’m panicking, or maybe I’m dying, or maybe it’s something in between. Either way, I don’t move, and neither does he.
The protection officer who escorted us into town is the first to reach us, and he radios his colleagues as he kneels beside us, the rush of air sending an agonizing tremor through me. Within seconds—or at least it feels like seconds—more officers appear, and when I blink, the forest is suddenly alive with red flashing lights. More people surround us now, but even as several paramedics try to usher Kit out of the way, he stays right where he is.
I blink again, and I’m suddenly in what I think is the back of an ambulance, but something is off. There’s a wall of noise around me, and I catch sight of a cloud floating even with us through a small window. My thoughts are so muddled that I can’t figure out what this means, but then Kit is there, his mouth moving even though I can’t hear him, and I don’t care about the cloud anymore.
This time, when I open my eyes, the oppressive sound is gone, replaced by a soft beeping. I’m in a dimly lit room with moss-green walls, and though a pair of curtains are covering the nearby window, a faint ray of gray light sneaks through a gap in the fabric. My body is heavy and numb, but my thoughts are clearer now, and when I notice the IV sticking out of my arm, I realize that this is a hospital room.
“Kit?” I manage, trying to sit up, but whatever medication is dripping through the plastic tube stops me from moving too much.
“Evie?”
Alexander’s hoarse voice floats toward me, and he and my mother are beside the bed in an instant, both of them looking like they’ve aged a decade. My mother’s eyes are red and swollen, and Alexander looks gaunt with worry. Which is ridiculous, because I’m fine.
“Where’s Kit? Is he okay?” I say, and even though my mind is scrambling to form a coherent picture from the fragments of my memories—the gunshots, the smear of blood on his coat, the whirling of what must have been helicopter blades—I sound incredibly drugged.
“Kit’s in the hallway,” says Alexander as my mother slides her hand into mine. “He’s all right—grazed in the arm, but nothing a few stitches won’t fix.”
Grazed in the arm. By a bullet. The same kind of bullet that somehow hit me. Maybe even the same one. None of this feels real, and I shake my head, trying to…I don’t know. Make it stick, maybe. Find something solid among all this haze.
“I’m so very sorry, Evie,” continues Alexander, and he covers our hands with his. With a sharpness that’s in stark contrast to the rest of this soft reality, I notice he isn’t wearing a wedding ring, and I can’t remember if he ever did. “Police and royal security are combing through the estate as we speak, but we’ve no idea how this happened.”
“It was Ben,” I mumble, and even though I haven’t actually thought about who pulled the trigger, I’m absolutely sure it was him. “Where’s your ring?”
“My—what?” says Alexander, taken aback.
“Your wedding ring. Don’t you have one?” There’s a signet ring on his pinky, but otherwise his left hand is bare. And it’s only now, with the way both he and my mother are looking at me, that I realize how strange this question is, all things considered.
He clears his throat. “Er, yes, but I haven’t worn it in private in years. Evan, it wasn’t Benedict—he was with me and the rest of the hunting party, and we were miles from the house. There’s simply no way it could’ve been him. But I swear to you, we will find whoever did this.”
Alexander’s voice catches, and my mother touches his arm with her free hand. He turns toward her, his face mostly hidden from me, and for the briefest of moments, she rests her forehead against his. Before it occurs to me that I probably shouldn’t be staring, it’s over, and Alexander steps back as my mother shifts closer to me.
