Total pages in book: 121
Estimated words: 117920 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 590(@200wpm)___ 472(@250wpm)___ 393(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 117920 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 590(@200wpm)___ 472(@250wpm)___ 393(@300wpm)
Everyone glances at each other, brows raised, ready for the axe despite what he said.
“And because I see you as friends and family, I know I need to be honest with you. Not only as a king but as a person. And so, I must tell you, that I have fallen in love.”
Someone let’s out an audible gasp—I think it was Karla, she’s such a romantic—while everyone else raises their brows.
“I knew it,” Maja mutters under her breath, but she’s so lead-faced that I can hardly tell if she’s happy about it or not.
“I realize this may come as a shock to you,” Aksel says. “Or maybe it’s not a shock at all. Maybe it was all very obvious. It’s hard to tell when you’re in it. I didn’t plan to fall in love with her and I’m pretty sure she’ll tell you the same. To be honest, I think she hated me for some time.”
“Oh, come on.” I roll my eyes.
“You did refer to me as King Asshole on a few occasions,” he points out while everyone in the staff laughs.
He shoots them a dirty look. “I’ll ignore that. Anyway, the point of all of this is two-fold. One is to let you know that we’re together. I realize she’s still the nanny, but the girls approve of it, and I think this palace is a better place with her around.” He looks around at all the faces. “And two, is to say that yes, Aurora made some mistakes when she was younger and that’s nothing as bad as what’s been printed in the tabloids. I won’t discuss it much further than that. What I will discuss, however, is how all of that got reported to the tabloids to begin with.” He pauses. “It was one of you.”
Everyone either gasps or goes silent.
Damn, Aksel. This is like the movie Clue!
“That’s right,” he says, starting to pace with his hands behind his back, his voice deepening. Wow, he’s really playing up the part of Wadsworth. “One of you sold Miss Aurora out to the press.”
“I don’t think anyone would do that,” Maja says. “We all have more respect for the both of you than that.”
He stops pacing and comes back over to me, picking up his glass of port from the coffee table and finishing it. “I know that. I’m just…” he trails off as his eyes go over to the doorway where Johan is standing with a laptop in his hands.
“Buying time,” Aksel finishes.
“It’s all in here,” Johan says, holding it in the air.
“That’s my fucking laptop!” Nicklas cries out, storming toward Johan.
But Johan has royal attendants behind him and he hands the laptop off to them and they disappear down the hall.
What the fuck is happening?
Then a few more guards appear, blocking the exit of the room.
Nicklas whirls around to look at Aksel. “What are you doing?”
“Johan found the emails on your hard drive I’m assuming.”
“Emails? There’s no…you can’t go in my room!”
“But you went in Aurora’s room to get her diary.”
“I did not.”
“And you admitted to me that you’d already been in there before.”
“This is an invasion of privacy!”
“Yes, it is, that’s what you did. You dug up fucking dirt and then you sold it. And you didn’t even really care to hide it well because you assumed you couldn’t get punished for it. Well, guess what, Nicklas. Pack your bags. You’re fired.”
Again, everyone gasps, including me. I didn’t think he’d do it and I flinch, bracing for what might happen next.
Oh, Aksel.
“You can’t fire me,” Nicklas says wildly.
“I can. I did. Get the fuck out of here.”
More gasps. More of my nerves on fire.
“No. No, this…you ruined my life.”
“How so?” Aksel asks, his jaw tense, eyes blazing.
Daring him. He’s daring him.
Nicklas frowns, trying to think, trying to come up with a way out.
Then he bites the bullet.
He turns vicious.
“Because you were driving the night Helena died. It was never me.”
And now it’s like no one can gasp anymore because there’s no air in the room.
Everyone looks at Aksel.
Aksel remains completely composed. “No, I wasn’t.”
He lies. He lies to him and to everyone else because the truth would ruin everything. And while Aksel is moral, I know that he’s lying because he has to lie. The truth is, well, the truth is messy. It’s complicated. They’re both at fault and they’re both not. One man carries the blame for something he didn’t do and yet hides the truth of something he did do. The other man spent years drowning in guilt for something he didn’t do either. Where is there a happy ending here?
“You’re lying. I’ll prove it,” Nicklas seethes, and I see sweat dripping on his face.
He’s nervous.
He’s losing.
He knows no one will believe him, especially after today.
“You do what you need to do,” Aksel says. “I have your laptop. We’ll do what we need to do. You’re dismissed, Nicklas.”