The Runaway Princess, Page 27

  Giselle’s first words to me had been, “So, Amy—sell yourself!” which was an immediate problem, since it had been drilled into me from an early age that talking about yourself was bad manners, not to mention boring. And to be honest, there wasn’t a huge amount to tell her—there’s only so many ways you can spin your mother’s encounter with Princess Anne at the Great Yorkshire Show. Giselle’s questions seemed geared to flushing out much more high-ranking details, like where I’d done my degree or what my most significant achievement to date had been. Mindful of Pavlos’s recent sacking, I’d done my best to give her whatever she needed.

  Both Liza and Giselle had demanded to know what charities I’d be representing; under pressure, I’d suggested I could found a therapy garden—since digging seemed to have stabilized my dad’s depression—and “maybe something to do with baking?”

  “Home baking is a wonderfully inclusive, nourishing skill,” Liza had said. “You know what would be great? If you could do some baking classes for underprivileged kids! Maybe your mom would like to join in! Wouldn’t that be cute? Me and your mom and you?”

  I’d tried to hide my horror and had agreed to about four things in a row just to stop the questions. I spotted on the press release that the Princess Amelia Green Shoots Project would be launching “this summer.” When was I going to do that? My work diary was already running three weeks behind. And I could have come up with a better name than that. Especially if I was going to be designing it.

  At his desk, Leo stabbed the send button on the e-mail he’d been rushing to finish, then joined me on the executive leather sofa. His assistant had been told not to put any calls through for half an hour, and we were down to eleven minutes now.

  He pinched a California roll from my sushi box and put his feet up on the chrome table. “I’m sorry about Giselle, but in my experience, it’s always better to give the press something to run with, and then they don’t come looking for more. And by the same argument, it’s better to agree to this engagement photo session for Mom, and then she’ll leave us to handle the wedding plans ourselves.”

  He flashed me a crooked smile that gave no hint of all the wrangling about cathedrals and banquets that had gone on when I wasn’t around. I knew that because Rolf had told Jo that Liza had tried to barter a honeymoon on Richard Branson’s ultra-exclusive Necker Island in return for a cathedral wedding, and Leo had refused point-blank because it was still my day.

  I felt bad. I didn’t want to look like I was causing trouble already.

  “Seriously, have you read this? ‘Amelia Wilde is one of London’s most in-demand outdoor experience creators, and comes from a long line of horticultural experts.’ She sounds great. I must get her on board!”

  “She is great.” Leo slid his arm around me, mindful of the glass walls that surrounded his minimalist office space. “I particularly like it when she wears those jeans with the rips in the wrong place and then digs until she gets this very attractive flush all over her. …”

  My stomach knotted with excitement, and I had to resist a powerful urge to wrestle him to the ground. Leo looked extremely suave in his business suit. All chiseled and professional and—

  A secretary walked past and stared in at us, and I sat bolt upright. Leo just helped himself to more sushi.

  “Will I have to do much preparation for this photo shoot?” I tried to phrase it so I didn’t sound quite so clueless.

  “Ah.” He scrunched one side of his face up, as if he’d found something untoward in his fish.

  “Ah, what?”

  “Ah, I meant to warn you about that. Sofia’s going to be in London next week, and she said she’d come round and give you a heads-up on the sort of prep you might want to do.”

  “Such as?” I asked warily. Sofia was supergroomed. That totally understated New York–style supergrooming that made Jo look like Helena Bonham Carter.

  Leo shrugged. “I have no idea, I’m not a girl. But you shouldn’t have to do too much. You’re gorgeous as you are. I keep telling you.”

  I put back my last bit of sushi and pushed the box away. I had the sinking feeling that I was already about five bazillion calories too late.

  *

  Sofia came round in person to begin the princessing process while I was in the bath deliberating about whether shaving my legs before being taken on a beauty boot camp was like tidying up for the cleaner.

  I know. I could have kicked myself. But to be fair, she arrived at eight o’clock, and I honestly had no idea she’d turn up herself—I’d assumed she’d call me and send a car or her assistant like the rest of them did. Sofia either didn’t have the staff or, as I soon realized, didn’t trust anyone to do anything properly.

  Dickon had to let her in, because I was in the bath and Jo hadn’t heard the door buzzer (she was on the phone to Callie Hamilton, who was trying to persuade her to oversee the new subcellar under her cellar). By the time Sofia had stalked up two flights of stairs, she’d probably added at least two more to-do’s to her list of improvements, starting with sacking the doorman.

  “Good morning,” she said when I opened the door wearing only a towel and Jo’s Ugg boots. “You should get your landlord to upgrade that intercom. It’s hopelessly outdated and a security risk. If you give me his number, I’ll deal with it for you right now.”

  Panic spread through me. How could anyone look so groomed so early? Did she have a hairdresser living in her flat?

  “Um, I’ll look out the number.” I didn’t like to say that the landlord was currently in the kitchen yelling at a needy client.

  Sofia peered at me down her long tanned nose. “Are you ill? Did I get you out of bed?”

  I clutched the graying towel closer. It was Sod’s Law that this morning I hadn’t used one of our many good towels. I made a massive effort not to tell her that this one was Badger’s (although I should stress it was fresh out of the washing machine). “No, I, er, just wasn’t expecting you quite so—”

  There was a cough behind me, and Jo moved me firmly out of the way.

  “I’m so sorry about my friend,” she said, extending a gracious hand. “She’s positively incoherent until she’s had her first gin of the day. Hello, I’m Jo de Vere. You must be …”

  “Sofia Wolfsburg. How nice to meet you.”

  The two of them shook hands like a pair of boxers squaring up before a title fight, and eyed each other with the sharklike politeness of the upper classes. From where I was standing, hopping from foot to foot with working-class embarrassment, it looked like quite an equal match: Sofia was pin-sharp in a navy suit that fitted her exactly, whereas Jo was wearing her “I mean business” Vivienne Westwood skirt that I’d thought, for six months, was tucked up in her knickers. (It wasn’t. It was ruched like that.)

  I noted that Jo didn’t fluster about whether to curtsy or call her Princess Sofia, but simply smiled and waved toward the kitchen. “Have you had breakfast yet? I was just about to put some coffee on. Would you like some toast?”

  Yes! I thought privately. Score one to Jo.

  Sofia smiled. “No, thank you, I had breakfast before I saw my trainer.”

  Oh. Maybe one all.

  “Your trainer? Heavens! What time did you get up?”

  “I see my trainer at six. We work out for an hour, then I cycle in to the office and shower there,” said Sofia, as if this were entirely normal and not the schedule of a maniac. Or an insomniac.

  She turned back to me. “Would you like to get dressed? We’ve got quite a lot to get through.”

  “I’ll put on the coffee and toast,” said Jo, and sailed into the kitchen.

  I had no idea now who was winning, but I knew for certain it wasn’t me.

  *

  I stood in my bedroom and panicked. I had never in my entire life been quite so paralyzed about what on earth to wear, not even for my first dates with Leo. Sofia probably had scorecards in her briefcase to hold up when I walked in.

  I reminded myself that Leo had to
ld me he liked my “natural” style, then pulled on my best jeans and a Breton top, and added my engagement ring and the diamond daisy chain to make myself feel better. I loved my sparkling daisy chain; it was a mixture of the ordinary and the precious—and, if you wanted to be all metaphorical, the precious in the ordinary—and more than that, it reminded me that Leo had actually been listening when I’d been rambling on about wildflowers and how much I loved them.

  I stared at the priceless slices of diamond fringing the yellow centers, a funny sensation fluttering just out of reach in the back of my mind; then I snapped myself out of it, and went back to face the music.

  In the kitchen, Jo and Sofia were having one of those chesslike conversations that involved working out how many mutual friends they had, but without revealing how well they knew them. My brain ached just listening to it.

  “Have you got coffee?” I reached for the jug. “And do you mind if I make some toast?”

  “Not at all,” said Sofia. “Could you pop that in some boiling water for me, please. Filtered.” She reached into her briefcase and pulled out a ziplock of herbal tea bags. “We have a lot of ground to cover and I have an important meeting in the office at four.”

  “Oh, really?” I dropped the tea bag into one of our better cups and seized the opportunity to show I’d been paying attention in Nirona. “Would that be a will-related matter?”

  Sofia stared at me as if I’d just asked her how much she earned a week. “Interfamilial litigation is my main field, yes.”

  “That must be fascinating,” said Jo. “Families are the absolute worst. My mother’s rewritten her will about thirty times in the last ten years—I can’t even remember if I’m in the latest one or not.”

  I furrowed my brow at Jo—family wills weren’t the most tactful topic right now—but Sofia reached for her transparent file without reacting.

  Jo’s nostrils flared in well-bred surprise. She wasn’t used to being blanked.

  “Amy, I’ve prepared a checklist of objectives that my mother and I feel it would be realistic for you to achieve by the end of October, which is when we’re scheduling the coronation, as well as some shorter-term strategies that we’d like to get in place before the official engagement photo shoot and press release, and then again some longer-term goals.”

  With each goal, strategy, and objective, she slapped stapled spreadsheets in front of me.

  “I know that makes it sound rather businesslike,” she went on with an apologetic smile, which actually wasn’t all that apologetic when I looked more closely, “but I think it would help you to think of it in those terms, so it doesn’t feel so … personal. This isn’t a reflection on you, it’s more an indication of what the role of Leo’s wife entails. Think of it more like a job specification.”

  The haggard specter of Pavlos floated before me; I blinked him away and started to make “no, no, it’s fine” noises, but then my eye snagged on the first page of targets, specifically the phrase “Achieve BMI 18,” and I felt as if someone had grabbed my muffin top and squeezed. Squeezed and then sniggered.

  Beneath that particular heading were the notes: “AW to meet with dietician and personal trainer in London; SW to accompany. AW to supply details of dietary requirements to String Beans, daily meal plan supplier. AW to confirm best times for biweekly weight check/Harley St.”

  I looked up, shocked. “Biweekly weight checks?”

  Sofia tilted her head. She’d had her brows shaped since our last meeting. They were not as bushy as I remembered. Obviously I wasn’t the only one with a checklist. “It’s so much easier for you if you can fit into a sample size. The camera adds at least ten pounds, and designers simply don’t make runway dresses in a size ten.”

  “But surely the point of couture is that it fits you, not the other way around?” said Jo smoothly. “That Zoë Weiss dress Amy wore for the charity ball was stunning.”

  Sofia looked unperturbed. “I’m not saying it wasn’t a strong piece,” she said. “But we want Amy to have the same access to the preseason collections as everyone else. She’s marrying into a high-profile family and she needs to be in the same fashion frame as the other young royal women.”

  “It’s all fine. I understand.” I tried to claw back some dignity. “I’ll have to check my work diary for some of these dates. Ted and I are actually quite busy at the moment. I’ve just signed an important landscaping contract, and …”

  Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Jo’s foot swinging, and that wasn’t a good sign. For anyone. It was a sort of metaphorical mime of the arse-kicking she was about to dish out.

  Sofia reached for her leather notebook and BlackBerry. “While we’re in Harley Street today, we can call in at the orthodontist too, get your braces sorted out. And where is your dermatologist?”

  “Is that a stamp collector?” I joked.

  Sofia blinked patiently. “No. It’s a skin-care professional.”

  I could see that joking with Sofia was going to be an uphill process. “I don’t have one. Unless you count Boots the chemist?”

  “Her beautiful skin is all her own work,” said Jo lightly. “I’m madly jealous of her freckles. Amy never wears a scrap of makeup and she still looks radiant. Must be all the vitamin D from the sun.”

  Nothing registered on Sofia’s discreetly made-up face. It would have a job anyway. “Ooookay,” she said, scribbling a note. “That was something I told Mom I thought you would have. No derm. Never mind, I can make some calls. Did you do a New Year’s detox?”

  “No.” I nearly laughed, thinking of the three-foot-long Toblerone Jo had brought back from Verbier. “Definitely not.”

  “Well, we can get you checked out there too. Um, hairdresser, we’re booked in after lunch for a consultation before we make any firm decisions about … anything. My facialist is clearing an appointment for you later.” She looked up from her list. “Nails?”

  Sofia fixed me with an unflinching stare, the type normally seen through either a confessional grille or a gun turret. Slowly I withdrew my hands from where they were safely hidden under the table, and showed them to her. She grimaced.

  She actually grimaced. And I thought they weren’t looking too bad.

  “I’m a gardener,” I protested.

  “Not anymore you’re not,” she said. “From now on, you’re a junior royal. Two pairs of gloves and no washing up, please.”

  I glanced across at Jo, but by now even she’d lost the will to joke.

  Twenty-two

  I was hoping Jo might have been able to come with me on Sofia’s Improving Amy Roadshow round Mayfair, but she had to go and deal with Callie’s latest drama. Callie, I was willing to bet, was agog at the developments. She didn’t seem to get out much, thanks to the boyfriend she always seemed to be waiting in for.

  “Text me your whereabouts and I’ll try to bump into you,” Jo hissed, while Sofia was on the phone to her manicurist; she hadn’t bothered to drop her voice when she instructed her to “book out a double appointment. Actually, make it three.”

  I tried to look on the bright side, I’d seen a lot of makeover shows in which normal girls like me were transformed into glossy beauties by a ruthless glamour-puss in glasses. The more unrecognizable the end result, the more pleased everyone was.

  “It’s like when you made me try on skinny jeans for the first time, right?” I asked in an undertone. “I should face my fashion fears. I mean, it might be fun? Going shopping with a princess?”

  We both looked over at Sofia at the same time. She didn’t look much like a princess. She looked like a corporate lawyer, albeit a very, very senior one. The stroppy madam I’d seen over the dining table in Nirona had been replaced by a woman with superflicky blond hair who was on a mission.

  A woman whose brother had just been promoted over her. A woman who might take it out on her brother’s fiancée using the terrifying weaponry only a hairdresser could offer.

  Jo grabbed my arms. “Try to enjoy it,” she urged. “
I know she’s a bossy cow, but if it makes life easier for you to have the right clothes, do it. At the end of the day, it’s just a hairdo.”

  I nodded. Aside from the lemon-sucking face, Sofia did look fabulous, and I knew I needed some help in that area. Now wasn’t the time to get on my “real women don’t wear mascara” soapbox.

  “And if you get offered any limited-edition Chanel nail varnish, bag it and I’ll give you the cash,” Jo added fiercely.

  *

  Sofia had borrowed Leo’s car for the day, and I was pleased to see Billy’s familiar figure standing by the Range Rover as I stumbled out of 17 Leominster Place behind Sofia. She wasn’t hanging about, towering heels or not.

  “Good morning, ma’am!” he said as he opened the door for me.

  “Morning, Billy!” I replied. “How’s the wisteria? It should be springing back thick after that second pruning?”

  “It’s doing very nicely, thank you, ma’am.”

  I frowned. I’d thought he’d said Amy the first time, but that was definitely two ma’ams. I opened my mouth to say something, but he flicked his eyes meaningfully toward Sofia, and closed the door behind me.

  The dark leather interior swallowed me up, and I felt smaller. But the smell at least was reassuringly familiar.

  Sofia leaned forward and said, “Harvey Nichols, please,” then leaned back and said, “Amy, one thing before we start—it’s best for everyone if you maintain the correct distance from staff right from the outset. That goes for any job. There is no we in management, just me. I like to feel my department is a team, sure, but my office manager doesn’t need to know about my weekend plans, unless they involve working late and requiring additional admin support.”

  She actually spoke like that. In full sentences that went up and down with “thoughtful” modulations, like one of Jo’s voice-overs.

  “Okay,” I said.

  I glanced forward and saw Billy’s gray eyes, guarded in the rearview mirror. He was very good at not seeing or hearing things, if you know what I mean, but he’d obviously heard every word Sofia had just said, and I felt embarrassed for him. And me.