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The peach-coloured dress floats as I walk, and the long sleeves make me feel slightly warmer in this cold weather. They gave me a bunch of borrowed diamonds from the royal collection to use tonight. 

I'm wearing a diamond necklace with a pink stone, small diamond earrings and a pink flower brooch that's got roots from King Hugh's grandmother's wedding day. Underneath my left sleeve is the charm bracelet my family gave me before all this royal business happened, and on my right wrist is a pink sapphire bracelet Kai had made from the royal diamond collection, and the same pink sapphire the brooch came from. Part of me feels overdressed.

Kai told me ages ago that we're presidents of BAFTA, which was handed to Kai when the last president stepped down. The presidents of BAFTA have always been royal, and Kai's love of the arts aligns with it. 

Tonight is the annual video game awards, and though it's never a smart-suited event, when they heard we were attending – our first engagement since the news of the cancer and our pregnancy came out – they turned it into a smart affair. Kai's been excited over it, and secretly so have I, with our love of video games. Luckily for us, part of our duties includes watching all the nominated films and playing nominated games. Both Kai and I have enjoyed doing that part of the role, for sure.

Kai stands by the door of the car as security opens it for me. The second I stand up, cameras and shouts are directed towards me. There's never much attention to video game awards previously, but it just goes to show if you put someone in public favour on the roster, people will flock. Hopefully, it turns into good attention for the industry. We're meant to be helping one company do classes in schools next week relating to gaming and setting up a scholarship for teens wanting to go into the industry.

That's of course amongst all the stress and unknown about when we'll be taking over as king and queen. It's been three days since the announcement of Hugh's cancer came out and the first time anyone royal has been seen outside the palace.

"We've got this, Peach, okay? Peach in peach colours," Kai whispers when I stand beside him for photos.

I laugh. "Princess Peach strikes again."

Kai moves to the left side of the crowd while I take the right hand side.

"Princess Mila!"

"How is the King?"

"Congratulations!"

I shake hands with people whose faces get lost in the sea of people while taking flowers of sympathy and congratulations and giving them to Jamie behind me. He seems to have become my personal security now instead of Kai's, while Kai has a new guy called Luke behind him all the time.

I stop in front of this young couple, two women holding hands while one of them has what I assume is a pregnant belly on her that she's resting her free hand on. Her partner holds out a phone to me.

"Can you take a selfie with us please, Princess?" she asks.

"Of course!" I lean back and let her take the shot.

"Thank you! Congratulations on the news, and sympathies to the King."

I smile. "Thank you; it's a strange time right now!"

"We're expecting a baby boy in two weeks and we're going to name him Liam Hugh."

"Oh, that's lovely. I'll tell King Hugh when I see him next. He'll be so touched." That's the first time I've heard someone naming their baby after my father-in-law; I've heard a few people fawning over Kai and naming their baby after him. I even had one calling their girl Mila a few weeks ago, which was the most surreal thing on the planet. We've had letters come to the palace press office with declarations of baby naming and pet naming.

Growing up, I wanted to be like Ariel or Cinderella, but when I watched Tangled, I wanted to be Rapunzel. Heck, I even went in to my dad and asked him if I was secretly a princess and he kept me in a house away from the royal family. He laughed and told me I wasn't. Never did I think I would walk into this life, or that I would enjoy it. Let alone have people name their babies and cats after me. Nor did I think I would walk red carpets with diamonds worth more money than I could ever imagine on my person.

"Princess Mila!" A girl looking around seven stands in front of the bollard with what I assume is her brother, and I don't know why she's out this late... though it's only seven, but it's so cold out here.

I take a photo with her before accepting a box of chocolates. "Thank you so much! Chocolate is my favourite!"

"Our mum was obsessed with chocolate when she was pregnant with our sister," the little girl says. "Will you be too?"

"I don't know; when I was pregnant with Emma, I used to drink so much lemonade and my dad was constantly in the kitchen making carrot cake!"

She laughs. "Carrot cake is gross! Vegetables in a cake!"

"Carrot cake is my favourite," I whisper. "But chocolate is also my favourite thing!"

She grins. "What will you call your next baby?"

I fake shock at her question. "I don't know yet! We don't know whether it'll be a boy or a girl. We're also not allowed to say yet. What's your name?"

"My name is Alicia, and my brother is Daniel."

"Lovely names," I say.

"Your Highness, you need to move along now," Jamie whispers in my ear.

I nod. "It was so lovely meeting you both. Thank you so much for coming."

She squeals as I walk through the crowd a bit more and eventually swap sides with Kai. There are so many flowers and cards of both sympathy and congratulations. It seems people love the royal family so much when things like this come out, and it's lovely to see. There have been questions about Kai and me taking over, though, and even a comment on how sad it is that Lucy and her family have passed as well.

I overheard a comment from someone about how they hope this baby is a son so it can take over instead of Emma when she's older. Little do they know the law around the succession is about to pass in a week when they'll announce it, too.

We usually get calls for abolishing the monarchy whenever we go out, too, but this time they've either gathered somewhere else or aren't bothered tonight.

Kai appears behind me, putting his hand on my back. "We have to go in now. There's time for more meet and greet once the awards are finished."

I nod. His aftershave is infiltrating my nose and making me wish I could kiss him. I'm usually told the best we can do is link arms or Kai can touch my back, apart from our wedding day. It makes me sad if I'm honest; I don't expect to make out in front of the cameras, but a small peck on the lips would never look bad.

He leads me forward.

"I'm desperate to kiss you right now. Just a small lip kiss," I whisper. "That aftershave just does things to me."

He laughs. "It's against protocol."

"Public displays of our love shouldn't be shied away from. We're still doing our duty professionally, and it's not like we're, you know, in front of the cameras. You look hot, I look hot—"

"Peach! I mean, you look hot, and I'm pleased you finally agree," he whispers. "It's against royal protocol, but also, who cares? I love you."

The cameras are still watching us, and I know that as I grin and lean in. "I love you too."

He kisses me on the lips, not once, but twice, and finally tangles his hand in mine as we walk the rest of the carpet towards the entrance of the building.

─── ♔♔♔ ───

The news is full of photos of me and Kai kissing at every angle, with tons of 'royal reporters' scrutinising how this is unprecedented. According to them, showing kisses that aren't at a royal wedding is against protocol, and we have to follow rules. One woman is texting into some news channel about how could they.

I scoff and point to the TV. "This woman, right? Thinks your dad will be so annoyed with us, he'll throw us out of the royal family. Or when she hears that Dad won't give two shits about it."

Kai laughs and sits down beside me on the sofa. "Oh, how she'll fall off her seat when she hears the news we're going to ascend soon."

"I know it's against protocol, but will it cause us trouble over one small kiss?"

Kai shakes his head. "If things were normal right now, as in a year ago? Dad would just shake his head and tell us not to do it again, maybe remind us of the rules. Now? No, he won't give a shit. If he did, he would've called by now. We can make this a norm now if we want. Decorum in public is still needed, but I'd love to hold your hand while we're out or kiss you like that once in a while. My dad told Lucy once how when she ascended the throne and while she was Princess of Wales, she would be the face of royalty-future. Now she's gone, it's our job, and now we're going to take the throne soon, it's us who can change things and modernise the royal family. If we say a peck on the lips and holding hands is fine, then future generations of the royals will go with it and adapt it when it's their turn."

"I love you, you know."

He smiles and squeezes my leg as I rest them in his lap. "Oh, believe me, Peach, I love you too. Ever since I laid eyes on you in that club."

I snort. "Loser."

He feigns offence. "Hey, hey, I'm perfectly okay with being a loser because I know deep down I won; look at where we've ended up. You're the one who took ages to fall in love with me."

I arch an eyebrow. "I hate it when you win fake arguments."

His phone buzzes on the coffee table. "Fuck sake. What now?" He moves my legs and stands up before answering the phone.

I finish my cup of tea and continue watching the news as Kai takes the phone call out of the room. They continue to play the rest of the day's headlines, including the news on the pregnancy and the king's cancer diagnosis.

There's so much on social media about pure royalists who hate the fact I've walked in from nowhere, being a nobody, from a broken family with a stepbrother and stepmum and going to be queen consort – or a princess – one day. The same people just love to comment on anything I do and think I'm bringing the monarchy down and making an embarrassment of our great nation or whatever they call it.

Part of me – the sane part – knows to ignore it, because it's not their decision. They don't get to decide who represents our country and rules it. But at the same time, they insult me and my family and that just stings. 

They can say what they want about my leadership or me as queen, but not my family. When my mum died, Dad and I were broken, but our family was never broken. My dad made sure to always give me love and smiles, he always provided and never made our little unit feel broken. We missed my mum – terribly – and her loss was felt so much, but that gaping hole she left never turned into a black hole of doom. Instead, my dad filled it with so much love and so much of his pure brilliance that we carried on and didn't give into life's worst feelings. We were strong and came out of mourning, together.

When Dad got together with Annie and both she and Patrick joined our family, they made our lives fuller, and together, two broken units became one. Patrick and Annie never got over her first husband's death, and still haven't, just like me and Dad never got over Mum's death, but instead of bringing us down, we celebrate our lives together, and their lives, too.

Our family is the opposite of broken. I'd say it's better than a typical nuclear family because we all have the shared experience of mourning and healing together. We're stronger for our losses and nothing anyone on social media says can change that.

Kai walks in a few minutes later. "That was Dad."

I turn the TV off. This means business; there's been news, judging by the look on Kai's face.

"So, he's already put the law through parliament and they've kept it very quiet until Dad wants to announce it. He's abdicating... Wednesday."

My eyes bulge. "That's in five days."

Kai nods. "What will happen is, on Monday, Dad will call a press conference to the nation with us beside him, saying the bill has passed through parliament, and because of his ill health, he's passing the throne. Then because of his appointments, he'll sign the documents Wednesday in parliament and we'll automatically be king and queen. We'll have to stay behind and sort out a coronation and everything, but our appointment will be automatic as soon as Dad signs the dotted line, and of course, we do, too. We're going to be king and queen next week, Peach. This is it." 

─── ♔♔♔ ───