“Giving her one tonight isn’t much nicer,” Freddie points out.
“Maybe not, but I don’t want it to look like she napped on the job,” Nick says. “She might be of help. You never know. She’s got a crafty streak, that one.” He stands up. “But I do have one thing I’d like to do first.”
He takes my hand and scoots down on one knee. “Gran is perfectly welcome to cancel the wedding tomorrow if she’d like,” he says. “But she can’t cancel our marriage. Not if we do it now.” He kisses my palm. “Marry me tonight.”
The words give me a thrill—and, apparently, have the same effect on Gaz, who gasps and clasps his hands together. His mushroom tart falls to the floor.
“Eleanor can have it annulled,” Cilla points out.
“Not if neither one of us signs the papers,” Nick says.
“She can make you abdicate your position,” Bea says.
“I’ll call her bluff. She’d never,” Nick says. “It would turn a house fire into an inferno.”
“Plus she’d have to bump me up a notch, which she wouldn’t, because it’s all my bloody fault to begin with,” Freddie said. “And she can’t dock us both and put Edwin two heartbeats closer to the throne. She’d rather marry Bex herself.”
Nick turns to me. “Can I get up now, love?” he asks.
“Oh, shit! Yes,” I say. “I’m sorry. And I just swore during this romantic moment.”
Nick pulls me up to standing position with him. “Wouldn’t be the first time,” he says lovingly. “I seem to recall you using that word when I gave you the ring in the first place.”
“Can we really do this?” I ask.
“Why not?” he says. “We’ve got the marriage license, right?”
He looks at Freddie, who nods.
“And the rings,” Nick says.
“Safe as houses back at ours,” Freddie confirms.
“And we’ve got a whole room full of witnesses,” Nick says. “We can sneak into the chapel at St. James’s from Clarence House. We just need a minister.”
“You can get ordained in five minutes on the Internet, though, right?” I ask. “Gaz would kill it.”
Gaz heaves a disappointed sigh. “As correct as that is, it is my great displeasure to inform you that, in the UK, we need a proper vicar for it to be legal.”
“This reminds me of my cousin,” Cilla begins.
“Now is not the time,” Bea snaps.
“My cousin, the vicar,” Cilla finishes, giving Lady Bollocks a piercing look. “He’s actually my mum’s cousin. He would’ve done our wedding, except he isn’t speaking to her.”
“Can he keep his mouth shut?” Bea asks.
“He has with Cilla’s mum,” Gaz pointed out.
“Might be a tough secret to keep anyway.” Nick says. He looks at me. “Bex. My love. Once and for all, are you in?”
I smile up at him. “I always wanted a small wedding.”
Chapter Five
I can’t breathe under here,” I cough. “I don’t know how I did this so often.”
“Well,” Cilla says from above me, “you were pretty stonking drunk most times.”
We’d gotten the green light from Nick an hour after our summit. PPO Twiggy was off on his motorbike fetching the vicar, the rest of the gang was gathering the license and rings, and Lacey responded to my all-caps text with a message saying not to do anything else drastic until she got to me. Cilla and I passed the time reverting me from Rebecca into Bex, and dissecting every conversation we’d ever had with Clive for hints at the cunning we’d clearly missed. We came up empty. Other than veiled remarks about Paris, which seemed self-pitying then and now look designed to inspire a servile pity in us, there was nothing. Clive’s poker face was expert, and we’d quite simply been had.
“I feel almost sorry for Joss,” I’d said, pulling back on my jeans. “And sorry about her. I feel responsible. She really was so angry at me, Cil. Maybe I could’ve done more.”
“That one was born under an irrational star,” Cilla had said as she zipped my Jenny Packham back into its hanging bag. “You can’t worry about her if she’s not worried about you. Let’s get you and Nick sorted instead.”
And thus, I am sneaking into Clarence House in the back of PPO Popeye’s car—or, more accurately, on the floor in the back, under a very familiar, itchy afghan.
“Like old times,” Cilla had laughed when Popeye threw open the Mercedes door to reveal my old nemesis. He’d grinned mischievously, his telltale piece of spinach clinging to his left upper bicuspid. Like old times indeed.