‘And you kept it up to keep him happy. Until?’ She pressed her lips together.
‘Until I realised it wasn’t fair on Sofia or anyone else. Not even me.’ He was better off on his own.
‘Not going to lie, Felipe, the Javier dude doesn’t sound like he was all that great.’
Felipe tried to laugh. Tried to explain. ‘He wasn’t that bad, you know? For a long time he was a good king. And he wanted what was best for everyone. For the country. But then he got older and he was more sick than we realised, I guess. He was losing his grip on his mind so he tightened his grip elsewhere even more. He got really difficult in the final years. Some parts of his mind faded, while he fixated on certain things.’ On lineage. On the Crown. On Felipe. ‘The courtiers wanted to keep his cognitive decline under wraps for as long as possible because of my age and the risk of political instability. If others thought the King was incapacitated in any way...’ It was why he was going to clear the bulk of the King’s power and change the constitution. ‘I took on most of the public engagements. It’s why I’m in that ridiculous bedroom. That historic wing of the palace was the easiest to make most secure. We converted his rooms into a full facility hospital suite and created an enrichment area to try to slow the advancing dementia...’
‘You cared for him.’
‘Of course. I had to stay here for him. I was the only one left who could. And he was a good man. Things were just different. He’d had a happy marriage. His wife had died young and he wanted stability for the family and he didn’t get it. He didn’t understand my father. Honestly, I didn’t either...’
‘How old were you when he got ill?’
‘Almost twenty.’
‘So soon after your father left? You were so young. And you were trapped here.’ She gazed at him. ‘Not just by duty and obligation. You were literally trapped.’
No, he wasn’t. ‘I was being protected. And then I was protecting him. And my country.’
‘Felipe.’ She shook her head. ‘No. What they did to you?’ She drew in a shaky breath. ‘When did you last leave—last take a holiday?’
‘It’s not possible to leave for any length of time. I couldn’t let them down. They need me to be here.’ Defensiveness rose. He’d never allowed himself to consider leaving for longer.
‘Is that what they said?’
His aides, sure. Over and over. ‘I was the strong one who had what it took. I was the only one left. Grandfather was counting on me. Not just Grandfather. The whole country.’
‘But they left you alone to face everything—including him. Alone, Felipe. They made you become this...’
He stiffened. ‘This what?’
‘Isolated guy. You’ve had to be so strong. And silent.’ She shook her head. ‘I don’t think anyone should be forced to stay somewhere. Or forced to leave. You should have had choices—the freedom to come and go as you wished. To become the person you wanted to be. To have all the things. Not just the palace and the power and the people who run at the lift of your little finger. But you should have the family support—the fun, companionship, the fulfilment of private and personal dreams...’
He tried to smile at her—to lighten this because it was too intense. Private and personal dreams? ‘Don’t pity me, Elsie. I already warned you.’
‘That you’ll use it to ask all the things of me?’ She leaned forward. ‘Then do it, Felipe. Ask me anything. I would do anything for you. Not because you’re the King—because it’s you.’
He froze, overcome by a desire so strong, so impossible. ‘Don’t...’
He didn’t mean to mutter it. Didn’t mean to show how much her words affected him. How much he couldn’t handle this. Her sweet generosity? Didn’t she know he would take everything if he could? Not just sex. She was afraid of being selfish, she had nothing on his latent greed.
She read his tension. ‘You can tell me anything you like. The best. The worst. Just tell me the truth.’
‘It wasn’t that awful, Elsie.’
‘Wasn’t it? Are you not alone, Felipe?’
He heard the note in her voice. Yeah, she knew how hard that could be—not all the time, but sometimes in those moments when he wasn’t quite strong enough... It could be so hard.
‘I’m not someone else you have to be strong for and take care of,’ she said earnestly. ‘Not someone you have to protect.’
‘Is that what you think I do?’ He tried to pull together some anger. Some humour. Anything to hide from the raw honesty he’d accidentally revealed.
‘You did for your grandfather. And your father—you took on his burden, allowing him to escape. And your mother too. Now Amalia. You don’t need to be that person for me as well. I mean it. I’ve been through fire and out the other side. I’m burnished. Tough. I can survive anything. You don’t need to protect me. Certainly not here. Definitely not now. So I repeat, you don’t need to be strong for me.’
‘What should I be, then?’
‘You don’t have to be anything for me. You can just be. You. As you are.’