Royal Wedding (The Princess Diaries 11)

“Yes,” I whispered, gagging. “I don’t know what I was thinking, trying to have a tender moment with her. I hope someday she gets what she deserves.”

“I think she’s going to,” he whispered back. “She’s going to be a great-grandmother. To twins.”

I looked up at him and smiled. “HA! Thanks for rescuing me, Fire Marshal.”

He smiled back. “Anytime.”

Dad was saying, in an exhausted voice, after having hung up with the lawyers, “They think we’ll have Olivia back by tomorrow afternoon.”

Michael raised a skeptical eyebrow. “Really?” To my grandmother he said, “And should you really be smoking that in here? I thought your doctor said—”

“I need a drink as well.” Dad grabbed a whiskey decanter from the bar shaped like a globe where my grandmother hides all her best hooch, and began pouring. “Well, who wouldn’t, after something that unpleasant? Who’s with me?”

Dad assumed everyone was with him, since he poured four glasses. Michael and I exchanged glances. I tried to get him to read my mind. Not now. We are not telling them now. Now is not the time.

I couldn’t tell whether or not I’d succeeded.

“Uh,” I said as Dad passed me a glass. The fumes from inside it made my eyes water. “None for me, thanks. I’m not really in the mood.”

“Well, you should be,” my father continued. “Because it’s not all bad news.” He raised his glass. “As of a few hours ago, Cousin Ivan has officially withdrawn from the election for prime minister of Genovia.”

I kept my glass in the air as Michael and Grandmère said “Cheers” and took a sip. “Oh, wow, Dad. That’s great.”

“It is great,” my father said. “For Deputy Minister Dupris.”

“Wait . . .” I lowered my glass. “Why is it great for her?”

“Because I’ve decided to withdraw from the race as well,” Dad said. I noticed he didn’t make eye contact with his mother as he said this. “And when I do, that will make her the only viable candidate.”

I heard the sound of smashing glass. When I turned, I saw that Grandmère had thrown her whiskey into the marble fireplace. She was shaking almost as much as Rommel usually did, only from rage, not from having no fur.

“I knew it!” she cried, her face a mask of fury. “I knew it! It’s because of that woman, isn’t it?”

Stunned at this outburst, I swung my astonished gaze back toward my father. Amazingly, he looked calm . . . and almost cheerful. Certainly happier than he should have been, given what had happened moments before with Olivia, and the fact that he’d just announced he was giving up on a campaign on which he’d spent millions of his own money.

“Yes, it is, Mother,” he said happily. “I’ve decided to take the advice of my daughter, and stop following the map.”

“Map?” Grandmère cried. “What map? What kind of nonsense is that?”

“The kind I should have listened to a long time ago,” Dad said, setting down his whiskey glass and heading toward the foyer. “I’m taking the road less traveled. It may not get me where I thought I was going, but it could take me somewhere even better. Right, Mia?”

“Sure,” I said as Michael and I followed him. He’d reached for his suit jacket, and as he did, I noticed that there was stubble on his upper lip. He was growing his mustache back. “You never know. Where are you going?”

“To have dinner with Helen Thermopolis,” he said. To Grandmère he said, “Mother, do not wait up for me.”

“Helen Thermopolis?” Grandmère looked apoplectic. “Amelia’s mother?”

“Yes,” Dad said. “We’re going to a new vegetarian restaurant that’s opened around the corner from her place. Helen says the baba ghanoush is excellent.”

“Baba ghanoush?” Grandmère looked as if she were about to have a stroke. “You’re going to eat baba ghanoush?”

“Yes, Mother.” Dad stopped in front of the floor-length mirror Grandmère had hung next to the front door to her condo so that she can check herself before she goes out in order to make sure her eyebrows aren’t drawn on unevenly. He adjusted his tie, then smoothed down the imaginary hairs on his bald head. “Helen has decided to give me another chance. And I am going to win her back, no matter what I have to do, even if it’s eat baba ghanoush.” He glanced at us, then added deliberately, “Or step down from the throne.”

Grandmère was so shocked, the cigarette dropped from her limp fingers to the marble floor. Michael stepped forward and quickly stamped it out.

“Abdicate?” my grandmother cried. “B-but what would you do instead of rule?”

Dad gave her a look that was as stony-eyed as any she’d ever given me.