Page 89 of The Heir Apparent
“No, you don’t understand,” I wept. “It’s just us. She drove the boat herself. And now I can’t find her. I don’t know where I am, and I think I might be out here alone. Should I press my panic button, Papa?”
“No, wait… just give me a moment to think,” he said. I could hear him rustling down a hallway and shutting a door. The line went very quiet.
“Papa?”
“I’m here, Lexi, just give me a minute,” he said sharply. “Was she acting strangely at all when you last saw her? Was she drinking?”
“I mean, we had some champagne, but—”
“Oh, Lexi,” he groaned. It was the same tone he used when I was a child and stuck my tongue out at the photographers or shoved Louis at an event when we were bickering. The same hot prickle of shame rushed up my throat now. “Does your brother know? Have you called anyone else?”
“No,” I said. “Only the Italian security guy knows we’re out here. The others didn’t see us leave. Should I call the police?”
“No,” he said. “You and I are going to hang up. I’ve got the location of your phone, so I’m going to send someone to come get you. It might take a couple of hours, so you’ll have to be strong for me, can you do that? While you’re waiting, I want you to get all the things that belong to you and pack them up. Did you say you slept in a bed? Go and make it. Get everything on board the way it was, just as you found it.”
“Papa,” I said. “Shouldn’t I look for her?”
“You need to do exactly as I say and nothing more. Do not answer this phone to anyone but me, do you understand?”
“Please don’t hang up.”
“I have to, mignonette. I have to make some phone calls now. Do as I say and everything will be alright.”
The line went dead and I was on my own again, floating through black nothingness. The quiet became too much, and I ran through the boat, closing cupboard doors and remaking the bed and switching off all the lights. I looked everywhere for the champagne bottle, but it was gone. Mum’s tote bag was still slumped on the floor of the cockpit and my eyes blurred with tears as I stuffed the blanket back inside it. I sensed Papa’s plan more than I was willing to acknowledge it. It was like I could glimpse it from the corner of my eye but would not turn to face it. When everything was as it should be, I climbed back to the bow to wait and screamed her name over and over until my throat burned. There was nothing but silence and water.
Distantly, I heard the low rumbling of a boat. It occurred to me then that if a cruiseliner came barrelling through, I was incapable of turning over the yacht’s engine and moving out of danger. But instead, a small fishing boat was gliding through the water with its lights off. I clambered back to the stern. I had no idea who was out there, but I knew I had less than a minute before everything changed.
There was a lifebuoy hanging near the cockpit, and I took it and flung it into the dark. If she was alive out there, maybe it would drift towards her. Maybe I could undo this with one final offering to the black night. For the conspiracy theorists who obsessed over my mother’s death, this tiny detail would transfix them for years. It had its own subreddits, its own amateur podcasts, its own Wikipedia page. If Princess Isla was really alone on that yacht, who threw the lifebuoy into the water? Some speculated that there was no flotation device on the vessel in the first place. But two months after it went into the water, itwashed up on a beach in Cavalaire-sur-Mer, bearing the faded but legible name of the vessel. By then, Italian police had closed the case, and the discovery was shrugged off by everyone who didn’t dwell at the internet’s hard edges.
The approaching boat slowed to a thudding crawl, and then there was a great flood of light. Blinded, I held my hand up to shield my eyes.
“Carina?” a man called.
“Who’s there?”
“It’s your mother’s guard, Davide. Your papa sent me. We have to go now.”
“I can’t find her,” I sobbed. “I woke up and she was gone.”
He was tying his fishing boat to the yacht’s swim step. He didn’t seem to understand the urgency of the situation. Once he was satisfied with his knot, he held out a hand to me. “Please,carina, we must go now.”
I shook my head and the tears slipped down my neck. “I can’t leave her.”
He looked around at the black night. “I’ll take you to the villa, and then I come back here and search for your mama.”
I hesitated.
“Please, you cannot stay out here. This is what your papa wants.”
It was the kind of walk I thought only possible in a nightmare. I staggered down to the swim step on legs that were feeble and unsteady. Everything was moving too slowly, everyone was taking this catastrophe in their stride, including me. Once I was on board, he began to untie his knots and pull in his ropes.
“Do you think,” I asked, “that we should check the boat one more time?”
He looked at me impatiently. “I don’t think she is here, but when I drop you off, I will come right back and check again.”
From the stern of the fishing boat, I watched the yacht grow smaller and smaller on the horizon. It bobbed on the waves,receding from view, until finally it was swallowed by the dark. I sat numbly as the engine roared below my wooden seat. The ocean spray stung my face. The stench of boat fuel burned my eyes. As the lights of Rapallo grew closer, Davide Rossi turned the motor down to a purr. He threw me a blanket.
“Lie on the floor and hide under this until I tell you it’s safe,” he said.
