The Prince's Private Symphony

3. A Bee in Your Bonnet

Eloise and I were running around. Mama gave us a break from our studies so we decided to play a game. I was chasing her around and Colin yelled that he was going to join in. I turned to her laughing. "Let's go outside! We can hide from him out there!" I told her excitedly.

"Brilliant!" Eloise complimented with a silly grin. She headed to the door before gasping, "Father and Anthony are home!" She yelled. I gasped too before grabbing her hand to run outside and meet them.

"Father? What is it? Father! Wha What?" I heard Anthony call.

"Mama?" I yelled inside. "I think papa's hurt!"

"Help us, someone! Someone, please! Help!" He yelled again. I ignored the calls of my mama who had yet to run outside and ran towards papa who had fallen to the ground.

"Papa! Are you okay?" I asked.

"Maybe he needs a hug to feel better," Eloise suggested from the door as Mama had stopped her from leaving the house.

"Eleanor, go back to the others!" Mama ordered. "What happened?" She asked, falling to the ground and I could see my father's face turning white.

"I don't know! I don't know! I don't know! Was it a bee? A bee, I think," Anthony cried.

"Edmund. Edmund, you must breathe," Mama begged. I couldn't hear anymore, my mouth dropped and I couldn't move. What was happening to my father. Mama hid him from view as she cried.

"Papa, Mama?" I asked quietly as my Mama looked over and the rest of my siblings were coming outside.

"Oh, God! The other children. They cannot—They cannot see him. Anthony! Go!" Mama snapped and the next thing I knew was that I was being carried by Anthony back to the house. I hid my face in his neck as I could hear him cry.

We all know the great lengths a young lady will go in pursuit of a proposal. And apparently, she will travel great distances too.

Lord Anthony Bridgerton appears to be inching ever so closer to selecting his viscountess, and to that end has invited our diamond to join him for an excursion at his ancestral home, Aubrey Hall.

"ALEX!" I yelled.

"What?" He asked, exacerbated. "I just got my brother settled."

"I got a letter from your Mama and Papa and they will be here for the celebration and so will your sister. Amara and Prince Fredrich are quite busy right now," I told him, apologetically.

"You know, now that we're here. We'll have more time. We're now in the same house," he smirks, wrapping his arm around me.

"Closer to my siblings," I reminded him.

"A whole garden, a whole house," he retorted. "Plus, you do not share a room with anyone here."

"Quite right you are," I smiled at him, pulling him in for a kiss.

Country air indeed clears the mind and invigorates the body.

Might this be the final gust that pushes the viscount over the precipice of a proposal? Of course, the luckless souls remaining in town will have to find new diversions in the absence of their most precious of stones.

Alex and I were now sitting with Elosie, discussing the book that the three of us had just finished reading and what we thought of it. "I'm just saying the main character was a little rash," Alex shrugged.

"Oh, please, just because she is a woman does not mean you have to call her rash, if it were a man you would say risk taking," Eloise whispered to him as our family was talking on the other side of the room.