Secrets of a First Daughter (12 page)

“We, er, got lost?” I offered.

“Don't insult my intelligence,” George said. “Make this easy on both of us and come clean, Morgan.”

Tell my Secret Service agent that I'd planned on impersonating the president of the United States so I could plead with the queen of England to let my best friend date her grandson? Riiight. “Honestly, we got lost.”

“I can help you,” she said unexpectedly.

Hannah and I stared at each other. Help us?

“It'll be much better if we were on the same side instead of you sneaking around and me having to cover your tracks for you. It's getting exhausting.”

“You've been covering my tracks?” I echoed, stunned.

“How do you think you and Max have been able to see each other so much? I put him on the Secret Service access list at the hotel. Max is a good agent, he might be able to
breach the bubble once in a while, but he's not
that
good.”

My Secret Service agent had been helping me see Max all this time? Could. Not. Process.

“Let's tell her, Morgan,” Hannah said. “We're wasting time.”

I bit my lip, calculating. How much more trouble could I get in? Besides, Hannah was right. We
were
wasting time.

So I gave George the bare-bones outline of what Hannah and I hoped to accomplish, and as I was telling her, it sounded more nuts than ever. “Still want to help us with our crazy plan?”

George displayed remarkable self-control given what she'd just heard. “I didn't think it'd be
that
crazy.”

Impressive.

“We need to get to the queen,” I said. “ASAP.”

“This way.” George led us down a stairwell. We passed by a desk with a security checkpoint. I tensed, but George flashed her ID and we were waved through. We wandered around the musty hallways until we emerged into an area just to the left of the main stage.

“Now what?” George asked.

“We need a place where Morgan can change,” Hannah said.

“Wait here.”

George disappeared. “Do you think she's ratting us
out?” Hannah asked.

“I don't think so. If she wanted to, she would have put the kibosh on the whole thing earlier.” But really I had no idea. Maybe George was right this minute spilling the beans to my mother. I started breaking out at the thought of the consequences, so I just stopped thinking about it. Seemed easier to go with the flow at this point.

George returned more quickly than I thought she would. “There's a vacant dressing room off stage left. At least, I think it's vacant. There's no makeup or costumes in it, just a bunch of sound cables.”

Hannah gave a cheer. “Great! It should only take a couple minutes to get Morgan ready.”

George stood guard outside the dressing room door while I hurried into the semiwrinkled gown. Hannah eased the bob wig over my head. “No time for wig glue or bobby pins,” she muttered. “Just don't move your head around.”

“Uh…okay. Do you have the earrings?”

Hannah handed me a pair of cubic zirconia studs that looked exactly like Mom's trademark one-carat diamond studs.

Hannah swiped some low-key lip color over my lips and a little mascara over my lashes, and stood back to survey her handiwork. “Ferosh,” she pronounced. “In a presidential way, of course.”

Of course. If you could call wearing a staid blue gown with a modest amount of beads along the collar and a bob-style wig ferocious.

George poked her head in. “The coms are buzzing. The queen is already here, and Foxfire is arriv…ing.”

Hannah and I experienced the immense satisfaction of rendering my hard-core Secret Service agent speechless. She recovered quickly, though.

“The protocol for a meet and greet with the queen is pretty simple. Call her Your Majesty when you first address her, then afterward ma'am. Gently shake her extended hand if she offers it. Above all, do
not
touch her. Unless you want to be tackled by MI6 agents.”

“Got it.” Don't touch the queen. Should be simple enough.

“How long do you need?” George asked.

Nerves began fluttering in my stomach. “Five minutes, tops.”

“I think we can only delay the president for about two, so you'd better get to the point quickly.”

No problem, if I could keep from babbling insanely.

“You can do it, Morgan.” Hannah gave me a thumbs-up. “I have faith in you. And I'll think of some way to stretch your two minutes into three by talking to your mom.”

“Thanks, Hans.”

George's com chirped. “The motorcade is pulling up to the VIP entrance,” she said. “The queen is waiting for the president in the greenroom backstage with her entourage.”

I took a deep breath. “Showtime.”

I slipped into the greenroom through a side door, expecting to find courtiers and all sorts of security. To my surprise, the room was empty except for a dumpy woman in a satin gown a nightmarish shade of green, an MI6 agent dressed in a tuxedo, and…the queen.

A flash of electricity jolted through me. Now I'm pretty used to meeting celebrities, I mean, some people consider
me
a celebrity of sorts, but when the queen of England is standing in front of you, it doesn't get more surreal than that. Her grandmotherly figure filled out a silvery beaded number, and her hair was a beautiful shade of white. A modest diamond tiara was nestled on top of her snowy curls.

The queen had been fiddling with the drawstring on her silver-beaded clutch, but she looked up when I entered. “Madam President?”

The MI6 agent goggled at me, while the frumpy woman looked shocked, then annoyed. I later learned that she was the queen's main lady-in-waiting in charge of manners and royal protocol, and I'd wrecked her whole agenda.

Okay. Try not to freak out, Morgan.

“Your Majesty,” I said. I remembered what George had told me about extending my hand for a gentle shake.

“We had word that the motorcade was still at the gate,” the queen said. Her voice, plummy and cultured, held a note of surprise.

The MI6 agent reached for his com button.

Quickly I said, “I thought I'd slip in quietly for a moment, gather my thoughts, and break the ice before we meet formally in front of all those people.”

To my relief, the queen nodded in agreement. “That's a sensible notion. I never liked all the fuss, either. Protocol seems to have been invented by men to make things more important than they are. Women leaders should stick together, and things would go much more swimmingly.”

“I agree,” I said. “Women should give every advantage they can to other women.”

The queen gave me an odd look.

I was trying to be subtle, but the com chirping on the MI6 agent's lapel meant I didn't have that luxury. “I'll get right to the point. Usually I don't interfere in the romantic lives of my daughter and her friends, but Hannah Davis is a lovely girl. Wouldn't it be wonderful to give young love a chance to blossom without all the stodgy protocol getting in the way? It is the modern age, after all.”

An unreadable emotion flickered behind the queen's
sapphire eyes, the ones her grandson had inherited. My heart sank. I thought she was totally ticked off at my presumption. I'd blown it!

“You're right, Madam President. I think the conventions of a past age can hamper the younger generation too much.”

Wha?

“That's…great.” I could barely get the words out. The MI6 agent muttered into his com, while the frumpy lady moved closer to me.

Worried that she'd start asking questions, I edged toward the door. “Would you excuse me for a moment? I need to visit the ladies' room.”

The queen graciously inclined her head, and I booked out of there. With presidential dignity, of course.

I'd just about made it back to the vacant dressing room when I heard the horrible sound of coms buzzing and the general commotion caused by the imminent arrival of a head of state.

Mom swept around the corner, surrounded by Secret Service agents and staff. I sped through the dressing room door as fast as I could scoot in those patent leather pumps, but not fast enough. My eyes locked with Mom's.

And boy,
livid
did not begin to describe what I saw in them.

I shut the door to the dressing room behind me and
leaned against it, heart bludgeoning my rib cage. I was going to get a
colossal
reaming out over this.

I eased off the wig and told myself to chill. If I got in trouble for helping a friend, so be it. I'd take the punishment.

Hannah and George entered a few minutes later. “We totally stalled your mom,” Hannah crowed, beaming with triumph. “You can thank George, she's the one who sent the Secret Service team around the back way.”

George, however, wasn't smiling. “It should have bought you a few more minutes, Tornado. Did you accomplish the mission?”

“If by mission, you mean talk to the queen about letting Hannah see her grandson, I did. Fingers crossed that it works. I couldn't tell if she was convinced by my argument or being British polite.”

Hannah glowed with happiness and her eyes sparkled with real hope. Her ecstatic mood would make my upcoming punishment worth the pain. I didn't have the heart to tell them that their ploy to delay my mom had failed.

“Anyway, help me out of this dress. Brittany and Trevor have to be wondering where we are by now.”

“Yeah, we've been taking the longest bathroom break in history.” Hannah turned me around to unzip the gown.

With Hannah's help, I became Morgan in less than five minutes. George rushed us back through the corridors to our box. “The concert is about to start,” she said, listening intently to the com in her ear. “You need to be seated when that happens so the president can give you a recognition moment.”

“Got it.” Mom was supposed to point me out from the stage, where I was to rise and wave briefly to the crowd.

We burst into the box. “Holy hell!” Hannah squawked.

Trevor and Brittany were totally twisted together in a major lip lock. They sprang apart, panting and sweaty. Brittany's bubblegum-pink lipstick was smeared all over Trevor's face.

“Don't you know everyone can see you from up here?” I asked. “What's the matter with you two?”

I pointed to the audience below. Half the spectators were craning their necks up toward the make-out session
going on in our box, while the guests in the boxes on either side of ours were either laughing or scrunching their faces in disgust over the major PDA.

“Yep, that's going to get me in trouble with the old man,” Trevor drawled. He didn't look worried at all, though. Instead he wore that preening expression guys get when they've hooked up with a hottie.

Brittany hastily adjusted her rumpled dress. “People should mind their own business,” she said snottily. “Besides, where have you two been? Peeing can't take that long.”

“Maybe we were trying to give you and Trevor privacy.” Hannah settled next to Trevor. “Don't get any ideas about me, bud.”

“Wouldn't dream of it.” But Trevor still couldn't resist one last ogle at Hannah's cleavage.

George leaned close to my ear. “You need to take your seat, Morgan. The concert's getting ready to start.”

“Right.” I sat next to Brittany, all keyed up on adrenaline. I'd pulled off a major presidential switch, and I'd spoken to the queen!

Brittany sniffed in annoyance when my leg brushed hers. “God, give me some space, you cow. And your hair looks like crap. What did you do to it in the bathroom, stick your head under the air dryer?”

I touched my hair. I'd forgotten to have Hannah brush it out when I took off the wig because we were in such a hurry.

I went on the offensive, hoping to throw her off the trail. “I'd be super nice to me if I were you. You may enjoy getting your photo in the tabloids because of your make-out session with the prime minister's son, but I doubt his dad will be all that thrilled.
Or
yours. I can either have Mom's rapid-response team work with you…or leave you hanging.”

“Bitch,” she muttered. Then she focused on my ear. “Hold on. Where'd you get those earrings?”

“What are you talking about?” I touched my ears and felt the fake diamond studs in the lobes.

“Those look exactly like the ones your mother wears. Except you weren't wearing them before. You gave
me
your earrings.”

Wow. And I had actually let myself feel good about the swap for about three seconds.

The wheels in Brittany's head began to turn. “You and Hannah leave for, like, ever…then you come back wearing your mother's earrings….”

“You'd better check yourself right now, Brits,” Hannah interjected. “Remember the last time you got crazy ideas about Morgan and her mom? Or do I need to refresh your
memory?”
Cough
—“Jail”—
cough
.

Brittany shifted uncomfortably in her seat at the reminder of her humiliation after she'd attacked my mother at the ABLC banquet.

Hannah went in for the kill. “I'd be
ever so happy
to fill Trevor in about it, too. I mean, if he's going to be sticking his tongue down your throat, he's got a right to know where you've been, doesn't he? And I'm sure he'd love to see the photos we took of you being hauled off, which happen to be right here on my cell phone—”

“All right! God, you two are so mean!”

“Speaking of mean, maybe you can return the earrings you took from Morgan,” Hannah said.

“Fine.” Brittany pulled them out of her earlobes and threw them in my lap.

“Thank you,” I said politely. Hannah and I exchanged smiles, and we couldn't help it if they were a tad gleeful.

The orchestra below played a musical flourish. Then the curtain rose and the program began.

Mom and the queen looked awesome together onstage. I sniffed sentimentally at the speeches of friendship and mutual respect. I rose when Mom prompted, and the cheers from the crowd really felt genuine.

The music wasn't half bad, either. I wasn't digging the orchestral rendition of a Beatles medley, but there were a
few kicking licks on other Anglo-American tunes that kept the concert from being completely boring.

Afterward, Trevor sidled up to me. I quashed an involuntary shudder. “Hey, Morgan. Would you, ah, be averse to me taking your mate Brittany out for a post-concert nosh?”

“Mind? Why would I mind?”

“Well.” He lowered his voice confidentially. “Don't take this personally, love, but it means that I'm moving on. We had a good thing, lots of special memories, but it's over now.
We're
over. Now, now. Don't cry.”

I guess he took my strangled snort of laughter for a sob. “It's disappointing, but somehow my heart will go on.”

“Cheers, Morgan. Thanks for being brave.”

“Best of luck to you both. Oh, and, Trev, make sure you increase the limit on your credit card. Brittany has expensive tastes.”

Hannah and I watched with amusement while Brittany snaked her arm around Trevor's waist and headed toward the prime minister's entourage waiting downstairs. Brittany giggled when Trevor squeezed her bum.

“Man, those two are MTB.” Hannah shook her head.

“Yeah, a couple of reptiles. But yay for us, because we finally got rid of her.”

“Yeah. Tonight we won't have to worry about ditching her. Now we can relax. Maybe Rich will even call.”

Hannah's face went all dreamy, like it always did when she thought about Prince Richard. I felt myself go all dreamy, too, because as soon as I could, I was contacting Max. I had to convince him that breaking up with me would be a
big mistake
.

George appeared before me. Grim. So very grim.

“The president is asking for you. And me. And you.” She pointed to Hannah. “At the motorcade. Now.”

I winced. This wasn't going to be pretty.