𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐩𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐜𝐞𝐬𝐬 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐛𝐨𝐝𝐲𝐠𝐮𝐚𝐫𝐝𝐬 | 𝐝. 𝐬𝐞𝐚𝐯𝐞𝐲

chapter twenty-one

One week later, Aurelia was still recovering. Her parents had been taken by the police and today she would see them for the first time since that day. She brushed her hair slowly and blankly stared into the mirror. She had decided to wear Daniel's sweatshirt and Nike shoes. She had light makeup on and began tying her hair into a ponytail.

"What're you thinking?" Daniel asked, coming into the room and wrapping his arms around her from behind.

"I dunno," She replied numbly. "I don't know if I want to know everything, Dani. I don't know if I wanna know what their sick thought process was when they exchanged my body and mental health for a stack of cash."

"I'll be there with you, love," Daniel whispered, resting his head on her shoulder and kissing her neck. "I'll help you every single step. I won't let go of you from the second we leave this room to the second we come back."

"Okay," She mumbled and turned around to hug him. "I love you."

***

"You can come in now," An officer stated, motioning Aurelia, Daniel, and Shawn to the door.

"Are you ready?" Daniel asked her, she nodded and tightened her grip on his hand. "It'll be okay."

The three walked into the interrogation room and sat opposite of the king and queen. Aurelia shuddered at the sight of her parents in bright orange jumpers and chained to a desk. Her dad smirked.

"You were scared to come by yourself, huh? You need a regular guy to hold you together," He said with a wicked smile. "What if I said he's paying to touch you? That every time he kissed you, I got a stack of cash?"

"Dad, stop!" Shawn hissed through gritted teeth. Aurelia's eyes grew wet with tears but refused to let any fall. She brought Daniel's hand to her thigh and ran her hand up and down his arm. "Now start talking about you. Who are you paying? Who else is paying you?"

"I'll give you part of the story," Her mom stepped in. "We paid the people at your school to treat you like a normal person. But we paid that guy Tony extra, to tease you; we hoped you hate school and go back to being a princess. Seeing it wasn't working, we paid him to assist in getting you shot. We knew it wouldn't kill you, but it'd weaken you mentally."

"That's so fucked up," Aurelia whispered and let silent tears fall. Daniel gripped her thigh gently and held her hands in his other; stroking them with his thumb.

"Keep letting him touch you," The king smirked. "All the more for us, Aurelia. He's no different from the other men that have touched you."

Shawn slammed his fist into the table angrily. "What about the shooting at Chipotle? Surely you had some twisted reasoning behind that."

"That wasn't us," His dad shrugged. "There are so many angry princes out there that would love to see her dead."

"And you didn't think to tell us?" Daniel asked.

"I wanna know when this started though," The queen demanded, pointing at her daughter and Daniel and ignoring the question. "How much should we be expecting in terms of payment?"

"Well I wanna know how you escaped prison," Daniel replied through gritted teeth.

"Simple, money; lots of it. We used the money we had made on Aurelia to escape and make more money on her," The king said then they both started hysterically laughing.

Shawn rolled his eyes and glared at them, "What's funny about that? I fail to see how any of this is fucking funny!"

"Ha, it's just so funny because," The queen started, "Aurelia paid for us to get out and sell her again."

Aurelia burst into tears, no longer being able to control herself. She cried into Daniel's chest and he wrapped his arms around her. She almost couldn't breathe and her head started spinning.

"We should go," Shawn said and stood up.

"Let's go, Aurelia, we're gonna leave," Daniel whispered. Seeing she wouldn't be able to stand, he asked her to wrap her legs and arms around him. She did so and he followed Shawn out the door with her sobbing in his arms.