Disclaimer: I don't own the characters. They belong to Cecily von Zeigesar and The CW.
So to get the foul taste out of everyone's mouth after last night's episode, I decided to work a little harder and post this tonight. I didn't know it was possible to dislike the character of Blair, but somehow the writers managed to accomplish that last night. I have to ask – what is Blair thinking?
My beta Lori2279 wants me to remind everyone that fictious writers make lousy lovers. For those of you that watched Sex in the City, you'll understand the reference.
Forgive my rant and enjoy.
"You are not welcome here," Sophie, Louis's mother, snarled upon seeing Blair and Chuck being let into the foyer of the palace, "Certainly not with him, not after you have humiliated not only my son, the future King of Monaco but also the noble people of this country. You are lucky we did not throw you into prison when your jet first landed."
"I'm here to speak with Louis," Blair stated calmly as she linked her fingers with Chuck's, "He knows that I'm coming." She had called ahead. Louis's secretary had agreed, although reluctantly, to schedule a few moments into his day for the three of them to sit down, hopefully as adults, and lay all their cards on the table.
"You are nothing but a piece of common trash. I knew the minute I first laid eyes on you that you would be nothing but trouble for my son, but he wouldn't listen. Now you have reduced him to ruins. He is the laughing stock of the entire world, and it is all your fault, you cheap, common slut," Sophie spoke out bitterly.
Chuck was about to step up and defend his lover, but Louis beat him to it.
"That will be quite enough, Mother," Louis announced his presence, "Blair, Charles, and I have matters to discuss that are no concern of yours."
"Louis, how could you agree to this?" Sophie hissed, "Hasn't she done enough already?"
"That is enough," Louis stared his mother down. She sulked away without another word. When the trio was left alone, Louis's cold eyes softened as he address Blair and Chuck. "I am sorry for my mother's words. She is clearly still upset."
"It is to be expected," Blair nodded as a nervous hitch filtered into her voice. She felt Chuck squeeze her as she took a deep breath to gather her courage.
"Come, I have tea waiting in the garden for the three of us," Louis motioned for them to follow him.
"You didn't have to go to all that trouble," Blair replied as she and Chuck followed along, her hand grasped his a little tighter as her nerves became greater. She wasn't sure if it was her nerves or morning sickness suddenly kicking in, but her stomach felt like it was doing flip flops.
"It was no trouble," he assured her, "I remember how much you loved to sit in these gardens during your last visit. I wanted you to have one last good memory."
"You're being far more civil than I deserve," Blair replied as they approached the table where the elegant tea had been set up. Louis motioned to hold out Blair's chair for her before he had a second thought and decided against it. Instead he took his seat as he watched Chuck hold out her chair before he claimed his own seat. "Louis, I am very sorry for what I did to you, your family and this beautiful country of yours. You deserved far better than I've given you."
"I appreciate the apology, Blair," Louis responded calmly, "But it is unnecessary. You were following your heart. I cannot fault you for that. Chuck can clearly give you something that I never could."
"I did love you, Louis," Blair insisted.
"Just not in the way you love Chuck," Louis concluded, "And since we are handing out apologies, I need to give you one as well, along with an explanation."
"Louis, you have nothing to apologize for," Blair replied, "I am the one at fault. I promised to make a life with you and then only a few weeks later, broke that promise. I swore to you that there was nothing left between me and Chuck, and then the first chance I was given, I went back to him. I hurt you, so deeply, and I am so, so sorry."
"Blair, you did not hurt me as deeply as you may believe," Louis began after a moment of awkward silence.
"I don't understand," Blair frowned.
"When I first came to you in New York, I was intending to sweep you off your feet. You see when we first met in Paris, I was in denial. I was denying who I was. I had not accepted my place within my family, mostly because I didn't know my place. There had always been that doubt as to who was going to be the next heir to the throne. My mother was given the decision. How it ever fell to her, is a mystery, but it was her decision nonetheless. My sister and I were determined to do whatever we could to be named the heir.
"Beatrice had no romantic prospects that I knew of, so no true claim to the throne. I knew that if I could provide my own prospect and show my mother that I was planning for the future of the monarchy and providing the next heir to the throne that she would pick me. I remembered the time that we spent together in Paris. Though you had no royal lineage, you gave off this royal . . . vibration like no one I had ever met before, but there was also a sadness, a piece of you that was missing. I didn't know it at the time because I didn't know about your connection to Charles, but it was him.
"When I came to New York, you and he were not together. Had you been or had there been a sign that there was a reconciliation on the horizon, I would have walked away. The more I got to know you, the more I fell in love with the idea of you, the idea of you being by my side as I ascended to the throne, so I began ignore the warning signs.
"I knew that my mother's threat of removing my claim to the throne was only a threat, so I let her call her bluff. I made you believe that I had the intention of renouncing my title to be with you when I never had the intention of doing so.
"When we became engaged, that very evening my mother told me that since I was taking a wife that I would also be ascending to the throne. Because of you, I was suddenly the next in line."
"So this was all some sort of game," Blair replied, her stomach turning a somersault as she spoke the words, "You used me all so that you could claim some stupid crown. None of it was real."
"It was real, Blair," Louis tried to assure her, "Maybe not at first, but it became real to me."
"When?" Blair demanded, "When did it become real for you, Louis?"
Louis struggled to come up with a response, and his fumble gave Blair license to go on the attack.
"You let Chuck break my heart because you were supposed to be the noble one. He gave you his blessing because he thought that you were the better man, that you could give me the uncomplicated life that he felt I deserved, and entire time you were using me. I would have married you, Louis. Had Chuck not swooped in and rescued me, I would have married you and given you everything.
"What kind of man does something like that? What kind of man uses the lure of a crown and title to seduce a woman into thinking that the look she sees in your eyes is love when all it really ending up being was greed for a title that you so clearly don't deserve. I had convinced myself that the kindness and gentleness that I saw in you was real. I fell in love with that. It was that love that I mistakenly showed to Chuck. It was that love that made him set aside his own desires, his own happiness, to give me to you. None of it was real. Nothing between you and I was real.
"You are the most horrible man that I have ever met. I cannot believe that I for one minute felt sorry for you. I cannot believe that I came here to apologize. I was almost on my hands and knees begging for you not to hate me. Now I wish I had never come here. I wish that I had never met you."
"Blair, I am sor . . ."
"Don't you dare," Blair growled, "I don't want another thing from you, certainly not an apology that has no merit."
"Blair, calm down," Chuck spoke up as he took her hand into his and forced her to look into his eyes.
"Chuck and I are getting married at the end of the month," Blair announced suddenly, not breaking her eye contact with her one true love, "And I'm pregnant with his child because even after I agreed to become your fiancée I could not ignore the pull that I have towards Chuck. I was held hostage by a deranged psycho. It was Chuck that found me. It was Chuck that rescued me. It was Chuck that comforted me. It was Chuck that loved me and made love to me and gave me the greatest pleasure I have ever known."
"Blair," Chuck spoke softly as he could see her working herself into blowing up in anger once more.
"Let's go home, Chuck," Blair smiled as she caressed his cheek softly. He nodded as he kissed her hand softly and guided her out of the garden.
"I'll meet you in the foyer," he suggested as he stopped at the doors separating the gardens from the palace. "There is just one thing that I need to do."
"Okay," she smiled a little brighter as she leaned into his lips for a sweet kiss, "Don't be too long. You and I have a plane to catch."
"I'll be right there," he vowed as he kissed her hand and motioned her into the direction of the foyer.
"Charles, did you forget something?" Louis inquired as Chuck made his way back to the table where Louis was sipping his tea as if nothing had even happened, as if he didn't have a care in the world. The carefree attitude upset Chuck more than his confession to Blair. He'd been forced on a downward spiral because he felt he could never measure up to the man before him. It had all been a lie.
"I forgot this," Chuck growled as his fist connected with Louis's jaw. Louis was sent sprawling to the earth as the teacup tumbled out of his hand and shattered a few steps away. Chuck shook out his hand as the pain began to course through his fingers. "If you ever try to make contact with Blair, myself, or our family ever again, I will scour every corner of this earth, turn over every rock, dig up every skeleton in your closet and broadcast it on every television, in every newspaper, on every webpage. Do I make myself clear?"
"Crystal," Louis growled as he clutched at his jaw as he rose to his feet, stumbling as he attempted to regain his balance.
Chuck turned away before the urge to knock Louis down once more overtook. He was pretty sure that the first punch was free, the second would create an international incident.
"Let's go," Chuck smiled as he found Blair waiting patiently in the foyer.
"Everything okay?" she inquired as he captured her lips with his in a searing kiss.
"Everything is more than alright," he assured her as his hand caressed her belly affectionate as he led her to the awaiting limo.
She had the urge to make love to him in the back of Louis's limo, to defile it in the most sadistic of ways, and it had been nearly impossible for him to resist her, but ultimately he wanted to rise above it all. He was going to be the better man, the one that truly did deserve her.
"What happened to your hand?" Blair inquired as she awoke from her nap on the plane to find his hand wrapped in a napkin full of ice.
"Turbulence as I was walking towards the bathroom," he explained as he tossed the napkin aside so he could touch her cheek.
"It looks more like a bruise you would get after connecting with Louis's face," she replied as she examined his hand more closely.
"I'm sorry," he sighed, "I couldn't help myself."
"No apology needed," she assured his as she lifted his injured hand to her lips and kissed it softly, "It certainly isn't anything he doesn't deserve."
"I'm sorry I pushed you towards him," Chuck apologized.
"I'm sorry that I put the idea in your head," she replied, "I never should have allowed myself to become involved with him. He obviously wasn't who I thought he was."
"Don't beat yourself up," Chuck replied, "He pulled the wool over your eyes. If I hadn't behaved so badly before he arrived, you never would have gotten involved with him. We would have ridden off into the sunset much sooner than we did."
"Thank you for defending my honor," she smiled as she kissed his hand again, "And for calming me down."
"I just didn't want you getting your blood pressure up," he told her as she settled against him, pulling his arms around her waist as she pressed her back into his chest, "That's not good for you or our baby."
"You are absolutely right," she smiled as their adjoined hands settled on her stomach.
"Are you two feeling alright?" he inquired as he rubbed her stomach softly with his thumb.
"Never been better," she assured him, "You and I need to come to some sort of agreement on sleeping arrangements this evening. I think you'll understand that I don't want to spend the night at The Empire, and I'll understand that you don't want to sleep at my mother's penthouse. That leaves us out of options."
"Are you offering up any ideas?" he inquired.
"I have one, but I'm not exactly sure it's an options," she replied as she twisted to look him in the eyes.
Chuck was able to read her thoughts as he pulled out his phone and dialed up The Palace and quickly reserved 1812 into the foreseeable future. She danced in her seat for a few moments as he made the arrangements.
"Was that the option you were inquiring about?" he teased as she relaxed into his chest as he tossed his phone aside.
"Yes," she let out a giddy giggle. "And I love that you are still able to read my mind."
"Get some sleep," Chuck inquired her, "This evening promises to be a busy one. Lily has sent me a message that we are expected to be at her penthouse this evening for dinner."
"How does she even know we're on our way home?" Blair inquired.
"Bass jet, member of the board, connect the dots, Beautiful," he told her as his lips ghosted against her temple.
"I was hoping we'd have an evening to settle in before we had to face everyone," she sighed.
"You know how this works," Chuck replied as he coaxed her head back against his chest, "I promise to have you home at a reasonable hour tonight."
"Are we going to tell everyone about the baby?" she inquired.
"Only if you're wanting to," he told her, "It is completely your decision."
"Why is it my decision?" she snapped her head around quickly.
"It's your body," he told her, "Therefore it is your decision as to when you want to draw attention to it. I know you still struggle with body image issues. I don't want you to feel uncomfortable with our wedding at the end of the month."
"Perhaps we just tell Serena and my mother," Blair offered, "And if you must, Nate."
"Your mother," Chuck prompted her to explain. Telling Nate made more sense than telling her mother.
"If she's going to design my wedding gown, she's going do need to know so that she can accommodate my potentially growing belly," she replied.
"Fair enough," he accepted her answer quickly, "And don't forget about your beloved Dorota because we both know it will be the first thing she'll ask. She was the one to send you the test in the first place."
"And Dorota," she agreed, "Maybe we wait to tell Serena and Nate until after the wedding. Neither are particularly skilled at keeping secrets, and I don't want our nuptials to be overshadowed by our child. I don't want the world thinking that we're getting married solely because I'm pregnant."
"It is the catalyst to us getting married at the end of the month," he told her, "We'd probably be waiting a bit longer if you weren't."
"Perhaps," she replied, "But I don't know if we would have waited much longer. I thought I'd want to wait awhile to be married, but now that we are getting married, I'm wondering why we should be waiting, even if I wasn't pregnant. This feels right."
"Agreed, and as I said, it's your choice who and when we tell," he replied as he once again coaxed her head against his chest, "Now sleep."
TBC. . .