Chapter 27 Chapter twenty seven
DEV
At nine thirty, my phone rang. Rosa.
"Dev, I need you to come to the South London Legal Aid Centre in Camberwell. Now."
"Why? What happened?"
"Aanya refused the palace's deal. She is going to fight the lawsuit. Sarah Chen is coordinating her defense through the environmental and housing advocacy coalition. We need your research. All of it. Everything you have on Crown Estate practices. We need it within the hour."
I stood up so fast I nearly dropped the phone. "She refused the deal?"
"She refused the deal. She is committed to fighting. But Dev, she needs support. Real support. Not just your research, but you. She is about to face the palace's full institutional power. She needs to know people are standing with her."
"I am on my way."
I hung up, looked at Marco. "She refused the deal. She is fighting."
"I told you," Marco said, grinning. "She looked like someone preparing for a fight."
We ran.
The legal aid centre was a twenty-minute sprint from Priya's flat. I arrived sweating and out of breath, Marco right behind me.
Sarah Chen met us at the door. "Dr. Marchetti. Good. We need your dissertation files, all supporting documentation, contact information for every family you interviewed, and any additional research you have not yet published. How quickly can you get that to us?"
"I have most of it on a secure drive. I can have everything to you within two hours."
"Make it one. Palace communications is already releasing a statement about Aanya's decision. This is going to move very fast. We need to be ready."
"Where is she?"
"Upstairs. Office three. But Dev, before you go up there, you need to understand what she just did. She chose potential bankruptcy over safety. She is going to face brutal media scrutiny, legal harassment, and institutional pressure like nothing you have experienced. She needs people who will stand with her through that. Not people who will question her commitment or test her resolve. Can you be that person?"
"Yes."
"Then go. She is waiting."
I took the stairs two at a time. Found office three. Knocked.
"Come in."
Aanya was sitting at a desk covered in papers, phone in one hand, pen in the other. She looked up when I entered, and for a moment neither of us spoke.
"You refused the deal," I said.
"I refused the deal."
"Why?"
"Because you were wrong. At the pub. When you said I would leave when it got hard. You were wrong. This is as hard as it gets, and I am staying." She set down her pen. "Also because I meant what I said on that stage. Lorenzo Marchetti deserved better. The displaced families deserve better. The truth deserves better than being erased for convenience. Even if fighting for it destroys me financially."
I crossed the room, knelt beside her chair so we were at eye level. "I am so sorry for what I said. I was terrified and I lashed out. But you need to know: I am with you. Whatever you need. However I can help. I am with you completely."
"I need your research. All of it. Sarah says we can build a truth defense if we have comprehensive documentation."
"You have it. Everything I have is yours."
"I also need you to understand what this means. The palace is not going to forgive this. Crown Estate will make this lawsuit as brutal as possible. The media will tear my life apart looking for ammunition. This could take years and I could still lose everything. If you are standing with me, you are signing up for all of that."
"I know."
"And you are still willing?"
"Aanya, I spent all night sitting on Priya's doorstep in the rain waiting for you to come out so I could tell you I was wrong. I think I could love you. I am not walking away from that because things are difficult. I am especially not walking away when you just chose the hardest possible path because it was the right thing to do."
She looked at me for a long moment. Then, finally, she smiled. Small, exhausted, but real.
"You sat outside in the rain all night?"
"Marco brought coffee around five thirty. So it was not entirely miserable."
"You are ridiculous."
"I am aware."
She stood, and I stood with her. We were close enough that I could see the exhaustion in her eyes, the fear she was trying to hide, the determination underneath it all.
"I am terrified," she admitted quietly. "I have no idea if I can actually win this. I have no idea if I am strong enough to survive what comes next. But I had to try. Even if I fail, I had to try."
"You are not going to fail. And you are not going to face this alone." I took her hand. "We fight this together. Your courage, my research, and everyone who has been waiting for someone to finally challenge Crown Estate publicly. We fight together."
She squeezed my hand. "Together."
Downstairs, I could hear phones ringing. Voices rising. The machinery of a legal battle beginning to turn.
And upstairs, in a small office in Camberwell, Aanya Windsor and I stood together preparing to fight the institution that had killed my father and destroyed her life.
We were probably going to lose.
But we were going to fight anyway.
Together.