His Majesty's Measure

by Pamela DuMond

  “I promised my husband I wouldn’t flash any private parts tonight,” Bea said.

  “Your husband can bite it for one night.” Esmeralda said. “Vivian’s only getting married once you know.”

  “Twice,” I said. “I don’t need booze. Chocolate, on the other hand…”

  Joan hustled over to us. “Vivian,” she whispered. “Are you okay?”

  “Do you have any chocolate? A little sugary something in your bag?” I swayed, going hot and cold and then hot again.

  Mumblings rose from the crowd. Out of the corner of my eyes I could see the gossips gathering, chattering amongst themselves in their not-so-hushed whispers.

  “No.” Joan smoothed my hair back from my clammy forehead.

  Lola walked over with Mateo. “Vivian, are you all right?”

  “No,” I said. “The cathedral is buzzing. It sounds like a swarm of bees. Everyone’s gossiping and pointing, aren’t they?”

  “Yes,” my Ladies said in unison.

  “Royal Nana isn’t here yet,” I said. “And Max isn’t either.”

  “No,” they said.

  “What should I do?”

  “Vivian,” Leo said.

  His eyes carried a look of embarrassment mixed with pity. My heart dove into my spanx-covered stomach. I didn’t think this foretold good news. “Is there something you need to tell me?” I asked the most handsome wrong prince of Bellèno.

  “Yes.” He pointed to a pew. “Royal Nana has taken her seat.”

  Indeed she had. The octogenarian was plopped on the end of the first pew. She wore a large hat adorned with a silk hummingbird that dipped its beak into white silk roses on the brim. Her walker was parked in the aisle next to her, festooned with multi-colored satin wedding ribbons for the special day.

  “Excellent.” I breathed a sigh of relief. I turned to my ladies-in-waiting, but they had already returned to their positions on the altar steps, smiles fixed on their faces.

  Fixed fake smiles.

  Phony smiles.

  A chill came over me. The man I loved, my groom, the spectacular ginger prince I had walked down the aisle to marry was not here. Max was still missing.

  “Where’s Maximillian?” I asked Leo.

  The aging bishop smiled at Leo and me, and nodded, his fancy mitre tipping dangerously off his bald pate. “Very well. Let’s get started, shall we? Welcome everyone! We are gathered here today in the sight of God to join these two people in matrimony. Prince Leopold Edward George Rochartè of Bellèno and Vivian Marie DeRose.”

  “No, I said. “You’ve got the wrong groom. Leo and I—well, we’re not getting married today,” I whispered. I glared up at the handsomest wrong prince.

  But the bishop continued. “We are gathered here today, on this very special day, to join Prince Leopold and Miss Vivian DeRose in holy matrimony—”

  “No,” I interrupted again. “So sorry, Archbishop. We are not gathered here to join these two people. Because one of the persons is missing.”

  “Ah,” he said. “We are gathered here today to celebrate…”

  “No celebrating,” I said and turned to Leo. “Where’s Max?”

  “This was just passed to me,” Leo said and handed me a note. “It’s for you.”

  I unfolded the piece of paper, my hands trembling, and read:

  My sweet Vivian,

  * * *

  I’m really sorry.

  Change of heart.

  Don’t love you.

  Bond can be borrowed not taken.

  Not your hostage.

  Not your Max

  “No!” I crumpled the note and crammed it down the front of my silk bodice. It scratched my skin and my heart hurt. The room turned white, then gray, and then spun around me at dizzying speed. “No!” I could no longer take the weight of the stares, the heat of the paparazzi’s cameras. My knees buckled and everything shot to black.

  Chapter 7

  LEOPOLD

  This was my second time standing next to Vivian at a church altar. The first was when I thought she was Lady Cici Fontaine. When I thought I was marrying her. For better, for worse. To have and to hold until death do us part and all that shit.

  I bought the whole deception that Vivian was Cici. I wasn’t sure I wanted to get married when I first I met her. I don’t know how, or why she won me over. It wasn’t anything she said. It was unspoken. Words weren’t needed. It was when I was being a smartass and yet she still laughed, her mouth quirking up in that sexy way. How her hands smoothed her skirt down her legs when she took a seat. My gaze was drawn to her fingers touching her supple legs as I wondered how I could score that job.

  I knew a year ago when I stood at the church altar that ‘Cici’ was only marrying me to exchange a title for a financial contract, yet I couldn’t help but wonder if time and married life with me would change her mind, change her heart. I dreamt about what it would feel like once we were married.

  I’d lie in bed with her every night, trace a finger across her creamy skin, the sharpness of her collarbone coming to rest at the divet leading to her breastbone, feeling the pulse as it thrummed at her throat. How would I feel if she were mine?

  Now, Vivian’s face was a funky shade of green. I longed to lean in, place a hand on her bare shoulder. Whisper in her ear and ask if she was okay.

  But I could not do that.

  Beads of moisture erupted on her décolletage. I willed myself not to bend my head and lick them off.

  She bit her very full lower lip. Shivers raced down my arms and I longed to press my mouth to hers, explore her warmth with my tongue. I’d run my tongue across her lip and then move to her neck, shoulder, feathering them with kisses, peppering them with bites.

  That would be wrong.

  My hands could not touch her.

  My lips could not brush against hers.

  Best not to pull her panties down her legs. Nor should I push her thighs wider, nestle my hips between them, or rub my hardness against her warm wetness. I could not sink my cock deeply, oh so deeply and deliciously into her.

  That would be very bad.

  Vivian was not mine to love or kiss, lick, touch, or fuck. She was Max’s.

  No matter what you might think about me being in unrequited love with my brother’s bride to be, you couldn’t deny me this: Surprises accompanied this delectable American commoner on every step of her journey. Of course I wished them decades of married bliss. I also feared I’d forever carry a torch for Vivian, always wonder if things would have been different if I had traveled to Chicago before Max. If I had met her first.

  Now, judgmental guests craned their necks, attempting to stare at her or gaze my reaction to her collapsed in a heap on the floor. Royal Security escorted several hundred guests out of the cathedral.

  Oh, Leopold, you arse. How in the bloody hell could you have fallen for your brother’s girl? What are you? A sorry fool? A daft prick? A hopeless romantic?

  Check. Check. And check.

  In my defense, I met Vivian when she was pretending to be Lady Catherine Fontaine. I knew that the House of Bellèno was drowning in debt. I’d heard the not too delicate rumors from multiple sources that the monarchy was screwed unless the younger generation sucked it up and did something bold to secure our future. I heard the rumors over and over until they practically screamed at me. I caved, and ordered that the financial paperwork be delivered to me.

  I spent a week going over the incontrovertible evidence that my parents had relied on advisors who had given them shitty advice. The House of Bellèno was up to its balls in a financial quagmire. But this time the mess didn’t just involve money or status. It involved Eastern European high stakes gangs that took blood oaths and eliminated their rivals by thievery, imprisonment, and even on occasion—poisoning.

  It appeared to me that we were all fucked unless someone did something that involved getting a quick infusion of cash and securing new investors who wouldn’t lop off our balls if we were one month tardy o
n a loan payment. The person who usually stepped up to the plate in these regards was Max. The world perceived me as the carefree, fun, playboy prince. My brother was considered the brainier, more introspective one.

  But I knew Max’s Achilles heel.

  My younger brother needed to feel in control. He thought I didn’t know about his crazy Crown Affair. Thought I was clueless about his plot to marry me off to a billionaire’s daughter, re-write our loans, buy some time, and secure financial reprieve. Why would I realize anything was going on besides parties, fucking young lovelies, and jumping out of helicopters over the Alps for extreme Heli-skiing? I’d always loved Max but I knew only too well he judged my life a piece of fluff in comparison to his earnest endeavors.

  I’d watched Vivian stuff Max’s note down her cleavage. Lucky note. Five seconds later she passed out on the royal cathedral’s altar stairs. Three seconds after that I dropped to my knees next to her, took her hand, and felt for a pulse.

  Thank God she had a pulse.

  “Vivian. Say something.”

  Royal security guards elbowed their way in and with their bulk, physically cleared space around us. The House of Bellèno’s doctor joined me on the stone floor and checked Vivian’s pulse. Two paramedics hustled down the aisle toward us.

  “Vivian, are you okay?” I leaned down toward her face, my lips almost brushing her skin. I was rewarded when her eyes fluttered open. My heart skipped a beat.

  “Leo?” She looked into my eyes.

  “Yes, love.” I wanted to take the words back, but they were already out.

  “Where’s Max?”

  “I don’t know.” I took her hand and squeezed it. It felt clammy, but it was pulsing. Security surrounded the wedding party quicker than fleas on a mongrel. Sirens rang in the distance. Guests were hustled out of the cathedral.

  “Your Highness,” a paramedic said.

  “Yes?”

  “I’m okay, really,” Vivian said, blinking.

  “We’re going to move her, Your Highness. We’ve got this.”

  “Excellent.” I released her hand and watched them pick Vivian up off the cold stone cathedral floor.

  “I don’t need any help,” she said.

  “Shut up, stop squirming, and let them do this,” Esmeralda said.

  “Fine.” Her lower lip jutted out.

  The paramedics moved her the few feet to a gurney. Someone stuck a sugar cube in her mouth. Lady Beatrice gave her a bite of chocolate. Lady Joan removed Vivian’s shoes and rubbed her feet.

  “Honey, everything will be okay,” her friend Lola said.

  “No. It won’t,” she cried.

  A paramedic shone a light into her eyes. “Pupils responsive.”

  “She’s hypoglycemic,” Lady Joan said.

  “Leo?” Vivian asked.

  “Yes.”

  “Where’s Max? Why would he do this to me?”

  “I don’t know, Vi. Hang in. We’ll sort the whole thing out.”

  The paramedics hustled her on the gurney, clattered onto the cobblestone street outside the cathedral, and headed toward an ambulance. A polished limo flying the royal flag pulled away from the church accompanied by the flashing lights of a security motorcade. My parents, the King and Queen of Bellèno and my grandmother, Royal Nana were inside. I’d text them with any updates as soon as I had any.

  Pops and whirs from cameras emanated behind a line of metal security fences ringed with security guards in the near distance. I worried Vivian was confused. Her big day ruined.

  Who knew what the fuck Max was up to? Even though I knew this whole thing could go in my favor, frankly I’d kill my control freak brother if he’d broken her heart because he’d gotten cold feet. I glanced around, but did not see him. Where the fuck was he? What was up with that cryptic note? I was in the dark.

  Police were milling about searching for signs of wrongdoing.

  “Do you want me to come with you?” I asked Vivian as they shuttled her past me.

  “No, Leo,” Esmeralda said as she followed the cart. “The Ladies have this covered.”

  Vivian tried to push herself up on her elbows. “I look like a meringue pie exploded on a bun.”

  “Have you had too much to drink, Miss?” a paramedic asked.

  “No!” She threw a weak punch at the guy, but only clipped him. “Damn it, I’m off my game.”

  I chuckled.

  “She smelled like scotch, earlier, Your Highness,” a woman in a fussy blue suit said to me.

  “Correction.” Lady Bea clucked under her breath. “Expensive scotch. I put a little under her tongue to help revive her. It’s a time-honored homeopathic tincture.” She hustled to Vivian’s side.

  “My name’s Famke Keegan, Your Highness.” The fussy-suited woman bowed her head to me. “President of Royal Wedding Consultants. We’re the ones putting on this show today. I’m so sorry this debacle occurred. We’ll do our best to sort it out.”

  “Excellent. Yes, except for the groom standing up the bride, a lovely show. Good to make your acquaintance. Do you know where Max went?”

  “I have no idea, Your Highness.”

  “Right.” I lifted a hand in front of my eyes as cameras popped and whirred. “Anything you can do to disperse the press? Thin the herd?”

  “Actually we don’t want that, Your Highness. The Royal House of Bellèno can benefit from every piece of coverage we get today. Every picture snapped. Every video taken. Any blaring headline is actually good news for Bellèno.”

  “How so?”

  “We normally buy publicity. It’s not often that publicity arrives free of charge and does us a favor by passing out on the cathedral floor in front of us.”

  Chapter 8

  VIVIAN

  “Make way, make way!” someone shouted as paramedics pushed my gurney across the cobblestones toward an ambulance. A throng of reporters leaned over the guardrails like a pack of ravenous wolves.

  A twig-thin male Bellèno Free Press reporter thrust his microphone in our direction. “Is she alive?”

  “That wedding gown is tight across her mid-section. Is it true that the bride-to-be is pregnant and already in her second trimester?” Cotton Candy Hair reporter asked.

  I threw another punch but it landed in thin air.

  “Is she seizing?” a third reporter asked.

  “Do something,” I whispered to my Ladies.

  “I am Barrister Joan Brady. I do not speak for the Royal Family. I do, however, represent Ms. DeRose. There will be no questions answered at this time.”

  “I think she just needs more booze,” Lady Bea whispered as they shoved me in the back of an ambulance and closed the doors.

  Thud.

  Thud.

  Thud.

  My vision might have been blurry, but my hearing was intact. The back of the ambulance would not shut as it collided against something firm and fleshy that—for a change—was not me.

  “If you hit my thigh one more time,” Esmeralda said, “I’ll take a video, post it, and file assault charges.”

  “I’m sorry, Miss,” the tech said. “I’ve already asked you twice to exit the vehicle but you keep leaping in at the last minute. You can’t be in the bus unless you are a relative.”

  “How much more related to her do I have to be?” Esmeralda asked. “She is my… sister.”

  “I doubt it,” he said.

  “She is my cousin.”

  “I don’t see the resemblance.”

  “Fine! We weren’t going to announce this just yet,” Esmeralda said, and squeezed my big toe, “but, she is my… Missus.”

  “That feels great,” I said. “Could you move a little down toward the arch? I’m your what?”

  “She is my Missus. We were just married.” Esmeralda pointed at the cathedral behind her. “The old ball and chain here got overwhelmed, and passed out, because she never thought she’d see the day it was legal. Are you one of those people who’s not cool with same sex unions?”

&n
bsp; “I don’t care who gets married,” the paramedic said. “At the end of the day the lawyers just line their pocketbooks with more money when everyone gets divorced. But isn’t the woman lying on this gurney the American girl meant to wed Prince Maximillian of Bellèno?”

  “Yes, but Vivian had a change of heart,” Esmeralda said. “She ditched the hot ginger Prince and fell for me, the hot, Lady-in-Waiting with the ample curves. Plans changed. Regimes were toppled. Let’s get our girl, I mean my little dove, and my new Missus to the hospital, shall we?”

  “Absolutely, Ma'am.”

  “That would be Lady Esmeralda Ilona Castile DeRose-Hapsburg. It was all very sudden, and I know we haven’t had a chance to discuss it, darling.” She tickled the bottom of my feet.

  “Stop!” I kicked.

  “That’s not what you said earlier today in the choir loft. Don’t expend extra energy now, darling. I’m just going to assume that we’re doing the hyphenating thing with our last names.”

  A half hour later I found myself at Friedricksburgh Memorial hospital, in a private room adjacent to the ER. ‘Private’ was the key word because we needed solid plaster walls to keep out the paparazzi, not flimsy curtains strung from metal beads clinging to skinny rods.

  I might not have been all that skinny, but right now I could only imagine what those beads felt like day in, day out, being pushed to and fro as they tried their very best to hang on and still do their appointed job. I too felt exhausted, worn to the bone from being pushed one way and shoved the next. I tried my best to hold onto the last remaining shreds of my sanity because my dignity was long gone.

  Where was my Maximillian? Why would he do this to me? Was it possible he’d gotten cold feet and dumped me in the middle of our wedding? It didn’t seem like him.

  Some argued Bellèno’s spare to the throne seemed cold and calculating on the outside. But if you got past the prickliness, if he trusted you, this man was a fierce defender of all and everyone he loved. He was a knight in shining armor.