“It’s, like, seventy degrees out there! If I were in Phoenix, I’d wear a coat. And maybe gloves.”
“Yes, but you were in Nepal for a month, so you’ve acclimated to entirely different weather than you were used to in Phoenix. Come on.”
Maxence strode out of the office, and Dree scurried behind him with her notepad, looking up and frantically scribbling while he expounded upon the imports and exports of Monaco, mostly imports. Sunlight poured warmth on his suit jacket as he strode, occasionally gesturing with a raised hand to emphasize an important point about olive oil.
Again, they walked along the parapet, encroaching upon a crowd of tourists queued up to gawk at the throne room before making a sharp left and trampling down the curving staircase that led to the tiled courtyard below. Dree’s pretty little shoes tapped the marble behind him.
Again, they sprinted toward the arch to lose themselves in the line of tourists trundling into the palace. Maxence already had one arm out of his jacket and was preparing to throw it around Dree’s shoulders to change her silhouette and disguise the color of her pale blue dress. It would also alter his appearance by now revealing his white shirt instead of his dark jacket. But when he glanced at the line of tourists waiting to get into the castle and saw four particular people—
His feet bolted themselves to the tile of the courtyard.
Maxence had run into a wall made of his own utter shock.
The two women were taller and slimmer than the tourists around them, but their sparkling white long skirts, blouses, and religious veils over their hair made them stand out from the crowd. Two little girls with them, barely older than toddlers, wore brightly patterned dresses with voluminous skirts that flowed around their knees.
Sandals on their tiny feet pitter-patted on the tile as they scampered toward Maxence, shouting. “Parrain! Mon parrain!”
Before Maxence could think about his actions and who might be watching, he’d squatted down and opened his arms, and the two little girls barreled into him. He closed his arms around the giggling, wiggling little baby-girls, and they peppered his face with kisses as he pressed his lips to their temples and hugged them to his shoulders. Pristine joy fountained in his soul, and he murmured to them in French, “Majambu, Mpata, I am so happy to see you. Seeing you fills my heart with joy.”
Their wiry hair was cropped close to their heads, as always, because he had never seen them anything less than impeccably groomed since they had arrived at the children’s home run by the Catholic sisterhood. They squealed and exclaimed in the odd language of toddler-talk, trying to express emotions they had no words for yet. “Mon parrain, leur parrain, where have you been? Why are you not at the rectory? The rectory is empty!”
“I have traveled,” Maxence told them. “Other children in other countries needed me. I have traveled to Nepal.”
“Nepal!” Mpata exclaimed. She was always the more adventurous of the two, even though she was six months younger. “Where is Nepal?”
“At the top of the world, where the mountains touch the sky,” he said.
“Like the Virunga Mountains?”
“Even taller,” he told her. “Who told you about the Virunga Mountains?”
“Bonne sœur Disanka,” Mpata said, gesturing with her chubby hand toward the religious sisters wearing white who were still standing in the line.
They smiled and inclined their heads toward each other, fondly watching Max and the girls.
Maxence scooped the girls up in his arms, each warm little baby claiming a shoulder, and walked over to the two sisters. “Good Sister Ndaya, Good Sister Disanka.” He let the girls slide down his sides to stand on their feet so he could greet and double-kiss the two women on their cheeks.
“Deacon Father Maxence, it is a blessing to see you,” Disanka said.
“I’m so glad to see all of you. There’s someone I want you to meet.”
The religious sisters Ndaya and Disanka pressed their lips together and inclined their heads again, kindly waiting but just a little patronizing.
Maxence held his arm out to where Dree was standing and waved her over. He glanced back and saw her walking toward them, so he began the introduction. “My dear sisters in Christ, this is my friend, Dree Clark. And my admin. Yes, she’s my admin.”
Introductions were made all around, first in French and then in English for Dree, who stuck out her hand to shake and then allowed herself to be drawn in for a double-kiss and hugs.
Both Ndaya and Disanka furtively pinched Dree’s silky strands of blond hair and rubbed them between their fingers during the hug and then exchanged a knowing glance.
Majambu and Mpata clung to Maxence’s knees, and he rocked back and forth as they giggled and batted at each other. “I’m just so glad to see you. I can’t believe you’re here.”
The two religious sisters laughed, and they patted his shoulders and arms as they talked. “Why can’t you believe we’re here? You sent the man to bring us.”
Max’s joy froze into ice shards. “Where is your luggage? We can get you settled right away.”
“It is at the hotel. We like the room very much.”
Maxence asked, “Who came to you in Kinshasa and told you to come here?”
Ndaya said, “He’s a very nice man. He has helped carry our luggage and did all the things for us. He did a very good job.”
“What was his name?” Maxence asked.
Ndaya and Disanka frowned at him and then checked in with each other before Disanka answered, “His name is Michael Rossi. Didn’t you send him for us? Was it the cardinal who has sent him?”
The warm air cracked apart, turning cold and chilling Maxence to his bones.
Ndaya asked, “Is there a problem? Are you sick? Is that why you have sent for us?”
Maxence laughed and patted his abdomen, where he seemed to lose muscle first when he wasn’t eating enough. “You can see I have not been sick.”
Ndaya nodded. “You are not wasted like you are when you come back from long missions. Still, I will cook for you.”
“Good Sister Ndaya, I would like nothing better. Let us get you checked out of that hotel and into a proper house where you can cook good food.”
Disanka asked, “Is there not a convent where we can stay?”
Excellent idea. “On second thought, perhaps we should rely on our Catholic connections to take care of you. It would probably be best if you stayed in a convent with other religious sisters so everyone can look after one another.”
Disanka nodded. “Yes, Deacon Father Maxence. We are always more comfortable when we stay with religious sisters.”
“I’ll make some phone calls. In the meantime, there is a room here where you can wait.”
Ndaya swiveled her head, looking around the courtyard. “Do you know people in this castle, Deacon Father Maxence?”
He winked at her. “I have connections everywhere.” He turned to Dree and said, “We’re going to take them up to my office to wait for some friends to come and get them. I know you don’t speak French, but they have no idea who I am here. I’m just Deacon Father Maxence, and I have ‘connections,’ so they can wait inside until someone from a convent comes and picks them up.”
Dree was still smiling and nodding at Ndaya and Disanka. “Who are they? I mean, you just told me their names, but who are they?”
Maxence’s grin grew forced. “It’s not entirely inaccurate to say they are my family.”
Dree raised one pale eyebrow at him, a grin playing around the corners of her mouth. “Did you forget to mention you have two wives and a couple of kids?”
Max chuckled, the tension in his chest evaporating. “Ndaya and Disanka are bonnes sœurs, religious sisters, with a Catholic order in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. We met there five years ago. They’re nurses who work at a children’s home in Kinshasa.”
“Ah, I always knew you had a thing for nurses.”
He laughed. “Evidently. Majambu and Mpata were left in the surr
ender cradle on the same day. Majambu was about six months old, but Mpata was a newborn. They were both sick. It took months to nurse them back to health. They were abandoned by women who couldn’t take care of them or were leaving their husbands, or they might have been born into upper-class families who didn’t want to admit that their teenaged daughters became pregnant. There’s no way to know. I was new in the DRC at the time, working with Father Moses at a rectory near the convent. Anyway, Father Moses assists at the children’s home, and so did I. And we—bonded.”
“Did they call you daddy? I heard them say pere, which I think means daddy?”
“They call me parrain, which means godfather.”
Dree’s voice dropped and became hoarse. “Someday, you can do a favor for me.”
Maxence smiled and rubbed his eyebrow, suddenly shy about what he should have been most proud of. “I baptized them. They were the first children I baptized.”
Dree glanced up at him, startled. “But you’re not a priest.”
He shrugged. “You don’t have to be a priest to baptize someone. Any Christian can baptize someone in extraordinary circumstances, but deacons do baptisms all the time. We’re considered ordinary ministers for baptisms. I’ve baptized lots of babies. But anyone can.”
Dree’s smile softened. “I wish I’d seen you do that.”
“Yeah.” The tight knot unraveled in Maxence’s chest. He wished she’d seen the better part of him, too.
Dree led the way back to Maxence’s office. Ndaya and Disanka followed her, their long, white skirts swaying like dangling lilies, while Max brought up the rear with Majambu and Mpata clinging to his shoulders and giggling. They struggled with each other because they were both trying to dominate Maxence’s attention, each of them turning his face toward herself and away from her sister. Except for a few furtive video calls, he hadn’t seen them since he’d left the DRC to tend to his dying uncle, and he could swear they had grown so much and were talking so much more in just that short time.
He hated that he’d missed so much.
In the office, Dree fussed over them and made sure there were chairs and tea for the ladies and milk and cookies for the kids.
Majambu and Mpata didn’t want chairs. They were delighted sitting on Max’s lap and competing for his attention and the cookies.
After a few quick phone calls, the refreshments, and plans for Maxence to come to the convent the next day for lunch, Max’s receptionist called on the phone and, sounding very confused, announced that three nuns had arrived and insisted they had an appointment.
Maxence and Dree saw the two nurses and two toddlers into the minivan, which had car seats, and waved goodbye as it drove out of sight.
Once the minivan had rounded the curve and sped into a tunnel, the smile dropped off Max’s face. He turned on his heel and marched back into the palace with Dree and five security personnel trailing him.
The crowd parted in front of him.
As he walked down the hall toward his office, he passed Quentin Sault, who was walking the other way. He growled to Sault, “With me.”
Sault fell in beside and one step behind Maxence. His receptionist called after him, but he straight-armed his office door out of his way. It banged against the wall on the other side as he turned.
Quentin Sault entered after him and came to parade rest, his hands locked behind his back and chin, high.
Maxence walked around behind him and flipped the door closed, leaving Dree and the other security personnel outside. As he paced around to stand in front of Sault, he asked, “Who brought them here?”
Sault blinked, weathered eyelids covering his nearly colorless eyes. “I beg your pardon, sir?”
“Those African ladies who appeared in the courtyard of the palace, a place where they should not have been. They should have been pretty much anywhere else in the world except this palace in this country. They’ve never known who I am, and they would not know to find me here. Someone knew they existed. Who was it, and who brought them here?”
Sault’s iron-gray eyebrows twitched toward the crease between his eyes. “I’ll look into it, sir.”
“They said Michael Rossi contacted them in Kinshasa and made the travel arrangements for them. Who is Michael Rossi assigned to?”
Sault’s blank expression did not change. “When we took Rossi off the palace detail, he resigned. I have no knowledge about his current employment.”
“You haven’t seen him since he resigned?”
“No, sir.”
“And did you ever find out who told my uncle Jules that my plane would be landing in Nice and then the helicopter would arrive in Monaco?”
Sault’s lips thinned. “No, sir.”
Maxence stepped forward, his anger expanding inside his chest. His voice was very soft. “You will find the answer to both of those questions within twenty-four hours and report to me as soon as you know.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Has anyone discussed my new admin, Dree Clark?”
“Not to my knowledge, sir.”
“Dismissed.”
Later that night, after several other business appointments, an interminable state supper with foreign diplomats, a private recital by a world-renowned violinist, and cocktails and small talk as was necessary, Maxence retreated to his apartment and texted Dree, Take Notes.
Later, when Dree was lying in his arms in his palatial bed, one of the few beds he’d ever slept in that properly accommodated his long legs, she said, “You were so cute with them.”
He scoffed, “I was not cute.”
She giggled and drew circles on his bare chest with one scarlet-tipped fingernail. “The little girls are pretty. They’re going to be beautiful when they grow up. They seem smart.”
“The girls’ full names are Majambu Milandu, which means ‘Defied the grave,’ and Mpata Majambu, which means ‘Doubted the grave,’ in Tshiluba. Like most babies who are surrendered to the children’s home, they were sick. They just needed some antibiotics and a bunch of formula. If I could take them and raise them, I would, but the Catholic Church has strict rules about priests adopting children.”
Dree paused for a minute, and then she said, “So, you’re still—um—you’re still thinking about that?”
Every minute he’d spent in the dark closet expanded in his mind until it felt like years of fruitless praying.
It had been years of fruitless praying. He’d discussed it with other priests, who’d said that if it were easy, if anyone had proof, no one would need faith.
Yet, the hollowness felt like an answer to Maxence.
He said, “I’m still thinking about it.”
“Okay.” Dree’s voice shrank, smaller and higher than usual, and he felt like an asshole for doing that to her, but she snuggled down under the thick duvet. “It’s just amazing the way they showed up here.”
No, it wasn’t amazing.
It was a threat.
Whoever now employed Michael Rossi had found someone Maxence loved and brought them to Monaco to be his weakness.
And yet their presence, safe behind the walls of the convent just a few miles away, and the anticipation of the immaculate joy of seeing his dear friends and his godchildren the next day and eating lunch with them cracked open his heart.
Dree whispered, her voice drifting with sleepiness, “It was like a miracle that you found them in the crowd.”
Maxence’s breath caught under his ribs like an enormous fishhook.
Chapter Twenty-Two
App
Maxence
Scheduling another meeting with Maxence’s cousin Nicostrato Grimaldi took a few days because Max’s schedule was booked days in advance. Finally, his receptionist found a free lunch hour, and palace hospitality service brought a table with place settings to his office.
Because it would invite questions, Maxence couldn’t have Dree sitting at the table with them, so he had the kitchens make an additional plate for her. She sat over in her admin’s ch
air, taking notes on projected spring plantings in the French farms just over Monaco’s border.
Nico arrived, hearty handshakes were exchanged, and Maxence took the chair across the table so that he could see Dree over in her corner. That left Nico with the chair that turned his back toward Dree so he would keep his filthy eyes off of her.
After some eating, generic pleasantries, and gossip, Maxence broached the subject. “About the upcoming Council of Nobles meeting.”
Nico looked up from his salad, his blue eyes bright and one sandy brown eyebrow raised. “You finally scheduled one?”
“No, and it’s a good thing I haven’t. We need to find a new candidate.”
Nico chewed and swallowed, frowning. “Neither Valentina Martini nor Great Uncle Louis is suitable? I would’ve laid odds that one of them would have worked out. As a matter of fact, I did lay odds. I’ve lost a hundred euros.”
“Valentina Martini is exceptionally conservative and will not hear of deviating from the line of succession, and Great Uncle Louis is a drug addict.”
Nico paused with his fork halfway to his mouth and then returned the bite of grilled meat to his plate. “I beg your pardon?”
“He had back surgery a few years ago.”
Nico nodded. “He’s made a remarkable recovery.”
“With the ongoing help of strong narcotic pharmaceuticals, a lot of them.”
Nico sighed and rolled his eyes. “Sorry about that.”
Maxence said, “And so we return to square one, the conundrum of who shall take the throne of Monaco.”
“Dammit.”
“Absolutely, but I need names.” Max flipped over his cell phone lying on the table at his elbow. Two red dots were displayed on the black screen. He tapped the top one three times in rapid succession.
Dree, sitting beyond Nico over by the bookcases, paused with her fork suspended in the air. Lettuce leaves dropped off the tines onto her salad, and she blinked several times before she speared them again and ate the bite.
“Lady Christine, Alexandre’s sister, is in the direct line of succession. She’s the easiest choice because you and Alexandre will abdicate immediately. She’s next, assuming the elderly and male-heavy Crown Council will vote for a woman.”
Prince: Royal Romantic Suspense (Billionaires in Disguise: Maxence Book 5) Page 19