Maxence rubbed the outer corner of his eye. He wasn’t going to find the woman he was looking for in the crowd, so he should stop searching for Dree Clark. She was safely behind the walls of the castle. He preferred that she was safely tucked away, and yet a ridiculous glimmer of hope kept his eyes moving, looking for one of the gowns that he had bought for her in Paris that she didn’t even have anymore or the bright, sunny curls of her hair.
Nico asked him, “Could you imagine my father at one of these receptions? He doesn’t suffer fools at all, let alone gladly. If anyone made the wrong political comment, he would dump his scotch and soda over their heads and demand satisfaction.”
Maxence chuckled. “I didn’t ever see my father at an event like this.”
“I’m sorry,” Nico muttered.
Maxence turned back to him. “It was just a statement of fact. I don’t remember him much at all. I was sent away to boarding school as soon as I turned five years old.”
Nico had attended a day school in Monaco, not Le Rosey boarding school in Switzerland like Maxence and most of his friends had. “You Le Rosey kids missed a lot.”
Max shrugged. “We formed a different kind of bond.”
“But do you ever see your friends from school? You must be scattered all over the world.”
“Relatively often. I saw two of them just before Uncle Rainier died. I missed Christmas with them this year because I was in Nepal, but we usually spend the holidays together.”
Nico turned to Max and cocked his head to the side a little. “I’m glad. I was always worried about you and Marie-Therese and the others who were shuttled off to Le Rosey. You’d come home for Christmas and the summer, but then we would blink, and you’d be gone again. My mom worried about you, you know?”
“Your mother is nice. She and Marie-Therese’s mother scooped up all us boarding school kids during the vacations. I still remember when we went to Nice to go to McDonald’s that one time.”
Nico laughed under his breath. “It was the first time you’d ever eaten a chicken nugget.”
“I still crave them.”
“That was the summer when you weren’t around much, and then you were back for barely a few days before you went back to school.”
Maxence didn’t blink or flinch. “Yes.”
“Did they feed you enough at that school? You were skinny sometimes.”
Nico was conflating times when Max had merely returned from school, having grown, with the time he’d been kidnapped. He’d been emaciated when he’d returned, and for security reasons, unable to explain why. “The food was fine and in adequate quantities. I went through stages of being a picky eater.”
The agreed-upon lie lay sour on his tongue.
“You know a lot of people from Le Rosey. Like, for example, when the Butorins held those events a couple of years ago so their construction company could bid on some of the land reclamation projects, you already knew Dima and Tatiana. I had no idea who they were.”
Maxence checked who was standing near them in the crowd, but it was mostly strangers and Quentin Sault standing off to the side, on duty and surveying the situation. “You don’t need to know who Dima and Tatiana Butorin are anymore. They both died within the last few years.”
Nico blinked. “Oh, Jesus. I’m sorry. Maybe we should talk about other candidates because I keep sticking my foot in my mouth.”
“You’ll get the hang of it. Besides, they weren’t friends of mine. Tatiana and I had an adversaries-with-benefits thing going on for a little while, but when the Butorins bid on the reclamation project, I made sure they didn’t get it.”
Nico glanced at him, startled. “That’s cold.”
Maxence shook his head. “Like many of the nouveau riche Russians who’ve applied for Monegasque citizenship in the past few decades, they ran a criminal organization. The Butorins were involved in drugs and protection rackets, mostly. The Sokolovs, however,” Maxence pointed to his Great Uncle Louis and the group of people standing with him over by the bar, “are almost all narco-terrorists.”
Nico looked at their uncle, back to Maxence, and again at their uncle. “We have drug dealers living in Monaco?”
Nico needed to become a lot less naïve very quickly if he was going to take the throne. “Even more certainly than we have counterfeit art hanging in the national museum.”
“No way. Who are those guys?”
“It’s been over a decade since I graduated from Le Rosey and went off to university, but Lady Valentina pointed out Matryona Sokolov as Uncle Louis’s primary drug dealer. I’m pretty sure that’s her brother Kir standing with her and Uncle Louis.”
Nico turned his back to the Russians and their uncle and lowered his voice. “Should we throw them all out? Isn’t that the point of having an absolute monarchy is that you can get rid of criminals like that?”
Maxence allowed himself to grimace just enough that Nico would be able to see it, just a tightening of his eyes and lips with a negative shake of his head. “First, there’s the old concept that you hold your friends close and your enemies closer, but also, we don’t want to antagonize them even though we don’t get into bed with them. Also, their money funds reclamation projects just as well as anyone else’s.”
Nico nodded, his eyes drifting as he absorbed the idea that his country tolerated Russian mafia criminals among its citizens. “Who else do we make accommodations like that to?”
Maxence inclined his head as he considered what he should tell Nico while they were standing in the middle of several hundred people, even if the string quartet over in the corner was also playing through the speakers over the crowd. “We should probably discuss more in private.”
“Should we start a spreadsheet or something? Can’t tell the mafia players without a scorecard?”
Maxence smiled at him. “You’ll get to know everyone within the first few months. Everyone will want to meet you.”
“We should consider other options. Someone in that position should know who’s the head of a Russian criminal organization and who isn’t.”
Maxence shook his head and smiled in a way he hoped was reassuring. “I will be at your right hand for at least six months, a year if you need me. I won’t let you make a mistake.” He leaned slightly toward his cousin. “And even if you did, no one would be able to say a word because you’d be the Prince of Monaco.”
Nico stepped back, nodding. “I guess that’s true.”
When Maxence looked up, he saw his Great Uncle Louis waving and motioning them over.
Max said to Nico, “Here’s your first chance to have a social interaction with Russian mobsters who will want to discuss business with you. Your goal is to be polite and regally inaccessible. You make no deals, you promise nothing, and you are perfectly pleasant and gracious while doing so.”
Nico lifted one eyebrow. “That sounds impossible.”
“You understand perfectly. Come.”
Maxence led the way through the crowd, shaking hands and greeting people as they moved along. As they strolled and sidestepped their way toward Louis, Max included Nico in every introduction and discussion as, “My cousin, Lord Nicostrato Grimaldi, heir to the Marquis de Ragny,” thus lightly implying that Nico would be a good person to get to know.
When they reached Great Uncle Louis and the two high-ranking members of the Sokolov bratva, Maxence heartily shook Louis’s hand and allowed himself to be introduced. Matryona had been quite a few years ahead of Maxence at school, though Kir was closer to his age.
Nico shook hands with the assorted Russian gangsters while smiling tightly. “Call me Nico.”
They should discuss whether Nico should use the diminutive of his name or insist on being called Prince Nicostrato after being elected. Very few people shortened Maxence’s name in any manner, though he’d always thought of himself as Max when necessary. He had always been known as Prince Maxence.
Uncle Louis’s crepey eyelids were half-closed as he soared through narcotic dreams. Not
noticing that his uncle was a drug addict had nearly caused a major miscalculation. Maxence must be more attentive to everyone he saw if he was to pull this off.
Matryona Sokolov was a petite, zaftig woman whose head barely reached the middle of Maxence’s chest. Her appearance provoked impressions of everybody’s favorite aunt, the one who always brought homemade cookies and gave amusing presents at Christmas instead of socks. Her sparrow-streaked hair fluttered as she laughed uproariously at some joke that Maxence hadn’t heard. “So nice to meet you, Lord Nico. This is my brother Kir. He’s a great person to get to know if you need connections to anyone in America.”
Kir Sokolov bent slightly at the waist as he was introduced to Maxence and Nico, bringing his eyes closer to level with theirs.
Because Maxence was six-four, he rarely met people taller than himself. Angling his gaze up to meet Kir’s was almost disorienting. The world tilted as his eye went past the level of the horizon, and his stomach churned like he was seasick before he adjusted.
Kir Sokolov’s tuxedo jacket hung limply on his cadaverous form, like he’d recently lost weight and hadn’t had his suit re-tailored. The discrepancy was so extreme that Maxence stopped himself from asking Kir if he was all right, or if he had been ill with cancer, perhaps a radiation accident. A radioactivity overdose might explain the white man’s gray pallor, bloodshot eyes, and numerous liver spots for a person who appeared to be in their early thirties, otherwise.
However, as a member of the royal family, one did not ask such questions and feigned surprise if the other person volunteered information. Maxence smiled gently and inclined his head to invite commentary as he asked, “Have you been residing in America?”
Kir smiled, revealing straight, blindingly white teeth. His thin lips appeared even more sallow by comparison. “I live in some of the larger cities, mainly in the West. Have you traveled much in the United States, Your Highness?”
“Very little. A friend of mine lives in Los Angeles, so I’ve stayed with him there. I’ve only occasionally ventured outside of LA.”
The Russian mobster’s smile did not waver. “I have many business contacts in Los Angeles, though my base of operations is in Phoenix and southern Arizona.”
“It’s a lovely part of the country. I spent time in Central America, where I attended graduate school.”
Max’s Uncle Louis added, “Maxence has said he has a vocation to be a priest. He plans to be a Jesuit.” As he spoke, his body canted sideways, and he stumbled.
Maxence caught Louis and righted him without comment.
Kir Sokolov’s pristine smile did not change, but his tone acquired a bit more gravel. “I have many associates in Central America, especially El Salvador.”
The combination of Louis’s mention of Jesuits and Kir’s immediate reference to El Salvador was menacing. Six Jesuit priests had been assassinated in El Salvador in a mass murder that had shocked the world. Even thirty years later, the allusion was unmistakable. The question was whether Kir was merely trying to throw Maxence off guard or making an actual threat. Either way, Maxence had spent too much time with psychopaths in his life to enjoy the experience.
After a few more pleasantries, he noted Marie-Therese signaling to him and led Nico over to greet her rather than waste any more of his time with the members of the Russian mafia. She was mingling with people who appeared more glamorous than threatening, and Maxence allowed her to tuck her hand in his arm and introduce him and Nico to the next generation of social media influencers. Their shallow giddiness was amusing, and Maxence found himself entertained by their avid discussion of algorithms.
He missed his little Dree Clark, though. She’d been a bubble of light at the Paris Opera House and the ball at Versailles, and even the most scintillating of conversations paled in comparison to her wonder, her effervescent observations, and the softness of her skin under her gown that he took every opportunity to touch.
If Dree were with him at the reception, Maxence would take her up on the other part of the roof where the darkened helipad was and make love to her under the stars with the chop of the Mediterranean Sea drowning out the voices of the people below.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Some Hillbilly Stuff
Dree
The next Friday night at shortly past eleven o’clock, Dree’s phone buzzed with yet another late-night text from Maxence asking her to come to his apartment to “take notes.”
Seriously, he was so prim sometimes. The security staff probably wasn’t even reading his texts, so it would be just fine if he texted her to come to his bedroom and blow him or meet him in bed, naked.
Just the thought of him saying that made her bra feel tight and her mouth wet. She had to swallow so she wouldn’t drool.
Dree slipped her work dress back on but took off her panties because even princes deserved a surprise now and then, and she trotted through the palace to his apartment.
In the serene glow from the antique wall sconces, the polished marble floors took on a warm patina from centuries of careful care. Every single item she passed—whether it was the majestic chandelier in the anteroom or a small hallway table with a lamp for extra light placed in a corner—was an example of exquisite craftsmanship, probably from hundreds of years before.
When Dree had been a kid and watching Disney princesses, she’d thought a palace would be slathered in gold, gilded from the walls to the floor to the faucets and toilets.
After the refined elegance of the Prince’s Palace, such bling-bling was obviously vulgar. Even the Palace of Versailles showed elegance and restraint, and it was so ostentatious that taxpayers had invented the guillotine. Only a childish narcissist would crap in a gold toilet.
At the door to Maxence’s apartment, Dree looked around carefully before she took the key from her handbag and unlocked the door. She hadn’t been seen at Max’s apartment since she’d gotten lost that one time when Marie-Therese had saved her from wandering around the castle endlessly.
Getting lost like that was kind of mortifying.
As always, Dree nudged the spring-suspended door, and it swung open gently even though the dark wood looked like it weighed a ton. She stepped inside and pressed it closed.
The living room was mostly dark except for small lamps that burned all night on the coffee table and the grand piano over by the windows that overlooked the dark harbor far below, but the double doors to Maxence’s bedroom stood open.
Bright light crept out and formed a bent square on the carpeting.
Bedsprings creaked.
Sheets rustled.
A woman’s giggle fluttered in the air.
Dree froze in the middle of the dark living room in mid-step.
Her face stung like she’d been slapped.
She wasn’t with Maxence all day, every day. He went out to all those balls and galas and cocktail hours and everything else alone, without her.
Of course, he was screwing around. He was richer than a billionaire. He was the de facto sovereign prince of a whole country, even if it was a tiny country. He had wealth and real power. Women must be throwing themselves at him all the time.
Of course, he must be taking some of them up on it.
Men were trash that way.
And just because Dree had thought Maxence was better than that, that he was different, didn’t mean he was.
You’d think Dree would’ve learned her lesson from when her drug-stealing ex-boyfriend had told his narcotic overlords Dree had the money he owed them before they killed him. Somewhere out there, powerful drug dealers wanted a piece of her hide, which was why she couldn’t go home.
It was weird that Max had texted her to come over, though. It’s one thing to get caught; it’s an entirely different thing to set yourself up to make sure you would be.
Unless he just wanted to have a huge fight to break up and get it over with. Some guys did that. They cheated and were stupid about it, so they got caught. That way, when the girl broke up with them, the girl
screamed instead of cried.
But they cried later. Dree had held many of her friends when they’d cried afterward. The guy didn’t have to see the heartbreak he’d caused.
Just cheating and a nasty, brutal fight, and it was over.
Well, if Maxence wanted a nasty, brutal fight, he’d picked the right cowgirl.
Or, you know, sheep farm girl.
But definitely the right one.
Dree screwed up her face and sucked in a deep breath through her nose. Balling her hands into fists and ready to fight, she stalked toward Max’s bedroom.
Over in the bedroom, Maxence growled, “What the hell?”
Sheets scuffled.
Then, an odd clatter, like furniture banging a wall.
Like a headboard.
Oh, Dree was gonna have it out with this guy.
She wasn’t going to punch the girl. The girl may or may not have known that Maxence had been saying that he “cared for” someone, that they needed “to get to know each other” in case there was a “long term” and other crap like that. The girl just probably wanted a quick roll in the hay with a hot, rich dude who did not have a publicly acknowledged girlfriend.
She probably thought he was single.
Dree was going in to pick a fight with Maxence.
He’d grown up in a frou-frou boarding school where teachers probably stopped slap-fests before they started, and Dree had grown up with four older brothers.
Dree bet she could take him.
She marched across the room and slammed the bedroom door all the way open, her fingers splayed on the wood, ready to tell Prince Maxence of Monagasquay what she thought of him.
Cheater.
Liar.
Coward.
Instead, she found Maxence standing butt-naked with his backside pressed against his dresser and a pillow clamped over his junk. He was holding one finger up toward the brunette on the bed like he was trying to ward her off. His jaw was set in stern anger.
Prince: Royal Romantic Suspense (Billionaires in Disguise: Maxence Book 5) Page 22