“Henry,” Mateo nodded.
“Sir.” It was the first time her bodyguard had called him that.
“If you could make sure no one leaves the stage.”
“Of course, Príncipe.”
Henry gave a shrill whistle and was joined by a couple of palace security guards. They crossed the stage as a group, and by the time they’d reached the podium, Roman had stared the king back into his seat and manhandled Easton into his. Tonya sat between them with an impatient scowl of disapproval. She seldom found herself on the losing side, and when she did, she didn’t stay there for long. Roxanne met her mother’s eyes and saw the steam of her gears already turning.
Henry and the palace guards stationed themselves on each side of the chairs while Mateo, Roxanne, Sofia, and Roman moved to the podium. Roman picked up the ponderous book and handed it to Mateo, who laid it on the lectern in front of him. Standing in between them, Roxanne looked out onto the small village of cameras, and the larger mass of Monte del Vino Real residents gathered on the lawn. Even though the residents were far away, with the king having made no special arrangements to accommodate them, she could feel their stress from here. She shared it.
What the hell had just happened?
She felt her husband take a deep breath as he surveyed the crowd. Hidden by the podium, she took his hand.
He laid his free hand on the book. “We’ve gathered you here under false pretenses.” His voice rang out over the lawn, deep and sure. “The document the king and I just signed does not sell half of the Monte to CML Resorts for the development of a theme park. Instead, it verifies that I abdicate my claim to the throne in favor of my brother, Roman Sheppard.”
Roxanne kept her face still, set, instead of letting it crumble into tears as the media rumbled in shock and shouts of denial came from the villagers. She wanted to shout, too.
“It also declares that Príncipe Roman Sheppard can sell no part of the Monte for thirty years or until the death of King Felipe Miguel de Esperanza y Santos.”
The crowd grew silent as people put together what this meant.
Roxanne tried to sort it out: Mateo and Roman must have pulled off some kind of switch with matching bound documents, and then relied on the pompousness of the proceedings, the determination to rub Mateo’s face in it, to guarantee that Fuller or King Felipe wouldn’t review the documents before signing.
“Any attempt to coerce, blackmail, or intimidate me for a different outcome will be futile.” Roxanne could feel the tension in Mateo’s arm. “I will no longer allow myself to be used as a tool to harm the Monte. I cede control to my extremely capable brother and sister. My brother is a military strategist who has saved people’s lives. My sister is an expert of the vine with the wisdom of the world’s best rulers.”
Mateo paused, just for a second, for just a sip of a breath. But in that second, she could tell what all of this was costing him.
“I have not been the prince you deserve. But I swear to you, I will be your most loyal servant. I will continue my work here in the Monte on an innovative new vine whose results we will unveil at the end of the growing season. Any involvement outside of that will only be at the request of my brother and sister. Should anyone try to reveal information out of spite or malice that discredits me, mine, or the Monte, they will find themselves facing lengthy criminal and civil court battles that they cannot afford. With our new partnership with Trujillo Industries, we can fight for a long, long time.”
Roxanne’s head spun. Trujillo Industries, as in Daniel Trujillo, the billionaire whose daughter had been rescued by Roman Sheppard? That’s why tearing up that check hadn’t been recklessly daring or ceding to Fuller’s plan. Mateo had found a way to see the Monte through until the Tempranillo Vino Real was profitable while still proving to Roxanne that his love wasn’t based on her money.
He had done it. He had saved the Monte. He’d kept it whole, kept it solvent, and kept Roxanne’s secrets.
And all he’d had to do was give up everything.
Sofia had known that this was his plan all along. Roxanne didn’t care that her sister-in-law had lied to her, made her believe that he was getting in bed with Fuller, to compel her here. How long do you think he’ll survive watching everything he cares about being stolen away by a man he hates? The Monte was safe, but the net result was the same: Mateo was forced to give up his heritage by the worst, weakest sort of men. And woman. He wants to show you that he chooses you. He’s willing to sacrifice everything else, even the kingdom he loves, to prove that.
It was a sacrifice Roxanne never wanted him to make. Sofia was right to rush her here to try to stop him. There was still something she could do.
She tugged on his hand.
Mateo glanced at her but kept speaking.
She leaned against him toward the microphone. “Excuse me,” she said, interrupting him, her voice jarringly loud over the speakers. “I just need one minute with my husband. I’m sure you’d love to hear from your new príncipe.”
She looked at Roman Sheppard and was surprised by the man’s wide green eyes. Apparently podium speaking was not one of the things he enjoyed. As she dragged her husband away, she watched Roman grab Sofia and tug her next to him.
She felt the death glares of her mother, his father, and Fuller as they crossed the stage. She pulled Mateo behind an oversized banner near the back corner of the stage and put his broad back to the crowd. Then she told him what she wanted to do.
* * *
Minutes later, Roxanne stood in front of the podium, her husband standing at her side.
She took a moment to look at the citizens of the Monte, the mass of press, the bank of microphones that would carry her words to the world. What she was about to say would undermine twenty-nine years of effort and make her a laughingstock to everyone who knew her.
But for the first time in her life, she would truly be free.
“I’m sorry to interrupt,” she said, the microphone carrying her words away. “But I have a story to tell, and it’s going to make a difference to what happens here.” She smiled tremulously at the crowd. “I’ve worked hard my whole life to make it a fairy tale. I wanted to be the Midas of money, the Snow White of beauty, and the Fairy Godmother of motherhood.” She paused and forced a backbone into her shaking voice. “But recently, I’ve found something better than fairy tales. I’ve discovered real life. I’ve found a real husband, prince though he may be, and a real partner. A real friend. And I don’t want to cling to stories anymore.
“My brilliant partner and friend once told me that I give people power with the secrets I keep. And he was right. To live in my fairy-tale world, I gave bad people too much power. I let them take things they hadn’t earned, let them punish good people. Today, I’m taking that power away.”
Roxanne looked down and took a deep breath. She felt Mateo step close. Felt his hand at her lower back.
When she’d told him behind the banner of her plan, he’d taken some convincing. I’m not worried about me, he’d told her. But about you. And our child.
She knew, without him saying a word, that if she decided to step away now, decided to abort this plan and leave the fairy tale intact, he would stand by her. Knew, left to his own devices, he’d already be tugging her away.
She raised her head and let the world see her.
“In January, I orchestrated an arrangement with King Felipe to compel Príncipe Mateo to impregnate me in exchange for funding for the financially struggling Monte del Vino Real.” Her voice echoed loud and clear over the lawn, over people’s stunned murmurs. “I thought I wanted a royal baby without the hassles of a royal husband. I was wrong. Príncipe Mateo, who was adamantly against the arrangement, agreed only because he is a good leader. His father had pushed the Monte into financial difficulties, and Mateo had no other options if the Monte was going to survive. At the close of this press conference, m
y PR people will send out a copy of our contract.” She jabbed a finger over her shoulder. “If I don’t send it, Easton Fuller will, and I won’t give him the satisfaction. He attempted to use the contract to blackmail my husband into selling half the Monte. As of today, I am not pregnant, there is a signed divorce decree already in San Francisco district court to terminate this arrangement, and Príncipe Mateo and I are very much in love.” She bit her lip, unable to hold back her grin. “A wedding date will be announced soon.”
She glanced over her shoulder and caught the dazzling smile of a gloriously in love man.
But they were not free yet, and Roxanne still had more to tell. She faced the stunned audience again.
“The other detail I must disclose is my arrangement with my mother.” She felt that same dark shadow on her heart, that same cold shroud she felt whenever she had to refer to the woman. “You’ve met her today. People of the media, perhaps you’ll track her down. Perhaps you’ll ask her invasive questions about her life and mine, and perhaps you’ll pay her oodles and oodles of money to answer them. I hope you do. Because she is never getting one more red cent from me.”
She took a shuddering breath. “She was a bad mother. She left me alone for days or abandoned me at random places when I was too young to care for myself. She slept with men for money because it was convenient, and she didn’t care if her child was in the room or not. She didn’t care where her child was. And she didn’t care that it made her child’s already miserable life more difficult in a tiny, conservative town. Once I became wealthy, she determined to keep making my life difficult by threatening to reveal her past unless I paid. So I paid, with my checkbook and my dignity and my self-worth. And I will continue to pay, as will my husband and our future children, if I don’t stop her now.”
As her words soared away over the crowd, to her surprise, so did that shadow. The weight of that shroud lifted up and the Monte sun warmed her bare skin.
“That scared little girl didn’t do anything wrong.” She looked back at her husband. “It’s not my shame to bear anymore.”
She wouldn’t turn to look at her mother. There was no need. The woman, without conscience or heart or love, was a void on the stage. And Roxanne’s world, her real life, was so full. She had brawn and brains. She had a sister and, apparently, a brother. She had a Father. She had an empire and two small towns that adored her and needed her.
And she had her love. She smiled at him now. “Does that cover everything?”
He smiled back. “I think so.”
“Oh, thank the Lord,” she heard Roman groan on her opposite side. She turned to grin at him. “Does that mean I don’t have to be prince anymore? I don’t even speak Spanish.”
Roxanne smiled at Sofia, who gave her a tear-glittering grin, before she shrugged at Roman. “If you don’t mind...”
He immediately leaned over and lugged the book off the podium. “Let’s find a shredder.”
The crowd slowly began to comprehend what had just occurred. A buzz of questions from the press quickly became a shout. The platform rumbled as Henry and the security guards escorted Fuller, Tonya Medina, and King Felipe, all hiding their faces from the cameras, off the stage. From the back of the lawn, rising like a wave, came a roar.
“¡Viva la multimillionaria!”
“¡Viva el príncipe!”
“¡Viven a nuestro próximo rey y reina!”
Mateo stepped next to her and pulled her against his side. He leaned down to murmur in her ear, “Wave at your people, mi reina de ojos marrones.”
My brown-eyed queen. Roxanne had left her contacts at home. When the people shouted, “Long live our next king and queen,” they were referring to her. This was real. This was permanent. These were her people. And she would one day be their queen.
Because Mateo, their king, would be her real and forever husband.
Feeling like she was actually in a fairy tale, Roxanne watched her husband for cues and then raised her hand. She began to wave. The shouts from the residents became exultant. She waved harder, her hair in her face. Mateo roared, “¡Viven el Monte!” and squeezed her against his side.
Screw fairy tales. Real life was awesome.
December: Two Years Later
Roxanne stared at Mateo over the glistening bump of her belly.
“I hate you,” she said.
Mateo just smiled back. “You once were willing to pay me an impressive amount of money to do this to you,” he said as he squeaked closer on the rolling stool and traced a heart into the gel.
Reclining on the obstetrics bed, she slapped at his hand. “I was an idiot. I didn’t know what I was doing. I’ll pay you even more if you take over the remaining six months of this pregnancy. ’Kay? Great!”
He protected his hand by grabbing hers, running his thumb over the simple diamond-and-emerald spiraled ring that they’d discovered together in the Monte’s vault. He raised her hand and kissed it, looking down at her with sympathetic eyes. “It doesn’t work that way. How’re you feeling?”
“Nauseous,” she grumped. “Starving.”
Her 24/7 “morning” sickness, paired with an unreasonable amount of heartburn and an impressive belly considering she was only twelve weeks along, was why she was laid out for this unscheduled ultrasound, stomach slick and waiting for her doctor to get back from an emergency phone call.
“Pobrecita,” he murmured, his thick, gold-tipped hair hanging in his face, his eyes shining honey down at her. “Mi reina gloriosa.”
My glorious queen.
Okay, how was a woman supposed to stay mad at that?
It was infuriating, the number of weapons her husband could use against her. The hair, the eyes, that body, those hands, and his deep purring voice were bad enough. But his kindness, loyalty, empathy, dedication, and perseverance were devastating. His humor slayed her, his intellect made her his slave; when he combined his humor and intellect into horrible jokes that had her rolling on the floor—well, she’d follow him to the ends of the earth just to share a quip that no one else in the world would think was funny.
His weapons had only gotten more powerful since their marriage two years ago. Just three months after that chaotic press conference in the Monte, she’d said “I do” in the village’s small chapel, with Father Juan giving her away and the children of the shelter acting as her wedding party, and had honestly thought that she couldn’t love Mateo any more than she had at that moment.
Just two days later, he’d proved her wrong. When he’d danced with every single woman and a few young men at their reception after they renewed their two-day-old vows at St. Paul’s Catholic Church, when he’d drunk beer and slapped backs with most of the men while Sofia and Roman and Carmen Louisa and his Titi dazzled the townspeople like exotic birds, when he full-heartedly embraced the small town that had provided her foundations, she realized she might have only dipped her toe into the ocean that could be her love for Mateo.
As she grabbed the front of his t-shirt, she inhaled the stomach-soothing smell of soil coming off of him. He’d been at his lab before the appointment; he traded his ball cap for a blazer. She dragged him down toward her.
“Distract me,” she said against his mouth.
“Gladly.” But instead of the smooth slide of his lips, Roxanne felt the cool press of paper. She snatched at it...and discovered that it was a check made out for half the amount she’d loaned the Monte after she and Mateo were married.
She stared at him, stunned. His grin spread itself beautifully wide. “We sold next season’s Tempranillo Vino Real fruit for three times what we offered it for. Once they tasted Sofia’s wine, some of the winery holdouts started a bidding war.”
She wished she could blame her sudden tears on her pregnancy, but she’d grown embarrassingly emotional since marrying Mateo. “That’s wonderful,” she breathed. “But, Mateo, you know you can wait to
pay this back until...”
He nipped her nose. “It’s okay, my lovely Midas.” Calling herself that was the only thing she regretted about the press conference; it had become one of Mateo’s favorite teases, especially as Medina Now Enterprises continued to grow and thrive. They now had a headquarters in Buenos Aires and were making a significant impact bolstering female-owned South American businesses. Mateo even had begun his own project, helping female Chilean growers select the best grapes for their land.
“I wouldn’t repay it if we didn’t have it,” he continued, tucking the check into her purse before straightening on his stool. “The rest of your money is an investment and you and Trujillo will begin seeing dividends faster than we’d hoped. But I’m more comfortable with you as my partner than my banker.”
The sum he’d allowed her to loan him was paltry compared to the amount she’d offered in their original contract. Daniel Trujillo’s surprising investment had eliminated the need, and Mateo wanted the royal family and the Monte to live within reasonable means. The Monte’s longtime treasurer had been replaced with a seven-person panel of Monte citizens and financial experts. King Felipe and Queen Valentina could withdraw nothing beyond their monthly stipends without the signatures of Mateo and at least two members of the panel.
His father had agreed to it to avoid blackmail charges. The blackmail case against Easton Fuller, however, was moving forward.
People magazine had lost their gone-to-the-highest-bidder interview with Tonya Medina when they’d informed her of the charges against Fuller.
“You can go to jail for that?” she’d asked.
She’d run out on her million-dollar interview and fled Freedom. Roxanne never intended to press charges, but now she was glad that she’d kept a lifetime’s worth of threatening letters, emails, and voice mails.
Eventually, she’d had her investigators track Tonya to Tennessee. She sent her a modest monthly check, enough to handle rent, food, and healthcare. She would never again interact with her or refer to her as her mother, but she didn’t want her to be society’s burden.
Lush Money (Filthy Rich) Page 32