Once Upon a Time: Billionaires in Disguise: Flicka

by Blair Babylon

  There wasn’t enough land for another palace and grounds in the three-quarters of a square mile ruled by the city-state of Monaco. The whole country was only two and a half miles long along the coast, and the narrowest part of it was only 382 yards wide, which is 349 meters.

  Yes, a 400-meter dash race could not be run across that part of Monaco without crossing the border into France or splashing the last fifty meters into the sea. As the world record for the 400-meter dash was a whisker over 43 seconds, that runner could sprint across the entire country of Monaco in about 36 seconds.

  But Monaco was Pierre’s sovereign principality, and Flicka didn’t make jokes about how teeny-tiny his micro-state was.

  Only Vatican City was smaller.

  Let’s face it, the Vatican is a building, not a country.

  People teased the royalty of Liechtenstein for being too small to be a real country, and it was eighty times the size of Monaco.

  The Kingdom of Hannover had encompassed most of Germany, thousands and thousands of square miles.

  Even Flicka had a propensity toward petty royal carping.

  It might have amused her.

  The other reason that the Grimaldi hadn’t just torn down their medieval fortress and started over from the foundation was superstition.

  While most of their sovereign power was theoretically derived from rather tenuous treaties with France and Italy, the stones of the fortress held the princely magic. They didn’t mess with the palace.

  In the late 1700s, the Grimaldi had finally relaxed, secure that their treaties with France would hold. They’d torn down some of the palace’s fortifications to make it prettier and more like the Baroque and Renaissance castles that other monarchs lived in.

  The French had almost immediately overrun the country, taken the palace, and stripped it of its treasure.

  The Grimaldi had been exiled to Italy for twenty years.

  When they’d won the palace back, they’d rebuilt the fortifications, which still stood to this day. They had never gotten some of their better art pieces back from the French.

  Yes, the Grimaldi ruled Monaco by capturing the fortress above the harbor, and they held it by keeping the fortress strong.

  The caravan had driven all the way inside the court of honor, the central courtyard around which the palace was built.

  And now, Flicka was inside the medieval fortress that was the Prince’s Palace.

  Safe.

  It looked so different than Schloss Marienburg, and it didn’t feel like home at all.

  But it was nice that Pierre had held her hand the whole way back to the palace.

  After the shooting, he had soothed her during the plane ride, holding her in his arms, ordering tea for her, and calling ahead to make sure her favorite chocolates would be waiting for them in their bedroom.

  Pierre could be really sweet.

  Flicka’s phone buzzed in her hand. The screen lit up, showing a violin in the background and a text from Pierre’s cousin, Christine Grimaldi. Flicka, baby! Are you back in Monaco yet? Do you want to have lunch tomorrow?

  She texted back: absolutely to both.

  As they stepped out of the SUV, the afternoon sun slanted over the rooftops of the palace.

  To Flicka’s practiced eye, the palace’s facade, built over the centuries, appeared to be the terrace of Renaissance-style, Italian palazzi from differing periods of the Renaissance era.

  Hey, when you grow up at least part-time in a castle, and all your friends live in other castles, you get to know castles.

  The Monegasque palace looked like tiers of balconies surrounding the courtyard, and it was beautiful. A horseshoe-shaped staircase led up to the main balcony where she would be presented to her new subjects at her first official appearance.

  She had been supposed to wear her wedding dress, but it was stained with grass sap, mud, and Dieter’s blood.

  Her reception dress would have to suffice.

  As they walked toward the huge double doors into the palace, flanked by a battalion of Secret Service men, Pierre ordered supper to be brought up to their apartment within the palace and turned to her. “If we can’t have a honeymoon in the Seychelles, we’ll have it here. Monaco is on the French Riviera, and it is springtime. We’ll picnic on the beach in the sunshine, perhaps go to the casino down in Monte Carlo, and you can settle into the palace.”

  They’d been pretending that she hadn’t been living there for the last six months for propriety’s sake. All of Monaco knew different. No one cared.

  Well, her brother cared, but he was an old fuddy-duddy. He’d threatened to send Welfenlegion bodyguards to protect her.

  “I was hoping to get away with you,” Flicka said, “just the two of us for a while. When we’re here, you’re always running off on business.”

  Pierre smiled at her, that smile that melted her panties right off when they had been dating.

  Still worked.

  He moved forward and stroked her arms. “No business. I promise. Or not very much.”

  She laughed. “Okay. One event per day, but then I get you all to myself.”

  “Deal.” He kissed her softly.

  Camera clicks fluttered from beyond the rope line outside the courtyard.

  Pierre glanced up and laughed, and his laugh was a brilliant, happy sound that rang from the tiles and balconies.

  Flicka smiled and waved for the cameras as they walked, hand in hand, into the Prince’s Palace.

  She never thought that, when she moved into her husband’s house, she would feel a little tremor of dread.

  Surely, she wasn’t feeling dread.

  She liked Pierre, quite a lot.

  He was fun in bed, she was pretty sure.

  She didn’t have a lot to compare him to.

  Really, she had one guy to compare Pierre to.

  And you know, just because someone gets second prize in a two-man race doesn’t mean that they’re not pretty darn good.

  Pierre was there. He wanted her and told her he loved her. He told her that they should make a life together no matter what her father or other people thought of them.

  And that made him better.

  Flicka held Pierre’s hand and walked into her new home, the Prince’s Palace of Monaco—the medieval fortress with fortifications that could still repel a lightly armed military or keep someone prisoner inside—with her head held high.

  A Confession

  Dieter Schwarz

  Eventually,

  I had to stop lying

  to Wulf about Paris,

  but about Flicka,

  never.

  Dieter stood in the shiny commercial kitchen of Wulfram’s house, drinking coffee, while in the garage, Wulfram handed Reagan Stone into a car to drive her to class at the university.

  The stainless steel appliances gleamed. Silence vibrated around the hard surfaces and tile except for the coffee maker gurgling a fresh pot.

  The staff had all left the kitchen for the morning. When Dieter set his coffee cup on the stone countertop, he was the only one who heard the click.

  Wulf should walk right through the kitchen on his way back into the house. That’s when Dieter would tell him.

  Hans Werner had drawn chauffeur and bodyguard duty for Rae today, which served him right for holding down Shloss Southwestern while Dieter and most of the rest of the Welfenlegion had been on duty twenty-four and seven in Europe. Hans looked particularly chipper and well-rested, the bastard. No one had asked him to dodge a bullet twice in the past few days.

  The stitched-up crease on Dieter’s biceps still throbbed.

  He had worn his sharpest black suit to talk with Wulfram. His starched collar scratched the back of his neck as he rehearsed his apology and the assurances gained from Luca Wyss only a few hours ago that Valencia and Pajari were safe if not unharmed.

  The envelope in his suit jacket pocket felt stiff against his chest.

  The door to the garage thumped closed behind Hans Werner an
d Rae Stone. With that, Dieter and Wulfram were alone in the kitchen.

  Wulfram turned and strutted toward the door to the living room, a small smile disrupting his usually inscrutable expression with an odd lightness.

  Dieter cleared his throat. “Herr von Hannover.”

  Wulfram stopped and looked at him. His smile was already gone, and he again looked like the cold monarch and sniper that he was.

  Damn, but Dieter was going to miss him. Their friendship was over a decade in the making and intense in the way that only mutual mortal risk and military camaraderie could forge.

  Wulfram asked, “Yes, Schwarz?”

  Dieter removed the envelope from his suit jacket. Speaking Alemannic, the Swiss dialect that they spoke together, he said, “I should like to submit my resignation, Herr von Hannover.”

  Wulfram glanced at the envelope in Dieter’s hand and the blank expression that Dieter maintained on his face.

  Dieter would have predicted that Wulfram would react with cold anger at evidence of such an absolute betrayal. Dieter would have.

  Instead, Wulfram’s lips parted, and his breath caught in his chest. “Dieter, what have you done?”

  Betrayed you, Durchlaucht, so many times.

  A Princess In Charge

  Flicka von Hannover

  What good is a real-life princess

  if she can’t plan a fairy tale wedding

  on truly, exceedingly inadequate notice?

  In late April,, Flicka arrived at Wulf’s house with her sample book in hand to plan his wedding to Rae Stone.

  Decisions must be made.

  Details must be attended to.

  Reservations must be nailed down.

  They wanted the religious wedding, the event of the season, to be held in mid-June, for heaven’s sake.

  Yes, in two months.

  Someone was out of their frickin’ mind, trying to plan a royal wedding event in just two months, but Flicka was going to make this wedding happen through the sheer force of her will.

  To make it happen, she had absconded with Pierre’s favorite little jet and had already made advance trips to Paris, London, and Montreux, Switzerland to reconnoiter venues before she had even arrived at Wulf’s house in the Southwest to confer with the bride and groom.

  The honeymoon in Monaco hadn’t been going so well, anyway. Being the heir to a sovereign prince entailed a lot of duties, every day. Pierre’s real job title should have been something like Trade Ambassador to the World or Head of Federal Publicity.

  Wulf von Hannover’s place in the Southwestern US was a cute little abode with just a small staff. Herr and Frau Keller were his head butler and head of staff, of course, and they had a cadre of some cleaning people, and some kitchen help, and of course his security brigade, the Welfenlegion. Perhaps only thirty people were in the house at any one time out of a staff of a hundred or so.

  The house only had three short wings around a central courtyard, but Wulf had added onto the garage. Wulfie liked cars.

  When she had slapped her samples book on Wulfie’s desk, Wulfram handed Flicka a credit card and told her that, while he would certainly weigh in on anything they would like another opinion on, if they didn’t require his opinion that was just fine, too.

  Carte blanche.

  Flicka hadn’t had that much latitude when planning her own damn wedding.

  Pierre had wanted to have the wedding in Monaco at his palace, of course, but the reception venues in Monaco were too small. Plus, there weren’t enough hotel rooms for the extravaganza that Flicka had planned to subsidize her charities.

  Flicka had wanted Schloss Marienburg, but Monaco also had a thing about conquering Germans coming after their throne after two world wars. Fair enough.

  They’d negotiated the neutral venue, Paris, because the publicity that was possible there would be tremendous for Flicka’s causes and Pierre’s work in Monaco.

  But they were working on Wulfie’s wedding now, not hers.

  Rae was still studying for her undergraduate degree in psychology and was loaded with coursework. She and Flicka huddled for an hour or two every few days, but Flicka got to make all the arrangements.

  She absolutely loved it.

  After some intense negotiations with Wulfie and Rae, they decided on Montreux, Switzerland, near where Wulf and Flicka had gone to school and a rather central location in Europe.

  Flicka loved Montreux. If her own wedding hadn’t been so enormous with over ten thousand guests invited to the various receptions, she would have preferred the gorgeous Swiss Alps and lakes of Montreux to Paris.

  But, sacrifices.

  If Flicka suspected that there was any reason for a rush job with this wedding, she said nothing.

  Her sharp eyes noticed that, while Wulfie had resumed drinking the occasional glass of wine with Flicka at dinner, Rae hadn’t.

  She also noticed that, while Rae was a lovely and voluptuous woman, she was really, really voluptuous in the boobies area.

  When designers and tailors started arriving daily to offer wedding gown options and then to fit the dress, they took one look at Rae and raised the dress’s waistline, plus they left extra material in the bust and torso.

  Flicka wasn’t stupid. She hurried up with the preparations.

  Flicka and Rae were sitting in Rae’s study office, working one afternoon. Rae was writing a paper on something or other psychological, while Flicka emailed suppliers about food and napkins and table decor.

  Rae lifted her head. “I feel bad about taking you away from your new husband so soon after you were married.”

  “Oh, tosh,” Flicka said, glaring at her computer screen. “It’s no inconvenience at all.”

  Rae laid her pencil on her wide desk. “Do you want to talk about it?”

  “Nothing to talk about. Is there anything you want to talk about?” She raised her gaze over the top of her screen and looked Rae right in her eyes.

  “Oh,” Rae said, turning a delicate shade of magenta. “Um, maybe?”

  “I think it’s wonderful,” Flicka said.

  “You do?” Rae said, her voice rising with hope. “I didn’t know how you would take it.”

  “I think it’s lovely. I’ve always wanted to be an aunt and spoil the devil out of the next prince or princess of Hannover. That is what we’re talking about, right?”

  Rae ducked her head. “Yeah.”

  Flicka bounded up and hugged Rae around her shoulders. “I’m glad. I’m so glad. Wulfie needs another child. He keeps trying to mother me, and I’ve had just about enough of it. Did you know that he threatened Pierre with bodily harm at our wedding?”

  Rae laughed. “I told him he had to. He’s your older brother. That’s what older brothers are for.”

  “Did any of your brothers threaten Wulfie?” Flicka asked, widening her eyes innocently while digging for gossip.

  “Your eyes! You’re so funny. No, I’m the oldest, so I’m supposed to do the threatening. I went with a cast iron skillet and a branding iron.”

  “Of course. Excellent choices. The traditional weapons are always the best. How many children are you planning?”

  “I’m not sure. This one,” Rae put her hand on her stomach, “was a little less than planned, so I guess we’ll take it one at a time. Maybe a few. I’m from a big family, and it’s nice to have siblings to blame when you do something wrong.”

  “I tried to blame Wulfie for breaking a vase once, but I don’t think he bought it.”

  “Probably not. You’re considered an only child, birth-order wise, because Wulf is more than five years older than you are. Plus he essentially raised you, so he’s more of a father figure than a sibling, anyway.”

  “I wish he’d been my father my whole life. I don’t remember much from before I went to Le Rosey. There were just a bunch of nannies shoving toys at me, dolls and some educational ones. I had a tutor come for a couple hours a day. I liked her. My mother was around a lot. I had tea with her every day, and she
often took me for a walk in the gardens in the morning. I probably spent more time with her than any particular nanny, honestly.”

  “Didn’t you have play dates or pre-school?”

  “Oh, heavens, no,” Flicka said. “I kept handing my dolls to Wulfie whenever he came home from school. He was quite tolerant, considering that he was probably twelve or thirteen at the time. After he left every term, I drove the nannies crazy, asking for him.”

  When Flicka looked over at Rae, the other woman had tears wobbling in her eyes. She said, “Oh, Flicka.”

  “Oh, don’t cry!”

  Rae flapped her hands. “It’s just hormones. Pregnancy does that.” She wiped her eyes. “I’m okay. That’s just such a sad way to grow up.”

  Flicka shrugged. “I turned out all right, and don’t contradict me on that.”

  “How many kids do you and Pierre want?” Rae asked.

  “None,” Flicka said.

  “But—” Rae’s eyebrows bent down. “—but if Pierre doesn’t have kids, isn’t that a problem?”

  Flicka shrugged. “That’s his problem.”

  “But you married him,” Rae said. “It’s your problem, too. Did you talk about it before you got married?”

  Flicka gazed at her sister-in-law—the sweet ingenue Rae Stone who was raised so very sheltered—and decided that some things didn’t need to be discussed just yet. One doesn’t casually announce that one is going to burn the monarchies of the world to ashes, certainly not to someone who just got her princess papers.

  “I just don’t want children,” Flicka said. “I wouldn’t know how to play with them or talk to them or anything. I’d make a terrible mother. I’ll make an excellent aunt because an aunt’s job is to spoil them rotten. I’ll sneak sweets to them, get them up in the middle of the night for ice cream, and give them fast cars as soon as they’re allowed to drive, but no one should ever give me a child of my own. I would ruin a child.”

  Her inflection left no doubt that ruination would be the worst fate that could befall a child.