by Lyla Payne
“That’s okay. I’m getting this round for my friends.”
“So, you’re not here with a date.”
“No. By choice, I assure you.” She grabbed the three bottles off the counter and dropped the money in their place. She gave the bartender a nervous thank you and turned to go.
“You don’t have to be such a bitch about it,” the handsome asshole muttered, malice glittering in his gaze.
“Maybe not, but I can if I want, so fuck off.” She stepped past him, pausing to give him a look of her own. “I’ve got a bottle of mace in my purse with your name on it, turd. Try me.”
She returned with the beers and set them down, still shaking from the adrenaline loosed by her encounter. Oxygen staled in her chest as she sat and scanned the room. Maggie blew it out when she saw the man hadn’t decided to follow, but was disappointed when she found the subject of conversation among her friends hadn’t turned to something less distasteful. Anything.
“I heard he got arrested and the Americans won’t let him go,” Camilla said.
Donni shook her head. “I heard the King is going to force him to be a priest. Can you imagine?”
Her friends shrieked with laughter, and even Maggie had to admit the thought was ridiculous enough to deserve a snicker. Rumor had it that Salvadore Piacere couldn’t go a day without getting laid. A lifetime? Forget it. He would ruin the priesthood’s reputation within a week.
For some reason she couldn’t fathom, she felt guilty about laughing. Her father had taught her that the royal family deserved respect, and not only because he had been their exclusive tailor for the whole of his career.
But that wasn’t it. It was her memories of Salvy as a boy—their steady friendship and quiet confidences that had grown into more.
For her, anyway.
But that was a long time ago. She hadn’t seen him in years, and his determination to act as though the people of Cielo didn’t deserve his time or consideration rubbed Magdalena the wrong way. In other countries, the royal family were nothing but figureheads, but in Cielo, they had influence and they wielded it. Second in line or not, she thought he should take his influence seriously.
The rest of them had no way to change things, not really. Anger twisted in her belly at the thought but she tried to smile, not wanting to discuss it with her friends. They only saw Salvy’s pretty face, his chiseled body, his lazy, charming smile… Sure, they had King Alfonso and Prince Nico to take care of things at home, but thinking of Salvy as a “spare” heir was irresponsible.
“So, Maggie,” Camilla started, a sly expression on her face. “Are you finally going to give up the goods on the guy, or what?”
Maggie made a face. “I think he’s given up his own goods, and besides, I keep telling you I don’t know him. Not really.”
The last time she’d seen Salvadore, he’d kissed a visiting princess right in front of her. Super classy.
She wasn’t telling them that, either. As much as she disapproved of the way the younger prince treated his title, she refused to throw more gasoline on the gossip fire.
“You’re no fun,” Donni pouted. She raised an eyebrow at Camilla. “Remind me why we’re friends with her again?”
“Because she’s the one who makes sure we make it home alive,” Emmy pointed out, slamming the rest of her beer.
They kept talking, the talk—at least at their table—finally shambling over to normal conversation like work and which of the guys they were dating had bugged out that week. Maggie sipped her second beer as slowly as her first, finishing the warm remnants a few hours later before she helped her friends into cabs.
Given the confrontation earlier, she decided to take a cab herself, and asked the driver to take her home. Her stomach grumbled the entire way and she regretted not ordering dinner even if no one else had wanted food. Foreign concept.
The small house on the rural outskirts of Arcobaleno was dark; her father would have gone to bed hours ago, and a stab of guilt went through Maggie. She worried he hadn’t found the soup she’d left for dinner, or that he hadn’t been strong enough to heat it for himself. It was the first time she’d left him in the evening for months, and now she wondered why she’d been so desperate for a night with her friends.
Inside, she set her purse and keys on the kitchen table and went to the fridge. Relief coursed through her at the sight of the empty soup container, but was quickly replaced by fear when she glimpsed a white envelope on the table next to her things.
She picked it up, her mouth going dry at the return address: Matrigna Holdings.
They weren’t going to stop until the Rossis, and others like them, had nothing left to call their own. Maggie’s mouth went dry at the thought and she blinked back tears.
The envelope crumpled inside Magdalena’s fist as she crossed the room and chucked it into the fireplace, then buried it under the few remaining coals. The heat fanned over her face and stoked her defiance until it glowed.
There had to be a way to fight the real estate company quietly bullying the people of Arcobaleno into selling off their land to make room for new developments. She needed to figure out what it was, and soon. Her father would not go to his grave without even the meager possessions he’d managed to accumulate over the past seventy years.
She wouldn’t let that happen. No matter what.
“Don’t worry, Papa. I’m sure you’re getting better—back to normal soon, you’ll see.” Maggie did her best to reassure her father while they waited in the stark office for the doctor to come and discuss the results of the latest round of tests, but she didn’t think it worked.
Not for him, or for herself.
Her father gave her a small, tired smile. “You look tired, bella mia. You are worrying too much. I can hear your mind.”
The choice of words startled her, dumped her into a memory of an afternoon at the palace with Salvadore. They’d been alone at the swimming pool after Nico had been summoned for royal duties, and Salvy had been his typical, happy-go-lucky self. Maggie had been fretting about school, about how her father would pay for the design college she wanted to attend in London, and the younger prince had said the same thing to her.
Come and swim, Moo Moo. Stop worrying.
How do you know I’m worrying? She had smiled despite the questions without answers that rattled around in her head.
I can hear your thoughts when they’re not happy.
It had pleased her, at the time, how well he knew her. They were twelve or thirteen, on the cusp of shedding their childhood, and even though she didn’t understand how yet, Maggie’s feelings had begun to change.
In the present, Magdalena was tired—she’d taken over all of the behind-the-scenes work at their tailor business and sent her father only on the calls where his missing presence would raise red flags. Gabriel Rossi was the famous, royal tailor of Cielo, but his daughter was no one special. Without his name, the business could fail, so they said nothing of the changes to their structure and hoped no one would notice.
It had never been the plan, for her to take over. Gabriel had been going to retire while Maggie started her own fashion line. Then he’d gotten sick, and their plans had crumbled. She couldn’t support them both on the salary of an up-and-coming clothing designer.
Based on the drawn expression on the doctor’s face when he entered the office, Maggie guessed that was about to happen again.
“Mr. Rossi, I’m afraid your Parkinson’s is getting worse. You need to think about retiring, sooner than later, because managing the sort of equipment you need will quickly become dangerous to your health.”
Maggie frowned. Not to mention that it was already affecting the quality of his work. She spent more time undoing his uneven stitches than it would have taken her to simply fill the orders herself.
“You have a capable daughter, and I’ve had the nurse put together a packet of information as far as what to expect, timelines, things like that.” He raised his eyebrows, pinning Magdalena’s fa
ther with a serious look. “This isn’t going to get better, Gabriel. It’s going to get worse, and you need to think about making arrangements to make the transition as smooth as possible. For everyone.”
The doctor cast a meaningful glance at Maggie. She averted her eyes as her father grunted. They got the message. They had gotten it months ago, but neither had been willing to accept the truth of it.
It sounded as if the time had come to do just that.
“Thank you, Doctor. We’ll show ourselves out.”
The doctor sighed and stood, shaking her father’s trembling hand when it was offered. Magdalena knew he wished that his patient would be more forthcoming, but that wasn’t her father’s way. He kept everything to himself—his clients, his feelings, his techniques, his pain—and she didn’t expect the end of his life to go any differently.
“Papa, do you want to stop and get something to eat? Maybe talk?”
He nodded, leaning on her arm for support as they made their way through the parking lot. “Yes. I think it is time to discuss how we will pass the business from me to you.”
She sighed, feeling half-exasperated and half-guilty over not wanting to be the new royal tailor. Magdalena had turned twenty-seven on her last birthday and even though her skills were more than up to snuff, she had to wonder whether the fact that she preferred to diverge from traditional fashion trends would play well with the crown.
They walked a block and took a seat at an outdoor café, the wrought iron table and chairs as wobbly as Maggie’s heart after the appointment. After they’d ordered, she cleared her throat and went first, hoping to make things as easy as possible.
“I can take over your clients, but we’ll need to hire someone to do the bookkeeping and answer phones. I can’t do it all.”
He reached over and patted her arm with a hand that used to be strong. It had always been the two of them—her mother had died and the one stepmother hadn’t worked out—which meant those hands had wiped tears, braided hair, cooked dinner, and bandaged scrapes and cuts. It hurt to see them spotted and withered, to watch him struggle to stop them from jerking. His fingertips were littered with scabs and scars from the slips of countless needles.
“Are you sure this is what you want, bella mia? To take over the shop?”
Surprise slowed her response. “Of course! Why, do you not want me to?”
It hadn’t been the plan, and perhaps she wouldn’t continue after…after he was gone, but he must know it was the best option for them both at the moment.
“I do, I do, settle down. I just wanted…I want it to be what you want, that’s all.” He frowned. “You’ll have to love it, because people won’t make it easy. They won’t look at you and see me, they’ll see someone new, someone they don’t know they can trust.”
“That’s silly. I’ve worked at your side my whole life.”
“I agree, dear girl. I’m telling you how people are, not how they should be, and if you search your sensible mind you’ll agree.” He frowned. “You’ll have to make your own way.”
Magdalena pressed her lips together as the waiter dropped fruit and scones off with their tea, and they ate in silence. As much as she wanted to argue with her father, she knew in her heart he was right. She wished the world were different, but until men decided to pull their heads out of their collective asses, she supposed that, like countless generations of women before her, she had to find a way to make the system work for her.
Which meant continuing to let people think her father was in charge, that his illness was temporary, and she was only filling in. Then, she’d have to hope that people realized the work hadn’t suffered while she’d been doing it.
They finished breakfast and headed back home, where Maggie figured she would spend the morning finding someone to replace her in the office. They would have to advertise as temporary so word didn’t get around.
At home, her father went straight for his easy chair and pulled the worn afghan her mother had made over his frail legs. Magdalena stared into the fire for a moment, thinking about the letter she tossed into it last night, but the morning had tired him.
She would wait to bring it up another day.
Chapter Three
Salvadore
With its heavy velvet drapes, oversized wooden furniture, and rich color scheme, the King’s office was arranged to be at least as intimidating as the throne room. Too bad royal intimidation of all means and measures had ceased to be effective years ago, at least as far as encouraging Salvy’s compliance was concerned.
Keeping subjects waiting was another trick designed to make an audience sweat. Salvy was feeling a bit hot under his collar, but only because he was hungover and the damn thing was too tight. While he waited, he shed his sport coat, loosened his tie and unbuttoned his top two buttons. He could breathe, then, and walked over and cranked open the large, old-fashioned windows to drink in some fresh Cielo air.
He loved his country. Some might think otherwise, with the way he traveled and flipped the bird at his family on the regular, but especially after a few days in Vegas, he appreciated the clean freshness of the little mountain nation he called home.
“His highness, the King,” a loud voice announced from the doorway.
Salvy rolled his eyes at the not-so-subtle pronouncement that he would be greeting the King this morning as opposed to his father.
He turned to see King Alfonso stride into the room, coffee in one hand and a stack of newspapers in the other.
“That will be all, Martin, thank you.” The King dismissed the steward and rounded the desk without looking at Salvadore.
Salvy moved to the chair on the other side anyway, taking a seat without being asked. He’d be damned if his father—or the King—would treat him like a common subject and not a crowned prince of Cielo, in good graces or not.
Once the door shut firmly, his father set his coffee down, then looked his younger son in the eye. “I don’t suppose you’ve seen this morning’s news?”
“I just got off a fifteen-hour flight. I haven’t had time.” Salvy assumed his father was referring to the pictures and video that had resulted from his antics in Vegas, but as the King slammed down the local paper, then five tabloids from Italy, France, Greece, Holland, and Great Britain, it became clear that something else had happened.
I’m Carrying the Royal Baby
Woman in Monaco Claims to Be Impregnated with Prince Salvadore Piacere’s Son
Once Night of Bliss…Now This
How Much Can the Crown Take - A Look Back at a Year of Prince Salvadore of Cielo’s Poorest Decisions
Will Prince Salvy Ever Settle Down?
Prince Salvadore Piacere Gives Prince Harry Windsor a Run for Most Eligible Royal
Salvy nodded toward the last one. “Well, you have to admit that one counts as good news. Ginger Prince and the Brits could use a little competition, don’t you agree?”
“I do not agree,” the King snapped, chucking the papers into the trash can one at a time. “And don’t think I haven’t been apprised of what happened in Las Vegas. Half the country is talking about your dong.”
Salvy smirked. “That’s not exactly news.”
“Salvadore, this is getting out of hand. I’ve tried to give you time to settle down, to come to the conclusion on your own that your duties to this family are important.”
“You have to admit I’ve done more for publicity than you or Nico.”
“This is not the sort of publicity we require.” King Alfonso sighed, leaning back in his giant leather chair and casting a glance out the window.
Salvy felt a pang as he noticed the deep grooves around his father’s eyes. His hair was almost entirely white, his beard thinner than it looked the last time Salvy had been in this office. The King had aged.
“I don’t know what you want me to say, sir. I’m the second in line. This kingdom will never be my responsibility, so I don’t see the point in cultivating a reputation like it’s going to be.”
> “Salvadore,” his father said, his tone softer now as he turned his gaze back toward his son. “Just because you will not be king one day, that does not mean you are not responsible for the people of Cielo. They depend on our family to guide them, to protect them, to help them prosper. One man cannot do that.”
“You have.”
King Alfonso had been widowed many years before, when the boys were knee-high to a horsefly. He never remarried, and his only brother had died a young man in the war – not long after he’d abdicated the throne for reasons unknown
“Not by choice, and your brother has been a huge help since he returned from university, almost a decade ago now.”
Yes, Niccolo Piacere, the perfect son. The perfect would-be king. He’d already given the crown an heir, as well. Salvy did adore his niece, Elisa, mostly because the girl was a holy terror and far too much of a handful for his brother.
“Well, you have Nico, and of course, Luca is always looking to take on more responsibility.”
The King’s mouth turned down at the mention of his nephew, distaste written all over his face. If Salvy was a disappointment, Luca was dangerous—he had his own ideas about how the kingdom should be run, and who should govern it.
King Alfonso grunted. “Your cousin is not a topic I care to discuss. I’m ninety percent sure he’s behind each and every one of these stories.”
His father nodded toward the trash can, then folded his hands and leveled his son with a piercing blue gaze. He’d passed the same eyes on to both of his sons, along with jet black hair, strong jaws, and a tendency to always think himself right.
“Since you seem disinclined to make a decision regarding the future role you would prefer to have in the running of this country, I have decided to give you two options. You will choose one before the end of the day tomorrow, or I will choose for you—and I doubt you will be happy with my decision.”
Salvy’s stomach tightened, irritation with being called onto the carpet like a little boy turning quickly to anger in the face of the King’s tone. He said nothing, watching his father in silence. He was afraid of what might come out if he opened his mouth.
