Royal: A Royal Billionaire Novel (Billionaires in Disguise: Maxence Book 6)

by Blair Babylon

  The two of them would destroy Monaco and walk away with its wealth in their bank accounts.

  Dammit, it should have been anybody other than Prince Jules or Lady Marie-Therese.

  “Who the hell defected from your coalition?” he asked Alexandre. “I thought we had our votes tied up.”

  Alex growled, “A few of my young guys fell off, but half of the nobles you assured me would stand with us voted for your disqualification as soon as Jules made the motion.”

  Max glared at the crowd around them. “Something is going on.”

  “Marie-Therese and Great Uncle Louis Grimaldi voted to disqualify you, among others. Among many others. It’s obvious now why Marie-Therese voted that way if she knew she was about to be nominated and elected, but Great Uncle Louis should have stuck with us. Not to mention Matheo, Ethan, and Nathan, and a half dozen more who said they’d vote for our candidate.”

  Max shook his head, trying to make sense of it. “They were all ready to vote for Nico. He was going to take it in the first round. We should’ve been out of here in under an hour.”

  Alexandre grimaced. “I don’t know how much you’ve heard about the casualties at the Sea Change Gala last night, but Nico didn’t make it. I’m sorry.”

  “I heard.” Maxence cleared his throat, which had snapped shut. “And I saw. But they shouldn’t have changed their votes. They still should have voted for our candidate.”

  “But you weren’t here.”

  “I’m aware of that, but it shouldn’t have mattered. Everyone knows I will not accept a nomination or an election. I’ve made it abundantly clear.”

  “Have you?” Alexandre asked, tilting his head.

  “Yes. Of course, I have.”

  “You’ve been working in the Prince’s office every day.”

  “That’s where you do the country’s business.”

  “And you’ve hosted the galas and receptions.”

  “Those events were booked months or years ago. Someone needed to step into the role as the representative of the royal family.”

  “You did it all splendidly. You’re quite popular.”

  Maxence brushed the air to flick away Alex’s argument. “Monaco needed a caretaker, and so I stepped into the role. I made sure the olive oil flowed.”

  “You did it well,” Alexandre mused.

  Maxence shrugged. “Anyone would have done the same.”

  “No one else did, though,” Alexandre said.

  Maxence gestured in frustration as the crowd argued around them. “Well, of course, I stepped in when I was needed. That’s my duty as the second in line. Again, everyone in this room bore the responsibility and would have taken care of the country’s business if necessary.”

  Alexandre shook his head, and he was peering at Max rather intently.

  It was unnerving, the way Alexandre was examining Max’s eyes as if plumbing the depths of his soul.

  Max had no idea what Alex was getting at with such scrutiny. Was there a problem with one of his eyes? He blinked, trying to clear any debris he hadn’t noticed.

  Alex said, “No one else did it, though, and I don’t think anyone else felt the responsibility. Quentin Sault didn’t manage to find you for over two weeks after Pierre shot himself, and that business office sat empty the whole time. Everyone was still in Monaco after the Winter Ball. After Flicka vanished in the middle of it, everyone wanted to see how that was going to turn out. No one thought Pierre would do that, though. None of us knew he was quite that—desperate.”

  Maxence nodded. After the shock had worn off in the weeks since he had returned from Nepal, Max found himself less surprised about Pierre’s suicide, either impulsive or not. Max asked Alex, “Why didn’t you take over for a few weeks?”

  Alexandre’s helpless hand gesture spoke volumes. “Baggage. No one wanted me in there.”

  “Christine, then,” Max said.

  “After her car exploded, she wasn’t coming back to this vipers’ nest. She’s been staying up in Nice, you know, not at my house. She got an apartment under a fake name because she felt the responsibility to vote, but she thought someone might try to assassinate her again.”

  Maxence sighed. “And next in line were Jules and Marie-Therese.”

  “They simultaneously didn’t want to look like they were overreaching and didn’t have time to do the work due to their politicking.”

  “I knew Jules was meeting with people,” Max said.

  “Marie-Therese was leaning so heavily on people that she escorted Great Uncle Louis to your office.”

  Max hadn’t thought anything about it at the time but was pissed he’d missed why she was there.

  “They’ve been busy meeting with everyone, and they’ve been making promises and threats. When someone refused to meet with them, they figured out where they would be and ‘dropped by.’ I mean, they’ve been working the system. They’ve broken it.”

  Yes, that was clear. “But what about the people who are after them in the line of succession? Why didn’t any of them step up for the good of the country?”

  “A combination of not wanting to be seen looking too greedy for the throne and just a case of ‘not-my-job.’ Mostly the latter. Our relatives are phenomenally lazy.”

  Maxence was watching Alexandre and the room, but out of the corners of his eyes, he saw the entry doors move. When he glanced over to see who was entering or escaping the Crown Council meeting, Arthur and Casimir slipped inside the throne room.

  Odd. Maybe Dree had called them.

  But she didn’t have a phone.

  Casimir caught Max’s eye and waved as they blended in with the crowd around the edges of the room.

  Maxence turned back to Alexandre. “I don’t understand what you’re getting at. We don’t have time to discuss who did or didn’t take over the business office and listen to the reports about olive oil futures.”

  “Because you did.”

  Maxence was getting frustrated, and his voice tightened. “Well, yes—”

  “And no one else did.”

  “Someone had to keep this country running!”

  “And you showed up at all the galas and events and meet-and-greets.”

  “Someone had to.”

  “And—you did.”

  “Of course, I did.”

  Alexandre stared at him for a beat, waiting, blinking his large dark eyes, and then said, “All right, the subtle approach isn’t working. Maxence, you should take the job.”

  Shock. “What? Absolutely not!”

  “Absolutely yes.”

  “Alexandre, I can’t.”

  “What’s your excuse this time? It can’t be that your brother has priority. Surely, you’re not still insisting that you want to be a priest. I saw the pictures of you down on one knee in front of some girl who looked oddly like your secretary at the Sea Change Gala before all hell broke loose.”

  “That doesn’t mean I want to be the sovereign prince.”

  “Monaco needs you, Maxence. And despite all the inconsistencies in your life decisions, you’ve always been there for Monaco when the country needed you.”

  “Yes, of course, but that doesn’t mean I want to rule it.”

  “But it doesn’t mean you don’t. Do you want Marie-Therese to be the sovereign?”

  “Of course not. Marie-Therese will destroy this country, whether or not she’s a puppet of her father.”

  Alex grabbed Maxence’s upper arms and stared straight into his eyes. “Max, my cousin, I’m going to give you what you always wanted no matter how hard you’ve tried to deny it.”

  Shock slammed through Maxence like his soul was leaving his body. “No, wait.”

  Alexandre pushed through the crowd and bounded up onto the dais in front of the throne.

  Maxence yelled after him, “Wait!”

  Alexandre raised his hands and shouted, “Everybody! During the previous proceedings, I called for a roll call vote during the motion to disqualify Prince Maxence Grimaldi fro
m the line of succession. I demand that we hold this roll call vote, so everyone’s position is on the record. Something this important should not rest on an impromptu voice vote. Prince Maxence Grimaldi, heir apparent to the throne of Monaco and chosen successor of Prince Rainier IV—”

  Maxence thought Alexandre was overstating that position by several orders of magnitude.

  “—come stand here on the stage while we call this vote.”

  Maxence hesitated.

  Lady Valentina Martini appeared beside him. “For the love of God, get up on that stage and look regal.”

  The crowd stepped away from Maxence’s path, and he stepped up onto the dais and stood beside Alexandre, his gaze level.

  His heart was pounding so hard that his veins echoed the rhythm.

  The Crown Council meeting had become a haze for Maxence. If you’d asked him just hours ago what he’d do if someone tried to crown him the Sovereign Prince of Monaco, his answers would have included go immediately to Rome to take Holy Orders and become a cloistered clergy and drown myself in the Mediterranean, mostly in jest.

  Mostly.

  But Monaco was a woman in danger, and Maxence had never walked away when someone needed rescue.

  More arguing broke out in the crowd, and the bickering turned to shouts.

  Over on the left, shoving started.

  Maxence drew a deep breath, inflating his lungs like bellows, and announced over the noise, “The meeting will come to order.”

  Most of the people were looking at him by the time he finished his sentence.

  The unruliness died down.

  Maxence intoned, “His Grace Duc Alexandre de Valentinois has requested a roll call vote, as is his right. A roll call vote shall proceed.”

  Every single noble and all the people around the perimeter of the room stared at him.

  Alexandre said, “I believe I see Maxence’s secretary. Please come forward and record the vote, Miss Clark.”

  The crowd separated.

  Dree was already standing near the dais, her hands clenched to her heart in a position of hope and prayer. She looked around herself, staring back at everyone staring at her. “I don’t have a pen and paper.”

  Maxence directed it to be done.

  A pad of paper and a pen were brought, and three liveried servants moved an armchair onto the dais for her.

  Alexandre angled himself toward the far wall of the room. “The motion is that Prince Maxence Grimaldi—the man right here, again, he’s standing right here—heir apparent to the sovereign principality of Monaco and chosen successor to Prince Rainier IV, be disqualified from the line of succession due to his absence during these proceedings. Again, he’s right here. One person, one vote, and all the votes will be counted. Starting over here”—he pointed to the left wall—”state your title and name, and your vote.”

  Max’s great uncle Louis looked up from his phone. “I object to the roll call vote.”

  Much muttering sputtered in the crowd.

  Maxence asked him, “Why do you not want a roll call vote? Do you not want to go on record as having voted for this particular motion?”

  An older man stepped out of the crowd.

  Maxence was, of course, related to everyone in the room because anyone more than three generations away from the previous sovereign was disqualified from participating in the Crown Council.

  This older gentleman, whose hands trembled but whose gaze was steady, was the great uncle of Max’s father. Étienne Grimaldi had been a constant fixture for years, never missing a Crown Council session. When Maxence had been canvassing the electors, Étienne had refused even to discuss voting for Nico because Nico wasn’t close enough to the throne.

  Max’s great-great-uncle Étienne said, “I second the motion for a roll call vote. I have never agreed with this electoral format. Monaco should return to being a true monarchy with male-preferred primogeniture, as is traditional. But, at the very least, I also demand a roll call vote so that we know who disqualified Prince Maxence, the heir apparent and traditionally next in line for the throne.”

  Alexandre looked toward the left wall. “The motion is seconded, not that it needed to be, but thank you, Uncle Étienne. We shall proceed. Uncle Louis, your titles and vote?”

  Max’s great uncle Louis looked up at the two of them from his phone, startled. Then, he ducked his head again and said in a monotone, “I am Prince Louis of Monaco. Prince Maxence Grimaldi was not present during the opening of these proceedings. Therefore, I cast my vote to disqualify him from the line of succession based on the fact that he was not in attendance.”

  The next two people cast their votes to reinstate Maxence in the line of succession, but then the three people after that voted to throw him out, though none of them looked up from their phones when they spoke.

  Less than thirty votes remained to be cast.

  Alexandre glanced at Maxence, worried.

  Maxence was losing.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Losing It

  Maxence

  If Maxence didn’t do something right then, Marie-Therese would win the election.

  But dammit, a lot of the people in that room had been lied to or threatened into voting for their own exploitation and destruction, and Maxence should try to convince them not to do it. He owed it to Monaco’s other citizens, the ordinary people who worked for a living and saved their money, to not allow their country to be destroyed by a brainwashed or blackmailed or lied-to few.

  It wasn’t that Maxence wanted to be the prince, but he wanted Monaco to be safe.

  Alexandre muttered, “Screw it. My turn,” and stepped forward. He spread his arms like a rock star in front of a crowd. “I am Lord Alexandre Grimaldi, Duc de Valentinois of Monaco, and I will now cast my vote. Prince Maxence has always been the best of us. Even though Pierre was the oldest and was therefore traditionally ahead of him in line to inherit the throne, we all know Maxence has always been the better choice. For a decade, when it became clear who Maxence was and what Pierre was, we whispered about setting Pierre aside in favor of Maxence.”

  What?

  No one had ever told Maxence about that.

  While, in theory, such an event could have happened, leapfrogging a designated heir apparent who wanted the throne would have been unprecedented.

  Alexandre continued, “Pierre wanted the throne because he thought he was entitled to it. He did not consider whether he was the best person for the job or even a good person for the job. When he realized he was going to be disqualified from becoming the Prince because his wife was divorcing him, he performed one last selfish act instead of doing what was best for Monaco, which would have been a peaceful and graceful transfer of power to the next person elected. If Pierre had stopped and thought about someone other than himself, he would’ve realized a long time ago that Maxence would be a better sovereign than he ever could have been.”

  Maxence’s gaze had traveled down from the crowd staring at him to the scarlet carpet beneath the black athletic shoes he’d worn to rescue Dree.

  Her pen scratched the paper behind him as she took notes, and he wished she could have been at his side for this instead of back there. At least Alexandre had managed to get her onto the dais with them.

  Alexandre continued, “While Pierre was indulging every one of his vices, Maxence was studying ethics and morality and God. While Pierre was intimidating and blackmailing you for your votes at this Crown Council, Maxence was running the charity he’d funded and making the world a better place. Pierre was stealing money from Monaco’s global charity projects to invest in BDSM clubs in the United States, where it was then embezzled and laundered to send to other people in his life he couldn’t acknowledge. Pierre was literally stealing money from kids with cancer to fund his sports cars and other problems. During that whole time, Maxence was taking no salary from his charities while he worked his ass off in orphanages and prisons.”

  Maxence hadn’t done those things to look good on hi
s resumé. Trotting them out now as evidence of his good works seemed sordid.

  Alexandre continued speaking. “Maxence runs his charities with an acute business sense as well as kindness towards the people he helps. He coordinates his projects with the Catholic Church’s, Flicka von Hannover’s efforts, and other NGOs. He handles enormous budgets and a staff of thousands in addition to doing publicity and working with people on the ground, which is exactly the training needed to be the head of our government.”

  That wasn’t why he’d run his charities that way.

  And yet, Alexandre was still talking. “Prince Rainier IV told Pierre how to run Monaco, but Prince Maxence has been running his charities like a country for years. That’s why he was able to step in and immediately start doing the job of being the Prince these last few weeks. He’s done everything, from analyzing imports and exports, to greeting ambassadors, to showing up at the galas, to quietly politicking with all of you. He’s done it all perfectly. And quietly. And without lying or grafting or causing a scandal that caused us all significant public embarrassment.”

  Pierre’s divorce had become instant fodder for the slimiest gossip influencers. When Flicka had spilled the tea on everything on social media because that was the only way she could get away from Pierre, well, the repercussions would be felt in Monaco for years if not decades.

  And it wasn’t true that Max hadn’t made mistakes.

  Trusting Quentin Sault with his life, for instance.

  Not comprehending the crimes his uncle Jules would commit to become the sovereign prince was another.

  Alexandre said, “Now, we have a chance to install someone as the sovereign who gives a damn about the citizens, economy, and future of Monaco. Prince Maxence is the best and only choice for this election. Elect Prince Maxence to be the Prince of Monaco.”