Happily Ever After (Runaway Princess: Flicka, Book 5)

by Blair Babylon

  “No, you don’t need me. You do need to go back to Abigai and be a father to your four children with her. Jesus, Pierre. You made me ‘the other woman.’ I hate that. I would never have done that.”

  “I’ll be everything you want me to be,” Pierre said. “You win. You win everything. If you tell me to jump, I won’t ask how high. I’ll just start jumping as high as I can.”

  Flicka caught a glance of her father’s smug, tight smile.

  She told Pierre, “It’s not going to work, Pierre. I remember all those little spats that we had when we were dating, and you never budged an inch. This is too late. We’re done. It’s over.”

  “I’m begging you to listen to me,” he said.

  “But you won’t listen to me! I said that we’re done. We’re over.”

  Dieter’s hand tightened around her fingers.

  Pierre said to her, “I love you.”

  “You don’t love me, not even ‘in your own way.’ You betrayed the one thing I needed from you, the only thing. I was willing to stay in that sham of a marriage with you, but you crossed the only line I had. And it was a sad line, Pierre. It was a pathetic line. I would have stayed with you forever. I would have fulfilled my obligation to stay married to you and do the job for Monaco, but you broke every part of me that night. You loved someone else. You made a life and a family with someone else. You beat me up, and you raped me. You put your hands around my throat, and you choked me. I thought you were going to kill me.”

  “I wasn’t going to kill you.” His voice was light, teasing, like he was trying to make a damned joke out of him strangling her. She hadn’t been able to breathe.

  Flicka twitched forward, almost leaping across the room to punch him, but she said, “Not that time, and there will never be another time.” She held onto Dieter’s fingers that curled around hers. “I want you out of my life. Don’t ever speak to me again.”

  “You can’t leave me,” Pierre told her.

  “I assure you, I can, and I already have.”

  “I’m in the line of succession for the Kingdom of Hannover. You can’t divorce me.”

  Flicka wanted to stomp her foot at Pierre’s total misunderstanding of royal law. “Succession to the Hannoverian throne is regulated by semi-Salic law, Pierre. It’s agnatic-cognatic primogeniture. It can’t be passed through a female except in the case of a total extinction of the male line, like when Sophia, Electress of Hannover, almost inherited the throne of England. That was only because she was the last Protestant royal in Europe. Even if you and I had had a son, he couldn’t have inherited Hannover through me. If anything happens to Wulfie before he has a son, some cousin or other will inherit everything. There are tons of agnates between me and any inheritance. Patrilineal descent to sons. All the time. Every time. I’m a girl.”

  Pierre’s scowl deepened. “But you can’t divorce me. Our houses and our dynasties are intertwined. I’m a Prince of Hannover.”

  Flicka shook her head, trying not to get bogged down in the minutiae of royal inheritance law that Pierre should damn well know, anyway. “You’re not a royal Hannover prince, Pierre! It’s just a courtesy title. People who marry into the Hannover royal family are given courtesy titles of prince or princess, but they aren’t royal titles. You’re not in the succession line. The title can’t be inherited. It’s like a participation trophy. Everybody gets one, but it doesn’t mean you won anything.”

  “Wait,” Dieter said from behind her.

  She turned her head. “Yes, I know. I ‘forgot’ to mention it. We’ll talk about it later.” She looked back to Pierre. “I won’t ever come back to you. I never want to see you again.”

  “Flicka, please!” Pierre ran two steps toward her.

  Dieter yanked her shoulder backward and spun her behind him, ending up with his gun pointing at Pierre again. He stared down the sights at the advancing prince.

  Pierre, however, had fallen to his knees, his arms outstretched in the most desperate of supplicant poses. “Flicka, I am begging you. I’ll do anything.”

  Dieter lowered his gun, obviously assessing the situation as non-threatening.

  Across the room, Quentin Sault had drawn his weapon and clasped it in both his hands, but it pointed at the floor, just in front of his foot.

  “Open your damn ears and listen to me, Pierre,” Flicka growled, holding onto Dieter’s tight waist and peering around the bulk of his strong shoulders. “This, right here, is part of the problem. I said no. I said never. You aren’t listening to me. You’re only focused on what you want, and what you want is usually a piece of ass. I’m not your piece of ass, and I’m not your pedigreed uterus to breed royal babies for Monaco, either. Get out and leave me alone.”

  Pierre staggered to his feet, only a few steps away from her. “Flicka, I’ve begged. I’ve pleaded. I’ve promised you everything. Don’t make me angry.”

  “I don’t care whether you’re angry or not, Pierre. Get out.”

  Anger shook Pierre’s body, from his fists to his grinding jaw. “If you divorce me, I’ll take the crown of Hannover away from you. I’ll sue you for it. It’s mine because I married you.”

  From off to Flicka’s right, her father snort-laughed. “No, Pierre. You can’t do that. Flicka, you should not go back to this sniveling rodent. He is not worthy of you. His entire principality, which is not even a kingdom, is not worth one moment of your unhappiness.”

  Flicka gaped at her father. That was new.

  Pierre stepped toward her and shouted, “I’ll sue you for everything, the crown, the kingdom, everything! I’ll make sure you have nothing!” Pierre yelled at her. “You’ll be nothing and nobody without me!”

  “That’s not how it works!” she yelled back.

  “You’ll have nothing without me! You’ll be on the street, helpless and destitute! I’ll sue you for every cent of the Hannover fortune!”

  “That’s patently insane,” she said, standing straighter. “If these last few months have taught me anything, it’s that I can live without you, without my family’s money, and without being a princess. I can stand on my own two feet and provide for myself. You can’t do anything to me.”

  “I’ll put you in jail!” Pierre screamed, the cords standing out on his neck. His finger jabbed the air toward Flicka and Dieter. “I’ll put you in jail, and that blond, hulking brute of a sham husband of yours, and everyone in the whole House of Hannover! Everyone with any royal connection to you will rot in a Monaco prison!”

  Her father asked, “Flicka, what does he mean, husband?”

  She yelled back at Pierre, aghast, “You said that if I listened to what you had to say, that you’d withdraw the arrest warrants! You already told the police that you did.”

  “I thought you’d do what I need you to, if I told you I was sorry. I’ll reinstate the goddamn warrants. I’ll draw up new ones, one for every Hannover in the world. I will take down the entire House of Hannover, every last one of you!”

  From his seat, Phillipp snorted and crossed his legs. “Please, control your actions, Pierre. You’re embarrassing yourself.”

  “You couldn’t do that,” Flicka said to Pierre. “You’re not the Prince of Monaco.”

  “I will!” Pierre shouted, but he grew calmer, grimmer, angrier. “Whether or not I am confirmed as the prince, I swear to God, I will, Flicka. I will hunt you down. I will hunt down anyone you’re associated with and every last prince and princess in the House of Hannover. You saw that the police were ready to do anything I wanted because I am Monaco. We have treaties with every member of the EU, and through the EU, with most of the world, including America. I’ll use Interpol and the FBI. I’ll hunt down every last one of you and put you in jail for murder. I’ll make sure that bastard daughter of yours grows up in foster care or juvenile detention.”

  When Flicka glanced at her father, one of his eyebrows had dropped, and he looked troubled. “The House of Hannover has extensive legal representation. We will fight you.”

&nb
sp; He didn’t sound sure.

  Images of Wulfie and Rae, and their baby, and everything that an actual monarch could insist that other governments do rose in her mind. Pierre could put people in prison on trumped-up charges. He’d almost had her arrested right there, that day, by German authorities.

  Trembling rose in her, fear for Wulfram and Rae and everyone she loved.

  She whispered, “I renounce.”

  Beside her, Phillipp said, “Flicka, think about what you are doing. We will fight this.”

  Dieter took her hand again. “I’ll protect you. He can’t take you. You don’t have to do this.”

  But it felt right.

  Scary, but right.

  “I renounce!” she called into the room, yelling it at all of them. Her eyes felt huge on her face as the enormity of what she was doing rocked through her, and her lungs fluttered in her chest. She couldn’t quite breathe.

  Dieter glanced at her but looked back to Pierre. “Flicka, don’t do this. You don’t need to do this right now.”

  She stated at the top of her voice, “I married Mr. Dieter Schwarz, a commoner, without permission either from the head of the House of Hannover or the sovereign head of the House of Welf. I made a non-dynastic marriage. I’m out of the line of succession. I broke the House rules, and I renounce my position in the House of Hannover.”

  Her father asked, “Flicka, what is the meaning of this? You married someone?” He looked up at Dieter, standing beside her with his gray eyes narrowed at Pierre. Phillipp asked, “You married a bodyguard?”

  She called out, “I renounce my position as princess in the House of Hannover and all my associated titles, forever.”

  She gasped, and no one spoke.

  The air seemed too thin to breathe.

  “There.” She spun to face Dieter. “I said it. I’m out. My endowment will all go into my charities. I can still control where the charities go, but nothing is mine anymore. I always said I was going to burn it all down, and I did. The world doesn’t need any more princesses. The world needs doctors, and scientists, and artists, and social workers, and help for refugees who shouldn’t have to be afraid that their child is going to freeze or starve, and help for working-class people who shouldn’t have to choose between medicine and food.”

  Dieter wrapped one muscled arm around her, but he didn’t take his eyes off of Pierre. “I love you, my Durchlauchtig.”

  She turned under Dieter’s arm and stared at Pierre. “Now, you can’t come after the rest of them. I have no legal or cultural relationship with them anymore. They’re safe. You can’t charge them as accomplices because there’s no relationship and they weren’t there.”

  “You can’t renounce,” Pierre said, horror dawning in his dark eyes. “You have to be a princess.”

  “No, I don’t have to. I can stand on my own two feet. I can get a job and pay my own bills. I don’t have to be a princess. I can be with my husband, Dieter Schwarz, and live my own life.”

  Funny, she didn’t feel even the smallest bit of worry that Dieter wouldn’t love her anymore if she wasn’t a princess and extraordinarily wealthy. She knew he would still be Dieter Schwarz, pure as the alpine snow, and her husband who loved her.

  Pierre squeezed his eyes and fists as if rage and anguish warred in him. “The Council of Nobles won’t confirm me as the Prince of Monaco without you.”

  “Ah,” Flicka said, disgust leaking through her threadbare control. “There’s the real reason you want me back. I’m not surprised in the slightest.”

  “Flicka, I am begging you. I can’t go back to Monaco without you. You must reclaim your titles and come with me. I need to be married to a Princess of Hannover. You were my ace in the hole. You were my proof that I was worthy. Without you, I’m just another playboy prince who can’t keep his dick in his pants and jizzes off illegitimate children on the weekends. If I’m not confirmed, there’ll be a succession crisis that will make Japan’s look like a minor flummox.”

  “Someone will take the throne,” she told him.

  “No one will, or the nobles might not confirm anyone who would. Without a sovereign, Monaco itself may not survive. The Prince and royal family are part of Monaco’s cachet and part of its glamour, that we have royalty rather than just a republic. At the least, without a prince, Monaco will be just another tiny strip of beach and a casino governed by a moderately corrupt legislature. It will lose everything that makes it special. Monaco will slowly die. It’s entirely possible that if no prince is confirmed at all, Monaco might be reabsorbed into France. It might cease to exist. Every Monegasque person would lose their citizenship.”

  Flicka frowned at him. “First of all, I doubt that they won’t confirm any prince at all. Someone will be suitable and will take it if they go down far enough. I’ll bet your cousin Marie-Therese would raise her hand right up. She’s what, number eight or so?”

  “Marie-Therese? Are you serious?” he gasped.

  “Second, I think Monaco will survive, and if it doesn’t, there are worse fates than being French.”

  His hands were open and empty. “It’s my country, Flicka. They’re my people. I have been bred and raised to be the Prince of Monaco my whole life. It’s the reason I was born. I have nothing else. I am nothing else.”

  “That’s not true, Pierre,” Flicka told him, stepping past Dieter. “You can do other things. You’d make a great prince. You’ve been a great royal for them. If they can’t see past a stupid divorce of a marriage that never should have happened, then that’s their loss. You can still contribute to Monaco.”

  Pierre covered his face with his hands. “I don’t know what to do. It’s my whole life.”

  Dieter lowered his handgun farther and dangled it in one hand now that the danger was over, but Flicka could feel his eyes watching over her.

  Flicka walked toward Pierre. “I’ll talk to them. I’ll tell them you should be the prince.”

  He shook his head. “They’ll never select anyone who has been divorced. Some of the nobles are hardcore Catholics. Divorce is a mortal sin. Divorce is disqualifying. They argued about it at the last meeting, and they won’t change their minds. They signed a proclamation to that effect, but they haven’t released it yet.”

  “Oh, Pierre. I’m so sorry.”

  “You can come back with me,” he said, dropping his hands. His eyes were red but dry. He took a step toward her. “We don’t have to have children. Alexandre’s children can inherit. It won’t be the first time an uncle recognized his nephew as heir, right?” he asked, his voice breaking.

  “Pierre, no. I can’t, and I won’t,” she said.

  “You have to,” he said, stepping forward.

  His hands were too close to grabbing her.

  “Don’t come near me,” Flicka said, stepping back.

  Dieter moved forward, still holding his gun low and in front of his boot. “Back off.”

  Pierre stepped toward her again, reaching out. “Just come back with me. I have nothing else. If they won’t confirm me, my life is over.”

  “Nonsense, Pierre,” Flicka said. “You’re still a prince of Monaco. You’ll still be an important delegate of the royal family. They need you.”

  “No,” he said. “I’ll be nothing. Nothing.”

  Flicka backed up more.

  Dieter stepped to the side, blocking Pierre. His gun rose from beside his leg, and he held it with one hand, halfway up, with his other hand out flat to signal stop. “Don’t come any closer.”

  “I have nothing,” Pierre begged Flicka. “I have nothing left. I am nothing.”

  He lunged at Dieter, but Dieter shoved him backward. “Stay back. Stay away from her.”

  On Pierre’s face, grief transformed into rage. “There’s nothing left of me.”

  Pierre lunged again and feinted to the right. Dieter followed him, his arm wide to clothesline Pierre.

  Flicka backpedaled, trying to stay out of Dieter’s path as the two men fought hand-to-hand.

&n
bsp; Dieter intermittently slapped Pierre’s hands away from his gun arm and blocked when Pierre punched him. “What are you—”

  Pierre tried to duck under Dieter’s arm, trying to get her. Flicka stumbled on a chair leg and slammed into the floor, bashing her elbows.

  “Flicka!” Pierre roared and lunged at her.

  She scrambled backward with her feet and elbows, trying to escape him.

  Dieter jumped with his arms spread, tackling Pierre in mid-flight, but his foot slipped on the ornate Persian rug underfoot, and they fell.

  Pierre snatched Dieter’s pistol out of his hand and rolled away.

  Dieter leaped for him, grasping, blocking every inch where Pierre might aim at Flicka.

  She yelled, “No!” trying to stop the Earth from turning.

  On the other side of the room, Quentin Sault ran forward, hands outstretched.

  Pierre flipped the gun backward, stuffed the barrel under his own chin, and pulled the trigger, blasting an explosion through the air.

  Murders and Suicides

  Flicka von Hannover

  I never wanted it to end like that.

  A pulse of air passed over Flicka’s face.

  A spike of sound drove into her ears, slamming pain into her head.

  Dieter twisted, spinning as he fell to the white marble at her feet.

  Pierre was falling backward, a fine, red mist haloing the top of his head.

  “No!” Quentin Sault’s voice echoed in the sunlit, golden room.

  A gun clattered on the floor, steel on stone. Brimstone stank in the air, stinging Flicka’s nose like harsh chemical fumes.

  She was running and sliding to her knees beside Pierre Grimaldi, horrified by his unseeing eyes. His strong hands flopped. “Pierre, no! No, you didn’t!”

  Quentin Sault landed beside her. “Your Highness, no, no. Get up. Get up.”

  Flicka glanced back. Her father was standing, his bright blue eyes wide, looking at the body and gore. “Oh, no.”

  Dieter pushed himself up on one elbow. “Jesus.”

  Flicka fumbled in her trousers pocket for her cell phone. “We have to call nine-one-one. We need an ambulance.” Without thinking, because they were in Germany, her thumbs hit the numbers one-one-two, and an emergency dispatcher answered the phone. She said, “We need an ambulance. We need one right now.”