Dree sat on his leg.
As soon as she did, her body curled, and his strong arms encircled her and drew her down to lean against his shoulder. Her nose tucked beside his chin, where the faint scents of a clove-studded orange and fresh wood rose from under his collar and his skin, and a whiff of lavender emanated from his crisp shirt.
He smelled so good that she wanted to crawl inside his clothes.
Warmth floated around him, the fabric of his clothes saturated with the heat from his muscled body underneath.
As she wrapped her arms around him, Dree’s hand slid over his stomach, her fingers tracing the solid cobblestones and sinews of his strong abdomen under the soft fabric of his shirt.
His lips pressed against her temple.
Oh, when he did stuff like that, she melted like a big ol’ scoop of ice cream dropped on the hot sidewalk in August.
Maxence whispered near her ear, “It’s my problem, not yours. I made those vows, and it’s my soul that is tormented and in jeopardy, not yours.”
“Pretty words,” she said.
“Men have been blaming women for ‘tempting them to sin’ for far too long. Everything I do ismydecision.”
“You shouldn’t keep making wrong decisions.”
He sighed, “You’re right.”
Dree pushed on his chest to prop herself up so she could look him in the eyes. “I am?”
“My loyalties have always been divided. I was born a prince of Monaco, and that comes with certain responsibilities. I chose to be ordained as a deacon even though I knew I was conflicted. I should’ve waited until Pierre had had legitimate children, so I could be free. Because I wasn’t and everyone knew I wasn’t free to make that vow, Pope Vincent de Paul ordained me with an altered sacrament. It’s not valid. It can’t be valid. In a baptism, if a priest says‘webaptize you’ instead of ‘I baptize you,’ the baptism isn’t considered valid. I’ve been desperately playing at this because I wanted so much tobelieve,because I wanted so much tobelong.”
Dree tried to wrap her head around it. “I can’t believe he did that. It seems like he was cheating you or like he wasmockingit.”
Maxence’s eyebrows twitched upward, but the shake of his head was rueful. “I don’t think he was mocking it. Monarchs have been getting away with mortal sins and crimes for millennia. Whenever they wanted to invade somewhere or get a divorce, past popes rubber-stamped it.”
“Except for Henry VIII.”
Maxence grunted a laugh. “And that’s why he was so pissed that Pope Clement VII wouldn’t grant him the annulment and divorce from his first wife. He didn’t have a male heir. The last time England didn’t have a direct male heir, they had a civil war for a hundred years. There were a lot of politics going on there, just like here.”
It was a good thing that her brother wanted to take over the family sheep farm, and she was happy being a nurse. At least the sheep wouldn’t be caught up in inheritance issues. “And nowyou’rethe next male heir.”
Max nodded. “And that’s why my uncle wouldn’t budge. Both Pope Vincent and Pope Celestine VI, the current Pope Emeritus, were exceedingly good friends with my uncle and my grandfather before him. When you’re one of the last Catholic monarchies in the world, you tend to be on first name terms with the Pope. I think they gave mesomethingso they wouldn’t lose me.”
Dree grabbed his hand and held on. “Lose you?”
His shoulder moved under the fine fabric of his shirt. “I can’t remember how many times I’ve threatened to abdicate and renounce everything. That was always my ace in the hole, to walk away to where they couldn’t get me. I’ve debated cardinals, insisting that if I walked away from Monaco, that there would be no reason why they couldn’t give me Holy Orders. It always came down to the fact that Pope Celestine VI had commanded me not to renounce my place in the line of succession, so if I did, I would be disobeying a papal order. We can’t have priests doing that, so I didn’t. Pope Vincent de Paul ordained me as a deacon so I wouldn’t leave everything. So, I’m both, and here, my loyalties are divided. When I’m here, my vows during my diaconate ordination say I’m a royal in the line of successionfirst.”
“That’s—that’s justwrong.”
He nodded. “No matter what, I can’t be a practicing deacon here in Monaco before the election and coronation. My loyalties cannot be divided.”
She shook her head, trying to clear her thoughts. “So, when you’re in Monaco, you’re not a deacon? My B.S. detector is going crazy on that one.”
“I was a member of the royal family before I was a deacon.”
Dree tilted her head. “That’s logical.”
“I am here in my capacity as a member of the royal family.”
Those were just facts. “Also true.”
“The change in the wording specifically references Monaco. There’s a clause in it that states if there is a conflict with my duties to the church and my duties in Monaco, that I ‘am released’ from my vows as a deacon. It doesn’t say ‘will be released.’ It doesn’t say ‘can be released.’ It says that I ‘amreleased.’ That was how Pope Vincent justified it to my uncle, Prince Rainier IV, that literally when I set foot on Monegasque soil, I was un-conflicted in my duties in the line of succession.”
