Near Maxence’s elbow, his office phone clicked, and his receptionist said, “I’m sorry, your highness. He’s coming in now.”
Her voice sounded minorly distraught and probably due to a breach of protocol, rather than terrified at an intrusion, so Max merely raised one eyebrow as his office door popped open and a pudge of a man bounced through the doorway.
Oh, dear Lord.
Maxence had been accustomed to courtly manners his whole life, so he merely rose, buttoned his suit jacket, and waited for his uncle to bobble the length of the room before he extended his hand across his desk. “A pleasure as always, Prince Jules.”
His uncle shook his hand and chortled, “Surely, Maxence, we don’t need to be so formal as that. We’ve never been that formal when no one else is around. It’s splendid to see you again, and so soon. You’ve had a haircut!”
Max sat in his office chair and smoothed the short hair around his ears. The back of his neck still felt chilly. During lunchtime in his apartment, his barber had sheared off almost three-months’ worth of growth that had curled over his ears and collar like a teenager. “Indeed.”
Jules placed his fingers on his red-checked vest as he looked between Max and Dree, who was dutifully scribbling on her little tablet-computer. “I see your little Nepalese admin has settled in. You don’t look Nepalese, my dear.”
Dree looked up at him, her blue eyes bright with laughter. “Oh, I’m not from Nepal. I was born in New Mexico, but I was working in Arizona before I went on the mission with Catholic Charities.”
If Maxence leaped across the desk and slapped his hand over her mouth, it would draw more attention to the fact that she had given Jules Grimaldi four pieces of information he could use when investigating her to find Max’s weak spots.
His emotion—whether it was impatience, irritation, or rage—must’ve shown on his face, because Dree caught his eye and then her head dropped straight down to stare at her tablet, and she scribbled something.
Jules was practically cackling with this new information, and he asked her, “Oh, do tell. You don’t seem to be merely an admin. I’ll bet you’re something much more interesting.”
Maxence said, “If you’re done harassing the staff, what brings you here today?”
Jules turned back to Maxence, his blue eyes sparkling with good humor, and took a seat in a chair on the other side of Max’s desk. “I heard our nephew Alexandre had arrived back in Monaco.”
Ournephew. Jules used the royal plural whenever he could get away with it. “Where did you hear that?”
Jules flipped his fingers at the air as if magic might emanate from them. “One hears things. I heard his sister is with him.”
Maxence didn’t have to act anymore. “I don’t think Lady Christine is in Monaco.”
“Oh? Where is she?”
“I have no idea.”
“Surely, you must. Is she staying at Alexandre’s house, that lovely château overlooking the ravine like she always does?”
“I don’t think she’s in Monaco, Jules. I don’t think she has any plans to return.”
“But shemust.Since Alexandre is back, wemusthave a Council meeting. Surely, now thatyouhave returned, Alexandre will desist with his incorrigible plan to tie up the Council with his voting bloc of young people.”
“I’m not sure what Alexandre’s plan is.”
“But surely he’s discussed it with you. You met with him and his American wife this morning. All you young people who went to Le Rosey have your own little cabal.”
Like many of his generation, Jules had been educated at home, though several of his siblings had attended day school. “And yet, I don’t know what Alex’s plan is. At the next meeting of the Council of Nobles, I will abdicate, and then it’s up to Alexandre as to what he will do. At least, that’s the way it’s always happened in the past.”
Jules had been brushing invisible crumbs off his garish vest, but his glance up at Maxence was like he’d flicked electricity across the desk and popped a spark in the air between them. “Do you have any reason to think the succession will not be as it has been done in the past?”
“Of course not. Monaco is a deeply conservative country,” Maxence said. “That’s how we’ve gotten away with an absolute monarchy in the modern world for so long.”
Jules seemed to ponder that, nodding. “But Alexandre is next in line. I don’t see how he is going to get out of this conundrum.”
“It is quite a conundrum, as you said.”
“The court will never elect him. That leaves Christine as next after him, and you’re saying that she will refuse to return.”
Maxence could see where this was heading. “She has so far. I think she may be staying away to increase the chance that her brother will be pressured into accepting the throne. Nobody wants multiple rounds of voting and negotiations.”
