Royal Marriage Market Read Free Page B

amenable toward her plans for me to marry some royal girl and knock her up as quickly as possible. I get that I ought to be thinking about settling down, and it isn’t like I’m out there shagging every available woman I can find. The thing is, I’m thirty years old .
    My choices ought to be mine.
    A conversation was attempted with the Grand Duchess about just this a month prior. Fresh off an inspirational speech about the importance of quality health care, my mother’s voice turned bitingly acidic when she informed me what she thought of such logic. Wasn’t that what all that time in America was for? Right now, your focus is to find yourself a breeder. Once your heir is born, go ahead and privately play the field all you want. Do your duty first, though.
    Classy, typical fare from the She-Wolf.
    Despite what she says and thinks, I’ll be damned if I walk into the Summit like a sacrificial goat—or worse yet, a man ready to be auctioned off to the highest, most convenient bidder. There has to be a way out of this.
    “Mark my words, Christian.” Her nails click against the crystal in her hand. “You will represent us at the Decennial Summit well.”
    I attempt another tactic, one much more subtle. “It’s in California, Your Highness.”
    One of the allures of living abroad was knowing my mother loathes travelling to any country outside of the European Union. Or, hell, outside our little Nordic corner of the globe. She’s a xenophobe of the worst kind. Allowing my Spanish Duke of a father to remain in the country is a struggle.
    Her pale eyes wander to the sheer white curtains framing a large window. “I wonder if it’s sunny there.”
    It most certainly isn’t sunny in Norslœ at the moment. Stark, diagonal slashes tear the sky apart, leaving nothing but gloom and misery.
    “You know, I have it on good authority that the youngest Vattenguldian princess will attend.”
    Oh, for the love of God.
    For years, my mother has been obsessed with the idea of me marrying the younger of the princesses from Vattenguldia, as she covets the prosperous coffers in their treasury, or at least a piece of them, since principality plays the ship registries game to perfection. I’ve always found it baffling, because, thanks to our alluring offshore banking strategies offerings, Aiboland is far wealthier. No matter. She’s willing to sell her son off to . . . bloody hell, I don’t know what that girl’s name is. Idina? Irina? Inga? Whoever the hell she is, the She-Wolf wants her all in the name of securing a piece of the profits.
    I haven’t met this girl yet, or her sister who is to inherit the throne. Any information about the Vasa heirs comes either from my mother or the press. They’re close to my age and also hail from a tiny principality in the northern Baltic Sea that gets about as much visibility on the global stage as Aiboland. And still, no matter how gorgeous these girls may or may not be, or smart, or funny, or whatever else, I sure as hell am not the least bit eager to bind myself to someone my mother sells me off to.
     
    Someone shouts, and glasses rise, clinking mine in sloshy succession. I shouldn’t be drinking so much tonight, let alone in a pub, but after the hour-long lecture my mother tortured me with this afternoon, detailing reasons why I must bag myself the Vattenguldian princess, I made it my mission to ensure the rest of the day was a blur. It was either drown myself in stout or throw myself off the bridge downtown.
    “Stop while you’re ahead.” Lukas’ warning is quiet. “There are a number of cell phones angled this way. You don’t want to give Her Highness any leverage, do you?”
    Arsehole.
    I don’t bother looking at my brother when I tell him to sod off. I do, however, glance at my personal secretary—only to find him subtly nodding in agreement. But, as annoyed as I am at him for saying that, Lukas is nearly always right. The one time I’d legitimately slipped up in America, when I