Prince: Royal Romantic Suspense (Billionaires in Disguise: Maxence Book 5) by Blair Babylon (best ereader for comics .TXT) 📗

Prince Rainier IV had detested these events. After his wife had died tragically young, his sisters and nieces had pitched in to keep him company and make these galas tolerable for him.

Uncle Rainier had been a good man, Maxence mused. He’d been grumpy at events like this to the point of turning it into a joke, but he’d left Monaco in better shape than he’d found it, both financially and as a society.

Marie-Therese had done more than her fair share of hanging on her uncle’s elbow at events like this one, claiming the events also benefitted her social media role. She’d halfway become the face of Monaco because paparazzi pics of royal bachelorettes sell magazines and invite clicks.

But not as well as those of single, royal bachelors, Max noticed.

He was walking between velvet ropes on the red carpet, approaching the photo-op area.

Camera flashes became a wall of light rushing at him. He squinted and smiled with one hand tucked in the pocket of his new Tom Ford tuxedo trousers.

The light became a tsunami cresting over him until he walked inside the door.

Darkness.

Maxence’s breath caught in his throat. He froze.

His feet contained in his rigid dress shoes, the left one laced slightly tighter than the right. The soles of his feet bearing his weight and planted on the firm floor. The crook of his thumb pressing on the seam of his pocket. His silk tie around his collar and neck. Cool air settling on his cheekbones. Over a hundred voices chattering and laughing, dissonant strings grinding in the moist air. Frying meat, spilled alcohol, women’s perfume, his fresh-wood cologne, and the sweat of human animals herded tightly together.

The taste of fear on the back of his tongue.

His eyes stretched.

Neon lines grew out of the darkness and formed lilies rising toward the ceiling.

Pale light dusted women’s bare arms, the sequins and beads on their gowns, and their shining hair before finding the men who wore dark suits.

The room was dim but not dark, and Maxence had a party to attend.

He drew a deep breath and stepped into the reception, greeting friends with a double-kiss and the event’s sponsors with a firm handshake after he’d wiped the sweat from his palm onto the seam of his trousers.

The cocktail party that night was being held in the Salle Médecin, the very same room in the Monte Carlo casino that had enchanted Dree just a few days before. The baccarat and gaming tables had been removed, and giant, glowing mushrooms and neon-tube flowers filled the darkened room to the ceiling five stories above as if the guests had shrunk. Eight open bars were strategically placed among the glowing flora, and the few hundred royals and oligarchs in the room threw back alcohol. Hors d’oeuvre stations were scattered among the surreal landscape to stave off inebriation too early in the evening. A five-piece string quartet scraped dissonant notes.

Security personnel lined the edges of the room, leaning against the walls and scanning the space for threats.

Quentin Sault stood at the corner of the room, having flanked Maxence as he’d walked the red carpet and entered through a discreet door farther down the hallway. Three men stood beside Sault, more of Max’s detail since he was out of the palace. All of them wore dark, boxy suits and seemed to have no necks.

Another man walked up to Sault, seemingly larger and more neckless than the rest. Max recognized Michael Rossi, the man who’d trailed him in Paris, conferring with Sault and gesturing toward the other end of the room.

Maxence followed Rossi’s waving arm and found his cousin, Marie-Therese, standing with her father, Jules Grimaldi. Sault must have assigned Rossi to the security detail that looked after his cousin Marie-Therese or his uncle Jules. At least they were far enough away from Max.

They both seemed to be having a splendid time. Marie-Therese laughed and bent over to give one of her father’s friends a view down her cleavage. Jules was chuckling with his hand on his tummy, holding a martini in his other hand. Maxence didn’t recognize the people standing with them. They might be either from the wealth management company or some of their better clients who had received one of the coveted invitations to hobnob with the royals.

He moved farther into the crowd at the party.

If Dree were at his side, he could only imagine what pithy adage she would use to describe the cluster of bluebloods and billionaires negotiating the business of the world in the Alice in Wonderland-style landscape.

He couldn’t expose her like that, of course.

Her anonymity was her safety.

As Max greeted his friends and people who wanted to be his friends for their own reasons, lightbulbs flashed. Professional photographers roamed the room, snapping pictures of guests having a splendid time while they discussed wealth management.

His goal for the night was to find his great-uncle Louis Grimaldi and Valentina Martini and decide who between the two of them would make the better monarch for Monaco. Perhaps seeing them in a formal social setting might help make up his mind.

Maxence caught a glimpse of his great-uncle Louis among neon palm fronds, holding a drink and talking with a few other people of his generation. Lurid fuchsia light glinted on bald pates and silver hair. The five of them were waving their drinks around as they spoke about something that must be very important, or else they were performing an interpretive dance about seaweed.

Camera flashes lit the room, throwing silver light and black shadows at the walls.

Maxence was just about to make his way over to his uncle when he caught a glimpse of Lady Valentina Martini, the other person Nico had identified as a likely candidate for the crown.

Lady Valentina huddled with a more sober group of women, and all of them seemed to be speaking in lower tones. Occasionally, one of them glanced around, either bored or just taking stock of