I didn't see my girl again before flying back to the Capital. I could have stayed in Oshwego – who would have stopped me? – and part of me wanted to. Her family had captivated me with their easy warmth and familiarity. After a lifetime of formality and protocol that dinner with Eva and her parents was a revelation. So those families did exist. The ones who loved each other, who cooked meals together and ate together and laughed together. Maybe it's stupid for someone in my position – or maybe it entirely makes sense – but I envied Eva's tight bonds, the solidity I felt in that house, the clear, uncomplicated devotion to each other. I felt the way I had in Woaden, like I could easily have just slipped out of my life and into hers, leaving all the bullshit of being the Prince of Rhenland happily behind.

But I couldn't do that. It would have made things even more difficult – not just for me, but for her. And I had caused her enough difficulty already. I had to face my parents. I had to face the Rhennish media and public, and I had to tell them all the truth. When I landed in the Capital I went straight to Pritchard Palace and, after a quick text to Jason to let him know I hadn't been kidnapped or run away with the circus, fell asleep for twelve hours.

The next day dawned chilly and gray, and it was with a sense of great momentousness that I called Jason and asked him to arrange a meeting with my parents that evening. That wasn't usually something that was possible, but I insisted and my father, obviously eager to hear where I'd been, didn't put up a fight. Just after the sun set, a small motorcade drove me to St. Stephen's and a butler led me into one of the cavernous sitting rooms, where my anxious parents awaited. To my surprise, my sister was there, too. Did my mother and father know what I was going to tell them? Is that why Charlotte was in attendance? She's always been better at talking to me than either of them.

"Killian!" My mother exclaimed, kissing both my cheeks and shaking her head. "Where have you been?! Good lord, do you have any idea how hard it's been keeping this out of the papers?"

I greeted my father, too, and my sister. Then I took a seat and faced them. "I'm sorry about that – I didn't mean to cause trouble for you, but it couldn't be avoided."

"Why all the secrecy?" Charlotte asked. "Why the James Bond act, Killian?"

"Well," I started, inhaling deeply. It was happening. I was about to defy my family and hundreds of years worth of tradition – it almost felt like an out of body experience, like part of me was observing the scene rather than participating in it. "The James Bond act was because of you."

"Me?" Charlotte asked, looking surprised.

"Not just you, all three of you. I knew if I told you where I was going, you'd pull some strings and stop me. And I couldn't allow that to happen."

There was a pause before my sister looked directly at me. "You were with that girl, weren't you? The American?"

I could feel them all, waiting for confirmation, waiting to unleash. "Yes, I was with her. But that isn't the reason I kept it from you – or, it's not the main reason." There was no choice but to just come out with it. I wasn't interested in trying to convince or placate anyone – the decision had been made and that was the part they needed to understand. "The main reason is because I needed to find out how she felt about me – and about what I'm doing. And what I'm doing, right now, is telling you that I love her. I'm serious about her and I'm not going to end it. How you react to this is up to you but you need to know that I understand the consequences of this."

Silence. I watched as my sister and my parents looked at each other, eyes wide. It was my father, the King, who spoke up.

"You understand the consequences, do you?"

His voice was deep and quiet – I had to lean in to hear him, that's how I knew how angry he was. I've only ever seen my father that angry once before, and it was when Charlotte developed a crush on that unsuitable stable boy as a teenager.

"Yes," I replied. "I do. And I want you to know that whatever you decide, I will live with them."

"Are you – Killian, have you proposed to this girl?" my mother asked, wringing her hands.

"No, not yet. She's too freaked out by everything right now. But that's something you should expect. That's why I'm coming to you with this now."

"Why?" my father finally asked, after another prolonged silence.

"I'm not sure I understand –" I started.

"Why are you doing this?"

"Because I love her." My words hung in the air for a few seconds. I let them. "Because I want the chance to be happy. I don't know the future, I know that – none of us does. But I want the chance. I refuse to give up on my life before I'm even thirty years old, it's –"

"Happy?" the King cut in, chuckling menacingly. I was bigger than my dad by the time I was seventeen, but that didn't mean he didn't still possess the ability to scare the absolute shit out of me with a laugh. "Happy?! Jesus Christ, Killian, I had no idea how badly your education had failed you. I mean, the signs were there, don't get me wrong. But I never thought –"

I interrupted angrily. "This has nothing to do with my education!"

My father was furious. His face was red and he was breathing hard, it was like he was forcing the words out of his throat. "Oh yes it does! Happy, Killian? YOU'RE LIFE WAS NEVER ABOUT BEING HAPPY! None of our lives were! Not mine, not your mother's, not your sister's, and not any of the ancestors whose legacy you are right this moment spitting on."

I stayed where I was, even as my father stood up and strode towards me, jabbing his finger in my face and repeating himself. "Do you hear me? Your life was never about happiness! Whatever made you think it was? This won't stand, Killian. Look at me! Do you hear me? This won't stand. This will not be allowed! This is – this is –"

"Dad," Charlotte spoke up meekly. "Dad, just hold on. Let's just all try to calm down a little. We need to talk about this." She turned to me, her eyes pleading. "Killian, I know you're angry, but so is dad. You know you can't do this. I know you know that. You can't just get to twenty-nine years old and decide oh, sorry, no, this life, the one I've been living, the one I'm committed to, isn't actually what I want. It's too late for that."

I said something cruel, then. Maybe I shouldn't have, but I felt at the time it needed to be faced, and faced in a way no one in my family was good at. "Oh yeah?" I replied. "Twenty-nine is too old? What age would have been appropriate, do you think? Do you think the reaction would have been any different if I was seventeen – like you were?"

It took my sister a moment to realize what I was referring to – her relationship with the stable boy, one that we all, Charlotte herself included, had agreed to pretend was nothing serious when we all knew for a fact that it had been. Her eyes widened and her cheeks got red. "Killian," she stammered. "Killian, that's not fair at all. Why would you even say –"

And then I lost it a little. "Not fair?!" I yelled. "Really, Charlotte? That's what's not fair to you? The part where someone in this horror show of a family finally says something that's actually true? And not the part where you were forced to give up the only person you've ever loved because – because why? Because some fucking dead people would be mad?! That is such bullshit! And I'll be damned if I'll let you try and talk me into making the same fucked up choices as you, I can tell you that."

My mother and sister sat back in their seats, looking like they'd just been hit by a tsunami. My father stayed right where he was, so enraged he was shaking. We don't talk like that in our family. Hell, we don't really talk at all. And I was sick to death of it. I watched my sister's eyes fill with tears as she struggled to deny the truth of what I'd just said. I felt bad for upsetting her, but I didn't feel bad for finally saying it out loud, the thing we all knew anyway, and had for years.

"Charlotte, listen. I'm sorry for – for saying it like that. I didn't come here to upset you, I –"

Before I could finish, she stood up and walked stiffly out of the room, not even managing to get the door closed behind her before breaking down into a single, heart-wrenching sob.

"Look what you've done," my mother snapped. "There wasn't any need for that, Killian. Now you've upset Charlotte."

"I didn't upset Charlotte!" I shouted. "You upset her! The two of you, when you made her give up that boy all those years ago! And you damn well know it!"

The Queen, who usually tends to get teary before she gets vicious, suddenly fixed me with an ice-cold glare. "I think I've had just about enough of this. You'll come to your senses. When you do, I just pray you have the decency to apologize for your behavior today. It's appalling."

She got up to leave – another Chatham-Hayes family tactic for dealing with unpleasant emotions – just leave, pretend it never happened. But I was done. I'd said what I needed to say, I'd conveyed the relevant information.

"Right," I said, getting up, looking at my parents one after the other. "I've said what I needed to. What you both need to know – and I mean really know – is that I'm serious. I won't 'come to my senses,' I won't change my mind. I came here to tell you how it is and now you know. What you do now is entirely up to you."

And with that, I headed towards the door as my father spluttered incoherently about freezing my bank accounts. I turned around one last time. "Go ahead. You think I came here thinking you wouldn't do that? Force the issue if you like, but hear me now – if I have to choose between money and Eva, I choose Eva."

I slammed the door behind me to the sound of my father's yelling that I had no idea how to live the life of an ordinary person, that I'd never make it. And fuck it, maybe he was right. But I was going to find out with Eva. With Eva.

"Back to Pritchard, Sir?"

I don't know how many minutes I sat in the car, white-faced, before Dan's words got through. "Huh? What – oh, yeah, Pritchard."

"Are you alright, Sir?"

I looked out the window and thought about it for a second. "Yes. Yes, I think I am. I think I might be more alright than I've ever been, actually. Especially for a man who has just lost a rather huge amount of money and status."

Dan eyed me in the rearview mirror. "That girl, eh?"

"Yes, that girl. Can't live without her, didn't have a choice."

"Well I hope you know what you're doing."

I laughed, relaxing a little as we got further away from St. Stephens. "I suppose we'll see about that."

The first thing I did upon arriving back at my apartment was call Eva. She picked up right away, sounding nervous.

"Hello? Killian?"

"I wish you were here," I told her. "I need you right now, Eva. I need you in my arms. I need you to tell me I just did the right thing."

"Did you talk to them?" she asked. "To your family, I mean?"

"Yes I did, just got back home this second."

"How did it go?"

"Well," I replied, "I suppose it went slightly better than I expected, in that I'm still alive. But they aren't happy. They really aren't happy. The last thing I heard my father say before I walked out was something about freezing my bank accounts."

There was a pause on the other end, the sound of Eva breathing. "OK. I'm coming back to the Capital. I'll take the next flight out. You can stay with me if it comes to that."

I was thankful for her tender decisiveness. I knew I wasn't in any danger of homelessness – I had a lot of rich friends, with a lot of properties between them, and someone would let me stay at their place – but for some reason I'd expected her to cry or freak out, the way I was about to. But she didn't. She just told me she'd be with me as soon as she could. Just hearing it made me feel better.

"Killian?" she asked, just before we hung up.

"Yeah?"

"Don't get drunk, OK?"

"I'm not going to get drunk," I assured her. "I want to be stone cold sober when I see you next, because I have a feeling that this is the beginning of something. Something that we're going to look back on one day when we're sitting in front of the fire, old and gray. And I want to remember every second of it." I paused. "Eva?"

"Yeah?"

"I love you."

I heard her sigh happily, such a sweet little sound. When she responded I could hear the smile in her voice. "I love you too, Killian."

We hung up and I lay down on the sofa in the sitting room, staring up at the ceiling. I never felt an ounce of regret, not even then when it was still so fresh and Eva wasn't yet in my arms, where she belonged. Well, I did regret how harsh I'd been with my sister. I should have chosen my words more carefully, not gone for the throat the way I had. It just pissed me off so much when she sided with my parents, after they'd tried the same thing on her. I sat up and composed a message.

I sent it as soon as I'd written it, but I didn't expect to hear back from Charlotte – not soon, anyway. There are rarely heated moments like that in my family – our preference has always been for passive-aggression and indirect communication, which is a lot easier when each family member has a team of staff doing it for them – and I knew it was going to take awhile for everyone to just deal with the emotionality of the scene, let alone what was discussed. I looked at my phone. Early afternoon. Nothing to do but wait – for Eva, for the rest of my life.

Jason called an hour or so later, pushing me to re-schedule a bunch of missed engagements. I stalled, telling him it was going to be at least a few days before I had any idea if there would even be anymore engagements. Would there? If my parents disinherited me, would anyone care about having a non-Prince at their openings and dinners? Everyone, including me, was just going to have to wait and see.

By the time evening rolled around, I was bored with sitting around indoors and wandered out into the grounds, looking for something to do. It had been a windy few days, and there were only a few brown leaves still clinging to the skeletal branches of the trees. Briefly, I wondered if Eva would find winter in Rhenland depressing.

That's how it was for me – whatever I thought about, whatever little detail or thought popped into my mind, it always went back to Eva. Eventually, I came upon a groundsman standing in front of a freshly chopped-down tree.

"What happened?" I asked, curious. The trees at Pritchard Palace are tightly tended and managed. This one looked young. "Bad spot?"

"Aye," he answered, not having seen who he was talking to yet. "Location's fucked, the soil here is a little too damp. Just need to get this chopped up and stacked and I'm off home."

"Want a hand?"

He looked up, then, and I almost laughed out loud at the look of pure horror on his face when he saw it was me. "Oh, Prince Killian. Your Highness, I'm sorry, I didn't – I didn't see –"

"It's OK," I reassured him, smiling. "Not a problem. I wasn't joking, though. Do you want some help?"

The groundsman looked at me like I was insane. "Uh..."

"It's not a trick, I'm just bored. Wanted to get outside. Let me give you a hand. What's your name?"

"It's John, Your Highness. John Heston."

John Heston was clearly suspicious of my sudden interest in wood-chopping, but he handed me an axe anyway and stood back for a few seconds, gawking, as I laid down a larger piece of the trunk and set a smaller piece on top of it. "Call me Killian," I told him, swinging the axe down and expertly cleaving the wood in two. "And don't look so surprised, my father used to make me do this as a child – didn't want me to grow up not knowing how to chop wood."

"Yes, uh, yes Sir."

"Killian," I repeated, smiling.

A few more competently chopped pieces of wood and John seemed to accept that I wasn't about to hack my own limbs off by accident. He grabbed another axe and got to work beside me, and we swung away until I was sweating and out of breath.

"Damn, I bet you're in shape doing this kind of work all day," I commented when we took a break.

"Well I would be, if my missus wasn't such a great cook. It's the pies. I can't stop eating them." He patted his belly proudly and once again I found myself thinking of Eva. Did she make pies? And if she did, would she make some for me? Would there be anything better on earth than sitting down to a meal Eva had cooked for me?

Truthfully, I was tired after the first bout of wood-chopping, but there was a lot more to go and I didn't want to leave John with it, not after getting started. So we got back to it and in the end it took the best part of two hours to finish. When we finally got it done, we both sat down on our respective stumps and John pulled out a thermos.

"I've only got the one cup, but you can use it. I'll use the cap."

"Give me the cap, I don't think I'll pass out or anything," I joked.

So the groundsman poured us each a steaming cup of tea and we sat there drinking it as the evening closed in around us. I asked John how long he had worked at Pritchard.

"Since I was eighteen, Sir. My father worked here, too, but he retired a long time ago. How about you? What's got you out here in the dark chopping wood like a peasant?"

I chuckled at John's cheekiness and didn't bother correcting the 'Sir' again – I'd noticed that sometimes asking people to call me by my first name makes them uncomfortable, and I didn't want that. "Oh, you know," I replied. "Life. Women. A specific woman, actually."

"Oh, aye. Women'll do it, prince or pauper, won't they?"

We sat out there drinking tea for a quarter of an hour or so, but without the exercise it was too cold, and I was conscious of the fact that the groundsman probably wanted to be getting home to his pie-making wife. We bid each other goodnight and I hurried back to my apartment to take a much-needed shower.

My phone chimed when I was toweling myself off, feeling oddly invigorated by the wood-chopping and the conversation with John Heston. I picked it up – a message. From Charlotte.

"Killian – are you at Pritchard? Can you call me?"

I didn't want to call Charlotte. The apology I'd sent earlier had been sincere, but I just didn't think I could handle another lecture – especially knowing as I did that it would be useless anyway. But she was my sister, and I'd hurt her. So, reluctantly, I called her.

"Killian?"

"Yes, it's me," I replied, a little tightly.

"Can I come over – if you're at Pritchard, I mean – I need to talk to you."

I sighed. "You can come over, Char. But I'm warning you, I'm not going to be talked out of –"

"Killian, stop. It's not – it's not about that. Well, it is but – damnit, just let me come over."

My sister's voice was thin and emotional, like she'd been crying. I felt a pang of guilt. "Yes. Alright."

"OK, I'll be there soon, depending on traffic."

No part of me trusted that she wasn't coming over to try and wheedle her way into my mind, to try and convince me that everything my parents had said was completely right, that I was an idiot etc. And fine, if she insisted, she could try. It wasn't going to make a difference but she could try.

Charlotte arrived twenty-five minutes later, in a larger-than-usual motorcade. When she got inside we stood there for a few seconds, looking at each other awkwardly, and then she hugged me.

"Hi, Killian."

"Hey."

"Don't look so suspicious," she admonished, walking into the kitchen and opening the fridge.

"Don't look suspicious, huh? Well, it's not like I don't have a good reason. And sure," I added jokingly, "help yourself. Don't you have food at your place?"

Charlotte snorted. "If you had anything to eat, Killian, believe me – I would help myself. But seeing as how it appears to be a few beers and some dirty carrots, I think I'll pass."

"Those are my Smythson garden carrots," I informed her. "They're not dirty. It's soil, not dirt. You just need to brush it off."

"Oh, these are from Smythson? Fine."

I hung back as Charlotte washed off a carrot and took a bite, nodding approvingly. "These are good, Killian."

"Well that's good to hear. I might have to start selling them soon enough, if the King is serious."

My sister gave me a look. "Let's sit down, OK? I have some things I want to say to you."

"OK," I replied, leading the way into the sitting room. "But I meant what I said. If you're just here to continue the lecture from earlier –"

"I'm not," she cut me off. "Quite the opposite."

"Oh?"

When we were seated, Charlotte looked at me. "Yes. Quite the opposite. What you said earlier, oh Killian, I know it's true. You know it's true, so do our parents. I loved David – the stable boy. I mean, what else is there to say? I loved him. And now it's almost fifteen years later and I don't love him anymore, and I'm basically happy with my life. Maybe not happy, exactly, but – more accepting, if that makes sense?"

I nodded. "Uh-huh."

"It's not like this is some great revelation to me, either. I didn't just storm off and change my mind about everything. It's just that I've got into that mindset, the same one our parents are in. This is how it's done. This is how it's always been done. And therefore this is the right way and anything else is the wrong way. Even though I know it's bullshit. It is, Killian. I'm just so used to you pulling dumb shit that I kind of automatically assume that's what you're doing all the time. But it isn't this time, is it? You meant it? You love that girl, Eva?"

I raised my eyebrows, genuinely surprised at what I was hearing – but also, in a way, not surprised at all. Charlotte is my sister. I grew up with her, I know her better than I know anyone else on earth. She's not stupid, and she's not wedded to certain ways of thinking and being like our parents are. "Yes," I replied simply. "Yes, I love her. She's on her way here right now, as a matter of fact, from America."

"Good. I'd like to meet her."

I eyed my sister, still slightly suspicious. "Charlotte – are you being serious? Are you sure mom and dad didn't send you here to try and lull me into a false sense of security before dropping the hammer?"

She shook her head. "No, no, it's not like that. I mean it. It really messed me up, you know – that thing with David. I don't know if you noticed, but I was a mess for a long time after that."

I looked down at the floor, remembering my sister's struggles with an eating disorder that no one wanted to admit she had, and the shameful way I'd been entirely too wrapped up in my life at boarding school to give her the familial love she had so clearly been desperate for all those years ago. "Yeah," I said quietly. "Yeah I did notice, Char. I'm so sorry I wasn't there for you the way I should have been."

"Oh," she waved her hand in the air, "it wasn't your job, Killian. You were a kid. I don't blame you at all. I'm just saying it really did a number on me. I'm OK now, but I'm just thinking – why should you have to go through the same thing? Like, not why are our parents livid, but in a larger sense – why? What's the point? Is Rhenland going to crumble into the sea if you marry an American? No. It wouldn't have crumbled into the sea if I married an American, but in a way I can see where they were coming from there, a little, what with me being the firstborn and first in line to the throne. But I didn't marry an American! I married exactly who I was supposed to marry and now – uh, well –"

"What?"

"Nothing, I'm getting distracted. What I'm saying is, the legacy is secure. It's also not three-hundred years ago. The truth is, not as many people care about who we marry as the King and Queen think. If anything it would be even worse PR if people found out you were being kept from someone you loved, than it would if you married her!"

Charlotte was right. What she was saying seemed fairly obvious – as soon as she said it, that is. I'd been so wrapped up in my own drama that I hadn't actually taken the time to sit back and look at the situation objectively.

"Anyway," she continued. "I just came here to say that. I haven't spoken to our parents since this afternoon, and I don't think I will, not right away. I think they need some time to let it sink in, you know? But I will, in a few days. Who knows, I might even be able to soften them a little? And Killian? I'm just sorry. I'm sorry for taking their side. I'm sorry for thinking that because I was treated in an unfair way, that you should be."

"I'm sorry, too," I reiterated. "I could have handled that a little more diplomatically today, with you."

To my surprise, my sister suddenly jumped up and bolted out of the room. I stayed where I was for a few seconds, thinking she was playing some kind of joke, but she didn't come back, so I got up and followed her. A tap was running in the bathroom. I knocked on the door.

"Charlotte? Are you alright?"

"Yes, yes. Just give me a sec."

When she emerged a couple of minutes later she was flushed. "Have you – you weren't crying in there, were you?"

She laughed. "No, not crying. Puking."

"Puking? Are you sick?"

"No," my sister smiled. "Not sick. Pregnant."

I took a step back. "What? Pregnant? You're –"

"You're going to be an uncle, Killian."

The emotional whiplash of the past few days just didn't stop. I stood there staring at Charlotte for a few moments before coming to my senses and giving her a hug. An uncle. I was going to be an uncle?! I laughed – not because it was funny, but rather out of pure happiness. "An uncle?" I asked, grinning. "Me? I – oh wow. Does anyone else know? When are you due? Do you know if it's a boy or a –"

Charlotte held up a hand. "Sloooow down, Killian. The King and Queen know – they had to be told, as soon as I found out. And their staff and my staff know. But I didn't want to say anything to anyone else until I was past three months. That's one of the reasons I came here tonight. They're worried about their legacy, right? Well we've got someone right here –" she rubbed her belly – "who's going to kick your ass right into third in line. So there's even less of a reason for them to come down so hard on you."

I was only half-listening at that point, too excited about being an uncle to pay attention to much else. "A baby?!" I grabbed my sister by the shoulders gently. "A baby! That's – that's amazing, Char. I can't believe it. Everyone is going to go absolutely bonkers when this gets out, you know."

She rolled her eyes. "Oh I know. We're trying to keep a lid on it but the press has been on bump-watch since the day I got married. Douglas and I might go and stay at our place in the north if it gets to be too much. Just go hide away for a few months and enjoy it while we can, you know?"

I was seized by a need to baby my big sister, ushering her back into the sitting room like she had suddenly become extremely fragile. "Are you still hungry? I'll call one of the cooks and have them –"

"No, Killian," Charlotte laughed. "It's fine, I'll get something at home. You don't need to do that."

"Yes I do! You're growing my niece or nephew in there, and if you're hungry now you should eat now." I picked up my phone as Charlotte leaned back on the sofa, smiling at me. It was so nice to see her smile like that. "I'm calling," I told her. "Tell me what you want."

"Oh, OK. I want a sandwich. Egg-salad. Hopefully I can keep it down."

"Done."

When the sandwich had been put in motion we sat back down, neither of us able to stop grinning for long. My sister was having a baby. My serious, beautiful sister was going to be a mother. I was going to be an uncle. And the woman I loved was, at that very moment, on her way back to me.

"Everything's going to be OK, isn't it?" I asked. "Regardless of what our parents decide to do – or not do?"

"Yes," Charlotte smiled. "I think it is."