41. DANTE

“Does this happen every day?”

“Does what happen every day?” I ask through a mouthful of croissant.

“You get up in the morning and there’s breakfast waiting for you in the parlor?”

I smile. “Amanda, what have I been telling you for the past week and a half?”

“I know, I know – better get used to it,” she chuckles. “Sorry, it might take me awhile.”

The staff has laid out a selection of pastries, fresh fruit from the palace orchard, and, of course, coffee. It never occurred to me until then that Amanda might want to start her days with something else.

“If there’s anything else you’d like, you need only to let the kitchen staff know.”

“Even steak and eggs?”

I frown. “Steak? And eggs? For breakfast?”

“I know, you Morovan types think breakfast is a sugar bomb and a tiny cup of espresso,” she says with mock consternation. “But I’m from cattle country. Breakfast is supposed to tide us over until lunch. There aren’t any cafes to stop in for a bite at ten o’clock out in the fields.”

I pop the last bite of my croissant in my mouth. “How do you keep such an amazing figure eating like that?”

“Good genes and hard work. How do you keep your Jason Statham body when you load up on carbs in the morning?”

“There’s a magical potion that only princes know about that melts away fat with a single sip,” I say.

“Best not spill any on your head, then,” she says with a giggle.

I shoot back my espresso. “Alas, no such potion exists, meaning I must spend two hours a day in the gym.”

“Which you just happen to have time for.”

“What can I say? It’s good to be the prince.”

I stand behind her chair and slide my hands along her trapezius muscles, gently kneading the soft flesh.

“It’s good to be the princess, if I can expect this every day,” she moans.

“This and more,” I say, leaning down to kiss her neck. Underneath her thin robe, her nipples begin to stiffen.

“What if we had been… occupied with something when your staff brought in the breakfast?”

“Our staff,” I correct her, moving up to her earlobe. “I suppose we’ll just have to make sure we’re not occupied at that time of the morning.”

“Except what if I want to be occupied all day, every day?” she says. “After last night, I think I need to catch up on everything I’ve been missing.”

“Then perhaps we need to start as soon as possible.”

She turns her face to mine and we kiss. But just as things get interesting, she pulls away.

“Oh, no,” she breathes. “I can’t believe it.”

“What?” I ask, alarmed.

“Today is your birthday! In the craziness of the wedding, I totally forgot!”

She’s not the only one. My birthday has been the last thing on my mind the past two weeks. In fact, no one even mentioned it during the wedding yesterday.

“I did, too,” I say. “I imagine most of the country did. They were all focused on you, as it should be.”

“But I want you to have something special,” she says, biting her lip.

“Amanda, I have everything a man could ever possibly want or need, so there’s no need to give me a present.”

She stands to face me, breathtaking in her morning clothes.

“I feel like the little drummer boy,” she says. “I have no gift to bring that’s fit to give a king.”

With a few deft moves of her hands, her clothes fall to the floor, leaving her naked in the sunlight streaming in through the windows.

“All I have to offer is me,” she says. Her eyes are wide, angelic.

I sweep her off the floor and carry her towards the bedroom.

“That’s all I ever want,” I whisper in her ear.

Our lovemaking is slow and luxurious at first, savoring every stroke like a sip of fine wine. Then we both seem to reach a new level of urgency at the same time, kissing harder, plunging deeper, faster, until we reach the heights of pleasure at the same time and collapse, trembling, onto the bed in each other’s arms.

“See what I mean?” she sighs. “All day, every day.”

* * *

“The wedding is still plastered all over the TV and online,” Amanda calls from the parlor as I dress. “It’s insane.”

“Nothing about my birthday?” I joke as I emerge from the bedroom.

“Very funny,” she says, flipping through the various channels on my streaming box.

Headlines of videos scroll past: Party of the Century; Real-Life Fairy Tale; Amanda Is Europe’s Latest Obsession; Dante Finally Finds Happiness.

“We’re a hit,” she says with a shy smile as she continues to flip.

I hold up a hand as a familiar face appears on the screen.

“Stop here, please,” I say. “We should see this.”

Chancellor Huber is stuffed into an armchair on the set of Morova Morning, the early show on the country’s only national television station. Across from him is Lorenzo Ricci, the stodgy co-host and a staunch anti-monarchist.

“Would you call the wedding a spectacle, then?” he asks. “Or was it more of a travesty?”

I roll my eyes. Journalism at its finest.

“It was quite simply a slap in the face to the Morovan people,” Huber says.

“Half the Morovan people were there, you jackass!” Amanda barks. “You couldn’t be bothered to show up!”

Sometimes I see so much of Ike in her, it’s scary. But I love it.

“It was so far beneath the dignity of a monarch as to be laughable,” Huber continues. “But then, what else would we expect from Dante?”

“That’s Prince Dante to you, you toad! You talk about dignity and you don’t even follow royal etiquette!”

“Darling,” I say, putting a finger to my lips. “Please.”

She’s still fuming, but she does as I ask.

“He certainly has a reputation,” says host Ricci. “And really, two weeks’ notice? We’re expected to believe they met and fell in love in such a short period of time?”

“Baby rumor coming in three, two, one…” she mutters.

“Obviously, one has to wonder whether she’s pregnant,” Huber says. “But that’s beside the point. To have madding crowds at a royal wedding reception is unheard of. It’s a solemn event, not a Garth Brooks concert.”

“Garth Brooks would kick your lily-white ass…”

“Amanda.”

“Sorry,” she says, not sounding sorry at all.

“So what do we do now?” asks Ricci. “Are we stuck with the playboy prince and his American commoner bride? Is this what we pay our taxes for, so the two of them can live their lavish lifestyle on the backs of Morovans?”

“The national revenues and the Trentini fortune are inextricably linked,” I say. “My money supplements the economy of Morova!”

“Dante, please,” she says, finger to her lips.

I cock an eyebrow at her. She sticks her tongue out at me, making me laugh in spite of myself.

“There are ways to work around the monarchy,” Huber says cryptically. “The Crown Council and National Council have grave concerns about its future, and we’ll be discussing it at length in the days to come.”

Ricci looks into the camera. “There you have it,” he says. “Straight from the chancellor. Is the era of the Trentini family coming to a close? Only time will tell.”

I click off the screen. The glorious afterglow of our lovemaking is gone now.

Amanda comes to me and takes my hand.

“I thought our wedding closed the loophole for government to take control of your fortune,” she says.

“It did,” I say. “But the councils have the right, in theory, to call a referendum on the monarchy any time they choose. We may have blocked any legal challenge, but they still have the option of taking it to the people.”

She circles her arms around my neck. “Then we’re fine,” she says. “Because the people obviously love us.”

“Correction,” I say with a grin. “They love you. They tolerate me.”

She gives me a long, leisurely kiss that’s almost enough to take my mind of off Huber’s bullshit.

Almost.