"I swear to all that is fucking holy I have no fucking idea what you're talking about," I say, not without a little fucking exasperation to Christine.

Fuck, I don't even know if Christine is the best person to contact. All I know is that after last night, this morning I went to the first of Natalie's friends that I could find. All I know is that I remember her from some party at the United Nations and over the last month or so she's been out with us half a dozen times.

Always seemed pretty solid. Maybe a bit immature, but then again this is coming from the man who calls himself Prince Pleasure, right, love?

"You have to have known something, Your Highness," Christine says to me, leaning back on her bench.

Christine is a young graduate student at NYU and when I came looking for her she was sitting on an outside picnic table reading something for class.

"Christine!" I yell out, and at first after she got done being startled, she didn't want to have anything to do to me.

"I'm not trying to do anything more than simply figure out what I did that pissed Natalie the fuck off!" I yell at her. This may or may not have calmed her down and got her to look at me curiously.

"You don't know?" she asks me.

I shake my head.

"All Natalie told me was that if I was going to drop Gage Price, I could've at least had the decency to let her know so she could've tried to fix whatever was wrong," I say to Christine. "The problem is I never dropped Gage Price."

Christine shrugs at me. "Well, she's out of a job most likely because they all think you dropped them because of her," Christine says. Then she narrows her eyes at me. "It's 12 noon right now. Do you know where your press officer is?"

At first I'm about to snort and laugh at this question. What a fucking joke.

But then I start to think.

Christine looks at me and raises her eyebrow.

"Think about it," she says to me. "If you didn't do anything, but Natalie thinks you did, then who else would be the one to know enough about your involvement to remove you from Gage Price?"

Fucking hell.

I tell Christine that I have to go and I start walking to my motorcycle.

I call Jacques before I get on the motorcycle.

“Jacques,” I tell him. “Get ready to go to St. Albans. Call me when you land. We’re going to have some digging to do.”

* * *

I get a call from Jacques that evening.

"Jacques, tell me everything we know on Nadia Scow," I speak into the phone. "And I don't just mean the standard shit we ask before someone starts working for the Crown. I mean I think Royal Intelligence needs to do a quick scan of her right now."

Jacques is nothing if not efficient because it takes him literally all of two days to get back to me.

It's not as if I'm sitting around on my ass during that time.

I do as much research onto the Constitutionalists as I can. If they’re focusing on me, I can’t help but feel that somehow this is all fucking connected.

Sure enough, there’s websites already running as to ‘the Crazy Prince’ and how he’s biting the hands that feed him - firing his PR company.

I place a call to Silas the next day.

"Tell me everything the Constitutionalists have been up to," I ask my brother Silas as I call him. He takes my call, despite being in the middle of a Cabinet meeting and sighs.

"They've mainly been pointing to the shenanigans of the Royals of St. Albans and calling us unfit to lead," he says wearily.

This doesn't make any fucking sense.

"Wait a second," I say to Silas as I talk into the phone. "Mom and Dad abdicated the throne to enjoy retirement and I doubt they warrant much gossip, and you're a family man with kids. That means they're all fixating on..."

I trail off as I make the connection in my head.

"Yeah, baby bro," Silas says. "They've started focusing on you. It's nothing you did or didn't do. It's that the rest of us are too boring and by using you they think they have the greatest chances of stirring up a popular revolt."

"What if I was in the process of cleaning up my act?" I ask Silas.

"Well then firstly I'd probably have to pinch myself," Silas says with a chuckle. "But you'd probably cut the Constitutionalists at the knees. In fact, baby bro, this last month you've been on some good behavior, haven't you? I think I read about how the Anti-Royalist factions in St. Albans were starting to get worried."

We talk for a few more minutes but everything is starting to make sense.

I hang up. It only took three days. But it all makes sense now.

It’s one thing to go to Natalie and tell her sorry for anything.

But in order to really win her back, I need to show her I’ve fucking changed. I’m not the impulsive fuck anymore.

I have all my shit together.

And then Jacques calls.

"Sire," Jacques says. "I'm sending over some security forces to your location. We have some definitive proof that..."

"Right, Jacques, listen, just track my motorcycle," I tell him and hang up before he can protest. I know I cut him off, but I already know what he's going to say. I’ve already figured this shit out.

I’m buzzing down Broadway within the half hour and it takes me no time to get to Gage Price.

I approach the receptionist at the lobby.

"Mr. Thomson and Mr. Brown aren't in right now," the receptionist tells me. "They're conducting the exit interview with a client."

No shit. I'm the client. But she's just staring at me dreamily. If I tell her I'm the prince of St. Albans I don't think it'll do me any good.

"I'm here to stop them from fucking doing that," I tell her. "I'm Prince Connor D'Avington from St. Albans."

The dreamy look disappears. It's replaced.

With fear.

"My Prince.." the receptionist says, trying to clear her head.

"Where are they?" I ask, politely.

"The Frying Pan," the receptionist says simply.

I nod. I know exactly where that is. I run out and hop on my bike.

In seconds I'm weaving Midtown traffic like a fucking boss.

The Frying Pan is on the West Side. Think extreme west side.

I see it in the distance.

So, just something really quick about this restaurant.

It's built on an old salvaged barge and it floats on the Hudson River. It's not actually on land. It's a giant barge that's tied up to a dock.

And within seconds I see where Natalie is sitting with George next to her. I see Nadia sitting across from them.

Fuck, I actually think Nadia sees me coming because I get the sense that her body stiffens.

No use slowing down now.

I've got to get fast enough to jump across the water that separates the barge from land.

And then there's gonna be a fucking reckoning.