In the morning, I awoke and rolled over to see Penny’s sleeping form. She looked so serenely peaceful, the dark cloud that had been above her head gone, and I decided not to wake her. I got the feeling that sleep had been evading her in recent months, as much—if not more—than it had me. I edged quietly from the bed and over to the tiny kitchenette, where I silently located coffee and milk and prepared to make some a coffee. Seeing her stir a little, I decided to make us some eggs for breakfast. A much-used skillet was sitting on the stove, and I got to work heating it up while I whisked together the eggs and cream to make us some omelettes.

“What are you doing?” she moaned sleepily, her voice low and husky.

“Rest, close your eyes and I’ll be over in a moment.”

She snuggled back down under the sheets.

I cut bread and popped it into the toaster, rummaging in her fridge to find butter, when I came across some asparagus. I popped some on to poach and then served up my mediocre efforts—I wasn’t much of cook. I’d spoil her later at lunch, I planned. With hot black coffee just the way she liked it, super milky for myself, and two small glasses of orange juice I made my way back to her.

Penny’s head revealed itself as she sensed my presence. Her eyes went wide as saucers as she took in the tray of goodies I put in front of her.

“I may want to keep you around if you keep doing things like this for me!” she teased as she bit hungrily into a slice of hot buttery toast. “In fact I thought I dreamed you up.”

“Nope, I’m very real.”

I speared a forkful of omelette and asparagus and munched happily. I wished we could’ve stayed like that forever.

“But I’m going to have to go back to the UK tomorrow, Penny,” I said sadly as we finished the last bites and were savouring our coffees. Her face fell, but I could see she had been expecting me to say something similar. “I kinda didn’t get permission to come, so I need to get back as soon as possible, before I’m in deep shit.”

“Oh wow. You did that all for me?”

“I would do anything for you.”

She grinned and licked her buttery lips. “Then we need to have as much fun as we can before you head home.” She had a determined look in her eye, and I knew better than to argue with her.

“Yes, ma’am,” I said giving her a cheeky salute. She shot me a blasé sideways look, only to follow it up with a massive grin.

“Oh shit, I have the damn golf event to do today for the charity. You don’t half pick your moments to come and see a girl!”

“I’ll come and help out. Would having a Royal on the course for a few hours help raise any more money, d’you think?”

“It might, but are you sure? It will be terribly dull,” she said in a mock bored, posh English voice.

“I quite enjoy playing golf actually, didn’t get to do it that often while I was in the army—but when we were at Balmoral for Christmas we often played.” I watched her face at the casual dropping of the name of our family’s favourite retreat. She didn’t bat an eyelid and I almost wanted to cheer.

“Well, if you are sure, then we could make a proper event out of you being there; have an auction for who gets to caddy for you? Or who gets to partner up with you and so on. It could work really well—and the people attending would all just love to be able to say they’d played golf with a prince!” she grinned at me, and gave me a lingering kiss as she headed for her tiny bathroom. I lay back on the bed, and waited for her to emerge. I couldn’t believe how happy I was lying in her tiny bed, in this rundown apartment in New York. I felt like I could take on the entire world and win.

Penny emerged, towelling her long hair dry with a second towel wrapped firmly around her body. She really must have been through the mill with her illness, and it had left its mark. But, I quickly moved to hold her tightly and kissed her on the top of the head before I followed her lead to get clean and presentable. When I emerged from the bathroom she was dressed in a smart trouser suit, looking every inch the professional. “I’ll drop you wherever you want, at the office? The golf course?”

“Please tell me you haven’t left some ridiculously flashy car out on the street overnight?” she asked me incredulously.

I tutted at her. “Please, I may have grown up with a silver spoon in my mouth, but I’m not an idiot. No, I have a car and driver—and I called him to come and meet us while you were showering.” I grinned at her and was rewarded with one of her beaming smiles. I wondered how long it had been since she had smiled like that, but was glad I was responsible for it.

“So, I get to be chauffeured around all day like Royalty?” she mused as I pulled on my jeans. “I’ve always wondered how the other half lives!”

“Well, don’t get used to it just yet. I may be cut off completely when I head back and tell my father I intend to leave the family firm, so to speak!”

“They love you, Robert. I am sure they will understand.”

“I’m sure they will too, but it’s not their understanding I need. I want them to give me my freedom; to let me do what I want. Only William has had luck in that department.”

“Well, then maybe they’ll surprise you.”

The rest of the morning Penny put my driver, Greg, and I to good use. She had us ferrying boxes of things from the office out to the plush golf course that only the wealthiest could afford. We helped erect the displays designed to elicit as much money and guilt from them as they enjoyed their luxuries, and picked up elite equipment from some of the most prestigious stores in Manhattan.

By the time we were ready for the guests to arrive, I was already completely exhausted, and hadn’t even started the eighteen holes that were on the agenda. I wondered how Penny usually managed all of this, when it was only her and a handful of volunteers, especially considering her recent ill health.

But it was all worth it in the end. She was proven right. The auctions for who got to accompany me around the links was a huge success. I often wondered what people thought they might get from having ties to my family. It wasn’t as if we held any real power, we certainly didn’t endorse any companies or brands, and never showed we had any kinds of political affiliations. I guessed it came down to good old-fashioned snobbery. People wanted to say they had dined with a princess, played golf with a prince, or danced with a queen to improve their own social standing and position in their circles. It was the ultimate in one-upmanship.

I was “won” by a jovial chap from Texas with a big booming voice and an even bigger Stetson. I loved him immediately.

Henry Marshall didn’t care whether he followed protocol or not, he simply wanted to have a good time and get a great story to take home and tell the folks back at his huge ranch. He was an oil billionaire, but fancied himself a cowboy. He cracked jokes that would have turned even the most seasoned squaddies ears red, but he genuinely seemed to care about the camps.

“Have you ever been out there?” I asked him.

“Nope, not yet,” he said as he teed up his shot. “But I’d like to. Help out, you know.”

“I was there a short while ago. It is pretty bleak, and having people around who care, and who can help deliver the equipment and the drugs are vital. They need all the help they can get.”

“Hell, I’d be no good in a crisis, faint at the sight of blood, but, son, I have a large wallet, and good contacts in Big Pharma. Just you tell young Dr. Penny to get me a list!” he said generously. I grinned at him. “She’s something isn’t she? I mean, great doctor doing everything she can out there, comes home sick and is probably even busier doing all this. Puts us all to shame.”

“Yes, she does,” I agreed wholeheartedly. “But, I think she’ll go back soon enough. She may run a mean event, but she’s an awe-inspiring medic. The kids out there love her.”

“Well, like I said, you get her to write me a list, and we will make sure Medica gets it. I have some pretty wealthy friends that I bet I can guilt into opening their fat wallets. I’m sure we can put on a few fundraisers down in Texas too.”

“She, and I, would be most grateful.”

Later Malcolm Lindbergh joined us on the final green. He looked dapper in his herringbone trousers and sun visor.

“Henry was just telling me how much he looks forward to being able to help us out.”

“Henry, that is mighty generous of you,” Malcolm said in his own Southern drawl. He was from Louisiana originally, and you didn’t often hear his birthplace so clearly in his speech. But I guessed he was playing it up to make Henry feel more comfortable.

“My pleasure, my pleasure. It will give the wife a new cause to work for. Nobody our way is doing a thing for Africa right now.”

His words jarred with me, as I realised that none of my friends and acquaintances back at home were either, especially not for the refugees in Chad. Mother had offered her name as patron to Medica, but little was actually being done. I remembered the frustration in the camp, that their cause just wasn’t fashionable enough, and I suddenly knew just how much more I could help them. I could be the big name, the name that got them the support.

Hell, my father would probably have an apoplectic fit, but I was convinced that if I gave the press access to me, working at the camps it could raise the profile of the entire situation.

My being on the golf course today had already raised them an extra $500,000, from the auction alone. I had Henry’s promises of support, and would ensure I extracted similar ones from the other attendees when we all adjourned to the clubhouse. I could guarantee that Angel, Penny, and Amy got the extra staff, the extra equipment and supplies, and all just because I was a member of the Royal Family… I could use it all to my advantage. It was like a light bulb had finally decided to switch on, illuminating my failure to not think of it sooner.

I had recently been so despondent about my place in my family, the strictures and the expectations, but I could now see the benefits. I knew I was supposed to remain aloof, to help many charities, yet this one was so forgotten, so overlooked. And it truly mattered to me in a way that cancer research, or a children’s hospital—though inherently worthy—would never satisfy me.

In the clubhouse, I grabbed Penny and dragged her into a side room. I needed to talk to her, to get her thoughts.

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing. Everything is perfect,” I said and told her my idea. She looked at me thoughtfully, and then reached up onto her tiptoes and kissed me warmly.

“I think it is a great idea but aren’t you already going to be upsetting your poor parents enough?” She said it so calmly that I could hardly believe she had said it.

“Penny, you think it could work?”

“Of course it could. Angel and I have been wracking our brains trying to work out how on earth we would ever get a big enough celebrity out to us to make a difference. Little did we know we already had one! But, I don’t ever want you to think that my feelings for you have anything to do with what you can do for the charity.”

“I know that. You’ve never asked me for a thing. No, I want to do this. Need to do this. I want to be back out there saving lives. I can be of so much more use to Medica than I can anywhere else.”

“Robert, you were useful to us when you were only a great surgeon. You do not have to be any more than that for us. But, yes, being a great surgeon and getting us the right publicity, you could be a miracle worker.”

“Will you come back out there with me?” I asked, praying she would say yes. That she missed being there as much as I did.

“I will, but remember if you do this publicly, invite the press, then we cannot be together. We would have to work side by side, and have to pretend that we’d never been anything more than colleagues.”

I stopped dead. She still didn’t think I was serious about her. She still thought that I was only going to be with her until they found me someone suitable.

“Penny… my precious Penny. Don’t you dare think less of yourself, my love. How many times do I have to tell you before you’re convinced? I’m not ever doing anything ever again without you by my side. If it means that I am shunned by my family and the world, then so be it. Hell, in a way if I am disowned, it could get us even more publicity for Medica!”

“No, Robert, I told you I won’t ask you to give up your family for me. I know you want your own life, to be able to make your own choices, but they won’t ever accept me.”

“You haven’t asked me. This is my choice. Besides as soon as they meet you they’ll fall in love just as I did. And if not, well, we shall have to make them see how wonderful you are then. Maybe, if they see what everyone else sees, they will realise their obsession with pretentious bloodlines means nothing. You are the most generous, intelligent, sparkly, honourable woman I have ever known. They will love you for that.”

“But not to marry you,” she said baldly. “Do what you must, Robert. I’ll always be here for you. But I told you before, don’t burn bridges for me. I’ll be with you anyway. I could never be with anyone else… not now.”

The words should have had my heart singing. Though she hadn’t used the words, she was telling me she loved me so much she would accept whatever I could offer her… even if it meant keeping our relationship a secret forever.

But it just made me feel sad that she felt it needed to be said at all and because that I couldn’t convince her that I wasn’t just doing it for her, but for us, for myself.

I held her close to me, feeling her heart beating against my chest. I could sense her fears, they mirrored my own. I didn’t want to lose my family. But I would gladly cut ties with them if they forced me to.