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He’d sold the role of queen to the highest bidder.
The target of his anger shifted from Celestine to himself. He’d been the one to agree to his father and Max’s ridiculous contract. He’d been twenty-six and already as involved as Daxon would allow him to be in Linnaea’s operations. Celestine had been all of nineteen, barely out of school and entertaining wide-eyed fantasies of being a princess. The moment he’d met her in the palace throne room, a little-used elegant hall Daxon had picked to impress his audience, he’d known she was too young to fully understand what she was agreeing to.
But he’d signed. He’d signed the contract and sold not only his soul but that of a young woman to two devils who cared more about their own interests than the well-being of a country.
The picture from the club flashed in his mind again. He might have made a mistake nine years ago, but Celestine had made her own choices in that time. Her behavior had grown increasingly erratic, the tabloid features more embarrassing, especially since she’d quit college.
When she’d answered the phone, her groggy voice had quickly sharpened into a razor blade as she’d asked if he was calling to be a “stick-in-the-mud.” He’d told her he was done, that either she cease her partying and set a wedding date or he would call her father to renegotiate. She’d responded with four words: “Go ahead. I’m done.”
A different kind of tension tightened his back. He kept his eyes trained on the mountain peaks beyond the lake. A familiar, dependable sight. Better to focus on that than the heightened awareness of his secretary.
Executive assistant, he acknowledged internally with a slight quirk of his lips. Clara despised being called “secretary.”
“I’m a prince, Clara. Not a hero in a fairy tale. The engagement was never about love or even compatibility. It’s always been about money.”
He spat the last word out. He’d spent his entire life fighting to distance himself from his father’s legacy of womanizing, drinking and spending what little wealth Linnaea had.
Yet here he was, obsessing over money. That one of his first thoughts had been satisfaction that, because Celestine had been the one to break the engagement, Linnaea would still receive a handsome payout from Osborne Construction, said enough about who he had become and what his priorities were. He’d almost dragged a very reluctant bride to the altar for her fortune.
Revulsion rippled through him.
“I’ve prepared an initial statement for your approval—”
“Send it.”
He felt more than heard her huff.
“I need your approval.”
“Granted.”
A louder sigh.
“That’s not how this works, Your Highness.”
The quelling glance he delivered over his shoulder didn’t stop Clara’s determined march across the room. The closer she got, the tauter his muscles grew.
She stopped next to him and handed him the tablet, a document now replacing Celestine’s photo. He focused on the black-and-white text. Better that than the tantalizing floral sweetness teasing him.
Prince Alaric Van Ambrose and Miss Celestine Osborne have announced they are no longer engaged. They wish each other the best...
His lips twisted. Celestine’s voice, shrill and frazzled, echoed in his ears. Somehow her screaming that she wouldn’t be caught dead in a marriage to a stone-cold bastard or stuck living in a frozen backwater country didn’t align with “wishing him the best.”
“Fine.”
The tablet disappeared. Clara, unfortunately, didn’t. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw her attention drop down to the tablet as she tapped something out. The glow of the screen lit her delicate profile.
He knew the exact moment Clara had gone from being trusted employee and confidant to something more. Someone he could depend on, someone he looked forward to seeing.
The first few years of their engagement, Alaric had kept his distance from his fiancée. Celestine had seemed so young. Neither of them had been in a rush to get married, not while Max’s construction projects finally flooded some much-needed cash and prestige into Linnaea. Clara had told him after the signing of the contract that she intended to live the next few years as she saw fit, including dating. Given that he’d known her for less than an hour, he’d been all too glad to agree.
Idiot.
While he’d been busy building up Linnaea behind the scenes and indulging in the occasional discreet affair, Celestine had started to act out, each year getting worse and worse as they neared the end of the engagement period. The last couple of years, he’d ceased his romantic involvements and tried to get to know his future wife better. He’d despised what he saw: a pampered, spoiled heiress who could have done anything with her life and instead chose to overindulge in the same manner his father did.
But he was not going to go back on his word or risk Linnaea’s financial future.
It was why a year ago, the day before the annual Christmas Eve ball at the palace, he’d sought solace in his private gym downstairs when Celestine had shown up to a dinner with Linnaea’s top officials already tipsy and wearing a dress better described as a shirt given how little it covered.
