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CHAPTER ONE
AMALIAMONTAIGNEONLYrealized how much she loved her life when it was taken from her.
She supposed there was a lesson in that, little as she enjoyed learning it. She had been raised as the Crown Princess of Ile d’Montagne, a tiny island country in the Mediterranean, with her every move pored over and scrutinized by friend, foe, and paparazzo alike as she learned how to walk in the footsteps of her formidable mother, Queen Esme.
Her main concern throughout her life so far had been the attempt to carve out a space in that fishbowl existence to beher.Not the Princess, bound by duty and convention. Not the public figure, owned by anyone and everyone who looked at her. A woman with a real life of her own, however hidden away from view.
Butreal lifewasn’t easy to come by for a woman in her position. Her single experience with it had ended badly. And as far as she could tell, her mother had abdicated her own real life, such as it was, in service to the crown long ago. All Esme spoke of was her throne, her legacy—not as a mother, but as a queen. If she had private thoughts about anything else, she usually kept them to herself.
Amalia had been determined thatshewould not do the same.Shewould live up to the expectations placed upon heras wellas create a place, somewhere in the swirl of duty and honor and obligation, where she could be entirely herself.
She hadn’t been succeeding in that objective, but now it no longer mattered. The truth had come out, shocking the world and turning her life—real or otherwise—inside out. Princess Amalia of Ile d’Montagne had been switched at birth. Or, rather, three days after her birth, to be precise—with the daughter of a farmer from Kansas. And the girl who had been raised on that farm, the true blue-blooded heir to the throne Amalia had been training to take over her whole life, had gone and married the head of the rebel faction that had been tormenting the Ile d’Montagne royal family for centuries.
Meaning that not only was Amalia not the Crown Princess, the future of her country and her mother’s successor, but the true Princess had returned to claim what was hers with the Montaigne family’s sworn enemy—a neat little bloodless, slow-moving coup that would change the little island country forever. It already had.
Not that it mattered to the actual, real life Amalia who was still a headline at the moment. She assumed she wouldn’t remain one for long. The fascination with her would pass quickly, she had no doubt, and all that attention would shine on someone else, instead. Probably actual princesses, including the one she had been unwittingly masquerading as all this time. Amalia’s name would be trotted out every decade or so to kick up the scandal anew and sell papers, that was all. Especially once Delaney Clark, the true heir, became Queen. And the more obscure Amalia became in the meantime, the more the greedy tabloid consumers would love it.
Can youbelievethatshewas almost a queen?they would tut on their morning commutes, or standing in their checkout lines.
The upshot of all this was, for the first time in her life, Amalia could have been anyone at all.
What she felt most keenly, however, was that she was a newly twenty-five-year-old woman who had no idea what to do now that her destiny wasn’t mapped out before her, step by step, until death. Now she had nothing to do, for the rest of her life, but beherself.
Whoeverthatwas.
“Are you ready?”
Amalia smiled at theaide who stood with herin thesmall hall off theentryway to thepalace that the royals used for more privateentrances and exits. Paparazzi were expressly forbidden.BothAmalia andthe impassive woman beside herwere pretending. The aide thatit was perfectly normal that the once futureQueen was slippingaway so ignominiously tonight, with no fanfare and no farewell committee. And Amalia that she was serene about herchange in circumstances.
But then, she had no choice but to act serene. It wasthat or go kicking and screaming, and what would that get her except pity and scorn?Amalia thought she could handle almostanythingbut pity.Shefelt lucky, truly, thather mother hadn’t offered her any—as she rather thought it mighthave killedher.
And she was immune to scorn. A life in the gimlet crosshairs of the public eye had made certainof that. But who knew—maybe a heaping of scorn as a private citizen would do her in too.
Best to puta good face on it, she’d decided.
Amalia was doing her best not to think about it all too closely whileshe was stillhere. Still in the palace where she’d been raised. The palace she considered her home. Instead, she concentrated on waitinggracefully, because she knew her behavior in these final moments would be dissected and retold, no matter howprofessional the aidewas acting while still in her presence. She folded her hands before her and pressed her tongue to the roof of hermouth tokeep her jaw from tightening around her polite smile. She’d used to think of such tricks, used while forever being in publicand watched so closely, as making her mother proud.
Though she had to remindherself—yet again—thatQueenEsme of Ile d’Montagnewas not her mother. No matter thetwenty-fiveyears they’dspent together. It was all washed away as if it had never been.A few blood tests were all it had takento erase their relationship.
It was stunning, really. Breathtaking.Impossible to fully comprehend.
Because at first, the Queen had been defiant.Shall the throne of Ile d’Montagne be toppled by these grubby upstarts?Esmehad thundered.Not on my watch.
If it’s a scam, it’s masterfully done,Amalia had hedged.Truly.
She could remember that moment so clearly. She and the Queen had beentaking their morning meal together, as was their long-held custom.They sat togetherin the Queen’s private salonso thatEsmecould rage about her enemies—almost always the rebels in the mountains, but sometimes theinsufficiently reverentEuropean press—and lecture Amalia on topics ranging from Esme’s strategy for finding suitablemarital prospects forher only child to comprehensive critiques of Amalia’s public appearances.
Amalia had learnedlong ago when to treat these lectures as conversations and when it was better to sit there quietly and listen toHer Majestydeliver a monologue.
‘Masterful’ is not a word I would apply to the likes of Cayetano Arcieri and his obsessive fever dreams of someday taking my throne,Esme had sniffedthat day.
But Cayetano,rebel warlordand thorn in the side of the royal family, had played his hand well. He had married his not-quite-a-farm-girlin secret in his stronghold in the hills. Onlyonce the true Princess had been bound to him foreverhad hegiventhat fateful interviewtoafriendlyBritish paperthathad been hanging onhis every wordsince university. Andin that one, specifically devastating interview, he had dropped—almost as an afterthought—the news that thewoman he’dmarriedwas, believe it or not, the long-lost daughter ofnone other than Esme herself.
Esme, who had suffered thesort of pregnancy complications that had necessitated she fly to America, to the only hospital in the world that specialized in thatexact syndrome, the better to protect her heir. And because of this, was there at the same time as the other mother—my real mother,as Amalia tried to remember to think of her. The nurse who was suspected of having made the mistakeand given the real Princess to the wrong mother couldn’t defend herself, having died years ago.
Two babies switched in a hospital,Cayetano had said in that interview, with the quiet charm that was a hallmark of his media appearances. Inperson, Amalia had always found him more off-putting. Much colder and more...warlord-like, which madesense.Who could imagine such a thing?
And sinceCayetanohad spent the better part of his life building up hismedia relationships in all the right places, making himself the protagonist in the story of Ile d’Montagne instead of thevillain Amalia had always believed him to be, his accusation caught fire.
