Royally Arranged (Royally Kissed)

Chapter One

Frederic

I drag my fingers through my hair as I pull my brows together so tightly, they’re in danger of fusing into a permanent monobrow. Who does Penelope Pemberley-Price think she is, proposing I marry some random princess I’ve met a total of twice in my life?

And all because I smiled at her.

Who could ever take such an idea seriously?

I scoff as I study the photo that accompanies this absurd fantasy of an article. “The evidence”, if you will. It’s true that I’m looking at Princess Astrid. It’s also true that I have a smile on my face. But that’s as far as it goes.

I know. I was there.

Unlike Penelope Pemberley-Price.

I recall the day well. Princess Astrid had somewhat impulsively cheered up a group of sick children at the hospital we’d visited together in Scandora, the capital city of Elkevik, by breaking into an impromptu dance on the balcony in the rain.

Of course I was going to smile. She did the robot, for goodness sake! It was utterly ridiculous.

Not that Princess Astrid was ridiculous exactly.

Between you and me, she was really quite charming.

Of course, she’s beautiful, with her bright blonde hair that seems to glow in the sun, pretty blue eyes that sparkle like stars, and delicate features.

But there’s more to her than just her good looks.

She’s got this light to her, a kind of joy that you just don’t see in grown women.

I’ve no idea how she manages it, but she sees the positive in almost everything.

There's something fresh and authentic about her. It’s hard not to be drawn to someone like that when you’re… well, when you’re not those things.

But the idea I’m in love with her? That we should be married? Preposterous.

She’d be a complete diplomatic disaster waiting to happen as my wife, with her impulsive behavior. Case in point, dancing in front of a group of children at the hospital to cheer them up.

Need I say more?

I huff out a breath before taking a sip of tea.

“Are you quite all right, darling?” Mother asks from across the breakfast table.

“Fine,” I mumble, feeling anything but.

“I see that feisty Member of Parliament is at it again,” Father says, his newspaper gripped in both hands.

“The referendum, dear?” Mother asks as she stirs her tea, her spoon making a delicate tinkling sound against the fine bone china.

Father lowers the paper and gives her a grim smile. “They’re like a broken record about that bloody referendum at the moment, and I really don’t understand why. Are we so very terrible for this country?”

“Of course we’re not, darling. But what can we do about it?” she asks, the familiar lines of worry appearing on her forehead.

“If I had that answer, my darling, I would tell you,” Father replies.

“If the Ledonian people vote to get rid of us, that will be it. A thousand years of monarchy gone, just like that,” Mother says with a shake of her head.

“Penelope Pemberley-Price has an idea,” I say.

“Oh? What’s that, Frederic?” Mother asks.

“She suggests I marry Princess Astrid of Elkevik simply because there’s a photo of me in the paper smiling at her.

” I brandish the paper in my fist. “Apparently, it’s the solution to both our countries’ woes.

” I wait for their laughter. When neither of my parents react with the surprised chortle I expect, I add, “Isn’t that the most utterly ludicrous thing you’ve ever heard? ”

All they do is share a look between themselves.

“I don’t know, darling,” Mother says with forced lightness.

“Your twenty-eighth birthday is in less than three months. If you were a woman, we’d be arranging your marriage by now.

The fact that you’re a man so the rule doesn’t apply to you is rather sexist and outdated in my opinion. This is the 1990s, not the 1890s.”

I harrumph. I turn twenty-eight in eleven weeks and four days, to be precise, and I'm fully aware of the ancient Ledonian rule that any female member of the royal family not married by the time they reach that age enters a marriage arranged by their parents.

“Sexist as it may be, Mother, but the rule does not apply to me, as you rightfully point out. The fact I’m turning twenty-eight soon should be neither here nor there.”

“Because you’re planning to make a love match?” she leads.

I pinch my lips together. “Indeed.”

The fact I've never actually been in love is quite beside the point.

“Would it be so terrible to marry someone as pretty as Astrid, darling? She is a princess, and princesses your age are few and far between,” Mother says.

I blink at her in disbelief. Has she had too much tea this morning, and it’s somehow scrambled her ability to think straight?

“You’re not serious,” I scoff.

My parents share another look.

What is going on?

“Perfectly serious, darling. Penelope Pemberley-Price might be onto something,” my mother declares, and I could fall right off my chair.

“Did you know about this marriage idea before now?” I question, my gaze darting between my parents with what I can only describe as mounting panic.

Father answers in a careful tone, “We’ve discussed it before, son. As your mother points out, you’re almost twenty-eight, after all. Time is a-ticking.”

I lean back in my chair, my brain racing to make sense of this. I’d raised Pemberley-Price’s idea as something for us to laugh at, not consider.

Have I slipped into a parallel universe in which royal correspondent’s random ideas are taken seriously?

“What do you think of marrying Princess Astrid, Frederic?” Mother asks, and both sets of parental eyes watch me closely for my reaction.

“I think it’s an absolutely preposterous idea,” I reply with a note of finality in my voice.

“Darling,” Mother says. Her tone is slightly condescending, if you ask me. “Surely it’s something to very much consider? The match would not only be advantageous to both Elkevik and Ledonia, but Astrid is so well liked among her people.”

It would seem my mother has well and truly drunk Pemberley-Price’s Kool-Aid.

I turn to my father, always the reasonable one. “What do you think, Father?”

“I think Princess Astrid is very sweet and pretty, and you could do a lot worse,” he replies, without really replying.

I blink at them. “Are you saying I should do what this opinionated journalist has decided is a good idea simply because I was caught on camera smiling at her?”

“Well, to be fair, darling, you don’t smile all that often,” Mother says.

“It’s more of a grimace most of the time,” Father adds helpfully.

I can’t argue with them. I’m not exactly the smiley type.

Life is far too serious for smiling. People like Princess Astrid smile continually, and that’s fine for her.

She’s a minor royal from a tiny kingdom off the coast of Norway with a population of about ten people.

She loves her chickens and her dogs and her Wellington boots.

Oh, and dancing in the rain to amuse sick children.

Me? I’m none of those things. Ledonia is considerably larger than Elkevik, and right now, thanks to the possibility of a referendum on the royal family’s very existence, we’re all under threat.

What’s there to smile about, I ask you?

“If nothing else, think of the benefit to our two countries,” Father says, switching into his let’s be reasonable tone. It’s the tone he often uses with my younger sister, Francesca, but rarely with me.

I don’t need it. I’m always reasonable. I take pride in my reasonableness, in fact.

Father continues. “As you know, Elkevik is in financial straits, thanks to their failed energy deal, and we’re facing rather difficult circumstances ourselves, with this referendum hanging over our heads.”

“But are those any reasons for me to do something as drastic as get married?” I ask.

Why did I come to breakfast this morning? I should have asked for a tray brought to my suite of rooms before going out for a ride, and then none of this would be happening.

“Think of what Lady Diana Spencer did for the British royal family back in the 1980s,” Mother says. “She reinvigorated the entire institution. Breathed fresh life into it.”

“We could hardly hold Charles and Diana up as the ideal royal couple, my dear,” Father protests.

“Isn’t their marriage going down the gurgler?” I counter. “That tell-all book about Diana certainly hogged the headlines around the world.”

Mother waves away my words with a flick of her wrist. “The point is, for quite some years, Diana injected a rather wonderful sense of something new and refreshing into the family. Before she came along, everyone was terribly bored with Prince Charles. They tried to spin it that he was very handsome and adored by women, but really, he was a bit of a… well, a bit of a dishrag, if I’m to be perfectly honest.”

“Mother!” I say, scandalised. “You can’t speak like that about a member of another royal family.”

“It’s only between us, darling,” she replies breezily. “Someone like Princess Astrid could do exactly what Diana did for the Windsors back then. She could inject something new and exciting into our lives. It could turn the public’s opinion of you right around.”

She pointedly lifts the newspaper photo of me smiling at a dancing Astrid, surrounded by happy, laughing children on the deck of the hospital. “She’s a delight, and you seem rather taken with her, too.”

“You did seem to enjoy her smiles,” Father adds, one eyebrow raised in my direction.

That’s it. This has gone too far.

“Let’s be reasonable about this. I barely know her. Yes, we got on well enough, if you call her doing all the talking, getting on well.”

“You could do with someone to spark you up, darling,” Mother says.

Father fixes me with a pointed stare. “You’re the ‘Prince Charles’ of Ledonia.”

“No, I’m not! I’m only twenty-seven, and I’m not as stiff and…” I stop mid-sentence because I know exactly where that argument leads.