Page 41 of Happily Ever After

“I’ll tell them what you’re doing,” Alexandre said. “I’ll tell them that Flicka is being kept here against her will.”

Pierre shrugged. “I’ll have her say that she’s not.”

Flicka looked down at her clenching hands. Yes, he could do that, and she would stand up there and say it, lest he threaten Alina or herself. That night in Montreux had been so terrible, and her hands started shaking when she even thought about it.

Yes, she would say whatever he wanted her to.

“She divorced you,” Wulfram told Pierre. “You’re not eligible to be the Catholic prince of this Catholiccountry.”

Pierre shrugged. “As my wife has returned, no one will have the objection that I’ve been divorced. If I need to, I’ll remarry Flicka in the chapel here in the palace with the council as witnesses.”

Wulf demanded, “You’ll take the economy of the country of Monaco down with you, rather than let Flicka go?”

“Like you said, I’ll be declared the Prince first, and then I’ll clean up themess. France will loan us the money. Our treaties with them will hold. Besides, I’ll have that other marriage to Raphael Mirabaud declared invalid, as Flicka and I never received an annulment.”

“Other marriage?” Wulf asked, and his dark blue eyes tracked to Flicka. “‘Raphael’ isRaphael Mirabaud?”

“Yes,” Flicka said.

Wulf’s expression didn’t change much, but she could see horror rise in hisblue eyes. “Dieter Schwarz isRaphael Mirabaud?”

She nodded, unsure why he was so upset.

“And hemarriedyou?”

Flicka told him, “I married him in Gibraltar three weeks ago.”

His left hand clenched into a fist. “Were you coerced?”

She didn’t want to have this conversation here. “No, of course not.”

“Was it to get away from Pierre somehow?”

“I’ve been in love with Dieter my whole life,” shetold him. “I would have married him when we lived together in London, but he left.”

Wulfram ripped open the manila envelope he held, the one that supposedly held Raphael’s living trust and Alina’s papers.

A small piece of paper fluttered to the ground. Alexandre stooped to retrieve it and stuffed it in his pocket.

Wulfram stared at the birth certificate. “AlinaMirabaud.Her name is AlinaMirabaud.”

Pierre frowned, looking at Flicka with one raised eyebrow. “I thought you were her guardian. Shouldn’t you know the child’s name?”

Wulf growled, “Bring AlinaMirabaudto me right now.”

“Wulfie?” Flicka asked him.

“I meant every word I said,” he told her. “When you’re safe atSchloss Marienburgor my house in the States, I will pull back my wolves. This is between Dieter and me, andevidently, we have a great deal to discuss.”

Pierre glanced at Flicka, looking troubled. “I cannot, in good conscience, hand over a child to you when you didn’t even know her correct name.Iknew her name was Alina Mirabaud.”

Wulf plunged his hand into the envelope and came up with a blue-bound passport. He opened it. “This passport shows the picture ofAlina Mirabaud.This living trust dictatesthat I am to have custody ofAlina Mirabaudin the case that her parent,” he read the paperwork,“Raphael Mirabaudis dead or missing for longer than a week. The fact that I called her a different name does not matter. I will take this child identified in this passport into my custody, as stated in this living trust from her father and only legal parent, and I will do itright now.”

Pierre sighed.“I can’t argue with that, and I don’t have time to be tied up in court hearings over a child that isn’t even mine. Flicka, bring Alina.”

Flicka hurried from the throne room, through the hallways, and to her apartment, the Princess Grace suite.

Secret Service officers trailed her the whole way.