Page 24

HUGO

M y schedule sits on my desk like a shield, each hour blocked in perfect rectangles of duty and obligation. It’s been three days since Emily left, but I don’t count days anymore. I count meetings attended, documents signed.

My hands hover over my keyboard, numb from typing since dawn, but I feel a warmth in my chest, an uncomfortable heat that I recognize not as heartburn from the coffee I’ve been drinking like water, but as something worse — regret.

“Your Highness?” Maurice knocks at the door to my office, his voice hesitant. “The minister of finance is waiting in the conference room.”

“Tell him I’ll be there in five minutes,” I say without looking up from my computer screen, where budget figures swim before my tired eyes.

When the door clicks shut, I lean back in my chair and rub my face. The stubble on my jaw feels like sandpaper. I’ve forgotten to shave again, and I don’t give a damn.

Emily would notice the stubble. She’d probably make some joke about me trying to look rugged for the cameras, her eyes catching the light as she laughed. But Emily isn’t here to notice anything about me anymore, and that is the bed I made for myself, isn’t it?

I push back from my desk, straighten my tie, and head to the meeting. One foot in front of the other. One meeting after another. This is what I’m good at now.

By evening, I’ve sat through six meetings, approved a trade agreement, and reviewed plans for next month’s diplomatic visit to London.

My eyes burn from staring at screens and documents all day.

My back aches from sitting too long in uncomfortable chairs, pretending to care about grain tariffs and tourism statistics.

“Your schedule for tomorrow, sir,” Maurice says, placing a freshly printed agenda on my desk. “And Matilde called to confirm your dinner tomorrow evening.”

Matilde. The name takes a moment to register in my exhausted brain.

One of Emily’s matches. From the speed-date event, where she laughed too loud at jokes that weren’t funny.

Emily said we’d be perfect together because we both loved modern art.

I don’t even like modern art; I only told Emily that because I thought Emily liked it.

“Cancel it,” I say, the words coming out sharper than I intended.

“Sir?” Maurice’s eyebrows rise slightly.

“The dinner with Matilde. Cancel it. Tell her I apologize, but state business has come up.”

“Of course, Your Highness.” He hesitates, pen hovering over his notepad. “Should I reschedule?”

I stare at him, at his careful, professional expression that doesn’t quite hide his concern. “No. Don’t reschedule.”

I loosen my tie and feel my shoulders slump. Emily would be disappointed. She put so much effort into finding these matches, creating detailed profiles, arranging perfect dates. And here I am, canceling them without a second thought.

But that’s the point, isn’t it? I never wanted this matchmaking business to succeed. I only agreed to it to get my mother off my back, to prove that I couldn’t be matched, that I wasn’t ready to settle down with some princess or duchess who only wanted the crown. I wanted Emily to fail.

Except now that she has — now that she’s given up on me and walked away — the victory feels hollow.

Maurice is still hovering at the door. Strange. I thought he had already left. Am I starting to lose my mind, or is it lack of sleep muddying up my mental facilities?

“Yes?” I ask him.

“The queen is wondering when you will be able to join her for tea. She has texted you…”

“Tell her I’m busy,” I reply, looking away.

“She was quite insistent, sir. She said, and I quote, ‘Tell my son if he doesn’t come to tea, I will come to him, and no one wants that.’”

I almost smile at that. Almost.

“Fine. Tell her I’ll be there at four.”

The hours pass in a blur of work and more work. I skip lunch, surviving on coffee instead. By four o’clock, my head is pounding and my stomach is empty, but I make my way to my mother’s private sitting room because I know better than to stand her up. Plus I could do with a biscuit or two.

She sits with her back ramrod straight, reading something on her phone. When I enter, she looks up and frowns.

“You look terrible,” she says by way of greeting.

“Thank you, Mother. Always a pleasure to see you too.” I bend to kiss her cheek, and she catches my face between her hands, examining me with critical eyes.

“When was the last time you slept a full night? Or ate a proper meal?”

I shrug and take the seat across from her. “I’ve been busy.”

“Yes, I’ve heard.” She pours tea into delicate porcelain cups, adding two sugars to mine the way I like it. “Everyone in the palace is talking about how Prince Hugo has locked himself away, working all hours, canceling appointments, avoiding his friends.”

“I’m not avoiding anyone. I’m doing my job.”

“Your job is to take care of yourself as well as your country.” She hands me my cup, and I notice the slight tremor in her hands, the new wrinkles around her eyes. “I didn’t push you to find a match so you could work yourself into the ground.”

I take a sip of tea to avoid answering.

“About Emily…” she starts.

The tea burns my tongue. “Emily? What about her? She went back to Los Angeles.” I set my cup down with a clink. “The matchmaking didn’t work out.”

“Yes, I know.” She sighs. “But why? Those women were all perfectly suitable.”

I laugh, a short, bitter sound. “Suitable. What a word.”

My mother waits, her eyes never leaving my face. She has always been patient, knows when to let silence do the work for her. It’s a skill I’ve never mastered.

“Fine,” I say finally. “You want the truth? I never intended to find a match. I agreed to the whole thing to get you off my back, to prove it wouldn’t work. I thought if I went through the motions, eventually you and Emily would give up.”

I expect her to be angry. To lecture me about responsibility and duty and the importance of securing the royal line. Instead, she looks sad, which is somehow worse.

“Oh, Hugo,” she sighs. “You think I don’t know that? I’ve known you your entire life. Did you really believe I couldn’t see through your little game?”

“Then why did you push it?” I ask, confusion replacing defensiveness.

“Because I saw something you didn’t.” She sets her cup down and leans forward. “At first, I thought the matchmaking might actually work despite your best efforts. Those women were carefully chosen, after all. But then I saw how you looked at Emily, and I knew.”

“Knew what?” My mouth feels dry suddenly.

“That you were falling in love with her.” She smiles, perhaps more to herself than me. “You looked at her the way your father used to look at me when he thought I wasn’t paying attention.”

“I—I…” do not know what to say.

Yes, I’m in love with Emily. But what good will that information do me now? She’s already decided she wants nothing to do with me.

“Is that why you’ve been working around the clock since she left? Why you look like you haven’t slept in days? Why you’re sitting here now, holding that cup like it’s the only thing keeping you from falling apart?” My mother’s words strike me like bullets, quick, each hitting right after the other.

I look down at my hands, white-knuckled around the delicate china. Slowly, I release my grip.

“It doesn’t matter,” I say quietly. “She’s gone. What was I supposed to do? Fall for my matchmaker? The woman hired to find me someone else? It’s absurd.”

“Love usually is.” Her smile is sad and knowing. “Hugo, you’ve worked so hard these past five years. You stepped up when we needed you most, and I’m so proud of the king you’re becoming. But your father wouldn’t want you to sacrifice your happiness for duty. Neither do I.”

Something cracks inside me, a wall I’ve been carefully maintaining since Emily walked out of the palace and out of my life. The truth spills out before I can stop it.

“I do love her,” I admit, my voice hoarse.

“I love her laugh, and her jokes, and the way she sees through people to what they really need. I love how passionate she is about her work, how she lights up when she talks about love even though she hasn’t found it herself yet.

” I swallow hard. “But I realized it too late. And now she’s gone, back to her life in Los Angeles, probably having already met someone else. ”

“So, what are you going to do about it?” my mother asks.

“Do?” I echo. “There’s nothing to do. I can’t just chase after her. She made the decision to walk away.”

Her lips draw thin. “And you made the decision to not chase.”

I blink at her, unsure of what to say to that. I showed Emily how I felt — or did I?

For all she knows, I’m still the playboy I used to be. Perhaps she believed I was only attempting to bed her.

My cheeks burn at the thought. It makes perfect sense; why would she think otherwise? That is, after all, my track record, and even once I became interested in Emily, I wasn’t thinking about any long-term plans.

Not at first, anyway. But that quickly changed. I quickly changed.

I shake my head, knowing that none of that matters now. Emily has slipped through my fingers nearly as quickly as she appeared in my life. She’s gone, and that is something I will simply have to learn to live with.