Page 54 of Rogue

Dree

Dree paused, shocked to her bones.

Augustine said he wasa prince,and he was second in line tothe throne?

So, he was going to be akingsomeday?

Then, like, why had he been just standing at the Buddha Bar in Paris?

Prince William couldn’t do that.

Prince Harry couldn’t do that.

Augustine must have an impressive amount of money, though. This hotel was incredible and must cost thousands of dollars per night. Being a prince made some sense.

But, wouldn’t “Prince Augustine” have to live in a castle and inspect hospitals all day and wear a crown and stuff?

Augustine wasn’t doing any of that.

It didn’t make any sense.

It totally didn’t—

Light.

Dawned.

Oh,right.

Augustine waslying to herabout himself,just like she’d asked him to.

Of course,he was lying to her. He’d said he had a job that he was thinking about quitting for something else and had to travel to The Congo next for work.

Duh.He wasn’t aprince.

Dree was LOL’ing at herself for being so gullible, but it was funny, too.

“Oh,”she said, her voice rising and falling in revelation. “Oh, right.Yeah.Sure.Tell me more about Monagasquay,‘Prince Auggie.’”Her grin tempered her sarcasm.

Augustine’s smile widened because he was, after all, pulling her leg. “I’m second in line to the throne, in theory, or at least I would have been in medieval times. About a century ago, around the time of World War I, we changed to an elected monarchy like Denmark had during the Middle Ages.”

Dree looked at him with one eye, turning her head so he would know she had caught on. “We call that apresidentwhen youelectthem.”

Augustine shook his head. “The monarch can’t be just anyone off the street. When we need a new sovereign, the nobles of Monagasquay meet in a council session, and someone is chosen from us to be the sovereign.” Augustine stopped talking for a second because he was biting his lower lip. His dark eyes were laughing at her, and it was fun that they were sharing the joke. “It’s more like how, in the Catholic Church, the cardinals elect one of themselves to be the new pope, rather than an open political election like the commoners have.”

That was kind of confusing. “That’s not how they do it in England, right?”

She knew a little about the world. Not geography, obviously.

Augustine said, “Oh, no. It’s not how Great Britain does it at all. They have an absolute-primogeniture, constitutional monarchy, so the oldest child of the monarch inherits everything. Then, their children would be next in line for the throne, assuming they have kids. If the monarch doesn’t have any living heirs, then their next younger sibling or that person’s heirs would get the throne.”

Yeah, that sounded right. “Oh, that’s why William—”

Augustine sat on the bed and stuck his long legs under the covers. Those jammie pants were garish. “Precisely.”

“But that’s not how Monagasquay works.”

“That’s how Monagasquay used to be, before World War I. However, our monarch died on the eve of the Great War—”