of the same. Your grandfather was a warlord. Your uncle was a playboy. Your cousin was a wastrel, and his sons were already mixing with women of the worst kind.’ Josef heaved a sigh and laid the newspaper aside. ‘Now it’s up to you, boy, to fix the mess.’
‘I have messes of my own to fix.’
‘Not as big as this one. Your Highness—’
‘Don’t call me that.’
‘It’s who you are,’ Josef said simply. ‘You’re Marc Pierre Henri de Falken, Crown Prince of Falkenstein. After your coronation you’ll be His Majesty.’ He hesitated but then forged on. ‘And, might I say, this tragedy is appalling, but for the country it may well be a force for good.’
‘I’m no prince,’ Marc exploded. ‘I’m a surgeon and I need to stay a surgeon. If you look at the mess our country’s health system is in...’
‘That’s why you have no choice but to take the throne.’ There’d been hours now to take in the news, and the country’s chief administrator obviously saw the path ahead as being without obstacles. ‘You’ve been doing your best with rundown hospitals, fighting for funds from a royal family who doesn’t care. Now the reins are yours. Think of the bigger picture. The schools. The courts. Our welfare system. If you refuse the throne then it goes to Ranald de Bougier, and heaven help us if that happens. He’ll propel us back to war.’
‘But I don’t want it.’
Marc took his coffee and stood at the vast bay window of the King’s private dining room. Though it was the informal part of the palace, even this part was intimidating.
Marc’s father had been the ignored younger son of the King. He’d been a pacifist who had hated his father’s warlike tendencies. He’d studied medicine, he’d struggled to build the country’s health system and he’d been appalled when the King propelled the country into a meaningless border conflict.
Marc had only been in this palace once, as an awed seven-year-old, brought to be introduced to a family his parents had little to do with. There’d been continual fights about health funding and then an epic fight when war broke out. Marc had never been back. Until now.
Marc raked his long surgeon’s fingers through his dark hair and stared into the future with horror.
He glanced through to the family’s ‘informal’ sitting room. It was an opulent display of gilt, brocades and priceless furniture.
He wanted nothing to do with it.
The huge mirror above the dining room’s massive fireplace showed Marc as he was, a thirty-five-year-old surgeon, a man who was weary from operating until midnight and who’d been brought to the palace straight from Theatre. After four hours of horrified discussion, he’d fallen asleep in his clothes. He was wearing faded jeans and a plain white T-shirt. He hadn’t had time to shave.
A king? Ha!
‘I can’t,’ he said simply. ‘I love my work.’
‘You have no choice,’ Josef told him, and Marc thought of the mess the country’s healthcare system was in, of the theatres without equipment, of the rundown hospitals, of the endless waiting lists.
If he turned his back on the throne, he could do more of what he was doing now. He could save lives, one patient at a time. If he accepted the throne...how many more could he save?
Josef was right. He had no choice, but he felt ill. He dug his hands into his pockets and kicked the heirloom rug at his feet.
‘We need to move on,’ Josef was saying, gently now, obviously knowing his argument had been won. ‘You need to face the press. We need to get you shaved, dressed in something...’ he eyed Marc’s clothes with distaste ‘...more fitting. And we need to have a statement ready. The country’s in uproar. We need reassurance of continuity. Even at this time we need the implication that this tragedy might make things better.’
‘Why? Surely there’s no need to talk of the future yet?’
‘There is a need,’ Josef told him. ‘The country’s desperate for a lifeline. You know there’s no one fit to form government. Marc, we need steadiness and the promise of a better future. Moving on, we need to find you a wife. Get you a son. I believe you’ll make a great king, and your sons after you.’
And that made Marc think of something else. Something that had played on his mind many times these past ten years. Something else that made him unfit to be royal.
He hesitated but it had to be said.
‘There may be another...issue.’
‘Yes?’ Josef looked as if nothing could surprise him, but Marc knew this would.
‘I have a son.’
He was right. To say Josef looked stunned would be an understatement.
Marc refilled his coffee mug and realised this was the first time ever that he’d said those words.
I have a son. The words seemed unreal in this situation that was already unreal. Having a son was part of another world. And yet, when it was said out loud it assumed a reality that shocked him as well as Josef.
He watched the colour drain from the old man’s face. His grandfather’s and then his uncle’s reign had been marred by scandal after scandal, Marc knew, and now he was asking Josef to cope with more. He was under no illusions as to the old man’s role in the royal household. Somehow Josef had kept the royal family intact, holding the country together. He’d served his country with honour. He didn’t deserve to have to cope with this.
‘A son...’ Josef whispered. ‘Where? When?’
‘You knew I was married, briefly?’
‘I...yes.’ The old man was struggling to regroup, sifting long-forgotten information about a Marc he barely knew, a doctor on the outer fringes of the royal family. ‘I had heard that,’ he said. ‘It was just after you qualified as a doctor, wasn’t it? In Australia. A momentary aberration. You came home when war broke out. The divorce was almost immediate?’
‘It was,’ Marc said heavily. ‘The marriage was...a mistake. I didn’t know Ellie was pregnant when we separated, and the child was born well after I returned. A son.’
‘It was never said.’
‘There was no need. Neither of us was in a position to keep a child. I was flying back into a war zone. Ellie was a second-year medical student and she wished to continue. The baby was adopted at birth.’
‘Formally adopted?’
‘Yes.’
‘Do you know the adoptive parents?’
‘No. I had nothing to do with the adoption.’
He watched Josef think through the ramifications while he considered a third coffee. Josef’s background was legal, Marc knew, and he’d spent a lifetime getting the royal family out of trouble. Scotching scandals was his principal skill. Marc could almost see the cogs whirring.
‘There should be no concern,’ he said at last. ‘This was a child conceived in an impulsive marriage when you were little more than a child yourself. If he’s been formally adopted, there can be no claim on inheritance. That can be explained to him if there’s ever contact. But then...’ he hesitated ‘...there may be more immediate repercussions. As the unexpected heir to the throne, you’ll face media scrutiny of the worst kind. The country hardly knows you, so the media frenzy will be extraordinary. They’ll dig out this old marriage. Where’s your ex-wife now?’
‘I presume she’s still in Australia. I haven’t spoken to her in years.’
‘Tell me about her.’
He was too tired for this. He was too tired for everything. To be dredging up memories of Ellie...
But, strangely, it was easy. She should