The Playboy Prince (Piacere Princes, Book One) (5 page)

“Oh, Stef? Please add some kind of wording that makes it clear only ladies of a certain standard will be considered. You know what I mean.”

He intended to follow the King’s instructions to the letter. If Alfonso wanted a storybook performance from his son, then that’s exactly what he would receive. One ridiculous turn did, after all, deserve another.

The ball would embarrass his father—Salvy felt sure of that. He also knew that once the invitations were in the hands of thousands of their loyal subjects, there would be no way for the King to retract them.

“Whoa, hey, Salvy! I didn’t know you were back.”
 

He looked up to see his older brother, Nico, peering at him through a small slit in the bulletproof windows of his Town Car. “Oh, hey. Yeah, yesterday morning.”

“Get in, I’ll give you a ride.”

Salvy thought about saying he preferred to walk, but in truth, he didn’t. Nico might have been annoyingly perfect but he was also a good brother, and it had been too long since they’d caught up.

He folded himself into the backseat and waited for Nico to motion the driver forward, then raised an eyebrow at his brother. “Are you going to lecture me about the papers, too?”

“No, but I’d appreciate a head’s-up if I’m about to be an uncle.”

Despite the teasing, Salvy could see the evidence stress and fatigue carved into his older brother’s skin. Nico had been devastated by the sudden and terrible loss of his wife, just three years after Elisa’s birth. He’d been living a life of solitude since, though the rumor mill was always busy with speculations of who he might find to replace Eugenie. After witnessing their intense love up close, Salvy had trouble believing anyone would be able to come close.

“You’re not. You know I’m careful.”

“Nothing is foolproof, you know. And your odds are higher than most.”
 

“I’m aware.” Salvy grabbed a bottle of water from the cooler and leaned back into the seat. “What are you doing out today?”

“Elisa’s gotten into a tussle at school. Again.”

“You look tired.”

His brother gave him a worn smile. “Between my daughter and my brother, the press never leaves me alone.”

Salvy felt a pang of guilt at the realization that his lifestyle caused his brother more stress. It wasn’t his intention. “I’m sorry. If you haven’t heard, I’ll be off your docket of things to address soon.”

Well, maybe not
soon.
After the ball, though.

A small seed of doubt landed in Salvy’s stomach and settled in deep. The idea for the tongue-in-cheek response to his father’s demands had seemed so good when it had sparked, and he’d fanned it until it caught fire, but now Salvy began to worry how happy he would be once caught in the flames.

He thought again how little he cared for the idea of a wife in name only. He couldn’t imagine that after living his own real-life fairytale, that Nico would have much stomach for the plan, either.

Nico waved off his apology. “It’s not you, truly, and I’m resigned to Elisa’s issues at this point. But Luca is determined to make all of our lives difficult.”

Salvy’s antenna went up. His cousin liked to stir up trouble wherever he could find it, all the better if it cast a poor light on the King and his sons. “What’s the bastard up to now?”

“I’m not sure, exactly, just rumblings. There have been a couple of op-ed pieces in the paper about a real estate developer who is using illegal tactics to buy people out of their land.”

“You think it’s Luca?”

“I think Luca is looking to cultivate power however he can get it. Land and public unrest are two ways to do that, plus make people upset with us for not taking action.”

“What does Father say?”

Nico shrugged. “We’ve done some investigations, but nothing about the company is turning up illegitimate, not on the surface. Nothing to suggest Luca owns it, and he’s actually been out of the country quite a bit lately. Father doesn’t think he’s behind it, and you know he won’t get involved in private matters unless there’s proof of illegal activity.”

That sounded about right. Alfonso took the same approach with the kingdom as he had with his sons—don’t intervene unless blood is about to be spilled. Typically, the subjects of Cielo appreciated the hands-off style, but they were responsible for these people. If Luca—or anyone—was swindling them, then the Piacere family needed to root out the person behind it.

The car pulled up in front of the guest house that Salvy called home. His brother and niece lived in a converted chapel, which would be Salvy’s once Nico took over the throne.
 

Nico turned to face him, lips set in a line. “I know Father gave you an ultimatum. Even though I’m not a fan of his tactics, I think his heart is in the right place. I know you think you can shirk all of the responsibility of our station because you’re second in line, but the truth is that I need you, Sally.”

Salvy made a face at his brother’s childhood nickname for him. He would beat anyone else’s ass who used it, but Nico got away with pretty much anything because of his ridiculously good nature.
 

“I’m working on it,” he told his brother.

Which, he figured as he let himself inside and headed straight for the shower, was not entirely untrue.

Chapter Four

Magdalena

That damned letter had been on her mind since she’d burned it; there was no reason to wait for another letter, or for another jackass to show up to the house in an attempt to bully her ailing father into selling.

The return address on the letter was in Old Town, next to the village. Magdalena hopped on the bus, sitting as far away as she could from the homeless man fondling himself two rows from the back. Thankfully, even though Arcobaleno was the largest city in Cielo, it still only took twenty minutes to cross from one side to the other.

Once outside, rain poured down, finding ways down her neck and into her wellies despite her raincoat and umbrella. By the time she arrived at the glass office building that housed more than twenty businesses, her skin was ice cold. Winter was tumbling on the heels of fall so quickly; she should have grabbed a hat and scarf, besides.

Magdalena stepped inside and shook the water from her hood, then set her umbrella in the can with several others and sloshed over to consult the directory. Matrigna Holdings was on the top floor, and the sign on the front of the elevator said it was busted.

“Of course it is,” Maggie sighed, heading instead for the ten flights of stairs.

She supposed she could forgo her cardio, if she had time to put such a thing in her schedule to begin with.
 

It took five minutes to climb to the top, and another three to catch her breath in the stairwell before pushing open the door to the hallway. While she waited, she dug the package of donuts from her purse and ate three, to re-fortify herself after the exertion.
 

Better.
 

She followed the numbered offices around the corner to the correct number, her mouth falling open at the state of the room she entered.
 

Boxes were stacked everywhere. Some were open but most were not, and they all threatened to topple onto the only piece of furniture in the small, square space. A woman sat behind the desk filing her nails, apparently unconcerned about her imminent death by falling cardboard. The entire picture made Maggie pause. This couldn’t be the multi-million-dollar corporation threatening to buy up the majority of the kingdom’s land.

Could it?

“Can I help you?” the woman sneered, flipping her long, blond hair over one shoulder.
 

“Is this Matrigna Holdings?”

She snorted. “That’s what it says on the door, right?”

It wasn’t an answer, and Magdalena hadn’t come all this way to ask one question and go back to work. “I’d like to speak to the person in charge.”

“He’s not here.”

“Can you tell me how I can reach him?”

“Lady, even
I
don’t know how to reach him. Never met him, never seen him, but he pays me good money to sit here and answer questions from stupid people like you who think they can beat him.”

The snide response heated Maggie’s blood and she stepped forward, pressing her palms onto the desk. “I could just refuse to leave until you tell him I’m waiting.”

“Don’t much care if you do. Gets pretty boring, though.”

Maggie blew her hair out of her face, glancing down at her watch. Annoyance tripped through her. She needed to get home; her replacement would be there soon and she needed to spend the afternoon training her. “Can I leave a message? Or do you not deliver those, either?”

“Fine by me. He picks up his mail once a week, so I can leave it with the bills.”

Magdalena took her sketchbook from her bag, along with a pen, and scrawled a quick message on a piece of paper before ripping it out. She made sure to reference the parcel number on the notice her father received, as well as a few choice words that advised the man in charge exactly where he could stick his offer.
 

The whole time, her mind toyed with the mystery this office presented. Enough of her countrymen had sold their land already that Matrigna
had
to be legitimate—they’d paid good money to the people who had agreed, and the legal documents that came to the people who hadn’t were from the same law firm the royal family had on retainer.

This office was a front for…what? Who?

It was a question for another day, she supposed, since this one was already heading toward lunch. She left the note on the desk and turned to go, pausing with one hand on the glass door when the woman at the desk cleared her throat.

“Ma’am?”

“Yes?”

“If you know what’s good for you, you’ll pick up that note and put it back in your bag.” The woman swallowed, her large blue eyes trembling with fear. The piece of paper Magdalena had left twitched between her manicured nails as she held it out. “You don’t want to mess with this guy. Not unless you want to know what it feels like to be a bug on the sole of a shoe.”

A stab of fear sliced through Maggie’s belly but she ignored it. It wasn’t stronger than her fury over Matrigna and the way they were corrupting her country. It couldn’t hold a candle to the protectiveness she felt toward her father, and the fact that after years of hard work, he deserved to live out his days on the land he loved.
 

None of those words came out of her mouth. She just turned and left.

The day had dried out, and by the time she returned home, so had Magdalena. She’d walked, despite the lack of time, because she needed to clear her head and her heart. If no one from Matrigna responded to her message within the week, she would have to figure out what to do next. For today, she could feel as if she’d done something, at least. A first step.

A tiny red car sat on the dirt lane in front of the cottage where she lived with her father. It sped up her steps, because the last thing they needed was for the temporary hire to get too close a look at just how fast Gabriel Rossi was deteriorating.
 

She dropped her keys on the front table and exhaled with relief. The temp—a middle-aged woman named Kat—was sitting primly in the foyer perusing something on her phone.
 

“I’m so sorry I’m running late,” Magdalena told her, a frown touching her lips at the sight of a creamy, expensive-looking envelope on the front table with the rest of the mail.
 

The swirly writing was done in gold ink, the seal on the back the unmistakable mark of the Piacere family. She frowned harder, and left the envelope where it was. She wanted as little to do with the royal family as possible, especially since they were refusing to do anything about the predation of Matrigna on their loyal subjects. Whatever they wanted to tell her could wait.

If it were a request for services, someone would have come by directly.

It could be a second royal child announcement. If the tabloids were to be believed, Salvadore had fathered half a dozen children in the past three months alone. The thought twisted Maggie’s stomach, though she couldn’t say for sure why. It was as if something inside her refused to believe the things she’d read, the stories she knew must be true. That little piece—not her brain, to be sure—still clung determinedly to the memory of the boy, and the friend, he had been.