1. Xander

CHAPTER 1

XANDER

“ Y ou’re going to run this monarchy into the ground!” Jorge slams his hand down on the table as he stands, gray hair slicked back and dark brown eyes blazing as he glares at me.

Atticus sighs, nodding to the chair. “Sit down, Jorge. This may be bad, but there’s no need for dramatics. I’m sure we can find a way to handle this without the show.”

Jorge gestures to me, standing up taller. “He’s been king for four months now, and not a single one of the people he rules over has faith in his ability to lead.”

“I think that’s a bit of an exaggeration,” I say, trying not to let the insult get to me. It’s better if it rolls off my back. Allowing it to jade me would only give Jorge more power.

As it stands right now, he’s already overstepping the bounds as my advisor, but I need him.

At least until I know what I’m doing, but I don’t know if that day is ever going to come.

All of this was easier for my brother. Yorgos was raised as the heir of Katastinia. We always knew that he was going to wear the crown, so he was the brother who sat through the political lessons and learned how to win over the hearts of the public.

Now that the crown is mine, the public doesn’t seem likely to accept me anytime soon.

“Public perception is low, and falling.” Atticus leans closer to me, shoving a report of the latest poll in my direction. “You may be their king, but right now it looks like you’re never going to escape the playboy reputation you created.”

“How the hell was I supposed to know that I would be taking over the throne?” I pick up the paper, eyes widening when I see my approval rating has fallen seven points from last month.

I was the spare son. The one born just in case something happened to my brother. Nobody ever expected me to take the throne.

Even my being in this room now, surrounded by all the portraits of those who came before me, is an anomaly.

Jorge’s chair squeaks against the floor as he sits back down. “I told you that people don’t think you’re responsible enough to rule over them. They think you’re too young and too immature, which means that we need to start thinking of how to change that.”

I shove the poll away, looking to my other advisors. Without a word, they dump several magazines on the marble table, the glossy pages shining as they skate across the surface.

Each one features a picture of me and a different woman on the cover.

Though not one of the magazines is from the last four months, it seems that erasing my past is going to be harder than I imagined.

And then they drop down the more recent magazines. The ones with headlines proclaiming that I will never be able to live up to Yorgos’s legacy.

According to the media, the country is doomed.

Atticus drags a hand down his face, his fingers raking through the stubble on his chin. “This is a nightmare. If I had known that you had made this much of a mess, I never would’ve agreed to be on this council.”

Jorge snorts. “We’ve been trying to corral the two of you for years, and it’s only now that you’re noticing the problems you’ve caused? This has been a decade in the making.”

“Well, I didn’t expect both my father and my brother to die within the last five years.” My tone is sharp, cutting him down where he sits, sending him slumping back in his seat.

“We know that,” Jorge says, “but you should have been trained to be the heir years ago. You may have the knowledge to do the job, but you didn’t curate your public image like Yorgos did.” He nods to the others to gather the magazines and take them out of the room, leaving only the two of us and Atticus in the room.

Atticus drums his fingers on the table, looking out the window to the festival happening in the town at the bottom of the hill. Though there is little to be seen from here, the sound of the lively music carries up the hill and in through the open windows.

He taps along with the beat as he looks at me. “I think you need to find a wife.”

The ground disappears from beneath me and I’m caught in a free fall, not sure where I’m going to land or if there’s going to be a ledge to save myself on before I hit the jagged rocks at the bottom.

Getting married is the last thing I want to do right now.

The room feels a thousand degrees warmer as I unbutton the top button on my shirt, needing the space to breathe.

“I’m not going to get married, and if that’s the best idea you have, then I’m scared for the future of the country. What happens when there’s actually a crisis?” I force out a stiff chuckle, getting up and pacing to the window with my hands clasped behind my back.

This should be Yorgos in this room right now, not me.

He would get married without a second thought if that’s what the country required of him.

He would do it marching down the aisle with a big smile on his face, too. I’ve never met anyone who loved the country as much as my brother did. Yorgos should be king. His death came too soon, and I have no clue what to do. I feel like I’m drowning as people who are supposed to be helping me are holding my head underwater.

Atticus and Jorge may be trying to do their best, but getting married doesn’t feel like the answer to the country’s problems with me.

They run deeper than simply finding a bride and slotting her into place, hoping that she’ll play along and not expose me for the fake I am.

I have no business sitting on the throne.

“You’re going to have to get married. It’s the only option,” Jorge says, his tone pinched as he rubs his fingers on his temples.

I wish there was something more I could do to fix this, but it seems like nothing will work. I can’t make people like me.

They would be suspicious if I came along with a bride out of nowhere. It wouldn’t be believable, and yet the two men in front of me think it’s the only way to keep the crown.

“You want me to find a woman that’s going to marry me? How do you propose I do that?”

“You need to think about what’s best for the future of the kingdom.” Jorge forces the words out like a parent who’s exasperated with his child.

“I’ve been doing that since the day I buried my brother. Nothing I ever do seems to be enough. I’ve gone to the parades. I’ve put on a smile. I’ve mourned with my people in the streets. They still don’t like me. They don’t think I’m capable, and I can’t do anything to change that.”

Atticus rolls his eyes. “You’ve always had a flair for the dramatic.”

Jorge leans back in his seat, crossing one leg over the other, his foot bouncing in the air. “I think we need to give some serious thought to this marriage idea. Atticus is onto something.”

“He’s onto nothing. Do you honestly think those people down there are going to believe I’m getting married? I haven’t been with a woman seriously in years. The only stable relationship I had was when I was twenty. I’m twenty-eight now, and I still have no clue what I’m doing. Our country’s people are going to see right through it.”

“We’ll just have to fake it, then. You’re going to pretend that you’ve been dating some woman for months. Maybe a year. Then all you have to do is convince the public that you love her and want to marry her.” Jorge shrugs one shoulder. “It’s simple.”

“It’s insane!” I say and throw my hands in the air.

Atticus smiles wider, his face lighting up. “This is the perfect plan. You’re going to find a woman that the press will love. Somebody who relates to the people.”

“So, you want me to marry a commoner?” I snort, leaning against the windowsill, looking down at the people in the streets as they make their way towards the castle. “And here I thought that the monarchy was supposed to marry for connections and control.”

“You need to think in a broader aspect,” Jorge replies. “Marrying someone who has nothing to do with the crown or the monarchy or the nobility is marrying for connections. You need a connection to the people. She would be that.”

I turn around and face them both, pinching the bridge of my nose. Both of them are grinning like fools, like this is the best idea they’ve ever had. I fail to see how two men who are both so intelligent in their own right have come up with something as asinine as marrying a woman I don’t know.

I take a deep breath, trying to hold my temper. “And what are you going to do, hold auditions for this woman? You don’t think that people will notice? We have to give them more credit than you’re giving them right now. If you start a search for my next wife, even in secrecy, it’s going to get around.”

“That it would, which is why you’re going on your own.” Atticus stands, looping an arm over my shoulders and hauling me back to the table, motioning me down into my seat. “You’re going to go out and blend in with the people out there. Find a woman who needs money. A lot of money.”

Steam would be pouring out of my ears right now if it could. “Oh, I see. There’s not a woman out there who’d want to marry me, so we’re going to bribe one to do it?”

Jorge shakes his head, his frown deepening as he looks between me and Atticus. “No, we can’t go and have you bribing women. That would be a whole other level of media trouble that I’m not willing to deal with right now.”

“I don’t see why we have to deal with it at all,” I bite out. “I’ll just go to more charity events and host more balls. Invite the townspeople into the castle. Show them that they don’t have to worry about me. Somehow prove to them that I have their best interests at heart.”

“Do you?”

For a brief second, I think of kicking Jorge out of the meeting room. I could strip him of all powers he has as an advisor, forcing him to go back to living in town in whatever little hovel he can find instead of the fancy mansion he has out in the country.

“Yes. I may not be Yorgos, but I do have their best interests at heart. I just don’t know how to make them believe that. Yorgos was so much better trained for this role than I was. He was suited for the crown.”

“Well, maybe you should have been there, right there alongside your brother, learning how to be king.” Jorge sniffs the air, looking down his nose at me.

If not for the fact that he served as an advisor to my dad before he died, he would be out of this room right now.

I don’t know how much longer I can put up with him, but I know that I’m reaching the end of my rope.

“Yorgos was eight years older than me. He didn’t want me hanging around. He had a future job to focus on. He was supposed to have kids long before he died, kids that would take over the crown and let me live in peace.”

Atticus smirks as he sits down beside me, kicking his heels up on the table and leaning back in his chair. “Cousin, I would watch what you say in regard to leaving you in peace and not wearing the crown. You don’t exactly have a fan club knocking down your door right now. You don’t need to make it worse.”

“That’s exactly what you’re trying to do with this marriage business.” I’m about to list all the ways this can go wrong when Jorge clears his throat.

“I think that you should take some time to think about it,” he says, standing up from the table. He bows to me before heading to the wooden door and leaving, shutting it with a heavy thud behind him.

As soon as we’re alone, I turn to Atticus. “You must be losing your mind. I can’t believe you think that I should be marrying some random woman to try and gain the country’s approval.”

He meets my gaze steadily. “Really, cousin. What do you have to lose?”