It took a few minutes, but they settled on an HEA TV movie about a prince. It took Ryker a minute to recognize the actor.
“That’s Christopher Bayfield.” He paused the screen. “His brother is Prince Alexander, Prince Consort to Queen Christiana.”
“I believe you’re right.”
Nothing in her tone of voice would lead Ryker to believe she’d likely spoken with the prince in the last few days. Pressing play, he watched the story begin to unfold on the screen.
There were far too many inaccuracies for a movie with a royal relative in it, but Mr. Bayfield may not have had enough creative input to matter.
The most glaring had to do with ascending the throne. From what Ryker could tell, the prince’s father had been monarch, but passed a number of years earlier. Now the prince’s mother seemed to be queen and was running things.
Reality said the prince would become king the moment his father died, just like King Benjamin had when King Alfred II’s heart failed. When Queen Elizabeth passed, Prince Charles - reportedly at her side, became King Charles III the moment she took her last breath. In fact, Queen Elizabeth was likely the only monarch in British history not to know the exact moment she ascended the throne, since her father passed unattended in his sleep.
Ryker tried to ignore the erroneous plot points and just take it for what it was - a story, rife with issues, designed to entertain. The target audience didnotinclude members of a royal protection detail, especially male ones.
“This is kind of ridiculous.” Princess Amalia apparently couldn’t keep quiet any longer but did wait for a commercial. She’d know even better than he would what issues there were. “I know Americans don’t have royalty, but even a cursory search online would tell you that an adopted child is ineligible for the throne. The late king simply wanting his adopted son to take over isn’t enough. At bare minimum, it would take an act of their governing body. At worst, a bloody war. Either way, the late king saying ‘Hey, my adopted son is totally capable so we just won’t tell anyone he’s adopted’ is probably treason.”
Before Ryker could say anything, she went on. “Plus this prince would have been king immediately. His mum would be the queen mother. Even if he couldn’t rule in his own right, he’d be king, with a regent to assist him. That’s what happened in both Eyjania and Ravenzario this generation - and the actor’s brother is a part of that world.”
Ryker couldn’t stop his chuckle. “I concur. He may have tried to get things changed, but clearly, it didn’t happen.”
They both winced when someone introduced the queen as “Her Royal Highness” and the prince as “His Majesty.”
“If he’s a prince, he’s an HRH,” the princess pointed out. “He’d only be ‘Your Majesty’ if he’s king. His mum would still be ‘Your Majesty’ as queen mother and former queen consort.” She let out a very unladylike snort. “This is completely ridiculous.”
“It is a bit much,” he conceded. “The likely target audience for this film either doesn’t know any better, doesn’t care, or turns it into a drinking game.”
She continued to mutter as the prince-who-should-already-be-king-if-he-wasn’t-adopted and his love interest wound up in a snowball fight.
Ryker checked his watch as it buzzed then paused the movie just as the two leads looked like they were about to kiss. If they followed the standard plot, this would be the first of two or three near misses. “It’s time to get ready. We need to leave in about ten minutes.”
Princess Amalia nodded then stood. “Can we finish later?” She didn’t look at him as she asked.
“Want to know what happens?” He grinned as she looked at the ground. “Me, too. Even though they have to get a happily ever after. It’s baked right into the name of the channel.”
In a few minutes, they were both ready to leave. Ryker extended his arm. “May I escort you to dinner?”
She gave him the most genuine smile he’d seen so far. “That would be lovely.”
* * *
TrustingRyker so completely should have scared Amalia far more than it did.
But with her hand tucked securely in his arm, she felt safer than she had in quite some time.
Not that she didn’t trust her security team implicitly, but this felt different.
From the time she was old enough to understand, Amalia had been warned not to trust anyone who hadn’t been vetted by the security team. Even her friends were subject to being checked out.
Not that she’d had many.
Being the presumed second to the throne didn’t exactly lend itself to true friendships.
Becoming the official third didn’t either.
Not when your older half-sister had been missing for just shy of twenty-four years, since hours after her birth, and reappeared looking like a younger version of your mother.
Complete with a fiancé.
