His Royal Prize Read Online Free PDF Page B

glamorous lives.
    “He’s different. I know he’s not going out with me so he can get his photo in the society pages.”
    “So you don’t know how to treat him?” Bebe asked.
    “I’m not sure that’s it,” Amelia said. The after-work rush hour had just started and people were hurrying past the window on their way home.
    “Whatever it is, be careful. You don’t want to do something outrageous.”
    She swallowed hard. Bebe was right. She couldn’t afford to let her nerves get the best of her—she tended to act without thought or restraint when that happened, and that meant regrets.
    “I’ll be fine. One more glass of wine and I’m set.”
    Bebe smiled at her. “You look fab. I love turquoise on you.”
    “Thank you, darling. My mother recommended it.”
    “How was Milan?”
    “Fab,” Amelia said, winking at her friend. “In fact, I brought you back a little something.”
    She handed Bebe the shopping bag that she’d carried in with her.
    Bebe took the bag from her but didn’t open it. “What’s going on with you? You’re not yourself. Is it more than that yummy Devonshire heir?”
    Amelia shook her head. Bebe was the one person in the world who knew about all of Auggie’s troubles, and a part of her wanted to just unload on her friend. But she knew exactly what Bebe would say. Don’t enable.
    Hadn’t she heard those exact words from everyone before? She knew that she was to blame. She should just step out of the equation, but letting the Munroe Hotel chain go wasn’t something she was ready to do yet.
    “Nothing.”
    “Is it Auggie?”
    Amelia shook her head in disbelief.
    “How do you do that?”
    “I know you. And it isn’t that hard to figure out. You just visited your mum and everything’s okay there. Your dad is recovering nicely from his surgery, so that leaves Auggie. What’d he do this time?”
    “He needed some time off from work.”
    “And you covered for him?” Bebe asked.
    “Please, don’t. I know I shouldn’t have, but I’m not ready to walk away from the hotel chain yet.”
    Bebe reached across the table and squeezed her hand. “I don’t want to make you feel worse when things are already mucked up. Tell me everything.”
    Amelia spent the next thirty minutes talking to Bebe about the board’s ultimatum that she take over running the hotel chain if Auggie was going to continue skipping out on meetings.
    “Are you going to do it?”
    “I have no idea. I could run both the foundation and the hotel chain, but that would mean giving up my life. I mean, I’d have to work 24/7 to make it happen.”
    “You can’t do that,” Bebe said.
    Amelia knew that. Sometimes she wished she simply were the scandalous heiress that the tabloids made her out to be because it would be so easy to walk away from it all if she were that shallow.
    She needed balance and wanted her life to be more than just her charities and her family business. She wanted to come home to more than Lady Godiva and to have someone who cared about her. Someone who would take care of her the way she watched over Auggie.
    “I have until the next board meeting to decide. So that’s three months.”
    “You’ll come up with a plan,” Bebe said. “I’m here for you, whatever you decide. Just be sure that you’re doing what’s best for you.”
    Bebe gave her a hug as they stood up to leave. As they walked out, Amelia heard whispers about her as she passed. She put on her carefree smile and walked through the crowd. She wasn’t sure she could keep that smile in place all night but she was going to try her damnedest.
    Bebe was the only friend who knew there was more to her than her party-girl image and she intended to keep it that way. No matter how much time and money she donated, the media never covered that. Instead, they only printed stories about who she was seen with. She was afraid to let anyone see the real her, afraid that she’dlose a part of herself if she did, and she wouldn’t be able to