My Prince Read Online Free PDF

fourth floor, her granddaughter was thirteen. Thirteen , George. Don’t know what the world’s coming to, I don’t. Babies having babies and losing it all. Look at you. World at your feet. You didn’t go messing around with girls when you were that age.”
    “I wasn’t interested in girls at that age,” George said, amused. He sipped his tea again. “I wasn’t interested in much apart from football.”
    “Too true. You going tomorrow?”
    “If I can convince either Dad or Maggie to let me have their season ticket, yeah.”
    “Good luck with that,” she chuckled. “That Van Gaal”—she butchered the name—“has a lot to answer for, if you ask me.”
    “He’s turned it around since last season.”
    She harrumphed again. “Long way to go. I did like Alex Ferguson. Was sad to see the back of him.”
    “Weren’t we all.”
    George stayed until the tea was gone, gossiping with his nan like he was one of the ladies from across the hall, then kissed her on the cheek before heading back to the car. The rain had eased off now, and he made the short journey round to his mum’s house on autopilot, knowing this route like it was threaded through the very fabric of his brain.
    The house he’d grown up in sat in the gray area between the notorious Manchester area of Moss Side, and the slightly— slightly —more respectable area of Chorlton. The red brick was pretty standard for the area, and there was a patchy front garden left where most houses had paved over their own garden space to create a driveway.
    George parked up the road, since there were no spaces in front of the house, then jogged down to his mum’s with his sports bag thrown over his shoulder. The two tiny bikes abandoned in the front garden told him his youngest sisters weren’t far away.
    Even though he’d moved out, George still had his house key and let himself in through the front door.
    “Mum!” he yelled. “I’m home.”
    She appeared in the doorway to the kitchen, which hadn’t had a door in it since George was six and Caroline was born, and grinned at him.
    George’s mum was short, only five feet four, and slim. For as long as George could remember, she’d been on a diet, living off Cup-a-Soup and coffee. Her dark hair was tucked around her ears, and her makeup was neatly done, framing her features. She wore tight-fitting jeans, enormous novelty elephant slippers, and a black T-shirt and chunky gray cardigan.
    “Hey, baby,” she said and practically threw herself into the hug.
    George laid his head on her shoulder and smiled, and held on to his mother as tight as he could.
     
     
    A FEW hours later, George had played with his youngest sisters until one of them—Felicity—actually threw up from laughing so much. She was only four, and George was still laughing with her as he carried her up the stairs and found a fresh, clean T-shirt. He messed about with the kids when he came home, throwing them around, making forts, hiding stuff, making them scream, generally wearing them out so they went to sleep for his mum later.
    The youngest five kids, plus Emma’s daughter, still lived at home, sharing three bedrooms while his parents slept in what was supposed to be a dining room. They didn’t need a dining room, though, because they’d built a conservatory on the back of the house and the huge old dining table went in there.
    “What time is Dad getting home?” George asked as he jogged back down the stairs with Felicity on his hip. She was pulling at his collar, and he didn’t care at all.
    “Should be done by five,” she said. “Do you want to help ice these cakes?”
    “I dunno.” He turned to Felicity. “You wanna ice cakes?”
    “Yeah!”
    “I guess so,” he said, carefully picking his way through the kitchen.
    Since Caroline, the eldest Maguire sister, had moved out for uni, his mum didn’t have the same amount of help around the house. With five kids plus a baby, the house was often a mess. It had always been that