“Because you would have told me to wait until morning, and I . . . did not want to do that.”

“Did something happen with Father?”

“No, no. I simply decided to leave. I’m sorry if I worried you.”

“I worry about your driving over the mountain in the dark, that’s all.”

“Oh, that was . . . not a problem.”

Hmm. Max’s Mr. Benz theory was looking more and more plausible. Benz had a way of making things happen. Pictures of unicorn onesies disappeared; people were spirited away over mountain ridges in the dead of night. “What do you think of Mr. Benz?”

“The equerry?”

“Yes. He seems even more uptight than usual, with all this wedding to-do.” Max tamped down a smile.

Seb did smile—ha. “Well, he and Leo seem to have struck up an unlikely friendship, and Leo tells me Benz is a secret aficionado of American jazz.” Seb looked at the door. “You might expect that with someone like Torkel, but Benz?”

Max lost his battle with the stifled smile. “I’m on to you, you know.”

Seb heaved a big, annoyed sigh of the sort he used to when they were boys and sank onto the sofa next to Max. “Really?”

“Don’t worry. My lips are sealed.”

“Nothing can ever come of it, anyway.”

“Perhaps. Perhaps not.”

“He’s a member of the palace staff!”

Yes, but not really. Benz was from an old, distinguished family, as the men behind the throne generally were. “You’d have to come out for this to be more than a theoretical discussion. Which, for the record, if you want to do, I am wholeheartedly and unreservedly behind you.”

Seb sighed again, but this one was more defeated-sounding. “I’m afraid of him, Max.”

They were talking about Father now. “I know.”

“I don’t want to be. I don’t want to be the kind of man who’s afraid of his father.”

“Well, you have reason to be.”

“So do you. But you’re not afraid of him. You’re not afraid of anything.”

That wasn’t true. Max was afraid of lots of things. The future foremost among them. A future in which he was alone. A future in which Dani Martinez didn’t live in his attic.

“Thank you for standing by me,” Seb said.

“Marie and Leo and I are walking down to the village to go skating. I’m here to ask if you want to join us.”

“What about Dani?”

“I hope she can come. She’s been spirited away for dress fittings and wedding nonsense.” He smiled. “Perhaps you can have some influence there and help me extract her.” Sebastien’s brow furrowed, and Max held back from telling him to invite Benz skating. One von Hansburg brother’s unlikely and ill-fated infatuation at a time.

The next few days were such a whirlwind of dress fittings, rehearsals, and royal protocol lessons, Dani hardly got to see Max.