Too Damn Rich (11 page)

Zandra nodded glumly. "I'm afraid so," she
sighed.

"Well, I'm not! This is only the best news
since ... well, since they invented hair extensions!" bubbled Dina.
"It'll be just like old times!"

She put her arm around Zandra's shoulders and
gave her a sisterly, sideways hug. Then, letting go of her, she
tapped her lips thoughtfully.

"Job . . . job ... jo—" Dina's eyes widened.
"But of course!"

"What is it?"

"Abracadabra!" Dina clicked her fingers.
"Consider yourself employed."

"Dina, really I—"

"Hush, sweetie, and listen to me a moment.
Robert just bought Burghley's. Or rather, I should say, he bought
controlling interest in Burghley's, which amounts to practically
the same thing. Right?"

"Burghley's? You mean ... the auction
house?"

"Good lord, yes," Dina said happily. "Maybe
now I'll be known as something other than Mrs. GoldMart. Anyway, do
you realize how huge Burghley's is? I just had the grand tour this
morning, and the New York branch alone employs several hundred
people!"

"Dina ..." Zandra began skeptically, but was
waved to silence.

"Whatever you're going to say, I don't want
to hear it. With a staff that large, they must have an opening you
can fill. Now then, let me see. What's your greatest area of
expertise?"

"You mean ... as far as a Burghley's
department is concerned?"

"Sweetie! What else could I pos-sib-ly mean?
Of course I'm talking department!"

"Well ... I did study art," Zandra said
rather uncomfortably. "And from all those vacations spent at
various relatives' castles and country houses, I suppose I'm most
familiar with Old Masters."

"There you have it! Look no further, sweetie:
you're now employed. Robert's lawyers can speed up all that green
card nonsense so that you can start immediately, and, in the
meantime, if you need money you can borrow some from me, or else
get an advance on your paycheck from Burghley's, whichever you find
most comfortable." The new Queen of Manhattan smiled magnanimously.
"Consider it a fait accompli!"

Zandra could only stare incredulously.
Everything was happening so fast it made her head spin.

"Now, then." The new Queen of Manhattan rose
to her feet, took Zandra by the hand, and pulled her up. "Next, we
need to take inventory. Show me the clothes you've brought along,"
she demanded.

Zandra blinked. "Clothes ... ?" she repeated
blankly. She cast an anxious glance toward the door of the walk-in
closet; from the way Dina was talking, she had an absurd mental
picture of having packed formal

gowns and cocktail dresses on the run. The
image was so powerful and ridiculous she didn't know whether to
burst into laughter or tears.

"Sweetie?" A troubled shadow flitted across
Dina's features. "Is something the matter? Did I say the wrong
thing?"

"No, of course you didn't. It's just that I
left so suddenly I didn't have a chance to pack a thing. In other
words ..." Zandra gestured at herself. "... what you see is what
you get."

"Oh, dear," Dina said, without looking in the
least bit perturbed. "Well, I'm sure we can find something for you
to wear." She stood back and gave Zandra a critical once-over, her
skilled eyes measuring her as accurately as the most experienced,
sharp-eyed couturiere. "Would you believe, we're still the same
size?"

"But why the big worry about clothes? Dina,
what in the world is up?"

"What's up? Ah, I'll tell you what's up. I,"
Dina purred, producing two thick vellum invitations seemingly out
of nowhere and waving them in a manner so giddily rhapsodic that
they could well have announced the Second Coming, "have just been
messengered invitations for the party of the season. Yes, the
season! And, would you believe, it's being thrown by none other
than—guess who? Ta da!"

With a flourish, she held the invitations
right under Zandra's nose.

"Yes, sweetie, your very own cousin, Prince
Karl-Heinz von und zu. And, as you can see, there are two
invitations. One for Robert and me, and another for you and your
escort." Dina all but swooned with excitement. "Well, sweetie? Are
you surprised, or what?"

"Oh, Dina," Zandra tried to beg off. "Not
tonight. Please? I'm frightfully tired. I've hardly slept for the
past two days and—"

"And nothing. I shall not, I repeat not, take
no for an answer. Since the festivities do not begin until
seven-thirty, there is plenty of time for you to take a nap and
wake up totally rejuvenated."

And taking Zandra by the arm, Dina guided her
gently but firmly out of the guest suite, down the grandiose hall,
and up the sweeping staircase to her own sprawling suite,
chattering like a happy magpie the entire way.

"Thank God my closets are bursting at the
seams with clothes I could never begin to wear ... so, first we'll
pick out that appropriate little something, then we'll go through
my jewelry to match it with a bauble or two—no, I will not let you
utter one word of protest—and after that, I'll give you one of my
magic sleeping pills and tuck you in myself. You might not believe
it, sweetie, but I assure you: when party time rolls around, you'll
look and feel fresh as a daisy!"

What a difference a day makes.

The man who sat down to lunch yesterday in
his grand, book-lined study in the Auction Towers penthouse was the
world's most eligible thirty-nine-year-old bachelor. The man who
was served lunch at the same library table today had turned
forty.

It was Prince Karl-Heinz von und zu
Engelwiesen's Big Four-O, and the fact that he had turned forty
made him aware of more than just his own mortality. The
responsibilities his fabulous wealth and title engendered, as well
as the peculiar laws of inheritance which had governed his family
for nearly three-quarters of a millennium, weighed heavily on his
mind.

That he should concern himself with these
matters now was in itself disconcerting—especially considering the
past two decades of lusty, carefree living.

For Prince Karl-Heinz, indisputably one of
the savviest businessmen in the world, was also acknowledged to be
one of the most notorious playboys of all time. An exciting,
passionate, and well-endowed lover, his life was a chronicle of
liaisons and affairs. Movie stars, showgirls, supermodels, and
other beauty queens—his amorous adventures did not stop there. An
inspired lover of women—all women—his conquests had included the
happily married wives and even daughters of friends, business
associates, celebrities, and politicians.

Now, hearing a light tap on the study door of
his condominium high above Burghley's, he called out in German,
"Herrein!"

The door opened and in came Josef, his thin,
precise secretary-cum- valet, who had been with him since his
youth, and who knew his every quirk and peccadillo.

"Guten Tag, Your Highness," Josef greeted
formally in German. "And may I take the liberty of wishing Your
Highness a very happy birthday and many happy returns?"

"Guten Tag, Josef, and thank you," returned
His Serene Highness, Prince Karl-Heinz von und zu Engelwiesen.

Josef hovered. "Would Your Highness like your
lunch now or a little later?"

"Later, Josef."

"Very well, Your Highness."

After Josef left, Karl-Heinz became lost in
his reverie once again. On this, his fortieth birthday, his stomach
felt hollow as he reluctantly faced the harsh realities of his
personal life. It was time he settled down, mended his licentious
ways, and secured his future—no easy task for a man in his shoes
...

His Serene Highness, Prince Karl-Heinz
Fernando de Carlos Jean Joachim Alejandor Ignacio Hieronymous
Eustace von und zu Engelwiesen was blessed with an overabundance of
everything. Besides his fortune, which was larger than most; his
title, which was older and bluer than most; his aristocratic good
looks, which were more handsome than most; he also possessed a
libido which—what else?—was more overactively demanding than most.
He looked younger than his forty recorded years—recorded, because
for the past seven centuries not a single legitimate von und zu
Engelwiesen had been born without a trio of lawyers present, whose
duty it was to duly witness and certify in an ancient book of
bloodstock that the newborn infant was indeed the product of the
rightful von und zu Engelwiesen womb, the double loophole in this
archaic tradition being, of course, that as many lawyers as not are
unscrupulous, and even a triumvirate of them have been known to be
bribable. And besides—how could there be irrefutable proof of the
paternal sperm serene if lawyers were not present during
insemination?

But be that as it may, there was no mistaking
Prince Karl-Heinz for anything but the genuine article. The result
of a carefully distilled pedigree, he exuded nobility from every
pore, not only carrying himself like a prince, but speaking and
looking like one, too. His nose was imperial, a true Roman nose:
narrow, long, and slightly irregular, with the same central bump
which all the ancestral portraits at Schloss Engelwiesen bore as
proudly as their dueling scars. His ears, small and flat and nearly
lobeless, were obviously a throwback to another of the many royal
houses of Europe, with whom von und zu Engelwiesens had
intermarried over the centuries. However, his eyes, slightly oval,
bright blue, and crinkled at the corners, had a whimsical and
definitely unprincely, mischievous cast.

Since the age of fifteen, Prince Karl-Heinz
had bedded, but not wedded, the most beautiful women on five
continents. Yet his highly publicized playboy exploits were but a
small part of his character. Behind the libidinous facade there was
a core of diamond-hard toughness, ruthless business acumen, and the
kind of confidence that only absolute power and a serene birthright
can bestow.

Ironically, that very same birthright was now
the root of his greatest problem—and that could be traced all the
way back to the year 1290, when his illustrious ancestor, Eustace,
had been rewarded by Charlemagne for services rendered, and made a
prince of the Holy Roman Empire.

Deeded vast tracts of lands in what is now
Germany, Eustace was also awarded that plum of all plums—exclusive
rights to the papal mail routes for the entire western
Mediterranean.

And it was that very same Eustace, the first
in a long, unbroken line of princes of the Holy Roman Empire, who
had laid down the von und zu Engelwiesen family laws governing
inheritance for future generations; strict, binding laws which
remained in effect to this very day, and to which Prince Karl-Heinz
was required to adhere, and to which, therefore, he owed his
current predicament.

At the heart of it was primogeniture, not so
unusual in itself, since many of the noble houses of Europe still
practice the ancient tradition of passing titles and inheritances
down through their eldest sons. And as Karl-Heinz was his ailing
father's only male offspring, primogeniture should normally have
guaranteed his inheritance, and precluded his sister, Princess
Sofia, from the running.

However, that was where the distinctive von
und zu Engelwiesen complication arose, a problem little appreciated
by Karl-Heinz. Thanks to Prince Eustace, the family's particular
law of primogeniture clearly spelled out that no less than two
prerequisites had to be fulfilled before the eldest son could
attain his rightful inheritance.

The first, a precaution to ensure a pure
bloodline, was that Karl- Heinz must marry a female who was also a
descendant of the Holy Roman Emperors—an obstacle which winnowed
the playing field down to a tiny handful of eligible women.

The second was that his wife had to give
birth to a male heir before the death of Karl-Heinz's own father,
the old prince.

If both these criteria could not be met, the
inheritance would then automatically pass on to the eldest son of
the next closest relative. As luck would have it, Karl-Heinz's
sister, Sofia, and her husband, Count Erwein, had managed to
produce a virtual army of strapping and exceedingly handsome if
featherbrained princelings.

Meanwhile, time was running out for
Karl-Heinz. His father, the old prince, was in such deteriorating
health that it was doubtful whether he would even live to see his
next birthday ...

Now, with the noonday sun streaming through
the windows, Karl-Heinz considered his options, or rather the lack
thereof. It occurred to him that if he wanted to secure his
rightful inheritance, forty carefree years of bachelorhood had
better come to a screeching halt. He would have to dig up an
appropriate, blue-blooded wife fast, and hope to God she was a
childbearer who could produce a son in record time.

The specter of Leopold, Princess Sofia's
lamentably sulky eldest son inheriting the estate which, by all
rights should be Karl-Heinz's, loomed ominously in his mind. It
didn't take much imagination to see Leopold, a hopelessly
provincial spendthrift with harebrained schemes and no business
sense whatsoever, run through the entire fortune and undo the work
of seven centuries in a single generation. Karl-Heinz had seen it
happen to other great and powerful families, and had no desire to
see it occur to his.

He felt every one of his forty years weigh
heavily today, and sighed gloomily. His thoughts of Sofia and
Leopold had definitely taken the shine off his day; they made his
entire life's work seem pointless.

Yes, he mused, if I know what's good for
me—and I do!—my playboy days are over. Definitely over ...

And with that depressing thought, he could
only wonder at his own stupidity in waiting so long ... perhaps too
long ... to secure his birthright.

He was still wondering about it during lunch,
oblivious to Cesar, his Spanish majordomo who, hovering discreetly,
sniffily orchestrated the perfect serving of everything from the
lobster salad to the freshly ground, scalding hot coffee.