“Interesting,” Max said and laughed. “How long has that been going on?”
His mother, Queen Natasha understood that her son was trying to figure something out. “About three or four weeks. Maybe a little longer,” she replied, waiting for her son to explain his comments.
Max nodded and smiled again. “That’s what I thought.” He walked over to the phone and dialed a number. “Sam, I was wondering if you had dinner plans tonight.” After a moment, “Good. I’m sorry to make this such short notice, but, since you don’t have any plans, would you mind filling my father in on the submarine issue you were telling me about earlier today? I think he should be in on the decision.”
Max nodded and hung up the phone before turning back to his parents. “Sam will be joining us momentarily,” he explained but his parents had already figured that out.
“What’s going on?” his mother asked, a curious smile on her face.
Marabeth walked into the room at that moment, her hair piled on top of her head and wearing a flattering, dark green dress that had a deceptively simple design. It fit Marabeth from her slim shoulders right down to her knees with no other embellishments. Max noted how pretty she looked and that her face was flushed with color.
“Father, I wanted to talk to you about something. I really need you to step in…” Marabeth stopped when she saw the other figure step into the room at that moment. Her lips thinned and her blue eyes flashed but she didn’t continue. “I’ll talk about it later,” she said and stepped over to the sherry cart to pour herself a drink.
“Your majesty,” Sam said and bowed first to the king, then to the queen, Max and Marabeth. “I can quickly brief you now so you can continue with your family dinner without me intruding,” Sam was saying.
The queen waived his papers aside. “Please don’t go into that right now. You can discuss it over brandy later. What would you like to drink?” she said graciously, immediately understanding that there was something going on between her daughter and this man that Max had picked up on already.
Sam looked back at Marabeth and shook his head. “Really, I don’t want to intrude,” he said.
“You’re not intruding at all,” King Stephan said and patted him on the shoulder, guiding the taller man over to the bar. “What would you like to drink?” he repeated.
Sam requested a bourbon and the waiter immediately poured some into a crystal glass. He turned and watched Marabeth while the rest of the family discussed their day.
It was Marabeth’s turn to talk about her day and she shrugged her shoulders. “Nothing spectacular to report from my end. I just hung around the palace today. Sam? What wonderful mischief did you get into today?” she asked and all eyes turned towards Sam.
He wanted to smile at her not so subtle jab. But he didn’t. He kept a straight face and shook his head. “I can’t believe nothing interesting happened to you today, your highness. Surely you ran around causing havoc and mayhem.”
Marabeth shook her head but the fire got brighter in her eyes. “Not today. But I’ll be ready to do so tomorrow. It was a very calm and boring day. Just one confrontation that I can barely recall now,” she said and shrugged her shoulders delicately.
The queen raised her eyebrows at her daughter’s obviously provocative behavior but was still trying to determine what was going on. She could feel the tension between these two people and wanted to understand what was causing it. “What confrontation was that?” she asked. “And who won?”
Marabeth shrugged her shoulders delicately. “Like I said, it was nothing of significance and the war has not yet begun. Only a minor skirmish which wasn’t enough for anyone to declare a win or a loss.”
Sam raised an eyebrow at her statement. “Surely nothing you are involved in has so little significance?” he countered.
“You give me too much credit,” Marabeth shot back. “Most of my appointments are very staid and laid back.”
“Probably not. What kind of life would that be if you only had staid confrontations?”
“That’s what I was trying to convince someone this morning. But that person just refused to be reasonable about the situation. Hence, my very long, very uneventful day,” she sighed.
A waiter appeared in the doorway and formally announced that dinner was ready.
The queen and king both looked at each other and smiled, understanding what Max had been about to tell them earlier before Marabeth interrupted them.
King Stephan offered his wife’s arm, his eyes twinkling. “I understand, son,” he said behind him. To his wife, he chuckled. “How long, my dear?”
Natasha turned to Sam and smiled, “Sam, would you mind escorting Marabeth to dinner? Max, I need you to phone Ana and ask her to confirm her due date, please.”
The queen took his offered arm and pondered the question as they walked into the room. “Three months?”
King Stephan chuckled again and shook his head. “I don’t think that would be a good idea.”
“Six months?” the queen said, already making plans in her head.
“Longer? I think that might be dangerous, given the circumstances,” King Stephan said and glanced back at his daughter, barely containing his laughter as Marabeth glared at Sam as he walked over to her and offered his arm to walk her into the dining room. She took it, but only her fingers would touch his sleeve.
Stephan turned his face away when Sam pulled her hand more fully into the crook of his arm and held it there while they followed behind.
The queen also saw the tussle and held her laughter as well. “I think you’re right. Two months is probably the only safe amount of time. But that will be making things very tight, won’t it? Oh, the details of the whole event are fairly mind boggling, aren’t they?”
King Stephan patted her hand. “Yes, my dear, but you’ll pull the whole thing off perfectly as always. How are we going to get the two main parties to agree?” he said so only she could hear.
“That’s the main issue, isn’t it?” she said and rolled her eyes as she heard her daughter sigh angrily behind her.
Dinner was very entertaining for the king, queen and Max. They had no idea what was going on but there apparently was a battle being waged between Sam and Marabeth. Both were painfully, obviously polite to each other, but the other three occupants knew that, if left on their own, the two of them would be yelling at each other. Well, maybe not Sam, but Marabeth definitely would be.