Page 1 of Royal Surrogate 1

CHAPTER 1

Caspar

This is the second time I’ve been to Seattle in my life. The first was to attend a rather ridiculous party at the home of some new-money tech mogul whose name escapes me now. This time, it is for something much more important.

I take a bite of my fried fish as I gaze out the window overlooking the water. There’s something exquisite about the flavor of freshly cooked fish, though my surroundings are far from exquisite.

My brother recommended this place—best fried fish in the world, he said. Perhaps he’s right, but it’s difficult to enjoy it given the shoddy table I’m sitting at, not to mention what’s just happened.

I’m not usually one for a pity party. I’m heir to my father’s title—Guardian of Wintervale. It may not seem like much—after all, my cousins are princes of Montovia. But the title is mine by birthright, and I’m more than happy to take it when the time comes. Montovia might be a tiny country landlocked in the middle of Europe, but the small piece of it known as Wintervale will be mine.

But there are things that have been gnawing at me for some time. Sadly, it is only by the grace of my cousins that I even have Wintervale to my name. While this has always been a difficult pill for me to swallow, I know there is little I can do to change it.

And now both of my younger brothers have children. When Benedict’s daughter was born, I was unfazed. The small thing vomited more than she slept and cried more than she laughed. I couldn’t understand why anyone would want such a monstrosity in their life.

Then my brother Xavier discovered he had a young son. I’m not exactly certain what it was about the boy, but my thinking about children changed with that revelation, and I couldn’t help wanting a son of my own.

Certain other events may have affected me as well, but I’m hardly one to think of such matters.

I take another bite of my fish, staring out over the water. It’s unlike me to be so obsessed by anything. Even when it’s come to women, I’ve never been taken with a single one. There are beautiful women everywhere, and it’s always seemed to me that I was meant to experience as much of that beauty as humanly possible.

But having a son of my own… It’s taken over my every thought. It’s why I’ve come to Seattle. I was told the best legal firm for handling surrogacy was here, and their services didn’t disappoint. I spent the last several hours perusing their hundreds of files—women willing to bear a child for a price.

None of them were right, though. Even when I found one I thought might suffice, her file clearly stated that she wanted partial custody of the child.

That would never work for me. My surrogate will have to play a certain role in my life, at least for a time. I can’t merely produce a son without a mother—the speculation from the press would be outrageous, and I can’t be hiding in Montovia to protect myself from it.

No, I have a very specific idea of what I want. Need. My surrogate will have to be beautiful, of course. Highly educated and brilliant. Able to carry on an intelligent conversation—after all, she’ll need to play the part of my partner, at least until my son is born. And then she’ll need to quietly slip away, preferably somewhere no one will be able to find her, at least until the press forgets she ever existed in the first place.

My guess would be about a year. I’ll pay her, of course, the sum of her choosing. I find there really isn’t a price tag that can be attached to having a son of my own.

And that’s just it—he needs to be mine. I want her to have no claim to him whatsoever, and she’ll need to agree to that upfront. It’s hardly fair that a man can’t have a child of his own without having it grow for three-quarters of a year inside a woman.

I’m just not certain why this has been so difficult. The attorney at the law firm told me I was being unrealistic. That the child would certainly want to know who its mother was at some point. He clearly doesn’t understand anything, but he was certainly willing to take my money. We’ll just have to wait for the right one to come along, he’d said. It could be a month, or a year, or even longer.

I want a son now. I understand it will take some time for him to grow inside some woman’s womb, but I don’t want to wait any longer. I’ve even considered trying to woo some unsuspecting woman, and I’m sure I’d be able to, but the complications of something like that would be…messy. I’d much prefer to have a contract between us, clearly outlining the expectations I have of her.

Someone sits in the booth behind me. The restaurant—if one can call it that—is small, and though it’s mid-afternoon, it’s full of patrons eating trays of fried fish. I barely noticed the constant hum of voices over my own thoughts.

“That’s ridiculous!” The woman behind me must be on her phone. “You have to be kidding me!”

I glance over my shoulder, and my heart stops beating for a moment.

She’s breathtaking. Long, black hair covers her shoulders, and her sapphire eyes stare out at the water.

Her jaw clenches as she listens to whatever the person on the other end of her phone line is saying. “This has to be a joke.”

She doesn’t seem to notice me watching her, but I turn back to my table all the same. As beautiful as she is, I didn’t come here to entice some random woman into bed.

The thought startles me, and I must blink a few times to clear my head. Did I just tell myself I didn’t want to bed a woman on this trip? Perhaps I really have changed. Maybe I’ve finally matured…

But that thought is quickly forgotten when I hear the woman behind me again.

“A million dollars?” she says. “That’s a joke, right? Where the hell am I going to come up with a million dollars?”

CHAPTER 2

Renae

---