Royal Pain Page 11

  I’m not used to that. I’m always the one in control. I’m always the one who decides what happens and how it happens. The fact that that’s not how this went down, the fact that I ceded this easily to Savvy…it makes me think. Makes me wonder just what is supposed to come next.

  But for now, as I gather her in my still trembling arms and carry her to bed, the answer doesn’t matter. Nothing does but holding her in my arms, kissing her, and making her feel as good as she’s made me feel.

  Chapter 16

  My phone goes off an hour and a half later. I’m tempted to ignore it, considering I’ve got a warm, sated Savvy dozing in my arms. Not to mention, my pants—which is where my phone currently is—are crumpled on the floor just out of reach.

  But Savvy’s having none of it. Ignoring my protest, she rolls away from me and snags my phone from the front pocket of my jeans.

  “Here,” she says, seconds later as she deposits it on the bed beside me.

  “Why’d you have to go and do that?” I demand, even as I plug my password into the phone.

  “I thought we’d already discussed how heavy that crown you’ve got is,” she says as she grabs a robe from her closet and belts it around her. “Call whoever it is back while I go make some breakfast for us.”

  “You don’t have to do that,” I tell her as I pull up my phone log.

  “Sure, I do.” She shoots me a grin from the doorway before continuing down the hall toward the kitchen. “I’m hungry.”

  A glance tells me I’ve missed two calls from Roland. I vaguely remember my phone going off a little while ago, but since my cock was in Savvy’s mouth, I hadn’t paid any attention to it.

  I start to text Roland back—if this is just another reminder of some bullshit interview he wants me to do, then he can cancel the damn thing. I’d much rather spend the day with Savvy, making love and badgering her with a million questions about herself, than I would smiling at yet another reporter as I lie through my damn teeth.

  But I barely get the chance to hit send on a text to Roland before someone’s pounding on Savvy’s front door—and by pounding I mean knocking so hard that she could be forgiven for thinking it’s a warning that Armageddon has finally arrived.

  I know better, however. I’ve heard that knock numerous times in my life and while it’s rarely good, it’s rarely as bad as the pounding makes it out to be.

  Still, I haven’t forgotten about the king’s ultimatum to Pierre and Jean-Luc, and I get out of bed a lot more quickly than I usually would under similar circumstances. Which is a damn good thing, since I’ve barely gotten my jeans over my bare ass before Niall bursts into the room.

  I expect some quip—that’s how these things usually go—but Niall looks deadly serious as he tosses me the shirt I left in the living room in the middle of the night.

  “What’s going on?” I demand as I pull it over my head.

  “Meeting at the palace in forty-five minutes, full security council and heads of all the intelligence agencies.”

  Shock slams through me, followed quickly by elation. “The lead panned out.” I take the shoes he hands me and shove my feet into them, sans socks. “Holy shit, Niall. They found something!”

  He tries to look cautious, but we’ve known each other long enough that I can see the excitement he’s trying to keep under wraps. “It looks that way, Kian.”

  “Forty-five minutes? We’ve got to go.”

  “That’s why I’m standing here trying to forget what your bare arse looks like.”

  “I was wondering how long it would take you to bring that up.” I head for the kitchen—and Savvy.

  “One of these days I’m going to write a tell-all book. It’ll include the number of times in my career I’ve had to drag your bare arse out of some place or another. And it will include pictures.”

  “Make sure you get my best side.”

  “Don’t you mean your best cheek?” Lucas asks, from where he’s leaning against one of the kitchen walls, a cup of coffee in his hands.

  “Making yourself comfortable?” I ask, sarcasm ripe in my tone.

  Avery springs to attention, setting down his own coffee mug with a clatter. “I’m sorry, sir. Savannah offered—”

  “Don’t get your panties in a twist.” I skirt the counter to wrap my arms around Savvy from behind. She’s standing at the stove, cracking eggs one handed into the skillet and putting bread in the toaster with the other hand. “I haven’t sent anyone to the dungeon for drinking my coffee in at least a year.”

  “Technically speaking, it’s my coffee,” Savvy says, shooting an amused look over her shoulder.

  But the moment our eyes meet, the wooden spoon in her hand falls to the floor. “Oh my God. You heard something about Garrett.” Her hands go to my shirt, her fingers twisting in the thin material. “Is he alive? Is he—”

  “I haven’t heard anything yet,” I tell her, gently pulling her into my arms to soothe her. And myself, if I’m being honest. I know her concern for Garrett is reasonable and I appreciate it—I do—but there’s a part of me that can’t help wondering what’s behind the concern. That can’t help wondering if, maybe, the reason she’s so upset is because she’s still in love with him.

  I hate myself for even thinking like this—everyone in this room is excited that there might be a lead on Garrett, I remind myself viciously. And she obviously loved him at one point—why wouldn’t she be excited that he might be alive?

  It makes perfect sense, I know it does. Just as I know I’d be offended if she didn’t care that there might be a lead on Garrett. But all that is logic speaking. The mini freak-out going on in the back of my mind has nothing to do with logic and everything to do with jealousy.

  Acknowledging it might not make it go away, but it makes it a hell of a lot easier to tolerate. I drop another kiss on Savvy’s cheek, even as I signal for my detail to leave us alone for a couple of minutes.

  “I’m sorry I can’t stay,” I tell her.

  “Don’t be ridiculous! He’s your brother—and the Crown Prince of Wildemar.”

  “I know, but it’s still pretty shitty to make love to a woman and then run out on her at first light.”

  The look she gives me is half-perspicacious, half-annoyed. “I’m pretty sure these are extenuating circumstances. Go take care of whatever you need to take care of. I’ll be around when you’ve got things under control.”

  “You’re really great, you know that?”

  “That’s what all the boys say,” she answers with a roll of her eyes.

  “Oh, yeah?” I wrap my arms around her again, then pull her back against my chest. “How many boys are we talking about here?”

  “Don’t worry, Your Royal Hotness. You still beat my record by a hell of a lot.”

  She’s playing around, teasing me like I was teasing her, but the words strike a chord anyway. And for the first time in my life I’m embarrassed by my reputation—and the copious amount of women that I’ve screwed and made no pretense of even being interested in.

  Garrett always told me my promiscuity would come back to haunt me, but I never really believed him. The fact that it is now, with a woman he met a long, long time before I did, just makes the sting a little worse.

  “I need to go,” I tell her.

  “I know.” She turns around in my arms, hugs me tight as she presses soft kisses into my neck and jaw. “Just give me a minute, okay?”

  “Sure. What do you need?” Right now I’d give her anything, give her everything, if she asked for it. The fact that I know she won’t only makes me want to do it more.

  “I just want to get these ready.” She lays four thick pieces of toast out on the counter and covers each one with a piece of cheese. Then she flips two eggs into the center of each piece, tops them with slices of bacon that were sizzling in another pan and then crowns the whole thing with another piece of bread.

  Then she’s wrapping the sandwiches in pieces of aluminum foil and putting them in a small pape
r sack, which she hands to me. “Give the extras to the guys. Tell them I’m sorry for keeping them sitting around all night.”

  I stare at her, completely and totally awed. I start to thank her, to tell her she really didn’t have to do that. But all that comes out is, “I’m totally crazy about you.”

  Savvy’s eyes go wide with surprise, but when I make no move to take the words back, she flushes with what I think is pleasure. “Yeah, well, I like you, too.”

  “Wow, that’s big talk. Don’t hurt yourself.”

  She rolls her eyes, even as she leans in for a quick kiss that turns into a slightly longer kiss. “I really hope it’s good news for you and Garrett,” she whispers against my lips.

  “Yeah, me, too.” Anything else doesn’t bear thinking about. “I’ll call you when I get the chance.”

  “No worries,” she tells me. “Now go before your breakfast gets cold.”

  Chapter 17

  The drive back to the palace seems to take forever, even with Niall and Lucas going on about how much they like Savvy—and how much they think I should “try keeping this one around for a while.” Avery doesn’t comment, but I figure he’ll loosen up eventually, once he gets used to the fact that I don’t stand on the same kind of ceremony the rest of my family always has. Plus, it’s kind of nice to have someone on the detail who doesn’t know what a slacker I am and who hasn’t had to clean up any of my messes…

  The fact that I’m thinking the same thing about Savvy feels strange—relationships have never been my thing, thanks to an up close and personal view of my parents’ own disastrous match before my mother’s death—but it also feels surprisingly right.

  I don’t know where this is going to end—God knows, we’ve got some strikes against us—but I do know that one night with Savvy is nowhere near enough to satisfy me. Then again, right now I can’t imagine a thousand nights being enough.

  I pull up to the palace ten minutes before the meeting is scheduled to start. Knowing the king would not approve of me attending a meeting in jeans and a T-shirt, especially one of this magnitude, I hightail it up four flights of stairs to my suite.

  I really need a shower, but there’s no way I’m risking being late, so I settle for the basic hygiene necessities before grabbing the first suit I find. Exactly nine minutes later—after tying my tie as I traverse the halls of the palace, I’m settled in the large conference room, waiting for my father to arrive.

  Every chair around the table is taken and there’s a palpable air of excitement in the room that has me nearly jumping out of my skin. I’ve done a pretty good job of acting normal so far, but if this goes on much longer I’m going to lose my shit completely.

  Next to me, Sebastian Mireaux—director of royal security—connects his laptop to the smartboard in obvious preparation for his slide show. I lean over, about to ask him if there’s anything he can share with me, but the king chooses this moment to walk in, grim faced.

  Underneath his stoic demeanor, he looks exhausted. Not that I blame him. I haven’t been sleeping much myself, not when every time I close my eyes I see my brother begging for his life. Or worse, begging for death even as he holds out hope that we will rescue him.

  “Good morning, gentlemen,” my father says as he makes his way around to the seat right in the middle of the conference table. “I trust you have the information that I asked for.”

  He nods to me as he settles into his chair, and I nod back. Then we turn away as one. It’s our standard greeting—our standard interaction, actually—a lesson I learned early and well at my father’s knee.

  “We’ve spent the last twelve hours going over every piece of information we have with regards to the DPL, Your Majesty,” Pierre says, but his pen is moving so hard and fast that I’m afraid the thing is going to take flight. “Safe houses, compounds, membership lists, intercepted documents, surveillance photos.”

  “And?” the king prompts.

  “And nowhere did we find any evidence that the person described by our witness has any connection to the Libération-Est.”

  Just that easily, I feel my optimism start to flag. That means the witness had either the tattoo or the face wrong—and trying to get a warrant without those key pieces of information is going to be almost impossible, even when it’s the crown prince’s life on the line.

  “Yet you called me here for this briefing.” My father’s tone is less than impressed, which is the first thing we’ve been able to agree on in pretty much forever. “I expected more than this.”

  I’m not willing to jump to that conclusion yet. From the years I’ve been on this council, I know that Pierre tends to line up all his ducks in a row and explain those ducks in great detail before getting to what we need. Even if what we need is for him to give us the money shot and then work his way back from there. He’s an amazing analyst and an even better investigator, but that doesn’t mean he isn’t frustrating as shit at times like these.

  “We did find something,” Jean-Luc says, piggybacking on Pierre’s comments in order to keep the room from exploding. “The barista isn’t as squeaky clean as she’d like us to think. She’s got ties to the new Résistance-Fer that we find very interesting. At first glance the ties look obscure, but when we started pulling on the thread, it started to unravel.”

  “So what are we talking here?” I ask. “She came forward and tried to blame a different militia group because she wanted to throw the scent off of RF? But you weren’t even looking at RF, were you?”

  “We had looked at them, but there was nothing to connect them to Prince Garrett at all—especially since they tend to be a more moderate group, on the whole, than DPL.”

  “When they’re not kidnapping the crown prince.”

  Jean-Luc nods at me. “Precisely.”

  “So, what’s the next step?” my father demands. “The RF has safe houses all over the country. How do we find him without tipping them off and forcing their hand with regards to the crown prince?”

  It’s a solid question, one that I want an answer to, as well. My gut says raid them all at once so they don’t see us coming, but what if he’s being held somewhere else and the raids trigger his execution?

  It’s a huge risk.

  “Investigation,” Pierre says simply. “From the moment we discovered her ties to the RF, we’ve been examining RF assets.”

  He flicks on the projector. “We’ve narrowed it down to five places we think he’s being hidden, but none of them are safe houses. All of them are remote access, off the grid and very hard to run reconnaissance on.”

  “Is that what you want to do?” I demand. “Run reconnaissance? How long will that take?”

  “A couple of weeks,” Sebastian says.

  “A couple of weeks? Are you kidding me? You think you know who has my brother—the Crown Prince of Wildemar—and you want to wait two weeks before going after him? Are you kidding me?”

  “We’ll move as quickly as we can—”

  “Like you have so far?” I shove back from the table, walk over to the corner where a pitcher of water and some glasses have been set up. I don’t want anything to drink but I can’t sit still any longer, not when they’re discussing my brother’s life with no more urgency than they would a chess game.

  “We need to know what we’re going into,” Pierre jumps into the conversation. “What the farm-compounds look like, where our best chances of finding him are—”

  “You can do that with satellites and a couple government experts. Shit, I could probably do it with Google Earth. Then, put five teams together and raid them all at the same time.” I pour myself a glass of water that I don’t want.

  “And if we do that and he isn’t in one of those five spots?” my father says to me. “They’ll rabbit with him, and then we’ll never find him.”

  “Am I the only one who’s noticed that they’ve already rabbited with him?” I answer. “We haven’t gotten any demands. No group has claimed responsibility for having him. No video has s
hown up on the internet of him being tortured or spilling state secrets. He’s already gone.”

  “Right now, we’re certain he’s still in the country—” Pierre begins.

  “And he still will be, even if we raid these places. If they haven’t smuggled him out by now, they aren’t going to. How would they even go about it with the heightened security we would implement in the airports, train stations and along our borders and coast?”

  “We don’t want to push too hard,” Jean-Luc tells me. “If we provoke them, things could go really badly.”

  “More badly than they already are?” I walk back to the table, slide into my seat. “What proof do we have that he’s even alive at this point?”

  “That’s enough, Kian,” my father says, his voice slicing the air like a whip.

  “It’s obviously not enough. Because if it was, we wouldn’t be sitting here talking about waiting two more weeks to actually do something to get Garrett back. We’ve been cautious for three months and it’s gotten us absolutely nowhere. If he isn’t already dead, then he’s probably dying. And if that’s the case, every second counts.”

  “And if we raid these compounds, risking the lives of dozens of Wildemarian soldiers, and he isn’t there? What do we do then?”

  “We round up everyone who is there and we interrogate them until one of them tells us where he is. If these are five of the most important, most secure places owned by the RF, somebody there knows where he is. I have absolute confidence that our intelligence agencies can get the information if they’re given the chance.”

  “And if they see us coming and kill Garrett out of spite?” my father asks. “What then?”

  “If they kill him out of spite, then they were going to kill him all along. Which means that every second he spends a prisoner of the RF, he’s one second closer to death. We need to get him out!”

  “And we will,” Jean-Luc says. “But the intelligence community agrees that reconnaissance is the best bet for now. Give us a week to do our jobs—”

  “You have seventy-two hours.” Once again, my father’s voice cuts through the room. “While I understand the importance of intelligence gathering, I agree with Kian that we’re reaching a critical point. I want to meet back here in seventy-two hours, and at that point, I want to know exactly how you’re going to go in and get the crown prince.”