by Geneva Lee
I wanted to wish him luck trying to keep us all in line. It would be like herding cats. Then again, now we had a purpose, and even if chances were slim we would find something, there was too much riding on it not to try.
I stared out the window, watching as the sprawl of London gave way to countryside. Windsor was a short trip from Buckingham and the helicopter I’d kept on standby since taking residence at the palace had been prepped and waiting. It had still taken us nearly half an hour to depart, mostly because the others insisted on going prepared.
Something heavy landed in my lap and I glanced down to find a gun. Looking up, my eyes sought Smith’s. We’d discussed this. I knew it would come to this. But now that we were here—on the verge of finding her—I knew I wouldn’t hesitate to kill anyone who came between me and her.
I’d once thought my father sent me to war as punishment. Now I wondered if he’d known a war was coming my way all along.
I was prepared. I’d seen death. I’d killed.
And I would do it again.
Windsmoor was eerily quiet as we landed the helicopter on the grounds. There had always been something strange about the house, and now it stood empty and lonely, making it even stranger. After Sarah had woken up, the employees had been dismissed or reassigned. I’d been avoiding the question of what to do with the estate ever since. Turning it into a summer house was out of the question, as was gifting it to a family member. It felt wrong—perverse somehow—to do anything with it at all. It had been a house of secrets. It was the place where we stashed the past we didn’t want to confront.
Now, being drawn back here, I realized it had become something else entirely. Knowing Sarah’s story, knowing that my family’s lie had provided cover for a much bigger lie, made the place feel more sinister. It was a warm spring day, but the closer we got to the house the colder I felt.
I was more than happy to let Smith take the lead on this one. I had my own ghosts to battle here.
“According to the blueprints, the entrance will be exterior.” Smith pointed to a patch of nondescript lawn. “Somewhere around here.”
As we moved toward the area, I felt morale tank. The lawn was untouched. If this was where the bunker was placed, it didn’t look like anyone had used it in years. It might not be here at all.
“I’ll grab supplies,” Brex called, hiking a finger towards a potting shed.
We were all eager for answers and knew we had to dig for them. I pushed aside the doubt creeping through me and forced myself to move forward. When Brex handed me a shovel, I got to work. It only took a few minutes before Georgia shouted. “Here!”
She’d hit upon a metal door, long forgotten under grass and dirt. Dropping my shovel, I ran to her and heaved it open. It was dark inside, but I didn’t care. I didn’t wait. I went down the ladder before anyone even had a chance to shine a flashlight.
As I descended, I felt my mood descend as well. Just because there wasn’t a hint of life didn’t mean Clara wasn’t here. I hit the ground with a crunch, landing on an unfinished dirt floor. A moment later, Brex joined me, shining a flashlight into the empty space around us.
The bomb shelter looked like it had only gotten to the foundational stages. A few retaining walls were done, but another had been left unfinished. It had begun to crumble after years of disuse.
“This would have led into living quarters.” Brex took a few steps toward a doorway, but paused. “They didn’t even bother.”
We’d known what we were going to find when we saw the dates on those plans. There was no reason to continue building a fall-out shelter after the war drew to a close. Not even the most judicious minds wanted to linger on wartime sorrows. After the bombs fell, everyone believed no war like that would ever be fought again. They were right.
Now, war was more protracted and more cruel. Now, war found its way into the streets of cities for deadly one night stands. Now, war knocked on your door and took you to battle one-on-one.
I knew because war had found its way to me.
“We should go back up,” Brex coaxed. “Regroup.”
Regroup? What was the point? We were as clueless as when we’d first began. I was vaguely aware of climbing the ladder, my body propelling me up the rungs while my mind stayed below.
I’d been holding on to Clara’s light the last few days, but I couldn’t see it anymore. Not a flicker. Not a flame.
Part of me wanted to tell them to close the door and leave me here to rot. I didn’t deserve more than that, and when sunlight hit my face, I wanted to throw myself back down the hole.
Georgia studied me, her dark eyes inscrutable. I could only imagine what she saw: weakness, failure. But she didn’t comment on that. “Let’s go inside.”
The last time I’d entered this house, I’d been full of dread. Clara had found out my secret. I’d thought then I might lose her. I’d deserved to. Now I wish I had. If she’d left me, none of this would have happened. She would have been safe. But I had been selfish.
In the few months since Windsmoor had been vacated, it had begun to collect dust and cobwebs. Although security checked in on the house, I’d assigned no temporary or permanent staff to keep the grounds or interior orderly. I’d wanted to put this place and what had happened here behind us all.
But Windsmoor didn’t want to let us go.
I bypassed Smith and the others, who’d spread the house’s blue prints on the table looking for some other lead, and headed down the narrow hall to the room where Sarah had slept all those years.
Except Sarah hadn’t been there. If I’d visited I might have known that. Where had they kept her? Who had kept her? Why? Each door I passed seemed to ask another unanswerable question.
When I opened the door to her room, it was as empty as the unfinished bomb shelter. The hospital bed was gone, as were the machines. There was no nurse sitting bedside. It was simply an ordinary room that held no memory of what it had once been.
“I’m sorry.” My words echoed in the empty chamber. I didn’t know who I was speaking to—I didn’t know who I’d wronged—but I needed to say it. “I wish I could undo it all. I wish I could erase all the pain I’ve caused. I wish I could pay for my own sins.”
Because Clara was paying for them while trying to protect our unborn child. She’d paid my debts over and over. Because Norris had given his life for my family. He’d given everything for me. Loving me wasn’t worth the price.
“This isn’t your fault,” Georgia’s voice punctured the silence.
I couldn’t bring myself to face her. She knew better than most what I was capable of—the monster lurking behind the man.
“Isn’t it?” I asked. “I knew better than to fall in love with her. I knew this life would destroy her.”
“You knew about this?” Georgia snorted and moved beside me.
“I knew my family was fucked up,” I said.
“Every family is fucked up. You didn’t choose this life.”
“But I chose her.” It was the same inexorable truth I kept coming back to. I’d chosen her against reason and common sense and public opinion.
“You chose happiness,” Georgia said softly, “which is what we all want—and that wasn’t stupid or selfish. It was brave. It takes guts to choose to be happy. Most people aren’t strong enough to do it. I’m not.”
“Why?” I didn’t understand, because I no longer felt brave or happy.
“Because being miserable is easier. It’s humanity’s natural position. We invent technology to make our lives simpler but not happier. We pretend everything is okay when it’s not. We fake happiness because the real thing has to be worked for. You fought for Clara. She fought for you.”
“I’m tired of fighting,” I admitted to her.
“I know.” She placed a hand on my back. “But choosing happiness is the best revenge. Refusing to suffer when others want you to eats away at them.”
“If you know this, why aren’t you happy?” I leveled a gaze at her. We’d dance
d around this since she’d come back into my life. For all of Georgia’s confidence and courage, she hadn’t been happy for a moment. I don’t think I’d ever seen her happy once.
“That’s not how my story goes.” Her eyes were haunted as she spoke. “I only know happiness because I’ve seen it. I’ve never…felt it. The closest I’ve ever come. Well, you know.”
I’d seen Georgia’s files. I knew things about her past, she would never speak of, so I understood that she’d been broken. But it filled me with pity to know that she equated happiness with nothing. That oblivion was as close to bliss as she’d ever come.
“I hope that’s not true someday,” I murmured.
“Me too.”
“There you are!” Brex called from the doorway. “Look, I don’t know, but I think we found something.”
It took effort to turn and follow him. It was another dead end. I knew it. When we reached Smith, he held up the blue prints.
“This house doesn’t make sense,” he said.
I shrugged. I’d always felt that way about it. “These old estates never do.”
“Not the actual house,” he clarified. “The blue prints clearly show the exterior square footage, but when you come inside—”
“It’s too small,” Brex said. “We just went through the whole house. It doesn’t add up.”
“Either the walls are really thick or…”
“There’s something behind them,” I finished for them. It made sense. Windsmoor was adjacent to Windsor Castle, which, like Buckingham, utilised a number of hidden passageways to help royalty move about while the guests used the stairs and halls.
“What’s interesting is that it’s not in the blue prints,” Smith said.
“But they wouldn’t have added them later.” It didn’t make sense. “Why wouldn’t they have included the passages on the blue prints, especially if the aim of the plans was to make Windsmoor more secure? The passages could have linked to the bomb shelter.”
“Because they didn’t need to make it more secure,” Brex said. “Think about it. Why draw up plans a few months before the war ended? They knew it was drawing to a close.”
“And why leave out the passages?” Smith added.
“Because you didn’t want people to know the truth. You wanted to send them in the wrong direction.” It was starting to become clear. The fallout shelter was a diversion, meant to keep people from looking closer at Windsmoor.
“There’s a shelter here somewhere,” Smith said. “I’m sure of it. They’ve left it off here on purpose.”
No one asked why. That reason was clear. Someone didn’t want it to be found.
“Where do we look?” I asked.
The high-pitched siren of an alarm answered me.
Chapter 21
CLARA
Pain doubled me over as a strong arm wrapped protectively around me. I couldn’t bring myself to look up. “Clara, we need to move. They’ll have heard that.”
As if on cue, a siren blared outside the door. We were out of time, but now I wasn’t alone. Now I had someone by my side who would get me out of here. I struggled to my feet with Norris’s help. As soon as I was up, I threw my arms around him and began to cry.
For the first time in days, I felt safe. Warmth swirled around me like a blanket as Norris wrapped me tightly in a hug.
“It’s okay, Your Majesty. I’m here.”
I twisted my head, bracing myself before seeing what had happened only moments ago, but Norris tried to shield my view.
“No, don’t turn your head.” He tried to keep me from looking back to where David had stood, but I turned anyway.
I wasn’t certain what I’d feel. I hated him. I loved him. But the sight of David strewn across the floor, hands clutching a bloody wound made me sway on my feet. Norris kept me upright.
“Clara,” David called weakly, stretching out a hand. “Please…”
Part of me wanted to go to him. Part of me hated the idea of him dying alone. He was my brother—or he had been. We’d commiserated over falling in love with royal men. I’d picked out his wedding band. We were supposed to be family.
The rest of me remembered how he’d tried to haul me back to the bed. He was going to let them kill me. He was going to choose cowardice over family. Why shouldn’t I do the same?
“We only have a moment,” Norris warned me. “We need to get a move on. Someone knows I’m free.”
“It’s…an…evacuation,” David said, shaking his head. “The siren only goes off when a location has been burned.”
Burned? That meant nothing to me, but Norris’s eyes narrowed. “Then we have even less time if protocol is the same.”
“Five minutes.” David waved his outstretched hand and for the first time I realized he was holding something in his bloody palm: his security badge. “This will get you out. Take the northern corridor.”
“What about the my room? Rachel?” I asked. She was there. She was trapped. Or would they take her with them?
“There’s an exit on the east end of the cell block, but you don’t want to go down there. There are...” He coughed and a small fountain of blood trickled down his lip “…explosives. Counter measures.”
Norris covered me as we approached David, keeping the gun trained on him the whole time. He whipped the badge from his hand and backed me away.
David’s head lolled a little as he tried to reach for me. “Tell Edward I love him. I’m sorry. You need to go. Don’t bother with…”
The words faded from his lips as his head tipped to one side.
“Is he…” I couldn’t bring myself to ask.
“He will be,” Norris said grimly. He glanced at the flimsy hospital gown I had on just as another contraction hit.
I bent forward, crying out. It felt like I was being torn in two. My hands instinctively covered my womb. The baby couldn’t come now. Not like this.
Norris kept a hand on the small of my back, looking ill at ease about our situation. The man could walk into a room shooting, yet it only took childbirth to make him uncomfortable. “I’m sorry, but we have to go. If this building has been burned…”
He didn’t have to finish the sentence. Smoke began seeping under the door frame. Norris let go of me and wrenched a sheet off the bed. Tearing a swath he held it to my face. I took it, grateful.
“You ready?” he asked.
The corridor outside was chaos, but no one seemed to notice or care that we were there. Then again, Norris was wearing a guard’s uniform. He kept the gun out, but no one stopped us. The few personnel we came across seemed occupied with their own tasks. A few had files. Others were racing up the northern corridor. When Norris turned to lead us that way, I shook my head.
“This way.” I pointed back to the corridor that led to where they’d kept me and Rachel.
“We need to leave.”
I pulled out of his grasp, prayed another contraction was a long way off, and started toward the other end. Rachel’s life had been stolen from her. She’d been an unwitting pawn in this bizarre game and I wasn’t about to sacrifice her now.
She had answers whether she knew it or not. And she deserved better than being left to die.
Norris came up beside me, shaking his head. “It’s dangerous.”
“I know, but I have you now.” I would not have dared to go back for her until he showed up.
When we reached the door that led back to the rooms I’d been kept in, Norris scanned David’s badge. It clicked open.
The smoke was thicker in the corridor and I coughed, crouching as low as I could, where the air was clearer. I pointed to the end of the hall, where Rachel’s room was. It would be the farthest from the eastern exit, if I had my bearings. Norris held up a hand as if wanting me to wait here. I watched as he raced down the hall. A moment passed. When he didn’t reappear, I hobbled down the hall, trying to ignore the first pangs of the next contraction. When I got to her room, I found him hunched over the bed. Moving inside, I realized he
was performing CPR.
But there was no use. Rachel’s eyes were turned up to the ceiling, her hand splayed across the bed, and on the floor lay an apple.
When Norris turned and shook his head, I already knew. This time they’d put something deadly in her food. I choked back an angry sob as the contraction robbed me of my grief.
Norris didn’t wait for it to pass. Instead, he lifted me in his arms, abandoning the gun and started down the hall. I turned my face into his shoulder, trying to block out the smoke. His heart was beating fast and I could hear his lungs struggling to keep up with the polluted air.
He stopped at the door we’d come through, but there was no scanner here. It could only be opened manually. That meant we had to find the exit David had told us about.
“I can walk,” I told him, squirming in his arms. It would be faster, barring any more contractions.
Once we reached the far end of the hall. We began opening doors. Then I remembered where I’d woken up. Opening that door, we walked into an empty room. I’d looked for windows that day, but I’d never bothered to look up.
Norris had the same thought. He pointed to the ceiling where a thin line formed a barely visible circle. This was the eastern exit? No wonder David had warned us the other way.
Norris disappeared into the hall and came back carrying a chair from Rachel’s room. He stood on it and reached for the circle, pushing against it. But before he got it to budge, a cold voice sliced through the air.
“I wouldn’t do that.”
I whipped around to find myself staring at a ghost.
Norris stopped and slowly got off the chair, looking unsurprised to find himself in the same room as Jack Hammond.
“You’re dead,” I said, still staring at him.
“Only as dead as you, my dear.” He brandished a pistol in our direction. “Which is to say very if you keep trying to force your way out this exit. It’s wired to explode.”
“Hammond.” Norris nodded. “If you know that, you know the way out.”
“You mistake why I’m here. Like your darling queen, you assumed this section was empty, but some of the doors were locked.”