by Sara Arden
“Where is your guard dog? The American?” Grisha demanded.
“How should I know? I paid him to get me passage out of Tunisia. I don’t need a keeper.”
“If he comes for you, I’ll kill him.”
Miklos scanned the area. He seemed to sense Byron’s presence. “I think you should stay aboard the Circe until Marseille.”
“Why is that?” Grisha asked.
“I know the American is still on board. I feel it in my bones. Here, we control the situation. There would be a lot of, shall we say, opportunities for him between here and Italy on a smaller craft.”
“I see your wisdom. If the princess is dead, I can’t very well marry her. We’ll take your cabin, Miklos.”
* * *
DAMARA HADN’T SEEN any possible way out of the situation that didn’t involve revealing herself. Maybe it was naive of her to trust Hawkins as she did, but she knew in her gut that he’d come for her.
She could stand a few hours of Grisha’s company—she’d had to endure it at home all the time. Of course, she’d always had her bodyguards and her brother and it had always been in a formal environment. But she was sure she could maneuver him to treat her gently at least until Hawkins could get to her.
Damara followed behind Grisha, wondering exactly how hard she’d have to hit him in the back of the head and with what to slow him down—if such action became necessary. She was thankful she’d asked her bodyguards to train her and even more thankful they’d agreed.
Abele would’ve had them put to death if he’d known. He’d thought it unfeminine and a sin for a woman to know such things. Of course, it had suited his purposes when hiring a contingent of female bodyguards to keep her secluded from men.
The captain’s berth was small, but it had been outfitted with every luxury. Damara knew immediately that the cargoes transported on this ship weren’t always on the manifest. If the Russians knew Miklos well, then he must have been transporting people, as well.
One of her objections to Grisha was that he’d been linked to sex-trafficking rings and she found that repulsive. How long before the young women of Castallegna began to disappear with him as their crown prince? No one would ever be safe.
It was times like this she wished she had more power. She wished she was more than a princess.
“Plotting my death?” Grisha asked conversationally.
She studied him for a moment. “Of course not. It’s no secret I don’t want to marry you, but I don’t wish you dead.”
“Why don’t you want to marry me, Damara? I have money and power. I can trace my lineage back to Catherine the Great.”
She doubted his royal lineage, but she wasn’t going to say so. “You’re a bad man, Grisha.”
“All great men are.”
She shook her head. “I must marry for my people. You know that. What would you bring to Castallegna? Convince me.” If she could keep him talking, maybe she could buy some time.
He grabbed her and pushed her up against the wall, but she shoved at his shoulders. “I said convince me for Castallegna. My body may come as a gift with the responsibilities of my people, but it has nothing to do with the decision of who will lead them.”
She prayed he heard her. His hands were just as strong and just as damaged as Byron’s, but they were not noble and they turned her stomach. Damara held her body stiff and immobile. She didn’t close her eyes, and she didn’t look away from him. Not even when he dipped his head to kiss her.
Grisha paused when they were eye to eye. Damara didn’t flinch, didn’t hide from what was about to happen. Something he saw there caused him to pull back. “Perhaps you are not as useless as your brother says.”
“Perhaps not,” she agreed.
“How is it that you make even your acquiescence sound like a challenge?”
“I assure you, it’s not. You’re obviously the one with the power. You’ve caught me. I have nowhere to go and no one to turn to for help,” Damara said calmly.
“But you’re not afraid of me.”
“Should I be? Would you like me to be?”
“You said I was a bad man.” He studied her.
“Just because you’re bad doesn’t mean I should fear you. Fear is a waste of imagination. You will do what you must and I will do as I must.”
He eyed her, hard. “I meant what I said about the mercenary. I will kill him.” As if she’d somehow said otherwise.
“I’ve no doubt. Which is another reason I can’t marry you. You kill someone because they disagree with you? My father had a dream for Castallegna.”
Grisha snorted. “A dream of democracy?”
“Yes. Being born into a family doesn’t make a person any more fit to lead than any other.”
“I did not expect to drag you to the captain’s quarters to talk politics.” Grisha scrubbed a hand over his face.
“No? What did you expect? To haul me down here, make me cower in fear and then force yourself on me so I’d be so humiliated that I would have no choice but to marry you? If my brother told you that would work, you are sadly mistaken.”
“And yet if we were on Castallegna, we would be legally married if I did.”
“That’s another thing that’s gotta go.” Tendrils of fear unfurled in her belly, but she ignored them. It didn’t matter what he did to her. She was still the Jewel of Castallegna. But her brother and men like him were convinced that her only worth lay between her legs. No man would want her if she wasn’t a virgin.
“What if I agreed to all these things you wanted?” Grisha surprised her.
“In writing? A contract that would be for all the world to see?”
“No, not in writing.” He unbuttoned his shirt and she gritted her teeth, fear blooming like a rancid flower. But he didn’t pounce on her. Instead, he showed her the tattoos on his chest, his belly. His arms. His shoulders. “I already have a contract in writing, you see. Bratva. If I am ever found unworthy of the ink on my skin, it will be removed for me.”
She found herself looking at the art on his skin. The stars on his chest. The church with the spires on his belly. “I don’t understand.”
“These are what mark me as a bad man.” He pointed to a marking in Cyrillic she didn’t understand. “The first man I killed for The Brotherhood.”
“And you want to sit on the throne?” She was incredulous as to why he would think she’d choose him to lead her people. To be her husband. He’d admitted to killing a man. Not just one, but the first of many.
“It could be good for both of us, Damara. When you lead men, you must make choices, hard choices, and sometimes people die. If you order your army to war or you set your people against me, you’re sentencing them to death.”
“You can’t offer me peace with one hand and threats with another.” Why didn’t anyone understand that?
“It’s how things are done.”
“No.” It would not be how things were done. She’d never agree to marry him. Never. No matter what he did to her.
“I don’t want to hurt you, but I will.” His voice was a growl, low in his throat.
“As I said,” she said, her mouth dry as the desert, “do as you must.” Damara tried to focus her mind, find her center and remember her training. He was bigger than she was, but she had speed and strategy on her side.
She studied her surroundings surreptitiously looking for a possible exit and weapons.
He lunged for her, and she grabbed the lamp on the nightstand, but it had been secured to the table in case of rough waters. So she used the table and the desk as leverage to deliver a roundhouse kick to his head.
It stunned him long enough for her to do it again, but he still didn’t fall. The man’s head must have been fashioned from concrete.
The door to the room swung open,
and a flower of blood bloomed on his chest where Byron shot him with a .38.
Grisha clutched at his chest and staggered forward, but Damara didn’t stay to watch him fall. Byron grabbed her hand and pulled her out into the hall.
“This was not how this was supposed to go down.” His hand was warm and strong; his very presence made her feel as though everything was going to be okay. “But next time I tell you to stay put, stay put.”
“It was the only way.”
“I know that. But I had a plan.” He yanked her up the stairs toward the deck.
“What’s the plan now?” she asked as she hurried up the stairs behind him.
“Run like hell.”
She didn’t like that plan very much, but it seemed that it was all they were left with. An explosion rattled the ship and she screamed, but alarms drowned out the sound.
“Don’t worry. It’s forward aft. We’ll be exiting toward the rear.”
“What did you do?”
“Answers later. Running now,” he commanded.
The sun was overhead by this point, and the crewmen who saw them were too busy responding to the emergency and keeping the ship afloat to bother with them.
When they got to the side, he started to climb over. “I’m going to jump and then you’re going to jump, okay? I’ll catch you.”
Damara froze.
“Don’t bail on me now, Princess. You’ve faced down ruthless thugs like you were at a cotillion. A little leap is nothing.”
He landed on the deck of one of the Russian’s boats. Then he emptied the .38 into the rear of the boat ahead of him, damaging the rudder. Hawkins held out his arms for her. “Hurry. They can still use the lifeboats, and they might catch us. You have to jump now.”
Damara’s brain screamed at her to keep moving, but her feet were rooted to the spot.
Castallegna. She had to do this for Castallegna. If she was caught... She couldn’t finish the thought. They’d blame her for Grisha’s death. They’d punish her for it, and she knew from what her bodyguards had told her that Abele’s head torturer had nothing on the Russians.
She remembered again from when she was little—the wind would carry her safely. Like it had then, like it had on the bike...and it was Hawkins. He’d kept her safe before. If he said he’d catch her, he’d catch her.
She jumped. Time stopped, and for Damara, it was as if she’d flung herself out into nothingness rather than over the side of a boat down to waiting arms on the deck of the small yacht. Terror froze her limbs, but he caught her easily and deposited her on the deck. She didn’t want to let go of him; her arms stayed around his neck even as Byron started the boat. Soon, Circe’s Storm grew smaller in the distance behind them, as did the smoke billowing up from her. So far, no one was in pursuit, but the captain knew where they were headed and a radio or a satphone would be much faster than a boat.
“You know we’ll still have to be on our guard. It’ll be best if we choose another port. Maybe Barcelona. It’s closer. If the fuel doesn’t hold, the wind will.”
She leaned against his shoulder, knowing she should release him but unwilling to just yet. “Thank you for everything that you’ve done.”
“You’re not safe yet.”
“Safer than I was.”
“You did good in there, Princess. You’re going to be okay.” He pulled her closer for a minute. When he released her, she finally let him go.
Again, his praise shouldn’t have been so warm, like basking in the sun, but it was. She’d never been good for anything but getting her brother what he wanted. Pride swelled at the notion that a man like him thought she could handle herself.
But she remembered the look of surprise on Grisha’s face. The sound of the gun as the bullet exploded out of the barrel and into the man. She knew it had to be done, but that didn’t make it any less horrific.
Damara shivered.
“Are you cold?” he asked, wrapping his arm around her again.
How quickly this physicality came to be normal between them, this touching. She leaned into his warmth and let him shelter her there for just a moment. Perhaps it was the stress of the situation, but she liked how easily he touched her, how he allowed her to touch him. This sort of intimacy was unheard of for her.
But as much as she enjoyed it, guilt swarmed her. “A man died. Because of me.”
“Are you sorry he’s dead?” He didn’t look at her, but out at the water as he guided the craft.
“Of course. He was a living being. I don’t want anyone to die because of me, but he was going to hurt me. And if he had the chance, he’d hurt Castallegna. He told me he was Bratva.”
Byron nodded. “Russian mob. They have a heavy presence in the Mediterranean. With the state of geopolitics, it makes sense.”
“I can’t believe my brother would align himself with these kinds of people.” No, she supposed that wasn’t true. She could believe it, but she didn’t want to. Abele had loved her once, when she was very young. Before he’d gone power mad when their father had died.
Before the Council of Lords had tried to have him declared illegitimate.
She tightened her arms around Hawkins’s waist and just buried her face in his chest. It was safe there. The outside world didn’t exist, only his warmth and strength.
Why couldn’t a man like him want her?
He was fierce and strong as all good leaders must be, but he was noble, too, self-sacrificing.
“Castallegna is small. This seems like much trouble to go to simply to have a base and consulate on Castallegnian soil.” She sighed.
“It would be good to have a government that was receptive to our operatives. Safe houses, if you will. Priceless, really. The Russians are trafficking in people, arms, munitions, and a lot of it is filtering through Greece, Cyprus and Italy.”
“Won’t that make Barcelona too dangerous because of the proximity to the Mediterranean?”
“No, I have contacts in Barcelona. We may have to lie low for a few days, but we’ll get you on U.S. soil soon.”
“I don’t mean to look a gift horse, Hawkins, but wasn’t Miklos a contact?”
“He was an associate.” Hawkins laughed. “Contacts. U.S. government. They’ll get us stateside safely. I promise you.”
“Then what will happen to me?”
“I’ll turn you over to Renner, the guy you spoke with. Then he’ll take it from there.”
“What will you do?” She didn’t want to be handed over to anyone else. But she had to remember that to him, she was just a job. A package that had to be delivered. Something he hadn’t wanted to take to start with.
“I’ll have to go back to Italy. I’m still on assignment there.”
“I hope I didn’t blow your cover.”
“No, it’ll be fine. Miklos doesn’t run with the same people. We’ve never had any transactions anywhere that was well lit, and I have a different name. Different social circles. They think I’m in finance. It’s not a bad gig, really.”
“So if I asked you how the yen was doing in comparison to the dollar, you’d be able to tell me?”
“Yes. Do you want to hear it?”
“Not really.” She laughed. “I’ve acquired many skills, but finance and global trends all turn to gibberish when I try to make sense of them. I understand spending money, and I understand budgets and taxes. But crude investments versus pork bellies because of the rise in gold? Nothing.” She’d always felt as if she should know more about international finance, but her brain just didn’t work that way.
“Whenever anything else was going wrong in my life, numbers always made sense. They’re irrefutable. Math is a universal language. Even though people say money is cold, hard and unfeeling, it’s not. It’s a tool. The stock market is attuned to feelings. When people don’t fee
l safe, the numbers drop. When they do, they rise.” He shrugged.
She liked that view of things. It made sense to her.
“I wish you could come with me after we’re stateside. I don’t know Renner. I know you.” It was the closest she could come to asking him without actually saying she wanted him.
“You don’t. Not really. I’m not a good guy, Princess. It’s nice that you see me that way now. But it’s like I said, I’m not really good at this protection gig. Killing is more my speed.”
“Then why do I feel so safe?” She was still tucked against his body, shielded by his heat and his strength.
“Because you haven’t learned any better.” His tone wasn’t quite condescension, but it was close.
“I’ve learned what you’ve taught me.” She looked up at his hard profile. “And what you’ve taught me is that I’m safe with you. That you’ll protect me. Even at the cost of your own life.”
“I work for the good guys, but don’t let that fool you into thinking I’m a good guy.” He turned away from the controls and stared down at her, his gaze focusing on her mouth.
For one second, she hoped he’d be what he thought was a bad guy and kiss her. He probably thought she was some sheltered girl with no experience. She supposed that was true, but it didn’t mean that she didn’t know what she wanted or wasn’t capable of making her own choices. She trembled and wanted to ask him if he was going to kiss her, but she knew that would shatter the moment. She wanted him to slam his mouth into hers and kiss her with no thought of where they were, who she was or what it meant.
His eyes were even more intense, his pupils dilated and his breathing was rough and hard, as if he exerted some superhuman effort just standing there. Maybe he wanted to kiss her, too. Her eyes fluttered closed, and she tilted her head up slowly.
“This can’t happen,” he said, his voice as low and guttural as Grisha’s had been when he’d demanded to know why she didn’t want him.
It occurred to her then that she wanted Byron Hawkins with the same intensity with which she’d despised Grisha.