The Princess Predicament

by Lisa Childs

  Maybe forever this time—if the man had managed to pull the trigger before Whit had knocked him out.

  “What the hell were you thinking?” he shouted the question at Princess Gabriella.

  His fear wasn’t for himself but for her, and he hadn’t felt an emotion that intense since the night before she disappeared. The night she’d begged him to stay with her. At first he’d thought she’d only wanted protection but then he’d realized that she’d wanted more.

  She’d wanted him. But then the next morning she’d left him without a backward glance. So he’d probably just been her way of rebelling against her father’s attempts to control her life. That was what that night had been about, but what about today?

  “I—I was defending myself,” she stammered in a strangely hoarse tone, as if she’d lost her voice or was trying to disguise it. She ducked down and reached for the gun that had dropped to the floor with the man.

  But Whit beat her to the weapon, clutching it tightly in his fist. “No more shooting for you, Princess.”

  “I’m not a princess—”

  “Save it,” he said. “I damn well know who you are.” He had no idea why she was denying her identity to him, though. But that wasn’t his most pressing concern at the moment.

  He leaned over to check the man for a pulse. He was alive, just unconscious. And that might not last long. “Who is this? And why did you shoot him?”

  “He tried to kidnap me,” she said, apparently willing to admit that much even though she wouldn’t admit to who she was. “So I grabbed his gun.”

  Whit uttered a low whistle of appreciation. Even without a weapon, the guy would have been intimidating, yet she’d managed to disarm him, too. Maybe she wasn’t Princess Gabriella. “How do you know he was going to kidnap you?”

  “He tried to drag me out there,” she gestured toward the big open doors in one of the metal walls, “to a plane.”

  As Whit glanced up to follow the direction she pointed, he noticed men—about four of them—rushing in from the airfield. They must have heard the shots, too. And they were armed.

  “We have to get the hell out of here,” he said.

  Or the man’s friends were liable to finish what he’d started—abducting Gabriella. And Whit with his shoulder wound and his borrowed gun were hardly going to be enough protection to save her.

  She must have seen the men, too, because she was already turning and moving toward the street. Whit kept between her and the men. But they saw the guy on the ground, and they saw the gun in Whit’s hand.

  And they began to fire.

  *

  “WHAT’S WRONG?” Charlotte asked anxiously. “What did Whit say?”

  It wasn’t so much what he’d said as what Aaron had overheard when he’d been on the phone with his friend. But Charlotte was already worried about Princess Gabriella; he didn’t want to upset her any more.

  She settled onto the airplane seat across from him. After her trip to the restroom, her eyes were dry and clear. She’d composed herself. But how much would it take for her to break again?

  She’d already been through so much—kidnapped and held hostage for six months. And she was pregnant, too, with his baby.

  Aaron’s heart filled with pride and love. But fear still gripped him. He wasn’t like Whit; he couldn’t hide his emotions. Whit usually hid them so well that Aaron had often doubted the man was even capable of feeling. But he’d heard it in his voice—his fear for Princess Gabriella’s safety—once he’d realized she was also where the shooting was.

  “I know something’s wrong,” Charlotte persisted, but she pitched her voice low and glanced toward the back of the jet where the king had retired to his private room. “Tell me.”

  Aaron uttered a ragged sigh of resignation and admitted, “I heard shots…”

  Charlotte’s eyes widened. “Someone was shooting at Whit? He wouldn’t have had time to get a gun yet. He won’t be able to defend himself.”

  On more than one occasion, Aaron had seen Whit defend himself without a gun. But he hadn’t been injured then. “Whit wasn’t the one getting shot at.”

  She gasped. “Gabby? Was it Gabby?”

  “I don’t know,” he said. But from the way Whit had reacted to the news that the princess was pregnant, too, he was pretty sure that it was her. “It’s a dangerous country. It could have been rebel gunfire. It could have been anything…”

  “Call him back!” She reached across the space between them and grabbed for the cell phone he’d shoved in his shirt pocket.

  But Aaron caught her hand in his and entwined their fingers. “He won’t answer,” he told her. “He needs to focus on what’s happening. And there’s nothing we can do from here anyway.”

  That was why he hadn’t wanted to tell her. She would want to help, and that wasn’t possible from so many miles away. That feeling of helplessness overwhelmed Aaron, reminding him of the way he’d felt when Charlotte had been missing. He’d been convinced that she was out there, somewhere, but he hadn’t been able to find her.

  Now Whit needed help—Whit, who’d so often stepped in to save him—and Aaron was too far away to come to his aid.

  Panic had tears welling in her eyes. “We can have the pilot change course—”

  “We’re almost to St. Pierre,” Aaron pointed out. “We’ll be landing soon.”

  Panic raised her voice a couple of octaves. “Once we drop off the king, we can leave again—”

  “No,” he said. “There’s a doctor meeting us at the palace. You need to be checked out.” Even after he’d rescued her from where she’d been held hostage, she’d been through a lot.

  She shook her head, tumbling those long tresses of golden brown hair around her shoulders. “I need to protect Gabby.”

  He knew it wasn’t just because she was the princess’s bodyguard. But he had to remind her, “You need to take care of our baby first.”

  “We shouldn’t have let Whit go alone,” she said. “He’s hurt too badly to protect her.”

  “We hadn’t thought she would need protecting,” Aaron reminded his fiancée.

  “We did,” Charlotte insisted, squeezing his fingers in her distress. “Six months ago someone left her that note threatening her life. That’s why I sent her into hiding.” And set herself up as a decoy for the princess. Her plan had worked. Too well.

  “But nobody knows where she is.” Or the paparazzi would have found her, no matter where she’d been. And there would have been photographs of Princess Gabriella on every magazine and news show, as there had always been.

  “If those shots were being fired at her,” Charlotte said, her beautiful face tense with fear, “then someone must have figured it out.”

  “How?” he asked. “Nobody but you and I and Whit know where she is.”

  She glanced to the back of the plane. “After I talked to my aunt and confirmed that Gabby was actually still with her at the orphanage, I told the king. I thought he had a right to know.”

  “Was he furious?” Aaron asked. Charlotte had done much more than just violating protocol as a royal bodyguard.

  “He called St. Pierre and sent out another plane with a security team as Whit’s backup.” She drew in a deep breath, as if trying to soothe herself. “They should be there within a few hours.”

  Aaron had heard the shots. He wasn’t reassured. In fact he was disheartened. He had wasted so many years being mad at Whit for something that hadn’t been the man’s fault. Had he repaired his friendship only to lose his friend?

  If Princess Gabriella had been involved in the shooting, then Whit would have stepped in and done whatever was necessary to try to save her life—including giving up his own.

  By the time the security team made it to where Whit and Gabriella were, they would probably be too late to help. With Whit injured and unarmed, it was probably already too late.

  Chapter Four

  Gabby pressed her palms and splayed her fingers across her belly, as if her hands alo
ne could protect her baby from the bullets that began to fly around the airport—ricocheting off the metal roof and cement floor. She wanted to help Whit, but she had no weapon—nothing to save him. So she ran.

  He returned fire as he hurried with her to the entrance. Keeping his body between her and the men, he used himself as a human shield. She would have been moved—if she hadn’t known that it was bodyguard protocol to put themselves between their subject and any potential threat.

  These men weren’t potentially a threat; they were definitely a threat. To Whit more than to her. They probably wouldn’t want to risk fatally injuring her—if they intended to kidnap her. It was hard to collect a ransom on a dead hostage. But if they’d been hired by whoever had left her that letter, then she was in as much danger as Whit was.

  Maybe more.

  She ran out of the building, but the street was as deserted now as the airport was. All the people had scattered and left. It was no safer out here than it had been in the deserted metal building.

  But she had Whit. He’d stayed with her, his hand on her arm—urging her forward—away from the danger. But the danger followed them. Shots continued to ring out. Whit’s gun clicked with the telltale sound of an empty magazine. He cursed.

  Panic slammed through Gabby. The men chasing them were not about to run out of bullets—not with all the guns they had. Should she and Whit stop and lift their arms in surrender and hope they were not killed? Before she could ask Whit, he made the decision for them.

  He lifted her off the ground and ran toward the street. Gabby didn’t wriggle and try to fight free as she had six months ago. Instead of pounding on him, she clutched at him, so that he wouldn’t drop her. He leaned and ducked down, as if dodging bullets.

  Gabriella felt the air stir as the shots whizzed past. But with the way he was holding her—she wouldn’t feel the bullets. They would have to pass through Whit’s body before hitting hers. Again, it was bodyguard protocol, but she couldn’t help being impressed, touched and horrified that he might get killed protecting her.

  He ran into the street, narrowly avoiding a collision with a Jeep. The vehicle screeched to a halt, and Whit jerked open the passenger door and jumped inside. He deposited her in the passenger seat and forced his way into the driver’s seat, pushing the driver out of the door.

  The man scrambled to his feet and cursed at him. Then he ducked low and ran when the gunmen rushed up behind him, firing wildly at the vehicle. Whit slammed his foot on the gas, accelerating with such force that Gabriella’s back pressed into the seat. She grabbed for the seat belt, but there wasn’t one.

  “Hang on tight,” Whit advised.

  She stretched out her arms and braced her hands on the dash, so that she wouldn’t slam into it and hurt the baby. “Please, hurry,” she pleaded. “Hurry—before they catch up to us.”

  “Where the hell am I going?” he asked. “Which way to the orphanage?”

  Panic shot through her, shortening her breath as she thought of the danger. “No. No. We can’t—we can’t risk leading these men back to the orphanage.” Those children had already lost so much to violence; she wouldn’t let them get caught in the cross fire and lose their lives, too.

  “I’ll make sure we’re not followed,” Whit assured her. “But we have to hurry.”

  She hesitated. She’d been uncertain that she could trust anyone again, let alone him. But this wasn’t her heart she was risking. It was so much more important than that. Whit was good at his job. Charlotte wouldn’t have had the king hire him if he and Aaron hadn’t been good bodyguards. So she gave him directions, leading him deeper and deeper into the jungle.

  The Jeep bounced along the rutted trails, barely passing between the trees and the other foliage that threatened the paths. Gabby left one hand on the dash and reached for the roll bars over her head with the other, holding tight, so that she didn’t risk an injury to her unborn child. She also kept turning around to check the back window and make certain that they had not been followed.

  “No one’s behind us,” Whit assured her with a glance at the rearview mirror. “I’ve been watching.”

  She uttered a breath of relief that they wouldn’t be leading danger back to the orphanage. At the speed that Whit was driving, they arrived in record time at the complex of huts and larger wood-and-thatch buildings that comprised the orphanage.

  “This is it,” she said with a surge of pride and happiness, which was the polar opposite from the way she’d felt when she’d first seen the complex six months ago. When she’d accepted that it was really where Charlotte had sent her, her heart had been heavy with dread and her pulse quick with panic. “We’re here.”

  Whit stepped on the brake but didn’t put the transmission into Park. Instead he peered through the dust-smeared windshield at the collection of crude outbuildings that made up the orphanage complex.

  “This is it?” he echoed her words but his deep voice was full of skepticism.

  “This is it,” she confirmed. Now that she knew how hard it was to build in the jungle, she was even more impressed with what Lydia had achieved—and with what Gabriella had helped her manage during her stay. “Pull around the back of that hut. That’s mine.”

  He followed her direction, parking the Jeep where she pointed. But before she could open her door, he reached across her. His hand splayed over her belly. He leaned close, so close that she felt his breath warm her face when he asked, “Is this mine?”

  She shivered at his closeness and the intensity in his dark eyes. But she couldn’t meet his gaze and lie to him. So she glanced down and noticed the blood that trickled down his arm. And she gasped in shock and horror. “You were shot!”

  Perhaps it had only been his duty as a royal bodyguard, perhaps it had been his concern for the child he suspected might be his—but he’d taken a bullet that had been meant for her. And after being hit, he’d driven the Jeep over tough terrain to get them to safety.

  “We need to get you inside,” she said, fighting back her panic and concern. During her time at the orphanage, she’d learned to not let the children see her anxiety when they were hurt because it only upset and hurt them more. “And I’ll have Lydia call for the doctor.”

  She opened the door and slipped out from under his hand. Then she hurried around to the driver’s side and opened his door.

  In addition to the blood trailing down his arm and turning the shoulder of his shirt an even darker black with wetness, he had sweat beading on his brow and upper lip. It was hot and humid in the jungle. But she’d heard the other guards talking about Whit’s deployments to the Middle East—usually because she had asked them to tell her about the blond bodyguard—and they had always said how he had never perspired—not in the heat—not under pressure.

  Was he hurt that bad?

  She lifted his arm and slid beneath it, in order to help him from the driver’s seat. But he didn’t lean on her. With a short grunt of pain, he unfolded himself from beneath the wheel and stepped out of the Jeep to stand beside her. Close beside her, his tense body nearly touching hers. He leaned down, so that their gazes met and locked.

  “I don’t need a doctor,” he said, dismissing her concern. “I need the truth.”

  She had given up denying her identity to him. She’d only been able to fool him once, but he obviously had no doubt about who she was now. So what did he mean? “The truth about what?”

  His throat moved, rippling, as if he swallowed hard. And after clearing his throat, he asked, “Is that baby you’re carrying mine?”

  The baby shifted inside her, kicking at her belly, as if he, too, wanted to know the answer. She placed her palms over her stomach again, protectively. And because she felt so protective, she wasn’t willing to share her baby with anyone.

  Not even the baby’s father.

  Whit moved to lift his arms—probably to grab her and maybe shake the truth out of her—but the movement had his handsome face contorting with a grimace of pain. And a groan slip
ped from between his gritted teeth.

  “Doctor first,” she insisted. “Then we’ll talk…”

  Maybe by the time she had Lydia summon the doctor from the clinic in the more populated town close by, she would have figured out if she was going to tell Whit the truth.

  *

  WHIT GLANCED DOWN at the dirt floor beneath his feet and peered up at the thatched roof. The hut was primitive and small. There was only enough space for the double bed that stood in the middle of the room, enshrouded in a canopy of mosquito netting. He sat on the edge of that bed, so he had a clear view out the window and the doorway. To make sure no one had followed them from the airport.

  There was no screen or glass in the window; it was just a hole to the jungle. There was no door either—just the threshold through which Gabby passed as she returned from wherever she’d gone to summon a doctor.

  Her bodyguard had sent her here to keep her safe? Anger at Charlotte Green coursed through him. Any animal—two-legged or four-legged—from the jungle could have come inside and dragged her off never to be seen again. After he had learned all the secrets about Gabriella St. Pierre, he’d begun to question Charlotte’s motives. Now he questioned them again.

  “This is where you’ve been staying?” he asked, still shocked that the princess of St. Pierre would have spent one night in such primitive conditions let alone six months.

  Gabby glanced around the tiny hut, and her lips curved into a wistful smile. “Yes…”

  Not only had she stayed here but she seemed to have actually enjoyed it.

  “I’m sorry I was gone so long,” she said, “but Lydia was with a class. My class, actually.” Her smile widened. “And the children were so thrilled that I came back…”

  “You’ve been teaching here?”

  “Yes, it’s a school as well as an orphanage.” She peered through that hole in the wall as if checking the jungle for threats. “Are you certain that no one followed us?”