by Riley Pine
On the morning of the third day, we languish atop my plush duvet. I pepper her skin with soft kisses from her ankles to her lush pink lips, then back down again. I pause mid journey for a quick taste of her tangy sweetness.
She gasps.
“I could survive on this alone,” I say.
She laughs, pushing up on her elbows to look down at me. “You’d starve eventually.”
“It would be worth it,” I tell her, then give her one long, slow lick.
She fists the duvet, then collapses onto her back as she writhes against my lips.
“We’re never leaving this room,” she says.
“As you wish, Princess.” And slip one finger inside her, then two, as I suck her swollen clit between my lips.
She bucks and thrashes, and I have no choice but to drive her the rest of the way home, taking immense pleasure in doing so.
“Damien!” she calls out as I do, and I realize there is no sound better than my name tearing from her lips.
I slide my hand free and crawl over her limp yet satiated frame, admiring the blissful smile spread across her face.
I put that there.
I lean down to kiss her, but before my lips reach hers, the bedroom door bursts open, wood splintering as six men rush into the room.
The Nightgardin Royal Guard, better known as the Black Watch.
Juliet screams as two of the men haul her from the bed. It takes the other four to restrain me. Even then, they’re barely able to do it. My fight-or-flight reaction takes hold, and all I know is I will fight for this woman.
“Damien!” she screams, and I seethe as I watch her naked form being dragged toward the elevator.
“You fucking bastards,” I hiss at my captors, but they say nothing. “Juliet!” I call after her, our eyes meeting as another waiting guard wraps her in a throw from the sofa. “I will come for you!”
She opens her mouth to respond, but one of the guards covers it with a less-than-gentle hand. She struggles against his grip. When the guard swears and snatches his hand away, I grin.
She’s bitten him.
But my joy is short-lived, because they are in the elevator now, the doors already closing.
“Damien!” she cries one last time.
“I swear it, Juliet! I’ll find you!” I yell just as the doors seal and she slips from view, and I know now that I was wrong. My name tearing from her lips in abject terror will haunt me for the rest of my life.
One of my captors punches me in the face before I can completely register that she’s gone.
Then the truth of it all sinks in. They aren’t just here to take Juliet to the king and queen of Nightgardin.
They’re here to kill me, and there’s not a goddamned thing I can do about it, not that there would be any point. I’ve committed an act of treason, one I knew was punishable by death. Yet I was fool enough to think that whatever connection Juliet and I forged would be stronger than the law.
Two of the guards pin my arms behind my back, but I no longer struggle as the two men before me trade punches in quick succession. A rib breaks. Maybe two or three. One of my eyes swells shut, and a fist to the jaw makes me bite through my tongue.
My mouth fills with blood. None of the guards say a word as they continue what they were sent here to do. All the while I replay Juliet’s screams in my head, the promise I made to come for her already broken.
Finally, my arms are freed, and I collapse to my knees. I cough, and blood sprays the floor.
One of the guards raises a rifle and aims the butt of it at my head.
“You better fucking kill me,” I say, my voice thick and wet. “Otherwise I will be back, and I’ll make every single one of you pay for what you did to your very own princess.”
The guard with the gun laughs in my ruined face and whispers something in my ear. Then the entire world goes dark.
Juliet
Two months later
“Well, well, well,” I mutter to myself. “Out of the frying pan and into the fire.”
Outside the window, the towers and parapets of Edenvale Palace come into view. Across the blue moat rise huge statues of heroes and kings, marbled memories of past glories.
“Sorry, miss. I didn’t catch that.” The driver I hired at the border glances in the rearview mirror, tugging one side of his long, walrus-like mustache. I can tell he recognizes me but that he doesn’t know from where. I have hidden my chocolate-brown waves under an Hermès scarf tied in a jaunty bow at my chin. My beige trench coat is expensive camel hair but unremarkable other than its elegant cut.
“I said, Goodness. Here we are.” I set my hand on the small suitcase on the seat beside me. “Is the servants’ entrance close?”
“Right around the corner, miss,” he says before giving me another searching look. “Who is it you are going to visit again?”
“My cousin Dora,” I lie. “She’s been a maid at the royal court for five years.”
“A Nightgardin maid? Working at the court?” he says, incredulous.
Blast! My accent has betrayed me in ways my hair never would.
I think fast. “Theodora, or Dora as we like to call her, was born in Rosegate.” Rosegate is the disputed city between our two long-feuding kingdoms. “Right next door to me, in fact.”
“Hmm, you’re from Rosegate too, eh?” The driver clicks his tongue. But he hasn’t called me out on the lie. He can’t, because people from both of our kingdoms reside in that ancient town. “Well, miss. I do hope you enjoy your stay at the royal palace. Folks say it’s gone a bit peculiar of late.”
“Oh?” I try to sound interested, but not enough to attract attention. In reality, I am starving for any scrap of information about—
“Damien,” the man says, finishing my thought. “The black sheep prince has returned from his years banished into the wilderness. Everyone is being quite tight-lipped about it. But my sister, Jenny, works in the kitchen, and she says that he has gone mad. I don’t like speaking ill of the Lorentz family, God keep His Majesty, but that youngest boy was born as bad as they come.”
Memories wash over me. Damien’s confident yet gentle hands claiming my body, making me burn, making me his. In our stolen days together, it was as if we were placed in France’s Large Hadron Collider, two particle beams thrust together at the speed of light. Of course the results were volatile. I was naive to have expected anything else. I see that now.
Damien was removed by Nightgardin guards as I was dragged away to my parents.
But...he said he would come for me. Swore it, even. Those were his last words as I was taken away.
He never came.
Perhaps the challenge seemed too great.
Perhaps I wasn’t worth the effort to him.
The king and queen could have hanged me. Instead they hastened plans for the wedding—to tomorrow. So naturally, I ran away. Again. But this time I did not bother with any sort of lie. It wouldn’t have mattered. I’ve been under lock and key ever since that weekend, every meal taken either with the king and queen or alone in my chamber. Each night my governess watched me place a sleeping tablet on my tongue—and each night when she left me, I retrieved the tablet from under my tongue and sent it down the toilet.
Last night when Elsie, the serving girl, brought my teapot, I asked that she join me. And because a servant cannot refuse a royal, Elsie drank a cup, but not before I distracted her and poured in two crushed sleeping tablets.
Soon after, I escaped out the window. No handsome prince climbed my tower and saved me. I did it myself.
My hand settles over my belly, still flat. No sign of the secret inside.
Maybe I fell fast and hard for a prince who fed me nothing but pretty lies full of tenderness and wonder, but now there is no choice. Our time together resulted in unexpected consequences. Ones he needs to answer for. Ones
he needs to protect.
“Ah, here we are,” the driver says, pulling up at the guard tower. “They’ll fix you right up and give you palace security clearance.”
“Thanks very much,” I say, and slide out, tugging my suitcase with me.
Once I had a kingdom. Now I own two dresses, four pairs of underwear and a toothbrush.
But I’m free.
At the guard tower, the royal officer barely looks up from his newspaper. “State your business.”
I untie the scarf from my hair and shake out my long locks. “I am Juliet de Estel, Princess of Nightgardin. And I demand an immediate audience with the Edenvale royal family.”
The man’s jaw nearly hits his ample belly. He clears his throat twice, his lips flapping soundlessly before managing to rasp “one moment, ma’am. I mean, miss. I mean, Your Eminence.”
He doesn’t pick up the phone beside him. Instead, he hits a red button on the wall.
“Yes?” A deep masculine voice says in a crisp accent.
“Mister X, sir, you’re going to want to come to the servants’ entrance, right away. There’s a...diplomatic situation unfolding here at the post.”
Two minutes later a dark-haired man in a black suit appears, his eyes hidden by a pair of aviator sunglasses. He doesn’t give me more than a passing glance before walking into the guard booth.
“The heir to the Nightgardin throne is at your post,” he says.
“That’s what I was trying to say. But more subtle-like,” the guard replies.
The man removes his sunglasses and regards me with a look of cool appraisal. “Subtle indeed, Bartholomew. This is most unusual protocol for a state visit,” he says.
“I’m a most unusual woman,” I snap, refusing to be intimidated by his hooded gaze.
That earns me a ghost of a smile.
“Indeed.”
“And since you know me, might I have the pleasure of an introduction?”
“I’m called X, Your Highness. Head of Edenvale’s Royal Secret Service.”
“X?” I chuckle. “X what?”
The guard Bartholomew joins in my humor. “That’s what I always say. We have a running bet on what his real name might be.”
“And it pains me to give you nothing but disappointment,” X says wryly before reaching out to take my bag. “Will this be all?”
I nod.
“I need to speak with all members of the royal family... Prince Damien especially.”
Something flickers in his enigmatic eyes. I get the sense that this is a man who has seen it all and then some. I am the daughter of his kingdom’s worst enemies, and he barely batted an eyelid. And yet when I say Damien’s name I get a reaction that I’d almost be tempted to describe as sympathy.
“You’re acquainted with Prince Damien?”
The strange way he says the prince’s name sends a chill down my spine. I remember the driver’s words. What has happened to Damien? The last I saw of him he was screaming that he’d find me–that he’d stop at nothing. Then two months of radio silence.
“He made me promises and broke them all,” I announce. “And for my impetuousness, my mother ensured that I was broken in ways few can imagine. I didn’t escape to rekindle a failed romance. I did it because a mother lets nothing—nothing—not solitary confinement, not interrogation, not hunger—stop her from protecting her child.”
X’s gaze follows my hand as again I lay a palm over my abdomen, as if the small gesture can protect the tiny spark inside. My now-solitary reason for existence, for having the courage, for risking everything.
“I see.” And I can tell that in some strange way, this odd man does see. Relief sweeps through me as I feel protected for the first time since being ripped from that hotel room two months ago.
“Now take me to see him at once,” I snap, recovering the royal imperiousness I wear as a second skin.
X gives a curt nod. “Follow me, Your Highness. I’ll assemble the royal family in the west wing.”
CHAPTER FIVE
Damien
A SOFT KNOCK sounds on my door, and at first I ignore it. Despite having been home for a month now, the palace still feels foreign—like it isn’t my home anymore. I guess had I not been left for dead in an alley behind the Royal Edenvale Hospital, I wouldn’t have been welcome any time soon. The notion rankles, like lemon pressed to a long-festering wound.
Whoever is out there knocks again.
“What is it?” I shout with annoyance, then wince. My three broken ribs are healing, yet still tender.
When my intruder doesn’t enter, I rise uneasily from the safety of the plush leather chair, put down my book and make for the door.
“What?” I ask, throwing the door open to find a tall, dark-haired man with a kind smile that makes my stomach turn. Not because I cannot stand his benevolence but because it’s like looking into some sort of funhouse mirror—some semblance of the me I could have been had my life gone in any other direction but the one it has.
“Benedict,” I say, greeting my older brother, the one who gave up a life in the priesthood for Evangeline Vernazza, an artist from Rosegate. “To what do I owe this brotherly visit? Here to bring me another book? Or to tell me again that I need to give Nikolai time, that he’ll eventually speak to me?”
I don’t mean to spew my bitterness at Benedict. He’s been nothing but concerned since they found me in the hospital—nothing but caring since I returned to the palace. But I doubt I’ll ever prove myself worthy of Nikolai’s forgiveness. And I can’t say that I blame him.
Benedict sighs. “No pep talks today, brother.” He looks me over and chuckles softly. “Forgive me for pointing out the obvious, but you’ve—looked better.”
I run a finger down the scar from my temple to chin—the one from the car accident years ago. My beard bristles against my fingertips. I gingerly touch the bridge of my nose, but even that sends pain rocketing to my skull. When it didn’t set correctly the first time, the doctors had to re-break it so I could breathe correctly again. Both my eyes are still rimmed with a mixture of purple and yellow. Then there’s the new scar running the length of my right eyebrow.
This time I’m the one to laugh, a rare occurrence these days. My hand flies to my side, and I brace the other on the doorframe.
Benedict places a steadying palm on my shoulder.
“Are you okay?” he asks. “Should I ring the doctor?”
I straighten carefully and wave him off. “I’m fine,” I say through gritted teeth.
My brother raises his brows. “You sure are going to be a sight for bitter eyes,” he says, and I detect a hint of amusement in his tone.
“What the hell are you talking about?” I ask.
Benedict throws an arm around my shoulder. “Join me in the west wing and you’ll see.”
I run a hand through my overgrown hair. “I was just starting a really riveting book. I think there are vampires in it. I really should finish it.”
Benedict urges me out the door and pulls it shut behind me.
“To the west wing,” he says again.
I glance at my attire—a falling-open robe, pajama bottoms and suede slippers—and shrug.
“Lead the way,” I say.
Benedict walks slower than usual, making sure I keep up. Yet he’s silent the whole way. Whatever waits for us at our destination, Benedict doesn’t seem to want to tell me.
And for good reason. When we arrive, Benedict pushes open a large oak door that leads to a sitting room, yet no one inside is sitting.
Standing in an arc facing the door is my father, the king; my brother Nikolai and his wife, Kate, our soon-to-be king and queen; Benedict’s new bride, Evangeline; and in the middle of them all, quite possibly the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen, though I am still on some pretty heavy painkillers.
She gasps when she sees me, and I realize I must look even worse to those who do not see me on a daily basis.
“Damien,” Nikolai says, the first time he’s addressed me by name since I’ve been home. His voice is laced with disdain. He opens his mouth to finish whatever he wanted to say next, but the young woman rushes toward me.
“Oh my God!” she cries, then reaches a hand toward my face. I flinch, and she pulls away.
“What happened to you?” She pulls open my barely closed robe, spots the fading bruises over my ribs. “Damien. Tell me what’s been going on for the past two months.”
I stare at her, my brow furrowed. Then it clicks.
“Jesus,” I say, my gaze shifting to Benedict, then my father and Nikolai. “What the hell is the Princess of Nightgardin doing in the Edenvale Palace? Are you all out of your minds?”
Nikolai crosses his arms. “So you do recognize her. Would you like to explain yourself?”
I let out a bitter laugh, trying to bite back the pain. But the princess’s hand flies to her mouth. She notices my wince, and I hate that she is perceptive enough to register my weakness.
“Of course I recognize her. I have read a newspaper or two in my absence—even turned the TV to the news once or twice. Just because I don’t—I mean didn’t—live in my own country, it’s not as if I abandoned all thoughts of home. I’ve kept up with what’s been going on in our enemy nation. Yet now you’ve gone and invited the enemy into our home. Would you like to explain yourself?”
The princess rests a warm palm on my chest, and I raise a brow. Perhaps this day will prove quite interesting after all.
“Tell them, Damien. Tell them I’m not a liar.”
“Tell them what, exactly?” I ask, amusement lacing my tone.
“About taking me home from the Veil. About our weekend in your Nightgardin penthouse.” She rests her other hand over her abdomen. “About making love to me for three days straight, planting your seed inside me—and then never coming for me like you promised you would.” Bitterness and hurt lace her tone as my head swims.
I back away, my hands in the air as if someone points a gun at me, which this woman might as well be doing because what she is suggesting could mean an all-out war.