The Wolf Princess: The Wolf PrincessOne Eye Open (The Pack)

by Karen Whiddon

  “Ruben!” Alisa protested. “How can you say that? We’ve got to check the tunnels out ourselves.”

  “Lisa, you will not be going in there under any circumstances, do you understand?” Ruben ordered.

  Since his tone brooked no argument, Braden figured that would be the end of that. And it might have been, if York hadn’t started growling furiously.

  A second later, the dog blew by Braden, brushing against his legs as he dashed past, into the closet.

  “Grab him,” Ruben shouted, too late.

  Alternately barking and snarling, York disappeared through the doorway, into the tunnels.

  Cursing, Ruben went after him. Barely hesitating, Alisa grabbed Braden and pulled him along, too.

  Up ahead, sounding as if it came from a great distance, they could hear the dog barking. Ruben shouted, without success, ordering York to come. He ran off ahead of them, calling over his shoulder for Braden to keep an eye on his sister.

  Still leading the way, Alisa’s footsteps became less certain. “It’s really dark in here,” she muttered. “Difficult to see. I wish I had a flashlight.”

  Now dark he could do.

  “Welcome to my world. It’s all the same to me,” Braden answered, actually feeling as if this one time his blindness gave him an advantage. Though neither one could see, he was actually used to stumbling around in the darkness and she was not.

  Raising his voice, he called to Ruben to wait for them. Ruben didn’t answer. He didn’t come back, either. And the sound of York’s barking and Ruben’s shouting faded into the distance.

  How deep were these tunnels, anyway? Damn. Braden yanked Alisa to a standstill. “Listen,” he whispered. “This is really not good. We can’t even hear the dog. Even Ruben has gone silent.”

  “Then we need to keep going.” She sounded unimpressed by his cautious words. “Come on.”

  “Alisa—”

  “We’re not abandoning my brother. Come on.” Again she tried to pull him along.

  “No.” He refused to budge. “Not like this. Let me go first. I’m much more expendable than you.”

  Expendable. Hearing himself, he grimaced. The foremost neurosurgeon and Pack researcher in the world and he was the expendable one. Interesting how life could turn so quickly in an unforeseen direction.

  “Either we do it my way or not at all,” he told her. “Your choice.”

  After a second’s hesitation, she released him and let him slide by her and take the lead. As he did, he couldn’t help but relish the luxury of her soft curves momentarily flush against him.

  Nice. Even in a situation like this, he couldn’t control his desire for her.

  And she apparently was oblivious. “Since you don’t have your cane, I’ll have to direct you as best I can,” she said.

  He snorted. “I thought you couldn’t see in here.”

  “Up ahead, it looks like the light is getting a bit better. It must be artificial, but still…”

  Since he had no choice but to take her at her word, he nodded. “Just keep me from running into the wall or anything else, okay?”

  “Of course.”

  They continued forward, moving slowly and cautiously. The water and smoke had luckily not made much inroad into these passages. After the first fifty feet, the floor seemed barely damp, at least judging by the lack of water sloshing against his ankles. This was a good thing.

  “Stop,” Alisa ordered, digging her nails into his shoulder. “There’s a wall about ten feet in front of us. We can either go left or right. I have no idea which way Ruben went.”

  Under his breath, he counted to three. There had to be some scientific, logic-based way to choose, but he couldn’t think of any right this instant. Instead, he did something he never did—he went with instinct, gut reaction. “Let’s go right.”

  About fifty feet into the new tunnel, the wall he’d been using to feel his way abruptly ended.

  “Wait,” she said.

  He stopped.

  “Wow!” Alisa exclaimed. “It’s not dark at all in here. This is where the light was coming from. There are lamps—either electrical or battery-operated.”

  “Yes, but where are we? Why has the tunnel ended?”

  “It hasn’t ended at all.” Grabbing hold of his shoulders, she turned him to the right. “We’re in a room. It looks like some kind of living quarters. It’s about the size of one of the receiving rooms on the main floor. There are bunk beds, stacked three high, enough to sleep twelve people. There’s even a refrigerator and a camp-stove-type thing that looks like it runs on charcoal. I don’t see a shower or any kind of loo.”

  A clanking sound behind them had Braden spinning to face it, instinctively moving to block Alisa from view.

  “There you are.” It was Ruben’s voice, a softly growling York behind him. “I went the other way at the split and found only more tunnels. Then York decided he wanted to backtrack our steps, so we did and found you.”

  At the growl, Braden’s wolf woke up and took notice of the alert dog, then dismissed him as beneath him.

  “Ruben, you shouldn’t have disappeared like that.” Alisa’s strong tone matched Ruben’s from earlier. “You spout off all this nonsense about protecting me, and then you run off and leave me alone with—”

  “A blind man?” Braden interrupted, disappointment and anger and hurt coloring his voice.

  Both Alisa and Ruben went silent. He imagined them staring at him, then glancing at each other.

  “I was going to say ‘an unarmed man,’” Alisa put in quietly. “You must stop being so hard on yourself.”

  “Why should I?” he exploded, driven by frustration and resentment. “I’m a liability here. You two have to guide me everywhere and if the bad guys were to show up right now, you’d have to protect me. I sure as hell can’t defend myself when I can’t even see.”

  Silence again.

  Finally, Alisa spoke. “Are you quite finished? I’ll allow this one instance of self-pity. When you think you might have finished wallowing in it, it will be time to pick yourself up and go on. Let me give you a few moments.”

  Silence, except for the faint sound of her counting under her breath. When she reached ten, she exhaled.

  “There. Finished. Are you quite done now?”

  Her tone, so proper and regal and completely unlike the Alisa he knew, had Braden fighting not to smile. Then, deciding the hell with it, he shook his head and laughed out loud. “Yes,” he said. “I’m quite done. Sorry about that. Now, what do you two want to do next?”

  “I called for a security detail,” Ruben answered. “I gave them instructions on where to find the door to the tunnels, but they won’t know which way to go. Perhaps we should retrace our steps so we can meet with them.”

  Once they’d done so, they exited out the same closet as before, to find the security team Ruben had called for milling around in the hall, apparently very confused.

  All the fires had been put out, though none of the perpetrators had been caught. Braden could sense that the mood was very grim.

  King Leo had put the entire palace on lockdown. No one was to come or go until the bombers were located. The discovery of the tunnels had sent the entire security team into an uproar, especially since one of the team leaders was among the more severely injured.

  King Leo summoned Alisa and Braden to his chambers. Ruben accompanied them.

  When they entered the room, Braden and Ruben stood silently while Alisa and her parents had an emotional reunion. Alisa returned to Braden’s side once all that was finished, taking his arm.

  “The palace is not safe,” the king said, his voice weary and stressed. “Ruben has informed me that these extremists want Alisa and Dr. Streib.”

  Queen Ionna made a sound of distress and her husband took a moment to comfort her before continuing.

  “Because I cannot protect either of you here, I am sending the two of you away. Ruben has concurred with my decision.”

  “Where?
” Alisa demanded, speaking for the first time.

  “You do not need to know,” King Leo declared. “We’ve worked out details privately. Your mother and I, as well as Ruben, are the only ones who will have this information.”

  “And your chaperone, of course,” Queen Ionna put in.

  “Chaperone?” Alisa sounded incredulous. “Why on earth do we need a chaperone?”

  Ruben laughed, though from the royal parents’ silence, Braden judged they didn’t find her comment at all amusing.

  “Come on, Lisa,” Ruben teased. “You know as well as I do that a royal princess can’t disappear with a man, even if he is a doctor. Imagine the gossip and the damage to your reputation.”

  Wisely, Braden remained silent. No way was he getting into the middle of this debate. After all, Alisa’s brother was correct. She did need a chaperone, if not only to protect her from him, but from herself.

  “What about you, Father?” Alisa finally asked, worry coloring her tone. “Are you and Mother going somewhere, too?”

  “We are not,” Queen Ionna spoke sharply. “We cannot leave the kingdom. Fleeing would seem not only like an act of cowardice, but we would be abandoning our people.”

  “But you must stay safe,” Alisa argued. “Father, at the very least, send Mother with us. She can be my chaperone.”

  The king sighed. “I’ve already asked your mother if she wished to go with you. She declined, saying she prefers to remain by my side, as a queen should be.”

  While Alisa digested this, the king continued, his voice hardening. “You will have thirty minutes to pack what you wish to take. Ruben will drive you. We’ve also arranged for decoys to leave at the same time. If the extremists have a mole inside the castle—and it appears that they do—I want them following the wrong couple.”

  “Thirty minutes to get ready?” Alisa sounded intrigued rather than upset. “That’s not very much time.”

  “No, it is not.” The smile in King Leo’s voice told them how even now, his beloved youngest daughter managed to amuse him. “So you’d better get busy. Ruben will accompany you both along with a small, armed detail, so each of you had better work quickly. We don’t know when these terrorists will attack again.”

  “We will.” Letting go of Braden’s arm, Alisa crossed the room at a jog, from the sound of her footsteps. Braden imagined she hugged her parents before she returned to him and tugged him away.

  “Come on,” she said. “We need to go.”

  “Just a moment.” Raising his head, he directed his question to the king. “Your Highness, what about my lab? If I am to be sent into hiding with your daughter, I would prefer to continue to run my experiments.”

  “I guessed as much. I’ve taken the liberty of having two of my most trusted guards pack your lab, or as much as they could,” King Leo said. “The smaller machines have already been loaded. Some of them were, out of necessity, sent with the decoys. I hope you understand.”

  Braden inclined his head in what he hoped was a respectful bow. “Thank you.” Most of the equipment belonged to the king anyway. Braden had brought very little machinery with him. Prior to his arrival, he’d sent a detailed list of what he’d need, and the king had provided everything.

  He retraced his steps back to where Alisa impatiently waited and held out his arm. “Let’s go,” he said.

  On the way up to their rooms, completely surrounded by armed guards from the sound of all the footsteps, Alisa went uncharacteristically silent, though she didn’t relinquish her grip on Braden’s arm. For this, he was grateful, especially since they were moving along at a fast pace.

  “Here we are,” she finally said. “Give me a minute to throw some things into a bag.”

  Ruben waited with Braden at the door while she packed. “Look, I don’t know what is going on between the two of you,” he said in a low voice. “But you should know you have no chance of a future with my sister.”

  Jaw clenched, Braden nodded, amazed at how much hearing the truth actually hurt. “Nor do I expect one.”

  At his response, Ruben leaned in close and gripped Braden’s shoulder, hard. “You’d better not hurt her, do you understand me? Because if you do, I will come looking for you. And, blind man or not, you will wish you were dead by the time I get through with you.”

  The threat touched Braden rather than intimidated or angered him. “Understood,” he finally said, turning away so Alisa’s brother wouldn’t see his self-deprecating smile. “If I had a sister, I’d be the same way.”

  “You’re an only child?” Ruben asked, sounding more relaxed now that he’d delivered his message, though Braden really wished he could see the other man’s face.

  “Yes.” Short answer, no elaboration needed. Braden knew perfectly well that all Ruben had to do was check out the file the royal family had no doubt made on him before ever allowing them access to their precious daughter. All his personal information would be in there.

  “I think that’s—”

  “I’m finished,” Alisa said, sounding slightly breathless as she interrupted whatever else Ruben had been about to say. “Let’s go to your room, Braden.”

  He let her pack for him since he couldn’t tell what he touched without feeling his little custom labels and they didn’t have time for him to do this.

  So he waited with Ruben, refusing to let the silence feel uncomfortable.

  Luckily, he didn’t have to wait long. As she’d done with her own belongings, Alisa finished in record time.

  “We’re ready,” she said brightly. From the anticipatory tone of her husky voice, she appeared to regard this entire thing as an adventure rather than a hardship. This was good. Once, when Braden had to staff his neurosurgery office, he’d made sure to hire people with a positive outlook, believing they would balance out his own tendency toward darkness.

  “Just a moment,” Ruben said, no doubt after exchanging meaningful glances or some such nonsense with his sister. “I need to make a call and arrange to have your doubles meet us in the parlor. We’ll have them come disguised, so the moles don’t see them.”

  When he’d finished his call, they headed back downstairs. At least things had quieted somewhat.

  “How is this going to work?” Alisa asked.

  “We’ve got two body doubles. You will switch clothing with them—they are currently dressed as household staff. They will be sent off with a lot of fanfare, while you two—and your chaperone—will sneak off with me.”

  “Sounds like a good plan,” Braden said.

  “Yes, it does,” Alisa agreed. After a moment of silence, she asked her next question in a too-casual voice. “Speaking of my chaperone, who is it?”

  “I can’t remember her name,” Ruben said. “But you both are familiar with her. She’s one of the household maids, I think. Father chose her. I’m guessing she won’t speak English, just Teslinkian. That way, at least you two can have private conversations.”

  Neither Braden nor Alisa commented. When they reached the parlor, Ruben handed them each a household staff uniform.

  “You’ll be dressing like a butler,” he said, clapping Braden on the back. “There’s a small closet in the back of this room. You can change there.”

  “Would you mind pointing me in the right direction?”

  Before Ruben could, Alisa grabbed Braden’s arm. “I’ll show you,” she said as she walked with him to the closet.

  He changed quickly, emerging to find Alisa still waiting outside the door.

  “My turn,” she said. “They’ve even given me a blond wig. Once we’ve finished, our decoys can get dressed in our clothes.”

  As plans went, it seemed like a good one. A few minutes later, Alisa rejoined him, taking his clothing from him, presumably to give to the man who’d be pretending to be him. Again they waited, this time while the others changed.

  “Are we ready?” Ruben finally said, a forced sort of cheerfulness in his voice. He repeated the question in his native tongue, and two unfamiliar voice
s answered in the affirmative.

  “Good,” he said. “Alisa, you and Braden will go to the service entrance, unaccompanied. An unmarked van will be waiting there for you. Your chaperone is already inside.”

  “What about them?” Alisa asked, apparently meaning the decoys.

  “I will accompany them. We have a limo waiting, as well as an armed escort on motorcycles. They will drive away with much fanfare. Hopefully, that will be enough to throw the extremists off.”

  “Make sure my decoy remembers to act blind,” Braden cautioned. “If he forgets and someone sees him, they’ll know he’s not really me.”

  “We have that aspect covered,” Ruben said. “I honestly believe we’ve taken care of every single detail, right down to the smallest.”

  Braden didn’t comment. Even brilliant men made mistakes and working out the details of a complicated plan under stress was iffy. He, like the rest of them, could only hope for the best.

  “But what if something happens to them?” Alisa persisted. “Are you certain you have taken adequate precautions? I refuse to endanger them simply because they wish to be of service to me.”

  “They wish to be of service to their country,” King Leo boomed, his tone letting them all know that he’d finished discussing the issue. “We will make sure they are safe, as we will for you. Now, if everyone is ready, let’s put this plan into motion.”

  Briefly, Braden wondered if the king watched a lot of American crime dramas on television.

  “Come on.” Alisa took his arm. “Are you ready to pretend you can see?”

  “Easy for you to say,” he grumbled, low enough that the king couldn’t hear. “Why doesn’t anyone think it will look odd if a maid is seen leading around a sightless butler?”

  Chapter 15

  They made their way down the deserted hallway, heads close together as though sharing confidences. Braden couldn’t help but relish her nearness, breathing in her sweet scent and aching as she pressed her soft curves into his side. His pulse quickened.

  “Good point,” she whispered, her breath warm on his neck. “But if we pretend to be lovers on our way to a tryst, no one will think anything of us having our hands all over each other.”