by Claire Adams
“And, what about me?”
“I’m asking you to trust me, too. Let me help her and I will be back.”
“No, there’s no way you can go halfway across the world and rescue this…woman,” she spat that out. I got the feeling she wanted to call her something else, but thought better of it. I tried one more time,
“Babe, I promise you I will be back for the wedding.”
She folded her arms and narrowed her pretty, green eyes. “Don’t bother.”
“Excuse me?”
“If you get on that plane, then I don’t care if you come back or not – the wedding is off.”
“Delia, you’re not being reasonable here.”
“That’s the deal, Nick. Either you stay here and marry me or you run off to Europe to rescue a woman that already left you once. And, she left you to get beaten and disfigured.”
“Disfigured?” It shouldn’t have hurt. I know she was just angry and didn’t mean it, but I felt a rush of pain in my chest nonetheless.
“That’s not what I meant.”
I let the hurt talk instead of the rational side of my brain, “No, you said what you had to say, now it’s my turn. Emma needs help, and I was the only one she could turn to, so I’m going. I’m sorry you have issues with that, but you don’t know anything about what happened two years ago. She sacrificed herself to save me and her best friend. I won’t leave her hanging. So if choosing to go help her is the same as choosing not to get married, then I’m sorry, so be it.”
I turned back to my bag, closed and zipped it up. I heard the front door slam as I picked it up off the bed. I felt bad for Delia, but I wasn’t going to be blackmailed into not doing something that I needed to do simply because she was jealous. Maybe when I got home we could work it out. Maybe not. One thing I realized when I heard the door slam was that right at that moment, I didn’t care.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
EMMA
I laid in the dark next to Miguel, listening to the sounds of his breathing. I was having thoughts that were unimaginable to me. I was thinking about how easily I could stop that breathing. I was thinking about how easy it would be to slit his throat and listen to the gurgles as he tries to suck in air while he died. I was thinking about pressing the pillow to his face; he had enough wine tonight he probably wouldn’t even wake up.
But then what? I’d be taken to prison and my son would be raised by my parents. He’d be just like me and never know what it was like to be held or cuddled or loved. At least, unless he ran away and met someone like Nicholas.
I’d carried the warmth of his looks and his touch for two years. If I had to, I could carry it the rest of my life. I could live off no more than that and my son’s hugs and kisses. But without Gabriel, I would die.
Nicholas said he was coming. He told me that he would be here by the time day breaks tomorrow. I had no idea how he’d get to me. He said that he knew where the villa was. I hadn’t had enough time for him to explain that to me, but it gave me even more hope to know that he’d at least looked for me for a while.
Miguel’s breathing changed and I felt the bed shift. I closed my eyes quickly. I had much preferred when he left me locked away alone. I’d even gladly take the beatings rather than have him this close to me all night long. I suddenly felt his arm go across me and I tried not to tense up as he pulled me into him. I swallowed the bile in my throat and told myself one more day.
I had no idea how Nicholas was going to help me, but for some reason, I had faith that he would. Maybe because he was the only one in my life that had ever cared enough to try.
I wished that I could just go to sleep and stop thinking about all of it. My mind went back to earlier tonight as I slid my sister’s phone back in her bag just as she came back from dancing with Eduardo Cortez. Eduardo was already sliding her chair out as I pulled my hand away. I could feel the sweat forming underneath my arms and along my hairline. Elena was so focused on Eduardo and him on her that neither of them noticed. Miguel was deep in conversation with my father and as I sat there in my own world of anxiety and pain I suddenly remembered something that I’d forgotten to do.
When I finished talking to Nicholas, I deleted the call from the log, but just as I pulled my hand away and let the phone slide back in her purse, I realized I hadn’t cleared the deleted calls log. I’m not sure if my sister would ever check those for any reason, but because I was already so anxious, my mind grabbed onto that and wouldn’t let it go.
By the time the sun came up in the morning and I felt Miguel’s weight shift off the bed, I was half crazy with nerves and lack of sleep.
I pretended to sleep for over half an hour after he left the room. I knew his routine well. He would take his shower and dress and then spend another hour having his breakfast and coffee and watching the news before finally leaving for the day.
I had no idea what he did all day. I knew that he sat in on a lot of committees for his father and a few for mine, but I didn’t care what they were or what he did there; I was just thankful to have him out of the house for a while.
I slipped out of bed quietly and got dressed. I had no idea if I was still on lockdown or not, but finding a shred of inner strength left, I went over and turned the knob on the door. I almost let out a little cry of delight when it opened. Pablo, one of the less unpleasant guards, stood near the door.
“Good morning, my grace.” He actually deferred to me with a bow. It was much more respect than most of the men that worked for Miguel gave me.
“Good morning, Pablo. I was just going to get some toast and coffee.”
“I can have Carmelita bring it to you, my grace.”
“I really don’t mind doing it myself,” I told him. “I’ve been confined indoors for too long. Would it be okay if I had my breakfast on the back patio?”
For a second, I thought he was going to say no. He pulled his brows together like he was thinking it over before finally he said, “Whatever would please you, my grace.”
It had been so long since anyone in my household had treated me so kindly that I was suspicious of his motives. I shook it off and gave him a smile, instead. “Thank you.”
I continued to the kitchen and felt him following me down the hallway. The villa was huge and the walk to the kitchen was no small one. I was glad to find it empty when I got there. The lead cook is a woman named Carmelita that had worked for the Esparzas since before Miguel was born. She didn’t even pretend to respect my title and Miguel did nothing but encourage her rude behavior.
I even heard her telling Miguel once that two brown-eyed parents could not produce a blue-eyed child. Miguel harshly told her that was a myth and she should watch her tongue, but her intent was clearly to run me down in the eyes of my husband. If she only knew what a moot point that really was.
I poured myself a cup of coffee and, deciding against the toast, I carried it out to the back patio. I could see Pablo standing just inside, watching me. I tried to ignore that and pretend I was sitting outside free, drinking coffee and planning my day with my son. It didn’t work.
The thought of Gabriel simply made my heart ache and my eyes fill with tears. I picked up my coffee and sipped it while I looked out at the stables. My thoughts shifted back to Nicholas. I wished that I knew what his plan was.
I finished my coffee and carried the cup inside. The first thing I noticed was how deathly quiet the house was. There was no noise at all, not even the sound of a refrigerator running. The second thing I noticed was Pablo was no longer standing inside the door.
The lights that had been on still from the early morning were all extinguished now and since the blinds had yet to be opened, the house was almost completely dark. I took a step toward the kitchen and that was when I felt a hand go over my mouth and my body being pulled up against someone.
I struggled automatically and felt warm breath against my ear as I heard a man’s voice say, “We’re here to help you, Princess. I work for Mr. Vansant. I need you to be still and v
ery quiet. Do you understand?”
I was shaking and still slightly skeptical, but I nodded. He must have sensed my skepticism, or expected it because he kept his hand over my mouth and his hold on me didn’t loosen as he half-dragged and half-carried me back out onto the patio I’d just come from. He didn’t put me down on my feet until we were about twelve feet from the house and headed for the stables. As soon as he let go of my mouth I said,
“Where is Nicholas?” The man didn’t answer me. I looked at him and saw a huge man with arms thicker than the tops of my thighs and a chest that rivaled a wine barrel for size. He had a black stocking cap on, black jeans, and a black sweater. There was a radio strapped to his waist and a holster strapped across his shoulder. In his hand was a big, black gun with a long barrel, or a silencer on the end of it.
He took hold of my arm and propelled me along toward the stables. When we got there, he pushed open the double doors and after a few seconds, my eyes adjusted and I saw the regular house staff. They were all tied up, some of them were gagged. One of Miguel’s security men was on his stomach with his hands and feet tied behind him. Three other men dressed the same as the one that grabbed me stood over them all with guns in their hands. Who the hell are these people? “Where is Nicholas?” I tried again.
“I’m right here,” I turned at the sound of his voice. He stepped into the stables, dressed the same as the other men and holding his own gun. He didn’t look at all like the man I remembered, save for the piercing blue eyes. He had a day’s worth of stubble across his jaw and just peeking out of the top of it on the left side of his face was the edges of a jagged scar. His body was a lot bigger and broader than I remembered it, and I remembered every hard, smooth ripple.
“Hi, Emma.” That voice was still the same, as smooth and masculine as ever. Despite the years between us and the gravity of the situation I was trapped in, my heart swelled and my breath caught in my throat at the sound of it.
“Nicholas,” I breathed out. It was like slow motion as he walked over toward me. He opened his arms when he was close and I folded into them like only two days had passed and not two years. The dam broke on the tears I’d been holding back and I forgot all the other people in the room as I soaked the front of his black sweater. He finally held me back slightly and with a gentle smile he said,
“We need to get out of here.” I nodded. “Are you okay to walk?”
“I’m okay,” I told him. The truth was my legs were shaking so hard they felt like Jell-O, but nothing was going to stop me from going with him.
He put his arm around me and I drew strength from him as he led me and all his men out of the stables and into several black SUVs that had appeared out of nowhere. I felt like I was in shock as he helped me into one and issued orders over the radio strapped to his shoulder.
He held onto me with one hand and gripped the gun tightly in the other. He looked so comfortable with it and so at ease in the combat-like clothing he was wearing. I marveled at what a difference two years had made. The man I left in Las Vegas was a smart, successful businessman, a leader no doubt, but one with a gentle soul. This man was more like a soldier with death in his blue eyes.
I shuddered as I wondered what he was going to do when I told him about Gabriel. How would he feel about me when he realized that the little boy my husband was holding hostage was his son?
CHAPTER NINETEEN
NICHOLAS
Once we were all in the cars and on the move, I finally released the pent-up breath that I hadn’t even known I was holding. Emma was next to me and I could see her in my peripheral vision, but I was afraid to turn and look right at her.
How does a man go from leading a covert kidnapping of a royal princess and shooting two men in the process to the epitome of a light-headed adolescent barely in the middle school stages of impressing a girl he has a crush on? I wished I knew why she had this effect on me, even now.
She was painfully thin. When I’d held her for those few precious moments, I could feel every bone in her spine. Dark-purple circles ringed her eyes, and when I looked into them, they looked almost haunted. I wondered what he’d done to her and then realized that I couldn’t think about it without feeling sick.
I’d made sure to only wound his two men that refused to follow orders…but I was sure if I ever came face to face with that son of a bitch, I was going to kill him.
“Where are we going?” she asked. Her voice was shaky, and I realized the hands she had folded in her lap were trembling.
I finally looked at her. God, the sight of her like this made my heart feel like it was going to explode. “To a safe place. I’m sorry if we frightened you, but we had to get in and get out quickly.”
“Don’t be sorry,” she whispered. “Thank you, Nicholas. Thank you for coming. I never wanted to get you involved in all of this, that’s why I ran away to begin with.”
I reached over and took one of her hands. That old, familiar jolt of electricity was still there and it shot its way up my arm. “I know,” I told her. “I wish that you wouldn’t have run. I wish that you would have trusted me enough to just tell me what was going on. I could have helped you stay in the country and I could have made sure Miguel left.”
She nodded and her pretty, haunted eyes filled with tears. “I realize now that would have been easier than all of this, but at the time, I thought….” Tears were rolling down her cheeks now. I reached over and wiped one away, and she flinched like I’d burned her. I pulled my hand away.
“It’s okay now,” I told her. “We’re going to get you back to the States, and we’ll get you granted amnesty—”
“No! I can’t leave the country!”
“What?”
“I can’t leave.”
I was confused and slightly angry. What the hell has all of this been about if she didn’t plan on leaving? I tried to check my anger before I said, “Then why did you call me, Emma? Why did you beg me to come and get you? This doesn’t make any sense.”
She swallowed hard and her accent seemed to grow thicker as she said, “I’m sorry, Nicholas, but there is something you don’t know.”
“Okay then, fill me in.” That was when I heard the shot ring out and glass shatter. The SUV swerved and blood sprayed over the seat, splattering Emma and I both.
Emma screamed, and I pulled her closer to me, leaning over her and covering her body with mine to shield her. Her breath was on my neck and I could tell that her lungs were constricted with fear as she struggled to suck in each breath.
My mind was going a thousand miles a minute trying to figure out what to do and trying to stay focused. Having the woman I’d obsessed over for two years pressed up against me like a second skin was not helping matters. I had never been in this kind of situation before, so that was the excuse I used to myself for my dick being rock hard even as bullets whizzed past us and my driver slowly bled to death in the front seat…shameless.
I finally came to my senses enough to say, “Mike! Are you okay?”
In a strained voice, he said, “My shoulder.” His left hand was still on the wheel, but his right arm was dangling loosely at his side as blood poured from it.
“Shit!” I gently peeled Emma off me and lowered her to the floor. She didn’t fight me on it. She tucked herself into the space behind Mike’s seat, but her deep-brown eyes didn’t leave my face. That wasn’t helping me lose this completely inappropriate erection. I refocused my brain on Mike despite what my treacherous body was doing.
“Where are they?” I asked him. His face looked stark white underneath the black stocking cap he wore as the blood seeped from his body. He was still driving like a bat out of hell. We were going over a hundred and ten miles per hour.
“Behind us now and to the left,” he grunted out.
I turned around and saw a silver pick-up behind us and a man hanging out of the passenger side window with a big ass gun. I put down my window and started to take aim, but before I could, another one of my SUVs pulled up alo
ngside of the truck. Gunfire was exchanged and the pick-up suddenly veered off the road and rolled down an embankment.
We weren’t finished yet, however. The next car was a hummer and there seemed to be guns coming out of it everywhere. “Mike, can you slow down?” He grunted again, but I could feel him decelerate.
When the other car was close enough, I aimed out the window and just as a bullet ripped into the side of the SUV, I shot the driver. He headed in the same direction the pick-up had ended up in. I was sure I’d just killed my first man, but I couldn’t think about that right then.
“Can you get us to the air strip?”
“Uh huh.”
“I can’t leave.” Emma was still in the floor where I had pushed her. What the hell did she expect us to do? I ignored her for now and stripped off the sweater I was wearing, wadded it up, and reached over the seat to press it into Mike’s shoulder. I was afraid he would bleed to death on our way back to the airplane.
I’d paid a lot of money to use a private air strip that the leader of my security group knew about somehow. These guys were all the best of the best and I depended on their knowledge since this was all new to me.
Thankfully, Emma stayed silent and Mike didn’t die before we made it to the rendezvous point. We had to get out of there before they found us again. The next time, I was sure they’d be sending a lot of reinforcements. We were kidnapping the fucking princess…how could they not try and stop us? I had a feeling that putting distance between us and them would be our only way out alive at this point.
Once at the air strip hidden between a beautiful mountain and an olive tree farm, the medic looked at Mike’s arm. It was obvious at a glance that the man needed blood. I wasn’t sure I’d be able to live with myself if one of these men died. Naively, I hadn’t really considered that before we went on this mission.
The medic stopped the bleeding and bound up Mike’s arm. He gave Mike something for the pain and made him as comfortable as he possibly could on the small jet. It was the best we could do for now, but we needed to get him some real medical treatment as soon as possible. I looked over and saw Emma sitting on a stump near the orchard and staring off into the distance. The leader of the team, a retired Navy Seal, stood a few feet away from her and when I walked over he asked,