Royal Pain

by Tracy Wolff

  If these bastards took Garrett, if they took my brother, I will use every ounce of power and influence I have in this country, and the world, to hunt them to extinction. I will destroy them, piece by piece, person by person. I’m not normally the vengeful type, but this group is a blight on our country, a blight on the world. They deserve—no, they need—to be wiped out.

  But first, we have to find my brother. We have to know, for sure, what’s happened to him. For the first time in three months, I can’t help seriously thinking that I might be wrong. That every feeling I have inside of me telling me that Garrett isn’t dead really is nothing more than a product of my own wishful thinking.

  Because for this group? Getting their hands on the crown prince is like every holiday on the calendar all rolled into one. And keeping him alive really doesn’t suit their agenda—or the madness that seems to underlie every decision they make.

  After all, what better way to strike a deafening blow against the monarchy than to kill its crown prince? To murder its future before that future ever has a chance of becoming a reality?

  Just the thought has my resolve hardening even as my blood runs cold. These people have hurt my family—and my country—more than enough. I’m not going to let it happen again. “How do we get to them?” I demand.

  At the same time, my father orders, “I want Anastasia’s guard doubled at university. She’s too vulnerable on that campus. I want extra security measures in her dorm and her room. If she’s determined to stay there through all of this, I want her protected. And double Kian’s guard while you’re at it.”

  “We’ve already added a third guard to both—” Pierre begins, but my father cuts him off.

  “Six. I want six guards on each of them. I want a full membership list from Libération-Est—and any offshoot factions, including DPL—on my desk by midnight. And you’d better have a warrant to search these people’s properties by tomorrow morning.”

  “We’re working on that, sir,” Jean-Luc assures him.

  “Work faster! This is the Crown Prince of Wildemar we’re talking about.” Once again, my father’s fist slams down on the table. “You finally have a lead. Now act like it!”

  “I want the same information on my desk, as well,” I tell the directors.

  For once, my father and I are on the same page about something—furious and frustrated and desperate to find out what’s happened to my brother. It’s why I don’t argue with him about not bringing Ana home from school, why I don’t say a word about him adding three more guards to my detail. But as the meeting wraps up and my father dismisses the lot of us, I can’t help going over what he said again and again.

  And that’s when it hits me, with a burst of bitterness that comes with the realization that my father never once called Garrett by name, never once referred to him as his son. No, it was the Crown Prince of Wildemar all the way and my father was every inch the king.

  I understand the importance of his position, just as I understand that the political ramifications of Garrett’s disappearance—and possible murder—are just as severe for the country as the personal ramifications are for Anastasia and me.

  But once, just once, it would be nice if I could see the man behind the crown, the father behind the king. Not because I need the coddling (my father’s never been a coddler) but because I need the reassurance—that if I step fully into Garrett’s shoes, and eventually, into my father’s—that I won’t lose whatever small piece of humanity I still have left.

  Chapter 7

  Hours later, I’m still thinking about the DPL. The Dépassement por Liberté—Overtaking for Liberty—and their vicious, violent ways. After the security briefing, I asked Pierre to send me any and all information he had on them and I’ve spent the last four hours scrolling through it.

  And trying, desperately, not to punch a hole through the wall. Or throw up—at the moment, it’s a toss-up which I want to do more.

  Fuck.

  Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.

  Fuuuuu­uuuuu­uuuuck.

  If even half of what’s in this dossier is to be believed, the DPL are maniacs. More, they’re monsters—completely without conscience or loyalty to anyone but their own small group. They say their mission is to overthrow the monarchy, but from where I’m sitting it looks like mayhem and murder is more their vibe, à la Gotham City under the Joker’s command.

  Their ideas are absurd, their violence unconscionable.

  And these are the people who have Garrett?

  It doesn’t bear thinking about.

  But I can’t stop thinking about it. Can’t stop thinking about them kidnapping my twin. Can’t stop thinking about what they’ve done to him—or what they might be doing to him right now while I sit here, safe and whole.

  For the first time since this nightmare began, I pray that Garrett is dead. Because if he isn’t, if he’s been in the clutches of these madmen for ninety-three days, I can’t begin to imagine the agony that he’s suffered. Any more than I can imagine him being sane if, by some miracle, he’s still alive and we somehow manage to find him and bring him home.

  Fuuuuuuuuck!

  I slam my laptop down, barely resist the urge to send it sailing against the nearest wall. Then head for the door with my brain racing and my heart beating way too fast.

  I don’t know where I’m going when I crash through the doors into the hallway. Don’t know what I’m looking for or who I want to talk to or what I expect to find. All I do know as I start down the long hallway is that I can’t spend one more second reading about the DPL. Can’t spend one more moment thinking about what they might be doing to Garrett—to my brother—at this very moment, while I’m sitting here safe in this damn palace, fielding texts from supermodels and drinking the best tequila money can buy.

  I may not have a destination in mind as I wander the halls—but when I find myself in front of the doors to Garrett’s suite a few minutes later, I’m not surprised, either. And when I push those doors open, when I step inside a sitting room that looks nothing—and everything—like my own, I think maybe that I’d been heading here all along.

  I haven’t been in here since the day Garrett disappeared, when I was called off that damn yacht and flown home in a Royal Air Corps helicopter. I came straight here after we landed on the helipad, hoping—praying—that this was all some sick joke. That my brother was safe in his suite, waiting to have a huge laugh at my expense.

  It was a ridiculous idea, thinking I’d find him in here that day. Just like it’s a ridiculous idea for me to be here now, looking for God only knows what. The royal guards, the police and numerous Wildemar intelligence agencies have all been through this room with a fine-tooth comb looking for evidence. If there was anything to find here, they would have found it months ago.

  Still, I can’t force myself to turn around and walk out. Not when this is the closest I’ve felt to my brother since this whole nightmare began.

  I close my eyes, try to pretend—just for a moment—that he’s right here with me. That he’s in the bedroom changing clothes or in the small kitchen grabbing us both a beer.

  It doesn’t work. I’ve spent nearly as many hours in here through the years as I have in my own suite and it’s always felt familiar. Always felt like home.

  Not anymore.

  Still, I can’t help winding my way through the rooms, looking for God only knows what. It’s a familiar walk—partly because of the hours I’ve spent here and partly because it’s so similar to my own suite.

  Sure, the color schemes are different—Garrett’s rooms are done in warm browns and golds while mine are all cool blues and grays—but so much of the rest is the same. Same layout, same overstuffed furniture, same wall of bookshelves jammed with books.

  Same bones, I think, as I walk the small study off the living room, pacing from one end of the bookshelves to the other. But the substance is different. The books on the shelves and the art on the walls—Garrett’s choices are solid, traditional,
respectable, while mine are anything but.

  Kind of like the two of us, I think, as I pick up Garrett’s copy of Alexandre Dumas’s The Count of Monte Cristo. It’s one of his favorites, though you’d never know it from looking at it. My brother doesn’t believe in cracking spines or dog-earing pages or—God forbid—underlining a passage.

  No, he marks key spots in other ways. With Post-it flags and bookmarks and his photographic memory (just one of the many things that drove me crazy when we were at Le Rosey together).

  I flip through the book—it’s got about a dozen marked pages—and I can’t resist opening to one of them, just to see if I can figure out what Garrett likes so much about this book. But the moment I turn to the first quote, marked with a bright pink flag about halfway down the page, I feel it like a blow in my solar plexus.

  “Life is a storm, my young friend. You will bask in the sunlight one moment, be shattered upon the rocks the next. What makes you a man is what you do when that storm comes.”

  I’m shaking a little as I trace a fingertip over the words, as I read them again and again and again. And wonder if he somehow knew that his life would go this way. If he knew that one day everything would be exceedingly normal—exactly as it should be—and the next he’d be at the mercy of madness.

  It’s the crown prince’s job to understand that this might be his fate—more, it’s his job to accept it. And yet I find myself hoping that he didn’t have a clue, no matter what this damn book says.

  Furious now, with the book, with fate, with whoever took my brother and with myself, I start to put the damn thing back where I found it. As I do, something flutters out of it. Figuring it’s a bookmark from its long, skinny shape, I bend to retrieve it. And end up with the breath knocked out of me all over again.

  Because it’s not a bookmark I’m holding in my hand. Or, more precisely, it’s not only a bookmark. Instead, it’s a strip of photos from a photo booth and Garrett is one of the key players in the silly pictures.

  But it’s not looking at this younger version of my brother that stops me dead in my tracks. No, it’s the person in the picture with him that has my eyes going wide and my breath catching in my throat.

  Because the very young, very fresh-faced, very beautiful young woman who is making faces at Garrett in one photo and kissing him in another, is none other than Savvy. My Savvy.

  Chapter 8

  Savvy

  I make the latest order of drinks—two mojitos, three lemon drops and a vodka tonic—and slide them down the bar toward Cecily. She smiles as she scoops them up, says, “Thanks, babe,” before turning away and making her way through the throng of people packing the bar tonight.

  Then again, when isn’t it packed? When I applied for a job here six months ago, I did so because it wasn’t a dance club and I—mistakenly—thought that meant most nights would be a little slower than the popular clubs farther down the street.

  But then Prince Garrett was seen here a few months ago, and it became an instant hotspot for young, hip, urban millennials. Add in the freedom the owner has given Marcus and me to put together a complicated and exotic cocktail list, and it’s pretty much been standing room only in here from six P.M. until one A.M. every night but Sunday.

  Not that I’m complaining. Or at least, not much. I may not be able to write during off-hours, like I’d originally hoped, but the tips are so good that I only have to do the hotel waitressing gig when they need extra staff for special galas. And even then, only when I want to.

  Plus, I like the Wild Sea. A lot. It’s beautifully decorated, filled with really great people to work with and I get to escape the pounding rhythms and brain cell–killing volume that the dance clubs boast. Not to mention it gives me a chance to stay in Wildemar.

  I’ve loved this country since I was a nineteen-year-old exchange student, immersing myself in French and Wildemarian literature, exploring the culture and art and pretending to be a great artiste.

  I was heartbroken when I had to leave—partly because of the country and partly because of a boy. I promised myself as I climbed on the plane that would take me back to America that I’d return here one day. And, after spending four more years getting my bachelor’s in English and an MFA in creative writing—and six months bumming around the world—I finally have.

  I’m not planning on staying forever, but my work visa is valid for another nine months, so why not take advantage of it?

  “I need a lychee martini, a dragon’s breath and a flaming ninja,” Carter says as he lands at the bar. “Plus three club sodas and a scotch and soda for the hotties in the back booth.”

  “On it,” I tell him, as I finish up a couple margaritas on the rocks for one of Samantha’s tables.

  “Seriously?” Carter drapes himself over the bar. “You’re not even going to look?”

  “At what?” I keep my head down and my hands busy as I fill glasses with ice and lime slices.

  “I tell you there’s a table full of hotties back there and you don’t even glance up. Are you a nun masquerading as a bartender or are you a lesbian?”

  “Sadly, neither. Just a girl who’s had her heart broken one time too many. Besides, you saw them first. Don’t you have dibs?”

  “I wish. But they seem of the heterosexual variety, more’s the pity.” He fake cries into his hand.

  “Now, now,” I tell him as I slide the drinks his way. “No use crying over straight milk. Isn’t that what you always say?”

  “It’s not, but it should be.” He sighs heavily, then puts the drinks on his tray. “Besides, I haven’t gotten a good look at the one in the back of the booth yet. Maybe he’ll surprise me.”

  “Bonne chance.” I give him a little salute before pulling my vibrating cellphone out of my back pocket.

  It’s a series of texts from Kian.

  What time do you get off tonight?

  I want to see you

  We need to talk

  I stare at the texts for long seconds trying to figure out what they mean—or even if they mean anything. Kian has texted me several times since he left my house yesterday, all sweet, upbeat little things that make me smile or get my heart pumping a little bit faster.

  I’ve answered every single one of those texts with something friendly and appropriate. But these texts…it could be my racing mind or my guilty conscience, but these texts have an entirely different tone. They seem on a whole new level.

  Not sure what I want to say to him right now—or what I should say considering I still haven’t shared with him my biggest secret—I shove the phone back into my pocket without answering him.

  The night goes on that way, drink orders coming in hot and heavy for the next five hours, my rhythm broken only by a few intermittent texts from Kian, none of which I answer—and none of which sound particularly fun or flirtations. I take a quick ten-minute break in the middle of my shift, most of which I spend worrying about how I’m possibly going to explain things to Kian and listening to Carter rhapsodize about his table of hotties—especially the one with the “blue, blue eyes.”

  By the time the night finally winds down sometime after two, my head is pounding, my feet are killing me and I want nothing more than to take a shower and crawl into the comfiest pair of pajamas I own.

  Either I’m wearing the goal like a badge of honor or Marcus—sweet, wonderful, blessed Marcus—feels my pain. Whatever it is, he sends me home before the floor is swept and the last round of glasses is put away, pledging to take care of it himself.

  I feel guilty leaving him there, but not too guilty as I’m the last one in the bar more nights than not. To counter the guilt, I think about how good a shower is going to feel. Or a bath—yes, that’s what I’ll do. Pour myself a glass of wine, put on some Ed Sheeran and slide into a tub full of bubbles. Maybe when I get out, I’ll have some idea of how to deal with Kian.

  There’s a part of me that knows exactly how I should deal with him, that knows I should just cut him off right now. Just stop answerin
g his texts and start pretending he doesn’t exist. But there’s another part of me that doesn’t want to do that, a part that instead wants to say to hell with everything and go on that date with him.

  Yes, it’s going to end up with me getting my ass kicked by the universe, but right now that doesn’t seem to matter. Not when I keep seeing Kian’s smile every time I close my eyes and not when I’ve spent most of the last two nights dreaming about having his mouth and hands and body on mine.

  I never should have dumped that champagne on him at the gala. And I definitely shouldn’t have taken him out to the servers’ break balcony. I’m not even sure why I did it, except as I stood there watching Garrett’s “little brother” fend off one unwanted advance after another, something inside me snapped. Garrett was always so protective of him, always so determined to keep the difficult shit away from his twin that it was instinct to step in. Instinct to do what I know Garrett would have done himself had he been able, what he would have wanted me to do.

  It just never occurred to me that if I did that—if I put myself on Kian’s radar and let myself meet him—that I’d end up as charmed by His Royal Hotness as the rest of the world.

  I don’t know why it didn’t occur to me. Maybe I figured I was inoculated against him because of the feelings I once had for Garrett. Maybe it was because bright-eyed charmers with super fast zippers have never been my type. Or maybe it was because I was already charmed by him and I just didn’t know it.

  Whatever the reason, the damage is done. Now I just have to figure out how to deal with the fallout.

  I’m so preoccupied with my thoughts that I’m halfway across the brightly lit parking lot before I notice that there are four men waiting at the far end of it, standing only a few feet away from the small secondhand car I bought when I decided I was going to settle in Wildemar for a while.

  I have one moment to curse myself for being an idiot, to think oh shit. And then they’re turning to me as one and a few things hit me all at once.