by Madeline Ash
Stunned, Kris stood rooted to the spot.
“Gul, I’ve missed you!” Hanna’s arms were tight around his neck, her legs wrapped around his middle. “Where have you been? I haven’t seen you for ages.”
“It has been at least six days, you’re right.” Gul’s low voice was warm with affection. “I’ve been living a half-life without you.”
“You’re teasing me!” But she clung on, pressing the side of her face against the back of his neck. “I’ve been dying to tell you about Frankie and Prince Kristof. Oh my God. There’s something epic going on there. Did you hear he asked to kiss her?”
Kris flinched, and his vision blazed red. Frankie had shared that moment with her team? Then he remembered her earpiece—the way she’d told him to wait on the drive back to the palace. No. She hadn’t told them. They’d overheard.
His night guards shifted uncomfortably beside him. Suspecting they intended to draw attention to themselves—and therefore to him—to stop Hanna talking, he shot them a silencing glance.
He wanted to hear this.
“Yes, and that she didn’t actually say no,” Gul responded, picking up his plate again and rifling through the fridge with Hanna on his back. “But I think you mean tragic, not epic. She’s a commoner.”
“She’s also a badass.”
“And while that deserves its own social status, high above us working class, the world remains unjust.”
“It’s not imposs—ooh.” Hanna unhooked one arm from his neck to pat at his shoulder. “Blueberry pastry, blueberry pastry.” He passed one up to her and she continued talking around a mouthful. “They’ve both been bulldozed by it. He’s like a rabid animal and she hasn’t slept since. Her skin is a little green, like the whole episode subbed out her heart for a kidney, but it can’t clean the anguish from her blood because even her body knows that Prince Kristof is supposed to flow through her.”
Kris suddenly lost the ability to breathe.
“That’s visceral,” Gul commented, opening a large container and piling sandwich triangles onto his plate. “And somewhat poetic. You’re full of surprises.”
“I’m a wordsmith who likes to shoot things. What can I say?”
Gul chuckled. “I’d say you’re romanticizing this more than you should.”
Kris was forced to agree. He took a step forward and said, “Hanna.”
He didn’t need to raise his voice for it to travel across the deserted kitchen.
Hanna and Gul froze. She dropped from his back as he spun around, the humor fleeing from their faces as they ended up side by side, spines straight and features neutral. The perfect guard façade. A moment later, they bowed in tandem.
“Gul,” Kris said, attention moving between them. “Evening.”
The man inclined his head, emanating formality.
Kris crossed the tiled floor, forcing himself to keep it casual. “What’s happening here?”
Hanna swallowed what looked to be an overly large mouthful of blueberry pastry. Her voice was thick with it as she answered, “A snack, Your Highness. How can I assist you?”
“By bringing back the Hanna I just saw and explaining why you pretend to be someone else around me.”
She kept her gaze downcast. “I’m afraid I can’t do either of those things, Your Highness.”
His irritation flared. “Why not?”
She hiccupped. Too much pastry in a single swallow, or perhaps too many drinks wherever she’d been that night. Gul rolled his lips together, lowering his face farther, as she said, “My orders, Your Highness.”
“Your orders?”
The corners of her mouth turned down just a fraction, as if she regretted her words.
Well, this was insightful. He moved to the stack of clean plates at the end of the counter, set out for resident palace staff with midnight appetites. “Orders from the head of personal security, by any chance?”
There were several moments of silence—punctuated by another hiccup—that she finally broke with a muttered, “Damn it.”
“I’ve been here for months, Hanna.” In an effort to keep himself under control, he opened a second industrial-sized, stainless steel fridge. He hardly saw what he put on his plate. “You’ve followed me just about everywhere. Avoiding eye contact, rarely speaking, regardless of how many times I’ve tried to draw you out with conversation. But here you are.” He gestured between her and Gul with a stuffed bagel, the beat of frustration sharp in his neck. “Proving it’s all been an act. And I am done with being lied to by the people around me.”
His head spun. This energetic and excitable woman had been ordered to disengage around him. Why? Why would Frankie do that to him?
Hanna didn’t answer, but guilt had crept into her eyes. Then she hiccupped again.
Kris stared at her.
She did it again.
He raised a brow. “That’s kind of killing the tension here, don’t you think?”
There—a spark of amusement lit her features. The first sign of her true personality, directed at him, in over three months. “My apologies, Your Highness.”
“I want to know why Frankie—”
Another hiccup interrupted him.
Kris ran a hand over his mouth but couldn’t hold back his grin. “Get some water, for God’s sake.”
Hanna made a small noise—a kind of “meep”—and darted to fill a glass under the tap. Gul waited silently, hands behind his back and chin still angled down. Kris couldn’t tell if he was uncomfortable or keeping a lid on his own amusement.
Once Hanna had drained a full glass and returned sheepishly to Gul’s side, Kris continued. “From now on, I want you to be yourself around me,” he said, hating that this request was even necessary. “That goes for all of you,” he added, louder, throwing a glance at his overnight security posted by the door. “Have a chat, talk to me. Laugh. Joke around. Tease me—we all know I deserve it. Please?”
“Your Highness,” Hanna said, wincing. “I’m not sure—”
“Finish dishing up,” he said firmly, cutting her off. “Then we’re all going to sit together and have a chat. That’s an order. Because your boss might be a badass, but I’m your prince.”
Funny. Hanna ran out of resistance after that.
Frankie’s headache was a pounder. She’d opened the window of her small room and set the fan on high, but even after a cool shower, the hammering at her temples persisted. She shouldn’t be surprised. This was a lot bigger than a heat headache.
Tossing the damp towel onto the desk, she pulled on a pair of bed shorts and cotton camisole and collapsed into the only comfortable seat in the room—an old, fraying armchair that had come with the simple staff quarters. With one-hundred-and-forty-eight bedrooms in the servants’ wing, the rooms were old, poky and unadorned. In other words, perfect. There was a bed with a mattress several decades older than she was, but it was a double and the palace laundry handled washing the sheets, so she couldn’t complain. Then there was this armchair and the coffee table she propped her feet on. All she needed.
Other staff plugged in bar fridges or brought in their own furniture to make their room feel more like home, but Frankie had never owned furniture or a home, and she had no issues grabbing her meals from the dining hall. If she was safe, she was happy.
Sighing, she closed her eyes and slowed her breathing. Her body sagged into the cushioning.
Her mind remained adamantly awake.
If she didn’t get proper rest soon, her team would strong-arm her into the emergency department with exhaustion. She’d caught the concern on Hanna’s face this week, the grim assessment in Peter’s glances. Frankie wasn’t naïve enough to believe the pair had kept her involvement with Kris a secret, but at least the rest of her team were smart enough to act like they were none the wiser.
She groaned, clamping a hand around the back of her neck and squeezing. Her tension was stockpiling. Kris hadn’t left the palace grounds. Which was good. She’d had time to work, but it als
o meant she spent every second of the day poised, waiting for word that he was leaving, knowing she’d have to make a run for it so as not to delay a member of the royal family.
She’d then spent each night fixating on the fact that he was avoiding her.
The later the hour, the more foolish her thoughts became.
He hated her.
He never wanted to see her again.
He was going to fire her.
He was going to make her his mistress.
He was in hate-love with her and the next time he saw her, he wouldn’t ask to kiss her, he’d just do it, shoving her against the nearest wall and—
Foolish or not, she’d stick by those thoughts right to the end.
Dropping her hand to her lap, she remembered the times it had been just the two of them—when she’d been too preoccupied by what separated them to soak up the simple pleasure of being alone with him. Walking the ranch with Kris in open-skied isolation, no brothers or neighbors for miles. Half-day road trips for supplies in his farm truck, filling the time by playing conversation games or songs they thought each other would like. Camping in the craggy mountains the few times he’d convinced her to do something so reckless—she’d come dangerously close to surrendering to their attraction on those rough, lonely slopes.
Now, she imagined she had given in.
Met his too-warm gaze over the campfire and held it. Allowed their stare to slide from a question into an unwavering answer. Made room for him as he slowly stood and came over to her, warmth gone from his face, replaced by a careful seriousness. Leaned into his touch as he reached for her face, his thumb brushing over her bottom lip a moment before his mouth—
Frankie started. Tangled in the ludicrous daydream, she was sure she’d imagined the knock on her door. It was beyond late. No one would come knocking.
Then she imagined it again.
“No,” she called out, just in case.
“It’s Hanna. I, uh—can we talk?”
Grumbling, but with no reason not to let her in, Frankie pushed herself out of the armchair. Ruffling her damp hair, she reached the door and dragged it open with a weary, “Yeah?”
Hanna stood in the middle of the doorway, still dressed up from her night out. Make up bold, blond hair loose. Her expression was peculiar. Uncomfortably apologetic.
“Realized you have the wrong room, Johansson?” Frankie asked dryly.
“No, ma’am,” she answered, standing tall.
Frankie pressed her fingers into the bridge of her nose. “Do you want to come in?”
“No, ma’am. I’m really sorry about this.” Hanna’s gaze swung to her left as she spoke. “I understand that it’s highly unprofessional. I would never, you know, except he came in while I was chatting with Gul and overheard—”
Hanna was cut off by a large male hand that reached out from the left of the corridor and cupped over her mouth.
Frankie’s pulse lurched.
She knew that hand—the coarse-haired, muscled arm attached to it.
Hanna spoke again, but the hand muffled her words. It could have been, “I’m sorry.” But could just as easily have been, “Don’t kill me.”
Slowly, Frankie leaned her head out the door, looking to the left. Even expecting him, her stomach ended up in her throat as their gazes clashed. He lounged against the corridor wall, facing her, eyes dangerous sparks of blue, close enough that she caught the woodland smell of him. Not the Kris from her campfire fantasy. He was rigid with barely contained temper, tight in his neck, bulging at the hinge of his jaw as he bit down hard.
Even angry, he filled her with a wild, hazardous need.
“Your Highness,” she made herself say. “Care to unhand my staff?”
His only response was to lift a brow. His hand remained over Hanna’s mouth, who was looking for all the world like, well, like a woman who’d unwillingly led an uncontainable prince to her superior’s private sleeping quarters in the dead of night.
Frankie’s own anger flared to life, fanned by her fatigue. How dare he put Hanna in this position? How dare he act so inappropriately?
He’s your prince, her fading traces of reason reminded her. And your guard is watching. Don’t blow your top.
“Your Highness,” she said, grinding her irritation down into a measured tone. “I don’t know what you’re—”
“Silencing her,” he said, before removing his hand. The first words he’d spoken to her in five days and the rough texture of his voice moved like friction inside her. “Though it shouldn’t bother you, since you’ve ordered her silence since I got here.”
Oh. Shit.
Frankie flicked a glance at Hanna. The woman’s answering gaze was wary. “Dismissed, Johansson.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Then Hanna was gone.
“Let’s sort this out then.” Frankie jerked her head inside and was rewarded with a fierce stab in her temple. “Since you’ve clearly come here for a confrontation.”
God, that was not the right tone for addressing a prince. Not even close.
“You ordered my guards not to talk to me.” Eyes flinty, he brought himself closer to the threshold. She had to tilt her chin higher to hold his stare, and her stomach curled. He was still dressed in the jeans and shirt he’d worn that day. Lush hair all over the place—too long, too prone to his frustrated hands. And still, she wanted to jump him. “Do you know how badly I could’ve used a couple of friends around here? Hanna made me think she was the dullest person alive”—Frankie made a mental note to praise her guard for her efforts—“until I happened to discover she’s this vibrant bouncy-ball you ordered into stillness. Why would you do that? Why the hell would you punish me—”
“Punish you?” She bit back, too exhausted to keep herself in check as his words struck her pride. “You think that’s what this is? That I’m so useless at my job, I set orders based on personal grudges?”
He didn’t seem to care that her tone was out of line. He moved even closer, rolling his lips together. “I have no idea what this is, Frankie, because you don’t tell me the truth.”
“Let’s talk about telling the truth, then.” Bad. This was bad. His temper was expanding—and hers was responding big time. “Because you seem to be under the delusion that you’re innocent in all this.”
“This’ll be interesting.” His stare bored into her. “Enlighten me.”
“Inside.” She pulled her head back into her room, wincing at her headache. No doubt about it. His tension and her sleep deprivation were about to collide head-on.
Kris rounded the doorway, features threatening a fight. Intent pushed him passed her into the room, but she clocked the instant he realized how little she was wearing. Probably the exact same moment she realized she’d just let this wild prince into her bedroom. His insatiate energy seemed to chew up all the space, drawing the walls in closer, blurring the corners and edges until she was the only thing left in his field.
Facing her, his focus snapped to her body. Anger flickered in and out of his gaze like a frequency dial that couldn’t decide where to land. Outrage or lust? His throat moved on a hard swallow as he took in her bare legs; his mouth parted, bottom lip pulling between his teeth as his attention traveled over her hips and stomach. Then his jaw flexed and his fingers curled by his sides, as if he couldn’t decide whether to punch the nearest wall or take hold of her camisole and tear it clean off.
Hot and refusing to be flustered, Frankie kicked the door closed behind her. “You’re not here to look.”
The slam brought his temper rushing back. “You’re right.” Standing in the short stretch of space between the foot of her bed and the coffee table, he crossed his arms. “I’m here to put an end to this.”
An end.
She could have let her legs buckle; could’ve made the sound that broke behind her lips. Instead she let his energy latch onto her. Raging, ravishing in its intensity, it held her up.
She narrowed her eyes and answered coolly, �
��About time.”
“Here I was,” he said, shaking his head. “Doing my best to accept that you’ve always lied to me. That you convinced Mark to lie to me.” His very presence coiled with insult. “But now I find out you’ve ordered my guards to pretend to be people they’re not around me. It doesn’t—I don’t understand—” He sliced a hand into his hair, a growl in the back of his throat. “What are you playing at?”
“Playing?” Affront pushed her across the old carpet, and she stopped a few feet from him. Days ago, she’d wanted him to believe he’d only been a job to her. Tonight, wrung thin by the whole damn thing, she was offended he’d believe that so easily. “You’re not a game to me.”
“No?” His breath lurched furiously. “Then what am I to you, Frankie? An obligation? An inconvenience? A private joke? A sucker who never—”
“My prince!” Her words cut through the air like a solvent, stripping away her anger and leaving the grain of raw emotion in her throat.
Kris looked like she’d just landed an uppercut to his chin.
Suddenly shaky, she wrapped her arms around her middle. “You’re my prince,” she said again, much quieter. “You don’t seem to realize that yet—that I don’t exist outside of this hierarchy just because we used to be friends. You’re my prince, and everything I’ve done has been to protect you.” She paused. “Your Highness.”
He took a swift, stiff step back.
“It doesn’t make sense to you now.” Her hands pressed harder against her sides. “You accuse me of being cruel, of punishing you, but I’m not. One day you’ll understand that I’m trying to do the right thing.”
His breath was sharp as he shook his head.
“You want to know why I ordered your guards to detach around you?” Damn this lump in her throat, inflamed by the scratch of her words. “Because they have a job to do. They must be prepared to make an objective, snap decision in a potentially life-threatening situation, and your tendency to befriend everyone around you could put that at risk. What could seem like a harmless conversation, a casual laugh, could make them lose focus right when they need it most.”