Her Last Protector
Her Last Protector
Jeanie London
His only duty is to defend herCovert agent Drew Canady has guarded Princess Mirie Selskla without once crossing the line between protector and lover. Keeping her safe, and his true identity under wraps, has never been a problem. Then an attack against Mirie sends her straight into his arms. Suddenly all those feelings he’s never acknowledged won’t go away.Drew knows she’s the last woman he should fall for. His focus must be on finding the enemy—even if that blows his cover and drives Mirie from his life for good. But as the stakes climb, maybe he’s underestimated the power of the attraction between them…
His only duty is to defend her
Covert agent Drew Canady has guarded Princess Mirie Selskla without once crossing the line between protector and lover. Keeping her safe, and his true identity under wraps, has never been a problem. Then an attack against Mirie sends her straight into his arms. Suddenly all those feelings he’s never acknowledged won’t go away.
Drew knows she’s the last woman he should fall for. His focus must be on finding the enemy—even if that blows his cover and drives Mirie from his life for good. But as the stakes climb, maybe he’s underestimated the power of the attraction between them….
Drew wasn’t sure what awoke him
He did know he shouldn’t have been sleeping. Not here in the cave. But the struggle to control his physical reaction to the feel of Mirie pressed against him had worn him out more than battling the snow.
He wanted to stop time with the feel of her in his arms. He glanced down at her, dark lashes forming half circles on her pale cheeks, her mouth parted around shallow breaths.
“Are you all right?” he asked automatically.
She surprised him by sliding her arms around his chest. The heat melded their skin together. Her hair tickled his nose with every breath. Her sleek curves unfolded against him so he could feel the length of her soft thighs, the way she fitted into the curve of his body.
His pulse began to race, rebelling wildly against his best intentions. And they were the very best. Just useless against the feel of her in his arms. A familiar burning started inside, a reaction that was going toe-to-toe with his discipline.
For the first time, he was losing sight of his job, rapidly forgetting that he had to protect her. Instead he was reacting like a man to a very beautiful woman.
Dear Reader,
I’m fascinated by the people who dedicate their lives to national security and defense. These caring people possess such courage of heart—whether they serve at home or abroad, in peace or adversity. The sheer fact they live their lives in such diverse settings and circumstances for the benefit of others speaks to the nobility of the human spirit.
That’s the idea that gave life to the Excelsior Agency.
I fell in love with this world of covert operations back in 2005, when I wrote In the Cold (Mills & Boon Signature Select Spotlight November 2005), and I am beyond thrilled to have the freedom to revisit Excelsior again in Her Last Protector. Mirie and Drew are people who understand the meaning of loyalty, each in their unique circumstances and in their own ways. While their goals may seem worlds apart (countries, actually!), together they learn that honor does not come without sacrifice, everything worthy is worth fighting for and love conquers all.
Ordinary people. Extraordinary romance.
Mills & Boon Superromance is the place to enjoy stories set in circumstances where love will endure. I hope you enjoy Mirie and Drew’s love story. Visit me at www.jeanielegendre.com (http://www.jeanielegendre.com).
Peace and blessings,
Jeanie London
Her Last Protector
Jeanie London
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Jeanie London writes romance because she believes in happily-ever-afters. Not the “love conquers all” kind, but the “we love each other, so we can conquer anything” kind. Jeanie is the winner of many prestigious writing awards, including multiple RT Book Reviews Reviewers’ Choice and National Readers’ Choice Awards. She lives in sunny Florida with her own romance-hero husband, their beautiful daughters and a menagerie of strays.
To everyone who defends this wonderful country I call home.
Your dedication reminds us all that we gain nothing through apathy. And your courage sets the standard. You are appreciated. May God bless you all.
Contents
Chapter One (#u7334eb18-0af3-5203-b3e5-be129c7dfe26)
Chapter Two (#u29afaaea-ead5-5aab-9a59-e662a75ed16d)
Chapter Three (#u0c16712b-3018-552e-a952-eb526e9445c5)
Chapter Four (#u646608df-523d-5453-83a0-1e6e14c6cd8f)
Chapter Five (#u39a0932b-62ee-5015-ab9b-a687923f38ff)
Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twelve (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fourteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fifteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Sixteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seventeen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eighteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nineteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Excerpt (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER ONE
“DREI TIMKO,” a voice barked.
Drew responded to the name as if it were his own. In the ways that mattered, the name was his. The man once known as Drew Canady had become a ghost from another lifetime. A life so long gone, he had almost forgotten. Almost. Not quite.
Turning, he watched the grizzled old man muscle through the crowd, broad shoulders forging a path through the mourners, face split with a gap-toothed grin. The logger, a man named Vlas, had befriended Drew back when he had been a stranger among strangers in this mountain village of Alba Luncă.
“You guard the princess as closely as you once guarded a lighthearted girl.” Vlas clapped Drew on the back.
Drew glanced at the woman walking behind the casket cart—graceful and dressed head to toe in white, from the fur ushanka on her head to the hiking boots on her feet. She looked appropriately austere for a funeral, colorless but for the flushed cheeks and wisps of caramel-colored hair lifting on the wind, her expression as brittle as the weather.
“That’s what they pay me to do.” His breath clashed with the morning air in a frigid burst.
Princess Mirela of Ninsele hadn’t been that lighthearted girl for a very long time.
Not since the years before his princess had come out of hiding. One minute she had been the girl he’d been hired to protect, a girl who loved to run barefoot through the meadows in spring.
Now she was the ruler of this mountain kingdom, and a very desirable woman. When he looked at her, he didn’t see Princess Mirela, last royal of the House of Selskala. He saw past the woman who engaged the media with intelligence and grace, who handled foreign diplomats skillfully and didn’t retreat when facing revolutionaries and thugs who would bully her to sidestep justice. He didn’t see the woman the media had nicknamed “Mirie of Alba Luncă,” a princess who had long hidden among commoners.
Drew saw only the laughing woman he had devoted so many years to protecting.
The woman who rarely made an appearance anymore.
He didn’t share the thought with Vlas, who had once been a friend. Long ago, he and the old logger had stood around the bonfire in the square, sharing opinions and flasks of făţată. Now they trudged uphill in an early-morning funeral procession. Nearly a mile of icy dirt road. In minus-twelve degree weather. The people of Alba Luncă were Spartans.
At least Drew wasn’t carrying the casket or digging the grave in frozen earth. He had retreated far enough to assess the procession perimeter but still had his eyes on his target. He had been in lockstep with Mirie for more than fifteen years. “The princess seems pleased to be back,” Vlas said.
Drew wouldn’t go that far. Mirie was burying her nanny, the woman who had saved her life during a coup when the royal family was executed. Geta Bobescue had hidden the eight-year-old princess in this obscure village. With the help of a retired royal guard, she protected Mirie during the decade-long civil war and prepared her for the day the dictator was overthrown. That day had come six years ago. Mirie had been plucked from Alba Luncă and taken to the capital city of Briere to rule her kingdom.
She hadn’t been back since.
Geta’s funeral was a bittersweet reason to return. This visit also posed an unnecessary risk. But Mirie hadn’t considered the risk to herself enough reason to forsake the task of burying her nanny.
Fortunately this funeral procession wasn’t a fast-moving train. It wound through the village slowly, people adhering to the crowd like filings on a magnet with each shop they passed, each house and alley. This parade of mourners was intent, like Mirie, upon honoring its dead. And enjoying the charity meal that would come after the burial. That was tradition.
Drew scanned each newcomer and kept a watch on the rooftops, balconies and doorways, assessing potential threats. He needed to get a lock on everyone who ventured near Mirie.
The Ninsele Royal Protection Guard, known as the NRPG, was the branch of military charged with the princess’s protection. Right now guards were posted throughout the village, but once the procession moved beyond the gate, the terrain would be nearly impossible to secure. Drew would be the first line of defense. He was always the first line of defense.
“Her Royal Highness tried to return before Geta died, but it wasn’t possible,” he said. Not with all the preparations to host representatives from the European Commission, who would be arriving in Ninsele in a matter of weeks.
A historic first step that was attracting global attention.
“Geta was at peace. She called the priest and received absolution and the Eucharist. She didn’t expect the princess to return even for the funeral.” Vlas withdrew an envelope from his coat pocket. “This is why I chased you down. And this.” His face split into another grin as he pulled out a leather flask.
Drew accepted the envelope, which had been addressed in a shaky scrawl with the princess’s formal title. Slipping the envelope into the pocket inside his coat’s lining, he asked, “You want me to deliver this letter to Her Royal Highness?”
“Eventually. When you think she is strong enough to be reminded of the past and her losses. Deathbed request.” Vlas took a deep swig after uncorking the flask. “Geta worried about the girl. She told me you would know when best to pass along her words. Give the girl time to grieve.”
Drew scanned the crowd around Mirie again, ready to intervene at any sign of a threat. People were keeping their distance, which made his job easier.
The envelope was sealed. Geta would never burden Mirie without good reason. No one knew better how deeply the loss of her family had affected the young princess.
Drew wished he could allow the contents to remain private, but that wasn’t his choice. “Anything else I need to know?”
“Secrets, Drei? That girl was Geta’s only secret.” Vlas motioned to Drew with the flask. “Go on. It’ll warm you up. She’ll be safe. We protect her as we always have.”
The villagers had done that. In the past when the princess’s existence had been fodder for conspiracy theorists, the people of Alba Luncă had claimed her as their own. Of course they hadn’t known she was a princess. Back then she had simply been a military officer’s daughter orphaned in the coup. That explanation justified the privileges and protection Mirie had enjoyed growing up in a rural village—the additional tutors, the bodyguard.
No one had questioned the facts then, and no one remembered them now. Mirie belonged to Alba Luncă. Period. A princess had lived among commoners. She belonged to these people now even more than she had then. No wonder the paparazzi never left her alone. Mirie’s story had captured the imaginations of a world that wanted to believe in happy endings.
Drew was determined to make sure Mirie got hers.
“As much as I’d like to accept your hospitality, my friend, I’ll have to pass,” he said. “I’ll make sure she gets this letter at the best possible time.”
There would be no good time. Mirie was barely twenty-five years old. She had royal obligation to a country violently split in its regard for the monarchy. Her days were filled with duty as she worked with the Crown Council to win the support of the European Commission to become an acceding country into the European Union and provide Ninsele with a future.
Whether the people wanted that future or not.
Many didn’t, but in a life filled with enemies, the one foe that had gotten close was the one Drew couldn’t fight.
Time.
He glanced at Mirie again, her hand resting on the casket as if she didn’t want her nanny to be alone. Her head was bowed low beneath the fur ushanka, and Drew could tell she was fighting back tears. He wished she’d had the chance to come back and say goodbye one last time.
She might be surrounded by people every moment of every day. Ministers and military officers. People who served. People who clung. People who schemed. People who wanted her to succeed. People who wanted her dead.
But her last connection to family lay in that casket.
Drew understood why Geta had been worried. He also knew why she had wanted him to decide when to turn over the letter. She had faith in his ability to protect Mirie—from physical as well as emotional threats. Protecting Mirie was his job.
One of them, anyway.
But no one in Ninsele knew about his other job. Never once during all these years had Drew given anyone a reason to suspect he wasn’t exactly who he claimed to be.
Drei Timko, Romanian close-protection guard.
No one had any idea that he was actually Drew Canady, a sleeper operative for Excelsior, a United States national security agency.
* * *
“YOU WILL CAST down the branches to mark her passing. You who were loved by her as a granddaughter would be.”
Grateful for this honor, Mirie accepted an armful of fir branches from the village elder council that stood as ceremonial guard around the grave containing Bunică’s casket.
Grandmother.
Geta Bobescue may not have been blood related, but she had become many things to Mirie during their years together. Protector. Confidant. Mentor. Savior in so many ways. Bunică had helped Mirie make sense of the senseless tragedy that had upended her life and helped her find strength. It had been there as promised, buried deep inside. But above all, Bunică had been a last flicker of love when all other flames had sputtered out.
Now she was gone, too.
“Peace, my beloved Bunică,” Mirie whispered.
She tossed the branches. They scattered over the casket with the springy sound of living flora. But they were no longer alive. Cut from the tree of life, they would soon grow brittle and dry and wither to dust.
Such was life.
Kneeling, Mirie reached into the pit and broke away a clump of frozen dirt. She tossed a fistful into the grave.
“Godspeed, Bunică. Take our leave now and rest.”
You will be missed, she added silently as the priest reached for the hoe.
The church bell tolled, a hollow sound that echoed over snow-tipped trees covering mountain peaks in every direction. Mirie retreated as a group of young men came to fill the grave.
The tolling filtered through her as if she stood naked in the wind. She had learned restraint through the years, but she had also learned that the past was a ghost and the future beyond her grasp. Right now was all she had. If she could only endure this moment, she would find her strength again, even though her insides felt frail. As if the wind might sweep away all ability to feel and she would never know anything but weakness again.
And loneliness.
Bunică was free of this life. Bunică of the quick hugs and practical wisdom, who brooked no disobedience or rebellion, yet understood the need for kindness and confidence. Only Bunică’s belief in Mirie had helped her learn to believe in herself.
This simple, solid woman, who had been chosen by Mirie’s grandfather to rear her beloved Papa, had lived all the stories with her lost family. Bunică had witnessed the first steps and last breaths of two generations. Weddings and coronations. Life and laughter. Fear and murder. How many moments and memories had not yet been told, tiny minutes in the lives of Mirie’s family that were now being buried in this grave?
The church bell withered to silence. The priest gave a blessing, and the women gathered to sing the burial song. Mirie joined the circle and raised her voice in a melody that rained sorrow down the mountain.
The song might have been beautiful but for the sadness. And she remembered this feeling, heartache that wrung every ounce of her strength as if her insides were made of sponge.
But she couldn’t take Bunică from this mountain. Nor could she leave any part of herself here. She had already given away everything, kept only what she needed to survive.
When the song faded to silence, the feeling lingered, loss cast on the wind, across frosty trees, rebounding through her.
Mirie might never see this place again.
Alba Luncă had been home when she had needed one most. When she had been robbed of love and identity, she had found joy again running through the dirt streets of the village, through leaf-strewn forests, over sunlit meadows.
This place had become everything to her. Shelter. Safety. Solace. But hope most of all. Mirie had learned life would go on here, like it or not. Whether that life was joyous or miserable was a choice that was hers to make and hers alone.
She had clung to that knowledge during these past six years, knowing life in all its simplicity was exactly where she had left it—in the mountains with Bunică. The knowledge had given her strength during never-ending council sessions, consolation when the palace she had been born in felt like an alien planet. Alba Luncă had given her purpose. She worked for Ninsele, fought to preserve a way of life she believed in.
Stay in the present, she reminded herself. Just focus on this moment.
The mourners began to move and whisper. It was time to leave. Perhaps forever.
Inhaling deeply, Mirie memorized the taste of the sharp wind in her lungs, of spruce and snow, of hope when all had felt hopeless, of life that filled her with possibilities the way the wind whistled through trees and filled this valley.
There was a path nearby that led to a hidden grove with a spring and a waterfall, one of the many secret places of this harsh yet heavenly country. Secret from strangers, at any rate. Teenagers had long ago designated the place as a rendezvous point. Mirie had kissed her first boyfriend there after escaping from her bodyguard.
Of course she had been caught long before youthful exploration had much of a chance to heat up. She had never been able to lose her tail for long.
That thought only made her sigh.
The fresh earth over Bunică’s grave looked like a dirty scar marring the snowy ground, but even in death Bunică’s nearness made Mirie long for that simpler time. She could not tear herself away even though she could hear people retreating. Bunică was her connection to Alba Luncă, to her life of eventual peace after everyone she loved had been taken.
Mama, Papa, Alexi, Petre, Stefan...
There had been only Bunică. This tiny mountain village. And these people.
A slight touch on her arm brought her back to the moment.
Drei.
He was there as he always was. The man who had long ago replaced Bunică as Mirie’s protector, such a constant presence he had practically vanished. How could she notice her shadow or be surprised by the sight of her reflection in a mirror?
He was a blond bear of a man, hard from every angle—big body, chiseled expression, gemstone eyes. But his gaze was soft now as he watched her with eyes so startlingly green they seemed out of place on a granite face. He waited for her cue, an exchange that had become as natural as breathing to them.
She inclined her head, and he led her away.
They rounded the front of the church, following the procession that was fast losing its formation and reverent demeanor. People joined friends and family for the walk back to the village. They greeted each other. Someone laughed.
Mirie followed with Drei a step behind, feeling the wind sting, more bitter somehow as they left the churchyard. Once these people would have welcomed her easily among them. The women would have ordered her to refill buckets from the well and the men would have asked her to fetch glasses of ţuică. Now they had receded from her as silently as snow in the spring.
She was no longer the girl they had known. More important, she no longer felt like that girl. And that knowledge made her mood grow as leaden as the clouds that promised snow.
“The storm’s coming,” she said.
Drei glanced up. “Are you thinking about going back early?”
She nodded.
“What about the charity? The priest is behind us. He’ll expect you to say something to kick off the celebration.”
Mirie met his gaze, as green as the meadows for those few glorious weeks during summer. She could think of nothing she would rather do less right now than celebrate. “We may risk getting snowed in.”
There were no plows to clear the roads. Trans-Alps highways did not traverse the gorges of these steep passes. Not close enough for convenience, anyway. Not until Mirie could find some way of bridging the distance between opposing parties and get a majority to agree on what Ninsele’s future looked like.
If she ever got everyone to agree.
Drei only nodded. He would do whatever she decided, no matter how much effort it cost to rearrange their plans. But Mirie glanced into the storm clouds and knew she would have to take her chances. Tradition must be upheld. She may feel like a stranger right now, but her quick exit would be noticed. She was a conversation piece. Alba Luncă would tell tales of the princess who had hidden among them for generations to come.
She would leave no one disappointed with Bunică’s send-off. Especially since she wouldn’t be back to host the series of charity meals that would commemorate Bunică’s passing for the next year. Mirie would rely on others to host those. Today she would honor the woman who had given her life.
“We’ll cross our fing—” She broke off when she saw Drei.
He cocked his head to the side, his grip tightening on her elbow, bringing them to a sudden stop. Mirie knew he was receiving a report through his earpiece. Then he was in motion, pulling her hard against him, his arms like a vise as he spun her around.
“Go, go, go!” he yelled over his shoulder at the villagers. “We have gunfire. Get to the village. Quickly.”
Chaos erupted among those who had been nearest the grave site. Plaintive demands and fearful questions discharged into confusion. But none drowned out the sudden growl of an engine in the distance, unseen, yet swelling quickly, churning through the mountain stillness like the roar of an avalanche.
“The village,” Drei commanded. “Not the church. Get safely behind the gates.”
People started running, shouting, “To the village. To the village.”
“Quickly, Your Royal Highness,” Drei hissed while spurring her into a run.
Toward the church.
The priest broke away, vestments whipping around him as he bolted in the opposite direction. “I will sound the alarm.”
“Get the people to the gates, Father!” Drei shouted.
But the priest followed them to the church, following her when he should have been running in the opposite direction.
She tried to keep up with Drei, but the way he surrounded her with his big body kept her blind and off balance. His thighs rammed into the backs of hers with each step, forcing her to keep his pace and nearly sweeping her off her feet as he slammed into the churchyard gate, throwing it open.
The church steps proved her undoing, and she stumbled. Drei lifted her against him as though she weighed no more than air and dragged her up the remaining steps and across the threshold.
He spun around with practiced skill, using the building to shield her as he pulled open the door.
And in that instant, she glimpsed the priest flying through the open gate, and a military transport helicopter riding low just above the treetops, armed men bulging from the open sides.
Powerful engines reverberated through the gorge, the rhythmic swoop-swoop-swoop of the blades, the grumbling heartbeat of a conveyance that carried death. The sound was deafening, yet not loud enough to drown out the eruption of gunfire that stunned the morning.
Drei dragged her inside and pulled the door shut, but not before Mirie heard the familiar thuds of bullets pounding flesh.
No warning bells would sound the alarm in Alba Luncă today.
CHAPTER TWO
“IS HER ROYAL HIGHNESS to safety?” General Bogdanovich demanded over the audio device. “Secure her. Repeat. Secure her. We’ve eliminated three of the enemy on the road, but a team of six has entered the churchyard. We’re surrounding the perimeter, but we’re drawing fire from the copter.”
Drew could not respond. The doors of the church slammed open as if on cue, and footsteps pounded over stone.
Mirie stared up from beneath her hat, features drawn and eyes wide. She had pulled on her courage as she might her coat, but he saw the fear in her tight expression, in the dilation of pupils turning blue-gray eyes almost black.
He questioned her without words, and she inclined her head, confirming she was unharmed and functioning. She knew the drill, and she was no longer a terrified eight-year-old.
Drew reevaluated, unsure if they could make the escape route undetected. Their pursuers appeared to be well-funded paramilitaries, seizing the opportunity to eliminate the last royal of the House of Selskala, who had made herself an easy target for the first time in six years.
Raising his pistol, he cased the stairwell before leading Mirie down the steps to the crypt. There were no windows down here, only the dank cold of frozen ground. They moved quickly, sound buffered by stone. But the impenetrable dark finally forced him to lower his pistol and feel his way with a hand along the wall.
Their attackers would break into pairs. One team would head into the loft that ran along the back of the church and the bell tower. Another team would make its way to the sacristy and vesting room, which would lead them here to the crypt entry. The remaining team would canvass the nave with the rows of pews and alcoves of small side altars.
“Major Timko,” General Bogdanovich demanded in his ear. “Sit-rep. Is Her Royal Highness alive?”
The general wouldn’t be getting a situation report any time soon, so Drew tapped once against the audio device.
Affirmative.
She was alive for the moment, anyway.
Mirie pressed against his back, following the drill they had practiced time and again to prepare for this emergency situation.
She needed to pace her breathing, but he could risk no warning. Their feet echoed, the sound amplified by the quiet.
Doors led to mausoleums and a chapel, and an escape route that had been excavated during World War I. Drew could make out the faint glow of the sanctuary lamp in the distance, coming from the second door on the right.
His pistol scratched stone, a noise that made Mirie gasp. He pressed his fingers against her lips, and her soft mouth yielded beneath his touch. Her eyes widened, a flash of white in the darkness. Drew wasn’t sure if he had surprised her, or if she was reacting to the low exchange of conversation that filtered down the stairs, but his fingers tingled as he drew his hand away.
Drew pulled her through the second doorway as the voices erupted again, louder this time, nearer. Luck was with them, though. The sanctuary lamp illuminated the obstacle course of furnishings. Chairs. Candle stands. Icons.
The entrance to the tunnel was concealed behind the tabernacle, recessed into the wall behind the altar. But Drew couldn’t enter the passage yet, couldn’t risk any noise that would jeopardize the only escape route they had. They needed to hide until he had a lock on the enemy’s location.
He considered whether they should make a run for the mausoleums. Then Mirie motioned him to the altar, and he learned there were more secrets to this chapel than even he’d known.
The marble altar had a decoration of inlaid mosaic tiles, which turned out to conceal a panel to a hideaway.
Slipping the pistol into his waistband, Drew helped Mirie inside, ensuring that every inch of white fur was hidden. He backed away to shut the panel, but Mirie grasped at his coat, urging him down beside her. The last thing he saw was light slicing beyond the door, and then he was on his knees, curling around her.
She began to shake. Drew could feel her against him, as she struggled to control her chattering teeth. Tightening his arms around her, he held her close until he could almost feel the slim outline of her body through the outerwear already making him sweat.
This was when normal people came unglued, lost their heads and did something stupid that led them to get caught. People who weren’t trained to handle the time-bomb pressure of managing fear and waiting to see if luck was with them or if life would get ugly.
Mirie had already witnessed more ugliness than most people. Her family had been slain in military-style executions while she had hidden beneath mock flooring. She had been spared one horror, only to live another, with her nanny’s hands pressed over her face to contain her screams and spare her the brutality of her family’s last minutes of life.
Boots scuffed over rough stone so close that Mirie inhaled an audible breath. Drew tightened his arms around her and maneuvered his face until he could press his cheek against hers, share the warmth of his skin, use their nearness as distraction.
His heart throbbed dully in his chest, his entire body an insane tangle of nerves and awareness. For two people who had spent every minute of every day together for so many years, for two people who knew so much about each other’s lives and intimate habits, they really knew nothing about each other.
Mirie didn’t know his true identity.
And Drew had no idea she would feel as if she belonged in his arms.
“Hovno!” A gravelly voice spat out the curse.
A Czech or Slovak curse, and a clue to the identity of their enemy.
The footsteps marked the perimeter of the room. Drew could make out the path, hear the intruder searching behind the chairs that ran the periphery of the chapel beneath the icons adorning the walls in all their Orthodox glory.
The resurrection of Christ.
The Blessed Mother.
Michael the archangel.
A buffet of saints, all of whom Drew sincerely hoped were praying for their escape right now.
Mirie shuddered, but Drew pressed his lips to her cool cheek, the only reassurance he could offer as seconds ticked by, each one stretching into another, protracted and tense. He inhaled fur from her ushanka until he was forced to knock the hat from her head with his chin before he sneezed.
Then he was treated to the full impact of her hair, a crisp, clean scent that filtered through his consciousness, made him aware of each strand against his skin.
“Any luck?” the Slovak speaker asked.
Definitely Slovak. They were near the gate.
“Bah!” another voice ground out, sounding like cigarette smoke over gravel. “They did not come down here.”
“You break that news to Ratko.”
A gruff snort, and the sound of retreating footsteps. Drew filed away that name and hoped the NRPG might neutralize the threat so they could ride out the danger in this hideaway. Could they be so lucky?
But one exchange over the audio transmitter reminded him that Ninsele’s resources were no match for well-funded paramilitaries. The effects of a decade-long civil war would be felt for a long time.
“Incoming, General.”
“Secure the village gate,” General Bogdanovich shot back.
“Roger that.”
Then silence.
Drew was out of choices. He couldn’t lie in wait until the church was surrounded or a villager tortured into revealing the church’s escape route. He had to protect Mirie until the NRPG had a lock on this situation or could spirit her to safety. He could make no other choice, take no chances with Mirie’s life.
* * *
THE METAL DOOR snapped into place with a gunshot crack that echoed forever. Mirie’s heart pounded in time with the sound, so hard that her chest ached from the rapid-fire beat and her ears throbbed with a steady tat-tat-tat-tat-tat like automatic gunfire. She couldn’t tell if the sound was real or some adrenaline-fueled trick of her imagination.
The memory of gunfire from long ago.
Sinking against the wall, she felt every muscle turn to liquid and her strength drain away.
Drei’s attention was on sealing the door, so their pursuers wouldn’t follow. From inside the chapel, the decorated metal panel was a showcase for the gold tabernacle with its locked door and keyhole concealed in an apostle’s pocket.
The panel concealed a spring-hinged door.
By the time he turned around, Mirie had gotten a hold of herself. With a hand on her arm, he led her into the narrow tunnel, barely high enough for her to stand upright. Drei was forced to hunch over, and kept a step ahead of her as the passage wasn’t wide enough to walk abreast.
Only after they had traveled a distance did he dare switch on a light. The red beam gleamed on rough-hewn walls as he whispered, “Talk to me, Your Royal Highness. How are you holding up?”
Her staccato heartbeat and the stale air suffocated her. She swallowed back a cry when her fingers sank into some sticky substance on the wall.
A spider’s web? Sweet Lord. If only the remnants of a web and the creature within were the worst of her troubles....
“I’m okay.” A lie.
She was bone-cold and shaking. Retrieving the glove in her pocket, she slipped her fingers inside and willed away thoughts of the men with rounds of ammunition strapped to their vests and the sound of gunfire outside.
Tat-tat-tat-tat-tat.
Drei didn’t reply. She could barely see his face, only the pinpoint beam of light that sliced through the endless darkness.
“Frightened,” she finally admitted. “Worried about the villagers.” And so, so guilty because she had been advised not to make this trip.
“The general has secured the gate and called for reinforcements.” Drei’s deep whisper embraced the dark, soothed with its tone. He liked this answer much better than the first one she had given. “He and his unit will capture these thugs.”
“You think they’re criminals?” That surprised her. Why would criminals bother with an attack when they could all too easily cross Ninsele’s borders—one more problem that hadn’t yet been solved?
“They’re thugs no matter who finances them.”
Ah, Mirie understood. Of course they were after her. Why else would anyone bother this sleepy village? And Drei would take any attempt against her personally.
She should never have risked leaving Briere, no matter how much she had wanted to be here for Bunică. Her selfish decision would impact everyone now because the NRPG could not deploy aircraft to pursue their attackers. The nearest air base was at the country’s western border and it belonged to Hungary. And Ninsele didn’t need the bad press. Not now. Not so close to the arrival of the European Commission’s representatives. Would they call off the talks, fearing for their safety? Had she just sabotaged all the progress they’d made toward the stabilization plan?
Was it any wonder she was struggling to breathe?
“The people expected a meal with a princess,” she said. “A celebration of a life lived with love.”
Was it really so much to ask for the princess they had treated as their own to speak at a funeral?
“They’ll have tales to tell their kids,” Drei said. “And they will celebrate life. Geta’s memorial and their own escape. The meal is already prepared.”
If they escaped. Mirie prayed he was right, appreciated his effort to reassure her.
But words and kindness couldn’t take away the guilt. She was responsible for her selfish choice to leave the safety of the royal compound. Now people were running for safety and fleeing armed paramilitaries.
How many would be killed like the priest?
“The general will make inquiries,” Drei continued, clearly determined to reassure her. “We’ll know by the time we get back to Briere. Who knows? Maybe some group will claim responsibility and save us the trouble of a search.”
“You hope.”
That made his gaze soften just a bit.
“I do.”
They both knew the trouble with assassins and revolutionaries was that they usually didn’t want to be identified. Secrecy gave them power. A terrorist cell would claim responsibility immediately and whip the media into a frenzy to frighten people.
“Let’s keep moving.” Drei locked his fingers around her wrist and guided her hand around his waist. His touch was solid, a reminder against worrying about things they could not control. Drawing her close, he pointed the red beam of his flashlight into the darkness.
Mirie kept pace beside him, concealed by his broad chest, chiding herself for her weakness. She had known the risks when deciding to make this journey. Yet she had hoped for the best, had felt she deserved to make this trip. She had survived when her family had not. She had a purpose to fulfill, an obligation. And she asked nothing in return. Only a chance to bury the woman who had loved her like a grandmother.
“How did you know about the altar?” Drei asked.
“Bunică was always afraid I would be discovered and instructed me how to escape.”
“She was wise.” He wanted to distract her. Her protector in body and spirit. Always.
But he couldn’t protect her from the truth.
“Has the general confirmed any casualties?” Innocent people had become targets. People guilty of no more than burying their dead, of lingering to get close to a princess.
Anyone who came near her was at risk.
She was poison.
Mirie could imagine the funeral procession in the wake of her escape, people frantic and screaming for their lives as they raced down the road for the gate, some whose steps would have been slowed by age or infirmity.
Had they stood any chance of reaching safety?
“Your Royal Highness.” Drei stretched out the syllables, a stern warning. “The general knows his duty. And the potential risks. He brought only his best men. They will secure the situation. Trust that much, at least.”
He knew her so well. She forgot that most of the time.
“I do.” But the cost of even one life was one that could never be calculated.
There were no answers in the passage that curved tightly in upon itself. The footing was treacherous. Drei moved along awkwardly, using the wall to brace himself. He kept her locked against him, steadied her as the floor descended sharply.
Mirie had known of the passage, but had never traveled it. The exit was far from the village, a place one might be able to escape through gorges that sliced a path toward the northern border. The secret of the passage was held tightly by only a few on the elder council, passed down through generations to those trusted with the villagers’ safety.
“You knew of this passage but not the altar?” she asked.
“I’ve spent a lot of years formulating escape routes in case we needed them. I’m sure Geta wanted you to have escape options even from me.”
He was right. Bunică had witnessed the effects of trusting the wrong people. But Mirie had to trust Drei. Otherwise, how could she function?
“Then it’s good we work together,” she said calmly, when she felt anything but. “You know where this passage leads?”
“The general vicinity.”
“Think we’ll be able to escape?”
“Yes.”
“Would you tell me if the answer was no?” She felt the motion as he slanted his head, as though peering down at her.
“No.” He gave a short laugh.
Under normal circumstances, his answer would have annoyed her, but the sound of that one humorless laugh stuck, a thought to divert the other sounds in her head.
Tat-tat-tat-tat-tat.
He seemed not to feel the brutal cold while her adrenaline seeped away in slow degrees. She couldn’t be sure how long they walked, but not much time had passed since she’d said her farewell to Bunică. Forcing herself to focus, Mirie put one foot in front of the other despite her quaking knees and chattering teeth.
Drei must have noticed her struggle because he brought them to another stop. Handing her the light, he opened his coat to forage through his inner pockets.
He withdrew a thick square wrapped in crackling plastic. With a few quick gestures, he shook out a weather poncho made of thin waterproof canvas.
“Wear this.” His voice was gentle as he drew the white outerwear around her and pulled a hood up over her head, hat and all. “It’ll help with the cold.”
“You travel prepared.”
“That’s what you pay me to do.”
Such a simple reply, yet not so simple. He had known there might be danger because she had left her secured palace, a glittering shell that housed the golden egg.
“Any better?” he asked.
She nodded, appreciating his precautions and his concern.
The tunnel began an ascent. Gravity and ice conspired to make each step more difficult. There were no handholds, and she was finally forced to cling to Drei, who anchored himself against the rough wall, a bulwark always, shifting his balance to secure her, his arm locked tight, his grip strong yet gentle.
And when they finally reached the end of the passage, they found a half-rotted wooden portal shaped like a manhole cover. The exit had long ago been concealed beneath snow and forest debris, making an icy, dirty blotch that didn’t budge when Drei put his weight to it.
He shut off the light. “I need you to step back, Your Royal Highness. This mess may collapse. I don’t want you far, though.”
“I can hold the light.”
“I have to see what’s out there, and this wood is disintegrating. I start loosening this ice, and the mountain might fall in.”
Mirie retreated just far enough to watch Drei work.
He tested the wood, used a knife to coax away debris so he might see outside.
Mirie gasped when the crack of ice startled the quiet. Suddenly thin light penetrated the darkness. He slipped some sort of slim instrument through the hole—a mirror?—and must have been satisfied with what he had seen because he pulled out another weather poncho like her own, camouflage to blend in with the snow-covered terrain.
This man was such a blessing in her life. Had she ever even told him how grateful she was for all his careful attention?
Probably not. She barely noticed him at all. Took his presence for granted. An oversight she would have to change immediately.
“I’ll stay within earshot, but if you hear gunfire, you head back the way we came,” he said, businesslike. “Just stay inside the passage until the general makes contact.”
He withdrew his audio transmitter, then with calloused fingertips, he tilted her head to the side. She could feel the warmth of his skin as he slipped his hand beneath her hat and brushed aside her hair. He wedged the tiny device in her ear, his touch soft, warm, so alive.
For the moment, anyway. They both knew if she heard gunfire, he was dead. That would be the only reason Drei wouldn’t return to her, and without him, her chances of making it out of this passage alive weren’t good.
“We’re out of range now. But if you make it back into the church, you’ll be in contact with the general. Got it?”
She nodded.
“Stay hidden.”
Then he crawled through the opening and vanished.
Mirie could hear the rustling of branches and tree limbs, his boots crunching through the snow. Then all sounds faded, leaving only silence to drown out the noise of her thoughts, solitude to distract her from the memory of the attackers in the helicopter, a fat-bellied fly skimming pristine white treetops and old Vlas running from automatic gunfire on creaky legs.
Tat-tat-tat-tat-tat.
When she could no longer resist the lure of the light, she eased toward the exit, listening for any sound from outside, adrenaline making each breath come hard in her chest. She peered through the broken slat and took in the surroundings.
From the village these trees sloped steeply up the mountain, always covered in snow, so beautiful, like a scene in a child’s globe. One turn of the wrist and glittery snowflakes sprinkled down upon a tiny village.
Ninsoare. Her country had been named for the snowy peaks that defined the land.
What Mirie saw now was more desolate than magical. Wind gusting so hard it whistled like an emergency siren. She had known the storm was coming, and here it was, recalling the last time she had been forced to flee into these mountains. So many years should have dimmed the memory, drowned out the sounds of screams and tears and murder.
Tat-tat-tat-tat-tat.
It had been snowing then, too.
CHAPTER THREE
“DAMN,” DREW SAID ALOUD, not bothering to rein in his frustration.
The tracks were fresh, and the snow came down so hard and fast, he had almost missed them. Inspecting the ruts, he followed the trail until determining that four snowmobiles had passed along this ridge. Probably not more than ten minutes ago.
Given the altitude and climate conditions, Drew was willing to bet no sports enthusiast would be up here snowmobiling for kicks. No, he was looking at a second group of thugs patrolling points of egress. The terrain was difficult, essentially ineffective for launching a surprise attack on a funeral procession. Most likely these snowmobiles had carried scouts searching for the missing princess.
Did they know about the tunnel? Would they be back?
These were the only questions that interested Drew right now. And who was behind these well-organized thugs? Were they Slovakian, too? Drew didn’t have a clue and knew General Bogdanovich likely wouldn’t, either.
“Damn, damn, damn.”
Gusting wind drowned out his frustration. Heading back to the tunnel, he used a branch to sweep away his tracks. Not that anything would be visible for long with this storm, but his boots were doing a helluva job marking his trail. He would have to assume the snowmobiles would be back, but with any luck the storm might slow them down a little.
It was certainly deterring him, and his options were narrowing by the second. He couldn’t use his two-way radio to contact the general. He would be lucky if he could transmit over a mile in these conditions, and couldn’t risk an intercepted transmission anywhere close to these snowmobile tracks.
As near as he could tell, the snowmobiles had headed in the most direct route back to civilization, which left him with the next problem—Mirie wouldn’t last long in this weather. They had dressed for a funeral, not for prolonged exposure to the elements, and she had already been fighting the effects of shock when he’d left her. He needed to get her safe and warm because he didn’t see any alternative but riding out the time it took the general to secure the area and retrieve them. Drew needed an alternate plan B.
Shoving up his coat sleeve, he glanced at his watch and made out the compass display. Visibility was getting crappier by the second. There was a place where they might hole up safely, but he would have to get Mirie there, and that wouldn’t be easy. The terrain was tough in good weather. Of course the storm would complicate travel for the enemy, too. That much was a plus.
Drew trudged back, unhappy with his choices. He hadn’t been gone five minutes total, but after crawling back inside the tunnel, he took in the sight of Mirie, safe, like a punch to the gut.
She still stood with her arms wrapped tightly across her chest, as if trying to fold in on herself to contain warmth. But Drew knew by one glimpse of her lovely face that she struggled. She would hide it. She would strap on her courage like Kevlar, but she was struggling hard right now. He could see it in the raw edges of her expression, the haunted eyes she lifted to his, the shuddering breath that echoed between them.
He had to get her to safety.
“Any problems?” he asked.
She shook her head, sending wisps of hair dragging along the fur collar, but she didn’t reply.
She couldn’t. Not without revealing her chattering teeth.
Crossing the distance between them with a few strides, Drew yanked off his own gloves and dug into his pocket.
“Any word from the general?” he asked.
She shook her head again. He hadn’t expected a transmission, but Mirie could use a distraction. He found the package of heat packs. They were small, the perfect size to fit inside a glove or a boot. He had hoped to conserve their few supplies, since these heat packs only had a short life span. Six minutes tops. She couldn’t wait.
Not optimum since she hadn’t been outside yet. She watched him curiously as he worked the packet to create a chemical reaction that activated the heat.
“Put this inside your glove.” He handed her the first, then went to work on the next. “It’ll help.”
She did as instructed and gave a small smile. “S-so what’s the plan?”
“How are you holding up?”
“Fine.” Her teeth let out an audible chatter and she rolled her eyes. “Freezing to death, b-but that’s because I’m standing around waiting to get shot.”
Drew eyed her narrowly and made the decision. “If you can handle a bit of a hike, then we should go for it. I’m not much for standing around waiting to get shot, either.”
That brought a smile to her lips, which hadn’t yet turned blue. A good sign.
“The village?” she asked.
“Not yet.”
She didn’t ask for details, didn’t want them. Mirie understood limitations better than most people. What did details matter right now when she couldn’t do anything to help?
He knew what her answer would be.
His own hands were warmer, so after giving her the second packet, he pressed his fingers to her chin. Her eyes widened in surprise, but she followed his urging and tilted her face to the side. Her skin was chilled and smooth beneath his touch, not waxen or stiff. No outward indication that her body temperature was dropping low enough to concern him. Yet.
Tucking the stray hairs into her hat, he withdrew the audio transmitter. “Thanks for hanging on to this for me.”
“Glad I didn’t need it.”
“Me, too.” He let his fingers trail from her face, forced his gaze to her gloved hands. “Any better?”
“Much. Do you want to use them, too?”
“You hang on to them. They can be reactivated with boiling water.” Which would require fire and a pot. There was definitely plenty of snow around to melt. Drew would save the rest of the heat packets for the other end of their hike to hold her over while he got a fire going. Hopefully they would be enough.
“Ready?” he asked.
“Rather dodge the bullets than wait for them.”
He liked that about her. Even as a young girl, she’d always been up for a challenge.
Drew surveyed the area again before he helped her out of the tunnel. Their path was clear and the snow fell steadily, no worse than before.
This was luck, and he would take all he could get. He shoveled debris against the hole to conceal their exit, trusting the snow to finish up the job. Using his belt, he created a leash of sorts to connect them, and then retrieved the branch he had used to cover his tracks.
He had to keep a close eye on his compass. This forbidding gorge wasn’t on the radar for people making their way through the mountains since it led to one of the highest peaks in the region. Not even sports enthusiasts appreciated this gorge, which was nearly impossible to descend without rappelling gear, and the narrow width made it hardly worth the effort. But there was shelter there, and a safe place to hide Mirie.
Drew had found it for exactly that reason. He had been trained by the man who had held the post of close-protection guard for two Ninselan kings. The man had been old, but he had taught Drew that the most important rule for protecting royals, was to know all the good hiding places.
Oskar would be rolling over in his grave right now because Drew hadn’t known about the altar. Or maybe Oskar was getting a good laugh, since he had probably been the one who had told Geta about the hideaway in the first place.
His former mentor had once delighted in sending Drew out to find the cleverest hiding places he could come up with. Then Oskar would shoot holes in every one.
He had liked the cave in the gorge, though.
He had shot holes in it, of course—too far away, too tough to access, not enough natural resources—but had also conceded that it would be a damned good hiding place if one could get to it.
Drew watched Mirie for outward signs of exhaustion. She trudged along with her head bowed against the weather, the weather cloak snapping around her as the winds picked up.
Their luck had held until now, but Drew finally abandoned the effort to cover their trail. Instead he motioned Mirie to grab the other side of the branch. Together they lifted it high enough to create a sort of windshield to block the falling snow and give him some visibility.
He couldn’t miss the outcroppings that would signal the entrance of the gorge. They were close. He could sense it even though he hadn’t been in these mountains in six years. And when they finally came upon it, Drew very nearly stumbled in. The snow concealed the sharp slope, and he took a step into nothingness. His feet shot out from underneath him and the branch went flying, jerked from Mirie’s grip. She gasped his name, and he would have dragged her over with him, if not for the tree limbs he managed to catch himself on.
“Grab the branches,” he shouted. “We have to climb down.”
Unfortunately, climbing down also meant dislodging snow. The snow seeped into the hood of his poncho like frigid fingers of ice. And they had to keep climbing until he could locate the cave ledge, which ran a good seven meters along the ridge. He had a strong sense of how far down it was, and when he caught the edge of it with his boots, he was relieved to discover that they had come down practically in the middle.
“Step down, but don’t let go of those branches,” he instructed Mirie.
She clung to the boughs until he cleared the cave access, digging and kicking through hard-packed snow. When he could finally scramble inside, he used a laser for a cursory check of the interior, relieved to find the cave was empty and dry.
“Come on.” He helped Mirie disentangle herself from the branches and crawl safely across the ledge.
The access was low, and he crawled in behind her, paying attention to her movements, looking for signs of exposure.
She seemed to be moving normally as she sank back on her haunches and asked, “How on earth did you find this place?”
“Dumb luck.” Drew directed the light so he could see her face. “Everything wet has to come off right now.”
She nodded, her skin translucent, her lips pale. She was freezing. He reached for her hand, tugged off first one glove then the other before digging through his pockets for the last of the heat packets.
“Wet clothes off first. Then activate these. They’ll help until I get a fire going.” He searched her gaze. “Understand?”
“Yes.”
Drew headed outside to search for spruce branches his boot knife could handle. Mirie had called him prepared, but he wasn’t. He carried basic survival items necessary in these mountains and a few extras—training from growing up on a lot of acreage with several generations of Canadys.
“Drew boy, you never know what to expect. Life’s always throwing surprises at you, so be prepared,” his great-grandfather had told him back in his other life.
That early training had come in handy in the Marines Special Forces and as an agent stationed in a mountainous region, and Drew didn’t take long to shave the branches into kindling he could light with the fire striker he kept on his key ring. The sap from the spruce would burn despite the wet wood.
He returned to find Mirie sitting with her back against the wall. She had removed only her hat and cloak and was fumbling with her boots. Even in the dark, he could see that her pants were wet all the way to midthigh. Her eyes were heavy-lidded, her efforts sluggish. Her body temperature was dropping, and he had to get this fire going fast.
“Get those clothes off,” he barked more harshly than he’d intended. “Unless you want my help.”
She growled impatiently in reply and tugged off a boot with what appeared to be monumental effort.
Drew set down the kindling, ditched his outerwear and fished out the remaining weather cloak.
“Wrap this around you. I’ll have the fire going soon.”
They were deep enough into the gorge that the smoke should dissipate before reaching the top of the ridge. The storm should be grounding any aircraft. Even that transport copter. He was risking a fire regardless. If he didn’t get Mirie thawed out, he wouldn’t have a princess to keep safe until the NRPG came after them.
The fire took some coaxing, repeated efforts with wet branches that would only burn because of the sap.
“You doing okay?” he asked, prompting Mirie while he willed the flames to ignite. They needed heat and light fast.
Only when he had coaxed a small blaze to steady life did he dare turn his attention away. “Come on. Get warm.”
“Okay,” Mirie said, but made no move to get up. So Drew went to her and found her fists still wrapped around the heat packets. Her boots were off, but she hadn’t even removed the cloak from the packaging.
“Let me help.” He made quick work of the poncho, then began the exquisite torture of helping her undress.
“I can do it.” She resisted as he peeled a sock away.
“I know,” he said mildly, massaging her slim foot between his fire-warmed hands, feeling the smooth skin, watching her reaction. “But humor me. How does that feel? Any pain?”
She shook her head, but he didn’t believe her and shifted to view her foot in the firelight. Her skin was red and icy.
“We can handle frostnip, Your Royal Highness. Let’s get these wet pants off. Trust me, you’ll feel better.”
She struggled to keep her eyes open, and made a few fumbling efforts to unfasten her waistband.
Drew couldn’t wait. He moved in to help, and she didn’t resist this time, which told him everything he needed to know about her condition. He unfastened the hook, then worked the pants over her hips, dragging her thermals along for the ride. She made several halfhearted attempts to assist by lifting her hips, but Drew barely noticed. Not when his fingers brushed her sleek skin as he peeled away the fabric, revealing a barely there thong and never-ending pale legs.
His breath galvanized in his chest at the sight of her nearly naked from the waist down, and ended that particular torture fast by draping the cloak over her middle.
With a hand behind her shoulder, he urged her to lean forward. “The coat now.”
“Okay, okay.” She swatted at his hands.
Her impatience should have been a good sign, but he knew Mirie. She would have to be unconscious to accept help without resistance. And sure enough, she leaned forward and practically melted into his arms, boneless. Suddenly, he was overwhelmed by her, the feel of her body against him, the scent of her with his every sharp breath, the awareness of her bare legs so pale in the firelight.
Only knowledge of her weakness helped him focus on survival right now. Her collar was as wet as his own, so he tortured himself by dragging the shirt over her head, exposing the swell of her breasts and the sleek terrain of bare skin, her hair falling around her shoulders.
“Come on. Let’s get you closer to the fire. You’ll warm up. I promise.”
She only nodded, her teeth chattering audibly, so he sat back on his haunches and lifted her against him. Dragging the cloak around her, he carried her to the fire. She curled up in the warm glow, and he watched her, unsure how much of her sleepiness was exposure or shock.
He made quick work of his own wet clothes. Everything had to go. Thermals. Shirt. Pants. The lining of his coat was in fairly decent shape, so he kept that on. Mirie might not care now, but she would come back to life when she warmed up. He didn’t want their relationship to get weird. He counted on the professionalism between them. A lot.
After setting up a blockade of stripped branches at the cave’s entrance, he was content that they would be alerted to any disturbance. Then he went back to the fire.
Mirie was still curled in a pathetic ball, her teeth rattling louder than the crackling fire.
No, he hadn’t been adequately prepared, no matter what she thought. Not when all he had to protect her was a poncho and a small fire and himself. Not when all he could do was sit down beside her and say, “Let me in.”
He pulled her into his arms and curled his body around hers. She sighed, nestling against the meager warmth he offered, resting her head against his shoulder, burying her face in his throat. He dragged the cloak around them, tucked her fingers into his armpits and willed himself with every fiber of his considerable self-control not to react to the feel of this near-naked woman in his arms. No other woman would test him this way, only this woman. But he would not react.
Even if it killed him.
And with the feel of her soft curves against him, the scent of her hair filtering through him with every breath he took, Drew thought it probably would.
They had come to Alba Luncă for a funeral.
* * *
SUFFOCATING DARKNESS, THE KIND with the blackest shadows, was where fear liked to hide.
The soft voice that sang such sweet songs, the voice that brought love to life during those scary, drowsy moments before sleep, was suddenly ragged and hysterical, almost unrecognizable through the fear.
Even in Mirie’s worst nightmares, all the terrors Stefan and Petre said hid in the shadowy places under her bed had never hinted at this sort of fear that made her want to bury her head beneath the blankets and never come out. Not ever.
This was fear like she had never imagined.
How could she have? Her life was filled with laughter. The soft voice of her mama tinkled with laughter and scattered worries like the courtyard fountain splashed water on the tiles.
She had never, ever heard anyone scream with such fear.
That fear paralyzed Mirie, made her eyes squeeze shut and her hands shake. Choked her. No, that was Nanny, smothering her with knotted old fingers and a bony chest. Nanny’s hissing voice shushed Mirie in the darkness, demanded silence, but Mirie was sure she would never make a sound again, not with Mama’s hysterical pleas in her ears. Desperate, agonized screams.
“Not my babies. Not my babies.”
Tat-tat-tat-tat-tat.
Then silence.
* * *
MIRIE AWOKE. FOR A stunning moment, all she could see was red. Red so violently bright, swelling and dripping, as if the world had erupted in a geyser of blood.
With the breath locked tight in her chest, reality receded, and no matter how hard she tried to grasp it, there was distance between the scene before her eyes and the awareness in her head. She could only feel the rapid-fire thudding of her heart, ready to erupt in another geyser of blood.
Tat-tat-tat-tat-tat.
Her heart throbbed so hard it hurt, trapped with the breath in her chest, a weight crushing everything inside her, pressure so great she would die because she couldn’t breathe.
But there was no death here. No!
One word finally penetrated her awareness, and the vision faded, bleaching the memory to dusty shades of gunmetal and smoke. The way she felt inside.
There was no impending eruption, just the pounding of blood in her ears.
And a long-ago nightmare.
Mirie drew a shuddering breath that dispelled the pressure the tiniest bit. She remembered.
Bunică. Men with guns. The dead priest.
And Drei. She felt his strong body tight around her, his arms holding her securely, the cloying warmth of heat and skin.
The pounding of another heartbeat beneath her cheek. Only his heart beat solid and steady, as if wanting to set the example for her own, reminding her not to panic.
But calm seemed beyond grasp, even though she was so much warmer now. There was no gunfire in the crackling quiet. Nothing to fear in Drei’s arms.
His face rested on the top of her head, so heavy her neck arched beneath the weight. Given the pace of his breathing, she thought he might be dozing.
She would do nothing to disturb him or this moment. Not until she had regained control of herself. The nightmares were no stranger. But she had not had one in a long time. She shouldn’t be surprised to have one now, back in this place of so many memories. A place where she had once had a life.
A life Mirie had once dreamed of, simple, intimate, but filled with so much love.
She should feel something for the loss, shouldn’t she?
She was wrapped nearly naked in a man’s arms. Such an occurrence hadn’t happened since her high-school boyfriend. She remembered the strong warmth of a man’s arms, the intimacy of skin against skin.
Shouldn’t she feel something?
Gratitude. Embarrassment. Awkwardness. Something.
Nothing.
A twig snapped, sending sparks raining over the flames, a swelling of light that made the surrounding darkness darker. Two people in a cave buried beneath a mountain of snow. They could be the only two people alive in the world. They could die here and who would find them before they withered to ash and bone?
Thanks to the media, many would notice her passing, but none would really care. Mirie didn’t even know if Drei would be missed. She had seen no evidence of a life in all these years they’d been together. She was his work, and his life it seemed.
Her heartbeat wouldn’t slow down. Her thoughts raced with what-might-have-beens and what-could-never-bes. Mirie had no patience for self-indulgence. Maybe the adrenaline that had fueled the nightmare had sparked this overwhelming loneliness, or maybe it was simply because Drei held her in his arms.
A man and woman mimicking intimacy.
She willed herself to calm down, but couldn’t grasp the edges of this panic. She was a woman who could lie in a man’s arms, surrounded in the warm cocoon of his hard body, smooth and settled with years of muscle, so unlike the boy in her memory. She remembered.
Drei held her like a man comfortable with a woman in his arms. Not too eager. Not overly impressed. Just easy.
But she only felt alone.
She didn’t want to be this woman, to pass from her life as Bunică had, only with many more years ahead, trudging through day after day, enduring, existing, knowing only duty, and obligation, and emptiness, feeling dead inside.
Until death claimed her for real.
Tat-tat-tat-tat-tat.
The fire sputtered, and Mirie stiffened at the sound. Drei exhaled heavily, a man who didn’t want to be disturbed, but who was attuned to her slightest motion, even in sleep.
Definitely asleep.
His breath fluttered against her ear, a slight burst of warmth she may not have noticed except for the way it caressed such sensitive skin. A velvet touch that reached down deep inside and drew the faintest reply.
A tingle low in her belly.
An echo of something she had forgotten.
She leaned into Drei, not wanting to disturb him yet desperate to know if the sensation was real or her imagination.
That one tiny feeling accomplished what she hadn’t been able to do on her own. Her breathing finally slowed, her pulse stilled, as if every fiber of her focused.
Drei’s breaths came soft and even, as solid as the man himself. But she felt nothing, heard only the crackling fire. Mirie held her breath and leaned in a bit more....
There it was again. A tingle that made her insides hum, a fragile tremor as if someplace deep inside her yawned, shrugging off a long sleep.
More like a coma, actually, but not death.
Not death.
CHAPTER FOUR
DREW WASN’T SURE what awoke him, but he damned sure shouldn’t have been sleeping. The struggle to control his physical reaction to the feel of Mirie pressed against him had worn him out more than battling the snow.
He had wanted to stop time with the feel of her in his arms. But something was off with her. He sensed it, knew it was probably what had awoken him. He didn’t think she was asleep. Her body was too tense, too aware.
Scanning the shadows for any sign of a threat, he found the cave as he had left it, trusted his years of training to alert him to an intrusion. The fire was holding up, so he hadn’t been out for long.
Shifting against the wall, he glanced down at her, dark lashes forming half circles on her pale cheeks, her mouth parted around shallow breaths.
“Are you all right?” he asked automatically.
His voice intruded on the quiet, but her only reply was to nod. She surprised him by sliding her arms around his chest. Repositioning herself, she relaxed a little, but her breath hitched in her throat, an unexpected sound.
Frowning into her hair, Drew resisted the need to interrogate her. She was warm, so any threat of hypothermia was gone. She’d had a tough day, but she would deal with her losses, wouldn’t let him see her fear. That much he knew. If hanging on to him made her feel better right now, then he would find some way to cope.
Not by sleeping.
No, he had to remain stone-cold sober to this assault on his senses. The heat melded their skin together. Her hair tickled his nose with every breath. Her sleek curves unfolded against him so he could feel the length of her soft thighs, the way she fitted into the curve of his body.
She exhaled a sigh, and her mouth shuddered against his skin, soft and yielding. His pulse began to race, rebelling wildly against his best intentions. And they were the very best. Just useless against the feel of her in his arms. A familiar burning started inside, a reaction that was going toe to toe with his discipline.
Drew was having a tough day, too.
He would take armed assassins over facing down this humiliating lack of self-control.
Mirie had no idea she was playing with fire—and not the blaze making this icy cavern habitable, either. And he didn’t want to deal with the consequences of her realizing just how fragile his restraint was around her. He couldn’t afford any change that might jeopardize their relationship. He was her close-protection guard and a U.S. sleeper operative.
Not a man.
So with his jaw clenched tight, he forced himself to focus on making out the cave entrance beyond the firelight, the gray light from the storm beyond. He deliberated how to fashion a makeshift pan to melt snow. They would need water soon, and frozen snow was no option to quench thirst.
But how could he concentrate on anything but the way her breasts molded to his chest, the swelling softness pressed full against him? The skimpy fabric of her bra was no protection.
When she stretched against him, his pulse galvanized. He wanted to thrust off the cloak binding them together. Heightened awareness was making him read so much more into the moment than was possible.
Lust was making him lose his mind. And this was an argument not to ignore his needs the way he too often did. He was a man in the intimate employ of a woman he wanted but couldn’t have. Of course normal relationships were out even if he had wanted one—that was not the life he had chosen—but he never lacked for companionship when he was off duty, taking the occasional leave. They didn’t happen often, but he always tried to make the most of them when they did.
But if he had seen to his own needs, he might be able to resist Mirie now. She sought warmth and comfort, lying here in the arms of someone she should be able to trust, an entirely natural response to their situation. And he should be worthy of her trust. He should shut down reactions that were inappropriate at best, forbidden at worst.
Torture either way.
But Drew’s best intentions meant nothing when Mirie nestled still closer, nestled her face in the hollow of his throat. Not an accidental action, but an intentional one, an inquisitive one that ignited fire in its wake.
One purposeful touch, and the whole world shifted.
The boundaries that had long established their relationship dissolved as she leaned into him, a slight arch of her back that pressed her breasts against his chest and brought her mouth in line with the sensitive skin beneath his ear.
Her breaths came soft and warm against his skin, smooth, silken sighs. Had she noticed the way his every muscle had fossilized? Did she suspect that one touch would shatter his willpower into a million brittle pieces and litter this cave with his best intentions?
Drew didn’t know. He only knew his arms ached with the effort of holding her already. He couldn’t push her away or pull her close, because in this moment he was paralyzed by her vulnerability.
And his need.
* * *
HE TASTED MALE. Mirie wasn’t sure why she was so sure what male tasted like, since she had only tasted one man, and the actual details of long-ago teenage rendezvous had faded in the haze of years. Drei’s skin was the texture of rough velvet, faintly stubbled and redolent with a hint of sweat.
She was so aware of him, of the way his body surrounded hers, generously shared his heat. His strength beckoned her to stretch out against him, melt over the ridges and hollows of his hard muscles. She liked the solidness of him.
He was a man, not a boy.
Loneliness faded beneath this. She felt no embarrassment to be nearly naked in his arms, only awareness of him in a way she had never been before.
The feeling made perfect sense.
Drei felt right because he was right. The only person she could trust.
She had never thought of him as anything but her shadow. He was a fact of life that she had long ago accepted. He was always there and always had been.
She had never considered him as a man.
She’d been a child when he’d shown up. But that had been so long ago. A lifetime. Right now he was a man, and quite a handsome one with his gemstone eyes and chiseled strength. And not so old, either. What had once seemed ancient to a girl was nothing to the woman. Ten years. A decade on the rosary or all of God’s commandments.
How had she missed this? She had looked at him for years, but had never actually seen him until this very moment.
Arching her body lightly, just enough for her thigh to settle a little deeper between his, she tested the feel of her skin against the textured hardness of his, half-afraid he would stop her and demand to know what she was about.
But even worry left her feeling more alive than she had in so long. As the seconds passed, emptiness yielded to daring. It was easy to be bold in this moment. They might be dragged from this cave and shot, their bodies tossed into the gorge. They might slip into a calm death from exposure, locked together forever because the spring thaw never touched these peaks.
This man may yet give his life for her.
Perhaps they would survive, and the general and his men would collect them. They would remind her unnecessarily that the risks she took involved others by default. They would return her to the royal compound, and life would go on, never-ending commitments that blurred days into loneliness. Her whole existence strung along by tiny triumphs after hard-won accomplishments that were never good enough.
One step forward. Two back. Ninety-nine to go.
Once inside her glittering shell, she would return to looking at Drei but never really seeing him.
How could she not have seen him?
He lay so still around her, he might have been carved from marble.... No, nothing as refined. Stone, she decided. Craggy and rugged and enduring like these mountains.
And she couldn’t stop touching him. That faint vibration she felt inside urged her to greater boldness, to see if a fire could be stoked from a single flame.
She nestled her face in the valley between his neck and shoulder, inhaled the scent that made him him. She liked the whimsical thought and shifted again. Just enough so her breasts lifted from his chest, a slight motion that grazed sensitive tips against wiry chest hairs.
The heat low in her belly flared as Drei’s hands locked hard around her waist. Mirie gasped, a sound that startled the quiet as she was hoisted off his lap as easily as he might have removed a pet.
“Your Royal Highness.” He used her title as her name, his tone a warning that she had crossed a line. He forcibly scooted backward as if she had become an ember that burned him.
Mirie stared at him across the blaze-soaked distance. She found the bright green of his eyes indistinguishable by firelight, found herself pierced by the reproach in his expression. And something else...
“What do you fear from me, Drei?” she asked, surprised.
“What are you doing?” A demand.
“I was...testing.”
He arched a quizzical eyebrow. “Testing what? I’m still breathing, Your Royal Highness.”
His indignation made her bristle. Or maybe it was the title that did. She had a name. He knew it.
Was it so wrong to want to be a woman? For one stolen moment, she wanted to think of nothing but what it felt like to feel again, to respond and to care. She already responded as a woman because she felt hurt by his withdrawal.
He dropped back into a crouch, a defensive stance, as though she were Eve with the apple. The muscles in his thighs bulged with the motion, drew her attention to the way he moved, so easy with his nakedness.
How had she never truly seen this man in all these years they had been together? She must have been blind.
The firelight cast his body in gold, his long legs, his narrow hips, the vee of his waist that spread into that chest that had provided shelter against the storm raging outside.
The storm raging inside.
Reason told her to retreat, but Mirie couldn’t stop. Not when retreat meant the spark inside would smolder to ash.
“You protect me.” Her voice wavered. She could be so weak.
Placing her hands over her heart, she stood her ground. “Protect me from this loneliness. Right here. Pretend I am only a woman who wants a man.”
“You’re a princess.”
His retort stung. Always the voice of reason.
“I’m a woman, too.”
And she could not lose this feeling that made her feel alive. To be like Bunică. Her family. Mirie did not want to live her life as one ready for the grave.
She feared that fate worse than men with guns.
“Please.” The word broke, not a demand but a plea.
Drei’s expression was unreadable, but his gaze pierced her as if he’d plunged a hand through her heart. She resisted the urge to shrink before him with her selfish demands.
Then she noticed his hands. They were balled into fists at his sides, tense-knuckled and desperate almost. Not because he didn’t want her, she realized.
Because he did?
There was much about this man she didn’t understand, had never taken the time to learn. But Mirie recognized the chiseled angle of his jaw, as though he ground his teeth to meal inside his mouth.
And foolish, foolish woman she was, so naive and self-absorbed, she had ignored the most obvious sign of all. Running her gaze down the muscled terrain of his body... Her breath hitched at the sight of him in his arousal, concealed by his stance, but such proof of his want.
He was a professional, and an honorable man.
But she had no such honor and simply couldn’t bring herself to stop.
Swaying toward him, Mirie felt her motion as though her body had turned to liquid, warmed by the flames. Not of the crackling fire, but the fire Drei had created inside her. Reaching out, she ran her fingers lightly along his thighs, savored the shock that visibly rocked him on contact.
“Drei, please.” Another plea.
His growl ripped through the quiet, a sound of the purest frustration. But Mirie knew, even as his arms shot around her with whipcord strength, that he couldn’t deny her.
He sprang up with the physicality of a man well-trained, and pulled her to her knees along with him. One swift move brought her into hard contact with his body.
She gasped as he locked her against him, arm a vise around her waist that anchored her close until suddenly all she could see was him. His broad shoulders blocked out the firelight. She could feel every ridge and hollow of his chest, the hot arousal that branded her belly, the steely thighs that braced her upright.
She had no chance to react before he speared a hand into her hair, coaxed her head back to tilt her face to his.
And his mouth came down on hers.
Time stopped. Her heartbeat simply paused. Somewhere inside she recognized how she had provoked him, but his kiss tasted of a need that shocked her, a hungry man.
Mirie couldn’t think past her surprise, not when his need became hers, catching her in an upsurge the way the fire sucked in the surrounding air.
She sighed against his mouth, her lips yielding eagerly. Their tongues tangled in discovery. And she was so grateful she had pushed, so glad he had given in.
Winding her arms around him, she ran her hands down his back, thrilled when he trembled beneath her touch. He was no longer Drei, but a strong, handsome man making her body hum with his kisses. Yet he was still Drei, a man who had always been there, a man she could trust with her needs.
Mirie felt comfortable with him, able to abandon herself to this haze of sensation that stole her breath, made her bold and eager and heedless of the consequences.
But not so her protector.
“You better be sure about this, Your Royal Highness,” he whispered against her lips. “There’s no turning back.”
She could practically feel the battle raging inside him, the tension in the body against her, even though his words might let her go.
Gently nibbling his upper lip, she teased his skin into her mouth, determined to win him to her side. He should forget who he was because she was no longer Mirie. She would shed the limitations of rank and duty to become a nameless woman who savored the moment with no inhibitions. A woman able to forget everything that normally dictated her life.
For one stolen moment, she would be only a woman.
“I have never been more sure,” she admitted. “Let this moment be ours, Drei. Just this one.”
He didn’t believe her. She could see doubt all over his face. Maybe she was a fool to believe her own words. Or naive.
But Mirie didn’t care because she felt.
Drei coaxed her head back to expose her throat. Deliberation carved stern lines in his handsome face as he considered her as if she were some tempting morsel he wasn’t sure whether to resist or devour.
Her chest rose and fell on a sharp breath, the anticipation making her body vibrate.
Had she ever felt so alive?
Her answer came when Drei nibbled his way along her jaw, lingered in that valley below her ear with his warm breath and teasing tongue, such an unexpectedly sensitive place.
Never.
His mouth traveled freely, as though he had waited forever for the privilege to explore and was determined to savor every inch of her. Fire filtered down into her very deepest places until an ache throbbed low in her belly, and she gasped when he flipped down her bra with a quick move that sent her breasts tumbling out as a feast for his devouring.
And he devoured with exquisite tenderness. His stubbled cheeks teased her skin. His tongue tested a peak that tightened eagerly. His strong hands lifted her breast so he could draw the tip into his mouth with a soft pull.
Mirie gasped and her whole being trembled with a prayer that he would not stop.
He didn’t.
Acquainting himself with her responses, Drei coaxed the fire inside her to feverish life. Until her body grew molten and she clung to him.
But he held her securely, raking his firm grip down her ribs as he lifted his head to catch her mouth with his again. Her excitement spiraled in response to his need when he ground his hips greedily against her, a dare to frighten her off, maybe, or an invitation to accept the challenge.
Mirie touched him with an urgency she had never known before. She dragged her palms down his back, over the tight curve of his bottom as she pressed him close, determined to explore every inch. She rode the length of his arousal and caught the sound of his excitement with her kiss, trembled against him as his hard body shuddered with need.
She wanted to make him feel the way she did, but he was the one in control. She found herself suddenly on her back, tangled in the weather cloak, as he maneuvered between her legs. Not to make love to her with his body, but to pleasure her with his mouth.
And she could only glance up at this familiar stranger and tremble in anticipation, for he touched her in ways so intimate that she grew dazed with desire, and could only reach out and hang on to his strong shoulders, as her thighs trembled and silken moans slid from her lips unbidden.
And only when her body pulsed and she was wet with her own pleasure did Drei cease his tender assault. He pulled her into his arms and forced her legs wide so she could straddle his lap, leaving her mouth poised perfectly to kiss him.
She did.
Mirie tasted her pleasure on his mouth, the strength of his hunger, the need that stunned her with its intensity. How could he be invisible to her one moment, then in an instant, the world revolved around their kiss, as if she would die right there if he stopped touching her?
When Drei joined her with an upward thrust, his growl was a desperate sound that reverberated through the cave, through her, and Mirie understood that while she had made love before, she had never made love with a man.
And there was a vast world of difference.
* * *
THE FIRE HAD burned dangerously low. Drew needed to get up and add more kindling before he wound up back outside stripping sappy branches. A part of him was relieved for the task. He was tempted to sit here forever, his back propped against a frigid stone wall, his butt numb from the frigid stone floor.
Life should stop right now, so he could die a happy man. He didn’t know what had just happened between him and Mirie, but he sure as hell knew it wasn’t smart.
He had a mission, and so did she. Two different missions to two different countries. Hers by blood; his by oath. This, whatever this was, would only complicate their work.
He could control his imagination. He could distract himself with other women. He could even feel noble about sacrificing his life to protect Mirie’s journey from childhood to royal duty. He had always told himself the fantasy would be better than the reality anyway, that he’d had the better part.
But he no longer had that excuse.
Reality was far beyond the fantasy. There had been no way he could have known how he would feel inside her, with her body melting around him, pulsing with pleasure as if her mouth had been formed to fit only his. As if her every curve had been formed to align just perfectly with him. As if her sighs had been tuned to his exact frequency.
As if inside her was the only place he should be.
He had never known that feeling before. Discontent had sent him fleeing family and home when he had been younger. It was what had kept him chasing thrills with Special Forces, what had allowed him to dismiss his identity for a mission as a sleeper agent.
He had never known right.
Until Mirie.
“Drei?” Even her voice was an assault on his senses, a sultry tone that caressed the quiet like mist.
“Mmm-hmm.” He wasn’t up to coherent responses yet, not with his blood still slugging through his veins like lava and his thoughts racing with what he had known all along.
Giving in to this was not smart.
“How do you do it?” She let her head roll back against his shoulder, so she could peer up.
“Define it.” Good. He’d shoved two words out. Of course his voice sounded like gravel over broken glass.
“Live in the shadows. Live a half life.” She exhaled another breathy sigh that had such power over him. “I don’t know what else to call it.”
He was so not up to philosophical questions right now. Not when the simple feel of her hair trailing down his arm felt monumental, as if their sex had only scratched the surface of years of lusting and when he recovered he was going to be a whole lot hungrier than before.
He dragged his gaze to hers, buying himself time because he couldn’t wrap his brain around anything beyond the arms she draped tightly around him, as though he were her anchor.
“Half life?” Two more words and an inflection that made them a question. He was making progress.
Her lips tucked at the corners as she considered him, looking thoughtful. He could see the sprinkling of freckles across her nose and cheeks even in this light. Those freckles were the bane of her existence. Once she hadn’t noticed them, but with the constant media attention now, she spent time in front of the mirror trying to conceal, blend or beat those freckles into submission.
She would be mortified he’d noticed.
He thought freckles suited her and hoped she never found a way to cover them. They were a reminder of the free-spirited girl she had once been, a girl who had danced through the meadows and splashed through streams.
The girl who had grown up to be a woman bold enough to make love to him.
“You guard me,” she finally said. “You live with me. Your schedule is my schedule. You don’t leave my life to go live your own. I don’t know anything about your upbringing or your family, and I can count on one hand how many times you have taken a vacation since Oskar died. That leaves you with a day off here and there and then only when I’m entertaining dignitaries in my glittering shell, with the royal guard and media smothering me.”
“Glittering shell?” He knew what she meant.
“The compound.” She waved a dismissive hand. “That doesn’t seem like much of a life to me. So, a half life.”
He nodded, considering.
She waited, and shivered.
“I need to deal with the fire.” He found the words to seize an opportunity for escape. Only the knowledge that they might freeze to death spurred him to get up off his ass and back to reality. There was another part of him that felt he would be okay with freezing to death as long as Mirie was in his arms.
But she complied and untangled her naked self and scooted back against the wall. Her skin gleamed pale in the failing firelight, and his crotch danced a little jig at the sight she made with her long legs stretched out before her, her hair threading around the swell of her lovely breasts.
Christ, he was in trouble here.
That thought was unavoidable as he used the last of the kindling. He’d be heading outside again soon. He should plunge himself into the snow while he was out there. He didn’t think even the blizzard would cool him off.
He coaxed more of the sappy kindling to life with the glowing embers, carefully stoking the fire back while he considered Mirie’s words.
And the stab of pride at her opinion of him.
He had a life even though she couldn’t see it. He served his country and carried out his mission objective. He had only sacrificed the normal life he had never been much interested in anyway, for a much more noble cause.
Like Mirie herself, although she had been born to her cause. But she didn’t see his life from his perspective, and she didn’t sound as if she was all that content with her own.
Loneliness was eating away at her bit by bit.
He wasn’t surprised.
“I guess from your perspective it doesn’t seem like much of a life.” Distance helped him get a grip.
“Sounds a lot like my life.” She finally pulled on the cloak to cover her exquisite nakedness.
He snorted while tucking a branch deep into the embers.
“What?” she asked.
“I thought the same thing.”
He hadn’t meant the admission as an invitation, but she took it as one. Suddenly, she was covering the small distance between them, kneeling before the growing fire, stretching out her hands to embrace the heat.
Drew only heaved an inward sigh. He wanted her to warm herself, wished her nearness didn’t test him and her discontent didn’t add to his defenselessness against her.
She saw only how he trailed after her around the clock, not living a life that would fit anyone’s description of normal. Because she didn’t live a normal life, either. She had once run through these mountains, flirting with the boys, giving her virginity to the one she had allowed to catch her.
Now she gave herself to the only man within her grasp to stave off the grief of her losses. What a waste.
“You’ve been working on a miracle,” he said, hoping to lend her perspective. And some encouragement, which she didn’t hear enough as far as Drew was concerned. “Once the government stabilizes and the economy shows some improvement, you’ll get back to a normal life again. Then, so will I.”
She faced him with a scowl. “By the time this political situation stabilizes, I’ll be ready for the grave like Bunică.”
“Your Royal Highness,” he chided.
To his surprise, she scooted toward him, coming up full against him and wrapping her arms around his waist. “Drei, call me by my name.”
Her breasts pressed against his back, and for a man who’d just spent himself in a big way, Drew’s body was on red alert again before he had a chance to suck in a breath.
He was in such trouble here. The very thought of her name on his lips collided with the memory of his body inside her, and he found himself clutching the stick hard enough that the damned thing broke. Wet wood. Go figure.
But it was the anchor he needed to resist turning around and grabbing her, pulling her against him and going for round two. There’d been no contact with the general. It was just the two of them, stranded here, alone.
She was upset. He got that. He also understood her isolation. He saw her life up close. He lived it. His own wasn’t much better except for the occasional furloughs. But unless they got back to normal between them, this “interlude” could only cost them. And cost big.
They were protector and the princess he’d been hired to protect. Period.
“Princess Mirela of Ninsele.”
“Drei.” She strung out his name on a long melodic syllable that reminded him of her earlier song.
Had it only been hours since the funeral?
The world had shifted since then.
“Mirela Selskala,” he tried again, earning only a huff of exasperation.
Then she surprised him by sinking backward, pulling him off balance and dragging him with her.
Suddenly they were tangled together in the weather cloak, too close to the fire, and Drew was forced to roll over and take her with him. She seized the advantage and twisted in his arms until she straddled him.
And Drew was already so far gone he didn’t resist. Couldn’t. Not when she lifted her mouth to his again in an unspoken demand and laughed that silken laughter that he never heard anymore, hadn’t realized how much he missed.
The last thing in the world Drew should do right now was give in. The absolute last. He’d do better to put the pistol in his mouth and pull the trigger.
But when she rocked her hips, swaying until she had his reawakening erection trapped between her smooth thighs, he could only ride out the motion and try to hide that she was about to shake loose any possibility of resistance.
But she already knew because she sighed softly and swayed erotically, opening herself to him, and he finally gave in. Arching his hips, he found her softness, and thrust home with her name spilling from his lips.
“Mirie.”
CHAPTER FIVE
MIRIE HAD ONLY wanted a moment, had asked for right now. By definition that meant their interlude in the cave wouldn’t last forever, yet when Drei tugged on the harness she wore and asked, “Ready?” she wanted to shake her head with an emphatic no.
A strange sense of panic took hold now that they were dressed again. She wasn’t ready to leave, wasn’t ready to face the aftermath of her choices.
And she wasn’t ready to end her time with Drei.
Not when she had felt more alive during these fantasy hours together than she had in a very long time.
“Yes,” she said. No!
He only nodded, so terribly distant.
She couldn’t read his mood. The handsome face that had been hungry with arousal and so alive with pleasure had solidified into an expression that should have been familiar.
In some ways it was. She recognized the features, but had never understood that the impassive facade was a mask. She had glimpsed the real him today.
The intimacy they shared made him a familiar stranger. The difference was striking enough to unsettle her. As she had dressed, she felt uncertain, as if somehow putting on clothes together had been more monumental than taking them off. Her nerves were playing games with her, making her thin-skinned after too many conflicting emotions, too many memories in a short span of time. The memories alone had always unsettled her.
But all was well now. Or should have been.
General Bogdanovich had made contact. The attackers had long since escaped, and when the storm eased up enough for travel, her close-protection unit had arrived to retrieve her. They were above on the ridge. They’d sent down dry clothing and gear so she could safely make the ascent.
Mirie should be relieved the threat was over, and grateful to be alive. But when she looked at Drei, securing his own harness with the hands that had just held her, pleasured her, she felt a pang of...something, and her breath hitched in her throat at the physical intensity of the sensation.
He glanced up. The hard lines of his face softened, and she could see past the mask. His eyes caressed her as if he might never see her again. She glimpsed longing, and regret.
For one instant, Mirie thought he would reach out and touch her. An acknowledgment of what had passed between them, the caring, the comfort, the contentment. But he didn’t. He said unnecessarily, “They’re waiting above.”
He didn’t bother extinguishing the fire. There wasn’t much life left in the flames anymore, just enough to light their way as they left this place of shelter and unexpected escape.
Nerves were definitely making her thin-skinned and moody. Emotion swelled in her chest as they stepped out onto the ledge.
The path was lit with emergency lanterns to mark their way, a path that ascended straight up from the ledge. From this vantage point, Mirie marveled that they had made the descent successfully at all. Surely she would never have made it had fear and a storm not driven them to desperation.
Drei braced her close as he secured her to the rappel lines, his expression shadowed by the artificial light, his motions perfunctory. Could he so easily forget the way they had found comfort together? It shouldn’t matter, but it did. She wasn’t sure what she had expected after breaching the boundaries of their relationship so completely. Maybe that was the problem. She had acted impulsively, and he had been forced to react to her. There had been no thought. She had felt, and hadn’t been willing to let that feeling go.
She considered this while clinging to the rappel line one-handed. The line lifted her off the ground, and she used her feet to maneuver the branches, twisting them out of her way to avoid the snow dislodged with each step.
The climb was steep even with assistance from above, but Mirie felt no weariness, only awareness of Drei a few feet behind her. He steadied her with an occasional hand on her bottom. He helped her shove aside branches to spare her the trouble when he could. He would have caught her had she fallen.
He protected her. That much was the same.
Then the climb was over. There were men handling the equipment on the ledge, their bodies harnessed around tree trunks to provide the leverage to work the lines. She could see them well before the general reached for her hands to drag her up the remaining distance.
And Mirie left behind her emotions in that snowy gorge, put her own mask back on. “Thank you, General. Gentlemen,” she said, as she gained her footing.
There were quiet greetings, but Mirie was left to the company of the general as the unit of armed men worked to bring up Drei safely.
General Bogdanovich was minister of security with the NRPG under his command. He draped a blanket around her shoulders, and Mirie quietly endured his inspection as she stared into the face dominated by a bushy mustache that overcompensated for a head of thinning brown hair.
“Thank God you’re all right,” he said.
She felt the same way about him. “What of the villagers? You said there were injuries. How serious?”
“Scrapes and falls in the rush to get to the village mostly. No casualties—yet. The priest is in critical condition. The poliţie transported him to the hospital.”
But he wasn’t dead yet. Mirie’s eyes fluttered shut, and she inclined her head. The nearest hospital was forty minutes away in the best of weather, and the storm had not yet spent itself.
God, please, please, please... “Will we be able to contain the fallout?”
“We can brief tomorrow, Your Royal Highness,” he said curtly. “The only thing that matters now is that you’re safe.”
Which told Mirie everything she needed to know.
She had brought this situation upon everyone.
She felt responsible for the consequences, for the potential consequences and for undermining the efforts of people who had worked so hard on behalf of the Ninselan people.
On her behalf.
And when Drei surfaced over the ledge, his gaze sought and found hers immediately, and she felt his glance along with the memory of him wrapped around her. Inside her.
Her longtime protector quickly took charge of her again. He forced her to drink, then eat a few bites of a protein bar while the soldiers dismantled the gear. After speaking privately with General Bogdanovich, Drei instructed her on their destination and settled her behind him on the snowmobile for the trek back to civilization.
But it wasn’t until their convoy had departed, as Mirie sat with her arms tight around Drei’s waist and cheek pressed to his back, wishing they could curl up and doze off together as they had earlier, that Mirie realized her right now might not be so simple after all. Not when the man she had looked past forever was no longer invisible.
* * *
“WELCOME BACK, Your Royal Highness.”
Mirie accepted the coffee cup from her private assistant. “Relieved to be back.”
That much was true.
She set the folder on the desk. The business she had missed since leaving for Alba Luncă could wait a little longer. She took a fortifying sip of the coffee and glanced at Drei. He stood inside the doorway, his usual post while inside her office. His black uniform helped a giant of a man blend into the woodwork no matter where they were.
He wasn’t blending this morning, which had everything to do with the fact that she knew what he looked like beneath the blazer, turtleneck and pants. Mirie took another hot swallow. The past twenty-four hours had taken a toll. Most especially on her senses.
“Why are you still hanging on to that newspaper?” she asked her assistant.
Helena Avadoni exhaled a sigh that said more than words ever could. A petite powerhouse of energy and organizational skill, she oversaw every detail of life from names of visiting dignitaries during events to spare panty hose if Mirie happened to snag her nylons on a chair leg.
“Are you ready?” Helena asked.
Mirie held out her hand and, bracing herself, scanned the bold headline that read:
Luca of Whitefish.
The headline was an obvious play on her own media nickname. “And so it begins.”
The story summed up the claim of a man named Luca Vadim, who had arrived in Ninsele from a town in the northwestern United States, asserting he was the product of an affair between a Ninselan envoy and the late king.
The article claimed Luca Vadim had heard reports of Mirie’s assassination and worried that if the throne was suddenly vacant, Ninsele might be plunged into another civil war. He’d come forward as a public service.
“A public service,” Mirie said aloud. “Really?”
Silence was her only reply. Both Helena and Drei knew the drill. This wasn’t the first time an imposter had come out of nowhere to claim a blood tie to the throne.
Mirie herself had set the precedent to inspire these copycats. After years in hiding, she’d resurfaced with enough political support to oust the dictator. But she’d been backed by royal supporters, and her first item of business had been proving her identity through DNA testing.
Drei opened the office door, and both the general and Georghe entered. Mirie left her desk to greet them.
“You haven’t slept.” She recognized the signs.
“Like anyone sleeps around here.” Georghe kissed her cheek.
Forcing a smile, she felt the weight of her choices even though Georghe was too kind to point out the obvious.
The chancellor of the Crown Cabinet was one of the most caring people Mirie had ever known. His inconspicuous competency was the reason he had survived the dictatorship when most civilian staffers had been executed or exiled.
The dictator had recognized Georghe’s function within the government and had believed he could control the mild-mannered man. Georghe had played the part, working behind the scenes to ease the peoples’ plight in so many ways and ultimately providing Mirie with the necessary support to overthrow the dictator once she had reached the age of majority.
“Come, come.” Georghe motioned to the chairs. “We have a lot to discuss and some decisions to make.”
Business as usual. “Pour yourselves some coffee, gentlemen.”
After visiting the sideboard, Georghe and the general sat in front of the desk.
“I’m not surprised by Vadim’s attempt to capitalize on the attack,” Mirie said. “But what’s this about an assassination? Who reported I was assassinated? I thought we didn’t announce that I would be attending the funeral as a safety precaution.”
“That was the problem,” Georghe explained. “Since we didn’t issue a press release, no legitimate media were invited. You can thank the paparazzi for the false reports. They camp at our gates, so they followed when you left the compound.”
“Not only were those idiots broadcasting the locations of our units, but they jeopardized everyone’s safety,” the general complained. “There were reporters and video cameras cornering villagers as they tried to get through the gate. I had to sacrifice a unit to get the situation under control.”
Wonderful. The consequences of leaving Briere just kept breeding, like mold. Mirie set the cup aside. It would take more than coffee to make her feel better this morning. “Losing that unit impeded your efforts, General?”
“We might have been able to bring in a few more of your attackers alive if I hadn’t needed to divide my forces.” He scowled blackly. “The paparazzi were a distraction, and we let them know that loud and clear.”
Georghe gave a disgusted snort. “So I’ve heard, thank you. My office was flooded with complaints about your infractions against free speech and the public’s right to know before you even picked up Her Royal Highness. Did you really have to instruct your men to destroy the van’s satellite equipment? We were faxed a bill for its replacement.”
“They’re lucky I didn’t take them into custody. I would have if I’d had the manpower. That won’t happen again. Since they can’t be trusted to use discretion during a crisis, they won’t be allowed near Her Royal Highness. I want to assign a unit to keep them away from our gates.”
Mirie wasn’t sure she understood the point of redirecting their limited manpower. “I don’t leave except to go to church.”
“Exactly. That’s your Sunday routine, and these vultures need repetition to get the point. We’ll create a perimeter around the church to keep the paparazzi at a distance. Georghe can write up one of his diplomatic letters informing these media outlets they’ve lost their privileges.”
Georghe exhaled a low whistle. “I like it. We’ll hold the paparazzi accountable, protect the public and let the legitimate press know we’re taking action so the paparazzi won’t stumble on breaking news again. A show of good faith.”
Helena scribbled some notes while the general raised his coffee cup in a mock salute.
“Now can we get to business?” Georghe asked. “I want to hear what we’ve learned about these attackers.”
The general glanced at Drei. “We believe the transport copter continued through the mountains out of Hungarian airspace. They may have grounded the aircraft. We don’t know. The Hungarians’ radar didn’t yield anything, but they did offer to review surveillance tapes from their military base and a private airstrip in the region.”
“Do you think they’ll find anything?” Mirie asked.
“The attackers would have to be idiots to go anywhere close to civilization. Drei thinks they headed to Ukraine, using the mountains as cover for their escape.”
For the same reasons he had used them to escape with her. Spotty satellite coverage. Terrain that limited radio frequency. Was it any wonder Ninsele couldn’t get a lock on her own borders?
The military had been dismantled and replaced with paid thugs during the authoritarian regime, so the general had been rebuilding their armed forces ever since Mirie’s return. Unfortunately, rebuilding cost money the treasury didn’t have at the moment.
“Do you think the attack was a protest of the upcoming talks?” Mirie had to ask.
“If so, no one has claimed responsibility,” Georghe said. “Not yet, anyway.”
“We do have several corpses, so we haven’t hit a dead end,” the general went on. “The medical examiner is working to identify them now. Hopefully they’ll provide some leads.”
Georghe glanced at Mirie, his expression neutral. He would never say, “I told you so,” but he wasn’t happy. He glanced at Drei, and then said, “I’m sure you’ll come up with something soon. Her Royal Highness is home safely, which is what matters most.”
Mirie sighed. “Let’s discuss damage control for my newest half sibling, shall we?”
Georghe briefed her on Vadim, an American attorney who claimed to have been born out of wedlock during the first years of her parents’ marriage.
“A first child,” she said. “We haven’t had one of those before. And an American. That’s new, too.”
No one replied. Dealing with these claims was always awkward. Her father couldn’t defend himself against the charges and no one wanted to offend Mirie by impugning his moral conduct.
She kept the lead. “Do we know when Vadim was born?”
Georghe shuffled through some paperwork. “I’ve got his entry papers. June 29, 1980.”
Mirie mentally calculated. “My mother would have been pregnant with Alexi.”
No response.
“Do we know yet if my father even visited America during―” more calculations “―October of ’79 or thereabouts?”
Georghe didn’t bother looking back at his papers. “His Majesty visited Washington, D.C., for several weeks the year the honorary consulate opened. The time frame works.”
“And the alleged mother. She was in our employ?”
“That checks, too. An envoy named Ileana Vadim. A Ninselan citizen. She put in her notice in late 1981, and I couldn’t find any documentation that she ever returned to Ninsele. I’ve got my staff trying to track her down now.”
She nodded. “So Luca Vadim has done his homework.”
Silence. Mirie didn’t really need a reply. Everyone around the table was likely thinking the same thing.
Jus sanguinis. Salic law.
She may be in charge right now. She may eventually give birth to a son who could grow up to be king, but she would never be queen. Primogeniture decreed that only males could rule.
She couldn’t change that law even if she had been so inclined. Until she could negotiate consensus on the government structure, such a move would be seen as self-serving and could potentially deepen the rift between the opposing factions that had only tentatively been bridged since the civil war.
“Vadim is an attorney,” she said. “His most likely move will be to take his claim to court and sue for the right to the throne as the only living male heir.”
“He’d have to establish paternity,” Georghe said.
“He won’t,” Mirie said firmly. “Not through legal means, anyway. But if he continues to use the media, he will cast doubt on my right to negotiate with the European Commission. Enough doubt, and he may give the representatives one more reason to delay the talks.”
The very last thing they needed was to make the process of hosting representatives from the European Commission more complex. Like the Western Balkans that endured years of civil war, Ninsele had to be stabilized before it could formally become an acceding country with the commission’s support.
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Jeanie London
His only duty is to defend herCovert agent Drew Canady has guarded Princess Mirie Selskla without once crossing the line between protector and lover. Keeping her safe, and his true identity under wraps, has never been a problem. Then an attack against Mirie sends her straight into his arms. Suddenly all those feelings he’s never acknowledged won’t go away.Drew knows she’s the last woman he should fall for. His focus must be on finding the enemy—even if that blows his cover and drives Mirie from his life for good. But as the stakes climb, maybe he’s underestimated the power of the attraction between them…
His only duty is to defend her
Covert agent Drew Canady has guarded Princess Mirie Selskla without once crossing the line between protector and lover. Keeping her safe, and his true identity under wraps, has never been a problem. Then an attack against Mirie sends her straight into his arms. Suddenly all those feelings he’s never acknowledged won’t go away.
Drew knows she’s the last woman he should fall for. His focus must be on finding the enemy—even if that blows his cover and drives Mirie from his life for good. But as the stakes climb, maybe he’s underestimated the power of the attraction between them….
Drew wasn’t sure what awoke him
He did know he shouldn’t have been sleeping. Not here in the cave. But the struggle to control his physical reaction to the feel of Mirie pressed against him had worn him out more than battling the snow.
He wanted to stop time with the feel of her in his arms. He glanced down at her, dark lashes forming half circles on her pale cheeks, her mouth parted around shallow breaths.
“Are you all right?” he asked automatically.
She surprised him by sliding her arms around his chest. The heat melded their skin together. Her hair tickled his nose with every breath. Her sleek curves unfolded against him so he could feel the length of her soft thighs, the way she fitted into the curve of his body.
His pulse began to race, rebelling wildly against his best intentions. And they were the very best. Just useless against the feel of her in his arms. A familiar burning started inside, a reaction that was going toe-to-toe with his discipline.
For the first time, he was losing sight of his job, rapidly forgetting that he had to protect her. Instead he was reacting like a man to a very beautiful woman.
Dear Reader,
I’m fascinated by the people who dedicate their lives to national security and defense. These caring people possess such courage of heart—whether they serve at home or abroad, in peace or adversity. The sheer fact they live their lives in such diverse settings and circumstances for the benefit of others speaks to the nobility of the human spirit.
That’s the idea that gave life to the Excelsior Agency.
I fell in love with this world of covert operations back in 2005, when I wrote In the Cold (Mills & Boon Signature Select Spotlight November 2005), and I am beyond thrilled to have the freedom to revisit Excelsior again in Her Last Protector. Mirie and Drew are people who understand the meaning of loyalty, each in their unique circumstances and in their own ways. While their goals may seem worlds apart (countries, actually!), together they learn that honor does not come without sacrifice, everything worthy is worth fighting for and love conquers all.
Ordinary people. Extraordinary romance.
Mills & Boon Superromance is the place to enjoy stories set in circumstances where love will endure. I hope you enjoy Mirie and Drew’s love story. Visit me at www.jeanielegendre.com (http://www.jeanielegendre.com).
Peace and blessings,
Jeanie London
Her Last Protector
Jeanie London
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Jeanie London writes romance because she believes in happily-ever-afters. Not the “love conquers all” kind, but the “we love each other, so we can conquer anything” kind. Jeanie is the winner of many prestigious writing awards, including multiple RT Book Reviews Reviewers’ Choice and National Readers’ Choice Awards. She lives in sunny Florida with her own romance-hero husband, their beautiful daughters and a menagerie of strays.
To everyone who defends this wonderful country I call home.
Your dedication reminds us all that we gain nothing through apathy. And your courage sets the standard. You are appreciated. May God bless you all.
Contents
Chapter One (#u7334eb18-0af3-5203-b3e5-be129c7dfe26)
Chapter Two (#u29afaaea-ead5-5aab-9a59-e662a75ed16d)
Chapter Three (#u0c16712b-3018-552e-a952-eb526e9445c5)
Chapter Four (#u646608df-523d-5453-83a0-1e6e14c6cd8f)
Chapter Five (#u39a0932b-62ee-5015-ab9b-a687923f38ff)
Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Twelve (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Thirteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fourteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Fifteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Sixteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Seventeen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Eighteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter Nineteen (#litres_trial_promo)
Excerpt (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER ONE
“DREI TIMKO,” a voice barked.
Drew responded to the name as if it were his own. In the ways that mattered, the name was his. The man once known as Drew Canady had become a ghost from another lifetime. A life so long gone, he had almost forgotten. Almost. Not quite.
Turning, he watched the grizzled old man muscle through the crowd, broad shoulders forging a path through the mourners, face split with a gap-toothed grin. The logger, a man named Vlas, had befriended Drew back when he had been a stranger among strangers in this mountain village of Alba Luncă.
“You guard the princess as closely as you once guarded a lighthearted girl.” Vlas clapped Drew on the back.
Drew glanced at the woman walking behind the casket cart—graceful and dressed head to toe in white, from the fur ushanka on her head to the hiking boots on her feet. She looked appropriately austere for a funeral, colorless but for the flushed cheeks and wisps of caramel-colored hair lifting on the wind, her expression as brittle as the weather.
“That’s what they pay me to do.” His breath clashed with the morning air in a frigid burst.
Princess Mirela of Ninsele hadn’t been that lighthearted girl for a very long time.
Not since the years before his princess had come out of hiding. One minute she had been the girl he’d been hired to protect, a girl who loved to run barefoot through the meadows in spring.
Now she was the ruler of this mountain kingdom, and a very desirable woman. When he looked at her, he didn’t see Princess Mirela, last royal of the House of Selskala. He saw past the woman who engaged the media with intelligence and grace, who handled foreign diplomats skillfully and didn’t retreat when facing revolutionaries and thugs who would bully her to sidestep justice. He didn’t see the woman the media had nicknamed “Mirie of Alba Luncă,” a princess who had long hidden among commoners.
Drew saw only the laughing woman he had devoted so many years to protecting.
The woman who rarely made an appearance anymore.
He didn’t share the thought with Vlas, who had once been a friend. Long ago, he and the old logger had stood around the bonfire in the square, sharing opinions and flasks of făţată. Now they trudged uphill in an early-morning funeral procession. Nearly a mile of icy dirt road. In minus-twelve degree weather. The people of Alba Luncă were Spartans.
At least Drew wasn’t carrying the casket or digging the grave in frozen earth. He had retreated far enough to assess the procession perimeter but still had his eyes on his target. He had been in lockstep with Mirie for more than fifteen years. “The princess seems pleased to be back,” Vlas said.
Drew wouldn’t go that far. Mirie was burying her nanny, the woman who had saved her life during a coup when the royal family was executed. Geta Bobescue had hidden the eight-year-old princess in this obscure village. With the help of a retired royal guard, she protected Mirie during the decade-long civil war and prepared her for the day the dictator was overthrown. That day had come six years ago. Mirie had been plucked from Alba Luncă and taken to the capital city of Briere to rule her kingdom.
She hadn’t been back since.
Geta’s funeral was a bittersweet reason to return. This visit also posed an unnecessary risk. But Mirie hadn’t considered the risk to herself enough reason to forsake the task of burying her nanny.
Fortunately this funeral procession wasn’t a fast-moving train. It wound through the village slowly, people adhering to the crowd like filings on a magnet with each shop they passed, each house and alley. This parade of mourners was intent, like Mirie, upon honoring its dead. And enjoying the charity meal that would come after the burial. That was tradition.
Drew scanned each newcomer and kept a watch on the rooftops, balconies and doorways, assessing potential threats. He needed to get a lock on everyone who ventured near Mirie.
The Ninsele Royal Protection Guard, known as the NRPG, was the branch of military charged with the princess’s protection. Right now guards were posted throughout the village, but once the procession moved beyond the gate, the terrain would be nearly impossible to secure. Drew would be the first line of defense. He was always the first line of defense.
“Her Royal Highness tried to return before Geta died, but it wasn’t possible,” he said. Not with all the preparations to host representatives from the European Commission, who would be arriving in Ninsele in a matter of weeks.
A historic first step that was attracting global attention.
“Geta was at peace. She called the priest and received absolution and the Eucharist. She didn’t expect the princess to return even for the funeral.” Vlas withdrew an envelope from his coat pocket. “This is why I chased you down. And this.” His face split into another grin as he pulled out a leather flask.
Drew accepted the envelope, which had been addressed in a shaky scrawl with the princess’s formal title. Slipping the envelope into the pocket inside his coat’s lining, he asked, “You want me to deliver this letter to Her Royal Highness?”
“Eventually. When you think she is strong enough to be reminded of the past and her losses. Deathbed request.” Vlas took a deep swig after uncorking the flask. “Geta worried about the girl. She told me you would know when best to pass along her words. Give the girl time to grieve.”
Drew scanned the crowd around Mirie again, ready to intervene at any sign of a threat. People were keeping their distance, which made his job easier.
The envelope was sealed. Geta would never burden Mirie without good reason. No one knew better how deeply the loss of her family had affected the young princess.
Drew wished he could allow the contents to remain private, but that wasn’t his choice. “Anything else I need to know?”
“Secrets, Drei? That girl was Geta’s only secret.” Vlas motioned to Drew with the flask. “Go on. It’ll warm you up. She’ll be safe. We protect her as we always have.”
The villagers had done that. In the past when the princess’s existence had been fodder for conspiracy theorists, the people of Alba Luncă had claimed her as their own. Of course they hadn’t known she was a princess. Back then she had simply been a military officer’s daughter orphaned in the coup. That explanation justified the privileges and protection Mirie had enjoyed growing up in a rural village—the additional tutors, the bodyguard.
No one had questioned the facts then, and no one remembered them now. Mirie belonged to Alba Luncă. Period. A princess had lived among commoners. She belonged to these people now even more than she had then. No wonder the paparazzi never left her alone. Mirie’s story had captured the imaginations of a world that wanted to believe in happy endings.
Drew was determined to make sure Mirie got hers.
“As much as I’d like to accept your hospitality, my friend, I’ll have to pass,” he said. “I’ll make sure she gets this letter at the best possible time.”
There would be no good time. Mirie was barely twenty-five years old. She had royal obligation to a country violently split in its regard for the monarchy. Her days were filled with duty as she worked with the Crown Council to win the support of the European Commission to become an acceding country into the European Union and provide Ninsele with a future.
Whether the people wanted that future or not.
Many didn’t, but in a life filled with enemies, the one foe that had gotten close was the one Drew couldn’t fight.
Time.
He glanced at Mirie again, her hand resting on the casket as if she didn’t want her nanny to be alone. Her head was bowed low beneath the fur ushanka, and Drew could tell she was fighting back tears. He wished she’d had the chance to come back and say goodbye one last time.
She might be surrounded by people every moment of every day. Ministers and military officers. People who served. People who clung. People who schemed. People who wanted her to succeed. People who wanted her dead.
But her last connection to family lay in that casket.
Drew understood why Geta had been worried. He also knew why she had wanted him to decide when to turn over the letter. She had faith in his ability to protect Mirie—from physical as well as emotional threats. Protecting Mirie was his job.
One of them, anyway.
But no one in Ninsele knew about his other job. Never once during all these years had Drew given anyone a reason to suspect he wasn’t exactly who he claimed to be.
Drei Timko, Romanian close-protection guard.
No one had any idea that he was actually Drew Canady, a sleeper operative for Excelsior, a United States national security agency.
* * *
“YOU WILL CAST down the branches to mark her passing. You who were loved by her as a granddaughter would be.”
Grateful for this honor, Mirie accepted an armful of fir branches from the village elder council that stood as ceremonial guard around the grave containing Bunică’s casket.
Grandmother.
Geta Bobescue may not have been blood related, but she had become many things to Mirie during their years together. Protector. Confidant. Mentor. Savior in so many ways. Bunică had helped Mirie make sense of the senseless tragedy that had upended her life and helped her find strength. It had been there as promised, buried deep inside. But above all, Bunică had been a last flicker of love when all other flames had sputtered out.
Now she was gone, too.
“Peace, my beloved Bunică,” Mirie whispered.
She tossed the branches. They scattered over the casket with the springy sound of living flora. But they were no longer alive. Cut from the tree of life, they would soon grow brittle and dry and wither to dust.
Such was life.
Kneeling, Mirie reached into the pit and broke away a clump of frozen dirt. She tossed a fistful into the grave.
“Godspeed, Bunică. Take our leave now and rest.”
You will be missed, she added silently as the priest reached for the hoe.
The church bell tolled, a hollow sound that echoed over snow-tipped trees covering mountain peaks in every direction. Mirie retreated as a group of young men came to fill the grave.
The tolling filtered through her as if she stood naked in the wind. She had learned restraint through the years, but she had also learned that the past was a ghost and the future beyond her grasp. Right now was all she had. If she could only endure this moment, she would find her strength again, even though her insides felt frail. As if the wind might sweep away all ability to feel and she would never know anything but weakness again.
And loneliness.
Bunică was free of this life. Bunică of the quick hugs and practical wisdom, who brooked no disobedience or rebellion, yet understood the need for kindness and confidence. Only Bunică’s belief in Mirie had helped her learn to believe in herself.
This simple, solid woman, who had been chosen by Mirie’s grandfather to rear her beloved Papa, had lived all the stories with her lost family. Bunică had witnessed the first steps and last breaths of two generations. Weddings and coronations. Life and laughter. Fear and murder. How many moments and memories had not yet been told, tiny minutes in the lives of Mirie’s family that were now being buried in this grave?
The church bell withered to silence. The priest gave a blessing, and the women gathered to sing the burial song. Mirie joined the circle and raised her voice in a melody that rained sorrow down the mountain.
The song might have been beautiful but for the sadness. And she remembered this feeling, heartache that wrung every ounce of her strength as if her insides were made of sponge.
But she couldn’t take Bunică from this mountain. Nor could she leave any part of herself here. She had already given away everything, kept only what she needed to survive.
When the song faded to silence, the feeling lingered, loss cast on the wind, across frosty trees, rebounding through her.
Mirie might never see this place again.
Alba Luncă had been home when she had needed one most. When she had been robbed of love and identity, she had found joy again running through the dirt streets of the village, through leaf-strewn forests, over sunlit meadows.
This place had become everything to her. Shelter. Safety. Solace. But hope most of all. Mirie had learned life would go on here, like it or not. Whether that life was joyous or miserable was a choice that was hers to make and hers alone.
She had clung to that knowledge during these past six years, knowing life in all its simplicity was exactly where she had left it—in the mountains with Bunică. The knowledge had given her strength during never-ending council sessions, consolation when the palace she had been born in felt like an alien planet. Alba Luncă had given her purpose. She worked for Ninsele, fought to preserve a way of life she believed in.
Stay in the present, she reminded herself. Just focus on this moment.
The mourners began to move and whisper. It was time to leave. Perhaps forever.
Inhaling deeply, Mirie memorized the taste of the sharp wind in her lungs, of spruce and snow, of hope when all had felt hopeless, of life that filled her with possibilities the way the wind whistled through trees and filled this valley.
There was a path nearby that led to a hidden grove with a spring and a waterfall, one of the many secret places of this harsh yet heavenly country. Secret from strangers, at any rate. Teenagers had long ago designated the place as a rendezvous point. Mirie had kissed her first boyfriend there after escaping from her bodyguard.
Of course she had been caught long before youthful exploration had much of a chance to heat up. She had never been able to lose her tail for long.
That thought only made her sigh.
The fresh earth over Bunică’s grave looked like a dirty scar marring the snowy ground, but even in death Bunică’s nearness made Mirie long for that simpler time. She could not tear herself away even though she could hear people retreating. Bunică was her connection to Alba Luncă, to her life of eventual peace after everyone she loved had been taken.
Mama, Papa, Alexi, Petre, Stefan...
There had been only Bunică. This tiny mountain village. And these people.
A slight touch on her arm brought her back to the moment.
Drei.
He was there as he always was. The man who had long ago replaced Bunică as Mirie’s protector, such a constant presence he had practically vanished. How could she notice her shadow or be surprised by the sight of her reflection in a mirror?
He was a blond bear of a man, hard from every angle—big body, chiseled expression, gemstone eyes. But his gaze was soft now as he watched her with eyes so startlingly green they seemed out of place on a granite face. He waited for her cue, an exchange that had become as natural as breathing to them.
She inclined her head, and he led her away.
They rounded the front of the church, following the procession that was fast losing its formation and reverent demeanor. People joined friends and family for the walk back to the village. They greeted each other. Someone laughed.
Mirie followed with Drei a step behind, feeling the wind sting, more bitter somehow as they left the churchyard. Once these people would have welcomed her easily among them. The women would have ordered her to refill buckets from the well and the men would have asked her to fetch glasses of ţuică. Now they had receded from her as silently as snow in the spring.
She was no longer the girl they had known. More important, she no longer felt like that girl. And that knowledge made her mood grow as leaden as the clouds that promised snow.
“The storm’s coming,” she said.
Drei glanced up. “Are you thinking about going back early?”
She nodded.
“What about the charity? The priest is behind us. He’ll expect you to say something to kick off the celebration.”
Mirie met his gaze, as green as the meadows for those few glorious weeks during summer. She could think of nothing she would rather do less right now than celebrate. “We may risk getting snowed in.”
There were no plows to clear the roads. Trans-Alps highways did not traverse the gorges of these steep passes. Not close enough for convenience, anyway. Not until Mirie could find some way of bridging the distance between opposing parties and get a majority to agree on what Ninsele’s future looked like.
If she ever got everyone to agree.
Drei only nodded. He would do whatever she decided, no matter how much effort it cost to rearrange their plans. But Mirie glanced into the storm clouds and knew she would have to take her chances. Tradition must be upheld. She may feel like a stranger right now, but her quick exit would be noticed. She was a conversation piece. Alba Luncă would tell tales of the princess who had hidden among them for generations to come.
She would leave no one disappointed with Bunică’s send-off. Especially since she wouldn’t be back to host the series of charity meals that would commemorate Bunică’s passing for the next year. Mirie would rely on others to host those. Today she would honor the woman who had given her life.
“We’ll cross our fing—” She broke off when she saw Drei.
He cocked his head to the side, his grip tightening on her elbow, bringing them to a sudden stop. Mirie knew he was receiving a report through his earpiece. Then he was in motion, pulling her hard against him, his arms like a vise as he spun her around.
“Go, go, go!” he yelled over his shoulder at the villagers. “We have gunfire. Get to the village. Quickly.”
Chaos erupted among those who had been nearest the grave site. Plaintive demands and fearful questions discharged into confusion. But none drowned out the sudden growl of an engine in the distance, unseen, yet swelling quickly, churning through the mountain stillness like the roar of an avalanche.
“The village,” Drei commanded. “Not the church. Get safely behind the gates.”
People started running, shouting, “To the village. To the village.”
“Quickly, Your Royal Highness,” Drei hissed while spurring her into a run.
Toward the church.
The priest broke away, vestments whipping around him as he bolted in the opposite direction. “I will sound the alarm.”
“Get the people to the gates, Father!” Drei shouted.
But the priest followed them to the church, following her when he should have been running in the opposite direction.
She tried to keep up with Drei, but the way he surrounded her with his big body kept her blind and off balance. His thighs rammed into the backs of hers with each step, forcing her to keep his pace and nearly sweeping her off her feet as he slammed into the churchyard gate, throwing it open.
The church steps proved her undoing, and she stumbled. Drei lifted her against him as though she weighed no more than air and dragged her up the remaining steps and across the threshold.
He spun around with practiced skill, using the building to shield her as he pulled open the door.
And in that instant, she glimpsed the priest flying through the open gate, and a military transport helicopter riding low just above the treetops, armed men bulging from the open sides.
Powerful engines reverberated through the gorge, the rhythmic swoop-swoop-swoop of the blades, the grumbling heartbeat of a conveyance that carried death. The sound was deafening, yet not loud enough to drown out the eruption of gunfire that stunned the morning.
Drei dragged her inside and pulled the door shut, but not before Mirie heard the familiar thuds of bullets pounding flesh.
No warning bells would sound the alarm in Alba Luncă today.
CHAPTER TWO
“IS HER ROYAL HIGHNESS to safety?” General Bogdanovich demanded over the audio device. “Secure her. Repeat. Secure her. We’ve eliminated three of the enemy on the road, but a team of six has entered the churchyard. We’re surrounding the perimeter, but we’re drawing fire from the copter.”
Drew could not respond. The doors of the church slammed open as if on cue, and footsteps pounded over stone.
Mirie stared up from beneath her hat, features drawn and eyes wide. She had pulled on her courage as she might her coat, but he saw the fear in her tight expression, in the dilation of pupils turning blue-gray eyes almost black.
He questioned her without words, and she inclined her head, confirming she was unharmed and functioning. She knew the drill, and she was no longer a terrified eight-year-old.
Drew reevaluated, unsure if they could make the escape route undetected. Their pursuers appeared to be well-funded paramilitaries, seizing the opportunity to eliminate the last royal of the House of Selskala, who had made herself an easy target for the first time in six years.
Raising his pistol, he cased the stairwell before leading Mirie down the steps to the crypt. There were no windows down here, only the dank cold of frozen ground. They moved quickly, sound buffered by stone. But the impenetrable dark finally forced him to lower his pistol and feel his way with a hand along the wall.
Their attackers would break into pairs. One team would head into the loft that ran along the back of the church and the bell tower. Another team would make its way to the sacristy and vesting room, which would lead them here to the crypt entry. The remaining team would canvass the nave with the rows of pews and alcoves of small side altars.
“Major Timko,” General Bogdanovich demanded in his ear. “Sit-rep. Is Her Royal Highness alive?”
The general wouldn’t be getting a situation report any time soon, so Drew tapped once against the audio device.
Affirmative.
She was alive for the moment, anyway.
Mirie pressed against his back, following the drill they had practiced time and again to prepare for this emergency situation.
She needed to pace her breathing, but he could risk no warning. Their feet echoed, the sound amplified by the quiet.
Doors led to mausoleums and a chapel, and an escape route that had been excavated during World War I. Drew could make out the faint glow of the sanctuary lamp in the distance, coming from the second door on the right.
His pistol scratched stone, a noise that made Mirie gasp. He pressed his fingers against her lips, and her soft mouth yielded beneath his touch. Her eyes widened, a flash of white in the darkness. Drew wasn’t sure if he had surprised her, or if she was reacting to the low exchange of conversation that filtered down the stairs, but his fingers tingled as he drew his hand away.
Drew pulled her through the second doorway as the voices erupted again, louder this time, nearer. Luck was with them, though. The sanctuary lamp illuminated the obstacle course of furnishings. Chairs. Candle stands. Icons.
The entrance to the tunnel was concealed behind the tabernacle, recessed into the wall behind the altar. But Drew couldn’t enter the passage yet, couldn’t risk any noise that would jeopardize the only escape route they had. They needed to hide until he had a lock on the enemy’s location.
He considered whether they should make a run for the mausoleums. Then Mirie motioned him to the altar, and he learned there were more secrets to this chapel than even he’d known.
The marble altar had a decoration of inlaid mosaic tiles, which turned out to conceal a panel to a hideaway.
Slipping the pistol into his waistband, Drew helped Mirie inside, ensuring that every inch of white fur was hidden. He backed away to shut the panel, but Mirie grasped at his coat, urging him down beside her. The last thing he saw was light slicing beyond the door, and then he was on his knees, curling around her.
She began to shake. Drew could feel her against him, as she struggled to control her chattering teeth. Tightening his arms around her, he held her close until he could almost feel the slim outline of her body through the outerwear already making him sweat.
This was when normal people came unglued, lost their heads and did something stupid that led them to get caught. People who weren’t trained to handle the time-bomb pressure of managing fear and waiting to see if luck was with them or if life would get ugly.
Mirie had already witnessed more ugliness than most people. Her family had been slain in military-style executions while she had hidden beneath mock flooring. She had been spared one horror, only to live another, with her nanny’s hands pressed over her face to contain her screams and spare her the brutality of her family’s last minutes of life.
Boots scuffed over rough stone so close that Mirie inhaled an audible breath. Drew tightened his arms around her and maneuvered his face until he could press his cheek against hers, share the warmth of his skin, use their nearness as distraction.
His heart throbbed dully in his chest, his entire body an insane tangle of nerves and awareness. For two people who had spent every minute of every day together for so many years, for two people who knew so much about each other’s lives and intimate habits, they really knew nothing about each other.
Mirie didn’t know his true identity.
And Drew had no idea she would feel as if she belonged in his arms.
“Hovno!” A gravelly voice spat out the curse.
A Czech or Slovak curse, and a clue to the identity of their enemy.
The footsteps marked the perimeter of the room. Drew could make out the path, hear the intruder searching behind the chairs that ran the periphery of the chapel beneath the icons adorning the walls in all their Orthodox glory.
The resurrection of Christ.
The Blessed Mother.
Michael the archangel.
A buffet of saints, all of whom Drew sincerely hoped were praying for their escape right now.
Mirie shuddered, but Drew pressed his lips to her cool cheek, the only reassurance he could offer as seconds ticked by, each one stretching into another, protracted and tense. He inhaled fur from her ushanka until he was forced to knock the hat from her head with his chin before he sneezed.
Then he was treated to the full impact of her hair, a crisp, clean scent that filtered through his consciousness, made him aware of each strand against his skin.
“Any luck?” the Slovak speaker asked.
Definitely Slovak. They were near the gate.
“Bah!” another voice ground out, sounding like cigarette smoke over gravel. “They did not come down here.”
“You break that news to Ratko.”
A gruff snort, and the sound of retreating footsteps. Drew filed away that name and hoped the NRPG might neutralize the threat so they could ride out the danger in this hideaway. Could they be so lucky?
But one exchange over the audio transmitter reminded him that Ninsele’s resources were no match for well-funded paramilitaries. The effects of a decade-long civil war would be felt for a long time.
“Incoming, General.”
“Secure the village gate,” General Bogdanovich shot back.
“Roger that.”
Then silence.
Drew was out of choices. He couldn’t lie in wait until the church was surrounded or a villager tortured into revealing the church’s escape route. He had to protect Mirie until the NRPG had a lock on this situation or could spirit her to safety. He could make no other choice, take no chances with Mirie’s life.
* * *
THE METAL DOOR snapped into place with a gunshot crack that echoed forever. Mirie’s heart pounded in time with the sound, so hard that her chest ached from the rapid-fire beat and her ears throbbed with a steady tat-tat-tat-tat-tat like automatic gunfire. She couldn’t tell if the sound was real or some adrenaline-fueled trick of her imagination.
The memory of gunfire from long ago.
Sinking against the wall, she felt every muscle turn to liquid and her strength drain away.
Drei’s attention was on sealing the door, so their pursuers wouldn’t follow. From inside the chapel, the decorated metal panel was a showcase for the gold tabernacle with its locked door and keyhole concealed in an apostle’s pocket.
The panel concealed a spring-hinged door.
By the time he turned around, Mirie had gotten a hold of herself. With a hand on her arm, he led her into the narrow tunnel, barely high enough for her to stand upright. Drei was forced to hunch over, and kept a step ahead of her as the passage wasn’t wide enough to walk abreast.
Only after they had traveled a distance did he dare switch on a light. The red beam gleamed on rough-hewn walls as he whispered, “Talk to me, Your Royal Highness. How are you holding up?”
Her staccato heartbeat and the stale air suffocated her. She swallowed back a cry when her fingers sank into some sticky substance on the wall.
A spider’s web? Sweet Lord. If only the remnants of a web and the creature within were the worst of her troubles....
“I’m okay.” A lie.
She was bone-cold and shaking. Retrieving the glove in her pocket, she slipped her fingers inside and willed away thoughts of the men with rounds of ammunition strapped to their vests and the sound of gunfire outside.
Tat-tat-tat-tat-tat.
Drei didn’t reply. She could barely see his face, only the pinpoint beam of light that sliced through the endless darkness.
“Frightened,” she finally admitted. “Worried about the villagers.” And so, so guilty because she had been advised not to make this trip.
“The general has secured the gate and called for reinforcements.” Drei’s deep whisper embraced the dark, soothed with its tone. He liked this answer much better than the first one she had given. “He and his unit will capture these thugs.”
“You think they’re criminals?” That surprised her. Why would criminals bother with an attack when they could all too easily cross Ninsele’s borders—one more problem that hadn’t yet been solved?
“They’re thugs no matter who finances them.”
Ah, Mirie understood. Of course they were after her. Why else would anyone bother this sleepy village? And Drei would take any attempt against her personally.
She should never have risked leaving Briere, no matter how much she had wanted to be here for Bunică. Her selfish decision would impact everyone now because the NRPG could not deploy aircraft to pursue their attackers. The nearest air base was at the country’s western border and it belonged to Hungary. And Ninsele didn’t need the bad press. Not now. Not so close to the arrival of the European Commission’s representatives. Would they call off the talks, fearing for their safety? Had she just sabotaged all the progress they’d made toward the stabilization plan?
Was it any wonder she was struggling to breathe?
“The people expected a meal with a princess,” she said. “A celebration of a life lived with love.”
Was it really so much to ask for the princess they had treated as their own to speak at a funeral?
“They’ll have tales to tell their kids,” Drei said. “And they will celebrate life. Geta’s memorial and their own escape. The meal is already prepared.”
If they escaped. Mirie prayed he was right, appreciated his effort to reassure her.
But words and kindness couldn’t take away the guilt. She was responsible for her selfish choice to leave the safety of the royal compound. Now people were running for safety and fleeing armed paramilitaries.
How many would be killed like the priest?
“The general will make inquiries,” Drei continued, clearly determined to reassure her. “We’ll know by the time we get back to Briere. Who knows? Maybe some group will claim responsibility and save us the trouble of a search.”
“You hope.”
That made his gaze soften just a bit.
“I do.”
They both knew the trouble with assassins and revolutionaries was that they usually didn’t want to be identified. Secrecy gave them power. A terrorist cell would claim responsibility immediately and whip the media into a frenzy to frighten people.
“Let’s keep moving.” Drei locked his fingers around her wrist and guided her hand around his waist. His touch was solid, a reminder against worrying about things they could not control. Drawing her close, he pointed the red beam of his flashlight into the darkness.
Mirie kept pace beside him, concealed by his broad chest, chiding herself for her weakness. She had known the risks when deciding to make this journey. Yet she had hoped for the best, had felt she deserved to make this trip. She had survived when her family had not. She had a purpose to fulfill, an obligation. And she asked nothing in return. Only a chance to bury the woman who had loved her like a grandmother.
“How did you know about the altar?” Drei asked.
“Bunică was always afraid I would be discovered and instructed me how to escape.”
“She was wise.” He wanted to distract her. Her protector in body and spirit. Always.
But he couldn’t protect her from the truth.
“Has the general confirmed any casualties?” Innocent people had become targets. People guilty of no more than burying their dead, of lingering to get close to a princess.
Anyone who came near her was at risk.
She was poison.
Mirie could imagine the funeral procession in the wake of her escape, people frantic and screaming for their lives as they raced down the road for the gate, some whose steps would have been slowed by age or infirmity.
Had they stood any chance of reaching safety?
“Your Royal Highness.” Drei stretched out the syllables, a stern warning. “The general knows his duty. And the potential risks. He brought only his best men. They will secure the situation. Trust that much, at least.”
He knew her so well. She forgot that most of the time.
“I do.” But the cost of even one life was one that could never be calculated.
There were no answers in the passage that curved tightly in upon itself. The footing was treacherous. Drei moved along awkwardly, using the wall to brace himself. He kept her locked against him, steadied her as the floor descended sharply.
Mirie had known of the passage, but had never traveled it. The exit was far from the village, a place one might be able to escape through gorges that sliced a path toward the northern border. The secret of the passage was held tightly by only a few on the elder council, passed down through generations to those trusted with the villagers’ safety.
“You knew of this passage but not the altar?” she asked.
“I’ve spent a lot of years formulating escape routes in case we needed them. I’m sure Geta wanted you to have escape options even from me.”
He was right. Bunică had witnessed the effects of trusting the wrong people. But Mirie had to trust Drei. Otherwise, how could she function?
“Then it’s good we work together,” she said calmly, when she felt anything but. “You know where this passage leads?”
“The general vicinity.”
“Think we’ll be able to escape?”
“Yes.”
“Would you tell me if the answer was no?” She felt the motion as he slanted his head, as though peering down at her.
“No.” He gave a short laugh.
Under normal circumstances, his answer would have annoyed her, but the sound of that one humorless laugh stuck, a thought to divert the other sounds in her head.
Tat-tat-tat-tat-tat.
He seemed not to feel the brutal cold while her adrenaline seeped away in slow degrees. She couldn’t be sure how long they walked, but not much time had passed since she’d said her farewell to Bunică. Forcing herself to focus, Mirie put one foot in front of the other despite her quaking knees and chattering teeth.
Drei must have noticed her struggle because he brought them to another stop. Handing her the light, he opened his coat to forage through his inner pockets.
He withdrew a thick square wrapped in crackling plastic. With a few quick gestures, he shook out a weather poncho made of thin waterproof canvas.
“Wear this.” His voice was gentle as he drew the white outerwear around her and pulled a hood up over her head, hat and all. “It’ll help with the cold.”
“You travel prepared.”
“That’s what you pay me to do.”
Such a simple reply, yet not so simple. He had known there might be danger because she had left her secured palace, a glittering shell that housed the golden egg.
“Any better?” he asked.
She nodded, appreciating his precautions and his concern.
The tunnel began an ascent. Gravity and ice conspired to make each step more difficult. There were no handholds, and she was finally forced to cling to Drei, who anchored himself against the rough wall, a bulwark always, shifting his balance to secure her, his arm locked tight, his grip strong yet gentle.
And when they finally reached the end of the passage, they found a half-rotted wooden portal shaped like a manhole cover. The exit had long ago been concealed beneath snow and forest debris, making an icy, dirty blotch that didn’t budge when Drei put his weight to it.
He shut off the light. “I need you to step back, Your Royal Highness. This mess may collapse. I don’t want you far, though.”
“I can hold the light.”
“I have to see what’s out there, and this wood is disintegrating. I start loosening this ice, and the mountain might fall in.”
Mirie retreated just far enough to watch Drei work.
He tested the wood, used a knife to coax away debris so he might see outside.
Mirie gasped when the crack of ice startled the quiet. Suddenly thin light penetrated the darkness. He slipped some sort of slim instrument through the hole—a mirror?—and must have been satisfied with what he had seen because he pulled out another weather poncho like her own, camouflage to blend in with the snow-covered terrain.
This man was such a blessing in her life. Had she ever even told him how grateful she was for all his careful attention?
Probably not. She barely noticed him at all. Took his presence for granted. An oversight she would have to change immediately.
“I’ll stay within earshot, but if you hear gunfire, you head back the way we came,” he said, businesslike. “Just stay inside the passage until the general makes contact.”
He withdrew his audio transmitter, then with calloused fingertips, he tilted her head to the side. She could feel the warmth of his skin as he slipped his hand beneath her hat and brushed aside her hair. He wedged the tiny device in her ear, his touch soft, warm, so alive.
For the moment, anyway. They both knew if she heard gunfire, he was dead. That would be the only reason Drei wouldn’t return to her, and without him, her chances of making it out of this passage alive weren’t good.
“We’re out of range now. But if you make it back into the church, you’ll be in contact with the general. Got it?”
She nodded.
“Stay hidden.”
Then he crawled through the opening and vanished.
Mirie could hear the rustling of branches and tree limbs, his boots crunching through the snow. Then all sounds faded, leaving only silence to drown out the noise of her thoughts, solitude to distract her from the memory of the attackers in the helicopter, a fat-bellied fly skimming pristine white treetops and old Vlas running from automatic gunfire on creaky legs.
Tat-tat-tat-tat-tat.
When she could no longer resist the lure of the light, she eased toward the exit, listening for any sound from outside, adrenaline making each breath come hard in her chest. She peered through the broken slat and took in the surroundings.
From the village these trees sloped steeply up the mountain, always covered in snow, so beautiful, like a scene in a child’s globe. One turn of the wrist and glittery snowflakes sprinkled down upon a tiny village.
Ninsoare. Her country had been named for the snowy peaks that defined the land.
What Mirie saw now was more desolate than magical. Wind gusting so hard it whistled like an emergency siren. She had known the storm was coming, and here it was, recalling the last time she had been forced to flee into these mountains. So many years should have dimmed the memory, drowned out the sounds of screams and tears and murder.
Tat-tat-tat-tat-tat.
It had been snowing then, too.
CHAPTER THREE
“DAMN,” DREW SAID ALOUD, not bothering to rein in his frustration.
The tracks were fresh, and the snow came down so hard and fast, he had almost missed them. Inspecting the ruts, he followed the trail until determining that four snowmobiles had passed along this ridge. Probably not more than ten minutes ago.
Given the altitude and climate conditions, Drew was willing to bet no sports enthusiast would be up here snowmobiling for kicks. No, he was looking at a second group of thugs patrolling points of egress. The terrain was difficult, essentially ineffective for launching a surprise attack on a funeral procession. Most likely these snowmobiles had carried scouts searching for the missing princess.
Did they know about the tunnel? Would they be back?
These were the only questions that interested Drew right now. And who was behind these well-organized thugs? Were they Slovakian, too? Drew didn’t have a clue and knew General Bogdanovich likely wouldn’t, either.
“Damn, damn, damn.”
Gusting wind drowned out his frustration. Heading back to the tunnel, he used a branch to sweep away his tracks. Not that anything would be visible for long with this storm, but his boots were doing a helluva job marking his trail. He would have to assume the snowmobiles would be back, but with any luck the storm might slow them down a little.
It was certainly deterring him, and his options were narrowing by the second. He couldn’t use his two-way radio to contact the general. He would be lucky if he could transmit over a mile in these conditions, and couldn’t risk an intercepted transmission anywhere close to these snowmobile tracks.
As near as he could tell, the snowmobiles had headed in the most direct route back to civilization, which left him with the next problem—Mirie wouldn’t last long in this weather. They had dressed for a funeral, not for prolonged exposure to the elements, and she had already been fighting the effects of shock when he’d left her. He needed to get her safe and warm because he didn’t see any alternative but riding out the time it took the general to secure the area and retrieve them. Drew needed an alternate plan B.
Shoving up his coat sleeve, he glanced at his watch and made out the compass display. Visibility was getting crappier by the second. There was a place where they might hole up safely, but he would have to get Mirie there, and that wouldn’t be easy. The terrain was tough in good weather. Of course the storm would complicate travel for the enemy, too. That much was a plus.
Drew trudged back, unhappy with his choices. He hadn’t been gone five minutes total, but after crawling back inside the tunnel, he took in the sight of Mirie, safe, like a punch to the gut.
She still stood with her arms wrapped tightly across her chest, as if trying to fold in on herself to contain warmth. But Drew knew by one glimpse of her lovely face that she struggled. She would hide it. She would strap on her courage like Kevlar, but she was struggling hard right now. He could see it in the raw edges of her expression, the haunted eyes she lifted to his, the shuddering breath that echoed between them.
He had to get her to safety.
“Any problems?” he asked.
She shook her head, sending wisps of hair dragging along the fur collar, but she didn’t reply.
She couldn’t. Not without revealing her chattering teeth.
Crossing the distance between them with a few strides, Drew yanked off his own gloves and dug into his pocket.
“Any word from the general?” he asked.
She shook her head again. He hadn’t expected a transmission, but Mirie could use a distraction. He found the package of heat packs. They were small, the perfect size to fit inside a glove or a boot. He had hoped to conserve their few supplies, since these heat packs only had a short life span. Six minutes tops. She couldn’t wait.
Not optimum since she hadn’t been outside yet. She watched him curiously as he worked the packet to create a chemical reaction that activated the heat.
“Put this inside your glove.” He handed her the first, then went to work on the next. “It’ll help.”
She did as instructed and gave a small smile. “S-so what’s the plan?”
“How are you holding up?”
“Fine.” Her teeth let out an audible chatter and she rolled her eyes. “Freezing to death, b-but that’s because I’m standing around waiting to get shot.”
Drew eyed her narrowly and made the decision. “If you can handle a bit of a hike, then we should go for it. I’m not much for standing around waiting to get shot, either.”
That brought a smile to her lips, which hadn’t yet turned blue. A good sign.
“The village?” she asked.
“Not yet.”
She didn’t ask for details, didn’t want them. Mirie understood limitations better than most people. What did details matter right now when she couldn’t do anything to help?
He knew what her answer would be.
His own hands were warmer, so after giving her the second packet, he pressed his fingers to her chin. Her eyes widened in surprise, but she followed his urging and tilted her face to the side. Her skin was chilled and smooth beneath his touch, not waxen or stiff. No outward indication that her body temperature was dropping low enough to concern him. Yet.
Tucking the stray hairs into her hat, he withdrew the audio transmitter. “Thanks for hanging on to this for me.”
“Glad I didn’t need it.”
“Me, too.” He let his fingers trail from her face, forced his gaze to her gloved hands. “Any better?”
“Much. Do you want to use them, too?”
“You hang on to them. They can be reactivated with boiling water.” Which would require fire and a pot. There was definitely plenty of snow around to melt. Drew would save the rest of the heat packets for the other end of their hike to hold her over while he got a fire going. Hopefully they would be enough.
“Ready?” he asked.
“Rather dodge the bullets than wait for them.”
He liked that about her. Even as a young girl, she’d always been up for a challenge.
Drew surveyed the area again before he helped her out of the tunnel. Their path was clear and the snow fell steadily, no worse than before.
This was luck, and he would take all he could get. He shoveled debris against the hole to conceal their exit, trusting the snow to finish up the job. Using his belt, he created a leash of sorts to connect them, and then retrieved the branch he had used to cover his tracks.
He had to keep a close eye on his compass. This forbidding gorge wasn’t on the radar for people making their way through the mountains since it led to one of the highest peaks in the region. Not even sports enthusiasts appreciated this gorge, which was nearly impossible to descend without rappelling gear, and the narrow width made it hardly worth the effort. But there was shelter there, and a safe place to hide Mirie.
Drew had found it for exactly that reason. He had been trained by the man who had held the post of close-protection guard for two Ninselan kings. The man had been old, but he had taught Drew that the most important rule for protecting royals, was to know all the good hiding places.
Oskar would be rolling over in his grave right now because Drew hadn’t known about the altar. Or maybe Oskar was getting a good laugh, since he had probably been the one who had told Geta about the hideaway in the first place.
His former mentor had once delighted in sending Drew out to find the cleverest hiding places he could come up with. Then Oskar would shoot holes in every one.
He had liked the cave in the gorge, though.
He had shot holes in it, of course—too far away, too tough to access, not enough natural resources—but had also conceded that it would be a damned good hiding place if one could get to it.
Drew watched Mirie for outward signs of exhaustion. She trudged along with her head bowed against the weather, the weather cloak snapping around her as the winds picked up.
Their luck had held until now, but Drew finally abandoned the effort to cover their trail. Instead he motioned Mirie to grab the other side of the branch. Together they lifted it high enough to create a sort of windshield to block the falling snow and give him some visibility.
He couldn’t miss the outcroppings that would signal the entrance of the gorge. They were close. He could sense it even though he hadn’t been in these mountains in six years. And when they finally came upon it, Drew very nearly stumbled in. The snow concealed the sharp slope, and he took a step into nothingness. His feet shot out from underneath him and the branch went flying, jerked from Mirie’s grip. She gasped his name, and he would have dragged her over with him, if not for the tree limbs he managed to catch himself on.
“Grab the branches,” he shouted. “We have to climb down.”
Unfortunately, climbing down also meant dislodging snow. The snow seeped into the hood of his poncho like frigid fingers of ice. And they had to keep climbing until he could locate the cave ledge, which ran a good seven meters along the ridge. He had a strong sense of how far down it was, and when he caught the edge of it with his boots, he was relieved to discover that they had come down practically in the middle.
“Step down, but don’t let go of those branches,” he instructed Mirie.
She clung to the boughs until he cleared the cave access, digging and kicking through hard-packed snow. When he could finally scramble inside, he used a laser for a cursory check of the interior, relieved to find the cave was empty and dry.
“Come on.” He helped Mirie disentangle herself from the branches and crawl safely across the ledge.
The access was low, and he crawled in behind her, paying attention to her movements, looking for signs of exposure.
She seemed to be moving normally as she sank back on her haunches and asked, “How on earth did you find this place?”
“Dumb luck.” Drew directed the light so he could see her face. “Everything wet has to come off right now.”
She nodded, her skin translucent, her lips pale. She was freezing. He reached for her hand, tugged off first one glove then the other before digging through his pockets for the last of the heat packets.
“Wet clothes off first. Then activate these. They’ll help until I get a fire going.” He searched her gaze. “Understand?”
“Yes.”
Drew headed outside to search for spruce branches his boot knife could handle. Mirie had called him prepared, but he wasn’t. He carried basic survival items necessary in these mountains and a few extras—training from growing up on a lot of acreage with several generations of Canadys.
“Drew boy, you never know what to expect. Life’s always throwing surprises at you, so be prepared,” his great-grandfather had told him back in his other life.
That early training had come in handy in the Marines Special Forces and as an agent stationed in a mountainous region, and Drew didn’t take long to shave the branches into kindling he could light with the fire striker he kept on his key ring. The sap from the spruce would burn despite the wet wood.
He returned to find Mirie sitting with her back against the wall. She had removed only her hat and cloak and was fumbling with her boots. Even in the dark, he could see that her pants were wet all the way to midthigh. Her eyes were heavy-lidded, her efforts sluggish. Her body temperature was dropping, and he had to get this fire going fast.
“Get those clothes off,” he barked more harshly than he’d intended. “Unless you want my help.”
She growled impatiently in reply and tugged off a boot with what appeared to be monumental effort.
Drew set down the kindling, ditched his outerwear and fished out the remaining weather cloak.
“Wrap this around you. I’ll have the fire going soon.”
They were deep enough into the gorge that the smoke should dissipate before reaching the top of the ridge. The storm should be grounding any aircraft. Even that transport copter. He was risking a fire regardless. If he didn’t get Mirie thawed out, he wouldn’t have a princess to keep safe until the NRPG came after them.
The fire took some coaxing, repeated efforts with wet branches that would only burn because of the sap.
“You doing okay?” he asked, prompting Mirie while he willed the flames to ignite. They needed heat and light fast.
Only when he had coaxed a small blaze to steady life did he dare turn his attention away. “Come on. Get warm.”
“Okay,” Mirie said, but made no move to get up. So Drew went to her and found her fists still wrapped around the heat packets. Her boots were off, but she hadn’t even removed the cloak from the packaging.
“Let me help.” He made quick work of the poncho, then began the exquisite torture of helping her undress.
“I can do it.” She resisted as he peeled a sock away.
“I know,” he said mildly, massaging her slim foot between his fire-warmed hands, feeling the smooth skin, watching her reaction. “But humor me. How does that feel? Any pain?”
She shook her head, but he didn’t believe her and shifted to view her foot in the firelight. Her skin was red and icy.
“We can handle frostnip, Your Royal Highness. Let’s get these wet pants off. Trust me, you’ll feel better.”
She struggled to keep her eyes open, and made a few fumbling efforts to unfasten her waistband.
Drew couldn’t wait. He moved in to help, and she didn’t resist this time, which told him everything he needed to know about her condition. He unfastened the hook, then worked the pants over her hips, dragging her thermals along for the ride. She made several halfhearted attempts to assist by lifting her hips, but Drew barely noticed. Not when his fingers brushed her sleek skin as he peeled away the fabric, revealing a barely there thong and never-ending pale legs.
His breath galvanized in his chest at the sight of her nearly naked from the waist down, and ended that particular torture fast by draping the cloak over her middle.
With a hand behind her shoulder, he urged her to lean forward. “The coat now.”
“Okay, okay.” She swatted at his hands.
Her impatience should have been a good sign, but he knew Mirie. She would have to be unconscious to accept help without resistance. And sure enough, she leaned forward and practically melted into his arms, boneless. Suddenly, he was overwhelmed by her, the feel of her body against him, the scent of her with his every sharp breath, the awareness of her bare legs so pale in the firelight.
Only knowledge of her weakness helped him focus on survival right now. Her collar was as wet as his own, so he tortured himself by dragging the shirt over her head, exposing the swell of her breasts and the sleek terrain of bare skin, her hair falling around her shoulders.
“Come on. Let’s get you closer to the fire. You’ll warm up. I promise.”
She only nodded, her teeth chattering audibly, so he sat back on his haunches and lifted her against him. Dragging the cloak around her, he carried her to the fire. She curled up in the warm glow, and he watched her, unsure how much of her sleepiness was exposure or shock.
He made quick work of his own wet clothes. Everything had to go. Thermals. Shirt. Pants. The lining of his coat was in fairly decent shape, so he kept that on. Mirie might not care now, but she would come back to life when she warmed up. He didn’t want their relationship to get weird. He counted on the professionalism between them. A lot.
After setting up a blockade of stripped branches at the cave’s entrance, he was content that they would be alerted to any disturbance. Then he went back to the fire.
Mirie was still curled in a pathetic ball, her teeth rattling louder than the crackling fire.
No, he hadn’t been adequately prepared, no matter what she thought. Not when all he had to protect her was a poncho and a small fire and himself. Not when all he could do was sit down beside her and say, “Let me in.”
He pulled her into his arms and curled his body around hers. She sighed, nestling against the meager warmth he offered, resting her head against his shoulder, burying her face in his throat. He dragged the cloak around them, tucked her fingers into his armpits and willed himself with every fiber of his considerable self-control not to react to the feel of this near-naked woman in his arms. No other woman would test him this way, only this woman. But he would not react.
Even if it killed him.
And with the feel of her soft curves against him, the scent of her hair filtering through him with every breath he took, Drew thought it probably would.
They had come to Alba Luncă for a funeral.
* * *
SUFFOCATING DARKNESS, THE KIND with the blackest shadows, was where fear liked to hide.
The soft voice that sang such sweet songs, the voice that brought love to life during those scary, drowsy moments before sleep, was suddenly ragged and hysterical, almost unrecognizable through the fear.
Even in Mirie’s worst nightmares, all the terrors Stefan and Petre said hid in the shadowy places under her bed had never hinted at this sort of fear that made her want to bury her head beneath the blankets and never come out. Not ever.
This was fear like she had never imagined.
How could she have? Her life was filled with laughter. The soft voice of her mama tinkled with laughter and scattered worries like the courtyard fountain splashed water on the tiles.
She had never, ever heard anyone scream with such fear.
That fear paralyzed Mirie, made her eyes squeeze shut and her hands shake. Choked her. No, that was Nanny, smothering her with knotted old fingers and a bony chest. Nanny’s hissing voice shushed Mirie in the darkness, demanded silence, but Mirie was sure she would never make a sound again, not with Mama’s hysterical pleas in her ears. Desperate, agonized screams.
“Not my babies. Not my babies.”
Tat-tat-tat-tat-tat.
Then silence.
* * *
MIRIE AWOKE. FOR A stunning moment, all she could see was red. Red so violently bright, swelling and dripping, as if the world had erupted in a geyser of blood.
With the breath locked tight in her chest, reality receded, and no matter how hard she tried to grasp it, there was distance between the scene before her eyes and the awareness in her head. She could only feel the rapid-fire thudding of her heart, ready to erupt in another geyser of blood.
Tat-tat-tat-tat-tat.
Her heart throbbed so hard it hurt, trapped with the breath in her chest, a weight crushing everything inside her, pressure so great she would die because she couldn’t breathe.
But there was no death here. No!
One word finally penetrated her awareness, and the vision faded, bleaching the memory to dusty shades of gunmetal and smoke. The way she felt inside.
There was no impending eruption, just the pounding of blood in her ears.
And a long-ago nightmare.
Mirie drew a shuddering breath that dispelled the pressure the tiniest bit. She remembered.
Bunică. Men with guns. The dead priest.
And Drei. She felt his strong body tight around her, his arms holding her securely, the cloying warmth of heat and skin.
The pounding of another heartbeat beneath her cheek. Only his heart beat solid and steady, as if wanting to set the example for her own, reminding her not to panic.
But calm seemed beyond grasp, even though she was so much warmer now. There was no gunfire in the crackling quiet. Nothing to fear in Drei’s arms.
His face rested on the top of her head, so heavy her neck arched beneath the weight. Given the pace of his breathing, she thought he might be dozing.
She would do nothing to disturb him or this moment. Not until she had regained control of herself. The nightmares were no stranger. But she had not had one in a long time. She shouldn’t be surprised to have one now, back in this place of so many memories. A place where she had once had a life.
A life Mirie had once dreamed of, simple, intimate, but filled with so much love.
She should feel something for the loss, shouldn’t she?
She was wrapped nearly naked in a man’s arms. Such an occurrence hadn’t happened since her high-school boyfriend. She remembered the strong warmth of a man’s arms, the intimacy of skin against skin.
Shouldn’t she feel something?
Gratitude. Embarrassment. Awkwardness. Something.
Nothing.
A twig snapped, sending sparks raining over the flames, a swelling of light that made the surrounding darkness darker. Two people in a cave buried beneath a mountain of snow. They could be the only two people alive in the world. They could die here and who would find them before they withered to ash and bone?
Thanks to the media, many would notice her passing, but none would really care. Mirie didn’t even know if Drei would be missed. She had seen no evidence of a life in all these years they’d been together. She was his work, and his life it seemed.
Her heartbeat wouldn’t slow down. Her thoughts raced with what-might-have-beens and what-could-never-bes. Mirie had no patience for self-indulgence. Maybe the adrenaline that had fueled the nightmare had sparked this overwhelming loneliness, or maybe it was simply because Drei held her in his arms.
A man and woman mimicking intimacy.
She willed herself to calm down, but couldn’t grasp the edges of this panic. She was a woman who could lie in a man’s arms, surrounded in the warm cocoon of his hard body, smooth and settled with years of muscle, so unlike the boy in her memory. She remembered.
Drei held her like a man comfortable with a woman in his arms. Not too eager. Not overly impressed. Just easy.
But she only felt alone.
She didn’t want to be this woman, to pass from her life as Bunică had, only with many more years ahead, trudging through day after day, enduring, existing, knowing only duty, and obligation, and emptiness, feeling dead inside.
Until death claimed her for real.
Tat-tat-tat-tat-tat.
The fire sputtered, and Mirie stiffened at the sound. Drei exhaled heavily, a man who didn’t want to be disturbed, but who was attuned to her slightest motion, even in sleep.
Definitely asleep.
His breath fluttered against her ear, a slight burst of warmth she may not have noticed except for the way it caressed such sensitive skin. A velvet touch that reached down deep inside and drew the faintest reply.
A tingle low in her belly.
An echo of something she had forgotten.
She leaned into Drei, not wanting to disturb him yet desperate to know if the sensation was real or her imagination.
That one tiny feeling accomplished what she hadn’t been able to do on her own. Her breathing finally slowed, her pulse stilled, as if every fiber of her focused.
Drei’s breaths came soft and even, as solid as the man himself. But she felt nothing, heard only the crackling fire. Mirie held her breath and leaned in a bit more....
There it was again. A tingle that made her insides hum, a fragile tremor as if someplace deep inside her yawned, shrugging off a long sleep.
More like a coma, actually, but not death.
Not death.
CHAPTER FOUR
DREW WASN’T SURE what awoke him, but he damned sure shouldn’t have been sleeping. The struggle to control his physical reaction to the feel of Mirie pressed against him had worn him out more than battling the snow.
He had wanted to stop time with the feel of her in his arms. But something was off with her. He sensed it, knew it was probably what had awoken him. He didn’t think she was asleep. Her body was too tense, too aware.
Scanning the shadows for any sign of a threat, he found the cave as he had left it, trusted his years of training to alert him to an intrusion. The fire was holding up, so he hadn’t been out for long.
Shifting against the wall, he glanced down at her, dark lashes forming half circles on her pale cheeks, her mouth parted around shallow breaths.
“Are you all right?” he asked automatically.
His voice intruded on the quiet, but her only reply was to nod. She surprised him by sliding her arms around his chest. Repositioning herself, she relaxed a little, but her breath hitched in her throat, an unexpected sound.
Frowning into her hair, Drew resisted the need to interrogate her. She was warm, so any threat of hypothermia was gone. She’d had a tough day, but she would deal with her losses, wouldn’t let him see her fear. That much he knew. If hanging on to him made her feel better right now, then he would find some way to cope.
Not by sleeping.
No, he had to remain stone-cold sober to this assault on his senses. The heat melded their skin together. Her hair tickled his nose with every breath. Her sleek curves unfolded against him so he could feel the length of her soft thighs, the way she fitted into the curve of his body.
She exhaled a sigh, and her mouth shuddered against his skin, soft and yielding. His pulse began to race, rebelling wildly against his best intentions. And they were the very best. Just useless against the feel of her in his arms. A familiar burning started inside, a reaction that was going toe to toe with his discipline.
Drew was having a tough day, too.
He would take armed assassins over facing down this humiliating lack of self-control.
Mirie had no idea she was playing with fire—and not the blaze making this icy cavern habitable, either. And he didn’t want to deal with the consequences of her realizing just how fragile his restraint was around her. He couldn’t afford any change that might jeopardize their relationship. He was her close-protection guard and a U.S. sleeper operative.
Not a man.
So with his jaw clenched tight, he forced himself to focus on making out the cave entrance beyond the firelight, the gray light from the storm beyond. He deliberated how to fashion a makeshift pan to melt snow. They would need water soon, and frozen snow was no option to quench thirst.
But how could he concentrate on anything but the way her breasts molded to his chest, the swelling softness pressed full against him? The skimpy fabric of her bra was no protection.
When she stretched against him, his pulse galvanized. He wanted to thrust off the cloak binding them together. Heightened awareness was making him read so much more into the moment than was possible.
Lust was making him lose his mind. And this was an argument not to ignore his needs the way he too often did. He was a man in the intimate employ of a woman he wanted but couldn’t have. Of course normal relationships were out even if he had wanted one—that was not the life he had chosen—but he never lacked for companionship when he was off duty, taking the occasional leave. They didn’t happen often, but he always tried to make the most of them when they did.
But if he had seen to his own needs, he might be able to resist Mirie now. She sought warmth and comfort, lying here in the arms of someone she should be able to trust, an entirely natural response to their situation. And he should be worthy of her trust. He should shut down reactions that were inappropriate at best, forbidden at worst.
Torture either way.
But Drew’s best intentions meant nothing when Mirie nestled still closer, nestled her face in the hollow of his throat. Not an accidental action, but an intentional one, an inquisitive one that ignited fire in its wake.
One purposeful touch, and the whole world shifted.
The boundaries that had long established their relationship dissolved as she leaned into him, a slight arch of her back that pressed her breasts against his chest and brought her mouth in line with the sensitive skin beneath his ear.
Her breaths came soft and warm against his skin, smooth, silken sighs. Had she noticed the way his every muscle had fossilized? Did she suspect that one touch would shatter his willpower into a million brittle pieces and litter this cave with his best intentions?
Drew didn’t know. He only knew his arms ached with the effort of holding her already. He couldn’t push her away or pull her close, because in this moment he was paralyzed by her vulnerability.
And his need.
* * *
HE TASTED MALE. Mirie wasn’t sure why she was so sure what male tasted like, since she had only tasted one man, and the actual details of long-ago teenage rendezvous had faded in the haze of years. Drei’s skin was the texture of rough velvet, faintly stubbled and redolent with a hint of sweat.
She was so aware of him, of the way his body surrounded hers, generously shared his heat. His strength beckoned her to stretch out against him, melt over the ridges and hollows of his hard muscles. She liked the solidness of him.
He was a man, not a boy.
Loneliness faded beneath this. She felt no embarrassment to be nearly naked in his arms, only awareness of him in a way she had never been before.
The feeling made perfect sense.
Drei felt right because he was right. The only person she could trust.
She had never thought of him as anything but her shadow. He was a fact of life that she had long ago accepted. He was always there and always had been.
She had never considered him as a man.
She’d been a child when he’d shown up. But that had been so long ago. A lifetime. Right now he was a man, and quite a handsome one with his gemstone eyes and chiseled strength. And not so old, either. What had once seemed ancient to a girl was nothing to the woman. Ten years. A decade on the rosary or all of God’s commandments.
How had she missed this? She had looked at him for years, but had never actually seen him until this very moment.
Arching her body lightly, just enough for her thigh to settle a little deeper between his, she tested the feel of her skin against the textured hardness of his, half-afraid he would stop her and demand to know what she was about.
But even worry left her feeling more alive than she had in so long. As the seconds passed, emptiness yielded to daring. It was easy to be bold in this moment. They might be dragged from this cave and shot, their bodies tossed into the gorge. They might slip into a calm death from exposure, locked together forever because the spring thaw never touched these peaks.
This man may yet give his life for her.
Perhaps they would survive, and the general and his men would collect them. They would remind her unnecessarily that the risks she took involved others by default. They would return her to the royal compound, and life would go on, never-ending commitments that blurred days into loneliness. Her whole existence strung along by tiny triumphs after hard-won accomplishments that were never good enough.
One step forward. Two back. Ninety-nine to go.
Once inside her glittering shell, she would return to looking at Drei but never really seeing him.
How could she not have seen him?
He lay so still around her, he might have been carved from marble.... No, nothing as refined. Stone, she decided. Craggy and rugged and enduring like these mountains.
And she couldn’t stop touching him. That faint vibration she felt inside urged her to greater boldness, to see if a fire could be stoked from a single flame.
She nestled her face in the valley between his neck and shoulder, inhaled the scent that made him him. She liked the whimsical thought and shifted again. Just enough so her breasts lifted from his chest, a slight motion that grazed sensitive tips against wiry chest hairs.
The heat low in her belly flared as Drei’s hands locked hard around her waist. Mirie gasped, a sound that startled the quiet as she was hoisted off his lap as easily as he might have removed a pet.
“Your Royal Highness.” He used her title as her name, his tone a warning that she had crossed a line. He forcibly scooted backward as if she had become an ember that burned him.
Mirie stared at him across the blaze-soaked distance. She found the bright green of his eyes indistinguishable by firelight, found herself pierced by the reproach in his expression. And something else...
“What do you fear from me, Drei?” she asked, surprised.
“What are you doing?” A demand.
“I was...testing.”
He arched a quizzical eyebrow. “Testing what? I’m still breathing, Your Royal Highness.”
His indignation made her bristle. Or maybe it was the title that did. She had a name. He knew it.
Was it so wrong to want to be a woman? For one stolen moment, she wanted to think of nothing but what it felt like to feel again, to respond and to care. She already responded as a woman because she felt hurt by his withdrawal.
He dropped back into a crouch, a defensive stance, as though she were Eve with the apple. The muscles in his thighs bulged with the motion, drew her attention to the way he moved, so easy with his nakedness.
How had she never truly seen this man in all these years they had been together? She must have been blind.
The firelight cast his body in gold, his long legs, his narrow hips, the vee of his waist that spread into that chest that had provided shelter against the storm raging outside.
The storm raging inside.
Reason told her to retreat, but Mirie couldn’t stop. Not when retreat meant the spark inside would smolder to ash.
“You protect me.” Her voice wavered. She could be so weak.
Placing her hands over her heart, she stood her ground. “Protect me from this loneliness. Right here. Pretend I am only a woman who wants a man.”
“You’re a princess.”
His retort stung. Always the voice of reason.
“I’m a woman, too.”
And she could not lose this feeling that made her feel alive. To be like Bunică. Her family. Mirie did not want to live her life as one ready for the grave.
She feared that fate worse than men with guns.
“Please.” The word broke, not a demand but a plea.
Drei’s expression was unreadable, but his gaze pierced her as if he’d plunged a hand through her heart. She resisted the urge to shrink before him with her selfish demands.
Then she noticed his hands. They were balled into fists at his sides, tense-knuckled and desperate almost. Not because he didn’t want her, she realized.
Because he did?
There was much about this man she didn’t understand, had never taken the time to learn. But Mirie recognized the chiseled angle of his jaw, as though he ground his teeth to meal inside his mouth.
And foolish, foolish woman she was, so naive and self-absorbed, she had ignored the most obvious sign of all. Running her gaze down the muscled terrain of his body... Her breath hitched at the sight of him in his arousal, concealed by his stance, but such proof of his want.
He was a professional, and an honorable man.
But she had no such honor and simply couldn’t bring herself to stop.
Swaying toward him, Mirie felt her motion as though her body had turned to liquid, warmed by the flames. Not of the crackling fire, but the fire Drei had created inside her. Reaching out, she ran her fingers lightly along his thighs, savored the shock that visibly rocked him on contact.
“Drei, please.” Another plea.
His growl ripped through the quiet, a sound of the purest frustration. But Mirie knew, even as his arms shot around her with whipcord strength, that he couldn’t deny her.
He sprang up with the physicality of a man well-trained, and pulled her to her knees along with him. One swift move brought her into hard contact with his body.
She gasped as he locked her against him, arm a vise around her waist that anchored her close until suddenly all she could see was him. His broad shoulders blocked out the firelight. She could feel every ridge and hollow of his chest, the hot arousal that branded her belly, the steely thighs that braced her upright.
She had no chance to react before he speared a hand into her hair, coaxed her head back to tilt her face to his.
And his mouth came down on hers.
Time stopped. Her heartbeat simply paused. Somewhere inside she recognized how she had provoked him, but his kiss tasted of a need that shocked her, a hungry man.
Mirie couldn’t think past her surprise, not when his need became hers, catching her in an upsurge the way the fire sucked in the surrounding air.
She sighed against his mouth, her lips yielding eagerly. Their tongues tangled in discovery. And she was so grateful she had pushed, so glad he had given in.
Winding her arms around him, she ran her hands down his back, thrilled when he trembled beneath her touch. He was no longer Drei, but a strong, handsome man making her body hum with his kisses. Yet he was still Drei, a man who had always been there, a man she could trust with her needs.
Mirie felt comfortable with him, able to abandon herself to this haze of sensation that stole her breath, made her bold and eager and heedless of the consequences.
But not so her protector.
“You better be sure about this, Your Royal Highness,” he whispered against her lips. “There’s no turning back.”
She could practically feel the battle raging inside him, the tension in the body against her, even though his words might let her go.
Gently nibbling his upper lip, she teased his skin into her mouth, determined to win him to her side. He should forget who he was because she was no longer Mirie. She would shed the limitations of rank and duty to become a nameless woman who savored the moment with no inhibitions. A woman able to forget everything that normally dictated her life.
For one stolen moment, she would be only a woman.
“I have never been more sure,” she admitted. “Let this moment be ours, Drei. Just this one.”
He didn’t believe her. She could see doubt all over his face. Maybe she was a fool to believe her own words. Or naive.
But Mirie didn’t care because she felt.
Drei coaxed her head back to expose her throat. Deliberation carved stern lines in his handsome face as he considered her as if she were some tempting morsel he wasn’t sure whether to resist or devour.
Her chest rose and fell on a sharp breath, the anticipation making her body vibrate.
Had she ever felt so alive?
Her answer came when Drei nibbled his way along her jaw, lingered in that valley below her ear with his warm breath and teasing tongue, such an unexpectedly sensitive place.
Never.
His mouth traveled freely, as though he had waited forever for the privilege to explore and was determined to savor every inch of her. Fire filtered down into her very deepest places until an ache throbbed low in her belly, and she gasped when he flipped down her bra with a quick move that sent her breasts tumbling out as a feast for his devouring.
And he devoured with exquisite tenderness. His stubbled cheeks teased her skin. His tongue tested a peak that tightened eagerly. His strong hands lifted her breast so he could draw the tip into his mouth with a soft pull.
Mirie gasped and her whole being trembled with a prayer that he would not stop.
He didn’t.
Acquainting himself with her responses, Drei coaxed the fire inside her to feverish life. Until her body grew molten and she clung to him.
But he held her securely, raking his firm grip down her ribs as he lifted his head to catch her mouth with his again. Her excitement spiraled in response to his need when he ground his hips greedily against her, a dare to frighten her off, maybe, or an invitation to accept the challenge.
Mirie touched him with an urgency she had never known before. She dragged her palms down his back, over the tight curve of his bottom as she pressed him close, determined to explore every inch. She rode the length of his arousal and caught the sound of his excitement with her kiss, trembled against him as his hard body shuddered with need.
She wanted to make him feel the way she did, but he was the one in control. She found herself suddenly on her back, tangled in the weather cloak, as he maneuvered between her legs. Not to make love to her with his body, but to pleasure her with his mouth.
And she could only glance up at this familiar stranger and tremble in anticipation, for he touched her in ways so intimate that she grew dazed with desire, and could only reach out and hang on to his strong shoulders, as her thighs trembled and silken moans slid from her lips unbidden.
And only when her body pulsed and she was wet with her own pleasure did Drei cease his tender assault. He pulled her into his arms and forced her legs wide so she could straddle his lap, leaving her mouth poised perfectly to kiss him.
She did.
Mirie tasted her pleasure on his mouth, the strength of his hunger, the need that stunned her with its intensity. How could he be invisible to her one moment, then in an instant, the world revolved around their kiss, as if she would die right there if he stopped touching her?
When Drei joined her with an upward thrust, his growl was a desperate sound that reverberated through the cave, through her, and Mirie understood that while she had made love before, she had never made love with a man.
And there was a vast world of difference.
* * *
THE FIRE HAD burned dangerously low. Drew needed to get up and add more kindling before he wound up back outside stripping sappy branches. A part of him was relieved for the task. He was tempted to sit here forever, his back propped against a frigid stone wall, his butt numb from the frigid stone floor.
Life should stop right now, so he could die a happy man. He didn’t know what had just happened between him and Mirie, but he sure as hell knew it wasn’t smart.
He had a mission, and so did she. Two different missions to two different countries. Hers by blood; his by oath. This, whatever this was, would only complicate their work.
He could control his imagination. He could distract himself with other women. He could even feel noble about sacrificing his life to protect Mirie’s journey from childhood to royal duty. He had always told himself the fantasy would be better than the reality anyway, that he’d had the better part.
But he no longer had that excuse.
Reality was far beyond the fantasy. There had been no way he could have known how he would feel inside her, with her body melting around him, pulsing with pleasure as if her mouth had been formed to fit only his. As if her every curve had been formed to align just perfectly with him. As if her sighs had been tuned to his exact frequency.
As if inside her was the only place he should be.
He had never known that feeling before. Discontent had sent him fleeing family and home when he had been younger. It was what had kept him chasing thrills with Special Forces, what had allowed him to dismiss his identity for a mission as a sleeper agent.
He had never known right.
Until Mirie.
“Drei?” Even her voice was an assault on his senses, a sultry tone that caressed the quiet like mist.
“Mmm-hmm.” He wasn’t up to coherent responses yet, not with his blood still slugging through his veins like lava and his thoughts racing with what he had known all along.
Giving in to this was not smart.
“How do you do it?” She let her head roll back against his shoulder, so she could peer up.
“Define it.” Good. He’d shoved two words out. Of course his voice sounded like gravel over broken glass.
“Live in the shadows. Live a half life.” She exhaled another breathy sigh that had such power over him. “I don’t know what else to call it.”
He was so not up to philosophical questions right now. Not when the simple feel of her hair trailing down his arm felt monumental, as if their sex had only scratched the surface of years of lusting and when he recovered he was going to be a whole lot hungrier than before.
He dragged his gaze to hers, buying himself time because he couldn’t wrap his brain around anything beyond the arms she draped tightly around him, as though he were her anchor.
“Half life?” Two more words and an inflection that made them a question. He was making progress.
Her lips tucked at the corners as she considered him, looking thoughtful. He could see the sprinkling of freckles across her nose and cheeks even in this light. Those freckles were the bane of her existence. Once she hadn’t noticed them, but with the constant media attention now, she spent time in front of the mirror trying to conceal, blend or beat those freckles into submission.
She would be mortified he’d noticed.
He thought freckles suited her and hoped she never found a way to cover them. They were a reminder of the free-spirited girl she had once been, a girl who had danced through the meadows and splashed through streams.
The girl who had grown up to be a woman bold enough to make love to him.
“You guard me,” she finally said. “You live with me. Your schedule is my schedule. You don’t leave my life to go live your own. I don’t know anything about your upbringing or your family, and I can count on one hand how many times you have taken a vacation since Oskar died. That leaves you with a day off here and there and then only when I’m entertaining dignitaries in my glittering shell, with the royal guard and media smothering me.”
“Glittering shell?” He knew what she meant.
“The compound.” She waved a dismissive hand. “That doesn’t seem like much of a life to me. So, a half life.”
He nodded, considering.
She waited, and shivered.
“I need to deal with the fire.” He found the words to seize an opportunity for escape. Only the knowledge that they might freeze to death spurred him to get up off his ass and back to reality. There was another part of him that felt he would be okay with freezing to death as long as Mirie was in his arms.
But she complied and untangled her naked self and scooted back against the wall. Her skin gleamed pale in the failing firelight, and his crotch danced a little jig at the sight she made with her long legs stretched out before her, her hair threading around the swell of her lovely breasts.
Christ, he was in trouble here.
That thought was unavoidable as he used the last of the kindling. He’d be heading outside again soon. He should plunge himself into the snow while he was out there. He didn’t think even the blizzard would cool him off.
He coaxed more of the sappy kindling to life with the glowing embers, carefully stoking the fire back while he considered Mirie’s words.
And the stab of pride at her opinion of him.
He had a life even though she couldn’t see it. He served his country and carried out his mission objective. He had only sacrificed the normal life he had never been much interested in anyway, for a much more noble cause.
Like Mirie herself, although she had been born to her cause. But she didn’t see his life from his perspective, and she didn’t sound as if she was all that content with her own.
Loneliness was eating away at her bit by bit.
He wasn’t surprised.
“I guess from your perspective it doesn’t seem like much of a life.” Distance helped him get a grip.
“Sounds a lot like my life.” She finally pulled on the cloak to cover her exquisite nakedness.
He snorted while tucking a branch deep into the embers.
“What?” she asked.
“I thought the same thing.”
He hadn’t meant the admission as an invitation, but she took it as one. Suddenly, she was covering the small distance between them, kneeling before the growing fire, stretching out her hands to embrace the heat.
Drew only heaved an inward sigh. He wanted her to warm herself, wished her nearness didn’t test him and her discontent didn’t add to his defenselessness against her.
She saw only how he trailed after her around the clock, not living a life that would fit anyone’s description of normal. Because she didn’t live a normal life, either. She had once run through these mountains, flirting with the boys, giving her virginity to the one she had allowed to catch her.
Now she gave herself to the only man within her grasp to stave off the grief of her losses. What a waste.
“You’ve been working on a miracle,” he said, hoping to lend her perspective. And some encouragement, which she didn’t hear enough as far as Drew was concerned. “Once the government stabilizes and the economy shows some improvement, you’ll get back to a normal life again. Then, so will I.”
She faced him with a scowl. “By the time this political situation stabilizes, I’ll be ready for the grave like Bunică.”
“Your Royal Highness,” he chided.
To his surprise, she scooted toward him, coming up full against him and wrapping her arms around his waist. “Drei, call me by my name.”
Her breasts pressed against his back, and for a man who’d just spent himself in a big way, Drew’s body was on red alert again before he had a chance to suck in a breath.
He was in such trouble here. The very thought of her name on his lips collided with the memory of his body inside her, and he found himself clutching the stick hard enough that the damned thing broke. Wet wood. Go figure.
But it was the anchor he needed to resist turning around and grabbing her, pulling her against him and going for round two. There’d been no contact with the general. It was just the two of them, stranded here, alone.
She was upset. He got that. He also understood her isolation. He saw her life up close. He lived it. His own wasn’t much better except for the occasional furloughs. But unless they got back to normal between them, this “interlude” could only cost them. And cost big.
They were protector and the princess he’d been hired to protect. Period.
“Princess Mirela of Ninsele.”
“Drei.” She strung out his name on a long melodic syllable that reminded him of her earlier song.
Had it only been hours since the funeral?
The world had shifted since then.
“Mirela Selskala,” he tried again, earning only a huff of exasperation.
Then she surprised him by sinking backward, pulling him off balance and dragging him with her.
Suddenly they were tangled together in the weather cloak, too close to the fire, and Drew was forced to roll over and take her with him. She seized the advantage and twisted in his arms until she straddled him.
And Drew was already so far gone he didn’t resist. Couldn’t. Not when she lifted her mouth to his again in an unspoken demand and laughed that silken laughter that he never heard anymore, hadn’t realized how much he missed.
The last thing in the world Drew should do right now was give in. The absolute last. He’d do better to put the pistol in his mouth and pull the trigger.
But when she rocked her hips, swaying until she had his reawakening erection trapped between her smooth thighs, he could only ride out the motion and try to hide that she was about to shake loose any possibility of resistance.
But she already knew because she sighed softly and swayed erotically, opening herself to him, and he finally gave in. Arching his hips, he found her softness, and thrust home with her name spilling from his lips.
“Mirie.”
CHAPTER FIVE
MIRIE HAD ONLY wanted a moment, had asked for right now. By definition that meant their interlude in the cave wouldn’t last forever, yet when Drei tugged on the harness she wore and asked, “Ready?” she wanted to shake her head with an emphatic no.
A strange sense of panic took hold now that they were dressed again. She wasn’t ready to leave, wasn’t ready to face the aftermath of her choices.
And she wasn’t ready to end her time with Drei.
Not when she had felt more alive during these fantasy hours together than she had in a very long time.
“Yes,” she said. No!
He only nodded, so terribly distant.
She couldn’t read his mood. The handsome face that had been hungry with arousal and so alive with pleasure had solidified into an expression that should have been familiar.
In some ways it was. She recognized the features, but had never understood that the impassive facade was a mask. She had glimpsed the real him today.
The intimacy they shared made him a familiar stranger. The difference was striking enough to unsettle her. As she had dressed, she felt uncertain, as if somehow putting on clothes together had been more monumental than taking them off. Her nerves were playing games with her, making her thin-skinned after too many conflicting emotions, too many memories in a short span of time. The memories alone had always unsettled her.
But all was well now. Or should have been.
General Bogdanovich had made contact. The attackers had long since escaped, and when the storm eased up enough for travel, her close-protection unit had arrived to retrieve her. They were above on the ridge. They’d sent down dry clothing and gear so she could safely make the ascent.
Mirie should be relieved the threat was over, and grateful to be alive. But when she looked at Drei, securing his own harness with the hands that had just held her, pleasured her, she felt a pang of...something, and her breath hitched in her throat at the physical intensity of the sensation.
He glanced up. The hard lines of his face softened, and she could see past the mask. His eyes caressed her as if he might never see her again. She glimpsed longing, and regret.
For one instant, Mirie thought he would reach out and touch her. An acknowledgment of what had passed between them, the caring, the comfort, the contentment. But he didn’t. He said unnecessarily, “They’re waiting above.”
He didn’t bother extinguishing the fire. There wasn’t much life left in the flames anymore, just enough to light their way as they left this place of shelter and unexpected escape.
Nerves were definitely making her thin-skinned and moody. Emotion swelled in her chest as they stepped out onto the ledge.
The path was lit with emergency lanterns to mark their way, a path that ascended straight up from the ledge. From this vantage point, Mirie marveled that they had made the descent successfully at all. Surely she would never have made it had fear and a storm not driven them to desperation.
Drei braced her close as he secured her to the rappel lines, his expression shadowed by the artificial light, his motions perfunctory. Could he so easily forget the way they had found comfort together? It shouldn’t matter, but it did. She wasn’t sure what she had expected after breaching the boundaries of their relationship so completely. Maybe that was the problem. She had acted impulsively, and he had been forced to react to her. There had been no thought. She had felt, and hadn’t been willing to let that feeling go.
She considered this while clinging to the rappel line one-handed. The line lifted her off the ground, and she used her feet to maneuver the branches, twisting them out of her way to avoid the snow dislodged with each step.
The climb was steep even with assistance from above, but Mirie felt no weariness, only awareness of Drei a few feet behind her. He steadied her with an occasional hand on her bottom. He helped her shove aside branches to spare her the trouble when he could. He would have caught her had she fallen.
He protected her. That much was the same.
Then the climb was over. There were men handling the equipment on the ledge, their bodies harnessed around tree trunks to provide the leverage to work the lines. She could see them well before the general reached for her hands to drag her up the remaining distance.
And Mirie left behind her emotions in that snowy gorge, put her own mask back on. “Thank you, General. Gentlemen,” she said, as she gained her footing.
There were quiet greetings, but Mirie was left to the company of the general as the unit of armed men worked to bring up Drei safely.
General Bogdanovich was minister of security with the NRPG under his command. He draped a blanket around her shoulders, and Mirie quietly endured his inspection as she stared into the face dominated by a bushy mustache that overcompensated for a head of thinning brown hair.
“Thank God you’re all right,” he said.
She felt the same way about him. “What of the villagers? You said there were injuries. How serious?”
“Scrapes and falls in the rush to get to the village mostly. No casualties—yet. The priest is in critical condition. The poliţie transported him to the hospital.”
But he wasn’t dead yet. Mirie’s eyes fluttered shut, and she inclined her head. The nearest hospital was forty minutes away in the best of weather, and the storm had not yet spent itself.
God, please, please, please... “Will we be able to contain the fallout?”
“We can brief tomorrow, Your Royal Highness,” he said curtly. “The only thing that matters now is that you’re safe.”
Which told Mirie everything she needed to know.
She had brought this situation upon everyone.
She felt responsible for the consequences, for the potential consequences and for undermining the efforts of people who had worked so hard on behalf of the Ninselan people.
On her behalf.
And when Drei surfaced over the ledge, his gaze sought and found hers immediately, and she felt his glance along with the memory of him wrapped around her. Inside her.
Her longtime protector quickly took charge of her again. He forced her to drink, then eat a few bites of a protein bar while the soldiers dismantled the gear. After speaking privately with General Bogdanovich, Drei instructed her on their destination and settled her behind him on the snowmobile for the trek back to civilization.
But it wasn’t until their convoy had departed, as Mirie sat with her arms tight around Drei’s waist and cheek pressed to his back, wishing they could curl up and doze off together as they had earlier, that Mirie realized her right now might not be so simple after all. Not when the man she had looked past forever was no longer invisible.
* * *
“WELCOME BACK, Your Royal Highness.”
Mirie accepted the coffee cup from her private assistant. “Relieved to be back.”
That much was true.
She set the folder on the desk. The business she had missed since leaving for Alba Luncă could wait a little longer. She took a fortifying sip of the coffee and glanced at Drei. He stood inside the doorway, his usual post while inside her office. His black uniform helped a giant of a man blend into the woodwork no matter where they were.
He wasn’t blending this morning, which had everything to do with the fact that she knew what he looked like beneath the blazer, turtleneck and pants. Mirie took another hot swallow. The past twenty-four hours had taken a toll. Most especially on her senses.
“Why are you still hanging on to that newspaper?” she asked her assistant.
Helena Avadoni exhaled a sigh that said more than words ever could. A petite powerhouse of energy and organizational skill, she oversaw every detail of life from names of visiting dignitaries during events to spare panty hose if Mirie happened to snag her nylons on a chair leg.
“Are you ready?” Helena asked.
Mirie held out her hand and, bracing herself, scanned the bold headline that read:
Luca of Whitefish.
The headline was an obvious play on her own media nickname. “And so it begins.”
The story summed up the claim of a man named Luca Vadim, who had arrived in Ninsele from a town in the northwestern United States, asserting he was the product of an affair between a Ninselan envoy and the late king.
The article claimed Luca Vadim had heard reports of Mirie’s assassination and worried that if the throne was suddenly vacant, Ninsele might be plunged into another civil war. He’d come forward as a public service.
“A public service,” Mirie said aloud. “Really?”
Silence was her only reply. Both Helena and Drei knew the drill. This wasn’t the first time an imposter had come out of nowhere to claim a blood tie to the throne.
Mirie herself had set the precedent to inspire these copycats. After years in hiding, she’d resurfaced with enough political support to oust the dictator. But she’d been backed by royal supporters, and her first item of business had been proving her identity through DNA testing.
Drei opened the office door, and both the general and Georghe entered. Mirie left her desk to greet them.
“You haven’t slept.” She recognized the signs.
“Like anyone sleeps around here.” Georghe kissed her cheek.
Forcing a smile, she felt the weight of her choices even though Georghe was too kind to point out the obvious.
The chancellor of the Crown Cabinet was one of the most caring people Mirie had ever known. His inconspicuous competency was the reason he had survived the dictatorship when most civilian staffers had been executed or exiled.
The dictator had recognized Georghe’s function within the government and had believed he could control the mild-mannered man. Georghe had played the part, working behind the scenes to ease the peoples’ plight in so many ways and ultimately providing Mirie with the necessary support to overthrow the dictator once she had reached the age of majority.
“Come, come.” Georghe motioned to the chairs. “We have a lot to discuss and some decisions to make.”
Business as usual. “Pour yourselves some coffee, gentlemen.”
After visiting the sideboard, Georghe and the general sat in front of the desk.
“I’m not surprised by Vadim’s attempt to capitalize on the attack,” Mirie said. “But what’s this about an assassination? Who reported I was assassinated? I thought we didn’t announce that I would be attending the funeral as a safety precaution.”
“That was the problem,” Georghe explained. “Since we didn’t issue a press release, no legitimate media were invited. You can thank the paparazzi for the false reports. They camp at our gates, so they followed when you left the compound.”
“Not only were those idiots broadcasting the locations of our units, but they jeopardized everyone’s safety,” the general complained. “There were reporters and video cameras cornering villagers as they tried to get through the gate. I had to sacrifice a unit to get the situation under control.”
Wonderful. The consequences of leaving Briere just kept breeding, like mold. Mirie set the cup aside. It would take more than coffee to make her feel better this morning. “Losing that unit impeded your efforts, General?”
“We might have been able to bring in a few more of your attackers alive if I hadn’t needed to divide my forces.” He scowled blackly. “The paparazzi were a distraction, and we let them know that loud and clear.”
Georghe gave a disgusted snort. “So I’ve heard, thank you. My office was flooded with complaints about your infractions against free speech and the public’s right to know before you even picked up Her Royal Highness. Did you really have to instruct your men to destroy the van’s satellite equipment? We were faxed a bill for its replacement.”
“They’re lucky I didn’t take them into custody. I would have if I’d had the manpower. That won’t happen again. Since they can’t be trusted to use discretion during a crisis, they won’t be allowed near Her Royal Highness. I want to assign a unit to keep them away from our gates.”
Mirie wasn’t sure she understood the point of redirecting their limited manpower. “I don’t leave except to go to church.”
“Exactly. That’s your Sunday routine, and these vultures need repetition to get the point. We’ll create a perimeter around the church to keep the paparazzi at a distance. Georghe can write up one of his diplomatic letters informing these media outlets they’ve lost their privileges.”
Georghe exhaled a low whistle. “I like it. We’ll hold the paparazzi accountable, protect the public and let the legitimate press know we’re taking action so the paparazzi won’t stumble on breaking news again. A show of good faith.”
Helena scribbled some notes while the general raised his coffee cup in a mock salute.
“Now can we get to business?” Georghe asked. “I want to hear what we’ve learned about these attackers.”
The general glanced at Drei. “We believe the transport copter continued through the mountains out of Hungarian airspace. They may have grounded the aircraft. We don’t know. The Hungarians’ radar didn’t yield anything, but they did offer to review surveillance tapes from their military base and a private airstrip in the region.”
“Do you think they’ll find anything?” Mirie asked.
“The attackers would have to be idiots to go anywhere close to civilization. Drei thinks they headed to Ukraine, using the mountains as cover for their escape.”
For the same reasons he had used them to escape with her. Spotty satellite coverage. Terrain that limited radio frequency. Was it any wonder Ninsele couldn’t get a lock on her own borders?
The military had been dismantled and replaced with paid thugs during the authoritarian regime, so the general had been rebuilding their armed forces ever since Mirie’s return. Unfortunately, rebuilding cost money the treasury didn’t have at the moment.
“Do you think the attack was a protest of the upcoming talks?” Mirie had to ask.
“If so, no one has claimed responsibility,” Georghe said. “Not yet, anyway.”
“We do have several corpses, so we haven’t hit a dead end,” the general went on. “The medical examiner is working to identify them now. Hopefully they’ll provide some leads.”
Georghe glanced at Mirie, his expression neutral. He would never say, “I told you so,” but he wasn’t happy. He glanced at Drei, and then said, “I’m sure you’ll come up with something soon. Her Royal Highness is home safely, which is what matters most.”
Mirie sighed. “Let’s discuss damage control for my newest half sibling, shall we?”
Georghe briefed her on Vadim, an American attorney who claimed to have been born out of wedlock during the first years of her parents’ marriage.
“A first child,” she said. “We haven’t had one of those before. And an American. That’s new, too.”
No one replied. Dealing with these claims was always awkward. Her father couldn’t defend himself against the charges and no one wanted to offend Mirie by impugning his moral conduct.
She kept the lead. “Do we know when Vadim was born?”
Georghe shuffled through some paperwork. “I’ve got his entry papers. June 29, 1980.”
Mirie mentally calculated. “My mother would have been pregnant with Alexi.”
No response.
“Do we know yet if my father even visited America during―” more calculations “―October of ’79 or thereabouts?”
Georghe didn’t bother looking back at his papers. “His Majesty visited Washington, D.C., for several weeks the year the honorary consulate opened. The time frame works.”
“And the alleged mother. She was in our employ?”
“That checks, too. An envoy named Ileana Vadim. A Ninselan citizen. She put in her notice in late 1981, and I couldn’t find any documentation that she ever returned to Ninsele. I’ve got my staff trying to track her down now.”
She nodded. “So Luca Vadim has done his homework.”
Silence. Mirie didn’t really need a reply. Everyone around the table was likely thinking the same thing.
Jus sanguinis. Salic law.
She may be in charge right now. She may eventually give birth to a son who could grow up to be king, but she would never be queen. Primogeniture decreed that only males could rule.
She couldn’t change that law even if she had been so inclined. Until she could negotiate consensus on the government structure, such a move would be seen as self-serving and could potentially deepen the rift between the opposing factions that had only tentatively been bridged since the civil war.
“Vadim is an attorney,” she said. “His most likely move will be to take his claim to court and sue for the right to the throne as the only living male heir.”
“He’d have to establish paternity,” Georghe said.
“He won’t,” Mirie said firmly. “Not through legal means, anyway. But if he continues to use the media, he will cast doubt on my right to negotiate with the European Commission. Enough doubt, and he may give the representatives one more reason to delay the talks.”
The very last thing they needed was to make the process of hosting representatives from the European Commission more complex. Like the Western Balkans that endured years of civil war, Ninsele had to be stabilized before it could formally become an acceding country with the commission’s support.
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Jeanie London
Тип: электронная книга
Жанр: Современные любовные романы
Язык: на английском языке
Издательство: HarperCollins
Дата публикации: 16.04.2024
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О книге: His only duty is to defend herCovert agent Drew Canady has guarded Princess Mirie Selskla without once crossing the line between protector and lover. Keeping her safe, and his true identity under wraps, has never been a problem. Then an attack against Mirie sends her straight into his arms. Suddenly all those feelings he’s never acknowledged won’t go away.Drew knows she’s the last woman he should fall for. His focus must be on finding the enemy—even if that blows his cover and drives Mirie from his life for good. But as the stakes climb, maybe he’s underestimated the power of the attraction between them…