future. The best parts of Damien and I merged into a new human. It seems a miracle. And one I must keep safe at all costs.
“Then let’s go,” I say.
“Don’t forget to eat something,” Kate says. “The rolls are still warm.”
“Thank you,” I answer. I don’t add that I couldn’t muster a bite with my stress. Though the smell is heavenly. That alone gives me comfort.
“Shall we, Highness?” X steps to the side with a deferential gesture.
Damien settles a hand low on my back. “After you.”
His touch grounds me. It’s true we have a mad desire, more chemistry than a laboratory. But is that enough?
We are both broken in our own ways. Perhaps we will end up only hurting one another, but I have to take a leap of faith.
And with that, I step through the door.
I don’t know what I expected to see. Maybe a dank corridor, with moss-covered stones and the sound of distant dripping water. Instead, there is a state-of-the-art elevator. I look where the buttons should be, and there is nothing but a black screen.
“How does this thing work?” I ask.
“Fingerprint activation.” X splays his big hand and a female robotic voice says, “Which floor?”
“The roof.”
The doors shuts and we lurch up. Damien puts his arms around me. “Nothing bad will happen to you. I meant what I said. I will protect you.”
I wish it was because he loved me, but I know it’s because it’s his duty.
“No matter what, swear you will protect our child.” A mama bear instinct rises in me. No matter what dangers might befall us, this child must survive unharmed.
“With my life,” Damien grinds out.
“Yes. Well, that got heavy fast,” X murmurs as the elevator doors open onto the roof of the palace. “Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.”
Damien
I’VE RIDDEN UNBROKEN steeds and driven the fastest cars, but there is nothing to describe the feeling when X hands me the cyclic and I take control of the aircraft.
I got my pilot’s license a couple years ago, but the racing circuit has given me little opportunity to fly, and I’ve never flown a copter such as this.
“Nikolai would not approve,” I say with an air of triumph in my voice.
X quirks a brow but says nothing.
Behind me, Juliet places a hand on my shoulder, and I instinctively reach up to grab it, resting my palm over hers. A jolt of something shoots through me. Not a memory—but the memory of a feeling, like touching her is as natural as taking my next breath.
But I know this is wishful thinking, that I might feel what she feels. I refuse to believe we could have found something so real in a matter of days.
I don’t do real.
I don’t deserve real.
And I certainly don’t trust my heart to another. I did that once, and look where I ended up.
“Have you flown before?” I ask over my shoulder.
“No,” she admits. “I was never permitted to leave Nightgardin. When the king and queen were choosing my suitor, one of the requirements was for each prospect to come to court. Never was I to visit them. It would not have been appropriate for me to be seen in public.”
She speaks the words like they are a script, and my blood boils to hear it—how she’s been conditioned to believe she is nothing more than a means to an end. Perhaps if she were male, she’d have been raised to be a ruthless king. Instead her mother and father have stripped her of all her worth.
“I will kill them if they raise a finger in your direction,” I tell her. “The king and the queen.”
Her hand slips away, and she says nothing.
“May I, Your Highness?” X says, and I give him control of the craft. “It is time to land, and only I know the exact coordinates.”
Below us is the smallest valley between the mountains, one I do not remember seeing on any map. As we descend, I note the smoothness of the insides of these mountains, as if they were carved by hand and not formed from generations of erosion.
“What is this place, X?” I ask.
Juliet leans forward, eyes wide, as we continue to drop down.
My ears pop, and my stomach lurches. I watch the instruments of the aircraft.
“We’re below sea level, X. Where the hell are you taking us?”
X grins, a rare expression for this enigma of a man. “The safest place in the kingdom,” he says.
I scoff. “The palace war room is—”
“No,” X interrupts. “The palace war room is the safest place known to your people. But where we are is unknown to any. Not your father. Not Benedict. Not even Nikolai.”
When we finally land, we are in what looks like a hangar save for the open sky hundreds of feet above. But then the stars disappear as something closes over us.
“Welcome,” X says. “I always wondered which one of the princes would see this place first, but somewhere in the back of my mind, I knew it would be you, Prince Damien.”
I shake my head, not sure what the hell this guy is talking about.
“Enough with the riddles, X. Tell me what the fuck is going on.”
He turns so Juliet can see him, too.
“You’re the key,” he says to me. “The key to saving your family, and your kingdom.”
* * *
After winding through a labyrinth of tunnels, all lined by several doors X does not take us through, we finally stop in front of one that looks no different from the rest. X pulls a key from his pocket and unlocks what looks like the entrance to a prison cell. But when we enter we find rows of desks and intricate-looking computer equipment—and a to-go coffee cup on one desk marked by a lipstick imprint. But no drinker of said coffee.
X sighs. “Always on the run,” he says under his breath with a rueful sigh.
“Who?” I ask.
“What?” X counters. “Oh, I spoke aloud. Hmm... I’ll have to watch that. Bad habit.”
He walks up and down the rows of monitors, tapping a button here, touching a
