Maxence could enjoy the show, but not the mercenary. And for just a moment, Maxence forgot the horrors of the preceding twelve hours as her curvy, soft breasts jiggled in her bodice while she tried to grab his phone in her bra.
She pulled his phone out of her cleavage like she was finishing a magic trick and handed it to him. “Yep! I’ve got it!”
The phone in his palm was still warm from its time between her breasts, and Max’s dick twitched in his pants.
He turned back to Magnus Jensen, who had absolutely no expression on his face. “I’ll need your phone number.”
Behind him, Dree said, “By the way, I also have the—” but Max was so busy stepping between Magnus Jenson’s greedy eyes and Dree that he didn’t turn around.
After Maxence tapped the commando’s number into his phone, Magnus Jensen placed a button with no wires or power source on the coffee table. “This panic button will send an alert to every operator in the vicinity. There’s another one on your nightstand in the bedroom. You can put them inside drawers, or there is adhesive for concealing them on the undersides of furniture.”
They understood.
He placed two small devices with a ring at one of their ends beside the panic button. “These are key fobs. Keep them on you at all times. If you activate either the panic button or the key fobs, Rogue Security operators will enter your location with guns drawn in a level-five assault. Their assessment of the situation could lead to gunfire and deaths. I need to stress to you that activating these buttons or key fobs is only for the most extreme emergency, like what happened at the Sea Change Gala.”
Maxence and Dree nodded.
Magnus Jensen added, “Cell phone communication is recommended for anything less than a full-frontal assault. You can tell us if you want discreet backup or something more forceful. Cell phone communication is also recommended before you go anywhere within or outside the palace.”
Once again, Dree and Maxence nodded.
Magnus Jensen left the royal apartment, locking the door behind him.
After a deep breath, Maxence was just turning back to Dree, telling her, “You were magnificent. I promise you that I will find those assholes and hold them down while you beat the living—”
As he caught sight of Dree, her blue eyes were enormous on her little elfin face, and tears wobbled on her lower eyelids.
“Oh,no.Oh,chérie.”He crossed the floor in three giant steps and folded her in his arms.
“I’m sorry! Farm girls don’t cry!I never do this,and I’m sorry, andI shouldn’t be crying because everyone’s all right and it’s over and I don’t know why I can’t stop!”
She melted in his arms, slipping downward as he was looking for her in his empty arms, and he found her as a tiny, sad lump on the carpeting, sobbing.
He crouched and placed one hand on her back. “No, no, Dree. You did wonderfully. You were a rock. You saved yourself. I just gave you a ride.”
“They hogtied me like a rodeo calf and were going to shoot me!”
He settled to his knees beside her and stole a glance out of the corner of his eyes at his room around him—the richly upholstered couch and ornately carved coffee table, the thick rug under his shoes, and the centuries-old, French chandelier hanging in the center of the room—because only four hours ago he had assumed he would never see any of this or this fantastically sweet woman again.
She curled into a fetal position and rolled away from him. “Don’t be nice to me. I don’t cry like this, and you shouldn’t beniceto me. Being nice justencouragesit.”
Maxence lowered himself to lie beside her on the carpeting and tucked her against his chest. “You were magnificent. If we hadn’t been there to pluck you up and throw you in the helicopter, I’m sure you would have crawled all the way back to the palace and into the front door.”
“Nuh-uh.They were going to kill me. That was the third time I tried to escape, and they were going to blow my head off if they caught me.”
Maxence pulled away to look down at her. “Your third escape attempt?”
She nodded, still tearful. “The first time, I installed malware on their computer that made the screen get stuck on some nasty porn. While they were trying to deal with the computer screaming, I just walked out. I would have made it, too, except the one car that pulled over to pick me up was the sister of the guy who nabbed me, Kir Sokolov.”
Maxence cuddled her more tightly against his chest. “I will hunt them down to the ends of the Earth. I can have Interpol arrest them. If that doesn’t work, I’ll send my military to assassinate them.”
“I can’t believe I was so stupid as to let them get me. I didn’t even know they were in Monaco.”
“What on Earth would the Sokolov bratva want with you?”
“Those are the people my ex-boyfriend, Francis Senft, stole the money from, and then he told them thatIhad the money. Have you heard of them?”
Maxence shook his head as the information rattled around and connected to the right neurons. “I met Kir Sokolov at the Sea Change Gala last night.” How could it only have been last night? “I’ve known his sister Matryona for years. We were in school together.”
