“Okay.”I raised my hands in the air.“Ich tue, was du verlangt hast!I’m doing what you’ve asked!”
If the armed police were really there looking for me, the best thing I could do was cooperate.Getting myself shot wouldn’t help me or Caroline.If being in command had taught me anything, it was that compliance, at least initially, was a good first instinct.
“What’s happening?”Caroline’s voice was shaky as she watched me kneel.I doubted she’d ever seen her master do as he was told before.I couldn’t remember the last time I had.Her intervention, however, only inspired one of the officers to turn their weapon on her.
“Bitte!”I arbitrated on her behalf, needing to let them know Caroline couldn’t speak their language.“Sie spricht kein Deutsch.She doesn’t understand.”
“Then let us speak English.”A pale-faced woman stepped forward, her expression serious.“Are you Commander General Adam Harper?”
“Yes.”For the first time in fucking years, the things happening around me were out of my control, and I didn’t know how to cope.“I’m Adam Harper.”
After so long being the one either wielding the weapons or in charge of those who did, it was utterly debilitating to find myself so powerless.But worse still was the threat to Caroline.She’d done nothing wrong except follow me across the English Channel, and she’d already been punished enough.Ian’s rules and the terrible regime at Fortorus had seen to that.I couldn’t live with myself if anything else awful happened to her—especially because of me.
“Please, make sure she’s not harmed.”I glanced Caroline’s way, our eyes meeting for just long enough for me to acknowledge the heartbreak swimming in her gaze.
“And you are...”The officer who was seemingly in charge of the spiraling events checked her notes before her gaze rose to Caroline.“Miss Caroline Craness?”
“Y-yes.”Caroline’s stammered response was reminiscent of so many better times, times when I’d been the one provoking her agitation, but kneeling on the hard floor, I had no way of knowing whether we’d ever know those moments of intimacy again.
“You will also come with us, please, Miss Craness.”
“What’s happening?”Caroline gripped the banister.“Where are you taking us?”
“Wait there.”The asshole with his gun still pointed at her raised one hand as he spoke.
“But,” she started.“We need to know what’s happening!If you’re the police, what are the charges?”
“Allow us to explain, Miss Craness.”The female officer’s accent was thick, but her English was word perfect.“But please, you must not resist.”
“Notresist?”She sounded horrified, and had I not been so overwrought, I might have smirked at the disgust in her voice.
My little girl had never been one for conformity.
“Commander General Adam Harper.”
My attention was back on the policewoman immediately as she spoke.Traveling under the guise of Adam Clément meant I hadn’t heard my old title for days, and somehow, the resonance of it was disturbingly jarring in the crowded hallway.“We are arresting you for war crimes and crimes of aggression in violation of international human rights treaties and international law.”
Her words reverberated in my ears, some of them captured and processed by my brain, while others seemed to rebound elsewhere, lost in the ether.
War crimes.My head lowered.That’s who I am—a war criminal.
I hadn’t known my arrest was coming, but I’d always been aware of the risk once I’d left Britain.Ian’s bullshit laws provided impunity there, but beyond its borders, I was fair game.
Throat drying, all I could think was that they’d found me.Somehow, the authorities had tracked us down.Despite moving under the radar and only paying for things in cash, they’d discovered who and where I was.
The question of ‘how’ flitted through my mind like a musical chord, but the rational answers were soon drowned out by the crescendo of alarm, its melody screaming in my head until I turned to acknowledge the noise wasn’t music at all but someone screaming.
Carolinewas screaming.
“Miss Craness.”The female officer scowled.“You’ll need to be silent, or we shall take you to the car outside.”
“Caroline.”For maybe the first time,Igazed atherwith imploring eyes, needing her to know that, however the situation had arisen, and however much I might have loathed the fear in her voice, pissing off the people with the guns would not pay dividends.For the time being, webothhad to concede.“Please.”
Holding my gaze, her eyes sent me their terrified unspoken message, and knowing I couldn’t move to comfort her tore me up inside.
“Okay.”Her voice was croaky as she stepped forward and reached for my shoulder.Her delicate digits clung to me as though I was her anchor in the raging storm.The irony of that analogy was that, for so many weeks, she had been mine.“I’ll be quiet.”
With a curt nod, the female officer went on, “While you will initially be held in custody in Switzerland, you will ultimately be transferred to the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court in The Hague, in the Netherlands.”
