“Why?”
“In case someone showed up asking questions—like my father’s men or his enemies.”
“So he hid you from the king?”
“Of course. Someone wanted me dead. So Poppie wasn’t going to allow me to return here until he knew it was safe.”
Becker laughed. “And he thinks it’s safe now?”
“No, he doesn’t. But my presence can save many lives, and that outweighs everything else. And the threat to me personally that he’s protected me from all my life, he’s going to deal with himself, since my father never did.”
Becker was silent for a moment, then said, “So last month your guardian shatters everything you believed about your life, telling you instead that you’re royalty? And you simply believed him? Why?”
“Are you joking?” she said painfully. “I didn’t believe any of it. It was too horrible, too—”
“Horrible that you’re a princess?” he scoffed.
She closed her eyes. She hadn’t wanted to tell him this much. His doubt was wearing her down. He still hadn’t taken his hands off her, either. And he shouldn’t be treating her like this at all!
“No ready answer this time, Alana?—if that’s even your name.”
The harsh tone he’d been frightening her with turned neutral for that question. His hands left her shoulders, too, though a finger trailed softly down her arm almost in a distracted manner. She shivered. It had to be the cold. It couldn’t be his touch.
“Think whatever you like,” she said tiredly. “You’re going to anyway.”
“This is how you are going to save lives?”
Her eyes snapped open again. He was right. She didn’t have the luxury of giving up.
She sighed. “Let me put it this way, Captain. The disbelief you’re exhausting me with? Well, my disbelief when Poppie told me I was a royal princess was a hundred times that, and I’m very good with math, so that isn’t an exaggeration. Poppie might have called me princess all my life, but I just thought it was an endearment. Of course I didn’t believe that I’m the king of Lubinia’s daughter. But there’s something you should know. Poppie loves me. He changed his life for me. He would never have confessed what brought that about if it weren’t true.”
“Why?”
“Because he was sure I would despise him for it.”
“For stealing you from this very palace eighteen years ago? This is what he told you, correct? Or was he actually not involved in that theft? Did this man who raised you merely know the real thief and took you from him or her?”
She was tempted to lie, to remove Poppie from the original crime—and the captain’s avid interest. But Poppie had told her to tell the truth, and she had to have faith that it would lead to her being reunited with her father.
“No, it was Poppie who took me directly from the palace nursery, though he wasn’t supposed to. He’d been paid to kill me.”
“Where is he now?”
“I don’t know.”
“Where is he?”
“I swear I don’t know! We stayed at an inn on the edge of town, but he warned me I wouldn’t find him there again. I told you. He’s going to track down the person who hired him eighteen years ago to kill me.”
“When are you going to figure out that I don’t like being lied to?”
He was abruptly in front of her again. To see how much he’d been frightening her with those rapid questions? Or so she couldn’t mistake how angry he still was?
“I have been telling you the absolute truth and will continue to do so. I really don’t have a choice in that.”
“There are always choices, and you need to make a better one if you hope to get out of here.”
She sucked in her breath. He couldn’t keep her locked up. He wouldn’t dare. She was his king’s daughter! But she began to tremble, half from the cold, half from fear. Yet she couldn’t let him know how much he was intimidating her. Fear would make her look guilty. He’d never believe her then.
