“Really?”
“It’s in a secret pocket,” I explain, as flatly as possible. “Inside of my pants.”
She nods slowly.
“Right under the tag,” I add. “It’s the size of a car remote. Small thing with little buttons on it. Do you think you can get that out and hand it to me?”
“I’ll see what I can do.”
I try to push my butt as close to the open back of the chair as I can. “It’s right at the base of my spine.”
This is not a flattering or dignified position, or how I like to be around a beautiful woman I’m wooing.But screw that.
Lucie scoots her chair closer and starts reaching. I feelher fingers grip around the edge of my pants. I try to get a little closer with a scootch of my chair. She’s gripping and fumbling around, knuckle-deep under my belt, between my jeans and underwear. On thewrongside of me, where no hand other than mine has been allowed since I learned to wash on my own.
I try not to think about it.
“I have it,” she says, tugging.
She got it out!“Pass it to my fingers.”
She twists her wrist and I grab my security pager, our beacon of hope. I’ve practiced touch-typing this thing enough times to know what I’m doing without looking. Just a few quick key presses, and then one depressed click to send.
I lean on the back of the chair. “Now we wait.”
About ten minutes later, I hear something. Unfortunately, it’s Butcher’s and his friends’ voices growing louder as they approach the door. But then I hear something else. Stomping boots and more voices, loud ones. Lots of people running.
Thud. Thud. Thud.
That sounds like beanbag guns. The cavalry has arrived.
The wooden door cracks against the force of a siege ram. The glare of powerful flashlights blinds me as the door collapses. Four guys in heavy SWAT gear run in to clear the room and rescue us. They snip the ropes, one strand at a time, until I can get my arms free.
Lucie runs into my embrace.
I pull her close and turn to the guys. “Thank you!”
“Stay low,” the team leader says.
We crouch down. I hear gunshots outside followed by more air cannon thuds, and then loud pops. Gas canisters. The gang must be coming out in force to defend their turf.They haven’t realized who they’re up against, and what these men’s orders are if they believe that my life is in imminent danger.
I lift Lucie’s chin and peer at her face, expecting her to be scared stiff. What I see is the opposite. Color has returned to her cheeks, and she looks relieved and almost excited.
Suddenly, I realize why. We can still get hurt, take a round or even a stray bullet. But no one is raping her today.
As guilt-tainted relief floods me, I vow to myself that no one ever will.
23
LUCIE
We’re driving up a twisty motorway against a heart-stopping Alpine backdrop.
Anders, who’s Max’s bodyguard, or whatever the proper royal term would be, is at the wheel. Max and I are in the back.
I met Anders late last night after the SWAT team took us to a safe house. I also learned about Mount Evor, a secret principality on our eastern border. As if that wasn’t enough, I had to wrap my head around the fact that my boss, Max Delaroche, is in fact Prince Maximilian Valois-Montevor and a member of the royal family of said principality.
I’m still processing that last bit.
