Page 26 of Bound

“Uhhh…” She bowed her head to hide her sudden flush. “Yes, of course I did. As an example of the ridiculous conclusions that my brothers are leaping t—”

“You mean the same impressions to which I sprang, right outside the cimetiere? And that I am certain Ozias and Jagger reached as well?”

“Creator’s bloody-stumped toes.” She lost every battle against her senses, which now screamed in humiliated horror. “Emme! Why did you not say something? Or at least give me a look or a glance that would have—”

“Done what, exactly?” her maid returned. “Blithely noted that most people being hunted by half of Paris’s police force do not do so with shaky knees, swollen lips, and blatant beard burn? That the soldier-spies helping them rarely follow their every move with such ardent interest or are fine with having a crown princess call them Sir.”

“Former crown princess,” Jayd interjected.

“Not part of the world’s reality yet,” Emme debated. “Regardless, the point is the point.”

And a damn solid one too.

Neither of them voiced it. Neither of them had to. A fast look toward her maid, as serene and humble as before, was verification enough. Whatever the outside world chose to infer or invent, the jig was up.

But instead of more dread, the realization brought Jayd…relief. A flood of it. A cleansing so complete, she was not even tempted to laugh about it. She was ready to cry.

“Highness?” The woman’s sweet sough provided another tug toward the tears. “Do you…want to talk about it?”

Jayd turned and sagged against the vanity. “Yes. No. Oh, I do not know.” She folded her arms and dropped her head. “Things are so confusing right now,” she rasped, ending with a gulp. She knew not why she still battled the tears, except to admit that once she pulled out the stops on the spillways, the deluge was likely not to stop for a while. As in, well after her new color had to be washed out.

“Confusing,” Emme reiterated. “Because you did not expect to be bringing Brickham home with you?”

The heat behind her eyes became a tormenting sting. “To begin with, yes.”

“And that is not a comfortable circumstance for him? Or maybe for you?”

Jayd sniffed. Hard. “How about box number one and two?”

Her friend nodded. “And because everything you shared in Paris was never supposed to last longer than Paris. And now that it has—”

“No.” As she swung a hand up high, more agony thudded the opposite direction, low in her gullet. “It has not. Which is exactly what I must accept here.”

“Why?”

Because Maximillian Brickham refuses to see it any other way.

Because even though we are here, he clearly cannot wait to get back there. As far away from me as he can get. As far away from what we had…

For the thousandth time, she fought to justify that somehow. To sympathize with why he looked like they had flown to Alcatraz, not Arcadia. Like his room, the most opulent in the palais infirmary, was actually his locked cell and not a gift from the cosmos, part of the conspiracy to keep them together a little while longer.

Why?

Because Samsyn had gotten to him before she had? Perhaps said something? Made a caveman-style threat? But Syn had not been in there long. He’d beat her by a few minutes at the most. And though he was the most physically daunting of her brothers, Brickham’s dimensions were nearly identical. Moreover, they spoke the same language of tiger snarls, tidal waves, and testosterone. No way could Syn have unnerved him that easily.

Which meant he was already spooked for another reason.

What?

Was there someone waiting for him back in Seattle? Maybe a number of someones? Did he have certain agreements with them when he was traveling for his missions?

At once, she doubted that. In so many ways, she sensed it was about…more. Or, depending on how one approached the subject, less. Not a female who waited for him at home. One who was somehow…with him…already. Pounding through his head. And his heart?

Was she haunting him from another realm, perhaps? Or maybe relentless with him from this one?

Or maybe…

That woman was her.