Total pages in book: 67
Estimated words: 64571 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 323(@200wpm)___ 258(@250wpm)___ 215(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 64571 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 323(@200wpm)___ 258(@250wpm)___ 215(@300wpm)
“We need to find who talked after all this time,” I say. “Someone just handed her proof you survived.”
Lily slides off my lap, standing straight, the sleep now gone from her eyes. “Then let’s find them first.” She straightens my shirt that’s swallowing her small frame, but her jaw is set with that stubborn determination.
Killian has already shifted over to another computer, pulling up personnel files, cross-referencing anyone with access to Victor’s old missions who might have talked. “I’ll start with the extraction team. See if anyone had financial irregularities, family pressure, or anything that could turn them.”
Lily’s mouth forms a perfect O.
“And I’ll trace the queen’s recent contacts.” I stand to stretch the tension from my shoulders. We’re far from done gathering intel, but there is now a more visible path. The more information we can uncover, the easier it will be for me to protect Lily and end the threat to her. “Someone fed her this.”
Lily nods. “You seem to have it handled.” She gives me a tentative smile, already moving toward the door. “I’m going to leave you all to it and go check on Teddy. She’s probably reorganized the vault by crown size or gemstone color by now.”
“Tell her I said good job,” Killian calls after her, not looking up from his screen.
Lily lingers in the doorway, hand on the frame, looking back at me. “Tristan?”
“Yeah, princess?”
“Thank you for telling me. All of it.” Her smile is small but real. “Even the parts that hurt.” Then she’s gone.
Killian waits until the door clicks shut. “The son.”
I pause mid-stretch. “What?”
“Prince Julian. Twenty-six, educated at Oxford, currently serving as Grandeurs’ ambassador to the UN.” Killian pulls up a file and rotates the monitor toward me. “He’s been making noise about reform. Anti-corruption. Transparency in royal finances.”
“The queen can’t love that,” I say.
“Making himself enemies.” Killian zooms in to show me. “And three weeks ago, he requested classified briefings on his father’s personal correspondence. Including off-books communications.” I stare at the date. Three weeks ago. That timeline is adding up.
“You think he knows about her?” I glance over to him.
“I think,” Killian says slowly, “that if anyone could find out what the queen is up to or is already on to her, it would be him.”
I sit back down, pulling the keyboard closer.
“Find me a secure channel. Something that won’t trace back.” Not that it matters much. They know where we are.
“You’re going to contact a foreign prince?”
“I’m going to find out whose side he’s on.” I look at the closed door, knowing I’ll do anything to protect Lily. “If he’s willing to take down his own mother, he might be the only person who can end this without more blood.”
I double-check the secure line and bounce the signal… And hope I’m not about to make things worse.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
LILY
“Amethyst cluster to your left,” Teddy calls out, her hand motioning under it like she’s displaying it on The Price Is Right. She has really reorganized the vault by gemstone color.
“Now the ruby section’s on the back right, past the emergency rations and the spare ammunition.”
That makes sense. The blood-red rubies should be by the ammunition. Minnie hops down from the velvet couch and stretches out, the tiara on her head slipping off.
“Ope.” Teddy hurries over to attempt to balance it back in place.
I stand in the doorway, simply watching my best friend treat a secure vault and kind of panic room like a dressing room.
“You know this is supposed to be for hiding from assassins,” I tease her. It doesn’t matter how heavy life can get, Teddy has a way of lightening everything. It’s a talent. It goes from zero to a hundred in a millisecond.
“Multipurpose space,” Teddy says, adjusting the tiara until it sits at an angle. “Besides, if I’m going to be murdered, I’d prefer to be wearing a crown.” She strikes a pose, the diamonds catching the emergency lighting. “So? How are you handling everything?”
“It is what it is.” I try to shrug it off.
“Don’t.” She abandons the tiara, crossing to me. “The princess thing. Double dads. The your-boyfriend-is-a-psychopath thing. Everything.” Calling Tristan a boyfriend sounds so strange. We’re way past that. Sure, the relationship of being together hasn’t been long, but we’ve lived together for a while. We probably know each other better than most couples that have officially been together for longer.
“Glass houses.” Her man is a psychopath too. I collapse onto the velvet couch. Minnie immediately tries to wiggle halfway into my lap. I swear she has no clue how big she is.
“Which are you worried about?”
“Any of it. All of it.” Teddy tucks her legs beneath her. “I’m checking in. Your mood is off and not just ‘I found out I’m secretly royalty’ weird. It’s more than that.”
I pick at a loose thread on the couch. “Tristan’s planning to contact my brother. Half brother,” I correct. “Prince Julian.”