Her Last Protector

General Bogdanovich had made contact. The attackers had long since escaped, and when the storm eased up enough for travel, her close-protection unit had arrived to retrieve her. They were above on the ridge. They’d sent down dry clothing and gear so she could safely make the ascent.

Mirie should be relieved the threat was over, and grateful to be alive. But when she looked at Drei, securing his own harness with the hands that had just held her, pleasured her, she felt a pang of...something, and her breath hitched in her throat at the physical intensity of the sensation.

He glanced up. The hard lines of his face softened, and she could see past the mask. His eyes caressed her as if he might never see her again. She glimpsed longing, and regret.

For one instant, Mirie thought he would reach out and touch her. An acknowledgment of what had passed between them, the caring, the comfort, the contentment. But he didn’t. He said unnecessarily, “They’re waiting above.”

He didn’t bother extinguishing the fire. There wasn’t much life left in the flames anymore, just enough to light their way as they left this place of shelter and unexpected escape.

Nerves were definitely making her thin-skinned and moody. Emotion swelled in her chest as they stepped out onto the ledge.

The path was lit with emergency lanterns to mark their way, a path that ascended straight up from the ledge. From this vantage point, Mirie marveled that they had made the descent successfully at all. Surely she would never have made it had fear and a storm not driven them to desperation.

Drei braced her close as he secured her to the rappel lines, his expression shadowed by the artificial light, his motions perfunctory. Could he so easily forget the way they had found comfort together? It shouldn’t matter, but it did. She wasn’t sure what she had expected after breaching the boundaries of their relationship so completely. Maybe that was the problem. She had acted impulsively, and he had been forced to react to her. There had been no thought. She had felt, and hadn’t been willing to let that feeling go.

She considered this while clinging to the rappel line one-handed. The line lifted her off the ground, and she used her feet to maneuver the branches, twisting them out of her way to avoid the snow dislodged with each step.

The climb was steep even with assistance from above, but Mirie felt no weariness, only awareness of Drei a few feet behind her. He steadied her with an occasional hand on her bottom. He helped her shove aside branches to spare her the trouble when he could. He would have caught her had she fallen.

He protected her. That much was the same.

Then the climb was over. There were men handling the equipment on the ledge, their bodies harnessed around tree trunks to provide the leverage to work the lines. She could see them well before the general reached for her hands to drag her up the remaining distance.

And Mirie left behind her emotions in that snowy gorge, put her own mask back on. “Thank you, General. Gentlemen,” she said, as she gained her footing.

There were quiet greetings, but Mirie was left to the company of the general as the unit of armed men worked to bring up Drei safely.

General Bogdanovich was minister of security with the NRPG under his command. He draped a blanket around her shoulders, and Mirie quietly endured his inspection as she stared into the face dominated by a bushy mustache that overcompensated for a head of thinning brown hair.

“Thank God you’re all right,” he said.

She felt the same way about him. “What of the villagers? You said there were injuries. How serious?”

“Scrapes and falls in the rush to get to the village mostly. No casualties—yet. The priest is in critical condition. The poliţie transported him to the hospital.”

But he wasn’t dead yet. Mirie’s eyes fluttered shut, and she inclined her head. The nearest hospital was forty minutes away in the best of weather, and the storm had not yet spent itself.

God, please, please, please... “Will we be able to contain the fallout?”

“We can brief tomorrow, Your Royal Highness,” he said curtly. “The only thing that matters now is that you’re safe.”

Which told Mirie everything she needed to know.

She had brought this situation upon everyone.

She felt responsible for the consequences, for the potential consequences and for undermining the efforts of people who had worked so hard on behalf of the Ninselan people.

On her behalf.

And when Drei surfaced over the ledge, his gaze sought and found hers immediately, and she felt his glance along with the memory of him wrapped around her. Inside her.

Her longtime protector quickly took charge of her again. He forced her to drink, then eat a few bites of a protein bar while the soldiers dismantled the gear. After speaking privately with General Bogdanovich, Drei instructed her on their destination and settled her behind him on the snowmobile for the trek back to civilization.

But it wasn’t until their convoy had departed, as Mirie sat with her arms tight around Drei’s waist and cheek pressed to his back, wishing they could curl up and doze off together as they had earlier, that Mirie realized her right now might not be so simple after all. Not when the man she had looked past forever was no longer invisible.

* * *

“WELCOME BACK, Your Royal Highness.”

Mirie accepted the coffee cup from her private assistant. “Relieved to be back.”

That much was true.

She set the folder on the desk. The business she had missed since leaving for Alba Luncă could wait a little longer. She took a fortifying sip of the coffee and glanced at Drei. He stood inside the doorway, his usual post while inside her office. His black uniform helped a giant of a man blend into the woodwork no matter where they were.

He wasn’t blending this morning, which had everything to do with the fact that she knew what he looked like beneath the blazer, turtleneck and pants. Mirie took another hot swallow. The past twenty-four hours had taken a toll. Most especially on her senses.

“Why are you still hanging on to that newspaper?” she asked her assistant.

Helena Avadoni exhaled a sigh that said more than words ever could. A petite powerhouse of energy and organizational skill, she oversaw every detail of life from names of visiting dignitaries during events to spare panty hose if Mirie happened to snag her nylons on a chair leg.

“Are you ready?” Helena asked.

Mirie held out her hand and, bracing herself, scanned the bold headline that read:

Luca of Whitefish.

The headline was an obvious play on her own media nickname. “And so it begins.”

The story summed up the claim of a man named Luca Vadim, who had arrived in Ninsele from a town in the northwestern United States, asserting he was the product of an affair between a Ninselan envoy and the late king.

The article claimed Luca Vadim had heard reports of Mirie’s assassination and worried that if the throne was suddenly vacant, Ninsele might be plunged into another civil war. He’d come forward as a public service.

“A public service,” Mirie said aloud. “Really?”

Silence was her only reply. Both Helena and Drei knew the drill. This wasn’t the first time an imposter had come out of nowhere to claim a blood tie to the throne.

Mirie herself had set the precedent to inspire these copycats. After years in hiding, she’d resurfaced with enough political support to oust the dictator. But she’d been backed by royal supporters, and her first item of business had been proving her identity through DNA testing.

Drei opened the office door, and both the general and Georghe entered. Mirie left her desk to greet them.

“You haven’t slept.” She recognized the signs.

“Like anyone sleeps around here.” Georghe kissed her cheek.

Forcing a smile, she felt the weight of her choices even though Georghe was too kind to point out the obvious.

The chancellor of the Crown Cabinet was one of the most caring people Mirie had ever known. His inconspicuous competency was the reason he had survived the dictatorship when most civilian staffers had been executed or exiled.