The Lost Princes: Darius, Cassius and Monte

“Why would he do that?”

She shrugged. “I thought it was odd at the time, but I assumed it might have been the law firm that was offering to pay. I didn’t take anything from him, but…”

“But you don’t really know who he is or what his connection to your law firm is, do you? He just came at you out of the blue.”

She gave him an exaggerated glare for the interruption, but she plowed ahead.

“I have a number where I’m supposed to call him when I find Cici’s father.” She glanced around, looking for a phone. “Do you think I should give him a call?”

He held back the grunt of exasperation he was tempted to mete out. That was obviously the last thing he wanted her to do.

“You haven’t called him yet?”

“No.”

“Don’t.”

She blinked. “Why not?”

He hesitated, then shrugged. “You haven’t found Cici’s father, have you?”

“Maybe not.” She eyed him speculatively, her chin high.

He groaned, turning away. He knew he couldn’t let her call the number. That would pinpoint his exact location for sure. But how to convince her of that without giving away the entire background?

Whoever this Carl Heissman was, the man was playing games. Deadly games. He had to think fast and get back to basics and consider all possibilities.

He glanced at her again, studied her, tried to pick up on any details he might have missed so far. Why was she really here? Was this a ploy? A plot to coax him out of hiding?

Whatever. He had to get out of here right away and hope whoever was behind sending her here wasn’t already on his trail—or worse, here as well and just hadn’t revealed himself as yet. He heard a sound behind him and turned quickly, jumpy as a cat.

There was nothing there—this time. That wary buzz was back in full force. Ayme had invaded his space like the point guard of a small enemy army and he was going to have to be on alert every minute. He couldn’t afford to trust her or anything about her. His eyes narrowed as he looked her over and considered every angle.

And then the house phone rang.

They stared into each other’s eyes for a long moment as it rang once, twice…

Then David took three steps and picked up the receiver, staring down into the identifying screen. Nothing was there. It was blank.

His face turned to stone and his heart beat so hard he could hardly breath. It was never blank. It always said Private Caller if nothing else. But this time, it was blank.

He couldn’t answer. That would give the caller absolute knowledge of where he was at this very moment. There wasn’t a doubt in his mind that this person wasn’t calling in the middle of the night for a friendly chat. This was the danger he’d always known would come his way—and until he understood the exact threat better, it was something he had to avoid at all costs.

And more than that, he had to get out of here.

He turned to look at Ayme, wondering if she’d caught the connotations of this late night call, if she might even know who it was and why he was calling. But her face was open and innocent and her gaze was shining with curiosity. He couldn’t believe she could be an expert liar and con artist with eyes like that. No, she didn’t know any more than he did. He would have bet anything on that.

“Okay, you’ve been begging for sleep,” he told her, putting the phone back on its cradle. “Why don’t you take the spare bedroom around the corner from where you were? Get a few hours sleep. You’ll be better for it in the morning.”

“Lovely,” she said, pure gratitude shining from her eyes for a few seconds. She only hoped that Cici would have as much compassion and give her a chance to get in some real, sustained sleep. Small dozes had been the rule for days.

She glanced at David. His eyes were clouded with some problem he was obviously working through and his handsome face looked a bit tense. That made her all the more grateful.

She was lucky he was taking her presence with such equanimity. Most people would have kicked her out by now, or at least edged her toward the door. But he was ready to let her stay. Thank God. She wasn’t sure she could think clearly enough right now to get herself a room in a hotel on her own, especially carrying a baby around. It was great of him to invite her in. She could hardly wait to throw herself on the bed and let sleep take over.

Then she had second thoughts. He hadn’t said anything about getting sleep himself, had he?

“What are you going to do?” she asked suspiciously.

He shrugged rather absently, as though his mind were miles away. “I’ve got some business to wrap up.”

She knew it was an excuse, but she didn’t push it. She was just too tired to challenge him. The thought of sheets and a real pillow were totally seductive for the moment. So she followed him to the spare bedroom and waited while he carried Cici in, setting her little bed right beside the real bed without waking her at all. He seemed to have the magic touch.

She smiled, watching him tuck Cici in. So precious.

“I’ll see you later,” he said gruffly, and she nodded, waiting just until he closed the door before slipping out of her skirt and sweater, leaving only her underclothes on, and sliding between the sheets. She dropped into sleep instantly, but for some reason, she began to dream right away, and her dreams were full of tall, dark-haired men who looked very much like David.

Meanwhile, David was moving fast, preparing to vacate the premises. He’d been planning for this day from the time he could think through the consequences of being found by the vicious Granvilli family who had taken over his country. He knew they wanted all remnants of the Royal House of Ambria wiped out, wherever they might be hiding. They wanted no lingering threats to their ugly reign of terror over the ancient island people.

And he and his older brother Monte were a threat, whether the Granvilli bunch knew it yet or not. At any rate, they were determined to be one. He was already committed to being in Italy by the end of the week to meet with other Ambrians and begin planning in earnest for a return to power. He might as well leave now. There was nothing keeping him here. He’d already made his office aware of the time off he planned to take. He could begin his journey a little early and make his way to Italy in a more careful trajectory. There was no telling what other obstacles he would find along the way.

“Nothing really worth having is easy.” Someone had said that once, and right now it made perfect sense to him. The struggle to get his country back was going to be a rough one and he was ready to get started.

And he had to go on his own, he told himself. There was no way to take Ayme along, no reason to do it. Why should he feel this tug of responsibility toward her? He tried to brush it away. She would be okay here. He hadn’t even known she existed two hours ago. Why should he feel he owed her anything?

He didn’t. But he did owe the people of Ambria everything. Time to begin paying them back.

He had preparations that had to be dealt with, paperwork that had to be destroyed so that the wrong people wouldn’t see things they shouldn’t see. It took some time to do all that and he had an ear cocked toward the phone in case the interested party from a half hour before might try again. But the night moved relentlessly forward without any more interruptions. The sky was barely beginning to turn pink as he wrapped up his arrangements.

Completely focused, he pulled on a dark blue turtleneck cashmere sweater and finished dressing at warp speed, then glanced around his bedroom. He hesitated for half a second. Did he have time to grab some things and shove them into an overnight bag? What the hell—he had to have something with him, and he’d taken all this time already. Why not? It was all right there and it took no time at all.

He slid into his soft leather jacket as he headed for the door. Despite all the rationalizing he’d been doing, he felt pretty rotten about leaving Ayme behind this way. She was so all alone in the city. She didn’t know anyone but him.

That gave him a quick, bitter laugh. She didn’t really know him, did she? Which was what was so ridiculous about all this. Still, he hesitated in the open doorway. Maybe he would call the doorman from his car and ask that he look after her. Sure. He could do that. She would be okay.

Right. He took one more step and then stopped, head hanging forward, and uttered an ugly oath. He knew he couldn’t leave her.

There was no telling who that had been on the phone There was no telling who was after him—except that he was rock-bottom sure it was an agent for the Granvillis. What if the assassin came into his apartment after he left? Who would protect her? Not the doorman. That was pure fantasy.

No, he couldn’t leave her—even if she was the one who had brought all this down on him. He was almost certain that she didn’t know anything about it herself. She was an innocent victim. He couldn’t leave her behind.

Giving out a suppressed growl of rage, he turned and went back, opening the door to the spare bedroom and looking in.

“Ayme?” he said tersely. “I’m sorry to wake you, but I’ve got to go and I don’t want to leave you here.”

“Huh?” She stared up at him, startled, her eyes bleary. She’d had less than an hour of sleep—not nearly enough. “What?”

“Sorry, kiddo,” he bit out. “You’re going with me.” He glanced around the room. “Do you have any other clothes?”