“What about her security?”
“Doesn’t have any that I could see.”
Griffin inhaled sharply. “That’s not good, bro.”
“No kidding?” Garrett shook his head as Griffin’s concern flashed his own worries into higher gear. Alex was all alone in a hotel room and Garrett was the only one who knew where she was. He couldn’t imagine her family allowing her to be unprotected, so that told him she had slipped away from her guards. Which left her vulnerable. Hell, anything could happen to her.
“What’re you gonna do about it?”
He checked the time on the grandfather clock on the far wall. “I’m going to wait another hour or so, then I’m calling her father.”
Griffin laughed. “Yeah, cuz it’s that easy to just pick up a phone and call the palace. Hello, King? This is King.”
Garrett rolled his eyes at his brother’s lame joke. They’d heard plenty just like that one while they were doing the job for Alex’s father. Kings working for kings and all that.
“Why am I talking to you again?”
“Because I’m your twin. The one that got all the brains.”
“Must explain why I got all the looks,” Garrett muttered with a smile.
“In your dreams.”
It was an old game. Since they were identical, neither of them had anything to lose by the insults. Griffin was the one person in his life Garrett could always count on. There were four other King brothers in their branch of the family, and they were all close. But being twins had set Garrett and Griffin apart from the rest of their brothers. Growing up, they’d been a team, standing against their older brothers’ teasing. They’d played ball together, learned how to drive together and dated cheerleaders together. They were still looking out for each other.
To Kings, nothing was more important than family. Family came first. Always.
Griffin finally stopped laughing and asked, “Seriously, what are you going to do?”
“Just what I said. I’m going to call her father. He gave us a private number, remember?”
“Oh, right.”
Nodding, Garrett said, “First, I want to find out if the king knows where she is.”
“You think she ran away?”
“I think she’s going to a lot of trouble to avoid having people recognize her, so yeah.” He remembered the blue jeans, the simple white shirt, the platform heels and her wild tangle of hair. Nope. Not how anyone would expect a princess to look. “Wouldn’t be surprised to find out no one but us knows where she is. Anyway, I’ll let the king know she’s okay and find out how he wants me to handle this.”
“And how do you want to handle it?” Griffin asked.
Garrett didn’t say a word, which pretty much answered Griffin’s question more eloquently than words could have. What could he possibly have said anyway? That he didn’t want to handle the situation—he wanted to handle Alex? Yeah, that’d be good.
“She must be something else.”
“Y’know? She really is,” he said tightly. “And she’s going to stay safe.”
Memories flew around him like a cloud of mosquitoes. Nagging. Irritating. He couldn’t stop them. Never had been able to make them fade. And that was as it should be, he told himself. He’d made a mistake and someone had died. He should never be allowed to forget.
“Garrett,” Griffin said quietly, “you’ve got to let the past go.”
He winced and took another drink of his beer. As twins, they had always been finely attuned to each other. Not exactly reading each other’s minds or anything—thank God for small favors. But there was usually an undercurrent that each of them could pick up on. Clearly, Griffin’s twin radar was on alert.
“Who’s talking about the past?” Bristling, Garrett pushed haunting memories aside and told himself that Alex’s situation had nothing to do with what had happened so long ago. And he would do whatever he could to see that it stayed that way.
“Fine. Be stubborn. Keep torturing yourself for something that you did. Not. Do.”
“I’m done talking about it,” Garrett told his brother.
“Whatever. Always were a hard head.”
“Hello, pot? This is kettle. You’re black.”
“Hey,” Griffin complained, “I’m the funny one, remember?”
“What was I thinking?” Garrett smiled to himself and sipped at his beer.
“Look, just keep me posted on this. Let me know what her father has to say and if you need backup, call.”
“I will,” he promised, even though he knew he wouldn’t be calling. He didn’t want backup with Alex. He wanted to watch over her himself. He trusted his brother with his life. But he would trust no one with Alex’s. The only way to make sure she stayed safe was to take care of her himself.
Alex couldn’t sleep.
Every time she closed her eyes, her mind dredged up images snatched from her memories of the day. Mostly, of course, images of Garrett—laughing, teasing his nieces, carrying a sleeping baby…and images of him as he leaned in to kiss her.
Oh, that kiss had been…well, way too short, but aside from that, wonderful. She could still hear the water sloshing against the boat, the singing from the pirates and feel the hot wind buffeting their faces. Still feel his mouth moving over hers.
It had been, she told herself with a small smile, magic.
She picked up her hot tea off the room service cart and stepped onto the balcony of her suite. A summer wind welcomed her with the cool kiss of the sea. She stared up at the night sky then shifted her gaze to the ocean where the moon’s light danced across the surface of the water, leaving a silvery trail, as if marking a path to be followed. In the middle of the night, everything was quiet, as if the whole world was dreaming.
And if she could sleep, Alex knew her dreams would be filled with Garrett.
She took a sip of the tea and sighed in satisfaction.
Alexis knew she should feel guilty for having left Cadria the way she had, but she just couldn’t manage it. Maybe it was because of the years she had spent doing all the “right” things. She had been a dutiful daughter, a helpful sister, a perfect princess. She was always in the right place at the right time saying the right things.
She loved her father, but the man was practically medieval. If it weren’t for her mother’s restraining influence, King Gregory of Cadria would probably have had his only daughter fitted for a chastity belt and tucked away in a tower. Until he picked out the right husband for her, of course.
Alex had had to fight for every scrap of independence she had found over the past few years. She hadn’t wanted to be seen only at state occasions. Or to christen a new ship or open a new park. She wanted more. She wanted her life to mean something.
And if that meant a twenty-eight-year-old woman had to run away from home—then so be it.
She only hoped her father would eventually forgive her. Maybe he would understand one day just how important her independence was to her.
Nothing had ever been hers. The palace deemed what she should do and when she should do it.
Even her work with