Unfaded Glory

by Sara Arden

  Or didn’t want to think about.

  The wedding was over. When they landed, so, too, would be their “honeymoon.” It could go no further than right here. He had to turn off these feelings, root them out of himself before they turned malevolent and devoured him from the inside out.

  She giggled and squirmed, pretending to try to get away from him. But when he would’ve let her go, she locked her arm around his neck.

  “This is getting to be a habit. So are we playing princess and the bodyguard?” He tried to think only about the physical, so he didn’t have to feel all this sorrow.

  “No, we’re playing husband and his new wife.” He kissed her before she could say anything else. Byron supposed that was cowardly, but he just couldn’t talk anymore and he didn’t want to feel anything but her.

  He pushed her up against the galley and he broke the kiss to turn her. She placed her hands on the sides of the counter. Byron pushed her fatigues off and pulled her panties down to her ankles.

  Byron ran his hands along her silky hips and thighs; he couldn’t get inside of her fast enough. He slipped his hand between them to ready her, but she was already wet for him.

  “You really like this.” He thought of a hundred other scenarios he could play out with her if he’d had the time. If she were really his. Oh, the things he’d do to this body—he loved the sound of his name on her lips and she’d be screaming it to bring the rafters down. If only, if only...

  “Oh, yes,” she said, her voice breathy. “Now do it.”

  He’d joked about liking her to command him, but he didn’t think there was anything sexier.

  This wasn’t just about sex. Or the heat that flared between them. It was about everything else, too. As much as he didn’t want it to be. He couldn’t fight it anymore. He knew it was going to hurt when she was gone, when he had to leave. Hell, it hurt now. There was no avoiding it. He was already in so deep he’d drowned in her.

  After sheathing himself in the condom from his wallet, he drove deep inside her.

  She cried out but pushed back against him, meeting his every thrust. She filled his senses, touch, scent, sound, sight and taste. The taste of her mouth was still on his tongue, the jasmine scent of her.

  Her sweet warmth pulled him deeper, taking it all but giving him everything.

  He lost himself in her every time he touched her. There was no beginning, no end, no nothing but the focused point of sensation where their bodies joined.

  Byron was starting to need this with her, to feel this connection and this link. This was more than a need for his body—it was a need for his heart.

  And when it was all over, he had to let it be just that.

  Over.

  * * *

  THE PLANE LANDED on a small Greek island that would have been the perfect honeymoon destination for a couple who wanted to be lost in each other. It was fairly deserted. From there, they took a skiff that had been docked for them and slipped right into a Castallegnian bay with no one the wiser.

  Her brother and Kulokav’s men ran the docks, but there were no docks, no trade routes here. Only a small abandoned hut that reminded her of the island they’d just left.

  Again, Damara found herself wishing things were different.

  It was just before dawn when they finally crept into the small hut, and Damara was exhausted. She should’ve slept on the plane, but she’d wanted to spend one last time with him.

  She didn’t understand how it was so easy for him to turn it off, to forget everything they were to each other.

  But she didn’t argue with him or demand they talk it out. It was what it was. Instead, she crawled into the pallet on the floor next to him.

  “We’ll hide out here until I get the word from Renner about the Italian navy. They should be en route.”

  She nodded sleepily.

  “If I’m gone when you wake up, I just went down to catch a few fish. Don’t worry.”

  “I’m not going to—” And just like the last time she was in this part of the world with her now husband, she fell asleep cradled in his arms when she expected to be awake all of the long night.

  Only when she awoke, it wasn’t to gunshots like on the Circe’s Storm. It was to Grisha Kulokav and his gun pointed at her head.

  She fought down panic, trying to take in the situation. Where Byron was, where she was, orient herself to her surroundings. Instead of whimpering or cowering, she said, “My husband needs to work on his aim.”

  “Husband? Indeed, Princess, you’d best hope that’s not the case.”

  They were already married. There was nothing he could do about it now. “And why is that?”

  “Because then I’ll have to make you a widow.”

  “As if you could.”

  “He already tried to kill me once, Princess. As you can see, he’s not as effective as you might think.”

  She didn’t have any reply, so she lay there, refusing to wilt under the weight of his appraisal and the threat there.

  He laughed. The bastard actually laughed with genuine mirth. “I do enjoy you, Princess. Vladimir thinks I should kill you or keep you as a mistress. But I think you are worthy.” His eyes slid up her body. “A beautiful bride indeed.” Grisha cocked his head to the side. “Abele, your brother, thinks the same. But I have other plans for you, malenkaya. Would you like to hear them?” He stroked a large meaty finger down her cheek.

  “If it involves the usual threats like torture and death, probably not.” She was pleased with how calm she sounded, because her insides were twisted up like barbed wire. She’d never been more terrified.

  He grinned again. “For all the trouble you’ve caused me, you’ve been less of a problem than your oh-so-royal brother. I want you for my wife, and I want Castallegna. Come with me now, and I will kill your brother and we will rule Castallegna together.”

  “I’ve already told you, Grisha. There will be no ruling Castallegna. Not by us, anyway.”

  “Abele killed your father to keep him from making the transition. Don’t you think he’d do the same to you? All of these men who want to protect you and save you, but you won’t let us kill the one thing that would hurt you.”

  “What do you mean?” How did he know about her conversation with Byron? His promise?

  A new thread of fear wound its way around her.

  “I think I was pretty clear. He killed your father. It was no riding accident. Abele bashed his head in with a rock. He was very proud of this.”

  “And you, are you very proud of this?”

  “Proud of what? The lengths I have gone to so that I may secure my woman? Of course. I’m strong. As are you.” His chest puffed up with the pride he spoke of. He really didn’t understand.

  She had to find out if Byron was okay. Her brain processed that since they were discussing him, Grisha must not know he was on the island. So he was safe. Damara searched for her inner center, that peace that helped her forge through whatever was in her path.

  “No. You haven’t done anything good or noble. Nothing to be proud of.” Damara felt as though she were a weed trying to stand against a hurricane. What was she? A spoiled princess who’d never lived in the world, who ran away and caused a clash of nations. Men were willing to die for her.

  No, not men.

  Man. One man. Her husband.

  She couldn’t let him. Damara had to find a way to save him.

  “I haven’t hurt you or sent my torturers after you like Abele.”

  “How did you know about that?” She cocked her head to the side.

  “I know a lot of things, Princess.”

  “If you knew about Tunisia before I fled Castallegna, why didn’t you stop me?”

  He shrugged as if the answer didn’t matter. “I honestly didn’t think you’d get
that far. Then as things progressed, you showed your true mettle. I was impressed.”

  Impressing the gangster had been the very last thing on her to-do list.

  “Then you left with a man. I was not so well impressed with that.”

  “I had to do what I had to do, Grisha. I still do.” Why wouldn’t he understand? Worse, why did she keep trying to explain something to him he chose not to understand?

  “Leave with me now and all will be well, Damara.”

  “I can’t. I’ve made commitments. I can’t break my word.”

  “Then your ranger will die, and so might you. Your brother has something planned for you. He knows you’re here. A statement to the world about what defying him means. He’s not too pleased to have been placed on a red notice, Interpol’s wanted list. He’s a king and above such things, you know.”

  “What’s he going to do?” Damara swallowed her bile.

  He tsked. “Either you will have me or you will not, Princess. You don’t get this information out of the goodness of my heart. Say yes. Say yes and save your ranger. Your new friends. It’s never just the target that gets hurt. It would be a shame if some little girl hoping to see a princess was blinded or crippled by shrapnel.”

  “Save my ranger? Have you seen him?” Damara dared ask. Grisha seemed to get some sick pleasure out of telling her the truth.

  “He let you escape him. He must be done with you.”

  “You’re horrible.” She kept her expression neutral, but his words were ripping out her guts.

  “And yet you will come to see things my way. Or have you forgotten all of what your father taught you?”

  “Don’t you dare speak of my father. You didn’t know him.”

  “Oh, but I did. He despised me, but I knew him. He would be so disappointed in you for putting any of your needs above the people. Do they deserve to suffer for what you want? Abele’s plans are already in place. No matter where you go, or who you’re with, he’ll be able to get to you. Just like I did.”

  He yanked her up off the floor and kissed her hard.

  She didn’t fight, because she knew it was useless, and she realized he’d want her to fight. He liked that she was rebellious and defiant. The fact that Byron had shot him only made Grisha want her more. She thought about biting his lips, but, again, he’d like that.

  So instead she showed him what it would be like if he forced this on her. She held her lips hard and dry; there was no feminine softness to her mouth or in the way he held her. She was stiff and cold, carved out of ice.

  She displayed no reaction either way, not fear, no revulsion and certainly not pleasure. In her head, she’d retreated to that place she went when people treated her like a princess doll instead of a person. The hours of hair and makeup, fittings, grooming, pinching and pulling on her body as though it were something that belonged to the world at large and not her.

  Because she knew Grisha was right.

  Would she really risk all of these people? She should’ve stayed on Castallegna and done whatever Abele instructed while pretending to be the perfect vacuous doll. Then she could’ve started a rebellion and led her people to freedom that way.

  Or she could’ve just slipped something into Abele’s soup. Because then only he would die. No one else would ever be hurt by him again.

  But that was pain and rage talking. No matter what Abele had done, Damara wasn’t capable of murder.

  Even knowing that Abele had killed their father. It was possible Grisha was lying, but it had given voice to what Damara had suspected for a long time. After her conversation with Abele, hearing the venom and hatred in his voice, she knew he was capable of anything.

  “Fine, I’ll go with you. But no one else gets hurt.”

  “I knew you’d see it my way.”

  Then she stepped out into the chilly predawn and headed toward the end of all good things.

  Damara tried not to think about Byron as she slid into the backseat, but she couldn’t help it. He filled her thoughts. She wondered if he was hurting, if he’d understood her message.

  Though she supposed it didn’t matter. This was the way things had to be.

  She shifted in her seat, sore from the previous day, but she enjoyed the discomfort. Pain made memories brighter, more real. She’d need it to remember everything as clearly as she wished.

  Her husband had made her feel this way, the man she’d fallen in love with. Not some crown or bank account she was supposed to give herself to for God and country.

  She looked at Grisha sitting next to her in the backseat and she wondered just how she was going to escape him. It seemed an impossible task. He’d knit a rather neat little trap around her, she realized as the driver started the car.

  She wished her father was there. He’d know what to do.

  Except he wasn’t, and wishing he was there didn’t make it so. It didn’t give her any answers or guidance. She had to rely on herself.

  “Already plotting your escape, Princess?” His voice slashed through the silence.

  “No.”

  “Don’t lie to me.” His voice was soft, but the threat there was not.

  “I’m not plotting my escape. I was thinking about all of my options.” Escape. Options. Same thing to her.

  “Which are?”

  “None.”

  “That’s not necessarily true. This doesn’t have to be a bad thing, Damara,” Grisha said softly.

  Damara stilled the shudder before it rolled through her. “You say this like you’re the one who has to marry someone he doesn’t want.”

  “You will want me in time.” He said it as if she were just a little girl who didn’t quite understand the birds and the bees.

  Damara shook her head. “No, Grisha. I will not.”

  No, no matter what Grisha did to her, it would never be anything like Byron.

  The car was big, lush. Everything had been designed with an eye of opulence and comfort, but none of that mattered to Damara. In fact, she wondered how many people’s lives had paid for everything he’d tried to give her.

  His wealth was dirty.

  “Your father indulged you too much, Princess. You will see. It is always better to have money. Even in your precious democracies, money is what eases your way.”

  Damara was filled with fire. She wanted to blurt out that she didn’t care about money. That all she wanted was Byron, but Grisha laughed.

  “The passionate fire of first love burns in your eyes. It is the love that would let nations fall if only to be together.” He laughed again. “You may think whatever you like, and, in private, you may say whatever you like. In front of my brother, or in front of my men, you will be respectful or you will be punished. Do you understand?”

  There was nothing he could do to her. Nothing.

  “Or perhaps I should say your whipping girl will be punished. In the days of old, royalty would have peasants who would endure their punishments for them. I would never want to mar a face as beautiful as yours. So your whipping girl shall be punished every time you disobey or embarrass me.”

  She was going to be sick.

  Instead of showing him any reaction, she nodded coolly. “I understand.”

  “Good.” He took a drink of his whiskey. “Tell me, Damara, what was it that made you love him?”

  “Does it matter?” She shrugged and looked out the window.

  “Perhaps. Perhaps not. Indulge me.”

  “Or you’ll whip someone?” She forced herself to look at him.

  “No, Damara. I told you that you may speak as you like when we’re in private. But what would it hurt to let me know you?”

  “You don’t want to know me. You want me to be your windup Princess Barbie to Gangster Ken.”

  He laughed. “In public, yes.
That is what I want. Although I know there is another you beneath the doll. The you that knows Krav Maga. The you that likes American pop culture.”

  “That me is the one who thinks privilege by blood is wrong. You have nothing in common with her.” Damara turned her head and looked out the window.

  When he offered her a whiskey of her own, she didn’t turn it down. She downed it in one gulp. It burned like hellfire all the way down, but then it was warm, languid and sweet.

  “Better?”

  She studied him again. He wasn’t ugly. He might have been handsome to some women if he wasn’t a murdering psychopath.

  “Why me?” She sighed.

  “Because you’re not afraid of me.”

  She was most certainly afraid of him, but she wasn’t going to let that control her actions. Damara had more people to worry about in this scenario than herself.

  “So if I start being afraid of you, will you get bored and let me go?”

  “I may get bored, but I will never let you go. You belong to me, Damara.” His laughter chilled her blood. “See, all I have to do is say something you don’t like and your eyes flash with rebellion.”

  Damara turned away from him and looked out the window again, staring blankly out onto the landscape that had once offered her succor. She could smell jasmine, and that made her doubly heartsick.

  It was both wonderful and terrible to be home.

  She swallowed her grief like so much bile and exited the car. Damara half expected a pack of paparazzi to meet them, but there was no one.

  “There is no one to meet us?” she asked.

  “No. I don’t want your brother to know we’re on the island.”

  “He has to already know. He has spies everywhere.”

  “No, Kulokav interests now have control of the docks, the airport and the spies he has planted. We’re already running Castallegna right under his nose, Princess.”

  Her stomach twisted on itself. “So did you have a hand in killing those Council members?”

  “Those were your brother’s orders, Highness. But I would not have hesitated to do so if it would give me you.”