by Eve Devon
“I get it. Go. Secure the king and queen. I’ll take full responsibility for securing the dia—”
There was a blinding white flash, and all the lights in the ballroom went out.
Fuck.
Adam’s hand went straight to his glasses again. He pressed the button but…
Nothing.
His feed had completely died.
He took out his phone, hoping the light on it would enable him to see where he was going.
No power on that either.
Guests started exclaiming, and when the backup generators didn’t immediately power up, they moved en masse to the large windows, where ghostly moonlight filtered through. Adam could feel their panic as they started pushing at each other to get out.
It was nothing compared with the panic throbbing inside him as he tried to reassure himself it was pure coincidence that Edward had disappeared and then come back before all power was cut to the castle.
Keeping the main window at the end of the room in his sights, he walked over, pushed it open, and stepped outside.
The castle should immediately have swung into lockdown, but there was no way they had enough guards to cover securing every guest within one room when there was a total loss of power. By now, Anton Haas had hopefully made it to King Zoltan. But with no communication capability, how could he stop guests from leaving? If someone really wanted to walk out with the Pasha Star, this was how they were going to do it. Unseen. One of the crowd.
Adam stopped.
What if Edward’s intention had been to steal the diamond all along? Had he done it and returned to the ballroom so Honeysuckle could provide him with an alibi?
He ran through all his options.
Should he go back and find Edward?
No.
His only choice was to check the status of his security case first.
Establish exactly what had happened, in order to determine what was happening.
He ran down the outside of the ballroom, around to the front building connecting to the gatehouse. It was the quickest way of getting to the throne room using the only light available. Moonlight.
Pausing in the open space, he looked up. The moon was high and nearly full. Flooded with adrenaline, he didn’t even notice the temperature had dropped even lower than when he had been outside on the phone to Max earlier in the evening.
He wondered if the whole city’s power was out.
His vantage point was blocked by the castle walls, but the faint yellowy-orange tinge to the sky told him it could be coming from street and house lighting in the city below, reflecting back up into the sky.
He had a feeling it was only the castle in darkness.
That it had been deliberately rendered powerless.
He took off again for the gatehouse door. If he remembered right, it would connect to a passageway that would bring him out into the main entrance outside of the throne room.
His speed was considerably hampered in the dark confines of the castle corridor. He could feel the cold from the stone walls as he groped his way along.
God, he hoped Honeysuckle was safe. That his concerns about Edward were unfounded—that Edward had taken her outside to the courtyard and was with her, keeping her safe for him.
About three-quarters of the distance down the darkened corridor, Adam felt the texture of the stone wall change to smooth, warmer plastic.
It must be the protective Perspex covering the carved wooden panels near the main entrance. He was coming to where the building widened out.
Keeping in line with the wall, he increased his pace.
It was getting easier to see as shafts of moonlight filtered in through the high triforia- windows from the floor above.
Squinting, he searched for the outline of guards stationed in front of the heavy arched doors of the throne room.
He couldn’t see shadow or human form, and something made him not want to shout out and call attention to himself.
Then, out of nowhere, he heard footsteps, and a dark shape came toward him. He hugged the side of the wall, preparing to step out and attack as whoever it was drew level.
But suddenly all he could smell was Honeysuckle’s perfume, and, completely confused, he hesitated.
The next moment, the person was upon him and he was being knocked to the ground, his glasses going flying.
The last thing he thought before his head landed against the stone floor was that he must have been mistaken.
No way could Honeysuckle have been there.
* * * * *
When Adam regained consciousness, his head was pounding. He pulled himself up to a sitting position, moaning aloud as the nausea rolled up his throat. Lifting his hand, he touched the back of his head and felt the goose-egg-sized lump.
He had absolutely no idea how long he’d been out. Seconds? Minutes? More than that?
When the next wave of nausea subsided, he dragged his feet closer and pushed upright against the wall. There wasn’t time to feel around for his glasses.
Grabbing against the wall for purchase, he reached the carved doors and felt his stomach pitch as he knocked against something heavy, soft, and immovable.
A body?
Kneeling down, he kept one hand against the wall and with the other he felt the form of the person in front of him. His fingers brushed over buttons, straps, and stiff woolen fabric.
Definitely one of the uniformed guards.
His hand brushed against a sticky substance.
Blood.
Had to be.
He forced himself to move his hand up the man’s chest and across to his neck to feel for a pulse.
There was none.
He had no choice but to step over the guard so he could find out what happened in the room beyond.
He felt for the doors in front of him, pushed, and the doors opened inward.
He was right. The throne room had been singled out in whatever this was—a full attack on the king or a distraction to steal the Pasha Star.
Chapter Fifteen
Adam lurched his way to the top of the throne room. His hands shook as he felt all around the glass walls of Descry. He couldn’t even pick the case up, shake it, and check the diamond was inside, because he had personally screwed the base into the plinth.
His hands came around to the top of the case, and when his fingertips found an opening, he thought the ground was going to go out from under him.
Someone had cut a hole in the glass?
He could hear the blood rushing in his ears as his hands went in and he felt around the inside of the case.
The Pasha Star was gone.
He let loose every profanity he’d ever learned.
He’d known the glass hadn’t been as strong as his last product, and still he’d taken the risk. He’d qualified the risk. He’d quantified the risk.
And failed.
Why, why had he been so arrogant?
The power going out had cut the signal from the security cameras to the cloud and therefore any device he’d been watching on.
Adam turned in the direction of the doors as beams of light bounced from left to right. Without his glasses, his vision was blurry anyway. Add in the colossal bump to the head and he swayed, grabbing on to the security case to keep him upright.
There was the sound of multiple footsteps running the length of the room, and as the beams got brighter, Adam realized they were from flashlights.
“Who’s there?” he called out, and when two men grabbed him on each side and held his arms behind his back, he bit back a moan as pain shot up the back of his head.
“Adam?” Anton Haas pointed his flashlight to his own face to show Adam who it was. “I am sorry, but I have to do this— Search him,” he instructed the men who held him.
“You think I stol
e the diamond?”
“I’m afraid I have to check.”
Adam was given a thorough pat-down, and when the guards came up empty-handed, he was released.
“I want every inch of this room searched,” Anton instructed his team. “And someone get a chair for Queen Izabella.”
“There is a very big chair up on the dais,” Adam said, thinking himself funny all of a sudden. His head pounded, and the terrible guilt of what he had allowed to happen had his knees so weak he had to lock them tight and hold on to the case once again.
“Adam? You are making a joke? Are you well?” Anton queried, stepping forward to shine his flashlight into Adam’s eyes.
“A bump to the head,” he said, automatically turning from the harsh light. “I’m fine.”
“You are not fine. You are bleeding. What happened?”
“Someone rushed at me, and I was knocked to the floor. Anton, your guards at the door—”
“Yes. They are being moved.”
“Dead?”
Anton’s breath released sharply, and that was answer enough.
“I am sorry,” Adam said quietly.
“Thank you.”
“You protected the king and queen. That was your duty,” Adam said, knowing the words sounded inadequate when there was loss of life.
God, if he had used the last iteration of the security case, would the thief still have been able to steal the diamond?
“Both guards have had their communicator and receiver transmitters removed, so I can only assume whoever checked in wasn’t legitimate.” Anton cleared his throat, and Adam knew the head of security was thinking if he’d realized earlier, he might have prevented this from happening. “We are arranging for diesel generators to be brought into the castle. Power should be restored within the hour.”
“Do you have any idea what caused the power to go out?”
“One of my team found a device on the floor. It looks as if it emitted an electromagnetic pulse that threw everything out.”
Adam pushed in at his eyes in a useless attempt to try to clear his vision. “Can you point your flashlight into Descry—the security case. I think someone cut a hole for access.”
Anton shone his flashlight into the case.
There was no Pasha Star.
However, there was a cream-colored, rectangular card resting flush to one side of the glass case. Adam cast the group a quick look and then reached in with his free hand.
He withdrew the card, flipped it open, and Anton shone the beam of his flashlight across the surface.
Two words were written across the center of the card in thick, bold cursive script.
The Raven.
“So someone deliberately set out to steal the Pasha Star and leave a calling card that points back to Steel Hawk?” King Zoltan said, his voice like granite.
“Your Majesty,” Adam said, using every ounce of grit he had in him to focus, “I cannot begin to—”
“This will be resolved satisfactorily,” the king said, cutting him off. “I will not allow the relationship we have built with your company over hundreds of years to end like this. I promised you the full backing of Zarrenburg. We do not hold you responsible.”
Oh, but Adam held himself responsible.
And nothing less than personally putting the Pasha Star back into the king’s hand was going to bring him peace.
“If someone is deliberately playing us,” Queen Izabella said, “I say we play a different game. Make an unexpected move.”
Flashlights turned toward her.
“Do we not still have the paste replica Pasha Star that Rose Hawk made sitting in our vaults? Why not put it in another case and open the exhibition tomorrow as normal?”
“What if the thief goes straight to the press and shows he broke into the case and stole the diamond?”
“Who would believe him? If we had to, we would simply have the replica officially declared real.”
“It would buy us time,” Adam said, thinking aloud. “The thief has engaged us with the calling card. This way, we force the thief’s hand. How long did you say it would take to restore power?”
“An hour, couple max.”
“I built a separate UPS system into Descry. She should have kept recording even when the power was cut. When the power comes back, I’ll get to work on recovering her data.”
“That is excellent news,” Anton said. “I will organize for the replica paste diamond to be brought up from the vault and we will spend the rest of the night ensuring this room is ready for opening tomorrow. Gustav can put out a low-key statement about the power outage, focusing on everyone being safe and protocol being followed.”
“I always bring spare kit,” Adam said. “I have a similar-looking security case. If the press is brought in here tomorrow, and whoever stole the diamond is watching, the new case will be a good match for Descry.”
“Are you certain you don’t require medical assistance?”
“All I need is to work.”
“Can you tell me anything about the person who knocked you to the floor?”
All Adam could think about was Honeysuckle’s perfume.
The blood drained from his face.
She couldn’t be…
It wasn’t possible.
The image of Edward and her talking together… Adam shook his head violently.
No. His mind was playing a trick on him to send his thoughts crashing down around him.
He had to recover that data.
But as much as he wanted to see how and who—there was now a very large part of him that didn’t.
* * * * *
Adam sat in the lounge area of his suite, trying to think.
He’d taken the ice from the champagne bucket Honeysuckle must have arranged as a surprise, and had placed the cubes in a towel he’d taken from the bathroom. Every now and then, he held the ice pack to his head in the hope the fogginess would dissipate.
His eyes strayed suspiciously to the champagne again.
He was now convinced he hadn’t been mistaken about smelling Honeysuckle’s perfume in that corridor. But how the hell had she gotten there?
And the calling card claiming to be the Raven?
Had he been mistaking the passion he’d seen in her face when she looked at jewels for something much more duplicitous? Was every stinking piece of this part of one giant setup to steal the Pasha Star?
If he could have cut the thought, the suspicion, the hopeless distrust, from his head, he would have done so. As it was, it all just sat inside him.
Building and building.
Staring into the fire’s flames, he thought about how cold it was outside.
He should be out there right now—searching for her.
Instead he’d come straight here. To think.
Maybe if he could wrap his head around the possibility she was somehow at the heart of this, he’d be able to confront her.
The suite door opened, and his head snapped up.
Squinting against the throbbing in his temple, he saw Honeysuckle step into the room.
“Thank God,” she said, rushing up to him. “I’ve been looking all over the castle for you.”
“All over the castle, huh? Didn’t happen to make your way to the throne room by any chance?” he asked, breathing in sharply and smelling the same intoxicating scent he’d smelled earlier as it mixed in with the smell of firewood burning.
“It’s where I’ve just come from.”
“And why did you think that was where you needed to be?” he asked, his voice stiff, his eyes now downcast.
“I figured when the power went out that you went to check everything was all right with the Pasha Star. One of Anton’s team let me into the room when he realized who I was. I can’t quite believe someone’s taken the diamo
nd—that they’re trying to implicate us by calling themselves the Raven. What do you want me to do?”
“Do?”
“To help.”
“Well, you could start by answering me a question.”
“Okay. What is it?”
“Are you the Raven?” He’d asked it like a joke, but she’d never know how reluctant he was to hear her answer.
Honeysuckle stared at him for a full three seconds. He knew because he was counting in his head as he stared back at her, wishing he could see if her pupils were dilating, wishing he could see if her nostrils flared, wishing he could see for sure one way or another.
Then she gave a light laugh and said, “Wouldn’t it be easier if I were. But nope. Not me.” She raised an eyebrow and, like an afterthought, said conspiratorially, “Are you the Raven?”
“Nope. Not me,” he answered, his voice barely above a whisper.
He saw the moment she registered the ice pack. Her step was unsteady as she came closer, all traces of joking gone from her voice when she exclaimed, “You’re hurt? What happened?”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re not fine. Wait, you’re not even wearing your glasses.” She turned and disappeared into his room, returning with his normal glasses. Kneeling down in front of him, she slipped them onto his face. A guard had found the ones he’d been wearing to download the camera feed. They were broken beyond repair, but at least not in the hands of the thief.
“Someone caught me off guard. Knocked me to the floor, and I bumped my head.” When she sat back away from him, he leaned forward, grasping her upper arms. “I thought it was you.”
“Me?” Suddenly her frown smoothed out. “You mean we passed each other in the corridor just now. But I didn’t bump into anyone.”
“Perhaps I was mistaken.”
“Perhaps you are concussed and should be getting your head looked at,” she said, her voice rising with concern. She rose from her knees and, grabbing the ice pack off the table, held it to the back of his head again.
He stared into her eyes. His vision better with his glasses on. She looked so innocent. So beautiful as the light from the fire danced over her face.
“Tell me again what I can do to help?” she said, smoothing his hair back from his forehead.
