Duty At What Cost?

by Michelle Conder

  Gilles barely blinked, but Wolfe could see his friend’s utter devastation below the façade of calm. ‘Wolfe, can we borrow your plane?’

  ‘Of course. But there’s no we, Gilles. I’ll take her.’

  ‘Frédéric was a good friend. I’ll—’

  ‘You should be with Anne—’

  ‘I can organise myself,’ Ava cut in.

  Wolfe’s hands clenched into fists when Gilles put his arm around her shoulders. ‘Don’t be silly, Ava. You can’t be alone at a time like this.’

  ‘Shouldn’t your priority be to your new wife and your house guests?’ Wolfe hated himself for reminding Gilles so flatly. Hated himself for the stab of jealousy over a woman he’d never planned to see again.

  ‘Would you two stop?’ Ava demanded. ‘I am more than capable of—’

  ‘Getting on my plane and letting me escort you home,’ Wolfe commanded.

  She scowled up at him. ‘I don’t want to put you out.’

  Wolfe didn’t know if she was being stoic or just obstinate, but he knew he wasn’t letting Gilles take her to Anders. ‘Too late,’ he growled.

  When the butler approached Gilles again Wolfe stepped closer to Ava, invading her personal space. ‘Is that your only suitcase?’

  She stepped back. ‘I told you before. I don’t get off on barbaric men.’

  Her view of him grated but he pushed his feelings aside. ‘Do you really have time to argue?’

  ‘No.’ His words seemed to trigger something inside her and her eyes grew distant. She paced. Looked at Gilles and then turned back to him. ‘Fine. You may take me.’

  Wolfe mentally shook his head, almost awed at the way she’d managed to turn her acceptance into an order.

  * * *

  Ava was functioning on autopilot and barely registered Wolfe buckling her seat belt while the plane taxied down the runway. Somehow he had got her to Lille and on board a plane without her conscious awareness of it.

  Her brother was dead.

  The news was shocking. Indescribable.

  A helicopter accident. Ava couldn’t think about it, her mind incoherent with grief. Her brother was the rock of the family. The future heir. He was five years younger than her and, while they had struggled to be close after her mother died, she had always looked out for him. Anticipated that he would always be there. He couldn’t be gone. He was only twenty-four.

  She shivered and felt a soft blanket settle over her shoulders. She clutched it.

  Wolfe placed a glass of water on the table in front of her. ‘Do you need anything else?’

  She shook her head. ‘I’m fine.’

  ‘So you keep saying.’

  But he didn’t push it, and Ava was grateful. She watched him return to his seat. When he’d come across her in the foyer her heart had turned giddy at the sight of him. It had taken a lot of effort to remind herself that there was no point in seeing him again and even less in sleeping with him! His increasing anger at her response had thrown her a little but then he’d confirmed that, no, he didn’t want more than sex from her, and she’d known she had made the right decision.

  After they arrived in Anders she would likely never see him again, and that fact made her feel instantly bereft.

  Her mind linked the feeling with a time when she was fourteen and her father had continued with a state trip even though she’d been hospitalised with chicken pox. He’d monitored her condition from afar, as usual, but coming so soon after her mother’s death his behaviour had done little to alleviate her loneliness and her sense of powerlessness at being alone.

  That same sense of helplessness and loneliness engulfed her now, and she pushed it back. Her father would expect her to demonstrate more fortitude than that.

  More childhood memories tumbled into her mind, like dice on a two-up table. Memories of Frédéric as a boy. Of her mother.

  Rather than becoming more available after her mother’s death from cervical cancer, Ava’s father had withdrawn and focused on his work, seeming not to know how to connect with her. He had been fine with Frédéric. Ava had grown more and more resentful of the disparity in the way in which he treated his children, and more and more determined to show him that his views of women were archaic and demeaning.

  But nothing she did ever seemed to be good enough for him. Perhaps if she’d been more like her mother, had been able to put his needs first, they might have seen eye to eye. But Ava couldn’t. She had witnessed her mother’s sadness whenever her father chose duty over family, and it had made her want something entirely different for herself.

  Now, with Frédéric gone—a thought that just wouldn’t stick in her head—she was next in line to the throne. She could only imagine how her father must be cringing over that, and she felt slightly nauseous at the prospect of having to step into the role.

  Wolfe’s voice telling her to refasten her seat belt cut across her tumultuous thoughts, and she glanced outside her window and saw the Anders mountain range as they came in to land.

  Imposing a rigid shut-down on her fears about being home, she blanked her mind and switched to cool indifference. From the plane doorway she could see her father’s royal guard standing alongside a line of official black cars, and she nearly turned and asked Wolfe to restart the engine and fly her some place else. Really, she felt about as strong as a daisy in a hailstorm—and she hadn’t even seen her father yet.

  Sensing Wolfe directly behind her, Ava had a debilitating urge to turn and rush into his arms, have him tell her that everything would be all right. But that was weak, and Wolfe was the wrong man to lean on in this situation. She wasn’t special to him, and he wasn’t the type to sit back and go unnoticed. He was used to taking charge, and there was no way she was going to let him sideline her in front of her father. She had been handling things on her own for a long time now, and she could handle this, as well.

  Images of last night, of falling asleep in his arms after their wonderful lovemaking, filtered through her mind and made her pause. Then the empty space he’d left in the bed that morning intruded and stiffened her resolve. It would be a mistake to think she could rely on James Wolfe even for a short time.

  ‘Thank you for the use of your plane but I can take it from here.’

  ‘I told you I would take you home and I will.’

  His hot toffee eyes glittered down at her dangerously, and his controlled voice told her he was as determined to have his way as she was.

  ‘I am home.’

  ‘Ava—’

  ‘Wolfe. I’m fine. Really.’

  ‘You don’t look fine. You look like you’re about to break apart.’

  Did she? She’d have to work on that between here and the palace. Practising now, she squared her shoulders and stared him down. ‘I’m not. I thought I told you already. I am not the sensitive type.’

  Wolfe arrogantly slashed his hand in the air to cut her off in a move that was reminiscent of something her father would do. ‘It’s not open for discussion.’

  That was exactly what her father would say, and exactly the reason she couldn’t have Wolfe with her. That and the sudden sense that if she let him Wolfe would hurt her as Colyn never had.

  ‘No. It isn’t,’ she agreed tightly, hardening herself against the sheer force of his will, the sheer force of her desire for him, which appeared to be even worse now that she had experienced what passion really was.

  For a moment neither one of them moved, facing off against each other like two adversaries in a gunfight.

  Wolfe’s mouth tightened as he made to turn away from her. Then his fist clenched and his eyes, when he brought them back to hers, were seething with frustration. ‘You are without a doubt the most infuriatingly stubborn female I have ever met.’

  His voice, for all its aggression, was as soft as silk and sent a flash of fire beneath the surface of her skin.

  He was without a doubt the most beautiful, the most powerfully dangerous male she had ever met, and she was afraid she would dream a
bout him for ever.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  ‘DID MATTHIEU SAY what my father wanted to see me about, Lucy?’

  ‘No, ma’am.’ Lucy, her new lady’s maid, returned from the wardrobe with two jackets for her to choose from.

  Ava shook her head and immediately felt terrible as Lucy’s face fell. Two weeks home and she still wasn’t used to being waited on hand and foot again. She felt sorry for the young girl whose services she’d barely used.

  She glanced at her reflection and smoothed her messy ponytail. She hadn’t done her hair properly in days, but her father had requested her presence and she would not let him see her as anything less than perfect.

  ‘You don’t like my choices, ma’am?’

  ‘I love your choices.’ She gave Lucy what she hoped was an appreciative smile. ‘But it’s hot. In fact, why don’t you take the afternoon off? Go and see your boyfriend.’

  The girl bobbed her head deferentially and Ava sighed heavily and headed out.

  She hated being home.

  Hated the cold stone walls of the palace that felt more like a prison. She had barely seen her father since she’d returned, which wasn’t necessarily a bad thing—except she had barely seen anyone other than staff, and it had given her far too much time to dwell on her grief.

  Glimpsing bright summer sunshine through the long row of Gothic windows as she moved from one hallway to the next made Ava feel bleak. It just felt wrong. The sky should be grey, not blue.

  Her brother was dead. The royal duties she had always shied away from were upon her, and there was no escape.

  As her father had said, the people needed hope in these black times and she was it. They looked upon her to lift them out of the bleak mood caused by the loss of her brother—and, more than that, Ava now knew that her father was ill. One day, sooner than she had expected, she would be Queen—and the thought was completely overwhelming.

  What did she know about running a country? Having all those people depend on her? It was criminal how little she knew, and even though that was mainly due to her father’s chauvinistic views that women were trophies, not leaders, it gave her no pleasure that he now had to rely on her to preserve Anders’ future as an economically viable entity.

  And what of her gallery? It was closed for the whole of August, but she had dithered about what to do with it. Although of course she knew in her heart that she would most likely have to close it. It was devastating to think that the life she had built for herself could be so easily dissolved. As if nothing she had done in Paris mattered.

  Steadying her breath, she hid her pangs of dismay and a gnawing sense of foreboding behind a smile as she stepped inside her father’s plush outer office and greeted his personal assistant.

  ‘He’s waiting, Your Royal Highness.’

  ‘Thank you, Matthieu.’

  She tried to relax her face as Matthieu opened an inner door and Ava saw her father, as always, behind his enormous rosewood desk. He looked pale and more drawn than usual, and Ava tried to keep her immediate concern from showing in her voice. ‘You wished to see me?’

  ‘Yes, Ava. Take a seat.’

  ‘You’re starting to worry me, sir,’ she said, sitting in one of the leather-bound chairs opposite, wondering why he had greeted her in English. ‘Have you received bad news from your physician?’

  ‘No.’ Her father’s response was clipped. ‘I’ve received disturbing news from the security expert who brought you home from France.’

  Wolfe?

  Ava’s heart leapt behind her rib cage as an image of him that seemed all too close to the surface of her mind clouded her vision. For two weeks he had filled her thoughts right before sleep took her, and he was the first thing she thought of when she woke up. Even on the morning of Frédéric’s funeral, when she had felt at her lowest.

  Ava sighed. She really needed to stop thinking about those hours they’d spent in bed together. Her dreams of him left her feeling weak and needy, and the man probably couldn’t even remember her name, let alone conjure up her image in his head.

  Unlike her good self, who could not only conjure up his image oh, so easily, but his scent as well—woodsy and masculine. It was so vivid that he might as well have been in the room with her right now.

  ‘What does Wolfe have to do with anything?’

  She had tried to keep the query light, but a sudden fear that her father knew that she had slept with him came at her from left field. Surely Wolfe hadn’t told anyone? The tabloids? Could her father’s health withstand a salacious story about her at this time?

  ‘I have to do with a lot of things, Your Royal Highness.’

  The deep, familiar drawl from the man filling her head space had her twisting around in her seat to where he stood across the room, his body half turned away, as if he’d been doing nothing more than studying the scenery outside the high arched windows.

  ‘But in this case it’s about your safety.’

  Her eyes drank in his beautifully cut black trousers and white dress shirt that pulled tight across his wide shoulders. He’d had a haircut, the shorter style drawing even more attention to the roguish quality of his perfect bone structure.

  Those remembered toffee eyes were fixed on her face, touching her mouth ever so briefly, and Ava felt singed all the way through.

  ‘What about my safety?’ She hated that she sounded as breathless as she felt.

  ‘Monsieur Wolfe has some news concerning your car crash at Gilles’s château.’

  She heard the underlying censure in her father’s tone and guessed that he was angry she hadn’t told him about the accident herself, but she had no time to ponder that as Wolfe prowled towards her, his loose-limbed gait impossibly graceful for a man his size.

  He effortlessly dominated the large room and as he drew closer she realised that her heart was racing. He, of course, could have been a mummy for all the emotion he displayed.

  Using years of practice to keep her expression from revealing any of her inner turmoil at having this man—her one-night lover—in the same room as her father, Ava forced herself to maintain eye contact with him. ‘Such as?’

  ‘Yesterday I spoke to the mechanic who repaired your car,’ he informed her, a touch of fierceness lining his words.

  ‘Why would you do that?’

  ‘A hunch.’

  ‘A hunch?’

  ‘Yes. One that paid off. You didn’t crash because of a loss of concentration. You crashed because a vial of potassium permanganate mixed with glycerine had been dropped into your brake master cylinder.’

  Ava’s brow furrowed. ‘Is there a layperson’s version of that?’

  ‘Your brakes were tampered with.’

  Did he mean deliberately? ‘Maybe they were worn.’

  ‘Yes. With a special chemical compound that, when it got hot enough, rendered your brakes useless.’

  Ava struggled to digest what he was saying. ‘You think my car was deliberately sabotaged?’ The very idea was ludicrous. It was true that Anders had once experienced conflict with the neighbouring country of Triole, but that had died down years ago. Her brother had even been set to marry the young Princess of Triole when she came of age.

  ‘Not only that,’ her father interjected. ‘We now know that Frédéric’s helicopter crash was not an accident either.’

  ‘What?’ Ava’s startled gaze flew to her father. ‘I... How is that possible?’

  Wolfe’s voice was hard when he answered. ‘A section of the rotor was altered in such a way that the pilot had no chance of detecting it.’

  ‘You’re suggesting Freddie was murdered?’

  ‘Not suggesting. Stating. And whoever did it went after you, too.’

  Ava reflexively pressed her hand into her stomach. This was too much to take in. ‘But that is absurd. Who would do such a thing?’

  ‘Enemies. Freaks. Stalkers. Shall I go on?’ His tone was deadly serious.

  ‘Monsieur Wolfe has kindly agreed to investigate that side o
f things.’

  ‘Wolfe.’

  He’d corrected her father. Something no man ever did. Half expecting him to put Wolfe in his place, she was surprised when her father nodded.

  Men!

  ‘Really? You volunteered?’ Ava didn’t bother hiding her incredulity. ‘Why would you do that?’

  ‘Ava!’ Her father’s reprimand at her outspokenness was loud and clear in the still room. ‘Wolfe hasn’t volunteered. I have hired him.’

  Of course. She thought asininely. Why would a man who keeps his affairs short and shallow volunteer to help out a woman he is clearly finished with?

  It galled her to recall just how many times she had checked her mobile phone for a missed message from him over the past weeks. She could have called him, she supposed, but pride had stopped her from even considering it. Calling him would only prove that she hadn’t been able to move on from their night together while he had.

  ‘Why would you do that, sir?’ Ava turned her back on Wolfe to try to block out the overwhelming physical attraction she still felt for him. ‘Why not use the local police?’

  ‘It’s a question of trust, Your Highness,’ Wolfe answered.

  His frigid formality made her feel despondent, and that in turn made her feel annoyed. ‘We don’t trust our own police force now? We’re a peaceful nation, Monsieur Wolfe,’ she said, stamping her own formality on the situation. ‘No political uprisings anywhere.’

  ‘True. But in this situation you don’t know who is intending to hurt you. I won’t.’

  His tone was bold and confident and she wished she shared his assurance. After the way she had dreamt about him for two weeks she wasn’t so sure. Although she did believe he wouldn’t hurt her in the way he was referring to.

  His thick lashes acted like a shield against his thoughts and Ava couldn’t wait for the meeting to end. ‘I’m not sure I believe this.’ She appealed to her father. ‘It could just be coincidence.’

  ‘Chemical compounds kind of mitigate that possibility, Your Highness.’ Again Wolfe answered for her father.