by Nana Malone
"Yes, you do. Someone tried to kill you.” He slowed down his speech as if speaking to a five-year-old. “And if you don't know enough to be worried about your own well-being, at least, I do."
"So, what? You're just going to take over my fucking life?" Shit. Shit. Shit. Shit.
I scrambled to come up with another alternative, another solution. This wasn't the way it was supposed to go. Sure, a guard, that made sense. One.
One couldn't possibly be looking over my shoulder all the time. The Royal Guards were usually two-man teams. The higher up on the royal food chain you were, the more guards you got. But if Sebastian was sending me knights, God only knew how many he was sending.
That meant people watching me, which meant my plans for Ashton and my plans for Max would be that much more difficult to carry out. "Look, I know what you're trying to do. You're trying to take care of me. You're my cousin. The king. I get it. I can get behind that. I appreciate it, but honestly, it's a little ridiculous. Someone shot Frank. Yes. But we were in an alley in not the best part of town. It could have been anything."
"Are you really going with this right now?"
"Anything is possible. I need my life to go back to normal. I have a lot going on. Sensitive deals."
"We're way the fuck beyond that right now, Tristan. Look, I get it. Penny is the same way. She doesn't want someone looking over her shoulder all the time and insists that she herself is a Guard."
If he wouldn’t relent with his wife, he wasn’t going to relent with me.
"Yeah sure. One guard. Makes a lot of sense. I need one to keep an eye on me, fair enough. I get it. But a whole team? Come on. I promise you that I can take the fuck care of myself."
"They're not there to watch you, Tristan. Fuck. I don't give a fuck what the fuck you're doing. Or should I?"
Bollocks. "No. I just... Goddamn it. I just want to live my life. I don't want to be under scrutiny all the time. That scrutiny may have well gotten my friend shot."
Sebastian sighed. "Look, I'm just trying to keep you alive. I never had any problem with your Dad. Even your Mom. You and Alix might as well be my siblings. I just want to take care of you. And right now, considering these two violent incidents... I can't just sit back and do nothing. Not only are you family, you're my subjects. Any citizen of the Winston Isles who I can do anything to assist, I need to. That is my duty."
I took a deep breath. Since I’d put the Max plan into play, I’d been laying it all out. If I was going to help Ella, I needed to do it in a way that never kicked back on her. And the way things were, I never coincidentally ran into Max. My team never played where he was. Ever. Not since Ella was traveling with me to the world cup two years ago, and then of course he’d been there. But blowback on Ella was the problem then.
I needed to be alone with him to make it all work.
He had a villa in Chile. And it just so happened that the Winston Isles home team played there twice a year. For over a year I’d been working on trade talks to play at home. It had been the biggest secret of my career, and Sebastian was about to ruin my carefully laid plans. The Argonauts had deliberately asked me to keep things mum. It was a big money deal, and they didn’t want it leaking. A native son coming home potentially meant a fuck ton of money.
Maybe I could keep him from calling a whole team. "Look, send one more, okay? That way, it's a two-man team. Just like always."
"It's already done. They will be arriving with Trevor."
Fuck. "I didn't ask for this. I just want to live a quiet fucking life. I don't want to be in the crosshairs. Whatever loopholes you created to make this happen, you don't think the Council will punish me for it?" More like I needed this deal to happen, and I didn’t want the council to block it.
"You know what? I weighed that against keeping you the fuck alive, and I opted for keeping you the fuck alive."
"You really should have asked me, Sebastian."
"Yeah, well, you don't get that luxury." He hung up.
Ella stared at me, her brow furrowed. "What's the matter?"
"Well, looks like we're about to have more company. My cousin is sending in knights."
"Maybe this is a good thing. If he sends in knights, there will be more people to make you rethink this plan. I don't care if I ever get my life back. Maybe that's not what's important. I'd rather have you alive than dead because you're doing stupid things."
I shook my head at her. "It doesn't matter. I'll figure out a way to get around it. The plans are already in motion. If everything goes right, sending me knights will be a moot point because I'll be home in the islands, anyway."
"And you didn't think it was a good idea to tell him?"
"No. I'll tell him when it's a done deal."
"I know you don't trust anyone, but you're going to have to trust someone eventually. Otherwise, we're both going to get dead."
"Nobody is dying. Not on my watch. I swear it to you."
I just hoped I wasn’t lying to her.
FOUR
ARIEL…
MY HEART WASN'T in this. But I said I'd go on this date, so date it was. Never mind that my brain was thinking about the assignment I claimed I didn’t want, worrying about someone I couldn’t have.
Stop it. Tristan was a grown up. And my team was excellent, he’d be fine. And I would be fine because I didn't have to see him.
There was a hot man here. A hot man who wanted me. Bird in the vagina and all that. Maybe that’s not exactly how the saying went. But basically… same.
After a series of texts, Ian and I had gone from coffee to dinner and back to coffee again because our schedules were too hectic. He'd already flown to Miami and back. Apparently, he was working on a deal for some promising hot basketball player.
After another change, we’d finally carved out part of an evening and opted for a drink at the ‘it’ wine bar not far from the office, so I'd let Penny and the girls dress me up during video chat like I was some kind of a doll.
I stared down at my shoes and wondered how the hell I was going to walk all the way to the wine bar and back.
God, I just wanted to cancel. Why was I so scared of a simple date? It wasn’t like I never dated. Okay, I barely dated, but still.
You're afraid of a lot of things lately.
I shoved down that wayward thought. I was not afraid. I could do this. It was just a date.
I took three steps out of the office and immediately decided to drive. My boots, as it turned out, were not made for walking. Trace was leaving at the same time and looked me up and down. "Uh, boss?"
"Yeah, Trace." I tried to remain casual as I sauntered over to one of the SUVs.
"Are you going somewhere? Do you have a… a meeting or something?"
The way he said meeting indicated that I did not look I was going to a meeting, which was accurate. Penny had made me wear a metallic top thing that was mostly backless. And then Jinx, the traitor, had suggested doing something with my hair that made it bigger. Not exactly curly but full of waves and more volume. Then, Jessa... well, Jessa was the worst. She'd had a makeup person come over and paint my face. Now I resembled some kind of social media starlet. Not overdone, but still beyond what normal me usually looked like.
"Yeah. I have a meeting." I refused to call this a date.
Trace grinned. "A meeting, huh? You know, I'm going to start doing our meetings in a backless top too, see how you like it."
"Word is, you have a hairy back, so I'm not interested in seeing that."
He frowned. "I do not have a hairy back. My back is awesome. Women love my back."
I rolled my eyes. "Goodnight, Trace. Tell your sister I said hi."
I caught a glimpse of his grin in my rearview mirror as I climbed into my seat. He stood next to his car and watched me as I slowly drove out. I felt dumb taking the car, but honestly, I could barely walk in these stupid shoes. What was Bryna doing suggesting them in the first place?"
She wants you to look hot so your date will think you lo
ok hot and will want to bone you senseless.
Ugh, I couldn't even think about boning. I was so nervous. My belly kept doing flips and flops back and forth, back and forth. My palms were sweaty, and I was watching my phone. My mind raced as it tried to think through all the logistics of sending the knights to Tristan.
Earlier, I'd briefed the team on what was happening with the prince. Trace's sister Emma had a college tour set up, so Trace couldn't go. I'd be sending Zia and Jameson in his place, and they would leave first thing in the morning.
Because you're too afraid to go yourself.
I wasn't afraid. I just knew better. For the time being though, I had it handled. My team was topnotch. If Jax hadn't just come off of the Neela assignment, I would have sent him. He'd become my right hand in the last couple of months, and I had grown to depend on him. When I pulled out and left Trace grinning like the idiot that he was, I drove the three blocks up to the wine bar.
It was still ridiculously early. I handed over the key to the kid wearing the valet jacket and confirmed that his outfit matched the other valet guys outside. And then I checked their footwear. They all matched too. Black sneakers. Serviceable, but not fancy.
The number of times I'd been called on to check for someone's wayward vehicle because they'd given it to someone who looked like they should be valet was kind of ridiculous.
When I stepped into the bar, an eager hostess approached. "Hi, I'm Ariel Scott. I'm supposed to be meeting Ian Tellman here. Is he here already?"
The hostess grinned. "Oh yeah, he's been here for twenty minutes."
I frowned. "Great." He was earlier than I was. I wouldn't get some time to settle my nerves. When I followed the hostess toward the table, he stood with a grin. "I guess, we're both anxious and excited."
"Yeah. Guess, so."
He slipped around the table and came over to give me a hug. "You look beautiful."
"Thank you."
"Yeah, I'm glad we finally get to do this, because I honestly didn't know when we were going to manage it."
"I know. The schedules are a little crazy."
I slipped into a seat and fired the opening question. "How was Miami?" It seemed like a safe enough topic. He would talk about his work. I would let him, revealing as little about me as possible. And then I would slowly back out of the room without having to really give much of myself away.
That's not how this works.
He leaned forward. "You look nervous."
"I am really nervous."
"That's fine. First dates are always nerve-wracking. But I think you're beautiful, and I would love to get to know you. So, why don't we just see what happens? No pressure."
Was this guy even real? All my life, where had guys like him been?
"I think that's a fantastic idea."
The rest of the date went well. He regaled me with stories of some of his athletes. Some of his stories were like something out of the TV show Entourage. Crazy shenanigans, usually involving sports cars and women. Finally, I leaned forward. "I mean, okay, clearly, I know about your career. I followed it. And I love football, myself. But I have to ask, how did you become an agent?"
A shadow crossed over his gaze. "Well, I was injured. And my team, that I thought would essentially love me forever basically called in my best mate to replace me."
I winced. I didn't have all of his history. If I was being honest, I didn't really pay much attention until Tristan had joined Madrid's team. Then I'd found that I loved it. "It must have been so difficult."
"Yeah, you can't imagine. So there I was, young... told I wouldn't be able to play again. But I was determined to prove them wrong, so I worked my ass off. Physical therapy, all those things. And you know what? With the surgery, they were able to cobble me back together, but it was just never the same, and I needed to take a good hard look at what my future might look like. If I wasn't going to be able to play, I needed to figure out how to do something else, so I became an agent. You know, sort of my way to keep players from making bad deals, like I had. I was so young, when I started, you know? My agent didn't think we needed a guarantee in the income clause. It depends on the athlete and what they’ve got going on, but if I'd had one, then it wouldn't have been so devastating."
"God, I mean, teams must feel like family, right? And then all of a sudden, they're gone and you feel unworthy somehow, even though you had nothing to do with it."
He nodded solemnly. "Obviously, you understand."
I managed to school the automatic wince. "Understand?"
"Yeah. I mean, the story of you leaving the Royal Guard. Clearly, it wasn't voluntary. You were writing your own ticket. You returned the lost princess. No one leaves the Royal Guard after that. And I find it very interesting that not many news outlets reported that one of the conspirators was, in fact, your father."
My heart hammered against my ribs. How did he know so much? He couldn't have gotten that information easily. Not that it was inaccurate, because it was shockingly accurate. It's just that Sebastian had kept it quiet. Nobody knew my real reasons for leaving the Guard. All everyone knew was that I left and started my own thing. That's all I wanted anyone to know, anyway. I didn't want to leave room for judgment or condescension.
"Um, wow. You're shockingly well-informed."
He winced. "Sorry, that was too much. I have sources, and I was curious about you. I didn't mean to pry."
In truth, he hadn't done any more prying than I had. I'd taken Roone's advice and ran a background check on him. He was on the up and up. No debts, a partner at the agency, and he was up-and-coming in his industry. Hungry.
I liked hungry. It reminded me of myself. "It's fine. I won't say I didn't look you up either."
He grinned. "Did you like what you saw?"
"I mean, on paper, you look fantastic."
He cocked his head and studied me. "And in person?"
I laughed. "I'm just not used to anyone looking so closely."
He nodded. "No, I get it. But I want you to know that I—" He trailed off when his phone rang. He winced and shook his head. "I'm so sorry. I just have this deal going on, and I need to take this."
I shrugged. "You're fine. Go ahead."
When he excused himself I watched him, and I watched the way other women watched him. The other women watched him hungrily. Fully assessing, scanning for any physical abnormalities as if evaluating him for breeding capabilities. But he seemed completely unfazed. As if he didn't notice at all. I liked that. He'd taken a peek under the hood I'd rather he hadn't taken, but since I'd done the same thing, I couldn't really be that angry. Then again, I was also a world-class hacker. Who was he that he'd been able to dig, and who were his sources?
Stop being so suspicious.
I really did need to let that go if I was going to date.
I watched as he hung up the phone and strode over. "Ariel, I'm so sorry."
"Let me guess, you have to go?"
He gave me a sheepish smile. "Yes. Do you mind? Can we pick this up again at an actual proper dinner?"
I gave him a smile. "Sure. We can do dinner."
He leaned in, and the panic set in. I didn't know what it was, or why, but something cold and slithering wound around my spine and froze me. He brushed a kiss over my cheek, remarkably close to my lips, but he didn't quite go there. When he backed away, he gave me a smile as if he hadn't noticed I'd gone suddenly statue-like. "I'll talk to you as soon as this emergency is over, and then we’ll pick a date for dinner, right?"
I forced my head to nod up and down. "Yup, works for me."
And then I watched as he walked out. His words had been exactly what I wanted to hear. But somehow, there was something about him I couldn't quite pinpoint. My body was rejecting him.
Because he's not Tristan.
Well, body, you don't get to have a say, because as far as you're concerned, Tristan isn't an option.
Ariel…
AS I WAS LEAVING the wine bar, I bumped into a familiar face.<
br />
Roone gave me a grin as he was coming up the stairs. “What’s up, former boss lady?”
“Fancy seeing you here. Date night before you leave?”
He grinned. “Something like that.” He looked around. “What about you. You’re all kitted out. Hot date?”
“Something like that.”
His gaze narrowed. The man knew me far too well. “You look tense. Why do you look tense? Was he a wanker? You want I should drag him out back for a lesson in manners?"
A smile tugged at my pursed lips, and I deliberately tried to force myself to relax. "I'm not tense. I'm fine. The date was fine. Just cut short."
He chuckled softly. "You forget I actually know you. I've seen that look before. We worked so closely on the Jessa thing together that I know your moods now. What's up?"
I needed to lie. I needed something plausible and believable, and I needed to lie well. "I don't know. Something feels off with the assignment for the prince, I guess. You and the team can handle yourselves, of course. I just don’t know. It feels off. We well and truly eradicated the conspiracy. I mean, they were dealt a heavy blow, so I'm just trying to figure out what the hell is going on now with Prince Tristan. It doesn't make any sense. There is no motivation. He's not in line for the throne. He gets a stipend, sure, but he has his own money. He doesn't need the crown, so I'm not really sure that this is a royal issue. You know what I mean?"
Roone nodded. "Yeah, you have a point, but royal issue or not, it's not like we can let the prince die. And for someone who adamantly didn’t want the assignment, you seem awfully invested in the prince’s welfare."
Shit.
"Right, but he is still a member of the royal family. I'm just trying to figure out exactly what we're dealing with, the mystery of it all."
Roone watched me. I wasn't sure if he was buying my bullshit or not, but whatever.
He stuck his hands in his pockets. “So, are you going to tell me the real version or not?”
