Despite the scent of hibiscus and gardenias in the air, the breeze of the Caribbean blowing through my office window, and the bright rays of sunshine casting a glare on my monitor, a dark cloud hung over the palace.

“Where the fuck did he go? It’s been three goddamn days.”

I knew Roone was under a lot of pressure. But for the love of fucking Christ, my brother was gone.

My best friend squared his shoulders and met my gaze levelly. “No fucking clue. I knew when the woman came up to the apartment that she was trouble. I listened to him, and I shouldn’t have. This is my fault.”

Marcus apparently wasn’t going to let Roone take all the blame. “Your Majesty, sir, we were both there. We both should have been paying better attention, especially considering he’d already given us the slip once or twice before. It was imperative we made sure exactly where he was and who he was seeing. We messed up.”

I glowered at them both. “I think that’s the fucking understatement of the year.”

Roone’s jaw went tight. “Your Majesty.”

I could tell he was pissed off. It was always in this tone with me. If it had just been the two of us, he would have been screaming just as much as I was, but he wouldn’t lose control in front of Marcus.

“With all due respect sir, there was also no way we could have possibly foreseen him doing a runner off the goddamn balcony.”

I stared at him. “What?”

Roone cracked his neck. “It’s in the report, sir. That’s how he got out; a makeshift grappling hook of sorts, off the balcony to the floor below. We checked. It was an empty conference room. Locked, but obviously that’s not a problem for the prince.”

I sighed. “Obviously. Do we have any idea where he’s gone? Any leads? Something. Anything?”

He shook his head. “None.”

I could see it in his gaze. He was torn up about this. He cared about Lucas too. And despite Marcus, he was taking this on himself. “And the girl? Is she okay?”

Roone nodded. “Lady Tressel has been secured in the prince’s old flat per his request in the note he left.”

“Well thank fuck for small miracles,” I grumbled.

Penny pushed herself to standing. “Gentlemen, I know that this is difficult.” She slid a glance over at me then she continued. “I understand that Lucas’s past makes it particularly difficult to track him. At the same time, please think. Can you think of anything he might have mentioned about somewhere he might go or people he might see? Anything could be helpful. Right now, considering the pressure to find the princess and the fact that we don’t know all the parties behind the treason plot and the death of King Cassius, Lucas is in more danger than he ever has been before.”

Somehow, Penny was able to get through to them a lot better than I was. I could see Marcus visibly relax. But then it also looked like his brain was working, calculating.

Some of the tension eased out of Roone’s shoulders too.

“Please, this is so important. Anything at all.”

Penny had that way about her. She’d even had it with me. The only reason I hadn’t known she was a Royal Guard was because I felt like I could talk to her. Like she was a real person. Like she was listening and that she understood.

She was good with people. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to encourage her using that particular skill on my men or not, but at this point, I’d do anything to find Lucas.

Roone shook his head. “No, Your Majesty. But I know he had a whole fascination with family. He might make contact with his mother. I didn’t say anything at the time because I didn’t think it was pertinent, but I could have sworn I saw the boys of Blake Security visit him at the office once. Some of those blokes are ghosts. I could have sworn I saw Weller though, but he never went anywhere near Lucas’s office, so I thought I was wrong. But maybe the prince hired them for a separate job we didn’t know about? Come to think of it, the bird that went ‘round to his flat, might well have been his mother. The age is right. I can’t be sure.”

I ground my teeth. Bloody fantastic. “I’ll look into it.” I turned my attention to Ethan, my father-in-law. It was strange giving orders to a man who’d helped raise me. “Ethan, I would like you to personally find him. I don’t know how much trouble he’s in, or if this has anything to do with the threats against the royal family, but this can’t go on. I want him home in the islands. Where are we on my sister?”

Ethan’s jaw ticked. “She has vanished, sir. Jessa Flynn doesn’t exist anymore on paper. Not to worry. We’re looking at other avenues. She might have changed her name, gotten married, something. We’ll find her.”

“Yeah, I keep hearing a lot of that lately.”

I dismissed them all. They all left. Roone looked like he wanted to stay and talk to me, but I was in no mood. Besides, he didn’t need chewing out.

I knew Lucas. Roone had done his job. The person I was really mad at wasn’t in the room. And it would do me no good to take it out on the people who worked for me.

The only person who did not vacate as requested was my wife. “I don’t think that command was for me, was it?”

I sighed and leaned against my desk. “No. Never you. I’m sorry. I’m just – my fucking brother.”

“Yeah, I know. Look, I love him as much as you do. But you know him. He has his own set of issues. You know he never would have left if there wasn’t a reason.”

I nodded. I worried that the reason had been being under too much pressure from me, from what I was asking from him. He’d had a completely different life. One where he’d had to scrape and scrounge for every morsel just to survive. I’d had the exact opposite. Everything had been handed to me. I wanted to hand him some of it, but maybe it wasn’t what he wanted. I didn’t know.

“I just – His life is in danger, and I’ve got nothing to go on to find him.”

She sighed. She stepped between my legs and leaned into me. Automatically, my hands slid around her waist and to her ass, and I pulled her forward. Just the light squeeze had me feeling marginally better. A little kick of endorphins from her always seemed to do the trick.

“Really? Was the ass squeeze necessary?”

I laughed. “It’s called self- soothing. Your ass is my blankie.”

She rolled her eyes. “Sweetheart, there’s something else we need to talk about.”

My hands went still, and my stomach knotted. Was this about the secret visit she’d made to the dungeon that she didn’t think I knew about? If she’d just asked to see Robert, the traitor, I would have said yes.

No, you wouldn’t have. Okay. No, I wouldn’t have.

Regardless of the nature of their current relationship, they’d dated once. Jealous twat. But still, Robert Sandstorm had set into motion a string of events that nearly rocked the monarchy, not to mention nearly killed my bride. So, no, I didn’t want her seeing him.

She is still Royal Guard. She could be trying to get information out of him. All the various scenarios had run through my head.

But I had two fundamental problems. First, her safety. The cells were protected by a fortress. I was being ridiculous, but I didn’t want her in harm’s way. My other fundamental problem was that she was keeping it from me. Secrets were nasty little things. Did she think I’d forbid it?

I knew her new role was fucking with her. We had the Artistic Trust, and she had her painting, but it wasn’t enough for her. Especially not when she saw her family in danger.

It was as if her experiences in New York and everything we’d gone through, had woken the long-dormant Royal Guard inside her. Before then, she’d never wanted to be a guard. But for some reason, since we’d married, she’d been resisting to giving up her post.

I just didn’t know what to do about it, because I couldn’t very well let the queen run around with a gun, could I? Except, she was no pampered debutante. She was a warrior. Always has been. And the last thing I wanted to do was kill her spirit. But she had a different job now.

Yeah, because diplomacy and running charity benefits is so exciting for her.

This was the one issue we hadn’t really ironed out before we got married. We’d just been so in love, and I’d been too busy sliding into her softness as often as possible. So I’d thought – I didn’t know what I’d thought.

“Okay, give it to me straight.”

She reached into her back pocket, pulled out a thumb drive, and gently placed it on the desk next to my thigh.

“What’s this?”

“It’s the report you wanted from Lucas about the financial status of the Artistic Trust. He sent it over the night he vanished. The report from Tressel is also on there. They both identified the discrepancies in fund allocation. Lucas’s is more stringent. He has found all the money. Tressel’s is much sloppier. But it’s not surprising that they both point the finger at each other." She inhaled deeply. "Tressel alleges that he has even more evidence of Lucas’s wrong doing. And he points out the obvious. That your brother was, well, for all intents and purposes, a thief. A white collar one. Not to mention, with his degrees and training, he’s perfectly capable.”

I shook my head. “No. Lucas would never take a dime from us. He wouldn’t. Because all he had to do was ask.”

“I’m not saying he did. All I’m saying is that Tressel would not be the first person to try to point the finger at Lucas, if and when anything goes wrong, especially where finances are concerned. I’m just warning you to prepare yourself. I know Lucas would never take from you. If Tressel knew anything about him, he would understand that when Lucas steals things, it’s either for survival, or to teach someone a lesson. There is no malice in Lucas. Never has been.”

I sighed and relaxed into her arms, dropping my head to her shoulder and kissing her collarbone. Just knowing she believed in him was like a balm to the ache all over my body. She saw what I saw. I just wished that Lucas could see it too. And I hoped to fucking God we found him soon. Because if I needed protection, my little brother was a sitting duck.

This was almost too easy. It was simple to let the old me out. I was comfortable not thinking about who I affected with my actions. This was just plain effortless. It felt like a second skin, like coming home.

I was in Yvette’s night club, and the dance electronica was thumping loudly, making the walls shake. I preferred hip hop personally, but, you know, to each his own. This was a known hot spot in Atlanta to see and be seen. A lot of young, rich stars came to play here often. The part that made this so fun was that it was a secret party. It moved from location to location, so you had to know people who were in-the-know. Luckily, as Atlanta was a town I’d worked often, I had a few friends.

Dane Jackson was one of them. “Are you sure you want to do this?”

I nodded. “Yeah, I’m sure.”

“Hey man, you know there’s no love lost between me and Tony. Getting payback on that guy is cool with me. I just don’t want it to blow back on you.”

Dane and I had never been really tight. I always thought he was a solid dude, a good guy. His sister had gotten caught up with Tony and she’d gotten pinched. He’d hung her out to dry and let her take the fall. She’d gotten hit with grand larceny. And if he’d even taken part of the credit, they both would have done a year. But instead, she’d gotten six to ten.

“Fair enough. I hear you. I’m ready to go. You ready to go?”

He nodded. “This is your access. The biggest stars and the cast are here. Actually, I think all of them are here. The douches are the ones around the VIP corner over there though, droppin’ bottles like it’s nothing. But the money cat, the one paying for all this—” he inclined his head upward, “—that’s Adar Tobat. He’s one of the producers.”

“Does he ever mix with the riffraff?”

Dane shook his head. “Almost always, he’s out of it. But we can create a scenario to get him down here. You’ll have to be clean and quick.”

I smirked. “Have I ever been anything else?”

“So humble too.”

I winked. “Always.”

I worked the crowd easily. Simple lifts here, quick cash grabs there. Basic stuff. Not necessarily penny ante, considering how much money we were working with. Minus the credit card stuff, I could easily pull a hundred grand just with the cash.

It was basically a four-man crew, and the payout would be a three-way split between the others because I wasn’t there for the money. I had given my mother the earnings from that fateful job. But I wasn’t a total idiot. I’d invested that money wisely. I could live on that for quite some time without the proceeds from this job.

But, this wasn’t about money for me. This was about payback. If my stepfather, Tony, thought he could get away with coming after me, I would make him a wanted man. All the things he’d done throughout the years… he would finally pay for them. He’d gotten away scot free for decades, but the chickens were finally coming home to roost.

It was almost like taking candy from a baby. Cross routes, in a star pattern, up and back. The cash was easy pickings. The jewels were more difficult. Hardly anyone was wearing anything real or worthwhile.

After about an hour, Dane’s contact came through. Showtime.

Adar was everyone’s babysitter. There were zero rumors of him messing about with too many women, or men for that matter. He was straight laced, the money guy. He liked to make sure his investments behaved themselves, which was why he was the one footing the bill for this house party and he’d be the one to cut it off too. But nothing got to him. He wasn’t the kind of guy you could blackmail, go after, seduce, or entice. He had one vice. Only one. His car.

At ten to midnight, we all checked our watches. I whispered, “Three, two, one.”

I watched as it all went off. And as if brought about my magic wand, Tobat sat up, frowned, looked at his phone, then shouted something to one of his body guards. When the guy didn’t move quickly enough, Gall shoved him out of the way and down the stairs. There was nothing like having the car alarm for a million-dollar car light up like a Christmas tree to get someone’s attention.

Natalie, the smallest of us, very casually sauntered over, acting drunk and tipsy. “Oh my gosh, do you think I could sit with you? Up there, what do you say? How do you even get one of those boxes up there?”

He said nothing. Just side stepped her easily. And then Dane and Marco did their thing. A little mini fight.

Bodyguards One and Two tried to break them up, effectively distracting Adar. Natalie came back after having taken his cards and scanning them on the reader. Then it was my turn to put the wallet back. The guy was careful, conservative.

“Shit, sorry about my friends.” I patted him down. “That watch looks expensive. Shit.” I deliberately touched him on the arm as I put the wallet in his other pocket. It was intentionally the wrong one. I wanted him to remember that it was in the wrong place.

Realizing it was in the wrong pocket would make him check to see what was missing. In addition to our fancy hand work, I’d also planted Tony’s thumbprint on one of the cards. We all wore finesse gloves on our hands to avoid any mistakes. They were imperative.

If that didn’t get the ball rolling, I had back up plans. I prayed to God this was going to work and get his crazy ass off the chess board. He could come after me all he wanted. But if he went after Bryna, I was going to be forced to do something drastic. And I didn’t think he was bright enough to leave her alone if he was free.

All right, let’s all hope that your plan works, otherwise you’ll be out of options.

No. This was going to work. It had to. On to phase two.