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“I have a few men following him. If I had to guess, he’s behind the attack yesterday. But since Christine killed your witness, we have no proof.”
My jaw ached from all the clenching. I really needed a stiff drink. Or maybe something stronger. “Does it matter if we have proof?” This was normally something I’d need to discuss with my advisor or maybe even my mother, but Atticus knew how criminals worked, and he had his ear to the ground.
“Unfortunately, yes. He is picking up a lot of underground supporters. People unhappy with your father’s legacy. People unhappy with you.” He stroked his chin. “I could make him easily disappear, but it would just embolden them. Many are treating your attacker like a martyr—something I’m sure you’re familiar with.”
“Fuck him. You go against me, and there will be consequences,” I said, sounding too much like my father for my comfort. “Why even are people rebelling?”
Atticus sighed, as if annoyed that he had to be explaining this to me. Yeah, asshole, I knew I wasn’t fit for this job, too. My father thought he was immortal, thought he had more time to train me up and turn me into the future king he wanted. But he was just a man. A dead man. And I was someone with formal training but no inside experience or desire to lead.
“Your father has been raising taxes, and the unemployment rate is higher than it’s ever been. Social services slashed. Hospitals are crumbling. Homeless shelters are overcrowded. Ironically, business has never been better for me. People resort to crime when they can’t put food on their table. I’m surprised an uprising hasn’t happened sooner than this.” He checked his watch. “They want a leader, and it looks like Lord Nathan wants to be the face of this little uprising. It’s a delicate situation.”
Fuck. I knew all of this, but hearing Atticus say it so plainly made me furious. I’d been pouring over documents about the state of the kingdom this last week. Adonis and the finance committee had put together enough facts and figures to make my head spin.
“So you’re saying we can’t kill him?” I asked, already knowing the answer.
Atticus shrugged. “We could. Easily. He’s a cocky fucker with hardly any security. But the backlash might be difficult to navigate. You could fight him the way all good kings fight.”
“How?” I asked, hating that I was asking him for help.
“Ask your advisors. Ask your mother? I’m more skilled at finding less than savory solutions. You can use the law. Hell, make a law. You’re the king with resources at your disposal, are you not? I have a future queen to check in on. And possibly spank.”
That caught my attention. “What are you talking about?”
Atticus fumed. “You stole my moment, yesterday. Did you know that? It was about me and Christine. You had to go and be a martyr and make it about you. Everything is always about you, isn’t it? First with that bloody declaration breaking Christine’s heart while you dramatically walked away from probably the one girl who ever loved you despite all your glaringly annoying faults. Then you had to almost get yourself killed.”
“I’m so sorry that my conversation with my fiancée was such an inconvenience for you. You’re the one who stormed in looking like an asshole getting pissy because she wanted to focus on her upcoming marriage.”
Atticus clenched his fist. “I had every right to confront her. She sent a text. A fucking text. Telling me that we couldn’t be together. That she’s sorry. After everything we’ve been through. Just because she doesn’t know I’ve been planning this for years doesn’t mean it isn’t real. I followed her for years. Scared off every asshole that thought they could kiss lips that belonged to me. I made her a fighter—”
I walked over to the bar cart in my bedroom and poured myself a glass of bourbon before lifting it to my lips and swallowing a gulp. It burned nicely on the way down. “Yeah. You made her a fighter. A fucking mindless killer—”
“Don’t. Don’t say that about her,” Atticus said, his voice strained. “You didn’t see her after…”
His words caught my attention. I moved to the desk in my living area to sit down, knowing that it would be difficult to hear what he had to say. “Tell me how she was.” It was a command. He’d already told me this, but I needed to hear it again. Without the secrecy.
He leaned against the wall, one arm wrapped around his middle and the other resting on it, his fist propped under his chin. “It was bad, August. I…she was so scared of the world. So alone. Didn’t leave her flat for days. Was scared in crowds. I wanted to comfort her, but I was scared I would trigger her. She didn’t want anything to do with her life in Aldrich. When she started going to the gym, I saw an opportunity and took it. Slowly, she came back to life again. I wouldn’t change my decision for anything.”
I felt like breaking something. What he described was my worst nightmare. I hated thinking that Christine had to go through all of this alone, but maybe it was good that she was far away from this castle. And even if I was nervous about her self-defense skills, I was thankful she found something that made her steal a bit of her power back. And I’d be lying if I wasn’t thankful to know she could handle herself if shit went south, and I had a feeling things would only get more difficult from here with this rebellion on the rise.
“I suppose I should thank you, though it still pisses me off that you were there for her when I couldn’t be,” I gritted.
“And I’ll continue to be there for her. I don’t need your permission. Or hers, for that matter. And I definitely don’t need you to make her feel even worse for being with me.” He straightened and smoothed his shirt. “And on that note, I’ll be going to visit her.”
“You might want to wait. She’s preoccupied at the moment,” I said, feeling somewhere between happy to piss Atticus off and sad that Christine was with the person she really needed at the moment. Was it being a martyr if I truly didn’t think I deserved her? If I recognized that I’d never be the person she needed?
“What is that supposed to mean?”
I cleared my throat and debated on chugging a bottle of whiskey. “She spent the night with Leo.”
His eyes widened. “I didn’t think he had the balls.”
I groaned. Truthfully, I didn’t think he had them either. “I forced him to. She needed him last night.”
And she didn’t need me.
He ground his teeth for a moment. “You know, when I worked out this happily ever after, I didn’t factor in a third.”
I blanched. “But you planned on…” I paused to gesture between the two of us. “Two? What? Did you just think we’d share her?”
