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A man stepped out of a shadowed corner of the interrogation room. He crouched down beside the man, saying something. The interrogator knew Eric was there. He was the only other person at this secret facility, which meant he’d been the one to buzz Eric in, probably using a portable control device he’d taken into the interrogation room with him.
Torturing information out of people was all about the timing. If they were just getting to the good part, it would be foolish to leave the room.
Eric tossed his pack and jacket onto one of the chairs and then hit the button beside the one-way glass that would activate the speaker system.
“We’re close to being done, mate,” the crouching man said. He had a thick Scouse accent. “I just need a bit more. Then we’ll get a beer. How does that sound?”
“Please, please, I’m going to fall.”
“You can’t do that. If you do that, you’re going to pop those arms right out of your shoulders, and that would fooking hurt.”
“I can’t see…” the other man whimpered.
“Your eyes are fine. You’re just a bit swollen from where I hit you. I’d say I was sorry, but I think we both know you deserved it.”
“I’m sorry. So sorry. Please.”
“I just need to know who told you where to find the princess.”
Eric rolled his shoulders, fighting the way they tightened in response to the reminder of what had almost happened two days ago.
The “princess” the interrogator referenced was Sophia Starabba, daughter of the admiral of Rome. The Starabbas had ruled the territory of Rome—which geographically looked more like the empire of the same name, rather than the current city—for generations. The membership of Rome called her “principessa,” and the nickname had gone with her when she’d married the admiral of England.
Unlike Eric, whose own marriage had a few years of peace and happiness before everything went to shit, Sophia and her husbands, James and Arthur, hadn’t known peace in their short relationship. They’d been the first people to figure out that ritual killings in Rome were actually a warning that an old enemy of the Masters’ Admiralty, the Domino, had returned. They’d gone to the fleet admiral, but their warning had come too late, and they’d been there when Eric’s predecessor was assassinated. Then the admiral of England had been killed when the territory admirals gathered to choose a new leader. Arthur, minus one arm, had been thrust into the role of England’s admiral.
Eric knew how that felt. Eric also knew that without Sophia by his side, Arthur might have fucked up royally, being so new to command.
But now Sophia wasn’t speaking to Arthur. She was livid, in a way only Italian women could manage, because Arthur had forbidden her from going to Rome in the aftermath of the attack on her father’s home. It had been too dangerous, but that hadn’t stopped her from desperately wanting to see her father, who was alive—barely—and in a coma, or her brother, Antonio, who was now acting admiral of Rome.
Another person forced into a role they weren’t meant to take, forced to remain in that position for the good of the society.
Eric was doing to them—to Arthur and Antonio—exactly what had been done to him.
Fuck it all.
Sophia and James had left the London home they shared with Arthur, planning to spend a few days at a country estate owned by James’s family. On the way there, they’d gotten a flat tire.
The tire had gone flat because the man currently being tortured had thrown out a spike strip.
Arthur, frantic for the safety of his spouses, and just the right amount of paranoid, had sent a knight with them, but had also deployed a team of security officers to follow and protect them in secret.
The knights of each territory were law and justice. They enforced the rules. They protected the members of their territory. When punishment was needed, they were the ones to hand down the sentence. That’s how Erik had started out. A riddari. A knight of Kalmar—noble, just, chivalrous.
But law and justice weren’t enough.
That’s where the security officers came in. They’d gone by different names throughout the years, some of those names infamous. What they did hadn’t changed. They were assassins and spies, shadow and smoke.
They did what needed to be done. No matter what that was.
“I told you. Told you,” the man blabbered. “I got a text from the master.”
“What did it say, exactly?”
“That the princess was leaving London. That I should follow her and…”
“Don’t stop now.” The security officer’s voice was friendly, almost jovial. “We’re just getting to the good part of the story.” He hooked an arm over the man’s bare lower back and pulled down, adding pressure to the shoulder joints.
The would-be kidnapper screamed, a high, thin sound.
