AllFreeNovel
Share Us
The king’s mouth hardened and his eyes turned to stone as he faced Trace again. “My father could never admit it was he who caused my mother’s death by insisting on another child, another son to secure the Marianescu legacy.” His eyes looked nothing like Mara’s at this moment, and Trace saw the same implacable hatred for the old king that he himself felt. “But it is too late for that. What my father started, you have nearly finished.”
Trace shook his head, unable to speak, but Mara’s brother wasn’t done. “I cannot reach her. I cannot heal her. I can only take a desperate chance and kidnap the man she loves, praying you can somehow undo the damage you have done to someone who never deserved such cruelty. Not from my father. Not from you.”
“That wasn’t what I intend—”
The king cut him off. “Perhaps not. But do they not say the road to hell is paved with good intentions?” He looked at Trace, his face hard and implacable. “You have put her in hell. What are you going to do about it?”
The two men stared at each other for endless seconds. “Where is she?” Trace asked finally, the words rasping in his dry throat.
“Stay here. I will send her to you.” The king turned on his heel and strode toward the side door. He glanced back with his hand on the knob. “Do not tell her I brought you here by force. Let her think you came to her of your own free will. I will not contradict you.” Then he was gone.
Trace moved to one of the long windows on the east side of the room, staring unseeingly out into the garden. He had no idea what he was going to say to the princess; he only knew her brother was right. If he loved her—and he did, so much so that life had not seemed worth living once he had driven her away—he somehow had to find the words to undo the damage he’d done. What had he intended to say to her when he’d booked his flight to Drago for New Year’s Eve? He hadn’t known then, just that he had to see her. Had to explain. He’d thought he would have time to think of what to say. But now he had mere seconds to find the words.
The hell with protecting myself, he told himself. The hell with that. I don’t know what I’ll say to her, but every word will be the truth, even if it damns me.
* * *
Andre dismissed his bodyguard and walked into the little library on the second floor, where he’d been told he would find his sister. She was sitting at the large table in the middle of the room where she and her best friend in high school, Juliana Richardson, had studied long ago. Textbooks were strewn haphazardly across the polished surface, some faceup, some facedown, others with strips of paper marking pages. Mara was busy scribbling in a notebook, and Andre heaved a sigh of profound relief. For the first time since she’d returned home she was showing an interest in her work, the work that had once been the cornerstone of her life. And that meant she was no longer completely devastated by what had happened to her at Trace McKinnon’s hands.
Mara looked up as the door closed behind Andre, and smiled. A real smile, the first one she’d given him since her return. The smile didn’t banish the shadows from her eyes, nor did it return the roses to her cheeks. But it gave Andre hope that his sister was moving beyond the pain, to a place where—even if McKinnon weren’t waiting downstairs—Mara would be able to return to something akin to a normal life.
“What are you working on, dernya?” he asked her curiously.
“I was going to surprise you,” she told him. “I was going to wait until I was finished, but I can tell you now.”
“Tell me what?” He came to stand by her side, looking at the incomprehensible notations on the page in front of her and laid a gentle hand on her shoulder.
“I have been working on a textbook. Differential equations. I started on it when I began teaching at the University of Colorado.” Her smile faded for a moment before she pasted it back in place. “The dean was most encouraging. And I let the head of the mathematics department critique the first few chapters. He was impressed.”
“Why am I not surprised?” he teased her, tucking a wisp of hair behind her ear. “My little sister is a genius. Anyone would be impressed. Anyone who understands differential equations, that is. It is merely Greek to me.”
She laughed, as he had intended. “It is Greek,” she averred. “The symbols, at least. The text is in English. I told Liam it would be easier if I could write it in Zakharan, because it is not always easy to find the right English words for what I want to say.” This time when her smile faded it didn’t return.
“But you will not give up, will you, dernya? How many times have I heard you say you do not like half measures?”
