Kathleen Creighton - The Rebel King

While hovering anxiously over her, another Rhia-a heartbroken Rhia-was wailing. What are you doing, you silly fool? The last thing you wanted to do this morning - the last thing you 'd ever want to do - is fight with Nikolas!

The angry Rhia, self-righteous Rhia, turned her back on the sink and the mirror and squeezed her eyes tightly shut. Dammit, Nikolas. Damn you. Why did you have to go and ruin things? Why did you have to ask me to marry you?

I can't…just can't. I don't want to be a queen. It would never work, no matter how much I love you.

With that thought the heartbroken Rhia and the angry Rhia coalesced into one, with a shaft of pain so intense it doubled her over. Oh, Nikolas, I do love you. I do… She rocked herself, arms folded over her breasts like broken wings, heedless of her unhealed burns, refusing to allow herself the solace of tears. Maybe it's just as well. Yes - it's good this happened now, while I'm still strong enough to say no.

She sniffed, and slowly, experimentally, unfolded herself. Discovering that she felt stronger, quieter inside, she washed her face and dressed in the clothes she'd worn the day before and washed out last night in Nikolas's sink. Except for the bra-no way could she wear that. She'd have to do without. The pullover was still damp, but the coolness felt good on her burns.

When she opened the door, Nikolas was just disconnecting the telephone. He glanced at her and said, in a voice as neutral as his expression. "I've summoned a cab. Rang Elliot on his handy, as well-he's warming up the chopper. All right with you if we grab coffee and a bite at the airport?"

"Sure, that's fine. Coffee's all I want, anyway." She wasn't hungry. Nikolas had fed her well the night before…in more ways than one. But the memories that tried to sneak into her mind through that door were too fresh, too raw. and she slammed it firmly shut on the beginning ripples of pain.

She picked up her utility belt, which, along with her leather jacket, she'd left draped across a chair. She buckled it on over her pullover, then reached for her jacket. Taking a nine-millimeter Walther from the holster built into the jacket's lining, she proceeded to check the weapon over thoroughly and with the efficiency of long practice. She'd asked Elliot to get her a weapon, and he'd given her his own backup piece. It was a little lighter than she was used to. but it would do the job.

She slapped the magazine back into place and looked up to find Nikolas watching her. eyes darkly intent. A sardonic little smile tugged at the corners of her mouth as she imagined the staiggle being waged behind his carefully controlled features. She knew what he was thinking…what he wanted to ask her…

You're going to visit a palace, Rhee - the royal palace, home of kings, the most beautiful and elegant building in all of Silvershire, one of the most beautiful in the world - and you're wearing that?

But he didn't ask it. Probably he'd already realized what it meant even to think it, and stopped himself in time.

Instead, he nodded at the gun and said mildly. "Do you think they'll let you take that into the palace?"

On that safe ground, she allowed her smile to bloom into full irony. "Nik, I have a permit and my Lazlo Group credentials. With those I could probably take a weapon into Buckingham Palace."

He said nothing, only nodded. She felt his gaze following her every move as she returned the gun to its holster, picked up the jacket and slipped it on…shrugged it into a more comfortable fit on her shoulders and tugged down the sleeves. Thus armored, she looked up at last and met those hooded, pain-filled eyes.

"This is who I am," she said softly.

From the street below came the beep of the taxicab's horn, saving him the necessity of a reply.

Rhia's reaction to her first glimpse of the royal palace was everything Nikolas could have hoped for. One word that pretty much said it all:

"Wow."

He smiled wryly and didn't reply, but the words gilded cage slipped unbidden into his mind as the car swept up the long drive toward the sentry boxes at the main front gates.

Beyond the heavy wrought-iron gates and the concrete security barriers, he could see the graceful stone spires of the palace outlined against a clear blue autumn sky, the yellow painted walls gleaming like gold in the morning sun. He'd been to the palace-the public part of it-more than once, the first time as a very small child, brought there by his "uncle" Silas Donovan to see where the man who'd murdered his parents lived. He'd tried, then and on each subsequent visit, to feel the anger and disdain he knew his uncle expected, but deep inside, even as a child he'd thought it must surely be the most beautiful place in the world. Now, for the first time in his life he allowed his throat to swell with a lump of pride.

The unmarked limousine that had brought them from the airport had tinted windows, an amenity Nikolas was profoundly thankful for when he saw the reporters and paparazzi staked out along both sides of the drive.

"Do you suppose it's always like this? The media. I mean?" Rhia had torn her gaze from the palace to look at them. too.

"I have an idea there are always a few lurking about. With all that's happened in and around the palace lately, though, it's probably to be expected there'd be a crowd."

"Especially since the rumors broke about the existence of a long-lost prince." Rhia said drily. "Good thing they can't see who's in here. We'd probably have a riot on our hands."

"Oh, come now." Nikolas said, laughing uneasily. "I think you're exaggerating my popular appeal. Not so very long ago, they were sure I was guilty of murdering the crown prince."

"And, now they know you're not. Care to put your 'popular appeal' to the test?" Even in the shadowed car, he could see her kitty-cat smile. "Go ahead-stop the car, get out and introduce yourself."

He snorted and said, "No thanks." But deep inside he felt a small shudder, and the same voice that had spoken of gilded cages now whispered. Are you sure you're ready for this?

He'd thought he was ready…had even looked forward to the challenges of running a country. That had been when he'd let himself dream that he'd be doing so with Rhia at his side. Now… He'd do it. of course, because it was his duty. His country needed him. But it loomed as a lonely and daunting task.

As soon as the limo had cleared the security checkpoint. Rhia ran her window down-partly so she could gawk unhindered as the car wound its way through the magnificent grounds, but also because she was finding Nikolas's silence oppressive. She knew the silence probably had nothing to do with the fact they'd quarreled; Nikolas wasn't the type of man to sulk. She had an idea it was finally beginning to hit him-the enormity of what had happened to him, and the changes that were coming. And the overwhelming responsibility. But still…the silence, the tight, thin line of his mouth, the muscle working in his jaw…were all reminders to her of the way she'd hurt him. like a toothache that wouldn't go away.

The limousine prowled past the palace's magnificent formal entrance, with its three-tiered sweep of gleaming marble steps leading up to the wide double doors that had been hand-carved from ebony and inlaid with silver and ivory, and the grand balcony above from which generations of Silvershire's monarchs had greeted their loyal subjects. Rhia would have liked to have taken a tour of the great halls and public rooms she'd heard so much about, but that would have to wait for another day. A day when there was no longer a madman on the loose. A madman with a chilling ability, it seemed, to enter and leave the most secure parts of the palace at will. She wasn't here as a tourist, she reminded herself, or even as a friend of the prodigal prince. She was here as an agent of the Lazlo Group, the most exclusive and highly regarded private security organization in the world. And her job was to catch a killer-before he killed again.