“Understood, sir.” Igor had the entire staff disappear from view in moments, and soon the prince was and wasn’t alone.
Memories of Fawn surrounded him.
This was where he and Jason Christakos had spoken in front of Fawn, the prince thought.
He headed down the hallway.
This was where he had first spoken to Fawn after her interview, and she had done her best but failed to make herself smile at him.
He looked at the end of the hallway.
That was where Fawn had thought she was being haunted.
He stopped in front of his study.
And here—-
Here—-
Prince, please. Her cry echoed in his mind, every word whipping his heart.
For your sake, you must learn to forget me.
I can’t. The words repeated over and over, and his heart began to bleed.
Then that’s a pity...because I can forget you.
The prince’s gaze burned.
Oh God, Fawn.
Here was his last chance of saving her from all the fucking agony—-
Here was where he had abandoned her.
Jaw clenching, he forced himself to step inside the study.
And then he started to call.
Again and again.
And typed.
He typed nonstop.
Emails. Text messages. Chats on applications.
I love you.
Please believe me.
I love you.
Please believe me.
One day passed.
Two days.
But the prince didn’t stop trying to contact her. Only the knowledge that the TRO would send him back to jail kept him from visiting her. His fear had nothing to do at all with being behind bars but of not being there for Fawn again if she needed him.
The nights were the hardest, the darkness making it impossible for the prince to hold on to illusions of hope. In his mind, his heart, he knew that his time to reach her was running out. He wished it was paranoia but he knew it wasn’t, the same way the prince had known that last time his biological father had told him goodbye—-
He had known he would never see his father alive again.
Death was like that.
It only needed to meet you once to be a friend for life, never to be forgotten.
And on the fifth day after his release from jail, the prince learned he was right.
He had just forced himself to swallow a few bites of breakfast when he received a call from Derek Christopoulos.
“Reid, I have news.”
“Fawn?” He gripped his phone hard. “Is she alright?”
“You told me to let you know if anything comes up, and she’s just been admitted to Wyndham Hospital. She’ll be undergoing surgery—-”
The prince said abruptly, “I have to go.”
Stalking out of the house, he found Noah and Igor waiting for him outside, the limousine’s engine already running and on standby.
He stopped dead in his tracks. “What do you think you’re doing?”
“We heard your conversation, sir,” Igor said. “We’ll be coming with you.”
The prince said in a hard voice, “No.” What he planned was against the law in every sense, and he didn’t want any of his men involved.
“We can either ride with you or we’ll follow behind you.” Noah’s tone was matter-of-fact. “Either way, sir, we will stand by you.”
“She’s important to us, too, sir—-” Igor’s voice suddenly cracked, and it was the first time for the prince to see the other man look every year of his age.
The prince breathed hard. “You’re both fucking idiots,” he muttered jerkily. “What...happened was my fault.”
Noah shook his head, saying hoarsely, “When we got to her that day—-” The older man’s gaze started to blur as memories rushed in, and he remembered Fawn’s bleeding, disfigured face. God.
He had survived war more times than he wanted to remember, and yet why could none of those battles compare to the pain of knowing that he, too, had played a role in Fawn’s suffering?
“She was already delirious, and we had to rush her to the chopper for medical attention. We hooked her up, stopped the bleeding, and then, she saw me—-” Noah’s chest heaved. “She smiled, sir. Like she hadn’t just had her face carved up. And you know why? You know what your fawn said, sir?”
The prince turned ashen at the bleakness that darkened the older man’s gaze.
“She asked me to tell you it doesn’t hurt as much as it looks.”
Ah.
Tears fell on Noah’s weathered cheeks. “Your love made her strong. That’s the only thing you gotta remember. The only thing that’s important.”
And the prince realized that all this time he had thought he was alone in his suffering—-