rays of sunlight. Kris’s gut wrenched at the sight of him, his resentment feeling too close to grief. How could his own brother have kept this from him? Mark would never have lied like this back home.
This place, this life, was changing them.
Mark turned without a word and led the way across the grounds to the empty, half-timbered stables. Kris got it—the unspoken understanding that they didn’t need Mark’s staff looking on, listening in. This was between brothers with simple beginnings and what should be simple respect for each other.
Frankie followed at a distance with the other guards.
Inside the stables, Kris ran his tongue along his teeth, leaning against a closed stall door with Mark standing opposite him. His anger at Mark’s secret-keeping hummed in the dusty air, but just as strong was their almost palpable discomfort—an instinctive resistance to bad blood between them.
The moment felt barbed, and Kris’s skin felt torn already.
“Mark,” Tommy said, sitting off to one side on the steps that led to the hayloft.
Mark had been avoiding eye contact. Now he looked at Kris with unwavering sincerity. “I’m sorry, Kris,” he said. “I didn’t want this.”
Kris huffed out a bitter breath, shaking his head.
“How long have you known she was here?” Tommy asked.
Mark rubbed a hand along the back of his neck. “I found out soon after we arrived.”
That kicked Kris square in the gut. Months. Mark had known about Frankie for months.
“What the hell, Mark?” Tommy leaned forward in disbelief. “Why didn’t you tell us?”
“She asked me not to.” Mark glanced at Tommy, features pained. “I’ve tried to convince her to talk to Kris—so many times—but she’s refused.”
“You should have told me anyway.” Kris spoke quietly, but his words shook.
“I—” Mark stared at him, stricken. “It was complicated.”
No, it wasn’t.
“You knew I’d been trying to reach her.” Kris pushed off the stall door, outrage swelling in his veins. “That I was struggling without her. And you’re defending yourself?”
Mark half-turned away before turning back, looking harassed. “I promised her.”
“You know what she means to me!” The words seemed to cut his throat on the way out. “I’m your brother! Your first promise is to me. You know how badly I—” Kris swiftly spun around and pounded his fist against the stall.
“I wasn’t supposed to find out,” Mark said behind him.
“But you did find out.” Kris spun back to him. “You found out and you didn’t tell me. I’ve been going crazy. I’d have thought that after Ava, all these months of not being able to contact her, not knowing where she was, you’d know how it feels.” The agitation; the anguish. “I’ve found myself literally trying to pull my hair out from missing her—and you’ve known she’s been right here!”
The following silence was strained. Tommy shifted, running a hand over his face. Mark shot a glance toward the stable door.
“She got Ava out,” he murmured.
Kris stilled. What?
Tommy stood slowly, frowning. “What do you mean?”
“It’s why she made me promise.” Mark’s blue eyes were so earnest, Kris almost had to look away. “Philip doesn’t know. Neither does anyone on her team. She could have lost her job. She planned the escape, coordinated it, and single-handedly erased the evidence. The only reason I found out about Frankie at all is because there were complications on the night, and she had to intervene. She got Ava out,” he repeated, gesturing helplessly toward the mansion, toward his fiancée. “I owed it to Frankie to keep her secret. I’ve hated every second of lying to you, but that’s . . . why I did it.”
Kris leaned back against the stall, this time for the support. “Why?”
His brother understood. “She’s head of security—she saw everything and pieced together Ava’s situation. You know how messed up it was. Frankie visited Ava one morning and told her she was going to get her out so she could be with Darius. And she did.”
Frankie had rescued Ava.
Frankie had risked her own back to help a visiting princess—a woman she didn’t know. All the while, she’d hid from him.
Kris slid down the stall until he was sitting with his face pressed into his hands. He felt dazed. “I don’t know what to think.”
Tommy lowered himself onto the dirt-packed floor beside him and admitted, “This does change a few things.”
Mark joined them, nudging Kris with his boot. “She’s still our Frankie, you know?”
The woman Mark had just described was every bit his best friend, but the woman who’d stood hard-hearted in his room last night, and who’d