going to places no one would ever expect to find a prince, seeing as how I was now back in my Clark Kent disguise. We had gone to the Seattle Pinball Museum, hidden in the heart of Chinatown, where she had epically defeated me and two preteen boys, who then told her she was too old to be playing. The look she gave them had crippled me with laughter as they ran away.
We were now in what she called a small dive bar named Sam’s Big Toe on Mayfield Avenue and Mount Pleasant. The place was owned by a woman named Sam, who knew Odette and welcomed her with a nod, along with ten very large, white-bearded biker men. They screamed her name like she was family. And the only explanation she gave for how a rich heiress like her knew people like them—so well that they cheered—was “don’t we all have wild teenage years?”
She did not like surprises, and she was full of them.
Leaning over the table once more, I noticed Wolfgang move out of the corner of my eye, noting that one of her balls was now significantly closer to the corner pocket.
“It is you!” I pointed at him, and he just stared at me. “You are helping her cheat.”
“He would never,” she said quickly.
“Really?” I asked then looked back at him. “Would you never, Wolfgang? Remember who it is you work for, by the way.”
“We are one and the same, aren’t we? He works for us both,” she interjected. “Right, Wolfgang?”
“Of course, ma’am.” He nodded at her.
“The treachery of you both!” I looked between them. “I understand her...Et tu, Wolfgang? I really cannot trust anyone.”
“Oh, please.” Odette rolled her eyes. “As if a little nudge is affecting you.”
“So, you admit it!”
“I did not.” She looked away, walking to the other side of the table.
I shook my head. “Iskandar, are you truly going to let them do this to me?”
I turned back to face him. However, he was on the phone with his back turned in my direction—great, who knew what he was informing my brother of this time.
“Are you playing or not?” Odette questioned.
And when I looked back to the table, we were somehow even. I glanced back to her face and the smile she was trying hard to hold back. “Do you have no shame?”
“If my mom were here, she would say, ‘Shame? What can I do with shame? Can I eat it? Can I wear it? Does it keep me warm at night? No. Then why the hell do I need it?’ It’s kind of her motto,” she said back, and I noticed Iskandar walking over to Wolfgang.
It was my chance to distract him before he helped her cheat again.
“Her daughter is not that far behind,” I muttered, walking around to find the best angle. “I better defeat you quickly. If I blink, I might see all the balls back on the table.” Seeing how to, I leaned over.
“Sir.”
I missed the ball completely, startled by how close he was to me. “Dammit, Iskandar! Did you not see—”
“We need to go,” he interrupted me harshly.
“What?” I stood up straighter.
“We are going now. I will also need your phone,” he said. I was used to the stone-faced, unaffected Iskandar, but something was different. His eyes gave him away. They looked dead, void of anything. Iskandar was a stickler for the rules, but he wasn’t completely dead inside.
“What is wrong?” I asked him.
“You phone, sir,” he repeated sternly.
I noticed Wolfgang taking Odette’s, too. He did not have the same demeanor as before, nor was he able to hide the emotions on his face as well as Iskandar; his freckled face was visibly paler, and he was shaken.
Panic started to work its way up me. “Is it my father?”
“We go need to go, now, sir. So, we are going.”
“You are not answering me!” I snapped at him. “What is going on?”
He looked me dead in the eye and said, “I do not know. I was just given orders to get you to safety, right now. Sir, we need to go.”
I did not know what to say, so I just nodded. I was not sure when he took the cue from my hand or when I started walking, but I did. It was only when Odette grabbed my hand that I notice how hard my heart was beating and also how I was trembling.
“Everything is going to be okay,” she whispered to me, squeezing my arm.
I did not reply because