‘He came to kill us,’ Nick said.
Rose hadn’t moved. She was still pointing the gun directly at the man before her. ‘Can I put it down?’ she whispered.
‘Let’s get back-up first,’ Nick said, and looked expectantly at the security guard, and the guard took a shocked look at Rose and moved into action. He spoke urgently into his radio.
And suddenly things were out of their hands.
The next hour passed in a blur. The security guards took their intruder down to one of the main sitting-rooms, where those who had no direct cause to be present could be closed out.
Nick called Erhard. The old man was a guest this night in the castle. Nick didn’t want to disturb him, but faced with what might have happened, faced with the evil he’d seen tonight, he needed to be sure who he could trust.
Erhard arrived in bathrobe and carpet slippers, looking pale, old and shaken to the core, but still retaining the aura of dignity that he’d carried from the first.
‘I’m so sorry,’ he told Rose, his voice trembling. ‘I would never have asked you if…’
‘It’s alright,’ Rose said, but she wasn’t moving from where she was. Which was tight against Nick. From the moment Nick had lifted the pistol out of her hands, she’d started trembling and the trembling hadn’t stopped. Nick had wanted her to be put to bed, for the doctors here to give her something to help her sleep, but she’d reacted with anger, and momentarily the trembling had stopped.
‘Someone tried to shoot me, so I’m supposed to take a sleeping tablet and go calmly to sleep without getting it sorted? You must be out of your collective minds.’ Then as Nick had held her she’d subsided against him and let him do the supporting. ‘I have a husband,’ she said with dignity. ‘When he goes to bed, I go to bed, and not before.’
She’d held to that line, as more onlookers had spilled from the surrounding bedrooms, as every member of the castle staff had seemed to find some excuse to see for themselves what was happening.
Little was happening. The security guards had held their prisoner until Erhard had arrived.
‘These men can be trusted,’ Erhard told Nick, nodding to each of the four security-guards. ‘I know each of them. But I don’t understand how-’
‘There was a disturbance on the far side of the castle grounds,’ one of the guards told Erhard, sounding appalled and apologetic at the same time. ‘The fence was slashed and a group of youths tried to break in. They were young and drunk and foolish, but we all attended.’ He hesitated. ‘There’s only been the old Prince here for so long,’ he said. ‘There’s been no interest in the castle. My officers have been lax.’
‘There’s been little need for security in the past,’ Erhard said gravely. ‘But there is now. What chance these youths were paid to make a distraction?’
‘I’ll find out,’ the senior guard said grimly. He looked at the man they were holding. Rose’s bullet had clipped his skin, a surface wound. One of the guards had roughly bandaged it to stop it bleeding. The man stood now between two guards, grim-faced, silent. ‘As we’ll find out who this is.’
‘And who’s paying him,’ Erhard said heavily. ‘Can you triple your numbers here tonight, using trusted people only? I want people outside and in the corridors.’ Then he turned to Rose. ‘I’m so sorry,’ he said again. ‘We weren’t prepared. You’ll be safe now.’
‘I had Nick,’ she said.
‘Yes.’ The old man’s eyes met Nick’s. ‘Without you…’
‘It was Rose who did the shooting.’
‘Thank you both,’ he said grimly. ‘My two…’He hesitated, and appeared to think better of what he’d been about to say. ‘We’ll keep you safe,’ he said roughly, and turned and walked away, signalling the guards and their prisoner to follow.
They were left alone.
‘I think we should go fetch Hoppy,’ Nick said, and as they walked out of the sitting-room door they had to walk past two burly security guards.
Two more appeared from nowhere and escorted them to the kitchens.
They retrieved Hoppy. Their guards followed at a respectable distance as they made their way upstairs again.
‘Not your room,’ Rose said urgently, hugging Hoppy close, and Nick nodded.
‘Okay, sweetheart,’ he said. There’d still be blood on the floor. He could understand. ‘But I’ll walk you to your door.’
‘Not…’ She took a deep, shuddering breath. ‘I meant
The security guards behind them had paused. They stayed, impassive. Maybe they didn’t follow English, Nick thought hopefully.
‘Of course,’ he said. It was totally understandable that she didn’t want to stay in the bedroom by herself, he thought. So why his heart should lurch…
‘Thank you,’ she said simply, and they didn’t say another word until they were in her suite with the door locked behind them. Securely, with a key, and the key stayed on the inside of the door, with a bolt besides.
Rose placed Hoppy on the floor. Hoppy looked up at his mistress, and gave a sleepy wag of his tail; it was four in the morning, after all, and a dog had need of beauty sleep. He hopped through to the big bed in the next room, leaped lightly up onto the pillows and proceeded to go back to sleep.
‘Great watchdog,’ Nick said, and smiled.
‘I think we’re safe tonight,’ she said.
‘Yes.’
‘It’ll have been Jacques.’
‘Probably,’ he said.
‘And Julianna.’ She was still deathly pale. Dressed only in her chemise, she was shivering. It was warm enough, and the fire made it more so, but still she shook. ‘Julianna’s my sister,’ she said, distressed. ‘I never dreamed…’ She shuddered. ‘She must hate me. I never thought. Back home this seemed so simple, but how did we ever think we could do it, take over a throne just like that? You know, somehow, because Julianna was planning to do it herself, it seemed possible. Feasible, even. Marry you. Have the great adventure. Save a country. It’s the stuff of storybooks where there are happy endings and everything’s resolved by…I don’t know kissing a frog.’
She hiccupped on a sob and he reached for her and tugged her against him, holding her, simply holding her as she sobbed and sobbed. The front of his shirt grew wet from her weeping, but still she wept, great, shuddering sobs that wracked her whole body.
He held her for as long as it took. But finally she cried herself out. He felt her body go limp. He was half- supporting her. She felt so…So…
So much his wife.
That was what it felt like. It felt like he had all the time in the world. It felt that indeed this was his wedding night, or more, that this was his wedding moment. He’d sworn never to fall in love, but he had, he had. If she’d been killed tonight…
He kissed her gently, wonderingly, on the top of her head, and maybe he shuddered himself for she drew back a little and looked up at him in the firelight.
‘I’m s-sorry,’ she said, hiccupping slightly as she tried to find her voice. ‘I don’t cry.’
‘I can see that about you.’
‘No, really,’ she said, and somehow she made her voice firm. ‘I don’t. I don’t know what I’m about tonight.’
‘You shot a man,’ he said gently. ‘How you did that…’He felt his gut clench at the thought of what she’d done. ‘How the hell did you do it?’ he asked, thinking it through. ‘To wake up and get the gun and actually fire the thing?’
‘I’m a vet,’ she said simply.
‘I’m not sure that that explains it fully.’ He tugged her close again, not because he needed to-oh, fine, yes, he needed to-but not for comfort. Just because this was Rose.
His wife!
