Betrayed Page 5

  She’d gotten tired of Malum and she’d gotten tired of me, and she’d left.

  Lane hadn’t even stayed for the coronation, and that, in particular, really rankled me.

  What kind of person didn’t stay to see their best friend crowned king?

  Someone selfish, I thought.

  I pushed the doors open, ready to start arguing with Lane. I was more than ready to walk into the room and ask – no, demand – that she be truthful with me.

  Only, she wasn’t there.

  She wasn’t in the kitchen at all.

  I stood in the center of the room and turned, looking around at everything. The room was totally empty. She wasn’t there. Nobody was.

  Hadn’t I seen her?

  I was just starting to second-guess myself when I heard a dark, low laugh.

  “Looking for me?”

  I turned to see her crawling out of a cupboard that was low to the ground. The door was a clear glass that slid open when you tapped on it. I could see everything in the cupboard, but somehow, I hadn’t noticed her.

  Strange.

  I was usually so on top of things.

  “How did you even fit in that cupboard?” I asked her. “You’re nearly as tall as I am.” Lane had always been graceful, but she was no tiny waif.

  “It’s a big cupboard,” she shrugged, looking over at it.

  “You were hiding,” I said, accusing.

  “Yes.”

  “Why were you hiding from me?”

  “I wanted to see if you were actually watching me on those dumb cameras.”

  “Having a security system isn’t dumb,” I pointed out. “It’s actually an important way I can protect the castle.” She didn’t understand the incredible job that a king had. It was up to me to make sure that everything – that everyone – was protected.

  “You protect the castle by watching over it like a creeper?”

  I sighed, shaking my head. I was never going to win with this girl. She had a response for everything. She was so damn snarky that she just didn’t care what I had to say.

  “That’s not what I said, and you know it.”

  “I know that you followed me here.”

  “Why do you think that?”

  “Didn’t you? It’s late. What reason could you possibly have for coming to the kitchens at this hour?”

  “I’m hungry,” I snapped.

  Lane paused, looking at me.

  “It’s weird, isn’t it?”

  “What?”

  “Being around each other. Seeing each other when we’re all grown up.”

  It was, a little bit. Long ago we’d been the best of friends, but something had changed. We’d lost something. We’d lost each other. Now she was back like a whirlwind, like a tornado, and I didn’t know what to do about it.

  Having Lane around meant my heart was being pulled in so many different directions that it was crazy...so many different directions that I felt like I was losing my mind.

  “It’s a little weird.”

  “Are you upset I came back?”

  “No,” I told her quickly, honestly. “If I’m going to go through something huge like this, I’m glad I’ve got someone I trust with me.”

  “You don’t wish I was Ryssi?”

  “No,” I chuckled, shaking my head. No, I didn’t want my little brother instead of this beauty. “I don’t wish you were Ryssi.”

  I looked at her standing there: so beautiful, so soft. My heart was filled with longing as I watched her. Really, it almost hurt that she was so damn perfect.

  Why couldn’t I just choose her?

  Why couldn’t it be her?

  I knew why. I knew she wouldn’t want to marry someone like me, and the truth was that Lane and I had a lot of issues to work out before we could even think about dating, much less getting married.

  But she was running from something, I knew that much. I remembered enough about Lane to know when she was hiding something big, and she wouldn’t have come back here if she didn’t need protection from something or someone.

  I wanted her to tell me.

  I wanted Lane to spill her guts and just admit whatever it was that was bothering her. It was probably too much to ask. I understood that.

  Still, I couldn’t resist pushing for honesty. I wanted just a little bit of truth. If I could get her to give me a little, just the smallest amount, then it would be enough for me. I’d be satisfied with whatever she could offer.

  “Lane?”

  “Yes?”

  “Why did you come back?”

  She sighed and turned around. She started pressing buttons to open cupboards. One by one, the doors slid up, revealing the inner-contents. She looked at a cupboard that held fruits from different planets, and then she checked out a cupboard that held grains.

  “Lane?”

  “It doesn’t matter, okay?” Lane spun around, glaring at me. “It doesn’t matter!”

  “It matters to me.”

  “Isn’t it enough that I came to help you?”

  Her voice sounded helpless and a little sad.

  Was it enough?

  Sort of, but not really.

  “Isn’t it enough that I came to guide you through this?” Lane was breathless. I could scent the sadness radiating off of her in waves, and I wished beyond everything else that I could help her. I wanted to help her. Needed to.

  I wanted to give her everything that she could possibly want or need or ask for, but she had to tell me.

  “Lane, I’ve been your friend long enough to know when you’re hiding something. Just tell me this: are you in trouble?”

  She paused for a long time, and then she took a deep breath.

  “Yeah,” she finally nodded. “Yeah, I’m in trouble.”

  Chapter 8

  Lane

  I didn’t mean to tell him.

  Not like this.

  Not now.

  I didn’t mean to admit that I was having a hard time or that I was being hunted by Claw, but when Andy cornered me in the kitchen, I suddenly felt like I had to. I suddenly felt like there was nothing that mattered nearly as much as being honest with him.

  “Tell me,” he said, stepping closer.

  “Food first,” I whispered. “Everything makes more sense with food.”

  He nodded, giving me this small reprieve. When my hands were moving, even to prepare something simple, it calmed me. People on Malum loved soups, and that was what I was going to make. I’d grown up eating every kind of soup imaginable from every kind of planet I could ever dream of.

  Andy had catered to my needs a lot as a kid. He’d always shared imported snacks and things his parents had gotten at the castle. He hadn’t been stingy and he hadn’t held back. He’d just let me in, and he’d shared.

  He’d always shared everything but his heart.

  Now, he stood quietly, watching me with those deep, purple eyes as I made myself at home in the castle kitchen. There were multiple rooms and multiple kitchens here, but the room we were in was probably the smallest. I had a feeling it was used for preparing small, simple meals, so that’s what I started with.

  I pressed a button on the counter in front of me. The counter slid to the side and a pot was raised up. It rose until it was even with the other countertops, and then with the press of a button, it started to heat up.

  “What are you going to make?”

  “The Tria special,” I told Andy.

  “Soup?”

  “Soup,” I nodded.

  I grabbed a liquid base from one cupboard and rustled around until I could find the vegetables I wanted to add. A special meat from Orchid, some vegetables from Sapphira, and then it was boiling.

  “I’ll let that sit for a little bit,” I muttered, more to myself than to Andy.

  I turned, looking at the king. For such a noble guy, he really was ordinary in so many ways. He had the kindest eyes I’d ever seen, and he was always willing to help people.

  Some people had this idea that a royal person was somehow boring or uninteresting or dull or mean, but he wasn’t. He’d never been any of those things. If anything, Andy was kind and loyal to a fault, and that was what made telling him my story so hard.

  “I was on Dreagle,” I began.

  “Dreagle,” he repeated. His eyes narrowed.

  “No,” I shook my head. “None of that.”

  “What?”

  “You can’t react like that.”

  “Like what?”

  “You can’t get upset by anything I’m going to try to tell you, okay? If you get upset, then I’m going to feel bad, and I won’t be able to keep telling you.”

  “I understand,” he said, but I wasn’t sure that he did.

  In any case, I couldn’t put off the inevitable anymore. He was right in assuming that I hadn’t come here just to save him. I’d come here for a different reason.

  “I came here for safety,” I finally admitted.

  “Safety?”

  “When I was on Dreagle, I worked with an organization that rescued children,” I said.

  To his credit, King Andy said nothing. He just stared, watching me.

  “There was a child who had been stolen from Sapphira. Cute kid. Really just the sweetest thing. The parents hired me to find her.”

  “They hired you?”

  “Yeah. I mean, I didn’t do it for pay or anything. The money went to the organization I worked for and then that money is used for living expenses and food for the people who help out. It’s not like I was personally profiting.”

  “No judgment.”

  “Anyway, the kid was missing, and I said I’d try to find her. I managed to track the abductor to Dreagle. You know what happens on Dreagle.”

  “Yeah,” Andy’s eyes darken
ed. “I know.”

  Bad things.

  Terrible things.

  When people went missing on Dreagle, you needed to just pretend they’d never existed or hope they died a quick and hasty death. The alternative was too horrible to think about, and most people couldn’t stomach that kind of thing, anyway.

  “I found her. She’d been taken by a guy named Claw.”

  “Stupid name.”

  I couldn’t help myself. I chuckled. I pressed another button on the countertop in front of me and my soup started to auto-stir. Damn, I loved Andy’s kitchen. Growing up, I’d had to do everything by hand. It was much cooler to be able to just press a couple of buttons and have my dinner practically make itself.

  “Anyway, I stole the kid back from Claw. Got her to her parents on Sapphira.”

  “You’re amazing,” Andy whispered, watching me. He seemed to have this sense of awe on his face, like he couldn’t believe I’d done it. That in itself made me feel proud.

  Most of the time, I didn’t spend a lot of time thinking about what I’d done. To me it just seemed like the right thing to do. I hadn’t woken up one day and thought, “oh, how can I save the world?”

  It had just happened, and I’d gotten slightly addicted to the rush, to the feeling of satisfaction it brought me.

  “Yeah, well, he found out.”

  “How?”

  “He caught my partner, Ox.”

  “Ox?”

  “Yeah, it’s a type of animal you used to be able to find on Earth.”

  “I know what the word means,” Andy said dryly.

  “Then why’d you ask?” I glared, suddenly frustrated. I knew that I was just getting emotional because it was such a hard situation. I didn’t like knowing that kids had died or gone missing. I didn’t like the realization that children had been separated from their parents.

  For every set of kids I’d saved, there were a dozen more who were never found.

  “Continue,” Andy said simply, as though that was enough.

  And it was.

  It was enough.

  Somehow, knowing he was proud of me, that he believed in me, was enough. The realization that he thought I was doing a good job was wildly comforting to me, and I continued.

  “Anyway, he took Ox. I kept running. I took the kid,” I whispered.

  It was horrible. There were still nights where I woke up in a cold sweat, wondering if I’d done the right thing.

  Should I have gone back for Ox?

  Should I have given up the kid?

  We’d made an agreement, Ox and I. We’d decided as a team that if one of us was ever caught, the other one should keep going. That was our deal. We’d promised one another.

  Still, when I’d been faced with the choice of leaving him behind or losing the child, it had been the hardest choice of my life. I didn’t know very much about the child we’d saved. I’d known that she was small and sweet and a good student, but I didn’t know much else.

  It wasn’t like with Ox.

  With Ox, I knew a lot. I knew his favorite foods and I knew he was planning to propose to his partner. I knew Ox was happiest when he was living wildly. I knew he liked to be a hero.

  I’d been the one to break the news to Taylor, Ox’s partner, that he was gone. He was as good as dead. We all knew what Claw would do to Ox. We just hoped it would be over fast.

  “Once the kid was returned to our base, I went back to try to find Ox.”

  “You went back?”

  “Yeah.”

  “And?”

  “I found his body,” I whispered.

  Andy reached for me, tugging me into his arms. He pulled me close to himself and started stroking my air. I didn’t even realize I was crying until I pulled back and his shirt was wet from my tears.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “Don’t be sorry.”

  “It still hurts.”

  “Did you love him?” Andy’s question was gentle.

  “As a brother,” I told him. “Ox had someone he loved and left behind. It wasn’t me.”

  “It still hurts to lose someone.”

  “It does.”

  “It’s not very fair.”

  “No,” I whispered. “It’s not fair.”

  “So, this man,” Andy said slowly. “You think he knows who you are now.”

  “I don’t know if Ox told him anything. If he did, it wasn’t willingly, but...”

  “But?”

  “The building where we’d been hiding was bombed the next day.”

  “Could he have put a tracker on the child’s clothing?”

  “It’s possible,” I admitted. “We changed her clothes at the building before sending her back to her parents.”

  “You think he knows your name, though.”

  “Yeah.”

  I swallowed hard, not sure if I wanted to tell him the rest, but Andy was king for a reason. He wasn’t dumb, and not much got past him.

  “The other members of my team have been hunted down and killed in the last month,” I told him.

  “And you think you’re next.”

  “I think I’m next.”

  Chapter 9

  Andy

  She should have told me sooner.

  She should have told me the second it happened. Fear and regret tore through me as I realized that she had been dealing with this all alone and I wasn’t there to help her.

  I reached for her, tugging her into my arms, and I just held her for the longest time.

  “I’ll keep you safe,” I promised.

  I half expected her to complain or to get snarky with me. There was a part of me that figured she’d say something like, “you can’t promise such a thing.” She didn’t, though. She just nodded, and she let me hold her, and it was everything I wanted.

  Everything I needed.

  When I finally released her and looked at her, Lane was tearing up a little.

  “I’m sorry,” she whispered.

  “You don’t have anything to be sorry for.”

  “I should have been honest.”

  “You came here to hide.”

  “Partly,” she said. “But partly because I can’t risk anyone else taking my home.”

  Malum.

  Malum was her home. It had always been her home, and it always would be. No matter how far she went and no matter where she traveled, this would always be her home, and she could always come back to it.

  “No one is going to take our home,” I murmured, holding her.

  “You have to take a mate, Andy,” she pulled back, looking at me. “You just have to.”

  That was the moment I realized she was right. She was right about all of it. Up until then, I’d been fighting myself internally, trying to come up with ways to avoid marriage, but she was right. If it meant keeping the throne safe, if it meant presenting a united front for my kingdom, then I’d do it.

  I still wasn’t going to be happy about it, but I’d do it.

  She pulled back without another word and turned back to her soup. It had burned a little, but she didn’t complain. She just sat on the countertop and ate it slowly in a little purple bowl. When she finished, I washed the dishes for her and set them on the counter, which opened up and lowered them back down.

  Then the two of us left.

  I walked Lane back to her bedroom and bid her goodnight, and then I returned to my own quarters. Probably, I should have gone to bed, but I couldn’t. I wasn’t tired enough, and besides, I needed advice.

  I called Alixei and Lion, my two best guards. They were, in some ways, the guardians of the planet. They were, at minimum, my own personal guardians. Both Alixei and Lion would do anything to protect me.

  When they arrived in my room just minutes later, they both looked refreshed despite the late hour.

  “Your highness?” Alixei asked, raising an eyebrow. “How may we be of service?”

  Lion was silent, looking at me. Both of my guards were trusted more than anyone else on the planet. I knew I could depend on them for absolutely anything at all.

  No matter what sort of threat I might be facing, they’d be here to help me with it. Alixei and I had been friends for years. He’d known me long, long ago. He’d even been friends with me when Lane had left. He knew how I’d felt.

  He also hadn’t said a damn thing since she’d been back.

  “I just had a snack with Lane,” I told them.