And now that she was back in power she would see that her people were never harmed again. She needed his protection. For her people, not so much for her.
Dangerous men did not scare her.
She had made a bargain with herself when dealing with such men for many years now. Making a bargain with a man such as this bothered her not at all.
“You wish me to return to Aillette with you?”
“I more than wish it. I command it.”
“Or?”
“I will think nothing of exposing your identity.”
“You see, in order for that to concern me,” he said, his voice hard, “I would have to care a great deal more for my life than I do.”
He was bluffing. At least, she was counting on this being a bluff. If it was not, then she might have a little trouble.
But he was. Surely.
This was the part she’d known she must steel herself for. Threats made her stomach shake. She did not wish to issue them. But she would do what she must.
“Your sister Violet? Who is a Princess, I believe, in Monte Blanco. What would become of her and her country, of her husband, if the world found out that her brother was an assassin?”
His eyes went sharp. Good. “You are playing a dangerous game, Annick.”
“Life is a dangerous game, is it not? And what of Minerva. Your sweet sister and her lovely children. Her husband. Your mother and father. What of them? If your identity was known, then their safety would be at risk.”
“You dare threaten my family?”
“They are not threats.” She shook her head. “I am merely presenting you with a piece of reality. It is not a threat—it is just true.”
“The end result of your truth is that innocent people, innocent children, may die.”
“Innocent people, innocent children, have died in my country already,” she said. “And if I cannot successfully wrest control here, do I not risk another revolution? An invasion from my neighbors? Yes, I think I do. I know I do. I am not open to such risk-taking.”
“And yet you have taken a risk coming here.” He reached into his pocket and took a device out, and with a flick of his wrist, the lights came on.
She blinked against the invasive brightness. She had seen pictures of him, but they did not do him justice. He was a very large man, broad, with dark brown hair.
His face was handsome. Uncommonly so. She had never seen a man with quite such a competent scaffolding. A strange thing, human beauty. For it was just an arrangement of features and skin placed over bone in a particular fashion.
Yet his was quite striking.
And it made a sensation stir low in her belly. One that was foreign to her. It reminded her a great deal of fear, but it was not that. She was not afraid. Then she noticed that in one of his hands he still held the gun. The light revealed the weapon she had known was there all along.
Though she had the sense just then that the true weapon was the man himself.
“Please do not shoot me.”
“I’ve no desire to shoot you. Therefore, to please us both—you and your desire to not be dead, me and my desire to not shoot a woman—I suggest you leave, and forget this conversation ever occurred.”
“I cannot. I cannot, because it is what must be done for my people. I have been over many solutions. Many. Are you a man who desires power? As my guard, as my...my right-hand man, you would be very powerful.”
“No. If I desired power, don’t you think I would have filled one of the vacant positions I left behind already?”
“And that is a strange thing,” she said. “Because most men do desire power, do they not?”
“I suppose, to an extent. But then, I often wonder if such men have ever been up close to it.”