“Do you recognize the tattoo?” I shove my hands in my pockets so that my father won’t see how badly they’re trembling. Terror and hope are alive inside of me, a potent cocktail of emotions that’s shaking me more than I want to admit. Especially in this room, where the crown prince nee
ds to be as steady as a rock. As steady as his country needs him to be.
“We do. It’s from a home grown liberation group that calls themselves the Dépassement por Liberté. They’re not a large group, but they’re an extreme branch of the Libération-Est. They want—”
“To end the monarchy,” my father says, and for the first time his face is ashen. “Are you telling me you have proof this crackpot group has my son?”
Ice slides through my veins, has everything inside of me stopping—freezing—as I wait for the answer I already know is coming. The Libération-Est is a radical group and has become even more so in the last few years since three of its leaders were put in prison for conspiring to blow up Palais des Fleurs, my family’s countryside home. If this group is a more radical offshoot of them, then I don’t even want to think of what they might be capable of.
“We don’t know, sir. As you are aware, we’ve been looking at them all along, but nothing has popped,” Jean-Luc answers grimly. “Until now.”
“So what are you doing about it?” I get in his face before I can even think about stopping myself. “Have you searched their compound? Pulled in any known associates? Obtained—”
“We’re working on all of that, sir,” Jean-Luc says as he takes a few deliberate steps back. Only then do I realize how close I’ve been standing to him—and how close I am to plowing my fist through a wall.
The idea of Garrett in the hands of these madmen? It’s enough to make me insane.
This is the group that tried to kill my whole family in one fell swoop with that bomb. The group that has spent years sending “anonymous” letter bombs to the palace and organized anti-monarchy protests all over the country.
The group that not only hates us, but will do anything to see us disappear.
When Garrett was taken, we looked at them exhaustively—of course we did. But after months of close scrutiny, of infiltration by agents risking their lives, it was decided that Libération-Est wasn’t to blame. To find out now that some radical offshoot might be…“Rage” isn’t a strong enough word for what I’m feeling. Then again, I’m not sure such a word actually exists.
If these bastards took Garrett, if they took my brother, I will use every ounce of power and influence I have in this country, and the world, to hunt them to extinction. I will destroy them, piece by piece, person by person. I’m not normally the vengeful type, but this group is a blight on our country, a blight on the world. They deserve—no, they need—to be wiped out.
But first, we have to find my brother. We have to know, for sure, what’s happened to him. For the first time in three months, I can’t help seriously thinking that I might be wrong. That every feeling I have inside of me telling me that Garrett isn’t dead really is nothing more than a product of my own wishful thinking.
Because for this group? Getting their hands on the crown prince is like every holiday on the calendar all rolled into one. And keeping him alive really doesn’t suit their agenda—or the madness that seems to underlie every decision they make.
After all, what better way to strike a deafening blow against the monarchy than to kill its crown prince? To murder its future before that future ever has a chance of becoming a reality?
Just the thought has my resolve hardening even as my blood runs cold. These people have hurt my family—and my country—more than enough. I’m not going to let it happen again. “How do we get to them?” I demand.
At the same time, my father orders, “I want Anastasia’s guard doubled at university. She’s too vulnerable on that campus. I want extra security measures in her dorm and her room. If she’s determined to stay there through all of this, I want her protected. And double Kian’s guard while you’re at it.”
“We’ve already added a third guard to both—” Pierre begins, but my father cuts him off.
“Six. I want six guards on each of them. I want a full membership list from Libération-Est—and any offshoot factions, including DPL—on my desk by midnight. And you’d better have a warrant to search these people’s properties by tomorrow morning.”
“We’re working on that, sir,” Jean-Luc assures him.
“Work faster! This is the Crown Prince of Wildemar we’re talking about.” Once again, my father’s fist slams down on the table. “You finally have a lead. Now act like it!”
“I want the same information on my desk, as well,” I tell the directors.
For once, my father and I are on the same page about something—furious and frustrated and desperate to find out what’s happened to my brother. It’s why I don’t argue with him about not bringing Ana home from school, why I don’t say a word about him adding three more guards to my detail. But as the meeting wraps up and my father dismisses the lot of us, I can’t help going over what he said again and again.
And that’s when it hits me, with a burst of bitterness that comes with the realization that my father never once called Garrett by name, never once referred to him as his son. No, it was the Crown Prince of Wildemar all the way and my father was every inch the king.
I understand the importance of his position, just as I understand that the political ramifications of Garrett’s disappearance—and possible murder—are just as severe for the country as the personal ramifications are for Anastasia and me.
But once, just once, it would be nice if I could see the man behind the crown, the father behind the king. Not because I need the coddling (my father’s never been a coddler) but because I need the reassurance—that if I step fully into Garrett’s shoes, and eventually, into my father’s—that I won’t lose whatever small piece of humanity I still have left.
Chapter 7
Hours later, I’m still thinking about the DPL. The Dépassement por Liberté—Overtaking for Liberty—and their vicious, violent ways. After the security briefing, I asked Pierre to send me any and all information he had on them and I’ve spent the last four hours scrolling through it.
And trying, desperately, not to punch a hole through the wall. Or throw up—at the moment, it’s a toss-up which I want to do more.