Chapter Three
IT TOOK NEARLY forty-eight hours to realize Ines was missing.
Alexandre had been avoiding her, and he’d been so wrapped up in diplomatic meetings that also required meetings with his bloodthirsty general he was still trying to get rid of without starting a bloody coup that he had simply assumed she was avoiding him as much as he was avoiding her.
He had heard no rumblings about missed appointments. He had heard nothing of her not being where she was meant to be. And since he had avoided meals with her, no one had bothered to inform him that she had not been taking meals at all.
Apparently because she had planned it quite carefully. Her assistant—also missing—had quietly and carefully rearranged all of Ines’s appointments—canceling, rescheduling, taking care of them via email.
Then there was the fact no one even knew what car she’d taken or even what day Ines had actually left the palace. Since he had gutted his father’s insane border patrol with checkpoints everywhere, leaving only what was necessary, it would be easy enough to slip out of the country unnoticed.
And so she likely had.
But it would require planning, and the conclusion Alexandre had come to was that it had also required help—from more than just her loyal assistant. There was no way disappearing for days without being found out could have happened without the most personal intel.
So he went in search of his sister, doing his level best to maintain the roiling anger underneath an outer wall of frigid calm. He’d had such practice at hiding his feelings, it was second nature.
Why didn’t it feel like second nature today? Why did it feel like he’d been split open and his insides were pouring out of him? Why did the anger feel akin to grief? Why was everything so damn confusing?
Ines.
Perhaps she was the punishment his father had wanted for him after all.
When he found his sister, Evelyne was sitting alone in one of the parlors. She was sipping tea with her eyes closed. She looked tired. In any other situation, he might have reconsidered making demands of her.
But his wife had run away, and someone had helped her do it. Evelyne had survived labor, and though he worried about her sitting here alone in silence, the doctors had assured him everything had gone exactly as it should, and Evelyne was as healthy as could be.
And his wife was missing. He gritted his teeth together and stepped into the room.
Evelyne’s eyes blinked open. “Oh, hello, Alexandre.” She closed her eyes again. “I’m a bit busy right now.”
He looked at her dubiously. She was curled up on the settee, drinking tea, no baby to be seen. Eyes closed.
She opened them again, narrowed them. “Shoo.”
He stared at his sister for a full minute. “I beg your pardon?”
She sighed heavily. “Sorry.” She did not sound the least bit apologetic.
“I have thirty minutes of alone time to sit with my tea in silence while Gabriel takes care of Gabriel.” Her irritable scowl softened into a smile.
“I suppose there are some downsides to naming your child after his father. It gets rather confusing, but we can’t decide on a nickname.
I think Gabby is quite nice. Gabriel thinks Gabri.
They’re near the same, are they not? So why not just go with mine?
I’m the one who had to push him out of my body, aren’t I?
” She waved a regal hand in dismissal. “Anyway, this is my quiet alone time. You’re not invited. ”
He let his sister prattle on, but he did not pretend to care about what she was saying. “Where is she?”
Evelyne’s eyebrows drew together. “Who?”
“Ines,” he ground out.
“How should I know?” She gave a careless shrug, then after a moment seemed to take on at least some of the gravity of the situation.
She studied him, tilting her head slightly.
“You’ve lost your wife, Alexandre?” she tsked and shook her head.
“What a shame, though I can hardly blame her the way you stomp about.”
He did not trust his voice right away. He breathed through the fury and some other feeling he did not know how to label.
Evelyne must have recognized some note of seriousness in his expression, because she sobered.
“Alex, I haven’t seen Ines. I’ve been exhausted and out of sorts, what with having a baby three days ago.
And… Well, to be honest, I thought perhaps she was feeling a little tender over the baby, and that’s why I haven’t seen her.
So I haven’t asked after her. Perhaps she’s in the library. ”
“She has been missing from the palace for nearly three days.”
Evelyne blinked, looking well and truly shocked. But his sister was a good actress. “She ran away?”
“You’re telling me you had nothing to do with this?”
Evelyne’s gaze got a little cool. She leveled him with a hard look, but there was a softness in her eyes. “I would help Ines in a lot of ways and support her in more, but I wouldn’t do either at the cost of you.”
It hurt, because he knew she was telling him the truth, and he did not fully deserve the high opinion she had of him.
Yes, he’d tried to protect her, and yes, he had tasked Gabriel with saving her from having to marry the awful General Vinyes last year, but there were also so many ways he’d failed her since she’d been a baby.
And still she saw him as a hero, even when he wasn’t one in the least. Father had still hurt her—physically, emotionally. No matter what stumbling blocks Alexandre had managed to erect, he had not been fully capable of protecting Evelyne.
“What will you do?” Evelyne asked gently. In the here and now. Married to a man she loved. Mother to a child she would love—better than anyone. It was not his doing that she had managed to find a good life. At best, he’d helped her survive. She was the one who’d figured out how to thrive.
While his wife had run away from him. Like he was a monster. Like he’d done something wrong, when all he’d done was work hard to do what was right, needed.
What would he do?
His reply was not gentle. “Find her.”
The days stretched out long, uncomfortable and nerve-racking. Ines had never rebelled before in any way—not against her father, not against Alexandre—her two captors, more or less.
Well, she supposed asking Alexandre for an annulment was kind of a rebellion. An easing into it. Asking permission to be allowed to rebel? It hadn’t felt so much scary as exhilarating, necessary, groping for change.
The way he’d reacted hadn’t exactly scared her. It had given her hope. That maybe here in the life she hadn’t chosen was something she could choose.
Him.
Then disappointment. Because he’d never choose her.
But now, running away, she felt like she’d taken a dive into an icy ocean. She was cold and scared and lost at sea.
If not for Jonet, she would have turned back. To the comfortable and familiar, even if it was a little miserable.
Jonet was Ines’s cousin and oldest friend, who Alexandre had allowed Ines to hire as her personal assistant. Jonet’s loyalty was not to Alis or Alexandre, but to Ines. So when Ines had asked her to make the runaway arrangements, Jonet had jumped to do just that.
Jonet was handling all the travel. Keeping Ines out of sight as much as possible and doing all she could to keep her moves from being easily found out by Alexandre.
He was a king with endless resources, so no doubt he would find her. She was not so foolish to think this was permanent, but if she could make it hard on him…
Well, maybe it was childish to want to punish him. Maybe she was childish. Maybe the new Ines could be childish and brave and terrified—all at the same time.
After a few days of crisscrossing Europe, keeping a low profile while Jonet handled things, they were now walking up a quaint, dirt walk to a small cottage in the middle of a forest. Ines did not know what country they were in, and she would not ask.
She did know they were meant to stay here for a while, as Jonet was satisfied they had not been followed.
Jonet marched forward, shoved a key into the lock and opened the door. She stepped inside, and Ines followed.
Inside it was dim, and all the furniture was covered. It was a bit musty, but nothing alarming.
“Home sweet home,” Jonet said brightly.
It reminded Ines a bit of a fairy tale. Like Princess Aurora’s cottage, and Jonet was her little fairy godmother flitting about making everything okay and safe.
It left Ines feeling a strange kind of exhausted.
She simply wanted to find a bed to sleep in for perhaps as long as Aurora had slept after pricking her finger.
“Jonet, I will never be able to repay you.”
“Let us not worry about repayments just yet.” Jonet moved into what Ines realized was the kitchen area.
“It’s a bit rustic,” she said. “I know you’re not used to that, but luckily for you, I am.
” While Ines’s father had always had money and they’d always lived in luxury, Jonet’s mother had married a man considered beneath the family’s means.
She had not grown up poor exactly, but there had certainly been lean times for Jonet’s family—and Ines’s father had refused to help his sister monetarily.
That was the kind of man her father was. Selfish. A little mean. But Ines had always lived comfortably. She knew her guilt over what Jonet had dealt with as a child was unwarranted, and certainly unwelcome, but she felt it all the same.
Jonet fiddled with the stove and started a fire in it, while Ines stood in the middle of the small cottage feeling more at a loss than she ever had in her whole life.
Was running away any better than staying?
Was having Jonet handle everything really the mark of a brave woman taking charge of her own life, her own wants?
Jonet looked over her shoulder at Ines. “Why don’t you pull off all the furniture coverings? We’ll get settled in.”
Right. Something to do. She wasn’t a queen here. She was a person like any other. She was herself, just like she’d always wanted to be. She tried to move toward the living room to remove the furniture coverings, but her legs wouldn’t move.
Ines couldn’t fathom why, but the only thing she could seem to do was stand there and sob as though she’d just lost everything.