Chapter 34 – Ferrin
FERRIN
“That’s not good enough,” the prince exclaims, his hands on his hips. “We have to be able to find her. After all this time, with her this close, we have to be able to find her.”
I nod in agreement, then direct my focus to Marcella, who is still in front of me. “I have Sven’s number, but he won’t talk to me, and he thinks I’m dead. He would love to kill me all over again given the chance, though.”
“I have Antonia’s number, and she wants me dead too. And she has her location off so we can’t track her by her number.”
I rub my jaw with my right hand because my left arm is fucked.
Good thing I’m a righty. However, whatever they gave me for pain is working nicely.
I’m not dead, which is frankly a bit of a shock.
It’s a second chance. One I don’t deserve.
But with that, I’ll get Desta back. If I have to kill a dozen more people to do that, I will.
“What if you text her and I text Sven? I tell him I’m not dead, but I tell him I have access to you and the necklace and will make a swap.”
She tilts her head at me. “What if I text Antonia and tell her that we have you and that my fiancée will do anything to get the princess back?”
I fall back on the bed and stare up at the ceiling. “Why didn’t she kill her?”
“What?” the king asks.
“All these years, she kept her tucked away in this cottage, telling her the world is scary and dangerous. She manufactured the television so it only showed gangs and violence. Desta had an old flip phone but had never been on the internet until I came there. Why would this Antonia chick do all of that?”
I can feel glances being shared around the room before they finally answer me.
“If you repeat anything, we’ll—”
“I just want her safe,” I cut the king off. “I don’t give a fuck about your shit.”
“Why should we believe that?” Marcella asks, more curiosity than censure in her tone.
“Does the bullet that grazed one arm and went through the other shoulder tell you anything? I was trying to save her.” My eyes close at the memory.
She was so scared. She couldn’t swim, and I thought…
” I swallow thickly. “Look, I’m not a good man.
I know that. I’ve never pretended to be otherwise.
But she’s… everything good. She should be here with you. That’s all I know.”
“Antonia is technically her aunt,” the Spanish man says.
I squeeze my eyes shut. “I don’t understand.”
“The original woman who took her was the same Marie you stole the tiara from. She’s Desta’s biological mother and Antonia’s sister,” Marcella explains.
“The woman I stole the tiara from? She stole Desta?” I release a breath as I work this through.
“That’s who she was with the night at the festival before Antonia took her.
So that was her mother, and I don’t care why she stole her from the palace or even what happened to your father.
But why would Antonia bother to steal her from her sister?
Why keep her alive and have Desta call her mother and rename her as Genevieve? ”
“Antonia had an affair with our father. Marie did after our father ended it with her, and Marie became pregnant,” the prince reveals. “Marie took Desta. Antonia is the one who killed our father. We don’t know what happened that night. None of us saw what went down in Desta’s bedroom.”
“When Desta confronted Antonia over text, she said that Desta was always supposed to be hers.”
“Maybe Antonia felt Desta should have been hers and not Marie’s?” Marcella guesses.
I swallow. “Antonia loves Desta. She thinks of her as her daughter. It’s why they took her instead of killing her when they tried to kill me. She’ll likely kill Sven. I would. He’s got nothing for us to bargain with and is no use to her.”
“The fingerprints at the tiara robbery match Marie’s.”
I shake my head and sit up, staring at the large Black man in the corner.
“Marie had no clue I took it. Antonia did, and she tried to kill me before I ran off with it the first time. She wanted that tiara. Badly. Then again, after Desta and I left the cottage, Antonia texted and told me her sister is the one who stole the tiara from me and that if I killed her, I could keep it.”
“But you don’t think Marie took the tiara?” the king questions in disbelief.
“No. I don’t. I think Antonia wants her sister dead and wanted me to do it and dangled the tiara over my head because she knows I wanted it back.”
“You’re telling us that finding the cottage and our sister after you’re the one who stole the tiara from Marie years ago is a coincidence?”
The prince is incredulous, but I only have one answer. “Yes. Or fate.” Something I never believed in before I met Desta.
He whistles through his teeth and exchanges a look with his brother.
“Maybe she planted her sister’s fingerprints to throw us off,” the younger bodyguard adds. “Or maybe the sister discovered it was you and came after it.”
“Maybe. Only something about it doesn’t feel right.
I linked up with Sven and Lars four weeks before the tiara was stolen from me.
They had a house, and I didn’t. They offered for me to put a safe in their place when I mentioned that I had things I wanted locked up.
It was their trust measure, and I went through with it because no one else had the code for the safe but me.
They had a place to house it, and we were building toward the necklace job.
But what if they knew Antonia all along?
They had to have. She got in contact with them almost immediately.
She broke in when the three of us were gone, scoping out the warehouse.
How would she have known we were gone the whole weekend unless she was in contact with them?
It’s not as though we informed the neighbors of our comings and goings. ”
“Could be her,” the prince agrees, pacing around in a circle and shooting glances at the younger bodyguard. “We never saw her face or anything in the video from the neighbor.”
“May I have my phone?” I ask, holding out my right hand.
“What for?” the king demands, sitting back in his chair with his arms and legs crossed.
“I have an idea.”
They hand me my phone, and I call Antonia.
It can’t hurt, and I have nothing to lose at this point.
It rings and rings and goes to a recording informing me that a voicemail hasn’t been set up.
I growl in frustration, fearing that I’ll never find her or that she’s already gone, clawing through me, ripping me apart, and bleeding me.
I dial Sven next, but it immediately goes to his voicemail as if his phone were off. I wonder if he’s dead. I hope he is, though I’m disappointed I wasn’t the one to make him so.
“Can you show us where you found her?” the bodyguard asks. “Where was that cottage? Maybe she was taken back there. Regardless, it’s the best place to start.”
I go into my phone and pull up the rendezvous school on my Maps app. I scroll around, following the path I took as best as I can. It takes me a couple of minutes, but then I find the general area where I think the cottage was.
“Here.”
The prince and the king come and sit beside me on the bed, which is wild, but whatever.
“Where is that?” the king asks.
I zoom out without losing the spot, and the king gasps.
“What?” everyone asks at once.
“That’s our land. It’s royal land. That river was once much larger, and the building was where goods, livestock, and anything else the palace in Carona needed were delivered.
It was sort of a small port location for the palace, going back a couple of hundred years.
I was there as a boy. Our father took me…
” He trails off, and a chilling silence settles over the room.
“Antonia used to work for your father,” Marcella picks up. “They had an affair. Maybe he took her there? Regardless, it wouldn’t be difficult for her to know about the land.”
“If it’s your land, then get someone there immediately,” I demand. “Though I will say that it’s a motherfucker to get through the barrier fence Antonia has set up around the cottage. There is an entrance on the roadside through the forest, but it requires a code to get in.”
The older Spanish guy pulls out his phone, but before he can call anyone, it rings in his hand.
He answers with, “May I call you back—” He stops abruptly and listens to whoever is on the line for a very long minute.
“What? Yes, I understand. I’ve got it. Do we have a number for her?
” He hisses a curse. “Text it to me.” He disconnects the call, and his phone immediately pings with a text.
“What is it?” the prince asks.
He holds up his hand. “Let me make sure. It could be a trap.” He calls the number. “Yes, hello, I’m trying to reach my girlfriend, Genevieve?”
My breath catches, and I spring up to my feet. The man holds out his hand to me, stopping me from advancing, but Jesus hell, my heart is pumping straight out of my chest. Please let it be her. Please, please.
“Genevieve?” he questions. “Hi. It’s so wonderful to hear from you. What happened?”
He puts the phone on speaker, and her sweet voice echoes through the room and I die all over again. It’s her. It’s my girl. She’s alive.
“I got lost in the woods when I was on a hike near my mother’s house. I fell and broke my wrist and lost my phone somewhere. I found the road, and this lovely gentleman stopped to help me. I told him that my boyfriend worked at the palace, and Richard let me use his phone to call you.”
My eyes pinch shut, and I sink into a crouch before I spring back up. I nod at the man, letting him know it’s her. She doesn’t sound good. Actually, she sounds awful.
“I’ve been worried sick,” he continues. “We all have been. Where are you? I’ll come get you.”
“Richard is taking me into town—”
“Carona,” a man’s voice comes from the background. “I’m taking you to the big hospital there. It’s about a forty-minute drive from here. But your wrist is broken, and you’re bleeding badly from your head. The small hospital out here is horrible. Trust me, I’ve been there.”
Fuck. I hate hearing how badly she’s hurt. Antonia and Sven could easily find her if they suspect she’s hurt. Everyone in the room is having the same thought.
“Good. I’m glad you’re going to get help. I’ll be there within the hour for you. Stay safe.”
“Thank you. I will.”
She disconnects the call, and I just about lose my mind.
“It’s an hour drive from here but twenty minutes by air,” the bodyguard declares, and for the first time, I realize I have no clue where I am other than at a royal residence.
The bodyguard and the older man immediately go for the door while the bodyguard makes a call to someone to get the helicopter ready.
“We’re going to bring her back to the main palace,” the older man states. “The plane is ready and on standby to take you all back too. We shouldn’t stay here. No one is to know you’re not at home.” He points to the king.
“Yes. We need to get back,” the king agrees. “I need to be with my family.”
They’re getting ready to leave, and I don’t know what happens next with me. I’ll never see the necklace again. They could throw me in jail. They’re going to get her. She’s going to be okay. She’ll be safe, and they’ll take care of her.
They’ll manage the threats that still face her. She’ll be with her family, and with that, she’s going to need time to get to know them. To discover who she is with them.
I don’t enter into that.
I never did.
She thinks I’m dead. Maybe that’s the best way for this to go. What do I bring to her life? I should let her go as I was going to do. Even if the thought of never seeing her again makes my heart hurt in a way it never has before.