His Princess (A Royal Romance) (41 page)

D
ale might have left
me enough hardware to overthrow the Chilean government, but even if I arm up as a one-man army I can’t take it with me. I could drive straight to the fourth weapons cache he told me to find, or head for the rendezvous with the crazy bitch who tried to strangle me last week.

I know Santiago. He’s a man of his word, if I go to the rendezvous, I’ll be safe enough until they take me wherever it is they plan to torture and kill Rose. I’ll never get the details out of that Lily maniac; last week you could have tortured me to death before I’d give up Santiago. It’s just not done.

Things are different now. I’m going to kill him myself.

The question is, how? He’s got me. I’ll be going to an unknown location with no weapons while my enemy holds three valuable hostages. He’s a man of his word, alright. He won’t hurt me or them until he has us all together, so he can watch us unwind one strand at a time. That’s what he does. He feeds on misery.

I let them go and the monster got them. I choke the wheel harder. Stupid, stupid, stupid. I never should have
talked
to Rose. Whatever good I deluded myself into thinking I brought into their lives, it wasn’t worth this. God. They’ll die hating me.

Quentin, you selfish fuck.

Dale said he left me a couple of presents. They had better be something good. I have time. The fun won’t start without me. If I just try to bowl myself right down the middle of the problem I’ll get the girls killed. I can’t let that happen.

I swing off the highway and drive toward Dale’s weapons cache. This had better be worth my time.

Using a key I took from his office, which must have been blown to smithereens by now, I open the storage locker door and roll it up. It hasn’t been opened for a while; leaves and spiderwebs cling to the bottom.

This locker is more of a garage, big enough to house a car. Everything is covered with dusty drop cloths that throw up curtains of grime when I yank them off. It’s all standard stuff, crates of weapons. No help. I can pack it all in the Impala’s trunk and never get it anywhere near Santiago.

Damn it, Dale, tell me you had something.

Nothing, just weapons and a laptop. No time. I need to meet up with the crazy bitch who’s going to drive me to my torture appointment.

Fuck.

It’s not a long drive from the cache. I don’t care if I’m being followed anymore, although it would be a little ironic if some
other
assassin took me out and claimed the bounty on my head before Santiago could get to me. The sick bastard would probably find that amusing.

I’m to meet this woman in public at a café in the Old City, probably to make sure I don’t attack her. Santiago thinks everyone is like him, a totally sick fuck without the slightest hint of scruples. I don’t hurt women. I have rules.

He doesn’t.

What the hell. I park the Impala in a garage so she won’t get towed (for a while, anyway; I’m probably not coming back to her alive) and walk down to the corner of Third and Market where there’s this pizza place.

Crazy Bitch Lily is sitting at a table in the corner, eating a slice of pepperoni pizza. I walk in, sit down at the cast-iron table, and give her the death stare.

“Hello,” she says.

“I can see you’re all choked up.”

“Been stewing on that one a while, I see.”

“Better than dumping your drink in your lap and saying, ‘Ice to see you.’ I considered that one.”

She snorts. “I’m sure you did.”

“Are you going to sit here and watch me squirm or can we go get me tortured to death now? I want to get this over with.”

“Want some pizza?”

I glance down at the mostly uneaten pie on the table before me.

Lily shrugs. “I’m not going to poison you. Santiago wants you for himself.”

“Kinky,” I declare, and take a slice of pizza.

“You’re in a weird position,” she says, chewing. “You want to throw all sorts of threats at me about your woman, but you can’t because
I’m
a woman.”

“That’s right, I won’t hurt you.”

“Stupid.”

“Yeah.” I chew with my mouth open. “That’s me. We gonna get a beer or get this over with?”

“Let’s go,” she says, rising. “You understand what happens if you bail on me.”

“Yeah, I understand.”

“Good, I don’t feel like chasing you.”

I stand up and follow her out. It’s blazing hot out, the sun baking down on the city streets, hitting the brick of the buildings and warming them up to oven hot. I start to sweat. She doesn’t.

“What happened between you and Santiago?” she says, glancing at me as I walk beside her.

“We had a falling out.”

“Over what?”

“He had two apprentices at the time. Only one of us was going to pass the test. It was never said but I knew it all the same.”

“You had to kill the other one?”

“No, he did, and I swore if I ever saw him alive again, I’d kill him. He just laughed at me. Santiago de la Rosa can never be killed, he’d say.”

“He says that a lot. Who was the guy?”

“Girl. Like you. You alone?”

“I’m the only one.”

“You’re not freelancing yet.”

She shakes her head.

“What’d he do after you returned from your failed mission? You tried to kill me and didn’t succeed.”

“Nothing. He said we’d correct the problem. He said you were his most dangerous pupil and it was a mistake to send me alone.”

“Oh,” I say cheerily. “I guess he didn’t tell you what that means.”

“No, what?” she says, a hint of curiosity in her voice.

“It means he’s going to kill you, too. He doesn’t tolerate failure, Lily. Is that your name, Lily?”

“I gave it to you true. I was there to kill you, after all, not much reason to hide my name. Professional courtesy, and Santiago is not going to kill me.”

I walk with her to a parking garage and my instincts make me scan all the exits and corners.

“Have you told Santiago we’re coming?”

“Yes, of course. I’m not an idiot. If I don’t make it back, your women are dead.”

“Right, right. How much time would you say we have?”

“It’s an hour drive.”

“Call him and tell him there’s traffic, it will take longer.”

“Why should I do that?”

“I have a story you need to hear.”

“I’m not interested.”

“I’m offering you this as a courtesy. I’m trying to save you.”

“Why?”

“You’re a woman.”

“So?”

“You want the answer to that question, tell Santiago we’re going to be late.”

She stops and fishes out the keys to the car.

“Get in, Mulqueen.”

I sit down in the front seat of the car, and wait. Outside Lily has a clipped conversation on the phone before she gets in with me. She starts the car and wheels around to the bottom of the garage.

“I’ve given you maybe an extra twenty minutes. Think that’ll work?”

“Yeah. I’ll make this quick. When Santiago first took me in I was twelve years old. He already had another apprentice. Her name was Samantha. She was a year older than I was, and I was just starting to notice girls, so it made things a little awkward even in Santiago’s place. He still at the villa?”

“No, we move around.”

“Yeah, figures.”

“So you got close,” she says as she eases the car to a stop at a red light. “So what?”

“We got close. It was an awkward teenage thing. We spent a lot of time together, shared training, did homework together. Lots of math.”

“Yeah, there’s a lot of trigonometry involved in sniping.”

“Chemistry for poisons and explosives, the works. You know the drill. We competed a lot. She was very tomboyish. It was a weird thing because we were basically in killer school.

“Still, it wasn’t real. It was like a game. None of it felt real, the target shooting, the sparring with rubber knives. Neither of us shared much about our pasts. All I knew about her was that her parents died. I didn’t tell her much more about me.”

“Then what?”

“Two horny teenagers in close proximity, mostly unsupervised. Do I need to spell it out?”

“No.”

“Santiago gave us condoms. He wanted it that way. I’m surprised there isn’t a boy that trained with you.”

“No, I’ve always been alone.”

“Anyway. He blooded us at sixteen. Not together, thank God. Even then some part of me didn’t want her to see me do it. I didn’t want to see her do it either.”

“You’re delusional,” Lily sighs. “This kind of poetic bullshit is what Santiago wants us to give up. Nobody is innocent, Mulqueen.”

“I was. You were. Santiago de la Rosa is twisted, Lily, and he wants to make us like that which twisted him. This needs to end. He needs to be stopped.”

“Shut up.”

I sigh and shift in the seat. “You know what the blooding was like. Mine went poorly but it went. I think he decided then I was the useless one, but I kept at it, kept up with the training. Started going with him on missions. He
never
took us together, only singly. You know why he did that?”

“No, why?”

“Because even one witness fucks up his sick little fantasy world. He goes on and on and on about himself in the third person, and Santiago de la Rosa this, and Santiago de la Rosa that, and he’s afraid if two people hear it together they’ll realize how full of shit he is. He’s not an artist or a poet. He kills people for money. There’s nothing amazing about him. He’s just an asshole in a mask. A sadist. He’s not training you, Lily. He’s playing with you. You’re a toy, and when you don’t amuse him anymore, you’ll be dead.”

She glances at me. “What happened?”

“When it was time to end our apprenticeship we were each given a mission. Separate. Yet we were given the same target.”

“What?”

“Same target, different methods. It was a game to him, you see, and it was rigged. Only one of us could win. I don’t even remember why the guy had a price on his head, he was nobody, but I was standing over his corpse when Sam came in the room through another door amped up to kill this guy, and it was then I knew.”

“Knew what?”

“What he’d do to the loser. That was the purpose of that final test, to break the ‘winner’ completely. To make them like him. He didn’t care who it was. I told Sam to run. I begged and pleaded with her to flee, told her I’d cover for her, but she went back anyway. We went back together. Then do you know what happened?”

“No, what?”

“Santiago said to Samantha, ‘You were not ready. It was a mistake to send you alone.’ She actually looked relieved. She never saw it coming. He shot her in the back of the head and told me, ‘You killed her, Quentin, by besting her. I was only the instrument. This is a life where only the strong survive.’”

Lily swallows. I can see her throat bobbing.

“He didn’t send you to kill me, you dumb bitch. He sent for you to
be
killed. That would be his finest act, make me break my rule against killing women. When we get back where we’re going he’s going to kill you and tell me it’s my fault and that you were dead once you stepped into that bar to meet me, and whether it was by my hand or his, it’s my fault because I angered my employers and damaged the reputation of Santiago de la Rosa. Those’ll be his exact fucking words, Lily. I know how he thinks.”

“Be quiet,” she says, but her voice is shaky, panicky.

“I will. Gotta say one more thing. If you want to make it out of this alive, you can help me get my girls back. I am not Santiago. I won’t kill you after you’ve outlived your usefulness. Or you can hand me over to that creature and let him play some sick game with me before he kills us all. He won’t even save you for last.”

I sigh sadly. “This isn’t even about you. You’re set dressing. You’re a prop in someone else’s play, Lily. Is that what you want to be?”

“
W
hat
?”

Santiago sighs. “It is not often I repeat myself. Which of your children do you love most?”

I swallow. “I…”

“Perhaps I ask because I intend to shoot one right now.”

He lifts the gun from his lap and aims it square at Karen’s chest. Karen whimpers and draws her legs up, as if she can hide. She presses against me and looks like she’s five years old again, trying to hide under my blanket from monsters. Kelly starts to cry.

“Yes, I think I might do that. Make you choose. I don’t think we need both.”

“No.”

“Choose!”

“No. Shoot me instead.”

“Mom!” Karen screams. “Don’t, pick me, pick me, don’t let him hurt Kelly—”

Santiago swings the barrel away from her and aims at Kelly. She just sits there, staring, like she doesn’t get all of this, like it isn’t real. Maybe she thinks she’s dreaming.

“I can see which one we all love most. Yet my friends downstairs would be angered if I damaged their goods.”

“Goods?” I say, my throat going dry.

“Yes. All three of you will be sold. You, Rose, I am afraid, are not of much value. Too old, too worn, too many children. You will be sent to entertain construction workers and other such lower strata of humanity. It will be unpleasant but will probably not last long. Since you are cheap chattel your new owners will not much care for you, and abuse or infection will be your end.”

He looks at Karen. “This one, though, will fetch a high price. She must be a virgin, I think. She has that look. They will check, of course, and it will be unpleasant. Then she will be auctioned off. The little one, well, my friends below have no scruples and the young ones fetch the highest prices of all, for demand is high and supply low. Basic economics. Do you have a boyfriend, Karen?”

“Don’t listen to him,” I tell her. I try to cover their ears, but I only have two hands.

“Answer me, pretty girl. They can still sell you if I shoot you in the kneecap.”

“No,” Karen chirps.

“That is good. The more innocent you are, the more some cruel man will enjoy breaking you. Forcing upon you acts that your innocent little mind cannot imagine. It perpetually amazes me how creative human beings can be in inflicting suffering on one another, though there is no master of misery greater than Santiago de la Rosa.”

He looks at me. “You should have answered my question, Rose. Whichever one you love more I would shoot, and spare this life.”

“You’re lying,” I rasp. “You’d shoot the one I picked and tell the other one I didn’t love them as much.”

Santiago de la Rosa laughs at me. “You’re good at this. Yes, that is what I would do. It would be a sweeter suffering.”

There’s a knock at the door.

It’s one of the thugs from outside. “Your associate called. They’re on their way. Slight delay.”

“Time?”

“Half hour.” He shrugs.

“Good, let’s move down to the floor. Did you clean up that unfortunate from before?”

“Yeah.”

“Very well. Ladies, on your feet. Now. Walk or be carried.”

I stand up, though I barely have the strength in my legs. This goes from bad to worse every second. They lead us out and that smell hits me again. The girls in the cages are on their feet huddled in front of the chain link, grasping it in sore, dirty fingers, watching us. Every one of their faces is Karen and Kelly and it makes me want to throw up all over Santiago’s shoes.

More chairs. They sit us down. There are people arriving, not Quentin, others. Men in suits. I try not to look at their faces, willing them not to notice me. One of them walks over, a heavy man in a dark suit.

He touches Kelly’s hair.

“This the traitor’s bitches?”

“Yes,” Santiago says amiably.

“Good merchandise. So-so on the old one.”

“Free merchandise is the best merchandise.” Santiago shrugs.

He looks at me. “My original plan was to have you all fucked right here by the lowest bidder, but if I did, someone would bid a penny right away and then what would we do? All the tension would be gone. The more time you have to contemplate your fate, the sweeter your suffering will be.”

I sit there trying to think. I’m not tied down, but I’m not running anywhere. God, all those women in the cages are looking at me. They’re all watching this. There must be fifty here. Where did they all come from?

“They’re here,” one of the thugs announces.

In walks Quentin.

He flinches when he looks at me. He’s not tied up, whatever that means. There’s a blonde woman walking behind him, escorting him. Once Quentin is well and truly surrounded he raises his hands and two men pat him down, and to my surprise they find nothing.

“I said unarmed,” Santiago says, “and you came unarmed. I don’t know whether to be pleased you’ve learned to keep your word or disappointed that you ignored my lessons. Never go into a room without the plans and means to slaughter everyone inside.”

“I have all the means I need to slaughter you, you twisted son of a bitch,” Quentin snaps.

Santiago steps behind me and rests his hands on my children’s shoulders. I freeze up.

“We’re going to play a game, Quentin. It will work like this. Your lovely Rose has refused to play, and so you must. Defeat me in single combat and you may choose one of these three to go free, one to become a slave, and one to die. What will you do, Quentin? Will you let the mother die that the daughters may live? Will you free the youngest or the eldest? Perhaps kill one of the daughters, to spare her, and free the mother? She’ll lose her will to live for a time, I suspect, but one thing I’ve noticed about common sluts like this one is that they’ll just rut and have more.”

“If I defeat you in single combat, I’m going to kill you,” Quentin says calmly.

“You have no chance of winning. It is only a game. That glimmer of hope will make you take the chance anyway, because if you don’t, all three will be slaves. The mother will be dead before long anyway, it’s these two that will endure and suffer, cursing the day you entered their lives.”

“You want me to fight you,” Quentin says. “Gladly. Let’s go.”

“No brawling. I had something more elegant in mind. Lily.”

That must be the blonde woman’s name, Lily. She steps away and returns with a long case. What are they going to do, duel? No, they’re not guns inside.

They’re swords, resting in scabbards. Freaking swords. Medieval broadswords. Santiago takes one and draws it from the scabbard with a flourish. It may look like an antique but it’s brand new, the edge so sharp it blurs in the light.

I realize that Santiago’s
guests
are forming a wide circle, to watch this.

Quentin takes the other one. He draws it and throws the scabbard aside, tests the weight of the blade in his hands, and then finally touches the edge with his thumb.

“This sword is blunt.”

“I know,” Santiago says, and lunges at him.

I can tell from the haphazard way he swings it that Quentin has no experience with that weapon, only strength, speed, and reflexes on his side.

Santiago has all of those and the skill. It’s like watching a ten-year-old jumping on a trampoline next to an Olympic gymnast. The difference is visible, inescapable.

The woman, Lily, walks behind us.

She leans just a little and whispers.

“Wait for me. I’m going to get you out of here.”

I stiffen. What did she say?

She doesn’t repeat herself. I replay it in my head, over the sound of blood rushing in my ears. Did she really say that? Am I losing my mind?

Santiago is toying with Quentin, who barely parries or dodges his swings and thrusts, and whose own are lazily batted aside. His sword is useless for cuts and he knows it, so he swings with power, trying to use it as a bludgeon. Santiago meets power with speed and grace, and the first cut appears on Quentin’s arm, trailing blood down his skin.

“Are you wondering if I’ve poisoned the blade, Quentin?” Santiago taunts.

“Shut up,” Quentin retorts.

He lunges and Santiago toys with him. I can feel every eye in the room on them. I can sense this Lily woman behind me, too, tensing, her breathing growing even as her hands disappear in her pockets.

There are two guards standing to either side of us, more standing around. I don’t know how many could be in the building.

“When I kick your chair, get down,” she whispers, just as a
clang
of metal almost drowns her out.

Quentin is bleeding from half a dozen shallow cuts, even one on his cheek. Santiago is unmarked, strolling around Quentin with a bullfighter’s grace, light on the balls of his feet. It’s a contest he knows he’s going to win.

“I have long waited to see the light drain from your eyes, Quentin. How does it feel to know it’s hopeless?”

Quentin bellows and lunges at him, swinging wildly, and Santiago ducks out of the way and swats the blows aside. Quentin throws himself into it with brute force, grunting and snarling, and his blunted blade slashes across Santiago’s side.

It does nothing, but that hit should have hurt.

“Body armor,” Quentin gasps. “You’re wearing fucking body armor. You’re cheating.”

“The blunt blade wasn’t cheating?” Santiago chuckles, and comes at him again.

Quentin directs all his swings at Santiago’s head, trying to land a blow in a vulnerable spot, and fails. He picks up more cuts along the way. His arms are slick with blood. It splatters on the floor when he moves, and Santiago hasn’t even cut him deep yet.

God, he’s doing it on purpose. Bleeding him out.

Lily kicks my chair, and in the same instant, draws a pair of pistols from her jacket and shoots two of the guards, standing on either side of us, in the head.

I throw myself down and pull the girls to the floor. The world goes crazy. More shooting, people throwing themselves to the concrete, people falling, women in cages screaming.

Santiago turns and Quentin takes the sword, two-handed, and swings it so the flat of the blade hits Santiago right below the shoulder blades. The metal snaps and the upper half of the sword goes flying.

Bastard felt that. He stumbles, swings around, and Quentin ducks out of the way like he’s getting a second wind.

Santiago starts to run, coming our way.

My daughter Karen kicks her legs out and trips him. He goes sprawling forward as Quentin ducks down to the floor. The shooting hammers my ears as I pull the kids together, trying to roll on top of them and shield them.

Santiago turns and sits up, raises the sword, and readies to bring it down right on my head. Quentin appears and catches the blow with the broken half of the sword he still carries, and shoulders into Santiago, howling.

Quentin goes down on top of him and they roll, wrestling.

There’s a gun on the floor. It’s got a strap on it. I wrap my fingers around it and pull, scraping it across the floor.

Santiago rolls on top of Quentin. He has a little blade in his hand, and his gloved fist is slick with blood. Oh my God, he stabbed Quentin.

Karen grabs the gun, rolls, and shoves it into Quentin’s reach.

I drag her back by her legs, away from them, as Quentin grabs the grip and swings it up. He jabs the barrel into Santiago’s chest and pulls the trigger, holding it down. The sound is deafening, the gun firing until it goes dry and locks open.

Santiago falls back and rolls on his side. His coat and shirt are ripped open and shredded. He is wearing armor, Kevlar like cops wear, but it must not have helped. He’s clutching his chest and rasping for breath, and starts to tug at his mask as he coughs, his whole body jerks, and the face of the cloth mask soaks through with blood.

Quentin rises to his knees, reaches over, and takes hold of Santiago’s sword. He jams the point in the ground and the blade flexes when he stands up.

Santiago drags the mask from his face, leaving a smear of blood.

I’m not sure what I was expecting, but he’s just a man. Sweaty, bleeding from the nose and mouth. He hacks up more blood over his chin and stains his suit coat.

Quentin walks over, leaning on the sword like a cane, then takes it in two hands.

“Wait,” Santiago says, lifting his hand.

Quentin says nothing. He swings the sword like a golf club and it goes through Santiago’s hand and then his neck. He clutches his open throat as if he can shove the gouts of blood rushing between his fingers back into his veins.

“Don’t look,” I tell the girls. Kelly listens, Karen doesn’t. She watches.

Santiago goes still.

Behind me I hear a groan.

Lily is on the floor, clutching her stomach.

“I got shot,” she says.