Bold Beautiful Love -- A Temptation Court Contemporary Romance: Temptation Court: Passion in New York (11 page)

The words are only seconds out of my mouth, and the laptop only halfway into its case, when a booming shout fills the little room.

“Cassian Cameron Jonathan Court. Put your hands up where we can see them. Now!”

“What the fu—”

“With all due respect, Prince Samsyn, you too.”

Wisely, Syn complies. His hands and arms form a pair of upward right angles—though one breaks the pattern to toss aside a handgun mysteriously appearing from somewhere on him. Weirdly, I’m just as stunned by that as the onslaught of insanity that’s hit the room, along with the four camouflage-covered soldiers following the lead of two black-suited men—if those ill-fitted things insist on being called suits.

Not the time to pull out your custom-fitted asshole, man.

Pseudo-baller one, with a haircut as government-issue as his threads, moves forward. His look might be shit but his moves are well-practiced, as he kicks Syn’s gun toward the nearest soldier. Syn’s vibration of a snarl stops the soldier in mid-gawk at the custom SIG, communicating one message alone.
Once you all are done with this BS, you
will
give that back.

But what the hell is this BS?

The demand twists at my lips, nearly erupting as a growl of its own, especially as pseudo-baller two directs another soldier to grab my laptop. I direct the urge to better use, trying to place the guy’s subtle accent. It’s not Arcadian, though Samsyn’s shock has already given me that detail. All at once, the connection clicks.
Dallas.

The ballers are American.

Which makes the next detail click.

Bad suits. Worse haircuts. Brass baller attitudes.

They’re CIA.

Goddammit, Damon
.

*

Mishella

“Creator help me
.”

Somehow, past the thud of my heart in my throat, the words make it out. I am glad they are only a rasp, for the two soldiers in the hallway, training their guns and their attentions into the service lounge, have not heard a word. Their stress, so thick I can nearly see it in the air, flattens me against the wall of the stairwell I have just descended.

I peek at them in frantic glances. Who are they? What do they want? Are they connected to the
bonsun
who blew up the Grand Sancti Bridge? Is this the beginning of another part of their plot? Or maybe they are members of the extremist militant Pura, so devoted to extinguishing the Cimarrons and returning Arcadia to its extinct way of life, they tried taking over the Palais from within just a few months ago.

And what if all of these monsters are interconnected
?

Rune Kavill’s ties to the Pura were believed severed after their pathetic coup failed…

But if all of us have learned anything about Kavill, it is his likeness to a damn reptile—especially the gift of re-growing himself in all kinds of horrid ways.

“Now stand up slowly. I said
slowly
.”

The directive comes from neither of the gunmen in the hallway. It booms from someone inside the lounge,
at
someone in the lounge.

Cassian.

I mold a terrified hand over my mouth, barely containing my scream. Breathe violently through my nose, forcing my fear to a manageable level—or I
think
I have, until compelling my quivering fingers across the keypad of my phone, into a text bubble directed at him.

:: WHERE ARE YOU? ::

A minute goes by.

No response.

Sounds come from inside the lounge. Scuffling feet. Steel against steel. Guns? Doing what?

Still no response.

Fear is all my blood is made of. The only thunder in my ears.

More clanking steel. Not guns.

Handcuffs?

“I’m sorry, sir. This is simply necessary.” I do not recognize the voice, only to know it is gruff, American, and as “sorry” as a cop arresting the bad guy in a superhero movie—without realizing he is the good guy in disguise.

Suddenly, I miss superhero movies. And the big leather couch Cassian and I always watched them from at Temptation Manor. And pigging on lemon bars and popcorn as we did. And the sounds of New York right outside the window.

And everything about the place I now realize as…

Home.

Just as much as all this.

Maybe even more…

A comprehension bearing the shittiest timing.

Especially as another voice answers Mr. Sorry-Not-Sorry.

“Tell that to someone who’ll believe it, Agent Bullshit.”

Cassian
.

“Cassian!”

One of the soldiers whirls. The barrel of his gun swings out. If he fires, I’ll likely lose my digestive system.

I do not care.

“Stop. Right. There!”

I do not listen.

“Dammit, I said
stop
!”

“Cassian!” My fear bursts to full throttle in it.

“Don’t shoot her!”

But the thrust of
his
terror—

That
stops me.

“What the hell is going on? Who the hell are you?” Like with all good onslaughts of fear, I explode into pure fury. Though I shake harder than before, I get both arms wrapped around myself. So much of me still does not care about their damn guns—but I must hold myself together,
somehow
, for Cassian.
Do not be afraid. Do not be afraid. Do not—

I am nothing
but
fear. My very center feels split like a ripe pomegranate, my sanity turned into seeds, spilling everywhere…ready to be crushed underfoot.

And then they are.

Beginning the moment Cassian is led out into the hallway, his face grim, his arms bound by those awful cuffs…

“C-Cassian?” I battle not to throw myself at him. Even bind myself along with him. Instead I glare at the men grabbing him by both elbows. They wear faded black suits, and smell like bagels and copier toner. I have not smelled copier toner in over two months, since my last few days of working in one of the office cubicles upstairs, but the alloy stench never leaves one’s memory.

Just like I know this moment will never be completely erased either.

“What the bloody hell is going on?” I charge it at the man on the right. His eyes are a little kinder than his counterpart, who twists his lips as if his breakfast—actually a bagel, by the appearances of the crumbs on his lapels—has not agreed with him.

“It’s Mishella, right?” he replies. “You’re the girlfriend?”

“The
betranli
.” I suck in a harsh breath, forcing the translation to mind. “I am his
fiancée
now.”

“Shit.” Bagel Suit snorts. “When did that happen and why didn’t we know about it?”

“None of your goddamn business.” Cassian mutters it as if simply swapping one-liners with Doyle. If he thinks the bravado will fool me, he is wrong. He is standing here in real handcuffs, flanked by two men who clearly have the right to have rendered him that way. Thankfully, he seems to realize the same thing. In a calmer tone, he says to Kind Eyes, “Look. Leave her out of this, and I’ll cooperate.”

“Cooperate with
what
?” I do not want to snap it at him but the expression is true—fear is the mother of anger—and right now, nothing but fear defines me.

Kind Eyes nods in the way used by doctors before breaking awful news to their patients. “I’m Agent Reyes and this is Agent McCree. We’re with the US Central Intelligence Agency, permitted to be here by the Arcadian government.”

“Fucking knew it,” Cassian grumbles.

There is movement behind him. Lots of it. In stomping fury, Prince Samsyn appears. “You have permission,” he barks, “but
not
authority. Especially not for this.”

McCree shoots out a glare. “Even if we have cause to believe that the perpetrator of the Grand Sancti Bridge explosion was working for a contractor hired by Court Enterprises Incorporated?”

“Don’t.” Cassian cuts in before I can. His stare slashes into me with equal brutality. “Don’t you goddamn
dare
, Ella.” The curve of his lips becomes a tight line but I hear his next words as if he utters them right into my mind.
Don’t you dare tell them you already know this, and we’re helping Damon with it
.

With a furious huff, I lock my teeth and comply—but it is only because of love for him, not any shred of solidarity I might have developed for Damon. It has been
two days
since the bridge exploded. Certainly, the CIA linked things backed to Cassian’s company—but not enough to show up here and drag him off in handcuffs. They have more. Much more.

And only one person could have supplied them with all of it.

“Oh, she doesn’t have to say a word, does she?” Bagel Man, now identified as Agent McCree, tacks on an assessing stare—at me. “That face
says
it all.”

“Get your eyes off her goddamn face,” Cassian snarls. “And everything else you’re looking at.”

McCree shrugs. “Cool your jets, Court. She’s not my type.”

“You going to tell me you used to get mistaken for a Helmsworth too?”

The man chuffs. “Nope. Just thinking the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. Selyna Santelle
is
one fine woman.”

For the first time in the last five minutes, rage joins my fear. The only thing holding me back from acting on it is the confusion. Why the hell is this filthy
soldask
prattling about my
mother
—who may be a good many things but is smart enough to be those things
only
to my father. Affairs kill reputations faster than anything in this Palais.

In my next breath, I realize I do not care. The man will lose his front teeth for it anyway. He is speaking about my
mother.

But I wait one moment too long in deciding how to best deliver that fate.

The moment in which Cassian looks like he has been kicked in the gut.

“Fuck,” he utters.

“What?” I blurt. “Cassian?” But when he yanks up his head, it is with an expression he lasers past me, down the hallway, as if he battles to burn a hole straight through the stone walls.

“Fuck,” he repeats. “How did they…
why
would they…”

“They who?” I scurry around, planting myself in front of him—as if that stops Reyes and McCree from yanking him forward. I curl fists into Cassian’s shirt, even as I’m forced to scramble backward. “They
who
?” I plead it again, begging for him to answer—because I don’t want it to be what my gut is drives into me like a jammed nail gun. “Cassian! They who?
What
is going on?”

He stops so abruptly, I nearly topple to my backside. The agents jerk him but he shirks them, a right shove then a left, without tearing his stare from me.

His stare—which is suddenly green fire upon me.

Seizing me.

Sucking in the sight of me, as if the hallway is about to turn into a black hole and swallow me up.

“C-Cassian?”

And I thought I was already afraid.

I also thought fear was always cold. But now, all the ice in my veins is pure fire. My breath tastes like brimstone. My stomach is a mass of charcoal. My vision swims, truly threatening to turn the floor into a massive sanity suck. I sway from it, fighting back with blinks, trying to refocus back on Cassian—

To comprehend the words he desperately yells at me.

“Ella! Dammit.
Mishella
!”

“Wh-what?” A wisp, like smoke.
Pathetic. Speak up
! “What?”

Through some miracle, it gains enough volume. Cassian expels a breath filled with too much relief. Pulls it back in just as fast, hardening his features to tawny granite. “Listen. To. Me.” After sending a come-at-me-again-and-pay-with-your-balls glare at Reyes and McCree, he whips back toward me. Dear Creator, even in his wrath, he is mesmerizing. “Find Doyle—”

“I can help with that.” Samsyn issues the blistering growl, daring the agents with a glower to equal Cassian’s.

“Thanks, Syn.” Cassian acknowledges it in words but not movement. His stare, still a green firestorm, does not waver from me. “Go with him, Ella,” he murmurs, pressing closer, summoning the very air around us in the way only he is capable of. At once, the molecules are spun into a bubble of exquisite perfection. How many times have I treasured that comparison, thinking nothing fit better than comparing our connection to the magic of spun color on the air?

Stupid, silly girl
.

You
picked bubbles
?

Fragile.

Breakable.

Bubbles.

“
Ella.
”

“
What
?” It breaks through my tears, which I no longer try to hide. The damn man himself is smiling—
smiling
!—even when he knows I see straight through his act—that from the second McCree mentioned Mother and he reacted with that gape, I know their little “chat” yesterday was about much more than
Maimanne
and
Paipanne’s
pre-nuptial arbitrations.

More importantly, what Cassian did not reveal to me about them.

So yes, dammit, he gets to see my tears. And know that they spring from being utterly enraged with him.

Utterly in love with him.

Stubborn, protective, determined, damnable, beautiful man.

“Go,” he repeats softly. “Go
now
, with Samsyn.” He clears his throat. “And find Doyle. And when you do, tell him he is ordered to take you back to New York. Immediately.”