Claimed: Gowns & Crowns, Book 3 (25 page)

Stefan sat back in his seat as Nicki blinked rapidly, but the evidence was on her face, and it wasn’t as if he hadn’t already figured it out anyway. Something was wrong with Nicki that had her spooked far more than the momentary terror he was sure she’d faced with those men. He’d guessed just now on her being sick…

But he knew he was right.

Nicki squirmed under his scrutiny. Opposite them, Ari peered out the window, offering them the illusion of privacy. Try as he might, Stefan could not call the prince by the name Ryker. Not in his own mind, anyway. It was too jarring to see him so disheveled as it was.

But for the moment, his focus was on Nicki—an American, in his care, whom he had completely failed. Why had he not researched her health more thoroughly? Why had he not looked deeper, searched harder? The dossier on her had not included a full medical workup—it hadn’t needed to. She wasn’t the consort of the prince, as Emmaline had been. She merely was the friend, one of a trio of supporting figures in the drama that had swept up the royal family when the Americans had come to the shores of the seaside kingdom less than a month ago. When that drama had begun, he’d barely registered Nicki’s presence.

But she’d lied to him. And, worse—he hadn’t caught her out in that lie. He didn’t know which angered him more.

He narrowed his gaze on her now. She stayed uncharacteristically quiet, and he knew she was buying time. Whether to come up with a suitable answer or to hope he moved off the topic of her, he didn’t know. He suspected the latter, however. He suspected that she’d managed her life quite well with that approach, and that most of her friends and associates had allowed her to get away with it. She was always, simply, Nicki—up for anything, ready for action, the first to volunteer and the last to give up.

Eventually, however, she broke under the weight of his glare. With the rumpled Ari doing his best to be invisible she spoke softly, almost dully.

“It’s called a bunch of different things,” she said. “Familial hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, inherited cardiomyopathy, genetic—but it all means the same condition. Essentially, my heart muscle has the predisposition to…well, to weaken and die. My dad has it, my brother too. I was checked out once, when I was eighteen, and I was fine. Really, I was.” Her words picked up speed as she seemed to force them all into the open. “But I’m supposed to get checked every six months or something crazy, and it started consuming my whole life. When I got to college, I stopped getting checked. So I honestly don’t know how healthy I am. And, well—I worry, of course. But at least I keep living, too.” Her eyes flashed toward him. “I feel fine though. I do. I mean, I passed out, but I’m fine.”

“You do that a lot? Pass out?” Stefan kept his words short and to the point, if only to keep a handle on his fury. At himself, at her, at the world for allowing someone so vivacious, so full of life to suffer such an insidious threat.

“No!” she shook her head firmly. “Seriously, no. I—I got dehydrated today, and I couldn’t seem to catch back up.”

“And you dropped your water bottle.” Stefan passed his hand over his eyes. “I should have given you mine.” Anger and a need for answers swamped him, but the car was already slowing, the lights, smells and sounds of the marina filling the limo as they cruised toward the yacht. He’d have time to grill Nicki later. And then make sure she got checked out the first moment possible.

He understood the idea of not wanting to live with constant fear. But fear could be managed. The unknown couldn’t.

Stefan glanced at Ari and tried again to gently jostle a memory. “You’re comfortable traveling with us, Mr. Stavros? You don’t need to contact anyone?”

Now Ari’s expression turned a bit wan. “I’m afraid there was no one here to miss me,” he said. A look of stark terror crossed his face as a sudden realization dawned. “I don’t have a wife or anything, do I? Or a girlfriend—children?”

His anguish was so immediate that Stefan’s heart twisted, and Nicki’s face softened with understanding and shared pain. To forget everything...

“No,” Stefan said quietly. “You were not married, and to my knowledge had no steady girlfriend. Your work kept you busy. You had no children either.”

“Thank God.” Ari sank his head back against the limo seat. “I don’t know how long I’ve been gone, exactly. It was summer when I was taken, and it’s summer again—that’s as close as I can get.”

“Almost exactly a year, yes,” Stefan supplied, then tempered his words at Ari’s wan expression. “But you’re almost home.”

The car stopped. Stefan stepped out of the limo, then handed out Nicki, his gaze warning her to stay quiet as Ari emerged from the car. She nodded, though she was clearly confused, and she didn’t object when he reached for her hand.

Good. Stefan didn’t think he was going to let go of Nicki Clark any time soon. She’d have to get used to that idea.

Chapter Twenty-One

Nicki willed herself to relax as they walked toward the yacht. She wasn’t sure why she was so nervous. The danger was past. They had the prince—even if he didn’t know he was a prince. She’d succeeded—they’d succeeded.

So why did she feel like she’d failed?

Ryker/Ari drew fewer stares than he ordinarily would because of his casual clothes, despite his unkempt hair and thick, scraggly beard. But when they approached the yacht with its bold crest of the Royal Family, he didn’t react. He stared up at the boat with a rueful smile and turned back to Stefan. “It seems I have very good friends. I’m glad of this, though I don’t know what I did to deserve it.”

“You’ve been a worthy friend in return, and will be so again.”

Ryker didn’t seem convinced, and they boarded the yacht under the deferent and watchful eyes of the crew. None of the crew referred to Ryker as anything specific, using the same honorifics for him as they would any other dignitary. Ryker, for his part, didn’t recognize any of them either.

“Tamas here will show you to your state room, Ryker,” Stefan said. He’d not moved out of touching distance from Nicki, and she wondered about that, too. “We’ll be setting sail at first light, sooner if we must. But it would be best not to draw attention.”

Ryker nodded. “I don’t think the authorities will waste resources searching for me. I will not turn down the opportunity for a shower, though.” He lifted his hand to his beard. “And if there’s a razor aboard, that’d be good.”

“I think we you’ll find everything you need in your state room. I would have brought a barber too, but we can’t risk any information about you getting back to officials here.”

“Of course,” Ryker murmured, though he looked bemused as he went below decks.

Stefan wasn’t finished yet. He turned with Nicki to walk her across the deck to the communications room of the ship. Instead of turning into that room however, he went another few doors down until he rapped on the door. It swung wide and she stared into the bright space—it was some sort of sick room, with a single raised palette, pristine counters and locked cabinets.

And one of the guards standing in the center of the room…with a stethoscope around his neck.

“What is this?” Nicki said, though Stefan wouldn’t let her stop until he’d pushed her in the room and closed the door behind them.

“This is Marco Osman, whom you’ve met. In addition to his skills as an operative, he is the team medic. I don’t want to risk a Turkish doctor here in Alaçati, but it’s a twelve hour trip to Garronia, and I can’t risk that either if you are unwell.”

“I told you, I feel fine—” the usual panic surged forth as Nicki considered the reality of what Stefan was saying. A doctor would be examining her, and this was only a field medic. When she returned to Garronia, she had no doubt there would be another doctor. Her medical files would be requested, and if her family didn’t get involved, it would be a miracle. “Really—I’m good. I’d tell you if I didn’t feel okay.”

Stefan was immovable as stone. “I can remain in the room or leave, whatever you feel more comfortable with.”

Nicki made a face. “Oh for God’s sake, Stefan. Fine.” She trooped forward and stood in front of Marco. “You want me standing or on the bed thing?”

“The bed thing is fine,” Marco said. To his credit, he didn’t smirk, and he didn’t glance at Stefan, though Stefan’s scowl practically filled the room as Nicki hopped up on the examining table. Before he could ask, she reached up and stripped off her shirt, leaving only her industrial strength jog bra. To emphasize her irritation, she tossed the shirt to Stefan. She was used to competing in far less clothing than many super models wore. She wasn’t shy about her body in front of strangers.

She still flinched when Marco put the stethoscope to her chest. But it was cold.

The tests proceeded from there, the pure basics to determine that her blood pressure, pulmonary activity, pulse and heart rate were normal, with no apparent ill effects from her fainting spell. Her eyes checked out, her depth perception and peripheral vision appearing unharmed. Throughout it all, Stefan stared, his glower eventually diminishing to a stoic impassivity that made her more nervous than the checkup did.

“Your immediate vitals are good, and given the limits of our testing equipment, that’s as far as we can tell with this equipment,” Marco eventually concluded. “You are significantly dehydrated. The climate here is arid, but dehydration can result from other issues too, like stress or adrenal fatigue. You’ll want to test that. You do not appear to have suffered a true cardiac event, and I can detect no arrhythmia or fibrillation currently. Nevertheless, we’ll want to monitor you for the length of the voyage.” He turned to include Stefan in his next statement. “With Miss Clark’s permission, we’ll have a full workup done as soon as we return to—”

“No,” Nicki said immediately.

“Yes,” Stefan snapped. His gaze whipped to hers, but he continued to speak to Marco. “Set it up. For both of us. Full VO-2 Max stress test, echo and EKG testing, and then the same battery of athletic performance tests we put the recruits through at the end of intake training.”

“Of course sir,” Marco said as Nicki’s eyes narrowed.

“What do you mean, for both of us?”

Stefan shrugged. “If I’m going to ask you to have your physical capacity checked, I should go through it as well. It’s been some time since I’ve gone through the full detail of it, and that’s not smart.” He nodded to Marco, and tossed Nicki’s shirt back to her. “We’ll be leaving shortly since you’ve checked out, and I’d like to put in a call to the king and queen once we clear the port. If you’d join me for that, I’d appreciate it.” He hesitated. “Probably best that we’re both cleaned up.”

Even as he turned to the door, however, his phone buzzed.

Nicki hopped off the bed. “The queen?”

Stefan scowled at his phone. “Regrettably, no. It appears that our attempts to move up our departure may be delayed.” He shunted his glance to her, and real regret seemed to color his gaze. “This might take a while. I’ll send for you when we’re clear.”

“Of course,” she murmured. He held the door for her and she went through, but to her surprise he didn’t touch her, didn’t kiss her on the way out. As soon as she registered that disappointment, she clamped down hard on her emotions, and picked up her pace.

“Get a grip on yourself,” she muttered, trudging up the hallway back toward the main deck. Stefan was the commander on this yacht. He also was a highly respected diplomat for his country. He did the right thing, at the right time, and when he did it, it mattered. If she was going to stay with him…

Her steps slowed as her brain caught up with her galloping thoughts.
Stay with him?
That wasn’t an option—it had never been an option. Stefan hadn’t asked, and he’d certainly given no indication that that was what he wanted from her. He wanted her healthy, sure. He was pissed that she blacked out but who wouldn’t be? And…and he did care for her. She knew that. He cared for her as a teammate definitely. As for more than that, it shouldn’t matter. It didn’t matter.

She’d always gone it alone, out of self-preservation more than anything else. She could handle going down with a busted heart as long as she didn’t drag anyone down with her.

Nothing had changed about that.

Nicki continued to her room. Of course, until now, all of her concerns had been a hypothetical. Maybe her heart would go out on her one day—maybe it wouldn’t. But they were beyond hypotheticals at this point. She’d passed out. Her heart hadn’t stopped, sure, but when the going had gotten tough…she’d flaked. No matter how she tried to talk her way out of it, the truth of the matter was—she was sick. She was broken.

The tears started before she made it to the shower. Nicki stripped off her clothes woodenly, pausing in front of the mirror to survey herself. Other than the usual assortment of bruises, she appeared to be whole. Normal. She didn’t look like a ticking time bomb. She turned and switched on the water, grateful for the cocoon of noise and warmth as she stepped beneath the heavy spray.

“It doesn’t have to change anything,” she muttered, but the reality wasn’t as easy as that. She had proof now. Who knew what was really wrong with her? At a minimum she’d be prescribed a laundry list of drugs, and if things got worse, her whole life could change. She could end up walking on eggshells and that still could wouldn’t that her heart wouldn’t give out one day anyway.

She didn’t want surgery. She didn’t want more pills. And she didn’t want to tell her family, especially her mother, who seemed to have been rooting for the family to stay in crisis since her father had been diagnosed. She didn’t want to hear the latest treatment options, didn’t want to get forwarded even more articles about athletes dying on the field.

The water pounded down around her, and she leaned against the wall, finally giving into sobs. She didn’t want to be broken, a liability. Didn’t want to live her life like she was the walking wounded. But now people would know. Her friends, certainly. The royal family. Stefan.

She could keep it there, maybe, she thought. If she agreed to the tests conducted in Garronia, there’d be no record of those tests to follow her back home. She could manage her care quietly, away from her family’s prying. She wouldn’t be stupid—couldn’t be, not anymore. She’d care for herself so she never left anyone in the lurch again. But she’d go somewhere that would be easy. Maybe to Josef’s teaching school after all, down in Texas. She’d be close to hospitals and clinics there, if needed. She could manage. She would adapt.