Natural-Born Protector / Saved by the Monarch (27 page)

B
ULLETS WERE STILL
flying in every direction. Judi knew only that Miklos had been hurt. She threw herself over him in a very Jacqueline Kennedy sort of moment. Then his men were there, bending over them, and she registered at last the blood covering his hand.

Vince immediately ripped off the sleeve of his own uniform to staunch the bleeding. “Hold tight. Here.”

She did.

He radioed for a military ambulance, which under the current circumstances might or might not be able to get to them.

Miklos groaned.

“He needs space to breathe,” she said when she realized there were eight of them crammed into a guardhouse meant for two.

The men stepped outside and took up positions.

Vince called back, “Help’s on the way. Keep him comfortable.”

How did you keep comfortable a man who was bleeding to death? Her heart raced as panic squeezed her chest. He couldn’t die. He was a good man. He didn’t deserve this. This was all so incredibly unfair. Her eyes burned with unshed tears.

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.” A sob escaped her throat as she cradled his head in her lap. “Everyone I love dies. I should never have…Everyone I love dies,” she
repeated. It was true. It was all her fault. By loving him, she had cursed him. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”

“Sorry enough to obey me next time?” he asked in a rough tone, as if waking from a dream.

She blinked away enough tears so she could see him.

His eyes were open.

“Fat chance of that.” She sniffed.

He smiled. “That’s my princess.”

“I’m not your princess.” How could he make her think that he was dying when all he was doing was coming up with more ways to aggravate her?

“But you will be.”

“I’ll think about it.”

“You love me.” His sexy smile put in an appearance.

“Did I say that?”

“You bet.”

“I was under duress.” She was an emotional basket case. And considering all that had happened to her since her plane had landed, who could blame her?

He was laughing. She couldn’t see how. His right hand was about blown off. She knew what that would mean to a man as physical as he was.

Vince popped his head in, pulled a white pill from a small pocket on his belt. “Good, you’re conscious enough to take this. You better swallow it, Major. I would have given it to you sooner, but you fainted.”

If looks could kill, Vince would have been a smoking heap of ashes on the threshold.

“I did not faint.” Miklos enunciated each word with care.

“Of course not, Major.” But Vince’s eyes were dancing.

“You hoodlums knocked my head against the stone.”

“Sorry, Major.”

“I don’t need the damn pill.”

“The adrenaline will wear off in about a minute.”

Or sooner, Judi thought as Miklos’s face suddenly turned ashen.

They were so not going to argue about whether or not he was taking the damn pill. She called forth her inner warrior princess she’d been referring to so often in the past hour and snatched the pill from Vince’s hand. “Open up, or I swear to everything that’s holy, I’ll…”

He gave her a grim look but did as she asked.

“She’s scary,” Vince said, then caught himself. “Sorry, Major.”

“No offense taken. I like that about her.” Miklos sat up at last, gritting his teeth, making sure he didn’t lean on his bad hand. “What’s going on out there?”

“Slaughter,” Vince said with disgust. “But the whole platoon is here at the guardhouse. We’re going to keep this position secure.”

“Damn right. And if you let her go again, you’ll answer to me with your life. All of you,” Miklos said and stood with a lurch, grabbing Vince’s rifle with his left hand.

“No.” Judi reached for him, stunned at this latest move.

But he already had his back to her, talking to Vince. “Have you seen my brothers?”

“I might have heard Lazlo’s voice from the North Tower.”

Miklos nodded and moved forward, sparing only a brief but potent look in Judi’s direction. “You stay here.”

“Permission to come with you, Major?” Vince was right by his side.

Miklos stepped out into the desperate fight in the courtyard without bothering to answer.

He’d been gone for an hour. A lot could happen in an hour. Judi tried not to think of any specifics. He was practically maimed already, for heaven’s sake. Why Miklos felt the need to go back to fighting was beyond her. Him and his damned sense of duty.

She went to the door and opened it a crack to see if she might not be able to catch a glimpse of the prince, only to have it slammed back in her face. Which meant that his men were still out there, guarding her. Good to know. Because the battle didn’t sound like it was winding down anytime soon.

“Get down!” someone bellowed from outside.

But before she could do anything, an explosion shook the guardhouse, knocking her from her feet. The boom came from somewhere above them, probably someone tossing a hand grenade on the upper floors. She huddled in the corner as the walls shook, some bricks falling from the ceiling. Dust and masonry bits drizzled around her, making her cough. Instinct pushed her to bolt for the door before the ceiling collapsed altogether, but the sounds of battle outside held her in place.

Trapped.

Where was her safe, familiar little cubicle crammed full of graphic-design gadgets? What was she doing in a castle under siege? She’d made up these kinds of things for her video games. They weren’t supposed to happen for real.

“We need another place to wait this out.” Vince burst in to check on her, and noted the unstable rocks above. His gaze settled on the small, wooden door at Judi’s back. “Stand behind me.”

And when Judi moved out of the way, he shot the lock off the door. He looked into the area behind it, then up. “The South Tower.”

“Do you think it’s safer up there than down here?” Didn’t the boom of that grenade come from up there? She would have preferred to stay where Miklos had left her. She didn’t want him to have trouble finding her when he came back. Please, God, let him come back. Let him come back without any new injuries.

“I don’t hear any sounds of fighting from above.” Vince shouted out instructions to the other men.

Four moved into the staircase, led by Joe. Then Vince motioned for Judi. The rest of them came up behind her, defending her from behind. She felt like the president, surrounded by Secret Service officers—an experience she could have lived without. Another reminder of what her life would be like if their arranged marriage took place.

Which seemed the least of her problems at the moment.

“You should go and protect the prince,” she told the men.

“Don’t start on that again.” Vince flashed her a discouraging look. “The major can take care of himself. We’ll do exactly as he instructed.”

They were all tough guys, every last one of them. They would not have followed a weak leader. If Miklos were anything else but the kind of man he was, he could not have inspired this kind of loyalty. He really was a man like no other: strong, honorable…

She didn’t have time to ponder Miklos’s fearless nature. Vince was nudging her forward. The spiral staircase was ancient and so narrow that it only allowed one person at a time. Would have been good to know whether the explosion caused any structural damage.

“Keep your head down,” Vince instructed, not looking particularly concerned about the condition of the stairs.

They stole ahead step by step, the staircase seeming to go on forever. At least they didn’t meet any enemy. She was starting to get dizzy from going around and around by the time they finally reached the top.

She was instructed to sit behind the stone parapet and stay still, while the men engaged and picked off some of the enemy from their higher positions. She hugged her knees and prayed for Miklos and his family, frustrated that she could do nothing to help them, that she knew nothing about where he was, what was happening to him.

Then she spotted holes in the parapet at regular intervals, and she moved up to one to look out. She could see some of the open area outside the castle.
Nobody was out there save the fallen and a couple of abandoned military vehicles and two burned-out tanks. The fight had moved inside the castle walls in the last hour or so.

Floodlights lit up the castle, and men fought as if by daylight.

She slid to another peephole and could see a section of roof. She was looking for a view of the castle yard, so she was about to move on when she noticed movement on the edge of the roof. The next moment Miklos appeared, balancing perilously on the old, ceramic roof tiles. He held the rifle in his left hand, standing straight and tall, his wide shoulders outlined against the sky. The bandage on his right hand was soaked through with blood.

“Miklos!” Her voice was swallowed by the din around them.

She watched as he found sure purchase for his feet and turned his back to her, determination in every move. He looked ready to face anything, but she knew that he had to be exhausted, had to be weakening from blood loss, slowed by pain, dulled by whatever drug Vince had given him.

In a word, he had to be a mess. A total and complete mess. But he had to be out there. He was too damn stubborn to do anything less. If it weren’t so futile, she would have screamed at him.

He needed to leave the battle to the rest of the men and find shelter somewhere. He needed to stay still and hold that hand up to slow the bleeding. And then it occurred to her that maybe that was why he had sought
the roof. Maybe just this once, he’d decided to be reasonable.

She watched him.
Sit down. Rest.

But he stood there, focused on something she couldn’t see. Tension knotted her muscles. He looked like he was waiting for something. Whatever trouble it was, he was in no shape to face it.

She gasped when, in the next second, a dozen enemy soldiers vaulted up to the roof to fight him.

M
IKLOS WAS BADLY
outnumbered, and his aim was terrible with his left hand. His father had made sure that all of his sons could fence with both hands, the sport a royal tradition, but nobody had ever thought to teach the princes to shoot left-handed. Something he would have to start practicing, he acknowledged with dismay, as pain throbbed through his right hand.

He was using the gun as a deterrent more than anything else. He squeezed off a couple of rounds and hit one man purely by accident. The rest were closing in on him. Ducking bullets, he kept moving. Damn, but he didn’t want to die on this roof. He needed to find the general, capture him and have him call his men off. It was the only way to stop the bloodshed.

His people were dying all over the castle. He had no idea where his family was.

He retreated, shooting wildly, forcing his enemies to scatter on the roof. When gunfire came from the South Tower, he ducked again, thinking someone was trying to get him from behind. But instead, three enemy soldiers fell.

He glanced up and saw Vince and the guys. What were they doing up there? He didn’t see Judi. His chest tightened as he tried to get a better look.

A bullet whizzed by his ear, reminding him that he couldn’t afford to be distracted. He shot back and, while his men from the roof covered him, ran to the opposite side of the roof and slid to the balcony below, sending some tiles crashing to the courtyard.

He paid little attention to them. He thought of what was ahead of him. He and his brothers had played in every corner of the castle in their childhood. He knew its every nook by heart.

Sounds of fighting came from the servants’ quarters. For a moment he hesitated. Instinct pushed him to go and check on Judi, but logic told him that the best way to save her was to find the general and end the battle. He ran toward the sound of guns.

The hallways were narrower here, the floor tile instead of marble, the light fixtures cast iron instead of the Swarovski crystal chandeliers that graced the lower floors. The doors were plain oak, only six feet tall instead of twelve, no decorative raised panels on them, no hand-painted scenes from the country’s historical past.

Which was why the young princes used to love to play up here back in the day, away from the strict formality of the main floors of the castle. And the servants spoiled them rotten with sweets and other treats on the frequent occasions when they’d been able to escape their eagle-eyed governesses.

Some of those servants were even now fighting in the courtyard. Some had already been killed.

He ran, making as little noise as possible. The ruckus of gunfire helped muffle the sound his boots made on the hundred-year-old tile.

He found his brothers in the hall outside the servants’ bedrooms that took up the back hallway of the top floor. They were locked in a gunfight with a dozen or so men at the top of the staircase at the end of the hall. The princes cheered when he came around the corner.

“Sorry I’m late.” He shot at the enemy blindly while checking over his brothers. Blood all over the place, but nobody looked badly injured. “Mother?” He ducked behind the marble table they were using for cover.

“In her quarters,” Janos responded then popped up to let a round fly. A shout on the other end confirmed that he’d hit his target. He always did, whether it was target shooting or golf. The sports papers didn’t call him the Devil of the Big Green for nothing.

“Where is the castle guard?” Miklos asked. He’d barely seen any of them around. Fifty of them were in service at any given moment when the royal family was at Maltmore.

“With her. Guarding her.” Lazlo was leaning heavily on his right leg. He fearlessly raced the cars his company built and had crushed his left knee two years before in a fiery crash. “What happened to your hand?”

“Bullet.” Miklos shrugged, then glared at Arpad. “Why aren’t you with her?”

He was the crown prince, damn it, didn’t he understand? He would be taking over the country soon. He could not risk his life in a fight like this.

Arpad, never one to be intimidated, glared back. “Where in hell have you been? We thought you’d already been killed.”

And the look on his brothers’ faces told Miklos that they’d been just as worried about him as he’d been about them.

No time to explain. “General Rossi betrayed us,” he said between two shots, then ducked as bullets whizzed overhead. He glanced back, making sure nobody had followed him from the roof, but didn’t see a soul. His men must have picked off that batch from the tower.

But did they still have Judi? Was she safe? He gripped his weapon tighter.

“General Rossi? Are you sure?” Benedek, too wellmeaning and, being an architect and a dreamer, not exposed as much to the darker side of life as some of the other princes, asked.

“He’s here,” was all Miklos said.

Lazlo looked grim. “We have to let the palace guard know not to let him near Mother.”

“I’ll go.” Miklos immediately volunteered.

But Arpad decided to pull rank. “We’re the Brotherhood, remember? We’ll go together.”

Which made sense, gave them a better chance of succeeding, but Miklos didn’t have to like it.

They popped up to shoot together, then ducked back down.

Benedek swore. “I’m out of bullets.”

Miklos stared. Benedek never swore. He was the mildest man among them.

“Me, too,” said Janos.

Miklos checked his own magazine. A half-dozen rounds left.

They had no way to get more bullets or other weapons. Nothing but the servants’ rooms up here and…A sudden idea gave him hope. “Does Monsieur Maneaux still live in the castle?”

Their old fencing master had come from France, but became a Valtrian through and through, to the point that instead of retiring back to Provence, where he’d been born, he’d stayed on to restore old weapons.

“Last door on the right,” Benedek said. “We’re reconstructing the fresco of the Battle of Karman at the Royal Opera House. I talked to him not long ago about the weapons in the scene.” He had a formidable eye for detail and the determination to see all his creations done to perfection.

Miklos looked to the last door on the right, which was the farthest from them. To reach it, they had to come out from behind cover.

“Let’s go,” Arpad ordered.

“I’ll go first,” Miklos said. “You stay in the middle.”

They stared each other down until Lazlo, a daredevil to the end, darted forward with his characteristic limp, and the rest of the brothers were forced to focus on covering him. They came up with guns blazing and charged as one, the Brotherhood of the Crown, and pushed the enemy back.

They had a moment of reprieve when they reached their old fencing master’s room, but their situation now was even more dire than before. The charge had used up most of the ammunition they had left.

Miklos tossed his empty rifle and reached for one of the historic swords on the wall instead. Early twentieth century. He checked the blade, found it sharp, then looked for the point of balance and realized that the weapon would be perfect for his left hand. His brothers were testing swords as well.

Grinning, the lot of them.

Miklos rolled his eyes when they started to form a circle, but when they cried, “Duty and honor, our lives for the people and the crown!” Miklos shouted the oath of the Brotherhood with them.

They used what few bullets they had to take out the enemy waiting for them in the hallway. Miklos finished off the last guy with his sword, using a weapon like that for real instead of practice for the first time. His respect for his ancestors immediately increased. Pushing cold steel into a man when he was at arm’s reach, holding his gaze as he went down, was vastly different than shooting a gun from a hundred feet away.

He pulled away. Arpad shouted. Then the brothers were running down the servants’ staircase toward the queen’s quarters.

He caught sight of the guardhouse through one of the windows, saw the intense fighting in front of it, spotted four of his men dead on the ground. The enemy probably thought that his men were defending him, that he was in there. It would be only a matter of time before they broke through and found Judi. If she were still alive.

A ball of ice formed in his chest at the thought.

The brothers ran forward, met a small group of
enemy soldiers who were using their rifles as clubs. They, too, were out of bullets. The six princes with their skill at sword fighting made quick work of them.