The Gender War (The Gender Game #4)(87)

“Tell me what’s going on,” I barked at Jeff. “I need to know everything.”

Jeff coughed slightly. “Maybe that had better be left to Violet. We’d been trying to contact you earlier, but she had to leave before I could reach you. She left you a message, though. Now that I have your handheld’s unit number, I can transmit it.”

“Do it,” I said, trying not to let my impatience with Jeff’s long-windedness leave me screaming at the screen.

I looked at the screen as the message loaded, then put Jeff’s call on hold and pressed the button to play the message. Violet’s face appeared on the screen, and I felt relieved just to see her alive, even if it was about forty minutes ago. Her gray eyes were hard, scared, and determined as they looked out toward me. She looked deeply sad. She swallowed before speaking close to the microphone, and I held the screen close, turning away from Owen.

“Viggo,” she began, “I’m sorry to leave like this… I’m sorry I didn’t get to say this in person. We tried getting ahold of you but it just didn’t work. I didn’t have time to wait any longer.

“Amber and Quinn were captured before they ever got out. Quinn was tortured in front of Amber, and she gave them everything. Don’t blame her—I doubt I could’ve kept quiet either, if I were in her place. Viggo, Tabitha sent Amber back to us with a message: she wants me, the egg, and the king in exchange for Cad and his family. My family. I couldn’t leave them there to die… especially not when Tabitha already knows where we are hiding out. It’s only a matter of time before they come for us, so I figured, let’s take the fight to them first—when they least expect it.

“I know I’m walking into a trap, but I’m not doing it empty-handed. Tabitha thinks she has the upper hand, but she’s in for a surprise. Please believe me when I say I haven’t given up hope. This isn’t a suicide message, Viggo.”

Then Violet’s eyes turned softer and warmer. “God, I’m so terrified right now. To be honest, I’ve spent the last hour wishing you were by my side the whole time. But I think it’s probably better this way. Don’t come after me, Viggo. If… if it goes bad, the rebellion, everything we’ve worked for, they’ll need you alive. And I need you alive, to take care of Tim, to fix things and make things right… and so I can go on living. And if I get back… when I get back in one piece…” She swallowed, then looked directly into the camera.

“I’m so sorry I haven’t said it to you sooner—I accept your proposal. Yes. My answer is yes. I want to spend the rest of my life with you, even if it turns out to be short. I want to be your wife and fix this country so we can have that little cabin in the woods somewhere…” Her eyes stared straight into the screen, as though she saw me watching, knew how much this filled me with joy even as my heart broke at the thought that I might lose her now.

“I have to go,” Violet finally said, gulping. “But I promise, I will find you, as soon as it’s done. I love you, Viggo… Always. Don’t forget that.”

And then the message was over. I breathed again, realizing I’d been holding my breath.

“Like hell,” I found myself saying to her message, as though she were right in front of me spewing this nonsense. “Like hell I won’t come after you.”

I’d almost forgotten about Owen in the passenger’s seat until he echoed my thoughts. “We can’t let her go in there alone,” he said. “That’s insane. They’ll all just get killed. We can’t let that—”

I looked at him, his blue eyes concerned, his mouth tight with worry. “We won’t,” I said firmly, and toggled the call on my handheld.

“Jeff, are you still there? When did they actually leave?”

The former valet answered promptly, as though I hadn’t just put him on hold for five minutes. “About twenty minutes ago.” I made mental calculations. We’d driven on backcountry roads in our scouting mission, but at least we were still closer to the palace than we would have been at the mansion. But they were flying, and who knew how much time that left between when they would arrive at the castle and when we would? There were too many variables…

“Do you know what they’re planning?” I asked Jeff.

“Violet did not choose to share her plans with me,” Jeff said, and I internally cursed the man for his damned politeness. If she hadn’t wanted to share, he wouldn’t have asked. “However, when they and Thomas left the security station, Thomas left something up on the computer… It appears to be the schematics for King Maxen’s palace. I doubt he left them up by accident.”

“Well, at least that confirms where they’re going. Can you transfer me those files as well?” I asked.

Jeff’s face went off-screen for a moment, presumably as he typed, and then he reappeared, shaking his head. “That file is too large for me to transfer without a physical connection. I’m sorry.”

I paused. I’d suspected as much. A part of me, the rational part, said that we should go back and collect those plans before we went anywhere. But it was only a small part. The rest of me needed to get to Violet as soon as possible, plan or no plan, and make sure she hadn’t dug herself in too deep this time. We didn’t have time for careful approaches. “That’s fine,” I told him. “Thank you, Jeff.”