His Princess (A Royal Romance)(134)

“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 f*cks 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 * 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 f*cking 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?”





20





Rose





“What?”

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.