Page 34 of Grand Romantic Delusions and the Madness of Mirth, Part Two

Coda chuckles smugly. As if they can read my mind. I glance at the phone screen still glowing that neon black. The tech isn’t a mind reader, but no matter how level I’ve kept my tone, I’m not guarding my expressions.

Coda huffs, amused. Presumably at me just catching on that they’re already tapped into my camera. “It’s pertinent if you’re going to need to ditch your guard.”

“Am I ditching my guard?”

There’s a long beat, more keyboard tapping, then a quietly murmured, “Fuck. Give me a moment …”

My stomach twists. But I grab my phone, and I’m already moving, away from the comforting darkness, back through the apartment, across the hall and into my own main living space.

Elias, Sully, and Bolan are deep into a quiet conversation near the couch, their phones in hand like they’re coordinating something. Presumably the plan to head out themselves. They all look up as I enter.

“Miller?” Elias asks, quietly frowning. “Again?”

I shake my head. Holding my phone in my palm before me, I don’t pause to fill them in. “Am I ditching my guard?” I repeat, speaking to Coda.

I don’t wait for a reaction from the others, crossing through to my bedroom.

Elias and Sully take off toward the other apartment, but Bolan follows me, keeping close enough that I can feel the heat of his body.

I push into my walk-in closet, not bothering with the lights to grab a pair of well-worn gray sneakers. Instead of stepping back to the built-in bench, I sit down on the floor right where I am, setting my phone beside me to pull on the shoes.

Bolan crouches beside me, eyes narrowed on the phone.

“Hello, rock star. I’m Coda,” the tech says, clearly able to see my wolf shifter through the camera on the phone. “Do you belong to the princess?”

“I do.”

“And the two mages in the other room?”

“Them as well,” Bolan growls.

Coda laughs quietly. “Well, this is going to be a fun friendship, Mirth. Normally, I don’t play well with strangers. But you already come with the best party favors.”

“The kids?” I prompt, catching sight of myself in the mirror as I grab the phone and stand. Except for the sneakers, I’ve dressed all in black without realizing it.

Stepping back into my bedroom to grab his boots, Bolan is swathed in black as well. “We’re going after the kids? Together?” he asks. He’s clearly confused but also clearly standing at my side, not in my way. “Without the guards?”

“They draw too much attention,” I say grimly. “Right, Coda?”

“Oh, yeah, we’re definitely about to break some … societal rules.”

Elias’s cool voice comes from the closet doorway. “How do you propose we get past them?”

The earl is now wearing a long black wool coat over his already dark suit— something from Armin’s closet that my brother never actually wore. At his side, Sully has swapped his suit jacket for a black peacoat.

Bolan pops up from tying his boots.

“This way.” I lead them all farther into my closet, raising my hand and placing it over a section of the wall at about shoulder height.

“Wait,” Coda says over the phone. “Lesson one. When working with me, I do all the tech. Hold your phone up.”

I oblige, having no idea how the tech awry even knew there was a palm reader hidden in the wall paneling.

“I thought this was the panic room,” Sully says, pulling a thin-ribbed black scarf out of his pocket and twining it around my neck. A touch of his essence keeps it pinned perfectly in place.

Energy shifts through the phone in my hand, still held up to the wall. Thankfully, my own power doesn’t rise to try to thwart it. A hidden door slides open before us, revealing a well-lit, steel-walled room. “It is. It’s also a second egress.”

“The royal guard are tied to all these security measures,” Elias says.

Coda pipes up from my phone. “Not right now they aren’t.”

Blinking against the brightly lit interior, I step through the door into the luxury panic room, ignoring everything as I cross toward the second concealed door.

“What’s the second lesson, tech?” Elias asks coolly.

“That’s between Mirth and me, Lord Hereford,” Coda says tersely. “You’re just along for the ride. I’ll happily ditch you if needed.”

Elias throws me a look. But I just hold my phone up to the second hidden palm reader and say, “The kids are in trouble.”

“What kind of trouble?” Sully asks. “More than the phone being broken and the apartment empty?”

“Coda?” I prompt.

There’s a long pause. The second concealed doorway slides open, beyond which a well-lit stairwell, also of steel construction, stretches downward.

“The kind of trouble that comes with cages,” Coda says.

Bolan slips around me, taking the stairs first. Heart pounding at Coda’s characterization of what the kids might be experiencing, I follow. Sully is at my back, Elias just behind.

“But don’t worry.” Coda’s fingers clatter over their keyboards. “It might be a new playground, but I’m pretty certain I know these assholes. Turn right in the alley. I’ve already got a car waiting for you.”

“We should inform the royal guard,” Elias says behind me.

“I’ll keep them in the loop,” Coda says. “But just a few minutes behind. Mirth and I have an agreement.”

“The favor?” I ask. “We didn’t specify.”

Elias huffs behind me, totally peeved and not at all cool about it. But still with us.

Bolan unlocks the door at the base of the stairs — it’s physically bolted in five separate places — and we step out into the alley.

The light over the door winks out, as do the rest of the lights punctuating the alley’s darkness.

Elias’s contribution to our sneaking away from my sure-to-be-pissed guards, even while protesting.

“Ah, you are handy, Earl,” Coda says. “And I think you’ll like our friendship, Princess.”

“That’s the favor, then? Open-ended friendship?”

“No. The friendship is a bonus.”

“You’ll help me rescue the kids.”

“I will. And you’ll get me access. The block on your kids’ phone should have made it obvious to your techs. I need someone to get me into their system, and this is a perfect opportunity.”

“Who?” Sully asks. “Into whose system?”

“The Mobius Group. If I’m right, that’s who has your kids. It’s too fucking clean a snatch. The lack of fingerprints all over it is a dead giveaway.”

A chill runs through me. “Awry hunters,” I whisper, only in partial disbelief. The other part of me already understands the truth of it all.

“Operating unchecked in the United European Nation in the twenty-first century?” Elias scoffs. “Ridiculous.”

“These rotten roots run deep and dark,” Coda says ominously. “Just because this is the first mistake they’ve made in this century doesn’t mean they’re not embedded deep into the fabric of every society.”

The first mistake. “They don’t know,” I murmur.

“Don’t know what?” Sully asks.

“That the kids are under my protection.”

Bolan looks back at me over his shoulder, eyes blazing bright. “Our protection.”

Coda cackles through the speaker of my phone. “Well, this is going to be fun.”

“Children are involved,” Elias snaps.

“Oh, Earl,” Coda croons nastily. “Children are always involved. Ask your beloved princess. How many times has someone or some group tried to snatch her?”

A car idles at the mouth of the alley. Bolan opens the back passenger door. Sully climbs in first, then reaches a hand back for me.

No one responds to Coda. Because the tech awry is correct, after all.