Page 31 of Happily Ever After

Elimination of Possibilities

Raphael Mirabaud

When the impossible is eliminated,

Whatever remains is your answer.

Oh, but I did not like the answer.

Both of Raphael’s plans to rescue Flicka were stupid.

Ludicrous, inopportune, and the propositions of a lunatic.

Stupid.

But even while Raphael had been explaining that bizarre plan to launch an all-out, complete waron Monaco while they’d flown over the Atlantic Ocean that sparkled far below the plane, Raphael had been channeling his mentor from across the centuries, Carl von Clausewitz.

Clausewitz wasn’t a strategist like Sun Tzu, who would have told Raphael to treat his soldiers like he would his dear sons to inspire their loyalty. He already did better than that. He treated his soldiers like they werehis friends and trusted comrades in arms, which they were. He listened to their opinions and respected them.

And he didn’t lead them into suicide missions.

The plan to sneak through the tunnels that laced the headland ofLe Rocherwas also a lie.

The truth was that Raphael still had no strategy for rescuing Flicka, and that was his best strategy of all.

Clausewitz said,Many intelligence reportsin war are contradictory; even more are false, and most are uncertain.

Raphael had loaded the ether with intelligence reports for Pierre. Now he just needed to wait until Pierre acted on one or more of them, and then Raphael could narrow down who hisWelfenlegionspy was.

This was much more accurate than trying to indirectly interrogate a group of men in a room. Those plans had been doomed fromthe start.

Clausewitz had also said,Although our intellect always longs for clarity and certainty, our nature often finds uncertainty fascinating.

Raphael would embrace the uncertainty of war with both arms and his whole heart.

His plan was to gather what information he could from his sources on the ground and devise a plan to utilize any advantage he could find or muster.

Two days aftervon Hannover’s plane had landed at theNice-Côte d’AzurAirport, where the runways were strips rising just above the blue chop of the Mediterranean Sea, Raphael drove a sedan through the crowded, winding streets of the city. When he paused at a street corner with a cafe on the bottom floor of the modern office building on that sunny, winter afternoon, a man opened the car’s passenger door andducked inside.

He tossed a small satchel in the back seat as he settled himself.

Aiden Grier, the ginger Scot from Rogue Security, buckled his seatbelt and checked the mirror on the passenger side for other cars following them as Raphael pulled into traffic.

Raphael had sent Aiden to observe Monaco’s palace security right after he had helped Flicka escape to Paris. In the meantime, Aiden hadcut his hair military-short to blend in with the other Secret Service men and walked in. Raphael thought it odd that no one in Monaco’s Secret Service had noticed a new guy, but Aiden had amazing espionage skills of all varieties, especially infiltration. He had probably convinced every one of the Monegasque Secret Service agents that they remembered him from grammar school. They’d been best friends,surely. Later, when they would try to find the redhead in their school pictures, they would be shocked that he wasn’t there, so shocked that they would concoct a memory rather than think that Aiden—genial and affable Aiden!—could have betrayed them.

Knowing Aiden’s other espionage skills, his alias was probably on the Secret Service’s official duty roster. He might even be drawing a paycheck.

After a minute, Aiden leaned back in his seat and grunted, “All clear,” with his guttural Scottish burr.

Raphael had been watching his mirrors and agreed no one was following them. “Well?”

“They’re all wallopers and bawheeds, thinking they’re celebrating a successful operation,” Aiden said, his Scottish accent so thick that Raphael could barely understand him. Aiden laid his native accent onheavily when he could because he was so often speaking another language. He’d told Raphael once that feeling the Scottish inflections roll on his tongue reminded him of who he was. “The numpties managed not to shoot themselves in the feet while they walked one woman and a baby out of a warehouse. We could have done the same with a tenth of the men. I’ve not seen such a sad knapdarloch in years.”

“What are they doing now?” Raphael asked as they drove past museums and white-columned buildings.

“Fortifying their meager defenses with poor choices and cheap weapons,” Aiden scoffed. “They believe that Her Serene Highness wanted to come back to Monaco and is content. They’re expecting nothing from within or below. Those train and pedestrian tunnels under the palace from the casino and museumare impossible to secure properly, you know, and they’re doing nothing to better them.”

“That’s interesting.” Raphael’s second plan—a sneak attack through the underground passages—hadn’t reached palace ears. That reduced the chances that their traitor had been in the second group that had met in the hotel room, including Romain Belmont. Raphael smiled. “Any other changes to palace security?”