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Chapter Twenty

I f Lottie was going to convince Zynara to rule Ain Zargiers in her brother’s place then she needed to focus on the woman’s love for her country.

Lottie didn’t doubt that Zynara was loyal and devoted to her homeland, but she worried that in amongst all the politicking, engineering and saving the world, she’d forgotten how to love it with her heart.

She needed to remember how to nurture her country. How to live for its people.

Lottie knew just how to remind her.

They’d spent the day at the summit. Zynara was cautiously optimistic.

Lottie had tried for a fist bump and received a royally raised eyebrow in return, but gas mogul Antonin Petrov had succumbed to Lottie’s charms and revealed—privately—that he was satisfied with the final details in the hydrogen deal negotiations and would sign tomorrow.

One-hundred and eighty billion over ten years.

It was an extraordinary triumph. Zynara’s teams were busy making arrangements for a flashy contract signing event at a ski resort in the snow at the top of the Atlas Mountains.

Zynara was pleased enough to want to take Lottie somewhere expensive to celebrate.

Lottie had other ideas.

She cleared things with Sami and the Qasira’s detail.

After the shootout in the alley, they trusted her with Zynara’s safety.

She gave Ace a list of gear she needed and a very short timeframe.

Sami gave her a shrewd look and Ace was definitely pissed, but she came good.

Everything was sorted. Lottie just needed to appropriate some wheels.

Entering Malik’s garage was easier than expected. She put on her shortest frock, strolled down to the party house and batted her eyelashes at a guard. A lipstick-sized signal jammer took out the cameras.

Malik was a total twat for imagining a biometric security lock keyed to his fingerprint would stop anyone in a house where he literally fingered all of the residents. Lottie copied his prints to a handheld device and cracked the garage lock in under twenty seconds.

Then it was simply a matter of choosing a car.

She lost a bit of time on that. A flame red Ferrari Enzo, a Lamborghini Revuelto in a gold that matched her curls, an actual McLaren Senna in an eye-watering lime green.

There was a very tempting vintage Dodge Charger, a very boring Rolls Royce, a Bentley and a Range Rover—all gold-plated, of course.

But it was the Bugatti Chiron Super Sport that took Lottie’s eye. Midnight blue with a gold trim and plenty of room for Lottie’s ego. She bounced over to it and breathed reverently on its majesty.

The keyless entry didn’t stop her either.

Lottie had a relay attack ready for that.

For good measure, she synced her burner phone to the car’s infotainment system and the party house’s security AI and routed the tracking software into a closed loop.

As far as the tech was concerned, the car never left the garage.

And fuck, the roar it made when she put her foot down—something between religion and a nuclear strike.

Lottie felt it with her body. She spared one rueful thought for the Qasira and her whisper-quiet electric vehicles, then shrugged it off with a laugh.

The noise hit her deep between her legs, and Zynara needed to live a little.

She hurled the car up the long drive back to the palace gates where her princess had been politely requested to wait for her. In almost every way, the amount of power under Lottie’s fingers was ridiculous .

She was having the time of her life.

“This is theft.”

“I borrowed it!”

“You stole it.”

“Malik stole it from the people. I simply reclaimed misallocated national resources. I’ll put it back.” Lottie thought about it. “Maybe. Besides, you look very good in it.”

She’d asked Zynara to wear something casual.

She’d been absolutely stunned when she’d pulled the car up in front of a vision in light blue jeans.

Zynara wore a white tee tied in a knot at her waist, Converse sneakers and her hair down, and Lottie had to take back every uncharitable thought she’d had back in London about rich bitches and personal stylists.

Zynara looked sensational no matter what she wore, but the everyday clothes made her look human.

Made her look like someone Lottie could slip her arm around and slide her hand into the back pocket of those jeans.

Someone she could be comfortable with. Forever.

“Where are you taking me, you criminal?”

Lottie played it cool. “Somewhere special.” She feathered the accelerator.

“Wait,” said Zynara.

She reached over the centre console and gripped Lottie’s chin. Lottie could feel her amusement through those long, elegant fingers. She tipped Lottie’s lips to her own and kissed her—deeply. Ardently.

“Reprobate,” she murmured when she was done, her eyes still on Lottie’s lips.

Lottie panted.

“When you’re ready,” Zynara said mildly, settling back in the luxurious seat.

Lottie burnt rubber as she hit the main road. The car handled like liquid fury and Zynara’s hand slid to the door grip, even as her laughter bubbled up.

“Is this your idea of romance?”

“Oh, princess. You ain’t seen noth—”

“Don’t say it. Don’t— Just— don’t talk. You are a nightmare.”

“Yeah, but I’m your nightmare. You bought this nightmare, princess. You love this nightmare—”

The L-word hung in the air between them for a second. They just kept on saying it. Zynara sighed. “I do,” she admitted.

Lottie grinned, dropped her foot to the floor, and they screamed down the coast.

They stopped at a small town called Axam n’uzarfi. Lottie’s Arabic tapped out at local place names so she was putting some effort into learning Tamazight. This town translated as falcon’s nest. It was perfect.

Chalky white buildings were stacked against a rocky slope, their doors painted in cobalt blue, the colour faded by salt and time.

They gathered around a small bay graced by a park that edged a wide boardwalk.

The sun was sinking low, casting golden light over fishing boats that bobbed on the tide, and music filtered from a handful of market stalls, a lazy, swaying rhythm that matched the waves that hissed on a pebbly beach.

Lottie left the car near a group of lads loitering near the water’s edge. “Mind it like it’s your own, yeah?”

On second thought, she tossed her burner phone to the nearest kid too.

He looked between the sleek muscle car, Lottie’s grin, the Qasira, and the keys to freedom in his hand and his eyes bugged out. His nod was so solemn Lottie almost laughed. She took Zynara’s hand and drew her away.

“You just gave the Qasirim’s car to a bunch of teenagers.” There was something close to respect in Zynara’s tone.

“I gave it to someone with more integrity than Malik. So, morally, we’re ahead.”

Zynara huffed a laugh despite herself and ran a hand through her hair as the sea breeze tangled it. Lottie watched the weight of the world—of crowns and countries, of deals and duty—fall away and drift across the water. The woman underneath was beautiful.

“Come on,” Lottie said, urging her toward the market stalls. “Let’s waste some time. You and me.”

She ignored the tiny frown that revealed just how foreign that concept was to Zynara and did the thing she’d been dying to do ever since she’d first admired Zynara’s backside in those jeans.

She leaned into her body and tucked her hand into her back pocket.

There was a beat, then she squeezed her arse.

Zynara’s snort of outrage blew away over the Mediterranean too. It turned into a sigh of resignation as relaxed as the breeze.

When she slung her arm over Lottie’s shoulders and kissed the side of her head, Lottie knew she had won.

They strolled down to the market.

They wandered the cobbled streets until the scent of fried fish, garlic and spice made them stop at a food stall.

Lottie ordered one of everything, proud to be able to do so in Arabic and laughing with the vendor.

She passed greasy paper plates of divine-smelling goodness back to Zynara and was very pleased when the Qasira added two beers to the order.

“Now you’re getting it,” she smiled.

Zynara poked out the very tip of her tongue.

The woman serving them looked at Zynara with sudden recognition. She popped her eyes at Lottie. Lottie nodded. “It’s her day off,” she joked, and laughed as Zynara swatted her.

The woman behind the stall pressed an extra paper cone filled with sweet chebakia slathered in orange syrup and honey into her hands and looked exceptionally pleased about it.

She refused to take money from either of them, and Lottie had to pull Zynara away when she tried to insist. As they walked away juggling an absolute feast between them, Lottie heard the vendor boasting to her neighbour that she’d just served the Qasira.

She cast a sly look sideways at Zynara. She’d heard it too, and bless, but she actually looked surprised.

“Your people love you. Do you think she’d have thrown in the free sweets for Malik?” Lottie asked.

Zynara’s snort answered that.

They sat on a low wall overlooking the beach, the bustle of the town behind them fading into the hush of the waves, and ate until they were bursting.

Zynara leaned back on her hands and watched the twilight colour the sea.

Lottie mirrored her, but she didn’t look at the water.

The weights that dragged on her spirit—the Circle, the mission, the Nightingale’s orders—fell away from her too as she admired the sunset caressing Zynara’s skin.

They were two women on the edge of the world, on the edge of potential and something wonderful.

The future Lottie could see in Zynara’s silhouette was beautiful beyond anything she’d ever dared dreamed for herself.

“I haven’t done anything like this for too long,” Zynara said eventually. Their shoulders pressed together. Lottie hooked one leg over Zynara’s knee. They sipped their beers.

Lottie waited.

“I used to think I had to run away from Ain Zargiers to get freedom like this. I studied in Cambridge when I could have studied here in Azzouan. I used to dodge my minders so I didn’t have to fly home on my father’s jet.

I spent three years in the States at MIT because it’s even further away from the palace, and if work takes me anywhere else in the world, I always go. I always leave.”

“But you love your country.”

“I was young, I guess. You resent everyone and everything when you’re young, no matter how good your situation is. I was rebellious.”

“Mmm. I can totally picture it. Leather jacket, ripped jeans, colour in your hair.” Lottie’s imagination got away from her. “Intimate body piercings. Serious tatts.”

Zynara swatted her thigh. “I had them removed.”

“What! You didn’t!” Lottie moaned. “You had tatts? You are killing me. Seriously?”

There was a cruel chuckle.

“I hate you,” Lottie whimpered.

“You really don’t.”

There was another companionable silence. Lottie almost hated to break it.

“Does that mean you don’t want to run now?” she asked.

There was no answer for a very long time.

Lottie could feel the hesitation in Zynara’s body, a tension under her thigh that she’d been hoping to erase completely with this adventure.

She’d been foolish to think a casual jaunt down the coast was enough to sweep away all the responsibility that rested on Zynara’s shoulders, but she wanted the woman to know she was here to help bear it if she could.

“I’m beginning to fear I made a mistake,” Zynara whispered. She hung her head and was suddenly timid. The proud, confident woman Lottie admired looked hesitant and afraid, and—even more alarming—seemed to be turning to Lottie for advice.

It was exactly the position her mission had been aiming for. Lottie should have been triumphant, but her heart sank like a stone.

“Malik is wrong for Ain Zargiers. He is the wrong ruler for my people. I always thought I wanted freedom. I still do. But I don’t know if I have the courage to serve my country.

I don’t know if I’m ready to surrender all the things I still want.

” She waved a hand that took in the two of them entwined on the water’s edge, the sunset and the market behind them. “I could never do this again.”

Lottie swallowed. “Rubbish. You heard that woman at the food stall. Wherever you go, your people love you. And if you are Q’sar, you can do whatever you want. If you want to eat chebakia on a balmy, gorgeous evening and watch the sunset by the beach, you can do it.”

Zynara looked Lottie full in the face. “I don’t know if I can do it alone.”

Lottie heard everything she wasn’t saying—and was a total coward.

“There’s my contract,” she said, forcing a fake coquettishness into her tone and hating every second of it. “You only need to say the word, and I’ll be here.”

It wasn’t what Zynara needed, and Lottie felt like shit the moment she saw the Qasira’s expression crumple. It was only a split-second lapse. Zynara pulled her haughty, domineering mask back over her features like it had never left.

“Oh, you’ll do as you’re told, zin dyali ,” she said, her voice low and dangerous, her fingers already dancing around Lottie’s throat. “You wouldn’t dare disobey.” And she pulled Lottie in for a kiss.

It was a hot kiss, of course—there wasn’t a universe where the Qasira’s touch didn’t wind Lottie up like a toy—but Zynara didn’t linger on her lips. She ducked her head and attacked that point on Lottie’s neck, just under her ear, that she seemed to love so much.

It was a way to hide her face.

Lottie’s conscience screamed at her, which was doubly astonishing because, until now, Lottie had never been aware of its existence. Tell her! it shouted in her head. Tell her you’ll always be here to stand beside her!

But how could she promise that when her orders were to fly in, convince the princess to rule, and then fly on to whichever job the Nightingale ordered her to do next? Lottie was a tool, in every fucked up sense of the word, and her heart was aching.

Zynara seemed to sense the moment was broken and they strolled back toward the town.

The car was gone, which was no surprise, but they took a bus back to the city—an open-topped, double-decker tourist thing. Lottie cleared some gawkers out of the back seat, and Zynara lay down, put her head in Lottie’s lap and watched the stars.

Lottie carded her fingers through her poor Qasira’s hair and wondered how the fuck she managed to mess up every job so profoundly.