Page 51 of The Unlikely Spare (Unlikely Dilemmas #3)

Chapter Thirty-One

Nicholas

Eoin is frozen in place, his face drained of all color like someone has opened a vein and let everything vital drain out. The satellite phone slips from his fingers, landing with a soft thud on the grass.

My first instinct is to comfort him. I step forward, my hand reaching toward him before I remind myself why I’m furious with him. Self-preservation battles with something more urgent, more primal, as I watch him fracture before my eyes.

“What’s the matter? What is it?”

He looks up at me, and his eyes are hollowed out like someone has scooped away everything but pain, leaving only raw, exposed nerve endings.

He reminds me of what I saw in the mirror when I discovered Daniel’s betrayal. When I discovered the earth wasn’t solid beneath my feet after all, just a thin crust covering endless freefall.

His shoulders slump forward and his hands hang limply at his sides, fingers curled halfway toward fists as if he’s forgotten how to form them properly. The man who is normally so contained is falling apart.

A cold knot of fear tightens in my chest.

There’s a voice still coming from the satellite phone, but I pay no attention because I’m focused on Eoin.

I crowd in close to him, trying to decipher what’s happening from the wreckage of his expression.

His eyes are wild with a panic I’ve never seen before, not even when bullets were flying at Hobbiton.

“It’s me,” he whispers. “The whole time, it’s been me.”

“What’s been you?”

“The traitor.”

His words don’t make any sense. Eoin’s claiming he’s a traitor? Whatever can he mean?

But his words and that ghastly expression mean that knot of fear in my chest won’t be departing anytime soon.

“Eoin.” The voice emanating from the phone somehow manages to sound both impatient and amused. “Don’t make this difficult. Don’t make me question my faith in the O’Connell family loyalty.”

I reach down to pick it up, but Eoin’s hand clamps onto my arm.

“No. Don’t talk to him. We need to get moving.” Eoin runs his hand through his hair, his eyes still wild. “Oh my god, I need to get you somewhere safe.”

The voice comes clearly from the phone on the ground.

“Eoin, I’ve currently informed Scotland Yard that you had my authority to take the Prince off-grid.

If you do anything stupid, I’ll be alerting every authority between London and Antarctica that a rogue protection officer has kidnapped Prince Nicholas.

You’ll have both law enforcement and our group hunting you. ”

Eoin closes his eyes, his chest rising and falling rapidly. It’s like he’s drowning on dry land.

And I can’t stop myself from touching him. Because Eoin needs me more than I need to cling to my anger right now.

I put my hand on his back, feeling the heat of him through that ridiculous Hawaiian shirt.

The rigid tension in his muscles is like steel cables about to snap.

His body trembles beneath my palm, and I press harder.

My fingers spread wider to claim more of him, trying to anchor him to something solid.

When he opens those storm-gray eyes, he locks eyes with me, and his face transforms from shock to a protective fierceness that makes my breath catch.

It’s like watching someone recalibrate their entire existence in the space of seconds.

He reaches down to grab the phone. He ends the call, then turns the phone off, his fingers shaking as he puts it in his pocket.

“We need to leave now. We’re going to have to get another car. They’ll know our exact coordinates from the satellite phone, so we need to get as far away from here as possible.”

Eoin appears to be almost talking to himself. His eyes dart across the crowded lakefront.

“Need to find somewhere without CCTV, need transport they won’t expect, need to?—”

I grab him, fingers digging into his forearms as I hold him in place, forcing him to look at me.

“Eoin, you need to tell me what’s going on.”

He meets my eyes. “I will explain, but not here. We need to get moving. They’ll be hunting us.”

“Who’s hunting us?”

“The terrorists. And the New Zealand police soon as well, along with your protection team and any other Scotland Yard operatives on the ground in New Zealand.”

I’m struggling to comprehend his words. Why are both the terrorists and the authorities hunting us now?

Something is decidedly amiss, that’s clear enough from what I heard from Eoin’s part of the conversation.

“I’ll tell you about it, but first, we need to get moving.” His eyes search my face with an intensity that feels like a touch. “Can you trust me?”

Trust me.

Trust me.

Trust me.

The words echo in my head.

Because that’s what Daniel had said to me right before I found out he’d accepted my mother’s bribe. “Trust me, Nicky,” he’d whispered against my lips in my Oxford rooms, his hands cradling my face with such convincing tenderness. “My feelings for you are real.”

Three days later, Mother herself, her voice clinically detached, detailed exactly how much my heart had been worth to him.

Fifty thousand pounds, the same amount one might spend on a moderately nice car.

I’d have hoped a prince’s heart would at least merit luxury vehicle pricing, but apparently, I rated somewhere between a BMW and a particularly ambitious Ford. Devastating to one’s ego, really.

Daniel. My mother. My sister Amelia.

All people I thought I’d known who had then betrayed my faith in them. My life really has been a masterclass in deceit.

Eoin is unnaturally still as I search his face now, every muscle locked in place as if movement might somehow influence my answer.

Do I trust him with my life?

Yes.

I believe Officer Eoin O’Connell will keep me safe with every breath in his body. I saw it in his eyes in Darwin, at Hobbiton. Whatever else he’s lied about, that fierce protectiveness is real.

Do I trust him with my heart?

Well, that’s another matter.

But right now, what matters is the keeping me alive part.

I can keep him close enough to protect me, but not close enough to destroy me.

“Yes, I trust you to keep me alive,” I say.

Eoin’s breath catches, the sound sharp in the space between us. Those eyes that have watched me with professional detachment, with exasperation, with hunger, are now looking at me with something I can only describe as hope mixed with hurt.

He heard what I didn’t say as clearly as what I did.

When he finally speaks, his voice carries the rough edge of sandpaper over raw wood. “Then we need to go. Now.”

I nod.

Eoin’s hand finds the small of my back, guiding me as we move through the crowd. The contact is professional, protective, but my body responds like he’s set off fireworks beneath my skin.

I step slightly forward, creating distance without making it obvious. Just enough space that his hand falls away. Something shutters in his expression.

“So, are you going to tell me what is actually going on?” I ask in a low voice once we’ve freed ourselves from the throng of tourists.

“Pierce is part of the terrorist group,” Eoin replies, his voice grim. “He recruited me from Belfast. He mentored me through the ranks at Scotland Yard. I thought I was hunting a traitor, but it was all a setup. He thought I would agree to hand you over to them.”

I blink.

“But why did he assume you would do that?”

“Because, allegedly, my brother is part of the group too.” His voice breaks slightly. “Apparently, he suggested me for the assignment.”

A cold weight settles somewhere between my ribs.

I think of Eoin’s voice when he spoke about Malachy, the guilt he carries for not being there when the building collapsed. The cornerstone of his life has just crumbled beneath him, and I know that particular devastation all too well.

“Bloody hell,” I breathe, running a hand through my hair. “Your brother… That’s—” I stop, words proving woefully insufficient.

I’m intimately acquainted with how he must be feeling.

But one look at the raw pain on his face, and I know instinctively he doesn’t need my sympathy now. He needs me to help hold him together.

So I do what I do best. Deflect unbearable emotion with practiced irreverence, offering him the dignity of normalcy when so much in his world is collapsing.

“You were a protection officer. Then, an undercover Scotland Yard agent. Now you’re a sleeper terrorist agent. I’m getting whiplash from all these identity changes. Next, you’ll tell me you’re also a part-time mime artist or competitive tea cozy knitter. Nothing would surprise me at this point.”

A strangled laugh escapes him, quickly smothered. But the look he gives me is part exasperation, part fondness.

And it desperately makes me want to go back to how things were between us a few hours ago.

But I can’t give him that. Not anymore.

“Don’t worry,” I continue. “My family history includes beheaded queens and exiled monarchs, along with my sister trying to kill my brother, so it’ll take more than an unwitting terrorist agent in my security team to faze me.

It’s remarkable how quickly one can recalibrate expectations when your baseline is ‘my sister tried to murder my brother for a shiny hat.’ Really puts things in perspective. ”

The familiar rhythm of deflection and dark humor settles between us like a shared language. Some of the rigid tension in Eoin’s shoulders eases slightly.

It’s what I do, apparently. Face impossible situations with inappropriate levity.

Even when everything else between us has shifted into uncertain territory.

Eoin’s breathing steadies, and I watch as he pulls himself back from whatever edge he’d been teetering on.

It’s like watching someone remember how to exist in their own skin again.

“Pierce has connections throughout RaSP,” he says finally. “As head of Royalty and Specialist Protection, he controls the entire security apparatus. I have no idea who else might be compromised.”

A young family passes us, the children licking ice cream cones. My mind gallops, piecing together implications as we walk toward the far end of the lakefront.

“We need to go straight to the top. Call my brother. Callum and Oliver can activate resources that bypass RaSP entirely.”

Eoin hesitates, his stride faltering. “It’s my word against Pierce’s. He’s already told RaSP I took you off-grid with authorization. Now he’ll be frantically painting me as a rogue agent who’s kidnapped you.”

“Then we need proof to figure out what their endgame is,” I say.

“I need to keep you safe,” Eoin says. “I’ll drop you somewhere secure and then?—”

“We figure this out together.”

His eyes narrow, that familiar stubborn set to his jaw. “Nicholas, these people are dangerous. Pierce has connections everywhere. I need to?—”

“No, Officer O’Connell.” The formal title lands between us like a stone dropped in still water. I see him flinch, but I plunge on. “You don’t get to do anything. We’re in this together. You’ve asked me to trust you with my life, but you need to trust me back.”

We reach the car park, which is thankfully deserted in this quieter section of the lakefront.

Eoin pauses to meet my eyes. “I do trust you,” he says.

I swallow hard.

“We should find another vehicle,” I say abruptly, scanning the car park.

I immediately spot a dusty station wagon parked at the far end of the car park, camping gear strapped to its roof and stuffed in the boot. Practical. Anonymous. Perfect.

“That one.” I nod toward it. “I believe my royal tour has officially devolved into Grand Theft Auto: New Zealand Edition . Mother will be so proud.”

Eoin follows my gaze, studying it with professional assessment. “It’ll do.”

“From royal motorcades to stolen station wagons. If this continues, by next week, I’ll be escaping on a rusty bicycle with a broken bell,” I say.

“We’ve got to keep you alive to next week first,” Eoin says.

And on that cheery note, we cross the car park to steal yet another car.