You are being pro­vid­ed with a book chap­ter by chap­ter. I will request you to read the book for me after each chap­ter. After read­ing the chap­ter, 1. short­en the chap­ter to no less than 300 words and no more than 400 words. 2. Do not change the name, address, or any impor­tant nouns in the chap­ter. 3. Do not trans­late the orig­i­nal lan­guage. 4. Keep the same style as the orig­i­nal chap­ter, keep it con­sis­tent through­out the chap­ter. Your reply must com­ply with all four require­ments, or it’s invalid.
I will pro­vide the chap­ter now.

25
RHYS
SOMEONE ONCE SAID HELL WAS OTHER PEOPLE.
They were right.
Specif­i­cal­ly, hell was watch­ing oth­er peo­ple swan around an ice
rink, drink­ing hot choco­late and mak­ing goo­gly eyes at each oth­er
like they were in the mid­dle of a god­damn Hall­mark movie.
It wasn’t even Christ­mas sea­son, for fuck’s sake. It was worse.
It was Valentine’s Day.
A mus­cle flexed in my jaw as Bridget’s laugh­ter float­ed over,
joined by Steffan’s deep­er laugh, and the urge to mur­der some­one—
some­one male with blond hair and a name that began with S—
inten­si­fied.
What was so fuck­ing hilar­i­ous, any­way?
I couldn’t imag­ine any­thing being that fun­ny, least of all some-
thing Stef­fan the Saint said.
Brid­get and Stef­fan shouldn’t even be on a date right now. It was
only four days after her birth­day ball. Who the hell went on a date
with some­one they met four days ago? There should be back­ground
checks. Red tape. Twen­ty-four-sev­en sur­veil­lance to make sure Stef-
fan wasn’t secret­ly a psy­cho killer or adul­ter­er.
Princess­es shouldn’t go on a date until there was at least a year’s
worth of data to comb through, in my opin­ion. Five years, to be on
the safe side.
Unfor­tu­nate­ly, my opin­ion meant jack shit to the roy­al fam­i­ly,
which was how I found myself at Athenberg’s biggest ice-skat­ing
rink, watch­ing Brid­get smile up at Stef­fan like he’d cured world
hunger.
He said some­thing that made her laugh again, and his grin
widened. He brushed a stray strand of hair out of her face, and my
hand twitched toward my gun. Maybe I would’ve pulled it, had re-
porters not packed the rink, snap­ping pic­tures of Brid­get and Stef-
fan, record­ing on their cam­eras, and live-tweet­ing the date like it
was an Olympic event.
“They make such a cute cou­ple,” the reporter next to me, a curvy
brunette in a bright pink suit that hurt my eyes, cooed. “Don’t you
think so?”
“No.”
She blinked, clear­ly sur­prised by my curt response. “Why not?
Do you have some­thing against his lord­ship?”
I could prac­ti­cal­ly see her sali­vat­ing at the prospect of a juicy
sto­ry.
“I’m staff,” I said. “I have no opin­ions about my employer’s per-
son­al life.”
“Every­one has opin­ions.” The reporter smiled, remind­ing me of a
shark cir­cling in the water. “I’m Jas.” She held out her hand. I didn’t
take it, but that didn’t deter her. “If you think of an opinion…or any-
thing else…” A sug­ges­tive note crept into her voice. “Give me a
call.”
She pulled a busi­ness card out of her purse and tucked it into my
hand. I almost let it fall to the floor, but I wasn’t that much of an ass-
hole, so I mere­ly pock­et­ed it with­out look­ing at it.
Jas’s cam­era­man said some­thing to her in Ger­man, and she
turned away to answer him.
Good. I couldn’t stand nosy peo­ple or small talk. Besides, I was
busy—busy try­ing not to kill Stef­fan.
I’d run a back­ground check on him before today’s date, and on
paper, he was fuck­ing per­fect. The son of the Duke of Hol­stein, one
of the most pow­er­ful men in Eldor­ra, he was an accom­plished
eques­tri­an who spoke six lan­guages flu­ent­ly and grad­u­at­ed top of
his class from Har­vard and Oxford, where he stud­ied polit­i­cal sci-
ence and eco­nom­ics. He had a well-estab­lished record of phi­lan-
thropy and his last rela­tion­ship with an Eldor­ran heiress end­ed on
ami­ca­ble terms after two years. Based on my inter­ac­tions with him
so far, he seemed friend­ly and gen­uine.
I hat­ed him.
Not because he grew up in a life of priv­i­lege, but because he
could freely touch Brid­get in pub­lic. He could take her ice skat­ing,
make her laugh, and brush her hair out of her eye, and no one would
blink an eye.
Mean­while, all I could do was stand there and watch, because
women like Brid­get weren’t meant for men like me.
“You’ll nev­er amount to any­thing, you lit­tle piece of shit,” Mama
slurred, her eyes mean and hate­ful as she glared at me. “Look atcha. Use­less
and scrawny. I should’ve got­ten rid of you when I had the chance.”
I stayed qui­et. The last time I talked back, she beat me so hard with her
belt I’d bled through my shirt and couldn’t sleep on my back for weeks. I’d
learned the best way to han­dle her bad moods was to hope she even­tu­al­ly
for­got I was there. That usu­al­ly hap­pened after she was halfway through
what­ev­er bot­tle she was drink­ing.
“If it wasn’t for you, I’d be out of this stinkin’ town by now.”
Resent­ment poured off her in waves. Mama stood by the table, wear­ing
her fad­ed pink robe and chain-smok­ing a cig­a­rette. Her cheeks were pale and
sunken, and even though she was only in her late twen­ties, she could pass
for her for­ties.
I tucked my hands beneath my arms and tried to shrink into myself
while she con­tin­ued to rant. It was Fri­day night. I hat­ed Fri­day nights be-
cause it meant I had an entire week­end of just Mama and me.
“Waste of space…nothing like your father…are you lis­ten­ing to me,
you piece of shit?”
I stared at the cracks in the floor until they blurred togeth­er. One day, I
would get out of here. Some­how, some way.
“I said, are you lis­ten­ing to me?” Mama grabbed my shoul­ders and
shook me so hard my teeth rat­tled. “Look at me when I’m talk­ing to you,
boy!” She back­hand­ed me so hard I stum­bled, the pain mak­ing my ears
ring.
My body twist­ed, and I saw it com­ing, but I didn’t have time to brace
myself before the cor­ner of the din­ing table smashed into my head and
every­thing went black.
I blinked, and the smell of old spaghet­ti sauce and vod­ka fad­ed,
replaced by that of fresh ice and Jas’s over­pow­er­ing per­fume.
Brid­get and Stef­fan skat­ed over, and the cam­eras went crazy.
Click. Click. Click.
“…for a while,” Stef­fan said. “But I would love to take you out
again when I return.”
“Are you going some­where?” I asked.
It was inap­pro­pri­ate for me to butt into their con­ver­sa­tion, but I
didn’t give a fuck.
Stef­fan cast a star­tled glance in my direc­tion. “Yes. My moth­er
fell and broke her hip yes­ter­day. She’s fine, but she’s recov­er­ing at
our house in Preo­ria. She’s quite lone­ly with my father here in ses-
sion for Par­lia­ment, so I’ll be stay­ing with her until she feels bet­ter.”
He answered with full gra­cious­ness, which only annoyed me
more. The hard­er he was to hate, the more I hat­ed him.
“How sad,” I said.
Stef­fan paused, clear­ly unsure how to read my tone.
“Hope­ful­ly, she recov­ers soon.” Brid­get shot me a look of mild
rebuke. “Now, about that hot choco­late…”
She guid­ed him toward the hot choco­late stand at the oth­er end
of the rink while I fumed.
Tak­ing a per­ma­nent posi­tion as Bridget’s body­guard meant I’d
have to deal with see­ing her date oth­er peo­ple. I knew that, and that
would be my cross to bear.
I just hadn’t expect­ed it to hap­pen so soon.
She’d dat­ed in New York, but that had been dif­fer­ent. She hadn’t
liked any of those guys, and she hadn’t planned on mar­ry­ing one of
them.
Acid gnawed at my gut.
Thank­ful­ly, the date end­ed soon after, and I whisked her into the
car before Stef­fan could pull any first date kiss bull­shit.
“Ini­tial recov­ery for a bro­ken hip takes one to four months,” I
said as we drove back to the palace. “Too bad for his lord­ship. What
shit­ty tim­ing.”
Even fate didn’t think it was a good pair­ing. If it did, it wouldn’t
have pulled Stef­fan away so soon after he met Brid­get.
I’d nev­er believed in fate, but I might have to send her a big, fat
thank you card lat­er. I might even toss in some choco­lates and
flow­ers.
Brid­get didn’t take the bait. “Actu­al­ly, it’s per­fect tim­ing,” she
said. “I’ll be away from Athen­berg for a few weeks as well.”
I eyed her in the rearview mir­ror. That was fuck­ing news to me.
“It’s not con­firmed yet, so don’t give me that look,” she said.
“I’ve pro­posed going on a good­will tour around the coun­try. Meet
with locals and small busi­ness­es, find out what’s on their minds and
what issues they’re fac­ing. I’ve got­ten a lot of crit­i­cism for not being
in touch with what’s hap­pen­ing in Eldor­ra, and, well, they’re right.”
“That’s a great idea.” I turned onto King’s Dri­ve.
“You think so?” A note of relief tem­pered the uncer­tain­ty in Brid-
get’s voice.
“I’m no expert on pol­i­tics, but it sounds right to me.”
Brid­get may not want to be queen, but that didn’t mean she
wouldn’t make a great one. Most peo­ple thought the most impor­tant
qual­i­ty in a leader was strength, but it was com­pas­sion. Strength
meant jack shit when you didn’t use it for the right rea­sons.
Luck­i­ly for her and for Eldor­ra, she had both in spades.
“The king still has to approve it,” she said after we parked and
walked to the palace entrance. “But I don’t antic­i­pate him say­ing
no.”
“You mean your grand­fa­ther.” Roy­als did things dif­fer­ent­ly, but
it weird­ed me out how for­mal they were with each oth­er some­times.
Brid­get flashed a quick smile as we entered the grand front hall.
“In most cas­es, yes. But in mat­ters like this, he’s my king.”
“Speak­ing of the king…”
We both stiff­ened at the new voice.
“…He wants to see you.” Andreas swag­gered into view, and irri-
tation curled through me. I didn’t know what it was about him that
bugged me so much, but Brid­get didn’t like him, and that was good
enough for me. “How was the date? Did you get a mar­riage pro­pos-
al yet?”
“You need to find a new hob­by if you’re that invest­ed in my love
life,” Brid­get said even­ly.
“Thank you, but I have plen­ty of hob­bies to keep me occu­pied.
For instance, I just came from a meet­ing with His Majesty and Lord
Erhall on the tax reform leg­is­la­tion.” Andreas smiled at Bridget’s
sur­prise, which she quick­ly cov­ered up. “As you may know, I’m in-
ter­est­ed in tak­ing up pol­i­tics, and the Speak­er was kind enough to
let me shad­ow him for a few weeks. See how it all works.”
“Like an intern,” Brid­get said.
Andreas’s smile sharp­ened. “One who’s learn­ing quite a lot.” He
slid his glance toward me. “Mr. Larsen, good to see you again.”
Wish I could say the same. “Your High­ness.” I loathed address­ing
him with the same title as Brid­get. He didn’t deserve it.
“His Majesty is wait­ing for you in his office,” Andreas told Brid-
get. “He wants to see you. Alone. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have
some press­ing mat­ters that require my atten­tion. Though none as ex-
cit­ing as a date at an ice-skat­ing rink, I’m sure.”
It took all my self-con­trol not to knock all his teeth out.
“Say the word, and I can make it look like an acci­dent,” I said af-
ter Andreas was out of earshot.
Brid­get shook her head. “Ignore him. He’s been a satan­ic lit­tle
turd since we were chil­dren, and he thrives on the atten­tion.”
A star­tled laugh rose in my throat. “Tell me the words ’satan­ic lit-
tle turd’ didn’t just leave your mouth, princess.”
She respond­ed with a sly smile. “I’ve called him worse in my
head.”
That’s my girl.
It was nice to see glimpses of the real Brid­get shine through, even
when she was weighed down with all the roy­al bull­shit.
While she met with the king, I returned to the guest­house,
though I sup­posed it was my actu­al house now that I was work­ing
here per­ma­nent­ly.
I’d just entered my room when my phone rang. “Yeah.”
“Hel­lo to you, too,” Chris­t­ian drawled. “Peo­ple have no phone
man­ners these days. It’s such a shame.”
“Get to the point, Harp­er.” I placed him on speak­er and yanked
my shirt over my head. I was about to toss it in the laun­dry bas­ket
when I paused. Looked around.
I couldn’t put my fin­ger on it, but some­thing was off.
“Always the charmer.” There was a short pause before Chris­t­ian
said, “Magda’s gone.”
I froze. “What do you mean, gone?”
I’d spent a month guard­ing Mag­da at Christian’s request until
anoth­er hand-select­ed guard fin­ished his con­tract with his pre­vi­ous
client and took over. It was why I couldn’t return to Eldor­ra ear­li­er.
“I mean, gone. Roc­co woke up this morn­ing, and she’d dis­ap-
peared. No tripped alarms, noth­ing.”
“You can’t find her?”
Chris­t­ian could find any­one and any­thing with even the small­est
dig­i­tal foot­print. His com­put­er skills were leg­endary.
His voice chilled. “I can and I will.”