Chap­ter 12: Rhys began with a gut feel­ing that some­thing was wrong long before he stepped into the palace’s grand recep­tion hall. The low, urgent tones of Prince Nikolai’s voice sent a jolt of unease straight down Rhys’s spine, sharp­en­ing every one of his instincts into high alert. Though he could­n’t make out the exact words, the ten­sion rip­pling from the small gath­ered group—Nikolai, Elin, and Viggo—was thick enough to cut through. Rhys, who knew the rou­tines and faces of the palace by heart, imme­di­ate­ly sensed some­thing was off. A prac­ticed nod was exchanged with the prince, but Rhys’s mind stayed razor-focused on Brid­get, whose absence was more deaf­en­ing than any words spo­ken.

Learn­ing Brid­get had dis­ap­peared an hour ago sent Rhys’s heart ham­mer­ing against his ribs, anger and fear mix­ing in a volatile brew. The rev­e­la­tion that Vig­go and his team were bum­bling around the palace rather than expand­ing their search out­side was infu­ri­at­ing. Rhys didn’t hes­i­tate, storm­ing into the rain-slicked night with­out wait­ing for per­mis­sion, deter­mined to find her him­self. Each minute wast­ed could cost her every­thing, and Rhys could not, would not, let that hap­pen. Search­ing the vast, water-logged grounds, he pushed him­self past exhaus­tion, the storm pun­ish­ing him at every step. Thoughts of Brid­get lying injured and alone fueled every fran­tic stride he took through the heavy rain.

When he final­ly found her, uncon­scious and bruised, relief near­ly brought him to his knees. The sight of her pale skin streaked with rain and blood flipped a switch inside Rhys, awak­en­ing a pri­mal rage. He was used to keep­ing calm under pres­sure, a skill sharp­ened dur­ing years as a Navy SEAL, but this—this was dif­fer­ent. This was Brid­get. Scoop­ing her into his arms with a gen­tle­ness that belied his fierce exte­ri­or, he made his way back toward safe­ty, shield­ing her frag­ile body from the relent­less storm. Every painful step back to the palace was a vow that he would nev­er allow her to be this vul­ner­a­ble again if he could help it.

Inside the palace, Rhys hand­ed Brid­get over to the palace doc­tor but stayed close enough to inter­vene if nec­es­sary. His clothes clung to him, soaked through from the storm, but he hard­ly noticed. His focus remained firm­ly on the woman who, despite every effort to stay pro­fes­sion­al, had come to mean more to him than any­thing else. When Niko­lai and the oth­ers rushed in with fran­tic ener­gy, Rhys bare­ly con­cealed his con­tempt, espe­cial­ly for Vig­go. A con­fronta­tion was inevitable, and though palace deco­rum demand­ed restraint, Rhys’s fists itched to teach the deputy secu­ri­ty chief a painful les­son in com­pe­tence.

It took every ounce of Rhys’s con­trol to lim­it the vio­lence to a warn­ing, though every mus­cle in his body burned for action. Threats were exchanged in low voic­es, promis­es of con­se­quences if Bridget’s safe­ty was ever again com­pro­mised. Once the oth­ers left, Rhys remained by Bridget’s side, unable to let go of the fear that had gripped him. Her assur­ances that she was fine did lit­tle to soothe the roar­ing wor­ry that con­tin­ued to course through him. Brid­get tried to min­i­mize the inci­dent, but Rhys saw the flick­er of deep­er pain behind her words, the hurt she didn’t dare reveal even to him.

Bridget’s con­fes­sion about the argu­ment with Niko­lai only scratched the sur­face of what Rhys sus­pect­ed was a deep­er fam­i­ly wound. Despite her deflec­tions, he knew her well enough to see the tight­ness in her jaw, the way her hands trem­bled slight­ly even after the worst of the dan­ger had passed. The com­bi­na­tion of anger, guilt, and some­thing tender—something he could­n’t afford to name—simmered in Rhys’s chest. With­out think­ing, he sat at her bed­side, keep­ing silent com­pa­ny with her in the dim light. The storm might have passed out­side, but a dif­fer­ent kind of storm still raged with­in both of them.

Through­out that night, Rhys stood watch over Brid­get like a sen­tinel, unmov­ing, unwa­ver­ing. His phone remained in his pock­et, ignored, as the hours stretched on. There would be hell to pay with the palace staff for his con­duct today, but none of it mat­tered. All that mat­tered was the steady rise and fall of Bridget’s chest as she slept, safe at last. The real­iza­tion that she had become the cen­ter of his world hit him like a freight train—and for the first time in years, Rhys Larsen wasn’t sure if he was ready for the kind of bat­tle­field this would turn out to be.