Page 4 of Hiding out with a Royal Billionaire

Skye wrung her hands together and started pacing.

“Hey now, come on. It’s Lucan. We know him. Our parents were friends. And besides, he’s part of the Prince’s Society.”

“Now’s not a good time to mention that’s a completely sexist group, is it?”

“Not a good time, but I’m happy to address it later.”

“Fine. Okay, but so what if it’s Lucan. Something is off here, and you’re not telling me everything. One of our oldest friends is circling above us in a helicopter. Do we know who we can trust? Your men? Lucan’s men? Those guys in the boats?”

“I’m gonna go with a definite no on the guys in the boats. But my men? Lucan’s men? I’m pretty sure we can trust them. No one is one hundred percent trust worthy, except maybe you.” The truth of it sunk in. Skye was one of the few people he trusted implicitly.

Skye had seemed pleased that he trusted her. Good. He got an absurdly large amount of pleasure knowing he had made her smile.

Then shots broke out. And Brooks ran to the window. “They’re firing on each other.” He lifted his comm. “Paul. Send warning shots from our cannon.”

“You want to engage?” Paul’s doubt carried over in his voice.

“He’s firing on Lucan.”

The silence felt heavy and then Paul said, “okay boss.”

A boom of what sounded ike cannon shook their boat. Something heavy landed in the water right in front of the first pirate boat. Then it exploded under water and caused the boat to roll backwards, not tip over, but the message was clear. Back off. The air seemed thick in a long silence. Then the men on board waved they hands and shook their heads. Then a white flag rose up their pole.

“Good enough.” But Brooks had had enough. He spoke into his comm unit. “We’re finished here.”

Their boat took off again and Brooks once more felt a small sense of victory. He exhaled slowly then turned to talk to Skye.

She stood across the brigg with her arms folded across her chest, frowning at him.

“Hey now, the bad guys are that way.” He pointed back behind them.

“What was all that? Brooks. You don’t even seem ruffled. Like you deal with stuff like this all the time.” Her brow rose in one adorable lift. And Brooks fought a smile.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about. All of us go through military training for a year. You know that. But do I regularly fire on pirates and try to avoid one of my best friends in a helicopter? No, this is not my typical day.”

“Hmm. I’m unconvinced. I feel like I’ve just seen hints of a part of your life I know nothing about.”

“Well, I would hope so. Is there a part of your life I don’t know anything about?”

Her telling blush made him hesitate. Did he want her to have a part of her life he didn’t know about. “Wait. Do you have a part of your life you don’t tell me?”

“Ha ha! See, it’s no fun being on the outs, is it?”

As much as he wanted to pursue what she wasn’t telling him, it wasn’t worth it if she were to keep pursuing his secrets.

“Come on. Let’s find a place to hide out and enjoy our plunder.”

She laughed like he knew she would, and he led her to the drawer with the maps. He unfolded a large one out on the table and pointed. “See these here. This area has a whole line of smaller islands, some aren’t even mapped. Let’s go find one with some topography, maybe a mountain or hill, some inlets.”

“A cave?”

“Yes! A pirate booty cave.” He made the goofiest face he could think of.

“Whatever. Okay, but you know we’re gonna have to go to some port somewhere, sometime, right? We can’t go live on a deserted island, and we can’t leave the gold there.”

He studied her. “You know, whenever they asked me in high school who I’d want to be stuck with on a deserted island, most people said stuff like Macgyver or someone famous, but I always thought you.”

Her eyes widened. “You did?”

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