Page 86 of A Girl and HER Prince
And Venice had thought of a way out of here with no time to spare. As far as he was concerned, the vision of how to radio out of here was a godsend. He just had to convince Livvy of it. She would think he hadn’t healed enough to go diving after it, which was why he shouldn’t tell her until they reached the fishbowl, and she’d have no time to argue.
He’d put her in danger long enough, and now he was paying for his selfishness. Venice snatched at a long length of rope. That was the one supply in these sheds that they had plenty of—he could use it to climb down the rock wall to the lagoon.
Livvy rushed to him, pulling out a gun from a knapsack.
His heart lurched with sudden hope.Well done, GI Jane!He touched the slick black metal. Venice had been taught to use these since he was a small child, but could he actually use it on someone if it came down to it? What would happen if he had to face someone he knew and loved?
He swallowed, stuffing the rope into Livvy’s bag. He’d try to avoid a confrontation with the killer if he could.
“We need to go back to where we came from,” he told her.
She nodded. “We can hide out in the ruins!” She threw the useless remains of his uncle’s ledger against the worktable and patted Steve’s back. “You stay here, okay?” Her eyes shifted to Venice. “They’re already calling for him at the house. I knew they were domesticated animals.”
And yet, they’d left them behind in the hurricane? His uncle cared for nothing but himself.
They began filling the knapsack with whatever supplies they could think to bring: the jerky and protein bars, duct tape, binoculars, a knife, the blanket.
That was all the bag would hold. Putting her finger over her lips so that Steve wouldn’t make a big deal over her departure, she edged out the door with Venice. As soon as the door shut, the loud braying and honks from the donkeys made him wince through his growing headache.
If Steve didn’t finagle anotherGreat Escapeout of the boatyard, his uncle’s staff would hear the donkeys in no time. With any luck, they’d discover the stolen galley ship and think Venice and Livvy had either sunk to the bottom of the sea or had succeeded in making their way to Crete.
His not-so-secret hope was that losing the boat would also outrage his uncle—not exactly a fitting revenge, but anything to tweak that psychopath felt satisfying.
Venice glanced up at the lights of the house as soon as they found cover in the trees. His uncle’s villa was only a twenty-minute trek up that mountain. Had he discovered his ledger was missing yet? Did he suspect that his nephew—that he’d once again failed to kill—had gotten to it like a rat ready to bite him with its disease?
He’d better! Even if Venice had ultimately failed to keep that incriminating information intact, he wanted the guy to sweat over it anyway.
Livvy leaned into him as they hurried up the hill to higher ground. The ruins were to the side of them in lush meadows sparkling with dew. Everywhere they turned, they were surrounded by the wonders of this island, an unhallowed reminder that all the great earthly kingdoms of this world faded into decay.
His uncle’s reign had been destined for such a fall, though he still grasped onto it with his murderous claws.
A fog wrapped around the stone pillars and touched the grounds like a ghostly visitor, though the seas against the bluffs below them were clear and silver. Livvy made a sound of discovery at exactly the same instant he spied the search and rescue ships along the coastline.
Her fingers found his arm. “I have flares,” she said breathlessly.
He hesitated. He’d stopped her from flagging down their friends before because any of them could’ve been the one who’d sent the assassin, but this was the Greek coast guard. Couldn’t they trust them?
“Let me see those binoculars,” he said.
Livvy dug through her knapsack past the blanket and other supplies before she handed him the heavy field glasses. The world across the island was brought into focus. There were five boats on the water—one of them, he noticed, was driven by Turner who methodically traveled around the coastline. His lips were stretched into a grim line.
Another boat was banked on the shore. Achilles was out on the beach with Deedee. They were shouting for them under the cliffs overlooked by the watchtower that Livvy had said were once used to send messages of invasion across the island with the use of smoke and mirrors. Bris was nowhere in sight. Had she stayed home or…?
If anything had happened to her, Venice doubted the coast guard would’ve felt safe enough to allow his friends to join in the search to find his and Livvy’s bodies.
Deedee’s red hair flowed around her shoulders. She looked scared. For once, Achilles’s relaxed face was set in stone. Nobody out there looked like they wanted Venice dead.
Venice let out a breath, lowering the binoculars. Their despair and worry tore him in two. And now his friends were in danger as they wandered beneath the Paradise in the Clouds where his uncle might catch sight of them. Had Venice just let his distrust and fear get the better of him? He could’ve saved Livvy a lot of unnecessary grief if he’d just accepted their help in the first place.
He was a fool.
“Let’s do this.” Venice dug through the knapsack for the flares next. His haste to stop anyone else from getting hurt made his fingers shake. “We should use the flares,” he said. None of his friends were coldblooded killers like his uncle, and now the real threat was coming for all of them if he didn’t stop this now.
His hand grasped the cold metal and he brought out the flare gun.
Livvy’s hand went to his arm. “Who’s Clysta?” she asked.
She’d asked it seconds before he shot the flare into the air. The rocket shimmered through the gray, overcast sky as he twisted around on his heel to Livvy, his heart diving as quickly as the rocket presently was.
