Page 86 of Mercenary Princess

Sophia laughed, but she knew it still held that hollow note she’d had for days. She loved a man who knew her secrets and who might have killed for her. How could he ask her to give up her family and her purpose? Especially after seeing her history?

“He’s still in London,” Riot said softly as she made it to the top with Sophia. Her friend’s sympathy only made her hurt more somehow.

They lay there, the cables holding their weight, while waiting for Irina.

Sophia thought it was worse that Viktor had stayed in London, as if he were waiting for her to go over there and tell him she would give up everything that was important to her so that she could hop back into his bed. If that was what he thought, he was sorely mistaken.

She couldn’t do that.

“Give him time. All the information he got from Jean Luc’s vault had to have set him off. All the notes, all that planning to get to you. And those women…” Just thinking of the women in the macabre videos made her want to vomit.

“We have your back no matter what. He was an asshole. If you never want to see him again, he’s dead to us,” Riot said vehemently. “But I say give him some time. The man obviously cares about you. Deeply. He wouldn’t have gotten into that vault otherwise. And he wouldn’t have done what we’re all not talking about.” They weren’t talking about the fact that Jean Luc had ended up dead. It had been all over the news, and he’d been missing before that—a fact that no one had told her about at first.

“Forde knows what happened to Jean Luc?”

Irina’s eyes suspiciously moved to the handholds she’d already grabbed onto while making her ascent.

Sophia narrowed her eyes. “What haven’t you told me?”

Riot sighed. “Forde had Jen discreetly tag one of Viktor’s men. Ivan, I believe. You said you wanted to stay out of the loop, so don’t look at me like that. James tracked the man and got into his phone. Forde has video of them taking Jean Luc to an abandoned building in France. Viktor arrived moments later.”

Sophia’s head swam. She’d actually worried about Viktor, about the implications, but it was her people who had that damning piece of information. “That’s why Forde wasn’t worried about Viktor knowing.” Viktor had either killed Jean Luc or had him murdered, and she was bloodthirsty enough to be grateful the man was dead.

“Viktor had to have watched all those videos. He’d have seen what Jean Luc did to those women,” Riot pointed out.

“And the news is all over the location of several serial murders. It’s the same place. We can only hope the bastard’s DNA is found in there. I’d hate to think the piece of shit died with his reputation intact. But you’re safe. There are no other women being tortured,” Irina stated as she climbed a few holds from the top of the wall. The heiress was breathing heavily, which normally would have made Sophia and Riot laugh and taunt her, but Sophia could barely muster any emotion other than pain and sickness, not with the seriousness of the conversation. “Bottom line, Sophia,” Irina continued. “He watched all those videos, read all the logs, he knew you were in danger, and he took care of it. That he rabidly demanded you quit means he’s still freaked out that you were targeted. It’s a proven fact that worrying makes men assholes.”

Sophia bit her bottom lip. “I know. But you didn’t see him. He won’t relent, and I won’t be controlled ever again. And I won’t give this up. If he tries to force the issue…” She didn’t want to think about what he could do to get her to stop. She sucked in some air, thinking of Forde’s own incriminating information. Her stomach rebelled at how badly things had turned out. If only it could have ended happily, but the look on Viktor’s face had made it clear he was not the man she could attempt a happily ever after with. “I can’t believe everything that happened.” Fate had obviously been working against them. “Jean Luc only had that information because of a freaking fluke. No one else would have ever put together the people we targeted from the ledger with a few videos of us as kids wanting to kill a prince. Even us admitting to breaking into the dean’s office on that one video still just amounted to kids talking.”

She took a deep breath before continuing her frustrated rambling. “Those video confessions wouldn’t necessarily lead anyone to believe three teenage girls had grown up to be vigilantes. A princess and two wealthy heiresses? No. Only someone as obsessive and sick as Jean Luc would have studied all that information and found those links.” Was she trying to convince herself what she was doing was safe, as if maybe that would sway the man she loved? She closed her eyes. His words and the way he’d demanded control over her had killed something inside her. Her friends thought it could eventually work. Maybe they wanted some hope for happily ever afters, even though it seemed so impossible to have with all their secrets. She wasn’t sure.

“I still can’t believe the bastard wove together such tiny details to set us up. That was beyond calculating,” Riot said, shaking her head.

It had been one thing that Jean Luc had figured out what they were doing, even though he hadn’t been sure how and who’d worked with them. But he’d known he would be on the list and had lain in wait to set them up at every turn. That was scary. He’d been too smart.

Jean Luc had been waiting and watching for months. He’d detected the moment their people started following him. The club in Paris had been a setup… her planting the bug probably hadn’t been foreseen. But the rest had fallen right into his expectations. He’d known they would send men to La Couronne after the ledger page he’d purposely given the Belgian. It had all been a ruse to get more information on her group. He’d guessed they would look into Fahd’s friends as well.

Jean Luc had set up video cameras everywhere he’d assumed her people would go, gaining images of Cade, Kate, and the others. With that, he’d dug into their operatives’ histories. It had all been logged. Obsessive had been too tame a word for the thoroughness involved. Individually, the pieces of information had been circumstantial, but he’d been trying for more damning proof of what she was doing in order to force her to what? Marry him? So he could control her? The thought alone made her shudder with revulsion.

Irina finally made it to the top with a little whoop that made Sophia smile.

“Wow, I feel a thousand years older. Glad you could make it,” Riot ribbed.

Sophia was finally free to be with her real family. This should be a good moment, but she was letting her heartache kill it. Irina, Riot, and Forde had closed ranks around her after she’d abdicated, and Sophia had needed that. “I don’t want to talk about Viktor anymore,” she stated with force. For days, they’d talked, and it wasn’t getting easier.

“Booze or carbs? Pick your poison, ladies.” Riot’s options forced her to grin.

“Booze,” Sophia voted.

“You need to get out of this house. You think you’re up for that tonight?” Irina asked her seriously.

“Yes,” Sophia agreed, more for them than herself. She needed to be seen again before the photogs grew restless and attempted to scale the walls. She could smile for the cameras. It wasn’t as if she hadn’t donned a mask for years.

Going out with her true friends was something she should have been excited about. It meant she was truly free. Yet the pleasure of the thought never came.

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