Chapter 49

CHARLES

Dinner tasted like ash on my tongue. Even the wine, which I usually loved, felt like it was burning acid each time I swallowed.

Despite all my best efforts, despite all the hints Isabella and I had dropped, Felix and Mila had managed to get engaged. And judging from the stupid heart-eyes she had whenever she looked at him, Mila was more than happy with this arrangement. The girl might even be in love with my stupid brother.

I had to switch tactics, and fast. No point in trying to break those two up anymore. I had to start thinking bigger.

I had always thought to myself that I was willing to do whatever it took to get the crown for myself. And now I needed to start actually doing whatever it took.

Isabella and I retreated to my chambers after dinner. No one seemed to care that we were leaving. They were too busy gushing over the happy, disgusting couple.

They were all a bunch of ingrates.

Isabella started crying the minute we left the dining hall. Her tears echoed through the hallways of the castle as we walked.

“You s-said that they w-wouldn’t get engaged and n-now they are,” she sobbed. “Y-you said this w-would w-work. F-Felix should be w-with me, not her.”

I rolled my eyes.

“I had no idea that Felix was such a good liar,” I said. “He’s not being honest with her, that’s obvious enough. There’s a reason Mila trusts him, but she has no idea that their entire relationship is built on a foundation of lies.”

“He s-said he l-loves her,” Isabella wept. “It’s n-not fair, I’m h-is soulmate…”

“Quit your blubbering,” I snapped at her. “We have more important things to deal with than their engagement. It’s too late now to try to place doubts in Mila’s head. So we have to switch gears. You want something to do? Get your prince back? Now we have a wedding to stop.”

Isabella dried her eyes and turned to me.

“How are we going to do that?” she asked. Her voice was still shaky, but thankfully she’d stopped wailing.

“We need to get Mila out of the picture entirely,” I told her.

“How are we going to do that? She’s not leaving him anytime soon, and it will be traced back to us if we tell her about the Dragon Knight stuff.”

“There are other ways to make sure they’re not together,” I said slowly, as if speaking to a child, “that don’t involve breaking them up.”

“Well, what the hell are you thinking? Tying her up and leaving her in the mountains to rot?”

As soon as Isabella said it, her eyes glittered with malice. That was my girl–she just needed to find her backbone again. She could be a cruel, cruel woman when she needed to be, and right now, I really needed her to be.

“Well, we now have a fantastic new ally,” I told her. “And lucky for us, we just got a whole debriefing on them at dinner.”

“Who?” Isabella stared at me in confusion.

“Do you ever pay attention?” I didn’t even care how rude my tone was. Isabella was getting on my last nerve. I needed her head in the game, stat. “There’s a whole gang out there who has it out for Mila and Felix–especially Mila. You don’t think that Mila dating someone who is now in jail for human trafficking is useful information?”

Isabella gaped at me. “You don’t think…”

“I think that I need to find the remaining gang members before my father or brother,” I said. “You can’t have a wedding if you don’t have a bride.”

Isabella threw her arms around my neck, the display of affection catching me off guard.

“You’re wicked, Charles,” she said. It sounded like a compliment coming from her lips. “And I love it.”

It was pathetically easy to track down the remaining gang members. I had no idea what was taking the royal investigators so long. My father insisted on doing things the honorable way, using due process to find the remaining criminals. But I had plenty of shady contacts on the streets who were more than happy to point me in the direction of the men itching to get even with the Crown Prince and his soon-to-be wife.

Getting the throne through manipulations was no longer an option. I had to seize it through force.

My first stop was making a call to an old university friend of mine who now was high up in the Fresonian police force. I asked him to grab a beer with me after work, and all it took was two bottles for the information to start flowing.

“Have you heard anything about this gang stuff?” I asked him casually. He side-eyed me.

“You know I can’t talk about ongoing cases with people outside the force,” he said. But his eyes were rimmed with red, and I knew that he was just tipsy enough to reveal information if I pressured him.

“Off the record, of course.” I assured him. “I’m just really fascinated by this particular case.”

He hesitated before taking another sip. “Off the record, we think they’ve all come to Fresia. It sounds like they’re after your brother’s girlfriend.”

“In Fresia?” I asked, trying not to sound too eager. “What makes you think that?”

“There’s been some grumbling on the streets,” he said. “Just stuff about new guys coming into town and claiming territory for themselves. This is all a theory, though. We really have no concrete proof as to where they are.”

A theory was all I needed.

One visit to a drug dealer who typically covered the wealthiest area of the city was all it took to get through to the gang members. They were all too happy to meet with someone who was offering them a job.

I arranged for a meeting with the ringleader of the gang (a menacing underground fellow who went by “Tiger”) the night after Felix and Mila returned to Fresia. Time was of the essence, and I needed someone who could give me results.

The night of our meeting, I dressed in all black and covered my nose and mouth with a thick black scarf that wrapped around my head. I was unrecognizable–and no one would ever suspect the prince’s little brother of committing such terrible acts.

Tiger and I met up in a private alleyway in the north part of town. I brought along my two most trusted guards, men who had sworn their loyalty to me, not my father, also dressed in disguises. Anyone walking past assumed the two were homeless men, trying to catch some sleep on a deserted sidewalk.

No one, including me, knew just how many weapons they carried between the two of them.

Tiger was already in the alley when I arrived.

“First you won’t tell me your name, and now you show up looking like Zorro?” he asked. “Who are you, man?”

“A concerned party who wants the same thing you do,” I said, purposely lowering my voice.

“And just what might that be?” Tiger folded his arms and glowered.

“The death of Mila Benson.”