Defending the Duchess (3 page)

* * *

When Linus looked back at Julia, her attention was focused on Jason Selini, the head of the royal guard, who’d come in from off duty in response to the attack, and now knelt at the duchess’s side, bandaging the scrape on her leg.

Linus watched her in puzzlement for a moment, wondering. He hated that she’d been attacked while under his guard. Worse still, he couldn’t help wondering
why she’d purposely escaped from the palace without him—and if her reasons might be related to her attack.

“Do you need anything?” he asked when she looked up. “A drink? Something to eat?”

“I am a little thirsty.”

Linus listed drink options, and Sam, another of the guards, went to fetch them both some juice. With just the three of them in the room, Linus hoped Julia wouldn’t feel
too overwhelmed. If it had been up to him, they’d be inside the palace and she’d have her sister at her side to comfort her, but Julia had been adamant about not alarming the new queen.

He crouched alongside Jason so that he could look up at the duchess. He didn’t need her feeling lectured or looked down upon. “We need to find out everything we can about the man who attacked you this evening.”
Linus tried to make his low voice less imposing. “What can you tell us about him?”

“I couldn’t see him. It was dark.”

“You didn’t recognize anything about him?”

“Should I have? You fought him. What did you notice?”

Linus swallowed. “He’s about six-two, one-eighty. Trained fighter.”

Julia shuddered. “Why would a trained fighter attack me?”

Linus watched Julia’s face
carefully. He’d always been adept at reading people—far more adept than at reading words in books. Now he watched her eyes dart between their faces before she glanced down. She felt ashamed and was weighing her next words.

The door burst open, and more guards poured in.

Julia’s eyes widened at the activity.

Linus sensed there was more Julia wanted to say, but she clearly wasn’t
going to open up in front of so many people. He leaned toward Jason and murmured quietly, “She knows something.”

“About her attacker?” Jason whispered back.

The duchess watched the men pour into the room discussing what they’d found on the beach—footprints and sure signs of their scuffle. She looked overwhelmed.

And Linus knew the commotion wouldn’t die down anytime soon. The members
of the royal guard had always taken their charge to protect the crown very seriously. If possible, they were even more zealous about their duties since the attacks that had threatened the royal family two months before. The attack on Julia was bigger than any threat to the royal family since the crown had been restored with the coronation of King Thaddeus and Queen Monica.

As control central
for such events, the royal guard headquarters would be far too distracting a place to hold such a sensitive conversation.

Linus looked back to Jason. “Where can I talk to her?”

Jason looked thoughtful, and Linus could guess what he was thinking. The interrogation room was meant to intimidate, not set a frightened female at ease. In fact, the whole royal guard headquarters was set up
for tough men to do hard work. There wasn’t a room in the building where the duchess might feel at ease enough to open up about her attacker and the fear that haunted her eyes.

“Take her back to the palace.” Jason cleared his throat and addressed the duchess. “I understand you don’t want your sister to know about the attack,” he conceded. “We don’t have to tell her yet this evening. Linus
can escort you back to the palace and avoid your sister, but he’s going to need to ask you some questions about the attacks. And we’ll have to brief the king and queen tomorrow. Will that be okay?”

Julia wrapped her arms around her shoulders as she nodded, blinking back tears. Yes, the events of the evening were catching up to her. Linus feared he might not learn much tonight.

Frustrating.
Still, he’d do his best.

“Want to try walking on it?” he asked as Julia placed her feet on the floor and braced herself to stand.

She nodded and eased herself slowly to standing. He felt a moment’s triumph at the small victory, but when she tried to shuffle forward a step, she winced.

He swooped in beside her and she took his arm, leaning on him slightly for support.

“I can
do it,” she whispered.

“You don’t have to. We can find a wheelchair—”

“I can do it.” Julia grimaced and leaned heavily on his arm as she made her way forward, growing more certain with each step.

Much as Linus appreciated the woman’s determination, he wished she’d relent to letting him carry her. It would be so much faster that way, and she wouldn’t have to risk straining her injury.

They made it more than halfway across the lawn toward a back entrance to the palace when the duchess stopped to catch her breath.

Linus had been waiting for an opening. He needed to ask her questions. Given the way she insisted on tiring herself out, he feared that once they reached the palace, she’d be too exhausted to talk about the attacks and close the door in his face. Then he’d
never learn what doubts had clouded her eyes.

He cleared his throat. “You probably want to forget all about what happened this evening, but before you do that, I need to know everything you were able to observe about your attacker, any clues you might have that would help us identify him.”

“I couldn’t see him in the darkness. He was wearing a mask.”

“I know,” Linus acknowledged,
thinking quickly. He’d already been briefed about the queen’s little sister before he was assigned to guard her, so he knew a few things about her background, and could guess how that might get in her way. “You’re a lawyer, right?”

“A trial lawyer.”

Having testified in court before about work-related cases, Linus knew about her line of work. “In court, you have to know things with certainty
and be convinced of guilt or innocence beyond a shadow of a doubt.”

“Yes.” She spoke the word slowly as she looked up at him through the misty moonlight. Obviously she had to wonder where he was going with his line of reasoning.

“Right now I need the opposite from you. I know you can’t say with any certainty who attacked you, but I want to know your hunches, your gut instincts, your
fears. Anything you might have picked up on that would give us a clue about this guy.” Linus watched her carefully as he spoke. Even in the moonlight, he could see enough of her face to tell that his own hunch had been correct.

She knew something.

He just had to convince her that it was okay to tell him what it was.

“It’s not anything.” Julia shook her head dismissively.

Still,
Linus felt hopeful. The woman had enough of a grasp on what she knew to discredit it. That meant she could likely put it into words if he could persuade her that it would be acceptable to do so—even if that went directly against her usual practice as a trial lawyer. He waited patiently.

“Back home,” she started softly, then pinched her eyes shut. She clearly felt foolish uttering the words
out loud.

“Back home?” Linus repeated, prompting her.

“Seattle,” she clarified. “Seven thousand miles from here.” She huffed a tiny laugh. “Who would be crazy enough to follow me halfway around the world?”

She spoke so softly Linus had to strain to hear her. And yet, as her words sank in, he felt a distinct chill. Had the duchess been threatened even before she left home? If she
hadn’t been the victim of a random attack, she could be targeted again. Especially if her attacker had already traveled so far to get his hands on her.

“Tell me what you suspect,” he prompted softly.

“He said something.” She shook her head slightly, but her eyes had met his. “I couldn’t have heard him correctly.”

“Tell me what you think you heard.” He locked on her gaze and held
her attention, focusing on imparting a sense of trust, of safety, of acceptance. “The smallest clue can be important,” he assured her as doubt rose in her eyes.

She almost smiled then, resignedly, and opened her mouth.

Then a small electronic sound cut through the silent night.

“My phone!” Julia pulled back from him and reached for a small zippered pocket on her shorts. “I have
a text.”

Linus felt his hopes deflate. Whatever Julia had been going to tell him, she wasn’t likely to speak up now.

Important as it seemed, his concern about her confession dimmed the moment Julia read the message on her phone.

“Oh, my—” she covered her mouth with one hand, looked up at him with terrified eyes, and whispered past her fingers “—no.”

THREE

D
id you get what I sent you?

Julia stared at the words, trembling, not just because of the message they implied, but because of the sender.

“What is it?” Linus had been propping her up, and now leaned nearer, the injuries to his face more painful-looking up close.

Julia pinched her eyes shut against the sight.

Linus lifted her hand and read the message
on the screen of her phone. “What?” He repeated. “Did you get something?”

“No.” She shook her head adamantly. “I didn’t get anything. I don’t know what it means.”

“Julia.” Linus spoke softly, his touch soothing as he propped her up. “Talk to me. I saw your reaction. This message frightened you. Why?”

“Did you get what I sent you,”
she repeated, praying the worlds didn’t mean what
she feared they meant. “What does that mean?”

“A delivery of some sort? A package?”

“Or a surprise visitor.” She didn’t want to believe the attack and the message were related, and yet...

“Your attacker?” Linus took the phone from her trembling hand. “Who’s the sender? Who is this
Fletcher Pendleton?
”

“It’s complicated.” Julia tried to straighten out her thoughts. What was
the best way to explain?

“Let’s get inside.” Linus scooped his arm around her waist again, lifting her up to her toes as he guided her toward one of the rear doors of the palace. “Then I need you to tell me.”

Emotionally drained, Julia leaned on Linus as he guided her inside, grateful for his steady arm to lean on and his apt understanding of the situation. They needed to get inside
before her sister noticed her hobbling across the courtyard and came to check on her. More than that, they needed to sort out what was going on. Had Fletcher sent the thug who’d attacked her on the beach?

She hated to think he’d do such a thing. And yet, given his antics of late, she could almost believe he had.

Linus settled Julia onto a wood-inlaid fainting couch in one of the palace
receiving rooms. The cozy parlor was near the rear of the palace and appeared to be seldom used, so they weren’t likely to be interrupted. Besides that, it was close to the door, so she didn’t have to hobble very far to reach it.

“Are you comfortable? Do you need anything?” The muscular guard, his injuries still untended, looked at her earnestly. Julia couldn’t imagine how he could be so
concerned about her comfort while his own eyebrow continued to leak blood at a slow trickle.

Linus swiped at his forehead with the back of his hand, his gaze never wavering from her face.

Julia felt a spear of guilt. She wanted to fetch a first-aid kit or at the very least a cube of ice for his swollen lip. The man had done so much to protect her, and now seemed determined to get the
sofa pillows arranged around her in the optimum position to ease the pressure on her leg. Were all the royal guards so perfectly sweet and attentive? Julia couldn’t recall a time when she’d felt so pampered.

“Now.” Linus plunked an ottoman beside the fainting couch and sat, meeting her eyes. “Fletcher Pendleton?”

“He’s an engineer. He’s brilliant. Probably going to be a millionaire.
Or he was.” She realized her initial assessment of the man was now grossly out of date.

“How do you know him?”

Julia sighed and thought back in time. It had been one of her first cases as a lawyer. She’d been so eager to do everything right, so earnest, so thorough. In spite of the many cases she’d dealt with since, that one stood out in her mind.

“Fletcher Pendleton created an
ultra-efficient engine design for cars. But he was working for a small automotive company at the time, a branch of a successful tech company, Seattle Electronics. Since he was working for Seattle Electronics when he designed the engine for them, they held the patent for his design, but then Motormech Industries tried to buy the design from him.”

“They can’t do that—not if the company doesn’t
want to sell.” Linus scowled.

Julia was glad the guard understood. “Precisely. I handled the case. It was very straightforward. We settled out of court. Fletcher Pendleton turned over all his design materials to Seattle Electronics. Motormech stepped away from the deal. Seattle Electronics retained ownership of the design and the car went into limited production as the SE323. That was after
I was involved. I’ve only been practicing law for two years, but since then I’ve been busy with other cases and I didn’t pay any attention to what Seattle Electronics was doing.”

“What was Seattle Electronics doing?” he asked in a whisper when she fell silent.

“Making cars. But there was a flaw in the design. The SE323 malfunctioned and overheated at high speeds. There were accidents—people
were injured, and a couple of Seattle Electronics’s employees died testing a car. Seattle Electronics was sued by several different parties.” As she stated the simple facts, she looked around at the elegantly decorated parlor, anywhere but at Linus and the injuries he’d received from helping her. His eyes were too kind, his face too ruggedly handsome. She was afraid she might start staring.

“Did you handle any of those cases?”

“No. But since I’d handled the original case, I paid attention whenever I saw their names in the news. Last I heard, Seattle Electronics had filed for bankruptcy protection.”

“And Fletcher Pendleton?”

Julia felt an uneasy swirl in her stomach at the mention of the man’s name. “That’s the strange part. I worked with him briefly when I represented
the case. Didn’t hear from him for nearly two years after that. Then out of the blue I got an email from him asking if he could meet me somewhere.”

“Somewhere?”

“He didn’t want to come to the office. He wanted to meet me in private.”

Concern swept across Linus’s features. “Did you?”

“No. His request struck me wrong. I hardly knew him, and he refused to meet in a public place.
He’s a rather big guy.” Pulled in by Linus’s concern, Julia found she couldn’t force herself to look away from him any longer. His brown eyes simmered with concern for her safety, reminding her all too clearly of how she’d felt when he’d carried her back along the beach. His strong arms had enveloped her securely, keeping her attacker and her fear at bay.

“How big?”

Julia struggled to
think. “Over six feet tall.”

“Six-two, one-eighty?” Linus echoed the specs he’d stated earlier.

Julia froze. She stared into Linus’s eyes as though she could find the answer there. But all she saw was an earnest desire to help, and determination to uncover the truth.

Linus waited before asking in a patient tone, “Could the engineer have been your attacker?”

Julia hated to impugn
a man who might be innocent. And yet, the circumstances all pointed in the same direction. Someone had fought with Linus on the beach. Someone had tried to carry her off. Though she hadn’t heard him speaking enough to recognize his voice, neither could she rule him out. Reluctantly she admitted, “It’s possible.”

“Do you have any other information about him? Contact info?”

“I have his
phone numbers, his address, his email address, along with all the emails he ever sent me. I never delete anything—I’m a lawyer. We understand the importance of an evidence trail.”

“Good girl.” Linus began to smile, but then his eyes narrowed. “
All
the emails? How many did he send you?”

“When I represented Seattle Electronics, he was forthcoming with everything. I got the impression he
wanted to cooperate. Maybe he even felt bad for letting negotiations with Motormech go so far.”

“Or he wanted you to think he felt bad,” Linus surmised.

“Maybe.” She sighed regretfully. “Anyway, he sent me a few scattered emails and text messages over the past couple months asking me to meet with him. Not harassing, necessarily, but enough that it creeped me out—that, and his insistence
on meeting me in private.” It was too much to look at Linus without remembering the feel of his arms around her. She wished she could reach for him and feel his strong shoulder against her cheek again, but she couldn’t make such a request after all he’d done for her that evening. So instead she leaned her head back against the pillows and closed her eyes. She felt exhausted by all that had happened
and irked by the nagging feeling that she’d forgotten some important detail. But what?

“I’m glad you didn’t go,” Linus told her, his voice gentle, even caring. “If you get a chance, can you forward me those emails and texts?”

“Sure.” She kept her eyes closed, wishing she could block out all memory of what happened on the beach. Rather than trying to remember the details, she wished she
could forget.

* * *

Linus absorbed the information Julia had given him. He wanted to ask her more questions, but the duchess looked exhausted, and he almost thought she’d fallen asleep. She ought to be tucked securely into her suite before she turned in for the night, but he didn’t want to disturb her, not when the fear had finally begun to fade from her features.

For his part,
he wouldn’t be able to rest any time soon. Not until he’d learned everything he could about this Fletcher Pendleton—including whether he’d recently traveled to Lydia. If the man was currently on Lydian soil, Linus wanted to catch him before he left again.

But then, if the man was after Julia, he probably wouldn’t leave the country. Not yet, not until he’d gotten what he’d come for. If anything,
he’d try something more aggressive the next time. But what did he want?

Linus didn’t understand why the man would be after Julia. Did he resent her involvement in his case, or blame her for the role she’d played in ending the deal he’d nearly made? Perhaps he’d watched her on the televised coverage of Queen Monica’s coronation and wedding vow renewal ceremonies. Maybe he thought he could
somehow tap into her fifteen minutes of fame.

If Fletcher Pendleton was their man, he already had several advantages over them, including a motive they had yet to understand. Linus was going to have his work cut out for him if he intended to catch Fletcher before the man tried to hurt Julia again. And he feared Pendleton would, indeed, try to hurt Julia again.

Linus took a step toward
the door and the floor creaked beneath him.

Julia’s eyes snapped open. “Linus?”

He was back at her side in an instant. “Yes?”

“One other thing. It might be important.” She made a face. “Yes, it’s probably important.” She met his eyes and her lower lip trembled.

Linus returned her gaze without wavering and tried to communicate trust, reassurance, safety. She had to feel safe
enough to share her fears. At the same time, he wished he could erase the worry that had clouded her features.

“The man who attacked me tonight said something.” She pinched her eyes shut.

In spite of his frustration that she hadn’t mentioned it earlier, Linus tried to be encouraging. “What did he say?”

“He said—” her voice squeaked as she quoted
“—I don’t want to have to hurt you.
I just need your file.”

“Your
file?
” Linus repeated.

“I think that’s what he said. That’s what it sounded like.”

“Any idea what he meant by that?”

“I don’t know.” She paused and wriggled her lips a bit more, clearly fighting back waves of emotions that threatened to leak out with her words. “Well, maybe there is something. It’s probably nothing. Even the police seemed skeptical.”

“The police?” Linus felt a jolt of alarm snap through him. Though it confirmed his hunch that she’d experienced trouble back home, he still didn’t like it. “When were the police involved?”

“
Don’t
tell my sister,” Julia insisted. “She doesn’t know. I don’t want her to worry.”

“I don’t want her to worry, either,” Linus agreed, “but I need to know what happened. I can’t help you if
I don’t know what’s going on.”

Julia looked up at the elaborate plasterwork that decorated the high ceiling of the parlor. She appeared to be gathering her thoughts. “Three weeks ago when I arrived at my office on a Monday morning, my office was...disturbed.”

“Disturbed?” he prompted when she was silent for some time.

Julia locked eyes with him again. The unshed tears that shimmered
behind her lashes begged him to believe her. “I have a violet plant near my window. I was going to water it first thing when I noticed that a couple of leaves had been bent. Violet leaves are very tender. If you bend them they snap and they don’t recover—they leave a brown mark right along the bend. Then I looked closer and the dirt was loose.”

“Someone knocked your plant over?”

She
nodded solemnly. “And then whoever knocked it over set it back up again and put the dirt that had fallen out back under the leaves.”

“Cleaning lady?”

“No. The cleaning lady doesn’t work weekends, only Tuesday nights, and she doesn’t have keys to the offices—she just cleans the restrooms and public areas.”

Linus understood. “Too much sensitive client information inside the offices.”

“Exactly. After I noticed the plant, I got curious. My office door is always locked—sensitive client information, you know—so no one should have been in there. Nothing else looked out of place. But when I checked my file cabinet, the lock had been picked on one of the drawers.”

“How do you know?”

“The lock looked a little scraped up. And when I tugged on the handle, it came open,
even though it should have been locked.”

Linus tried not to wince at the thought of Julia’s hand erasing any fingerprints that might have been on the handle—but then he reminded himself that any criminal fit to pick a lock was probably wearing gloves. Besides, there was a far more important question he needed to ask. “Was anything missing from the file cabinet?”

Her expression clouded
immediately. “I scoured it folder by folder. I couldn’t find anything missing—not a single page. I called the police and they came to investigate, but I have to admit I felt foolish. They tried to take my case seriously, but other than someone reading confidential client information, I couldn’t imagine then what the motive might have been.”