Page 101 of A Problem Princess

A gloved hand closed over hers. “I’ve got you, Princess.”

Cordelia gave a soft cry at the rush of emotion brought on by the sight of his grin, by the mix of joy at stopping Scepter and the fear of an uncertain future.

He opened his arms, and she stepped into his embrace. He shielded her with his body from the crush that pressed in around them as he slowly walked her toward the door and safety. She lay her head against his shoulder and closed her eyes to breathe in deep the strength and solidity of him.

He had protected her again, just as she knew he would.Always.

Thirty

Three Days Later

Clayton grimaced with disbelief as he looked around the main room of the Armory and muttered a curse beneath his breath.

The building was barely more than a shell after the battle that had been waged here in Scepter’s attack. The front entrance had been destroyed by explosives that had blasted to bits the twin portcullises and ripped the metal doors from their hinges. The thick outer walls still stood, but the thinner walls of the entrance hall had tumbled; so had the crenellations edging the roof. The tall tower had caved in, bringing down the gas chandelier and stairs with it, and it lay in a tumble of stones just inches from his boots. The fine rugs and leather furniture that had made the place so comfortable had been ripped to pieces and charred by the embers from the explosions. Insult had been added to injury by the torrential rains that fell shortly after the roof had, drenching the stone floor and buckling the walnut wall panels.

But it was the training room that had taken the brunt of the battle. Its display of weapons had been ripped from the walls during the heat of the fight, and all its equipment had been destroyed.

Unfortunately, the damage went beyond the building. While the aunties had escaped unharmed, several of the Armory’s men had been wounded during Scepter’s attack. Two of them had stab wounds to shoulders and thighs that had needed surgery to stitch up the deep cuts, and two more had arms in slings. One of them was forced to use crutches until his damaged knee could heal, and even then he might always have a limp.

But they were all alive. Clayton thanked God—and the hoard of weapons in the training room—for that. Lesser men would have been killed.

The men of the Armory had prevailed. But could the Armory itself be salvaged? Would the men even want to rebuild it now that Scepter was finally gone for good?

“Clayton,” Marcus called out as he emerged from the basement steps. “I’m glad you were able to come to today’s meeting.”

“Your message was insistent.”

Marcus nodded. “We have to decide what to do with this place.”

A handful of men followed behind Marcus, all looking as grim as Clayton felt. The scene of destruction around them was much the same as what they’d experienced in the wars. So were their emotions. There was no triumph in victory when so much devastation accompanied it. There was only relief.

Now they all had to decide how to move on.

“Scepter’s gone, the organization dead,” Clayton reminded him. “We don’t need a headquarters from which to fight against it anymore.”

“That wasn’t the reason I created this place,” Marcus countered. This time, when his old friend glanced at the building around him, Clayton knew he wasn’t seeing the damage but the promise of what it had once been. “I did it to give former soldiers a place of refuge when returning to their postwar lives proved too much.”

“I’m not certain we need that anymore,” Brandon Pearce interjected as he approached them hand in hand with his wife, Amelia. “Once, perhaps, but we’ve all moved on and found other purposes.”

“Then perhaps this place shouldn’t be only for us any longer,” Merritt Rivers added. “Maybe we can put it to better use. After all, Scepter might be gone, but there are still thousands in London who need our help.”

“The poor and the downtrodden,” Merritt’s wife, Veronica, Baroness Rivers, reminded them as she wrapped her arm around her husband’s.

She shouldn’t have been there, Clayton knew, not as heavy with child as she was. But he also knew she felt a special connection to the Armory and wouldn’t have missed today’s meeting to decide its future.

“The abused,” Danielle Braddock added as she went to Marcus’s side.

The former general placed an affectionate kiss to her temple, and Clayton’s gut tightened as he watched them. He wanted that same closeness and love with Cordelia, the same promise of a lifetime together. But she’d been separated from him after her address in Parliament and securely ensconced in St James’s Palace, waiting for her contingent to return to Monrovia. He had been turned away by the palace guards every time he’d tried to see her, including one last visit to the palace that morning.

He knew he would never have a future with her. They’d both known that truth all along. Princesses didn’t marry men like him. No amount of revolution or peaceful reform would ever change that.

But damnation, he would never even have the chance to say goodbye.

“And the children,” a soft voice called out from behind him at the battered entrance.

His heart leapt into his throat, and he spun around, not daring to believe… “Princess.”

Her eyes locked with his for a moment. Then she smiled with embarrassment as the men all bowed and the women curtsied at her arrival. She shook her head in a gesture for them to forgo all obeisances as she stepped slowly into the main room.