“Move, Father,” I growled. Thinking of what Vennix had done, how he’d almost killed Trinity in that suite made me see red, made my finger twitch on the trigger. “He’s a stone-cold killer.”
“So are you.” Cold words. Hard. Intent. The words of a commander and I tore my gaze from the assassin, Nix, the male I’d served with on several missions, the male I’d once respected as a warrior, and looked my father in the eye.
“What the fuck is going on? Trinity has been taken, and you are protecting the man who tried to kill her?”
Vennix stepped out from behind my father, and I adjusted my aim. One blistering shot through the heart would do the job just fine. But his hands were up in the air, and my father was waving me off. “Don’t you dare, Leo. Put it down. That’s an order.”
“I wasn’t trying to kill your mate, you love-sick idiot. I was trying to save her. Which I did.” Vennix had the gall to bow slightly at the waist. “I had to climb down a rope and break through a fucking window. The fight cost me two good men, asshole. You’re welcome.”
What. The. Fuck?
My father cleared his throat. “Nix isn’t the bad guy. He wasn’t at the suite when the princesses arrived and he’s not one now. There is a traitor inside the Jax household. One of my informants caught wind of the plan when Cassander was invited to ease Trinity’s Ardor upon the sisters’ arrival on Alera.”
“How do you know the females who went into the citadel with her are her sisters?” I asked my father. “They covered their heads to remain anonymous and no one has mentioned their relation.”
“I told him,” Nix said.
Traitor.
Maybe I should shoot him just for fun.
My father continued. “Put the ion p
istol down, Leo, before you shoot someone. Or at a minimum cause a scene. The fewer guests who know of the princess’s disappearance, the better.”
I sighed, pushed off the ground and stood before my father, but my focus was squarely on Nix. My pistol was aimed at the floor, but that didn’t mean I wasn’t prepared to use it.
“Cassander was innocent in the plot,” my father continued. “He truly believed he was simply doing his job. But one of the guards sent to escort the females told a friend that as soon as her Ardor was eased, they were to murder the consort and frame him for the females’ deaths. The three sisters would have disappeared and no one on Alera would have been the wiser. Or even know of their existence.”
“Except Lord Jax.” So, I needed to kill the man as well. I needed to start a line, just like for the dancing.
“No. This runs deeper than that,” Nix added. “Lord Jax is a pompous old man with too much money and too much time on his hands. He doesn’t have the patience to plan something like this.”
“His son does.” Thordis Jax. I could kill him just as easily. And he’d been speaking with Trinity earlier.
“Listen,” my father said, settling his hands on his hips. He had an ion pistol on his belt, but didn’t make any attempt to use it. As if he didn’t think Nix was a threat. As if he were one of his own. “I will tell you more when Trinity is safe. We don’t know if Thordis was involved. We don’t know who is behind the queen’s kidnapping. When we learned of the princesses’ arrival on Alera from Earth, of the threat on their lives from those who had met them at transport and vowed to keep them safe, Nix and two queen’s guards went to the safe house to save them. They hadn’t been harmed… yet, thank the goddess. But they did save them.”
“I stormed through the window before the guards could get to Trinity and Cassander in the bedroom. I had to get Cassander out of the way, but I did not kill him. Trinity ran to the other room to escape, assuming I was the enemy and afraid I was going to harm her as well. But the other two guards with me were already in direct combat with the Jax guards when I followed her. Then you stormed in and let one of the bastards live,” Nix accused.
I paused, thought about the cluster fuck that was that bloody confrontation. Blaster fire, dead bodies. Fighting. Innocent females.
Fuck. Nix was right. One of Jax’s guards had survived. I’d even given Faith my ReGen wand to save him. And now Trinity’s life was in danger because of it. But I’d had no fucking idea the Jax guards were actually the enemy. Neither had the princesses.
“You should have told me.”
“Before or after you blew my head off?” Nix asked. “Would you have believed me? Would the princesses? I was the one who came through the suite’s window, remember? I was the one who they’d thought killed the consort in the bedroom. I left them in your hands, Leo. You’ve lost two of them and now your mate is missing as well.”
“They aren’t lost.” I glared at my father. Now wasn’t the time to let him know about Faith and Destiny’s plans to infiltrate and learn about their missing mother. “And you should have told me the truth.”
“Just as you told me about your conversation with Prime Nial? Told me about the mission he gave you?”
Score one for the old man. Shit. He was right. And not done rubbing it in.
“I only discovered the truth when Prime Nial contacted me himself, looking for information on an assassin he intended to hunt down and eliminate—on information he’d received from you, son.”
I’d told Prime Nial and Ander about Nix on board Battleship Karter, when we’d all agreed to allow my mate to use herself as bait to draw the assassin out of hiding. The assassin being Nix. But now…
Leave it to the protective Prillon leader to try to help me protect my mate, without her knowing of his additional interference. Calling my father in for reinforcements only made me respect my friend even more. Also, thankful it was my father he’d contacted, who’d been helping. I was grateful, not angry.