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Alex enters the meeting room with an air of smugness; nothing betraying the simmering anger and hurt that being back in this palace pulls from the pits of his stomach. When the queen lifts her chin in his direction and motions for him to take the seat across from her, he makes a face, his nose wrinkling.
“No, thanks,” he says. “I’ll stand.”
Her jaw clenches and he tilts his head at her, waiting for the reprimand he knows she’s got budding at the back of her throat. Blah blah I’m the queen etc, etc. But nothing comes. He crosses his arms.
“What am I doing here? I was under the impression I’m not,” he grimaces, his nose twitching, “Allowed here.”
“We are in need of your skills.”
Alex stares at her for a long moment before a laugh bubbles up from the pit of his stomach. He allows it to trek its way up and out of his mouth, “That’s rich,” he says around the laughter, waving a hand and pointing at her. “Oh, my god. After everything you’ve done you need me. Oh, karma’s a fucking bitch, ain’t she?”
“Do not speak to the queen—“
Alex whips his head around to stare at White Man #2 in the corner, shaking his head. “Oh, no. Mary and I have history. I’ll talk to her how I please, especially considering the fact that y’all called me. Which means I’m your only fucking hope.” He turns back around to face the queen. “I’ll help, but it’ll be double my going rate. No, you know what, triple.”
“Perhaps you’d like to listen before speaking for once,” the Queen says.
Alex rolls his eyes. “Sure. What do you need? Intel on a foreign diplomat who got in your crosshairs somehow? To blackmail a lover of Henry’s?” His throat goes tight at the thought of Henry, but he barrels past it, stepping up to her desk—not blind to the tensing of the men around the room as he does so. He’s dangerous, and they know it, but he’s smart enough to know that he can’t kill her.
Not that he hasn’t fantasized about it. He’s certainly considered how enough times over the years. But never quite figured out the getting away with it part.
“Or maybe,” he says, “You just need me to kick a couple puppies. That’s certainly on brand for you.”
The queen blinks at him, once, unimpressed.
“Are you quite done?”
He flashes her a sharp grin. “Lady, I haven’t even gotten started.”
She takes a big breath and folds her hands overtop the table. “Henry’s been taken.”
It takes a moment for the words to register.
Takes two, actually.
Because at first—they don’t quite hit as a real statement. The words are there but his mind jumbles them around and centers on Henry and then slowly, the following words come into play. They ebb in like a wave settling on shore.
His hands fall to his sides.
“What,” he says, swallowing, “Do you mean taken?”
She watches him, before her gaze drops to the desk. She unfolds her arms, picks up a paper, and then slides it across the desk towards him. “The ransom letter.”
He’s hesitant to tear his gaze away from her, but within seconds he’s storming forward and snatching the letter up off the desk to read it. He doesn’t get far—the kidnappers have dated it. And it’s four days old.
“This is from four days ago.”
“You are a last resort.”
“Most ransom kidnappings don’t tolerate stalling,” Alex says, eyes flicking over the rest of the letter before slipping off the paper and returning to the queen. “You’ve let them keep him for four days, no doubt to be tortured, because you’re too fucking proud to call me?” His hands fall to his sides, a tremor wracking up his spine.
The queen lifts her chin, a move he’s seen Henry emulate a thousand times in his most vulnerable acts of defiance. “We’ve been given a deadline. Twenty four hours.”
Alex takes a deep breath, tapping his index finger against his thigh; self soothing so he doesn’t launch himself across the desk and get himself arrested before he can save Henry. “How long ago was that?”
“Eight hours ago.”
That gives him sixteen hours.
“What was the ultimatum?” He asks. She doesn’t reply. “I don’t have time for you to play fucking games. What is the price if you don’t meet the deadline?”
She narrows her eyes at him. “A finger every three hours thereafter.”
Fuck.
“How many have you sent after him?”
“Three.”
“Alive or dead?”
“Assumed dead.”
“Did they leave any resources behind?”
She nods, once. “Jenson shall take you to the team working to retrieve him. They’ve narrowed it down to a country and city, but our previous . . . attempts were met with gunfire and radio silence. I, truly, doubt you have the skills necessary to bring him home, but it’s been brought to my attention that you’ve rescued more prominent figures than Henry, from more dangerous situations. As for your rate—”
“We’ll discuss that when I return. With Henry.”
“Is it not true that you expect partial payment upfront?”
He tilts his head at her. “I’m going to save Henry, and you’re going to pay me whatever I ask for when I do. Maybe it’s money, maybe it’s a favor, maybe it’s something else. You don’t get to decide, and you don’t get to negotiate.” Her right eye twitches, but she doesn’t move to argue, so he sets the ransom letter on the desk, leaning forward with his palms pressing into the wood. “Do we have a deal, your majesty?”
She stares him down for a long moment, nearly dragging him into a memory of the last time he’d been in this office, before looking over his shoulder and nodding to one of the men behind him. “Escort Mr. Diaz to the others.”
“Claremont-Diaz,” He says immediately, standing upright. “As I’m sure you’re well aware.”
“Mr. Claremont-Diaz,” she clips. “Do make haste. As time is not on our side, unless you’ve forgotten?”
As if this isn’t here entire fucking fault.
He bites back a reply, because she’s right. He doesn’t have time to argue with her. Not now, at least.
Once he’s got Henry.
Once he’s got Henry he’s going to make sure she regrets letting him get hurt in the first place.
The thing about rescuing people one cares about is . . .
It makes things complicated. Messy.
It makes one emotional.
It allows for mistakes.
He knows this.
He also knows there’s not a fucking force on this planet that could stop him from saving Henry. He’d left him behind, once, in that awful palace to rot away beneath his grandmothers hand. He’s not going to stand by and let her hand be the one that guides his kidnappers.
Maybe that’s why when the time comes, and it’s him, standing between a guard and Henry’s room, out of bullets and out of plans, he does the only thing that makes sense—he runs straight at the gun directed at his head. He rushes the guard, and he doesn’t even fucking blink when he feels something pierce his shoulder, his rage and heartache and fear thrumming him forward, as if he’s simply the song leading an action scene in a movie.
He gets hold of the guards neck—snaps it before he can react.
The gun clatters to the ground.
Then the body follows.
Alex stands over them both, chest heaving. There’s an ache clawing at the corners of his senses, but he pushes it down and away in favor of turning back towards the room at the end of the hall.
More will come.
But for now, it’s just the two of them; two separate worlds colliding.
The silence is so very loud.
Hours of planning; minutes of action.
Everything had been so loud for so long, from the moment the queen said the words Henry’s been taken, to the moment they dropped him just outside of this small european city, to busting his way through the compound like fucking James Bond, he’d been drowning in stimuli. From screaming to gunfire to the rough hammering of knuckles meeting skin.
There’s something dropping onto the floor—the only noise but for his breathing.
He looks down.
A small puddle of blood sits at his feet; dripping from his left arm.
He frowns down at it for a moment, tightening the first on his left hand. Adrenalin has numbed whatever pain should be there, but he needs to mvoe fast. Needs to secure Henry and get them the fuck out of here before more bodies arrive and it becomes the lost cause the queen thought it’d be.
He takes a breath—readies himself for what’s waiting for him in the room.
And then he closes the distance and opens the door.
Henry Fox is the most beautiful man in the world.
He’d told him this, once, laying beneath the stars in the gardens outside the palace. Their hands had been laced, Henry reaching for the sky with them to point out an array of constellations; pausing on his favorite, Orion. He’d wondered if there were anything quite as mesmerizing as the stars on a clear night, and Alex, the lost romantic that he was, had turned his gaze from the sky and settled it on Henry’s devastating profile.
“There’s you,” he’d said, softly, as if speaking louder might usher in the clouds.
Henry’s the type to roll his eyes, to brush off affection, but that night, he’d turned his head from the sky, and smiled softly at him. “Me?” He’d asked, so soft.
Alex had nodded at him, leaning in and pressing a delicate kiss to devastating lips, bumping the tip of his nose against Henry’s as he pulled away. “The most beautiful man in the world.”
Then, Henry had rolled his eyes, but the smile remained.
The smile remained; reigned on the rest of their night as if he were the monarch of love rather than the spare to a crown that didn’t understand the wonder they possessed.
There’s blood.
There’s blue eyes, squinted, peeking through a bruise the size of a golf ball; a black eye swollen to the point of worry. There’s a single chair, a body slumped in it, eyes squinting against the light in the hall; a white shirt, bloody and blinging to skin. Hands tied behind his back, the only thing holding him up.
The door slams against the wall as Alex rushes forward, falling to his knees in front of Henry as he reaches out and gently cups his cheeks.
A hoarse voice, so achingly familiar and drenched in pain that Alex wishes he could repay the kidnappers ten fold if they weren’t already dead, says, “Alex?” Beneath the pain, there’s surprise; confusion. Hurt.
Alex nods at him, “Hey, baby,” he says without really thinking, as he scurries behind Henry and starts on the ropes holding his wrists together. “We’ve got maybe ten minutes to get out of here before more bad guys drop in, so if you have any questions, they’re going to have to wait until the end of the ride, okay?”
“You’re here?” Henry says, disregarding Alex’s words entirely.
“I’m here,” Alex answers, finally unraveling the ropes. Henry starts to slump forward without the pressure of his wrists tied behind his back, and Alex quickly runs around to the front and holds him up. “I’m here, and I’m getting you out of here. Can you walk?”
Henry’s mouth opens and closes, and then he’s gently pushing Alex away with trembling hands, and grabbing the sides of the chair to push himself up. Alex holds his hands out for him, to catch him in case he falls, but then Henry, beautiful, brave, stronger than anyone even fucking understands or realizes, is rising to his feet and looking down at Alex with those bruised eyes.
“That’s it,” Alex says, reaching out to wrap an arm around his waist so he can lean on him. “Wish they could see you now,” he murmurs as they take the first step towards the exit; Henry’s trembling against him, blood dripping down onto the floor between them—he’s no longer sure whose blood it is marring their walk, but they don’t have time to find out, either.
At the door, Henry pauses; gaze raking over the bodies strewn across the hall.
Alex follows his gaze. Swallows.
Henry knows what he does, but knowing and seeing are two different things entirely.
“I wasn’t going to stop until I got to you,” Alex says after a beat.
Henry looks down at him. Something flickers in his gaze, but then he’s turning away and asking, “Which way?”
Always the strongest person in the room.
Alex grips him a little tighter, and motions east. “This way,” he murmurs.
They make it out without running into anymore goons, thank fuck. Alex carefully loads Henry into the car; he’s slipping in and out of consciousness, eyes opening and closing like he’s trying to desperately hang on to the moment. His head lolls to the side when Alex climbs into the drivers seat, hands fisting tight around the steering wheel, blood keeping his grip loose.
“I’m supposed to take you directly to the extraction point,” Alex says after a moment.
Henry blinks at him.
“I don’t think either of us are going to make it that far right now.” He reaches out with his reach hand and carefully pushes Henry’s hair, mattered with blood, out of his face. “It’s your choice, though. Do you want to go straight home, or take a pit stop?”
Henry swallows, leaning into Alex’s touch in a way that definitely doesn’t send waves of longing crashing through Alex’s chest. “Where else?” He asks, voice crispy.
Alex rolls his lips, narrowing his eyes as he looks out over Henry’s head. “I have a safe house,” he says. “We can go. Recuperate for a bit. And then i’ll take you wherever you want to go.” Even if it’s home to the nauseating castle with it’s crippling demands and threats.
Henry nods after a moment. “Okay,” he says. “We’ll go there.”
Alex nods, too, taking a moment to look him over. The injuries aren’t too bad—kidnappers clearly keeping in mind that they had to return him alive when all was said and done. But they’d had their fun with him; bruises and cuts that aren’t going to heal for a weak or two. His right eye might take three for the swelling and bruising to fade; Alex is entirely too familiar with an orbital fracture, and would trade places with Henry in a heartbeat.
But, somehow, he glances down at his shoulder, where the pain is slowly starting to ebb out past the throes of adrenalin, he thinks Henry might prefer the fracture to gunshot wound.
He turns back to the steering wheel. Nevermind, that. His left hands comes up, pressing down on the wound, something to help alleviate the blood carefully oozing out of it, until he can stitch himself back up as he’s done a thousand times before.
“You’re bleeding,” Henry says.
Alex starts the car.
“It’ll stop,” he replies. He glances down at Henry as he puts the car into gear. “Get some rest. We’ll be there soon.”
Henry doesn’t do as he’s told—Alex isn’t the queen, so why would he? — and sits up a little straighter, using the back of the chair as leverage. “Why did you come?”
Alex smiles wryly. “I’ll always come for you, Henry.”
Henry’s eyes, or what Alex can see of them, flicker back and forth over him.
“Could’ve fooled me,” He finally says, before turning in the seat to face the window, his arms wrapped around his waist, and knees pulled up to his chest.
And that’s the rub, isn’t it?
Alex had left.
Not that Mary had given him much of a fucking choice.
There’s a ring sitting at the back of Alex’s dresser. For several months, it had sat in his front pocket, as he paraded around a palace he’d truthfully never had any right to be in, holding the hands with the spare—the only man the world misunderstood as deeply as they misunderstood Alex. For months he sought the perfect moment; the perfect ray of sun highlighting the swatch of Henry’s hair that falls in his face when he’s not made up by the palace hair people.
And then the queen realized that what he and Henry had wasn’t just a silly little fling.
Henry’d gone to her, not about their relationship, but about himself. Demanding he no longer hide who he is behind the image of a perfect royal. He wanted to come out.
And then, he wanted to be out.
Obviously, this is all second hand knowledge, but Alex had begged Zahra for all the info she could give, and Zahra and Shaan may be the best in the international surveillance game, but Alex knows his way around a tight lip.
That same day, Mary had called for Alex.
I know who you really are.
Which, fine, he’d told Henry ages ago that their first meeting had been manufactured; that meeting him had been his goal to gaining insight on English relations, but that the job came second nearly as soon as he’d made eye contact with him. Henry knew everything.
In that moment, Alex had been certain whatever threats she had—he’d walk out of the meeting having won.
And then she mentioned June. And Nora. And a whole slew of people from his past that he’d cut connections with in order to better protect them given his career choices.
But it was June that it came back to.
June, who knew Alex had a dangerous job, who worried for him when he was gone, and even more when he was home. Who knew that their connections to the white house might be deeper than he let on—than that of their parents political stakes.
And Alex has a great poker face—he couldn’t do what he does if he didn’t. But the mention of June had all but shattered it for the three seconds it took him to realize she had in fact said what he’d heard.
Then came the threats.
And Alex had to choose.
He had to choose between being with the man he loves or protecting the sister who’d only ever protected him their entire lives.
And as much as it hurt; there wasn’t really a choice to be made.
It was June.
It’d always be June’s safety that came first.
Henry had a whole country to protect him; he had the kindest eyes and smartest mouth and softest touch. He’d move on, even if Alex didn’t.
He’d move on and he’d find a life for himself that he deserves outside the shackles of the monarchy, with someone who isn’t bogged down by secrets and lies. He’d fall in love again, and he’d be happy. And that’s all that mattered.
Henry would be okay.
June?
If he chose Henry, June’s life, that she’s worked tirelessly for, would fall to pieces.
And, someone, somewhere, would probably try to kill her to get back at Alex for something he’d done they felt slighted by.
So, of course he chose June.
Of course he walked out of the palace without so much as good bye.
He disappeared.
After all, that’s what a spy’s good for.
The ring still sits in his nightstand. There’s been no one else. No real or scripted fantasy to block out the memory of what he and Henry had. There’d been attempts; a kiss here, a one night stand there. Somehow, though, it always felt wrong. He never belonged.
It’s been three years, and the only place he’d ever belonged, is at the side of a man he can never have.
The safe house isn’t so much a house as a dingy apartment on a third floor walk up. They’re both exhausted, the edges of Alex’s vision are needling on the edge of black which means if he doesn’t get this bleeding under control, they’re going to be in serious trouble soon. Henry’s feet drag as they climb up the steps; probably dehydrated and malnourished and who knows what else.
They lean on each other, guide one another up the steps. A tender balance beam keeping one another upright.
Feels a bit like what their relationship had been. Two people on the brink finding one another so that they might hold one another up.
There’s a lingering scent beneath the blood; Henry’s cologne, what’s left of it, singles out Alex’s senses. Gives him the strength to make it up the final block of stairs and get them through the front door, closing and locking it behind them. He falls against it with a groan, his shoulder screaming of pain, begging to be taken care of.
He takes a moment to breathe.
Henry’s standing in front of him, watching, and Alex opens his eyes to narrow slits to look at him. “Go lay down,” he orders, motioning to the room on the left side of the apartment. “I’ll—be right there to clean up your wounds.”
Henry blinks at him. “You’re still bleeding.”
Alex breathes in through his nose, “Yep,” he says on a deranged sigh. “I’ll take care of that soon as I’ve got you—“
“I’m fine.”
“You’re fine?” Alex scoffs, weakly shoving away from the door. He brings his hand up to the wound, applying direct pressure. “You’ve probably got an orbital fracture, and I—“
“You’re actively bleeding,” Henry insists, stumbling forwards. “What are you going to do? Patch me up and bleed to death? I’ve no idea where to go from here, so unless you’ve called someone to retrieve us, I quite like you alive.”
“I’ll be—“
“Lying dead on the ground in no time. Where’s your aid kit?”
“What?”
“This is a safe house, I presume you have a bloody aid kit.”
Alex stares at him for a long moment. “Henry.”
“Stop being a stubborn fucking American and let me help you.”
Alex mumbles stubborn fucking American under his breath as he shoves away from the door entirely and hobbles across the apartment towards the bathroom. “In here,” he says, nodding to the door. He looks down; finds a trail of bloody dollops chasing him across the room. “There should also be blood in the fridge.”
“What?”
“It’s an active safe house. We have supplies.”
“Did they—“
“Nobody knows we’re here,” He says entering the bathroom and flopping onto the toilet seat. “Probably should’ve told someone but honestly your family can get bent.”
Henry appears in the doorway. “How long has it been?”
Alex answers without thinking, “Three years, two months, and sixteen days.”
There’s a long moment of silence. And then Henry clears his throat and steps into the bathroom. “I—I meant since I was taken?” He turns to the medicine cabinet and pulls it open, humming at the sight of the first aid kit.
Fuck.
Right.
Why would he be thinking about them?
“About a week,” He answers.
“Took your time, then?”
Alex sits up straighter. “You have to know I came as soon as I heard.”
Henry’s brows furrow as he turns towards him with the first aid kit. “I’ve never mended a bullet hole,” he says. “You’ll have to tell me what to do.”
Alex shakes his head, reaching out for the first aid kit. “I can take care of it.”
“Not likely,” Henry says, pulling the kit out of reach. “I know to ask—did it go through?” Alex flinches. “So, I need to extract the bullet.” His skin pales a fraction, but he straightens out his shoulders. “No matter. What will I need?”
“Henry you’re not going to extract a fucking bullet from my shoulder.”
Henry goes very, very still. “You’ve rescued me from my captors, killed who even knows how many people in the process, and brought me somewhere to recuperate and expect me to be of no assistance to you? Is that why you left, then? The belief that I’m so incredibly selfish—“
“Stop.”
“Stop what? Trying to help?”
“Making assumptions.”
Henry’s lips form a thin line. “When one only has assumptions to go off of, how do you expect—”
“If you want to talk about us, fine, but it’s going to have to wait until after the bullet’s been removed, yeah?” Alex shuffles awkwardly on the toilet seat. “So, if you’re insisting on helping, fine. I’ll guide you through it. If not, go lay down and I’ll come patch you up when I’m done.”
“To think,” Henry mutters, turning to the counter and tearing open the first aid kit. “I wanted to marry you.” He scoffs, slamming his hands down on the counter and twisting his neck to glare at Alex. “All right, then. What do I need?”
Alex’s mouth opens and closes several times.
It’s one thing to hope they were on the same page; to dream and fantasize a life where he got to go down on one knee and ask the question and they lived happily ever after.
But to hear it, from Henry’s lips—
He wishes he’d killed the Queen of England, that day.
Wishes he’d done whatever he had to to stay.
“There should be some tweezers,” he says, eventually, voice crackling. “You’ll need them.”
Somewhere between Henry clumsily trying to extract a bullet from Alex’s shoulder, and Alex screaming because he’d missed for the fifth time, he passed out.
Which, not a great impression to make when trying to rescue someone.
I’m here to save you . . . right after this nap.
Henry’s sitting just out of sight on the couch in the livingroom, because he’d someone managed to drag Alex out of the bathroom and into the bedroom and dump him on the bed. He’d, somehow, done all this and stitched up the entry wound from the bullet. And now, he’s out there by himself, thinking only god knows what, about Alex, and Alex being here, and how fucking useless Alex is in this whole thing.
He’s saved foreign dignitaries before people ever realized they’d gone missing, and he couldn’t manage to—
“Stop beating yourself up,” Comes that voice from the living room.
Alex makes a noise at the back of his throat. How the hell—
“You were snoring. You’re no longer snoring. It doesn’t take a spy to connect the dots.”
Alex blinks. “I don’t snore,” he says, petulant, as he forces himself to sit up. The room spins for a moment, and he stills, allowing himself to get reacquainted with everything being upside down, before it slowly rights itself and he can finally push himself to his feet. Henry doesn’t say anything else as Alex drags himself to the living room.
He’s laying back on the couch, one arm over his forehead, as he looks up at the ceiling. He drops his arm to his chest and looks at Alex as he rounds the couch and sits on the edge of the coffee table. “Once you’re well enough, I’m ready to go home.”
Alex’s heart sinks.
Home.
Is that palace really a home for anybody?
Especially Henry?
Alex swallows. “I can call my team to escort you home if you’re in such a rush.”
Henry rolls his split lips. “I’m . . . not feeling particularly anxious to be accompanied by strangers at the moment.”
Alex nods. “Fair enough.”
They’re both quiet for so long, Alex is tempted to get back up and go back to the bedroom. So as not to sit here and examine every one of Henry’s injuries—most of which, he’s appeared to have banaged for himself. If Alex hadn’t been stupid enough to get himself shot he could’ve made sure they were bandaged correctly. Kept Henry from getting any scars to go with the memories this whole thing is going to leave behind.
But, Henry apparently has other plans, because he sits up and gives Alex a dissecting look—or as good of one as he can given the current state of his face.
“You need to get that eye checked out,” Alex murmurs, softly, reaching out with his good hand to gently run it over the side of Henry’s temple.
Henry swipes his hand away. “You left.”
Oh.
So they’re going there.
Alex nods, biting down on his lower lip. “I did.”
“You said you loved me and then you left me.”
He nods again. “That is exactly what I did.”
The muscle in Henry’s jaw jumps. “Are you going to explain why?”
“It’s been three years—”
“Two months and sixteen days,” Henry completes. “You’ve kept track. You came for me. Why? Why do any of it?”
Alex gives him an incredulous look. “What?” He asks, forcing himself to stand. “You think I’d hear you were kidnapped and just stand by and not do a damned thing about it?”
Henry tilts his head. “You left me in that tower and never once looked back. What else am I supposed to believe?”
“Never once looked back? All I’ve fucking done is look back.”
Henry’s split eyebrow raises. “Right,” he says, nodding. “Explained by all the texts and calls and visits.”
Alex shakes his head, turning a little too quickly; the world turns upside down, and he grabs onto the side of an armchair beside the table. “I did what I had to do,” he says once things stop spinning. “I didn’t want to leave you.”
“I’ve certainly heard that one before.”
He turns back around. “A lot of anger for someone still under his grandmother's thumb, three years later.”
Henry stands. “You do not understand what it costs to leave a position such as mine.”
“And you don’t know what it would’ve cost for me to stay.”
“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”
“Nothing,” Alex mutters, turning away again and heading for the kitchen. “It doesn’t mean a damned thing.”
“I loved you!” Henry exclaims, anguish lining the words. “I loved you and I would have done just about anything to be with you. I thought you loved me, too.” He scoffs, mostly to himself, and Alex hears the fabric of the couch rustle as he sits back down. “There have been moments in my life I felt like an utter fool, but none quite so clearly as being told you’d left.”
Alex pauses at the entry to the kitchen, a hand coming up to grab the doorframe. He hangs his head. “I didn’t want to leave,” he says after a beat. He licks his lips. “Whatever you want to believe about me, you’ll have to trust that.”
“Then why did you?” He pauses. “And don’t give me that bloody it’s confidential bullshit, either.”
Alex turns, replacing his hand with his back, and leaning all his weight against the doorframe. He looks across the living room, Henry’s sitting firm and proper, every bit the sophisticated prince if one ignores the bandages and bloody shirt. “I’ll answer your question if you answer mine.”
Henry’s good eye narrows. “And what is that?”
“Why did you stay?”
He stares Alex down for a long moment, before smiling wryly, and reaching up to flick at his eyebrow. “I hardly had reason to leave, did I?”
“You have every reason to leave,” Alex says, softly. “For your sanity, for one.”
Henry shakes his head. “Why did you leave?”
He could lie.
But he’s never lied to Henry, and he’s not about to start now.
“I have a sister,” he admits; the first time he’s said those words out loud since taking this job and all it’s risks. “June.” He looks to the ceiling, shaking his head. “I don’t know how she found out, but she did. She threatened to expose her to,” He swallows, motions around them at the safe house, “All of this. If I didn’t leave you.” He pauses again, letting the next words roll around on his tongue for a moment, before, finally, admitting, “It was you or June, and I wish it could’ve been you, but it had to be her.”
Henry’s quiet for a long, long moment. Alex doesn’t move, and neither does Henry.
And then, “You could’ve called. Written. Something.”
“I was waiting.”
“For what?”
“For you to leave.” Alex shoves away from the wall, wincing as it twinges the wound in his shoulder. “I had google alerts set up so the second you announced it, I’d reach out. The only way we could be together—we both had to leave. You, the castle. Me . . . this.”
Henry’s brow furrows, his gaze dragging along the floor until it pauses, and jets up to Alex’s face. “Would you have?” He asks. “If I’d abdicated. Would you have given up this life to be with me?”
And it’s heartbreaking that he has to ask—that there’s even a speck of doubt in him that Alex would give it all up if it meant they had a real shot, but can he blame him? He’d left.
“In a heartbeat,” He admits, quietly.
Henry looks to the ceiling, shaking his head.
The silence overtakes them once again.
And then, quiet and hoarse, and a bit like the world is tipping off the edge of a precipice, Henry asks, “And what about now?”
Alex swallows. “What about now?”
“Would you still give it all up?”
Alex blinks once, then nods. Nods again, and then again, tears scorching across his vision. “Is that even a fucking question?” He pushes away from the doorframe and makes his way across the room. “I’ve shown you tonight that I’d die for you, Henry. I think it goes without question that I’d live for you, too.”
Henry gives him a long look. “Right,” he says, eventually. “Then, I think it’s time we leave.”
“What?”
“I’d imagine grandmother is waiting.”
Alex’s heart drops. “Are you fucking kidding me?”
“You’re going to die if we don’t get you proper healthcare and I,” He motions to his face, “Evidently have a, what did you call it? Orbital fracture? She’d hardly be pleased if I didn’t get that taken care of and showed up in public with a fresh scar and no explanation.”
Alex blinks at him. “So that’s it?” He asks. “You make me admit I’m still in love with you and just dismiss it like it’s nothing?”
“It’s not nothing,” Henry says.
“Could’ve fooled me.”
Henry makes a face. “Just—” He shrugs his shoulders helplessly. “Trust me?”
And, well.
Trust never did come easy to a spy, but somehow, when it comes to Henry.
There’s no question.
“Always,” he replies.
Even if it sends him careening off the edge of the world, he’d catch his final breath on his trust in the Prince of Wales, and even if it means the end—well.
At least he had one last chance to say it.
He calls for the extraction thirty minutes outside the city. The helicopter arrives shortly thereafter, and then everything goes by in a haze.
He’s separated from Henry.
They give him a check up.
But all he can think about is the fact that he’s been separated from Henry.
All they’d discussed.
That final declaration—and he’s separated from Henry.
The queen will never let him near him again.
He weaves in and out of consciousness.
He wishes he’d kissed him one last time.
She’s waiting for him once he’s patched up and released. He’s lured away from the exit to an office off to the side of the palace—one he knows all too well. She owes him, but he wouldn’t be surprised if this is another threat—perhaps she’s discovered something new about him to lord over him so that he stays away from her grandson.
But, as much as it pains him to admit, all she needs is June.
And Henry.
She’s got both of them, and there’s nothing he can do. June’s safe so long as he stays away, and Henry will never be his so long as he’s hers.
He’s met with a room full of security, who he could still take, even with one arm.
He contemplates killing her.
Diving across the desk and taking a letter opener or a pen and slashing her throat with it. It won’t be pretty, and it won’t be clean, but it’ll finally be over.
Only, when he walks through the doors—it’s not just the security and the queen he finds.
Sitting in the seat across from the queen is a familiar head of sandy blond hair. He’s got an eyepatch rather than a shoddy bandage job, and probably about a thousand stay the fuck inside declarations to go alongside it. Alex stops at the sight of him, and when Henry turns to look at him, not a hint of the ragged emotions he’d worn the night before on his face, he starts walking again.
“This is unexpected,” he says when he takes the seat next to him.
The queen hums. “Quite.” Her tone is perfunctory; exact. A bit like this wasn’t at all how she planned this conversation.
Almost as if Alex is intruding on a conversation already in progress.
As if to prove his point, Henry turns back to the queen, “As I was saying.”
She ignores him, her wrinkled evil eyes glaring at Alex. “Enough,” she says, waving a hand at Henry without so much as giving him an ounce of her attention. She picks up an envelope and carefully slides it across the desk towards Alex. “Payment. Three times your rate, I believe?”
Alex tilts his head at her, leans forward and slides the envelope back towards her. “You agreed to pay whatever I asked.” He feels it when Henry turns to look at him. “I didn’t ask for three times my rate.”
She clicks her tongue, tapping a perfectly manicured nail against the desk. “And what exactly is it you’re going to ask for?”
Alex resists the urge to ask for quadruple the pay, because there’s so much more than money at risk here. He turns to Henry, silently asking if he should even bother asking.
The corner of Henry’s mouth quirks up as he turns to face his grandmother. “I believe that’s for me to answer.”
“Pardon?”
“You’re going to forget about her,” He says, all the royal authority he’s denied coming straight to the surface. He may have been born the spare, but the role of ruler paints his veins just as thoroughly as it does Mary’s.
“Her?”
“His sister.”
Her gaze snaps back to Alex. “Is that so?”
“It is,” Henry says. “You’re going to forget about Alex, as well.” Alex frowns, gaze flickering between the two of them. “In any capacity other than that of a royal suitor.”
The queen scoffs.
“Or, you’ll find, front page, the news that it took you a week to send appropriate forces to retrieve me from my kidnappers. That I’d been kidnapped, and that money, from this dynasty, was sanctioned to use in the murder of no less than ten people involved in that kidnapping. All without so much as reaching out to the proper authorities.”
“Have you lost your wits?”
Henry smiles at her. “Perhaps,” he says. “But seeing as I was taken and held against my will, I think you’ll have no choice but to forgive that.” He turns to Alex. “Are those agreeable terms?” He asks. “It is your payment I’m negotiating, after all.”
Alex stares at him for a long moment. “Royal suitor?” he asks.
Henry shrugs. “An American might be a bit much for the public to stomach, but that’s their problem, not mine, I’m afraid.”
“Not just an American,” Alex murmurs.
He shrugs again. “They’ll survive.”
“These . . . terms, are not agreeable.”
Henry nods, slapping his hands on his thighs. “No matter, then. The story shall break by morning. So good speaking with you, grandmother, as always.” He moves to stand.
“I’ve told you you’re not to tell a soul—”
Henry leans in, slamming his hands on the edge of her desk. “You left me to rot,” He tells her, the words a hiss between his teeth. “You let your pride leave me in a cell while men beat on me simply because of my relation to your money.” He stands up. “Now that I say that, you’re right. The terms are entirely unagreeable. I think I shall abdicate.”
“Excuse me?”
He turns to look down at Alex. “How do you feel about a vacation?”
Henry shrugs his good shoulder. “Always down for a time at the beach. How about the Maldives?”
“Oh,” Henry’s brow quirks, as he nods. “I’ve never been. I think I’d quite like a bit of time in the sun.”
Alex grins at him, vibrating with pride and hope and something else he can’t quite quantify.
“We are not done here,” The queen admonishes.
Alex turns his grin on her. “I believe,” he says, smug. “You agreed to whatever I asked.”
“This does not—”
“I suppose,” Henry interrupts, raising a finger and tapping his chin. “I could withhold abdication. And the article, if only you’d forget about Alex’s sister, and leave us to live the life we so wish.” He gives her a sharp look. “I’m never going to be king. And, we both know, I’m never going to be the prince you’d like me to be. So, give up. Give up on me being the picture perfect Prince Charming you thought you could mold me into. Just as you gave up on trying to rescue me from those monsters.”
“I did not give up,” She hisses, rising to stand. “As is evidenced by your standing before me now!”
“And yet, it took you a week to call in the person you knew could get the job done.” Henry shakes his head at her. “We’ve set our terms. Take them or leave them.”
For once, Alex doesn’t wish he’d killed her that day she’d forced him to elave—because standing here, watching Henry stand up to her and make demands she never thought him capable—god, that’s so much better.
Watching the queen bend a knee is so much better.
And bend a knee, she does, when she sits back in her chair and motions to one of the men by the door. “You’ll keep the kidnapping a secret,” she says. “You’ll remain the Prince of Wales.”
“And?”
Her upper lip twitches, gaze drifting over the both of them in what he thinks is the closest example of defeat her expression has ever found itself. “You shall have one another for as long as you deem him worthy of your time.”
“And my sister?”
Her jaw clicks side to side. “Is there a sister I should be aware of?” She replies.
Henry looks at Alex, then back to the queen. “I can agree to those terms. Alex?”
Alex grins. “Oh, I can agree to those terms.”
She stares him down for a beat, until the man reenters the room and moves to the side of the desk, a suitcase in hand. “We’ll need it in writing, of course.”
“Of course,” Henry agrees.
“Duh,” Alex says. “Can’t trust anybody these days.”
Except Henry.
He looks to him, his grin fading to something simpler, as Henry watches the lawyer pull out all the equipment needed for a cover up by the monarchy.
He doesn’t have to leave, this time.
And it’s all because of Henry, beautiful, brave, wonderful Henry.
“Let’s begin.”
Hours later, they walk side by side in silence to Henry’s room.
When the door closes behind them, Alex is gently pushed up against it, and Henry presses close to him, hands on either side of his hips. “You’re stuck with me,” he says. “I do hope that’s all right.”
Alex grins up at him, his good arm coming up to wrap around Henry’s waist. “How long until I can propose?” He asks.
Henry’s brow quirks. “It’s been three years since you’ve had me,” He says. “Are you certain you don’t want to wait?”
“I’ve waited long enough.”
Henry’s smile softens, something specially curated for Alex and Alex alone. “Give it some time,” He murmurs, pressing a kiss to Alex’s cheek. “Once we’re healed up and the public has gotten used to my having a suitor, we can . . . discuss.”
Alex nods, tips his chin up.
And then, finally, blissfully their lips meet and the world rights itself for the first time in three years.
There are nightmares and phantom pains and a public with questions and a family with even more, but nothing dulls the truth of it all; the depth of the love shared between them as they cross the palace halls and walk down towards the gardens.
For once, even as Henry works through his ptsd, and Alex through his physical therapy, things are finally looking up.
For once, Alex has everything.
Alex has Henry.
And June is safe.
And his family knows about them, because who could miss a nobody from Texas bagging the Prince of Wales?
He smiles at Henry as he spins him around beneath one of the trees in the garden; their spot, perfect for stargazing in the dead of night.
Tonight, though.
Tonight, it’s perfect for falling to a knee and setting in stone the future they deserve.
Tonight there are no villains out to hurt them, or a public out to dissect them, or a queen out to get them.
Tonight it's just them, their history, and the path to their future.