That kicked Kris square in the gut. Months. Mark had known about Frankie for months.
“What the hell, Mark?” Tommy leaned forward in disbelief. “Why didn’t you tell us?”
“She asked me not to.” Mark glanced at Tommy, features pained. “I’ve tried to convince her to talk to Kris—so many times—but she’s refused.”
“You should have told me anyway.” Kris spoke quietly, but his words shook.
“I—” Mark stared at him, stricken. “It was complicated.”
No, it wasn’t.
“You knew I’d been trying to reach her.” Kris pushed off the stall door, outrage swelling in his veins. “That I was struggling without her. And you’re defending yourself?”
Mark half-turned away before turning back, looking harassed. “I promised her.”
“You know what she means to me!” The words seemed to cut his throat on the way out. “I’m your brother! Your first promise is to me. You know how badly I—” Kris swiftly spun around and pounded his fist against the stall.
“I wasn’t supposed to find out,” Mark said behind him.
“But you did find out.” Kris spun back to him. “You found out and you didn’t tell me. I’ve been going crazy. I’d have thought that after Ava, all these months of not being able to contact her, not knowing where she was, you’d know how it feels.” The agitation; the anguish. “I’ve found myself literally trying to pull my hair out from missing her—and you’ve known she’s been right here!”
The following silence was strained. Tommy shifted, running a hand over his face. Mark shot a glance toward the stable door.
“She got Ava out,” he murmured.
Kris stilled. What?
Tommy stood slowly, frowning. “What do you mean?”
“It’s why she made me promise.” Mark’s blue eyes were so earnest, Kris almost had to look away. “Philip doesn’t know. Neither does anyone on her team. She could have lost her job. She planned the escape, coordinated it, and single-handedly erased the evidence. The only reason I found out about Frankie at all is because there were complications on the night, and she had to intervene. She got Ava out,” he repeated, gesturing helplessly toward the mansion, toward his fiancée. “I owed it to Frankie to keep her secret. I’ve hated every second of lying to you, but that’s . . . why I did it.”
Kris leaned back against the stall, this time for the support. “Why?”
His brother understood. “She’s head of security—she saw everything and pieced together Ava’s situation. You know how messed up it was. Frankie visited Ava one morning and told her she was going to get her out so she could be with Darius. And she did.”
Frankie had rescued Ava.
Frankie had risked her own back to help a visiting princess—a woman she didn’t know. All the while, she’d hid from him.
Kris slid down the stall until he was sitting with his face pressed into his hands. He felt dazed. “I don’t know what to think.”
Tommy lowered himself onto the dirt-packed floor beside him and admitted, “This does change a few things.”
Mark joined them, nudging Kris with his boot. “She’s still our Frankie, you know?”
The woman Mark had just described was every bit his best friend, but the woman who’d stood hard-hearted in his room last night, and who’d sat opposite him in the car—was that still his Frankie? He wished he knew.
Frankie was positioned a respectful distance away from the stables with Hanna and Peter. They were murmuring an easy conversation behind her, results from a big football game, and Tommy’s guards were taking the opportunity to catch up with a few members of Mark’s security on the far side of the stables. Despite the warmth of a hot summer’s day in the making, Frankie was cold clean through.
The drive here had been torture. Tommy’s stony questions and Kris’s hostile silence had been made worse by the truth behind this visit. Frankie had come between these brothers.
Throat thick, she turned at a movement from the mansion. Ava had emerged in a bumblebee-yellow dress and was making her way toward them across the hillside on the pebbled path. Darius, her three-year-old boy, was at her side. Black-haired and olive-skinned, they looked so alike Frankie ached.
Ava was different to when they’d first met, and it had nothing to do with that pixie haircut. Her posture was less rigid; her spine no longer a coiled spring. Her gait was smoother, her features relaxed.
Nearing, she waved to Frankie, gesturing her over, and Frankie lifted a hand in return, intentionally misunderstanding. Her goal was to blend with the guards, not expose herself beside the stunning and sophisticated Princess of Kelehar. Standing beside Ava made Frankie feel like scrawled graffiti on an otherwise unspoiled white fence.
Besides, her sense of inferiority was already off the charts today.
“Frankie,” Ava called, gesturing again. “Join us.”
God, okay. Striding out to meet them, Frankie tried to think of something to discuss. She’d never been a fan of small talk. The only possible purpose of asking a question when she didn’t care about the answer was to establish a subject for the next time she was obliged to ask a question when she wouldn’t care about the answer.
“Your Highness.” Frankie bowed before sliding a hand in the back pocket of her jeans. She glanced at Darius, who was blinking up at her from where he stood slightly behind the long skirt of Ava’s dress, holding a book in one hand. “Hello there,” she said, clueless about how to greet a small child. “You okay?”
He smiled.
“You’re not.” Ava was eyeing her with a frown. “You look terrible.”
Fantastic. Criticism on her appearance from a goddess. “Cheers.”
Ava gave a small roll of her eyes. “I was intending to convey sympathy.”
“Needs work.”
The woman sighed, but there was a smile hidden in there somewhere. “I’d like to invite you to my bridal shower next week.”
“Invite me to—” Frankie cut off with a baffled frown. “Why?”
“Because I’d like you there,” Ava answered, studying her. Then she reached back, gently touching Darius on the shoulder and steering him forward. “He wanted to say hello. He talks about you.”
Startled, Frankie deflected. “All bad things, I’m sure.”
“No bad things,” the princess said firmly. “He remembers you taking control that night. Remembers you sending him away with me.” She paused, arching an amused brow. “He also remembers that you were eating pizza.”
“Now that’s the kind of memory you keep close,” Frankie said, not sure what else to say. She offered the kid a grin and he returned it.
Oh, man. The trust in his smile physically hurt.
“He likes you.” Ava toyed with the gold engagement ring on her finger. “Don’t you, Darius?”
“Yes,” he said.
“Um.” Frankie gave a nod. “Awesome. Thanks.”
Ava cleared her throat, tilting her head downward pointedly.
Swallowing, Frankie knelt and softened at the boy’s closeness. He didn’t hug her, but stepped in and rested a hand on her leg as he held up the book. “I have a new book.”