Page 59 of The Heart of the King

“Not right now. It looks like I thought it did.”

“Can I detach it from the bottom of the shelf so I can get to it more easily?” David asked, trying to shift into a better position.

Captain Phillips hesitated. “Since I’m not there to actually see and feel it, I’m going to say no for now. Video chat is better than audio, but there’s no replacement for being there. Something you might overlook as not important could be. If I have you feel around it, you might not feel something I would because I’m trained to.”

“Understood.” Maybe there ought to be a bomb dismantling course for future monarchs. He needed to sit through some classes later on.

Captain Phillips asked question after question. David gave him all of the answers as best he could, moving the phone as needed and providing more detail than a front-facing camera was capable of.

“Okay, I’m going to need you to get into the best position you can to remove or cut some wires.” Captain Phillips looked concerned, but he couldn’t be more concerned than David felt. He figured the security teams outside were even more worried. Sounds of banging on metal told him they were still trying to get the door open.

David took off his coat and rolled up his sleeves. He wrapped his coat around Hazel who was shivering despite the warmth in the room.

“Here you go,” he said softly. “That will help keep you warmer.”

“Thank you, Davey.” She pulled the lapels around her and burrowed herself into it as much as she could.

He looked at her and brushed her now-disheveled hair off her face. “We’re going to be all right, Hazel. I won’t leave you.”

“Even if they get the door open?” Her voice sounded smaller than he’d ever heard.

“Even if,” he promised. “They’d have to drag me out of here, and I won’t let them.” He pressed a kiss to her forehead. “I’ll do everything I can to get us out of here safely.”

Maybe it wasn’t the right thing to say. Maybe he should have promised he’d get them out rather than only saying he’d do everything he could. But he couldn’t promise that. Not when he had no idea what he was doing.

Captain Phillips walked him through finding the blasting caps. “You’ll need to pull those out of the explosives very carefully.”

“I don’t think I can get a good angle on them.” David twisted his arm and tilted his head a bit more. “I can’t get to them.”

“Okay. Do you have access to a pair of scissors?” Captain Phillips asked.

David pulled his knife back out and opened the scissors. “I have the ones on my pocket knife.”

“Those should work.” Captain Phillips didn’t sound too certain. “Simply cut the wires leading into the detonators.”

Simply? He made it sound so easy.

He scooted around some more and twisted a bit, shining the flashlight on the bomb.

A quick swipe of his forehead with the back of his arm, and David took a deep breath.

Time to go for broke.

This had to work. Hazel would never know the difference if it didn’t. Neither would he. Not with their proximity to the device.

But Jasmine...

She’d never know he was falling in love with her.

He reached out with the scissors on his pocket knife and cut.

21

They weren’t being told to get on the smaller boat yet.

Jazz took that as a good sign.

She didn’t know for sure if it really was one. The ship rolled worse than it had before. The smaller ship would be much more dangerous in even semi-rough seas, though it would be better than a yacht with a hole blown in it.

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