“You’ve used her.”

“And you,” Armand agreed. “And others. The picture’s too large, too complex to bring it down to the kidnapping of my daughter. Her Serene Highness Gabriella de Cordina was abducted. My actions are as a result.”

“Why did you ask me here?”

“Because I could trust you, as I told you in the beginning. Because I was aware that you’d soon tire of sitting on the sidelines. You’d think, you’d assimilate, and eventually you’d act. I had no intention of allowing you to act until the time was right. It nearly is.”

“Why in hell are you leaving her in the dark?” Reeve demanded. “Don’t you know how she suffers?”

“You think I don’t know how she suffers?” Armand’s voice rose, his eyes flared. In his youth he’d been known and feared for his lethal temper. For a moment, the control of twenty years nearly slipped away. “She’s my child. My first child. I held her hands as she learned to walk, sat by her bed when she was restless with fever, wept with her by her mother’s grave.”

Rigid, Armand rose to stride to the window. There he leaned out, his fingers digging into the wood of the sill. “What I do,” he said more calmly, “I do because I must. I love her no less.”

If he believed nothing else, Reeve believed that. “She needs to know it.”

Pride and regret moved through the prince, but above all, was responsibility. “The mind is a delicate thing, Reeve, and we’re still so ignorant of it. Gabriella, for all her strength, all her will, isn’t able to overcome her mind’s decision not to remember. If you thought differently, why haven’t you told her what you suspect? Who you suspect?”

“She needs time,” Reeve began, and Armand turned back to him.

“Yes. I can do nothing more than give it to her. I’m advised, strongly advised, by Dr. Kijinsky that if Gabriella is told everything before her mind is ready to hear it, understand it, accept it, the shock might cause a breakdown. Her mind might refuse ever to remember.”

“She’s begun to remember bits and pieces.”

“A button’s pushed and the mind reacts.” Armand continued to move the white rock in his palm. “You’ve studied enough to know. But if I were to tell her everything I know or suspect, it might be too much, an avalanche. As a father, I have to wait. As ruler of Cordina, I have ways of learning or discovering what I need to know. Yes, I know who took her, and why.” Something fierce came into his eyes. The hunter, or the hunted, would understand it. “But the time isn’t right. To have them, I need time. As someone who worked closely with—shall we say, governmental intrigue in Washington—you understand. No need to deny,” he went on before Reeve could form a response. “I’m well aware of the work you did.”

“I was a cop.”

“And more,” Armand said with a nod. “But we’ll leave it at that. You understand that as a ruler I must have absolute proof before I make an accusation. I can’t show the weakness of a father in rage over his child; I must be a judge seeking justice. There are some close to me who believe that because of my position I’m not aware of the maneuvers, the bribes, the false loyalties that swim under the surface of my reign. I’m content that they stay unaware. There are some who might think because I have Gabriella back that I wouldn’t look further into the motive for her kidnapping. One of the ransom demands was the release of several prisoners. All but one was camouflage. There was only one—Deboque.”