His expression clouded and she didn’t have to read minds to know he wasn’t happy at being asked to put the weapon aside.
She spoke quickly. “Just until we get to the interstate. The last thing we need is for some local cop to stop us for speeding and see you sitting there with a big honking sword on your lap.”
“It would not be on my lap.”
“Exactly. In the bag, please. Trust me on this. If we want to put some distance between us and this house, a few precautions are wise.”
Dragan gave her a grudging nod. “I will trust your judgment in this, as you know this world better than I.”
Maeve started to agree, but he wasn’t finished.
“But I will learn,” he added firmly.
“I bet you will,” she muttered, closed her big suitcase, and dragged it to the floor, then raced into the bathroom to throw every bottle of everything she owned into her small vanity case. That done, she moved back to the tiny sitting room, where she swept up the few personal photos she had sitting on the desk, caught up her laptop, and turned to find Dragan right behind her.
“Is it difficult to leave this place?” he asked, showing an unexpected care for her feelings, when probably all he wanted was to get the fuck away from this prison as fast as possible.
She walked back to the bedroom, and he followed. “Not really,” she admitted. “I liked it, for a while at least. It’s a beautiful house, filled with all manner of fascinating objects. But now, I’m ready to leave.” She looked up with a smile. “You can carry the big suitcase. But I’ll take the sword, if you want.”
“Not likely,” he scoffed. Picking up the suitcase in one hand, and the bag with the weapons in the other, he strode through the sitting room and into the hallway.
“Keys,” Maeve muttered, and scooped them off the dresser. As she did, her chest tightened with emotion. Part of it was concern over what she was being forced to leave behind—especially the books. There was also anxiety over whether she was doing the right thing, but even that was overlaid with a sprinkling of excitement. This was a bona fide quest. She’d lived so much of her life through virtual reality, and the dreams that followed, for so long. But this was real. Dragan—the tortured warrior—and her—the bookish heroine who freed him—running for their lives from an evil sorcerer. She wasn’t naïve or foolish enough to buy completely into the fantasy. She wasn’t sure she believed magic existed, or whether Mr. Sotiris was evil, or just an asshole.
But he certainly didn’t wish anything good for Dragan. And if he caught up to them, who knew what he’d do? Not only to Dragan, but her. She’d stolen his rock. A bubble of completely inappropriate laughter tried to escape. His rock. Right.
“Okay, Maeve,” she scolded. “If you’re going to do this, then let’s go.” Walking out to the sitting room, she shoved her small purse into her laptop bag, slung it over her shoulder, and held out a hand to Dragan who was holding both her cases. “I can take the small one. You don’t have to—”
He didn’t roll his eyes, but she could tell he wanted to. “Fine. You carry this.” He handed her the small suitcase, which she promptly dropped to the floor and pulled up the handle, so it would roll. Dragan was already out the door and striding for the stairs, carrying the heavy suitcase in one hand, as if it weighed nothing.
“Show-off,” she muttered and followed, taking the time to lock her bedroom door, though she didn’t know why. Habit mostly. The same habit that had her setting the house alarm when she led him through the kitchen and out the back door. “This way.” She dragged the wheeled suitcase over the gravel behind the house to the three-car garage, which used to be a stable. She was the only one who parked here. Sotiris left his car on the concrete circle drive in front of the house when he visited, since he never stayed long.
Entering the garage through the side door, she flicked open the lock on her small SUV, then walked around to open the back hatch. “You can toss everything in here,” she said, collapsing the handle and sliding the small case into the cargo space.
Following her instructions, he literally threw the huge, heavy suitcase inside.
“Where were you on my last trip to Europe?” she asked admiringly.
“In that house, encased in stone.”
She shot him a suspicious glance. There hadn’t been the tiniest hint of teasing or sarcasm in his reply, but the look he gave her was a touch too innocent. Hmm. The handsome warrior was getting his mojo back.
“You go on that side,” she ordered, then realized he might not know how to get into a car. Following him to the passenger side, she opened the door and gestured inside. “You can put the sword in the back seat . . . or keep it with you,” she amended, as he pulled the sword out of the duffle, slid it between his seat and the console, then threw the bag on the back seat. “Put it on the floor in back if we get pulled over, okay? But don’t worry. We probably won’t. I’m a good driver.”
“I don’t know what that means.” He sighed and looked around.
She walked to the driver’s side, slid behind the wheel, and reached over to pat his shoulder. “You’ll catch up.” She opened the garage door with the press of a button, then showed Dragan how to manage the seat belt, and fastened her own. “There’s going to be some noise now. It’s just the engine,” she warned, then put her hand over his where it lay on his thigh. Everything she took for granted, virtually everything about living in this century, this decade, would be completely foreign to him. She doubted Sotiris had bothered to keep him up to date on anything other than his personal victories, and lies about the fate of Dragan’s friends. And maybe some of those weren’t lies at all, she thought. The first thing she’d do once they reached a safe place—or at least as safe as she could make it—would be to search for information on the warriors he called his brothers and their leader, Nicodemus. Dragan deserved that much, at least. She didn’t know if they were real or just a figment of his imagination. It was very possible they’d all died in the same battle where he’d been cursed, and he’d dreamed up their survival, as a way to keep himself sane over the centuries of his imprisonment.
But if they were real, and if by some chance they weren’t still trapped in their own prisons, then she’d find them. It was what she was good at.
“You ready?” she asked.
His fingers, which had curled around hers on his thigh, loosened, and he nodded. “Where will you go? Sotiris is very powerful. And he’ll have like-minded allies who will look for us.”