She smiled and slowly slid to the ground. I helped her get her jeans back on before stuffing myself back in my pants and picking up her bag, which she’d dropped when we’d gotten busy.
“I don’t know what we’re supposed to do now,” she said with a soft laugh as we walked back towards the street.
“My last day is the thirtieth of November, so I don’t know what you want to do about your job and everything, but if you stay here, we won’t see much of each other until we leave. I’ll have to figure out the process of bringing you to the U.S. legally, whether you need a visa or if we need to get married first or something else.”
“Okay.”
We headed down a side street a few blocks away from the café and I looked around. “Where are we going?”
“I rent a room in a house at the end of the street.”
“Oh.” I looked around, thinking this wasn’t the safest street for her to be walking down by herself late at night, but I figured I’d keep my mouth shut. I knew her well enough to know that would annoy her. I’d have to find a way to be less overprotective going forward, but it was going to be hard.
“Do you think I’d be able to go to university in the U.S.?” she asked me.
“I don’t see why not. You might have to take a bunch of placement tests because your records from Limaj might not translate to the appropriate scores or whatever, but yeah.”
“It’s expensive, though, isn’t it? It’s not free like it is here?”
“Going to college can get expensive, but it’s not like you’re going to Harvard. University of Nevada won’t be too bad once we establish residency in the state.”
“How far is Las Vegas from where your family is?” she asked.
“It’s pretty far. We’d have to fly to get there.”
She seemed thoughtful. “Do you like Las Vegas?”
“I have a job there, which is important, because health insurance can be really expensive, so having a job that provides it isn’t optional. Especially if we want kids, and we’d have it right away if I went to work for Westfield & Carruthers.”
“So many logistics,” she murmured.
“It’ll be fine. There will probably be an adjustment period for you, but even though we’ve just talked about a lot of negatives, there are a lot of great things about the U.S.”
“I’ll get to talk on the phone to Nicola whenever I want.” She grinned. “Without paying a fortune.”
“Yup. And you can fly out to Florida to visit, too.”
“How far is the flight from here to Las Vegas?” she asked.
“About twelve or thirteen hours in the air.”
“That’s long,” she said, unlocking a side door and letting us into a tiny but functional room.
“It is,” I acknowledged, looking around. It was one big room with a double bed on one wall, a small kitchen with a hot plate, microwave and mini-refrigerator, a table with two chairs, a worn recliner, a dresser, a tall wardrobe I assumed was for hanging clothes, and a door that probably led to a bathroom. That was it.
I hated that she’d chosen to live like this rather than stay in Hiskale, but I understood her need to get as far away as she could from what she considered a huge betrayal by almost everyone in her life. That was something else we were going to have to talk about, but not tonight. We’d just gotten back together, just gotten engaged, and I didn’t want to get into anything like that. There were a few things we had to talk about right away, though.
“I have to leave early in the morning,” I told her. “We’re really short-staffed now that Natalia’s gone and—”
“Where did Natalia go?” she asked, frowning.
“She started her six months in Iraq early. It’s an exchange program but the guy they sent is really a fish out of water. Doesn’t know anything about our customs, the language, palace protocol, stuff like that, so mostly he gets duty assignments inside the palace, like keeping an eye on Luke. Lennox is in absolute hell; she’s still puking her brains out but at least now we know why.”
“Why? Is she okay?” Her face was filled with concern, despite how angry she claimed to be with everyone.
“Twins.”
Her eyes rounded. “Oh my god.”
“Yeah, she and Sandor are excited but pretty freaked out. And she’s dragging. They were figuring a due date in late April but twins tend to come early so now they’re thinking early April and they’re scrambling to figure out how they’re going to do it all.”
She didn’t respond to that and started to get undressed. “I’m going to take a shower. Coming?”
“Yeah, sure.”
We definitely were going to have to talk about her relationship with everyone back at the palace, just not tonight.
I got up at the ass crack of dawn and headed back to Hiskale. I had to be there for the morning briefing because we were too short-staffed for me to miss any more work than I already had. My leaving had been a huge blow to Erik but he’d understood. He empathized with how Solange felt and didn’t begrudge me the happiness I’d found with her. Sandor had been less understanding, wanting to reach out to her, try to explain why he’d handled things the way he had. I’d convinced him that would only make things worse but part of me wished he would. Not only was I leaving a job I loved, I had deep friendships with the other Protectors and it would be hard to keep up with them once I left for Vegas.
“You’re late,” Sandor deadpanned as I walked in at two minutes after nine.
I flipped him the bird. “Traffic.”
I moved to pour a cup of coffee and realized they were all staring at me. I turned slowly, coffee cup at my lips. “What?” I asked.
“I swear to god,” Lennox muttered, “I will kick your ass into the middle of next week if you don’t tell us every detail.”
Everyone knew why I’d taken last night off.
I quirked up one side of my mouth. “We’re back together.”
“Yay!” A cheer went up around the room.
Except for Sandor.
He looked annoyed.
Lennox nudged him. “Stop being an ass. He loves her. Are you saying you wouldn’t have moved heaven and earth to get me back?”
“You wouldn’t have made me sacrifice an oath I took to serve my king,” he said.
“You didn’t call me a traitor and turn your back on me,” she shot back.
He didn’t say anything.
I hated this but I didn’t know what to do. I wasn’t willing to give her up and I’d done what I needed to do to keep her.
“What if I talked to her?” Erik asked. “Maybe coming from me, maybe even bringing Levi with me, to appeal to her maternal instincts… For her to get a sense of the panic I feel every time there’s a threat to my family?”
I shrugged. “I don’t know.”
“I don’t want to do anything that might impact your relationship,” he said quietly. “So you have to guide me here.”
“I don’t think it will. She’s staying in Voda for the rest of the month, though, until the café where she’s working closes for the winter and to settle things at the jewelry store and with her landlord. Then she’s going to move in with her parents at the inn until it’s time for us to move.”