“Sounds like.” Michael kept his voice deliberately flat.
Darnell was watching them both, his head whipping back and forth as if he were a referee in a tennis match.
“I want you to stay,” she said.
“Then it’s up to you. That temper stays under control.”
“I’ll lose my temper if I want to,” Emma said.
“Fine,” Michael said. “You’ll do it alone.”
Darnell raised his head, his eyes imploring.
“And I’ll take the cat,” Michael said. “Then you won’t have anyone to inflict that temper on.”
He reached for Darnell who crawled toward him like a whipped dog. The cat was a bad actor, but effective. Emma clutched at him as if her life depended on it.
“You can’t take him. He’s my familiar!”
“Why would it matter?” Michael asked. “Your magic is out of control. What difference would a familiar make?”
“He’d keep it from harming anyone.”
Michael looked at Darnell. “Do you believe that?”
Darnell shook his head and pawed at Michael’s arm.
“You can’t take my cat!” Emma said, sounding panicked.
“I can and I will,” Michael said. “He doesn’t deserve this any more than I do. In fact, I think after that lion stunt, he’s suffered enough.”
Darnell was still pawing at his arm. Emma clung to the cat.
“You’re going to make me beg, aren’t you?” she said, and it seemed as if her temper was about to flare again.
“No,” Michael said. “I’m just asking you to show the same kind of self-restraint most grown-ups use.”
“I’m not a child,” she hissed. “I’m older than you.”
“I doubt it,” he said.
“I am,” she said. “Much older. That’s why I’m having this problem.”
“Of an out-of-control temper? That’s a child’s problem, not an adult’s.”
“No!” And then she tilted her head back as if she had said something she shouldn’t have. “Please, Michael. Don’t take Darnell. Stay.”
She was begging, and it clearly embarrassed her. But he was angrier than he had thought he would be.
“All I’m asking, Emma, is that you control your temper.” He made himself speak calmly.
“The thing is,” she said softly, “I don’t know if I can.”
Michael looked at her. “You’ve never learned how to control your temper?”
She shook her head.
“You mean your parents let you run amok?”
“My parents…” She sighed. “Believe me, you wouldn’t understand.”
“Try me.”
She reached across the distance between them and petted Darnell’s head. The cat buried his face in the crook of Michael’s arm.
“How about I say that I’ll do my best to control my temper?”
“Not good enough,” Michael said. “I didn’t do anything except agree to accompany you across country. I’m doing you a favor. It would be polite if you remembered that.”
He said that last with more force than he intended.
She looked up, her eyes wide with wonder. “You’re mad.”
“I guess so.”
“Why can you lose your temper and I can’t?” she asked.
“I haven’t lost mine.” Yet, Michael thought.
“Even though you’re angry.”
“Yes,” he said. “Even though I’m angry.”
“And you want me to be as bloodless as you.”
That stopped him. Darnell tensed in his arms. Apparently she had meant that shot to see if he could control himself.
He made himself smile. “Even more bloodless. For the next few days, Emma, endeavor to be in a good mood.”
Her eyes narrowed even farther. “You’re just like Aethelstan.”
“Who?”
“Aeth—the man I was promised to.”
“Was?”
“Never mind,” she said.
“What did he do?”
“Tried to take over my life!” she snapped.
“And that’s why you ended the relationship?”
“Yes,” she said.
Michael leaned as close to her as he could without dropping Darnell. “I don’t want to take over your life. I want to get out of your life as quickly as possible. I want to get you to Oregon like I promised, with a minimum of fuss, and a minimum of grief.”
Emma rolled her eyes. “Would it help to say I’m sorry?”
“No,” he said.
She glared at him.
“Your choice, Emma,” he said. “Do I stay or do I leave?”
She lowered her head and mumbled something.
“What?” he asked.
She frowned. “Stay.”
“On my terms,” he said.
“On your terms,” she said.
Somehow her acquiescence didn’t make him feel as good as he thought it would. He had an odd sense that he had just made the situation worse.
“Well, then,” he said. “Let’s get on the road. Is it my turn to drive?”
“It may never be your turn to drive,” she muttered.
Michael grinned. For some reason, he was relieved that she hadn’t called his bluff. Deep down, he hadn’t wanted to leave.
And he wasn’t sure why.
Chapter 8
Emma closed the hotel room door and leaned on it, the emergency exit instructions stabbing her in the middle of her spine. Darnell was in the center of the room, sniffing the floor as if he were memorizing it. Ahead of her, there was a queen-sized bed with an ugly green and blue spread, a dresser with a TV on top of it, and a table with two chairs. Her suitcase sat on the holder in the closet, and Darnell’s litter box in the bathroom. His food and water dishes were under the table, and his oh-so-precious bed was beside the only upholstered chair in the room.
Finally. Privacy. She’d been thinking about it all day. How she needed time alone so that she could scream and kick and let out all that frustration from the argument that morning.
But now that she was here—in Sioux Falls, South Dakota, of all places—she was too tired to kick anything. She had no idea that reigning in her temper took so much energy. Her hands were sore from gripping the steering wheel hard. She had teeth marks on the inside of her cheeks from biting back comments—especially when the good professor changed the radio station away from the Brewers game to find All Things Considered—and her shoulders hurt from general tension.
The next few days were going to be the hardest of her life.
At least no magic had erupted today. So far.
She went into the bathroom and washed her face. When she had left the front desk, triumphantly holding her own key, Michael was still talking to the clerk about restaurants. His obsession with food would drive her insane. They had driven all over some small Minnesota town to find an authentic Norwegian restaurant for lunch, and the place smelled faintly of lutefisk, and had a buffet that looked as if it hadn’t changed in decades.
Most of the foods were covered in gravies so thick she could hear her arteries clogging, and the only thing that passed for vegetables—at least that she recognized—was the relish tray the waitress had left on the table when she took the order.
That was not what Emma had had in mind when she agreed to Michael’s food terms. But he had seemed like he was enjoying himself.
He had enjoyed himself since they crossed the Mississippi.
She used the thin terry-cloth washrag to wipe her face, pushing so hard that her skin was red. She hated being in the position of needing him more than he needed her.
Magic did that to her. Magic had done it to her before. When she had awakened from h
er coma, she had been at the mercy of Nora, Aethelstan, and all the other people who wanted to help her. She had needed their help, because she had no idea how to survive in this century.
Now she did know—information gained at great effort and cost—and she had to give up all her hard-won independence because her magic had come twenty years early.
She did owe Darnell an apology. She had never treated him as badly as she had today. As she drove, listening to the damn news instead of the baseball game, she had wondered what really had gotten into her.
And what she kept coming back to was the warmth in Michael’s gaze after she had slipped. He had been laughing—not at her, but fondly, the way a person did when he thought the joke was being shared with a friend.
She couldn’t afford to be his friend. He was too good-looking for that. And she didn’t like the way she felt around him.
So she got angry. It was easier than letting him get close.
She hung the washcloth on the shower bar, and dried off her face. No man could get close to her. She’d resigned herself to that long ago. So, if she were being honest with herself (and she saw no reason not to be) then she had to admit she had tried to anger Michael to keep him away from her. Far away from her.
She walked out of the bathroom to find Darnell sitting in front of the door connecting her room and Michael’s. Darnell was staring at the door as if he could open it just with the power of his mind.
He had never pined for anyone like that before—except her.
“He’s not coming in here,” Emma said.
Darnell’s ears twitched but he didn’t move.
“We’re going to have some privacy.”
Darnell’s ears went flat.
“I believe that you and I could use some time alone.”
A shiver ran down Darnell’s back. An elegant, on-purpose shiver.
She crouched. The damn cat was going to get her to apologize again. He was manipulating her worse than he usually did.
At that moment, someone knocked. At first she looked at the main door, the door to the hallway, but Darnell hadn’t moved.
The knock came again. From the connecting door.
She sighed, and stood, her knees cracking as she did so. The man wasn’t going to leave them alone.
“What?” she asked, hoping her tone would turn him away.
“I found us a really great restaurant. It’s not far from here.”
“I’m having room service,” she said. “With Darnell.”
“Good luck,” Michael said. “The hotel’s kitchen is closed for renovation.”
Great. Well, if she had control of her powers, she’d sweep her arm over the place, finish the renovations, and fill the place with the best chefs possible.
If she had control over her powers. Which she decidedly did not.
She sighed. She was starving. The lunch buffet had annoyed her rather than fill her up.
“You know,” Michael said, “it would be easier to talk through an open door.”
“This thing is locked,” Emma said sweetly. “You need a special key.”
As she finished her sentence, she heard a key turn in the lock. Darnell’s ears perked up and his tail twitched. Traitor. Had Nora felt like this when Darnell had switched his alliance from her to Emma?
Michael pushed the door open. He had put on a different shirt—a blue one, which suited his blue eyes and blond hair. He smiled. Darnell walked up to him and rubbed on his leg.
Michael looked at her, eyebrows raised. “What did I do to deserve this?”
“It’s probably what you didn’t do,” she said.
“True enough,” Michael said. “Look, I’m hungry, and I’d like dinner, and I’d love it if you come along.”
Darnell was winding his way around Michael’s legs and purring so hard that no one—not even the desk clerk two buildings down—could miss his joy.
Little manipulator.
“What about Darnell?” she asked.
“What about him?”
“We can’t just leave him here.”
“Why not?”
“Because it’s a strange place.”
“A strange place with windows that don’t open and a door that locks.”
“That other people have a key to.”
Michael stared at her for a moment. “You think someone will open this door and steal Darnell while we’re at dinner.”
She flushed again. Damn him. He twisted everything. “No,” she said. “I think someone will open this door to do some maidly thing and Darnell will run through it, escaping into a strange world he’s never seen before.”
Amusement flickered across Michael’s face—the same kind of amusement that had so angered her that morning. He was laughing at her again. He thought she was ridiculous.
Well, maybe she was, but Darnell—for all his quirks and manipulations—had been her closest friend for ten years. Her best friend.
This time, though, Emma didn’t say anything. And after a moment, Michael nodded.
“Here’s what we’ll do,” he said. “You put a Do Not Disturb sign on the door, push the privacy button, and put on the chain lock, and then we’ll leave through my room.”
She was about to protest—after all the hotel had a key to the connecting door—when she realized she was just being silly. Yes, they had a key, but they had no reason to use it. Darnell would be safe.
“He howls when he’s alone,” she said.
“Leave the TV on. Someone’ll think you’re watching a bad movie.”
She grinned. She couldn’t help it. She had never had help with Darnell before.
“All right,” she said.
Darnell sat down, ears back, glaring at her as if she had betrayed him yet again.
“Be good,” she said to him, “and I’ll bring you back something tasty.”
He turned his head away. Finicky to the last.
“Ready?” Michael asked.
“Let me get my purse,” she said.
Michael picked up Darnell, who didn’t struggle, but who didn’t look at him either. Emma put out the Do Not Disturb, double-locked the door, and turned on the television to some smash-’em-up cable movie with lots of explosions and car chases. That would drown out Darnell—at least for part of the evening.
Emma went through the connecting door. Michael gently tossed Darnell inside her room, put his foot out to guard in case Darnell tried to escape, and closed the door.
They had done it.
On cue, a loud wail started behind the door.
“He always does that?” Michael said.
Emma nodded.
“Do me a favor,” Michael said. “When we get back, stay in your room tonight. I don’t want to break a cat’s heart more than once a day.”
She smiled back, and let herself out of Michael’s room. Darnell’s howls seemed softer in the hallway. Almost inaudible. Now, if there wasn’t anyone in the room on the other side of her, she’d be just fine.
They walked to the car, and Michael got in the driver’s side. She didn’t protest. He was, after all, the one who had heard of the restaurant. Besides, she was more tired than she wanted to admit. Even though they hadn’t gone as far as she had wanted to, they had still driven a pretty full day. Michael had felt it would be easier to find a hotel that took a cat in a city the size of Sioux Falls rather than in some place like Murdo or Pukwana. Emma knew from experience that he was right.
Now that they were off the highway, Emma was pleased to discover that Sioux Falls was a pretty city. Spring gave everything a nice green touch. Flowers, planted around every house and near every important building, added a riot of color.
Michael drove them past a number of Victorian homes, many of them painted bright col
ors. This was a city that would be lovely even in the winter. The Big Sioux River was as much a presence here as the lakes were in Madison. In fact, the mixture of colleges, universities, and growing private industry reminded Emma of her adopted home town. The side streets that Michael turned the car onto reminded her of State Street, with funky shops that catered to students, bookstores on every corner, and restaurants crammed together like strands in a loom.
She felt more at home here than she had thought possible.
Michael found a small parking place and somehow got the car to fit into it. Emma fished in her pocket for money to feed the parking meter, but Michael stopped her. Everything shut down here after six, apparently. Even the parking was free.
People rode by on bicycles and couples strolled down the sidewalk. A group of students sat on the sidewalk in front of a nearby café, drinking lattes and playing backgammon. A woman bent over another part of the sidewalk, long skirts trailing behind her as she made a chalk drawing on the concrete. Her hands were stained and her face was lined with chalk dust.
Michael went around the drawing instead of stepping over it like all the other pedestrians had. Emma was touched by his considerateness—considerateness that seemed to be something he did without any thought at all.
The restaurant he led her into wasn’t as funky as the others. It called itself a brasserie, and it was done in rich woods. The tables were covered with linen cloths and, although there were students in the bar, the people farther inside seemed to be older—professors and businesspeople. Emma scanned the price list, and suddenly understood why.
Michael gave the maître d’ his name, and they were immediately led to a table near the window. Through the lace curtains, Emma could see the street—with all its quirks. The maître d’ gave them leather-bound menus, and then left so quickly that for a moment, Emma thought she had made him vanish.
“I didn’t expect anything like this,” she said.
“See why we couldn’t bring Darnell?” Michael asked with a grin.
“Oh,” she said, “put a bow-tie on him and he’d fit right in.”
Michael grinned at her, then picked up the wine list that the maître d’ had left behind. “Mind if I do the ordering?”
Emma looked at the list. Even though Aethelstan and Nora had tried to teach her about the finer points of wine, Emma felt that spirits were spirits were spirits. She had learned how to read, write, and do higher math; she had learned everything from world history to running a computer. She did not feel that she needed to know the difference between one company’s cabernet and another’s blush.
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