“But then, that’s the difference between the adventure in a romance novel and the adventure in other kinds of stories. Romance novels aren’t stories about conquering, they are ultimately stories about surrendering. The bravery that the heroine expresses in a romance novel is not to crush the hero and bind him to her will. Instead, the stories claim that the only path to truth happiness is to allow the hero total control over the heroine’s body and emotions. She struggles, because it is irrational for her to trust the hero, but only when he forces her to let him in do the two of them get to the next level in their relationship. They both have to surrender to each other. The hero surrenders his beast, his wildness, and chooses domestication, and the heroine surrenders as well, physically and emotionally. And it’s this dual surrender that brings about the happy ending, because they learn to rely on each other.”
* * *
Dana watched as the students filtered out of the lecture hall. She’d found Larissa’s class engrossing, and possibly all of it had hit somewhat too close to home. She didn’t know what to make of her relationship with Cole these days. And she had to face the fact that it was a relationship, however unconventional.
When the students were gone, Cole got up, and she followed his lead.
They made their way down the aisle to the front of the room, where Larissa was gathering her things up and putting them into her bag. When she crossed over to her podium, she saw them, and her eyes widened.
“Hey, Larissa,” said Cole.
“Cole?” Larissa said in a tiny voice. “Cole Randall? Oh my God.” She started to shake. She looked terrified.
“Listen,” he said, “I know I’m dropping in on you out of nowhere, but—”
Larissa screamed. “Help! Help me, someone help me!”
Dana was stunned. Wasn’t this person supposed to be on their side?
Larissa took off across the room, heading for the aisle on the other side of the room. She was still screaming.
Cole made an annoyed face. “Larissa, can you please calm down?”
“Help me! I need—” Larissa fell down on the steps, her voice dying in her throat.
Cole had shot her with one of the tranq guns. He glowered at her motionless form.
Dana shut her eyes. “Jesus, Cole.”
Cole scratched the back of his neck. “Well, I guess I haven’t really spoken to her since I was splashed all over the news as a serial killer. I guess she’s kind of freaked out.”
“Seems like it.” Dana started to walk back up the aisle, heading for the door.
“Where are you going?” said Cole.
“We should get out of here, right?”
“No way,” said Cole. “I just need to talk to her. She’s going to help us out once she understands the situation.”
“Talk to her? You just shot her.”
“With a tranquilizer dart.” Cole strode over to Larissa and gathered her into his arms. He stood up. “Go check the hallway and see if there’s anyone out there.”
Dana’s jaw dropped. “You have got to be kidding.”
“Dana, how long have you known me? Do I kid?”
She sighed. She stalked across the room, went over to the other door and stuck her head outside. “There are tons of people in the hallway.”
“Well, give it a little bit. They’re all still switching classes.” Cole carried Larissa’s motionless body up to where Dana was standing. He set her down in one of the chairs.
Together, they watched the hallway.
Cole was right. Within several minutes, the hallway cleared.
He hoisted Larissa back into his arms. “Get the door.”
Dana did as she was told, but she didn’t understand what the heck was going on.
He stole out into the hallway. Dana followed him. He carried Larissa down the hallway and around a corner until they came to a door marked Dr. Larissa Fielding. Cole nodded at the doorknob. Dana tried it, and the door opened.
They went through the door and found themselves in a cluttered office. There was a desk along one wall, covered with papers and post-it notes. Cole set Larissa down in the desk chair. Then he bent over the computer, moving the mouse until the screen came to life.
Dana looked from Cole to Larissa. “Cole, what are you doing?”
Cole clicked things on the screen. “Hold on, let me just find her email client.”
Dana drew a hand over her face. “This is crazy, Cole. This is the opposite of lying low, you realize that?”
“There,” said Cole, obviously ignoring her. “Let’s see, has she sent any emails to her assistant today? Yeah, very good. All right, I’ll send off something quick.”
“You’re writing an email from her?” Dana wanted to slap him.
“I’m just canceling the rest of her classes so no one wonders where the heck she is,” he said. “I mean, she can’t teach. She’s knocked out.”
“Yeah, because you shot her.”
“Dana.” He stood up from the computer. “This is going to be fine. Seriously, stop freaking out.”
Cole was going through Larissa’s bag. He yanked out a set of keys. “Okay, here’s what we’re going to do. You drive the car we brought here, and I’ll drive Larissa’s car. You can follow me. I just got to figure out where her house is.” He went back to the computer. “I think she should have access to the faculty directory, which lists addresses…”
“Don’t you think it would be better if we just left?” said Dana.
He turned to her. “And go where? You got an idea where we can go?”
She sighed.
“This is going to work,” he said, going back to the computer. “There. That’s her address.” He fumbled on the desk for a pen and scribbled on it. He straightened. “Look, I’ll bring the car around to the place where we parked, okay?”
“Cole, this is crazy.”
“Yeah, so when have we ever done anything sane?” He hoisted Larissa up over his shoulder. “Let’s go.”
“You’re going to carry her like that? What will people think?”
“It’s college, right?” said Cole. “I’ll just say she’s drunk.”
CHAPTER NINETEEN
Larissa Fielding was tied to a chair in her kitchen, still passed out, and Cole was bustling about, cooking spaghetti on the stove.
Dana sat at the table, watching both of them, feeling sick to her stomach. This was not going the way she’d expected. She had no idea why Cole thought they could trust this woman, but it didn’t seem like they could. And now they were basically holding the poor woman prisoner in her house. Heck, if this was the plan all along, they could have broken into any old house, tranqed the people that lived there, tied them up, and started eating their food.
“Relax, Dana,” Cole kept saying.
But she couldn’t.
He handed her one of the cell phones they’d stolen. “You want to turn that on and see if we got any texts?”
“Is it safe?”
He shrugged. “Safe enough, I guess. The people I texted wouldn’t have direct contact with Enoch, and he’s the only one who could trace the phone. So, everyone else is just someone with an ear to the ground. They might know something. They might not.”
Dana turned on the phone. At first there was nothing, but then text messages began to appear. Dana scrolled through them. Most of them didn’t say much. No one knew anything.
“We’re not getting anything,” she said.
“Damn it,” said Cole, stirring the spaghetti. “How many texts did you get?”
“Six.”
“Some people haven’t replied,” he said. “Turn it back off. We’ll check it later.”
“If they can’t trace the phone, why does it have to be off?”
“Better not to take chances, right?”
He was right. She turned off the phone.
Larissa lifted her head. She surveyed her surroundings, the fact that she was tied to a chair, and then she started screaming again.
Col
e turned around. “Hey, Larissa. There’s no need for that.” He held out the fork he’d been using to Dana. “Can you keep an eye on the pasta?”
Dana took it.
“What are you going to do to me?” said Larissa. She sounded close to tears.
Cole pulled a chair up next to her, facing her. “Nothing. I won’t do anything.”
Larissa looked at Dana. “I saw you two on the news. Now you’ve got a partner in crime, huh, Cole?”
“Look, there’s no crime,” he said. He considered. “Well, kind of, maybe, but we’re not going to hurt you. I came to you for help. We used to be friends.”
Larissa took a shaky breath. “Oh, God.” She squeezed her eyes shut. “If you’re not going to hurt me, why am I tied up?”
“I just didn’t want you running off and doing anything stupid before I got a chance to talk to you,” said Cole. “How about I untie your hands, okay?” He reached around and freed her.
She stretched, massaging her wrists.
Cole took both of her hands in his. “No one’s going to hurt you.”
Larissa started to pull her hands away, then stopped. “What are you doing here, then?” Her voice was getting stronger.
He looked up at Dana, and then back at Larissa. “Look, we just need someplace to stay. Not for long, just until I can get in touch with some people. I thought… there aren’t a lot of people in my past that I would consider friends, but you and I… well, I thought I could trust you.” He released her hands and sat back.
Larissa took a deep breath. “You thought you could trust me, so you tied me to a chair?”
“That’s what I said.” Dana ran the fork through the boiling water and pasta.
Larissa massaged the bridge of her nose. “Cole, it’s been years.”
“I know.” He bent down and began working on the knots at her feet. “Maybe I shouldn’t have tied you up or shot you with a tranq gun.”
“You shot me?” said Larissa, her voice cracking.
“With a tranquilizer dart.” Cole sat back up, looking exasperated.
“For Cole, that is showing restraint,” Dana said.
Larissa laughed nervously. “Well, that doesn’t exactly put my mind at ease.” She got up from the chair. “What about my classes? I had two other classes this afternoon.”
“I emailed Betty and said they were canceled.” He stood up too.
“You emailed…” Larissa shook her head. “Oh my God, I never thought I was going to see you again.”
“Well, sorry about that,” he said.
The buzzer on the stove went off. Dana took the pot of water off the burner. “She obviously doesn’t want us here. We need to leave.”
He went over to the stove and picked up the pot. “Is that what you want, Larissa?” He started to drain the pasta in the sink.
Larissa was hugging herself. She still looked thrown. She turned to Dana. “You. How did you end up mixed up with him? I remember the reports from years ago. You’re the one who got him arrested, right?”
“We don’t call it arrested in the SF,” said Dana, “but yeah, that was me. It’s complicated.”
“When I saw him on the news a few days ago, and you were with him, I…” Larissa turned around in a circle. “I don’t know what to think. It hasn’t been exactly easy for me, knowing that I had sex with a serial killer werewolf, and then you just march back into my life—”
“What?” Dana looked at Cole, who was pouring sauce all over the spaghetti. “You brought me to your ex-girlfriend’s house?”
Cole laughed. “No, it wasn’t like that at all. We were just friends.”
Dana looked at Larissa.
She was backing away. “Are you two like… together?”
“You were friends that had sex?” Dana glared at Cole.
He shrugged at Larissa, stirring the sauce and pasta together. “Basically.”
“And you brought me here?” Dana thought she might strangle him.
“You are together, aren’t you?” said Larissa. “Look, I’m not interested in him or getting in between anything or…” She swallowed. “Please don’t hurt me.”
Dana massaged her temples. “I’m not going to hurt you.” She turned back to Cole. “It’s like you’re completely clueless about normal human emotion, I swear to God. You do not bring me here to hide out in the house of a woman you used to sleep with. It’s wrong on so many levels.”
He threw his hands up. “Okay, okay. We’re going to leave. It’s what you wanted, and you’re right, I didn’t think this through.”
“Good,” said Dana.
Cole held up the pot. “Can we eat spaghetti first?”
* * *
They were all chewing and no one was saying anything.
Larissa cleared her throat.
They both looked at her.
“So,” she said. “You really thought of me, Cole? After all this time, you thought of me.”
He twisted spaghetti around his fork. “Yeah.”
“Why?” She turned to Dana. “It’s like he said, there was nothing romantic about our relationship. It wasn’t anything like that. Personally, I’m not really one for romance, anyway, but between Cole and I there wasn’t even… warmth.”
He raised his eyebrows. “Sure, there was.”
“No,” Larissa said. “We talked philosophy. We saw each other at work. We had sex a few times. That’s all.”
“What do you mean you’re not one for romance?” said Dana. “We just listened to you give that whole lecture on romance novels.”
“Oh, I like romance novels,” said Larissa. “It’s just real-life relationships that I’m not fond of. There’s a big difference between books and reality. For one thing, real men are nothing like men in romance novels. Take Cole, for instance. You can’t tell me that he seems like a hero from a romance novel.”
Well, all that stuff about beast-men and civilization had sort of—
“Larissa,” said Cole, “this might sound kind of weird, but I’ve changed since then. Maybe I didn’t convey to you that I appreciated your friendship, but I did. It meant a lot to me. I’ve never really been good at friends… I’ve never really been good at people, actually, but you were easy to talk to, and you seemed to respect my thoughts, and… I don’t know. I misread everything, and I’m sorry.”
Larissa set down her fork and looked at him.
“That’s why I came here,” he said. “But I’m going to leave, and I’m sorry we scared you.”
“Where are you going to go?” said Larissa.
He sighed. “I have no fucking clue.” He put a bite of spaghetti in his mouth, chewed, and swallowed. “But we’ll figure it out. It’s not your problem, don’t worry.”
Larissa furrowed her brow. “You have changed. You’re…” She cocked her head to one side. Then she turned to Dana. “So, how did you end up with him? Why would you be with someone like this?”
“I’m not—” Dana broke off, looking at Cole. “It’s really hard to explain.”
“Not hard,” he said. “She’s not with me. We sort of accidentally had a child together, and that child has been kidnapped by bad people, and we’re trying to get our daughter back. That’s it. There’s no romance, Larissa. Dana’s too smart for that.”
“A child.” Larissa looked down into her pasta. “But the news said that you two had murdered people, and that you were dangerous.”
“Not Dana,” said Cole. “If she’s done anything, it’s only been to protect herself. But everything’s gotten out of control.”
It wasn’t true what Cole had said. Dana had killed people for bad reasons. But she was strangely warmed by the idea that he’d lie to make her sound better, that he’d take it all on his shoulders.
Larissa looked up at them. “Oh, what the hell? You can stay. Not long, though. Just overnight.”
* * *
“Ha!” said Cole.
“What?” Dana was sitting on the couch in Larissa’s living room, watching telev
ision with Larissa.
Cole held up the cell phone, which he’d just turned on. “I got a text. A lead.”
“You did?” said Dana.
“Yeah, someone knows something about the kids. They don’t know anything about Enoch, but we were only looking for Enoch to find Piper, so that doesn’t matter,” said Cole. “I need to make a call, but I need to use a different phone, just to be safe.”
Dana started to get up.
He held up his hand. “No, don’t worry about it. You sit tight. I’ll do it, and I’ll come back and tell you what I know, all right?”
Dana settled back on the couch.
He left the room.
Dana went back to staring at the television screen. She realized that she really hadn’t registered anything that was happening on the program for quite some time. She’d been staring at it, but she hadn’t been comprehending. She guessed that things were too screwy for TV right now.
Larissa picked up the remote and switched off the screen. “Don’t lie to me, Dana. It’s just us girls. There is something between you and Cole, and it’s not just history.”
Well. Dana wasn’t sure this conversation was much better than watching TV. She just shook her head. She didn’t know what to say.
“You did it somehow,” said Larissa. “You tamed him.”
Dana raised her eyebrows. “What are you talking about?”
“I never heard an apology come out of his mouth before,” she said. “I never heard him take notice of anyone’s feelings. The Cole I knew was cold and distant. He was intelligent, and I even thought he was attractive, but whenever I was close to him, I always thought, ‘There’s something off about this guy. There’s something missing.’ And then when I found out he was killing people, I felt like an idiot, because I’d always sensed something, but I’d just brushed it off.”
Dana squared her shoulders. “There’s still something missing with him.”
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