She hesitated and then nodded. “Of course. In fact, you may even invite me to go for a ride on your motorcycle.” She brushed at the front of his jacket. “Say . . . down to Turtleback Station some evening for dinner and maybe dancing?”
She looked up when he didn’t respond to see his jaw had slackened—that is until his eyes narrowed. “Do you mean for us to have a modern date?”
“If that’s what you wish to call it.” She canted her head. “When was the last time you did anything for the sheer fun of it?”
His eyes closed on another heavy sigh.
Her sigh was one of relief when he suddenly strode off—that is, until she realized he was heading for the porch. “Wait,” she said, running after him. “Where do you think you’re going?”
“To see the inside of your hovel,” he said without breaking stride.
“No!” She pulled him to a halt. “I mean, not today,” she said calmly. “Some other time. Soon. After I— Once I’ve settled in.”
He looked at her home and slowly tilted his head to match the lopsided roofline. “Would your reluctance to let me inside mean the exterior is its . . . best quality?”
“I told you that’s an illusion.” She slipped her arm through his and guided him toward the side of the house. “The interior walls and floors are perfectly plumb and the structure is sound, which you will see when I invite you to dinner. Once I’ve settled in.”
She managed to get him all the way to his motorcycle before he made one last attempt to talk some sense into her. How he went about it, however, was so typically Titus that it might have been comical if it weren’t so sad.
He set his helmet on the seat, then turned and palmed her face to hold her looking at him—apparently not wanting her to miss the tender concern in his vivid green eyes. “I have a worry you’re not looking after yourself properly. Please don’t feel that you can’t come to Nova Mare, as I know how much you enjoy swimming in the outdoor heated pool and horseback riding on the trails.”
The blackguard; she couldn’t decide if he was concerned about her expanding posterior or wanted to remind her of all that she’d walked away from.
He slid a thumb to her lips when she tried to speak. “Just because you’re no longer living at the resort doesn’t mean we can’t continue our morning swims together.” He shrugged one shoulder. “Or by yourself, if you prefer.”
Well, she did miss that heated pool. Titus and their two children, Maximilian and Carolina, had no problem swimming in the Bottomless Sea—or any of the world’s oceans, for that matter—but since she was a mere mortal and didn’t have command of the magic, she’d never been able to handle frigid water.
“Are you eating well? Healthy foods?” he clarified when he leaned away just enough to look down at her, his eyes stopping on her bosom before snapping back to her eyes in surprise. “Or a steady diet of cinnamon buns?”
Well, the man did know her body rather intimately.
Rana stepped free of his hands on her cheeks before he felt her blush. “I’ve only dined at the Drunken Moose once this past week.” She walked up the porch steps, deciding it was time to end this conversation before she said something she’d regret. “Good-bye, my love. Remember to breathe the fresh air as you ride your motorcycle.”
“Wife,” he said, his intimate tone making her hand still on the doorknob. “Your added pounds please me.”
Not exactly sure how to take the compliment, considering it had been those very pounds that had sent her running from him in the first place, Rana turned and inclined her head. “Then I shall endeavor to hold on to them.” She shot him a cheeky smile. “And maybe even add a few more.” But then she frowned when he picked up his helmet. “You have a care, husband, when you’re riding that speed demon.”
His eyes widened in surprise. “You’re worried I’m going to kill or maim myself?”
Not wanting him to leave here believing he’d won this round, she gave a loud, exasperated sigh. “Not you, but the unsuspecting drivers you’re sharing the road with.”
He pulled the helmet down over his sudden scowl, then flipped up the visor to expose deep green eyes crinkled with his equally sudden grin. “So long as you remember to share Bottomless when you’re racing through the waves in that monstrous sailboat you—” He froze in the middle of fastening the chin strap. “Please tell me that old scow came with the house and not that you purchased it on purpose.”
Rana silently turned and went inside, then softly closed the door on his quiet laughter. The maddening man knew of her obsession for fast sailing vessels, since she already owned several—all of which were back home on Atlantis.
Chapter Three
Titus stopped at the end of the camp road and waited for one of Nova Mare’s limousines heading toward the resort to pass, then pulled onto the main road behind it. For the love of Zeus, his wife was living in a house half the size of their palace bedroom. And yet the confounding woman not only managed to appear every bit the queen of her crooked, unpainted castle, the morning sun sparkling in her big brown eyes had added a glowing vitality to her intrinsic beauty.
Yes, her small weight gain did indeed please him—the downside being that it also turned him on. But he hadn’t dared act on his urge to carry her inside and explore those luscious curves more intimately, as he hadn’t wanted to risk sending their already precarious relationship off in an even more disastrous direction. Not that he knew why their marriage had strayed so badly off course.
Having left the town proper, Titus glanced over his shoulder, then twisted the throttle and leaned into the oncoming lane. The responsive bike shot past the limo as he shifted through the gears until the engine’s throaty pitch smoothed to its optimum power range, the burst of speed doing nothing to lift his mood as he remembered the silent war Rana had waged against him four months ago.
Nicholas had been two weeks overdue returning from what should have been an easy mission to pull a child out of harm’s way before history had to be rewritten when Rana had started insisting someone go find him. And although the mythical warrior was more like family than his personal peacemaker, Titus hadn’t started worrying until the third week had passed with no word from the man. But when Nicholas finally had returned, badly wounded and carrying the remains of one of his elite soldiers, Rana had been so relieved he was alive that she’d suddenly forgotten all about her anger.
In fact, the ensuing months had been nothing short of a honeymoon—although Nicholas’s wedding nine days after his return may have had something to do with Rana’s amorous mood. Then again, the fact that their daughter and daughter-in-law, as well as Nicholas’s and Duncan’s wives, were expecting babies also might have contributed to her acting like a young bride herself.
Titus flipped up his visor to dissipate the heat of his escalating frustration as he shot past the road to Inglenook, remembering how the honeymoon had come to an abrupt end two weeks ago—although for the life of him he still didn’t know why. There had been no inciting incident or warning signs, as one day they’d been galloping the resort trails like flirtatious young lovers—which had led to a passionate interlude on the sun-bathed sands of a hidden grotto at the north end of the fiord—and not two days after that the woman had suddenly announced she was leaving him. Something about feeling suffocated and needing a breath of fresh air, he recalled her saying.
The one thing he did know was that once Rana made up her mind on a matter, the combined power of the gods couldn’t alter her course. Within a week she’d purchased a house, and three days later he’d found himself sleeping in an empty bed.
Realizing he was about to overshoot his destination, Titus quickly decelerated and somehow managed to enter the marina without killing or maiming himself. He pulled up next to his son’s SUV, set the kickstand and shut off the engine, then took off his helmet and scanned the docks for Duncan MacKeage’s pontoon boat.
“Nice of you to finally show up,” Maximilian said as he walked from the direction of the of
fice. He stopped beside the motorcycle and peered down at the instrument panel. “The Japanese didn’t think to put a clock on this model?”
Titus got off the bike and pulled the key from the ignition. “I can’t be late, since MacKeage isn’t even here yet.”
“We’ve all been here for nearly an hour.”
He looked at where Mac was gesturing to see Nicholas step off a large boat and start untying lines just as its motor started. “Is there a reason we’re taking a tour boat?” Titus asked, following his son down the ramp to the floating dock.
“We’re on a covert mission,” Mac drawled, stepping to the side to let him board.
“Both Duncan’s pontoon boat and cruiser are easily recognized,” Nicholas added as he also stepped onboard, his Nordic blue eyes suddenly narrowed and direct. “Why am I seeing camp road dust on your new toy?”
Titus walked over and sat down on the first row of benches directly behind the wheelhouse. “Because nine miles wasn’t far enough to blow it off.”
Nicholas sat down beside him. “I thought we agreed you’d give her all the time and space she needed to come back on her own.”
“You agreed,” Titus said as he slid his helmet under his seat. He straightened with a threatening scowl. “And I suggest you mind your own marriage before your new wife discovers your cats are more civilized than you are.”
“Well?” Mac asked with a chuckle, sitting on the other side of him. “Are you satisfied your wife hasn’t run off to live with another man?”
“She’s living in a hovel. I’ve seen outhouses that looked better.”
Nicholas released a heavy sigh. “Please tell me you didn’t say that to her face.”
Titus stood and walked to the wheelhouse as Duncan guided the large vessel through the narrow channel protecting the marina, which had been nothing more than a gravel pit before Maximilian’s little epic stunt had flooded it with seawater. “Remind me again who we’re disguising ourselves from?” he asked Duncan.
The highlander glanced over at him, his eyes widening with his grin. “I hope the dealership threw that suit in with the bike.”
“You’ve had command of the magic for almost four years,” Titus said, arching an equally impudent brow, “and you still require two wizards and a mythical warrior to back you up at the first hint of trouble?”
That got rid of the cocky bastard’s grin. “I wouldn’t,” Duncan muttered as he sent the tour boat surging into the swells of the fiord, “if I’d been given a mountain that could stay awake.” He shot a glare over his shoulder at Maximilian. “Ye could have warned me there was such a thing as contrary magic.”
“It usually takes on the disposition of its master.” Mac turned serious. “Which brings us back to Dad’s question of why you’ve asked the three of us for help, when it’s your calling to protect Bottomless and the surrounding wilderness.”
“Dad?” Titus repeated before Duncan could answer, only to close his eyes on a silent groan. “Henry finally got to you.”
“No,” Mac said with a chuckle. “Ella did, although likely at Henry’s urging.” He shook his head. “You try arguing with a three-year-old cherub. Or have you forgotten that Carolina had you wrapped around her princess pinky finger at three months?”
Only because it had taken him that long to stop blaming his daughter for nearly killing his wife, Titus remembered as he turned to stare out the windshield. And it had been Nicholas—a mere child himself and Carolina’s self-appointed protector—who had finally brought him to his senses. Not that he knew how a boy who’d been spewed from a whale onto a local beach and raised by the island midwife had had the gonads to call his king—much less the man who had built Atlantis—an idiot.
“You don’t deserve the miracle your wife nearly died giving you,” Titus recalled the seven-year-old saying when the boy had caught him standing over Carolina’s crib the day they’d learned Rana would live. “Her highness isn’t still weak from childbirth; she’s heartsick that you want nothing to do with Lina.” Nicholas had crowded Titus out of the way to pick up Carolina, protectively holding the week-old infant to his chest as he’d glared up at his towering king. “So why don’t you just walk into the sea and never come back, and save me the trouble of killing you the moment I’m big enough.”
Which would have been only a few years, at the rate the boy had been growing.
Despite moving Nicholas’s adoptive mother and father into the palace as their family healer and gardener, and installing Nicholas in the bedroom next to Carolina’s as her bodyguard, the boy had kept up the verbal attacks until the morning Titus had nearly walked past a whispered conversation taking place in the garden. He’d stood frozen behind a tree and listened to Nicholas pleading with Rana to let him help her run off with Maximilian and Carolina, the boy promising he would find someplace beautiful to raise her children where everyone truly loved one another.
But it had been Rana’s response that had nearly brought Titus to his knees. Unconditional love, she’d told Nicholas, sometimes required an awful lot of patience. She’d then patted the boy’s scowling cheek, saying she had faith that time and a few baby belly laughs would soften Titus’s heart. And it so happened, she’d gone on to assure Nicholas, that her big powerful husband had an infinite amount of time to remember that small, everyday miracles were all that really mattered.
Somewhat similar to what she’d said this morning. Except what in Hades had happened to the unconditional part? Because to his thinking, living in separate houses while he was supposed to explore the everyday wonders of the world was damned conditional and not the least bit patient.
“That’s why dealing with Lina for thirty-one years,” Nicholas said as Titus merely continued staring out the windshield, “made me decide I’m only having sons.”
Mac snorted. “Assuming Providence even wants your soul in exchange.”
Want it, Titus thought with his own silent snort. Providence already owned all six foot seven inches, two hundred and twenty pounds of the warrior. And that was why to this day Nicholas continued being his voice of reason—more often than not as direct and insolent as he’d been as a child. Which had Titus wondering why he hadn’t listened when, just days before he’d left on his mission last November, Nicholas had reminded him that even gods needed to take time out of their busy schedules to play with their wives.
Poseidon’s teeth; he’d apparently been suffocating Rana with his attention.
“Hey,” Duncan said over his shoulder, “try having twin daughters.” He turned to face the two other expectant fathers. “It was bad enough they found two babes at the ultrasound last week, but I had to physically restrain Peg when they couldn’t find any extra appendages.” The highlander shook his head with a chuckle. “She still managed to grab the device out of the technician’s hand and run it over her belly, all while yelling at me to watch the monitor for signs of exterior plumbing.” Duncan checked to make sure they weren’t about to run over any boats or navigational buoys, then shot Nicholas a grin. “I don’t suppose ye could put in a word for me and see if Providence couldn’t put some stones on those babes? Big ones,” he clarified, holding his fingers in a large circle, “so they’ll be the first thing Peg sees at our next ultrasound.”
Nicholas sat up straighter. “I thought Peg was going to let Mom start caring for her. My Julia is looking forward to having a home birth with a midwife.” Nicholas glanced at Mac. “Olivia’s using my mother, isn’t she?” He looked at Duncan again when Mac nodded. “That was the whole point of my parents moving here. Rana asked Mom to stay on after Lina gives birth and open a women’s clinic. And midwives can usually tell the sex of a child just by how a woman is carrying.”
“Carrying twins?” Duncan thought to clarify as he turned back to the wheel.
“Their gender matters not,” Titus said. “Peg will love them unconditionally.”
“Aye,” Duncan said with a sigh. He slowed the engine back to an idle as they neared the uninhabited eastern
shoreline halfway down the forty-mile-long inland sea. “Grab the binoculars out of the holders on the benches and try to look like tourists in awe of this ninth unnatural wonder of the world,” he instructed. “Oh, Mac, I promised Ray Byram a weekend stay in one of your hotel suites for letting us use his new boat.”
Mac stopped the binoculars halfway to his eyes. “Didn’t Olivia’s secretary marry Ray Byram last summer? But as an executive employee,” he continued when Duncan nodded, “Lucy is entitled to a free weekend at Nova Mare each year.”
Duncan grinned. “I guess she forgot to tell Ray about that little perk.”
“We’re back to my original question,” Titus said, taking the binoculars Nicholas handed him. “Who exactly are we disguising ourselves from?”
“And more importantly, why?” Mac added.
“Ye know the small colony that set up camp near the Turtleback town line shortly after the earthquake? Well,” Duncan said when Mac nodded, “this past winter they started acting weirder than usual.” He pointed at the island they were passing as the boat idled between it and the eastern shoreline. “And from what I’ve been able to learn, they’ve started holding secret ceremonies out here.”
“People gathering in ceremony is now a crime?” Mac asked as he scanned the densely forested island with the binoculars.
“Well, no,” Duncan admitted.
“Are they performing human or animal sacrifices?” Titus asked.
“I guess they feel whoever they’re worshipping is also a vegetarian,” Duncan said with a chuckle, only to just as quickly sober. “I did find what looked like an altar when I checked out the island a few nights ago, but no signs of blood. Just some clay pots filled with grain and a pile of rotting vegetables.”
“Then what is your concern? Why are we spying on a bunch of hippies?”
“Hippies?” Duncan said in surprise. “I’m afraid you’ve got the wrong decade. No, the wrong century. The only hippies left are wrinkled and bald and have traded in their Birkenstocks for orthopedic shoes.” He gestured at the smoke rising from several chimneys across Bottomless, now that the western shoreline was no longer blocked by the island. “Near as I can tell, this is a good old-fashioned cult, complete with a new charismatic and probably psychotic leader.”
Spellbound Falls [5] For the Love of Magic Page 3
