by Alyssa Day
"Stevie would love that," she said, when he made the water swirl into a figure eight, and then she started to cry. Her baby was alone with strangers and probably terrified, and Rhi had no idea when or if they'd catch up to the people who'd stolen her. "I want my daughter. I want my daughter now."
Lucas immediately stopped what he was doing, and the tiny streams of water vanished in mid-air. Then he moved his fingers in a small, gentle motion, and she could feel the tears evaporating from her heated cheeks. It helped her calm her roiled nerves, and they drove in silence for a while. Sometimes she thought Lucas was sleeping, but then he'd turn to fix that startling gray gaze on her and she realized he'd been awake the entire time. Thinking deep thoughts? She wasn't sure she wanted to know, so she didn't ask.
By four o'clock in the morning, she was flagging. "I think I need to nap, now," she reluctantly admitted. They made a quick stop on the side of the road to switch places, and then they were back on the road, somewhere in Missouri. She rolled up her jacket, wedged it between the window and her head, and closed her eyes. The tension, rage, and sorrow of the day had combined to overwhelm her defenses and her will, and she could feel herself slipping off into sleep, so she could escape. If she even slept for two hours, they'd be two hours closer to Stevie.
Lucas reached out and covered her hand with his. "I'll follow the rules, I promise. You can relax."
She nodded and waited for sleep to take her, but she didn't let go of Lucas's hand.
And she refused to think about why.
It felt like only seconds later when a horrible clunking sound snapped Rhi awake. She automatically looked at the clock on the dash to check the time. It was eight-fifteen in the morning, and the bright morning sun almost seemed to mock her.
The car lurched again, and she came fully awake. "What happened?"
Lucas was wrestling with the steering wheel and muscled the car, still jerking and clanking, to a stop on the side of the road, where it died a horrible, wheezing death.
"Lucas?”
He slammed his fist into the dash. "I don't know; I'm useless for this. The mechanics of your automobiles are beyond me. I can drive them, but I know nothing about repairing them.”
Despite the situation, she almost smiled. Oddly enough, it was refreshing to hear a man say he didn't know how to fix a car.
"Where in trouble," she said.
Really, Rhi? Just call me Captain Obvious. Argh.
"Yes. This is a problem," he said. "We need new transportation. There's no time to fix this car, if we're to have any hope of catching up to your daughter before they get her back to the pack, where we'll have many more shifters trying to stop us."
Rhiannon's fingers started to shake, and she couldn't make them stop so she sat on her hands. Her damn body was a traitor; she was viscerally giving into despair, even though her heart and mind refused to give up, even though everything in the world seemed to be acting against her. Her car dying? Now? She'd just had it serviced…she stared at Lucas as the dawning realization struck her, hard. "They sabotaged my car. They must have sabotaged my damn car!"
Lucas nodded. "It makes sense; it's good strategy. So, what should we do about it?"
She realized he was asking her, instead of telling her. He was really telling her that he believed in her and was confident she would know what to do. The idea filled her with a powerful rush of courage. Brock never would have asked her opinion on what to do; he never even took her advice when she offered it, because he knew everything, and his way was the only way.
That had been true even before the beating started.
She wrenched her mind away from past mistakes and focused on the present. "I'll call a tow truck. We can catch a ride and then find a rental agency and rent a car."
Lucas nodded. "Right. Let's do that."
That was it? No discussion, dissent, or argument? She felt almost dazed. Lucas was nothing at all like what she'd imagined. She still didn't know who he was--a killer? A warrior? Did he hand out punishment or justice? She had no answers, and she didn't even have time for the questions, so she put it all out of her mind, opened another burner phone, and started making calls.
An hour later, she stood outside Sam's Garage and stared at Lucas in disbelief. "There is no car rental agency within fifty miles. This town has a population of 1800 'on a good day,' according to the guy who owns this place."
Lucas pointed at a used-car lot across the street. "Let's just buy a new one."
"Are you crazy? It's not like I can just walk in and buy a new car. I'm a single mom, and I work as a secretary. Every spare dollar goes to pay bills or put some back for Stevie's college. I can't afford to buy a new car. We'll have to figure something else out."
But she was talking to Lucas's back. He was striding down the street, but not in the direction of the car dealership. Instead, he seemed to be aimed at a bank.
She ran to catch up with him and grabbed his arm. "Lucas. What are you doing?"
"I'm going to the bank to get human money, so we can buy a car, of course." He patted her hand but kept walking.
"Banks don't just give out money, Lucas. You must have a bank account. An American bank account, not an Italian one," she added, a little snarkily, which she considered more than fair under the circumstances.
"I get that." He pulled a thin leather wallet out of his pocket and retrieved a card. "We have this. The new queen gave them to all the Warriors for use on missions." He handed it to her, and she realized it was a credit card that seem to be made of actual gold.
"What is this? I've never seen anything like it." She turned it this way and that in the light, bemused, but before he could answer, they arrived at the bank.
Lucas walked right in, pulling Rhiannon behind him into the marble-floored foyer. "It's called a credit card. We stop at a bank, which should honor your country's relationship with Atlantis. "
She understood, now. She'd fallen off a cliff and broken her head. Or the electricity in that cage lobotomized her brain. None of this could really be happening--it was too surreal, like the setup to a really peculiar joke.
An Atlantean and a single mom walk into a bank…
Lucas gently took the card back from her and handed it to the teller, a woman around Rhiannon's age who was openly ogling him. For one completely irrational instant, Rhiannon wanted to throw her arms around Lucas and plant a steaming kiss on him, right there in the bank. Then maybe next she'd pee on the floor to mark her territory.
She was really losing it here.
"I am Lucas from Atlantis, and I need money to buy a car." He handed the woman the card, and she looked dumbfounded.
"I've never seen one of these in person before," She said in awestruck town. "Hey Jimmy. Come look at this.”
A man in a suit walked over, and the teller handed him the card. His eyes widened comically, and his mouth dropped open. "Yes, sir. You're from Atlantis. I've always wanted to meet someone from Atlantis. Let me shake your hand.”
Lucas shook the man's hand, but Rhi could tell he was becoming impatient. Even more impatient than usual.
"Now you have met me. I need to buy a car, so please give me money."
"Have you ever actually been in a bank before?" Rhi hissed at him.
"No, of course not," Lucas said, raising his eyebrows.
Oh, goody. This was not going to work. Worse, they'd probably get arrested or something.
The manager beamed. "How much money do you want, sir?"
"What?" Rhi squeaked.
Lucas gave her a stern look, and rightly so, since he was solving their problem while she gaped at him like a moron. The manager was practically bouncing. This must be the most exciting thing that had happened in this town since it got its first McDonald's.
Lucas's forehead furrowed. " I don't know, exactly. How about… fifty million dollars. Just put it in a bag."
Rhiannon, the teller, and the manager all gasped simultaneously. Then the manager let out a little nervous laugh. "We don't ac
tually have that kind of money, or a bag that big. In fact, a bag that big probably doesn't exist."
Rhiannon smiled apologetically at the man. "He doesn't get out of Atlantis much." Then she turned to Lucas. "We don't need fifty million dollars. If we're really going to get a car from that used-car lot. I'm sure we could get something reasonable for ten thousand."
The manager, sweating a little, had gone pale beneath his normally ruddy complexion. He gulped audibly. ", ma'am, this card authorizes me to give him fifty million dollars if he wants it. He could even ask for more, but this bank has never had fifty million dollars in cash in its entire existence."
The teller leaned forward, giving Lucas a show down her neckline. She'd gone from ogling him to looking like she wanted to throw herself naked into Lucas's arms. His total hotness plus the fifty million dollars idea had probably overwhelmed her tiny little mind.
Rhi moved so she was standing between the two of them.
Lucas looked thoughtful. "If we can get a reasonable car for ten thousand, what can we get for fifty thousand?”
Rhiannon had to smile. "For fifty thousand, we can get a car that goes really, really fast."
Lucas nodded decisively. "Excellent. Give me twice that," he told the manager. Then he looked at Rhiannon. "After all, we'll need money for food and gas."
She shrugged. "Sure. Those steak-and-egg breakfasts get expensive."
Five minutes later, the bank manager was handing over one hundred thousand dollars in cash, which Rhi frankly couldn't believe they had handy, and effusively complimenting Lucas, Atlantis, the king, the queen, and possibly even the sheep of Atlantis.
Lucas nodded, looking constipated, which Rhi had figured out meant he was about to explode. She stepped in and thanked the manager and told him that they would convey his compliments, and his wish to establish a working relationship with Atlantis, and he'd probably get a royal invitation to visit any minute.
The manager, clearly dizzy with the excitement of it all, walked them out, fussing all the way. Just before they reached the door, two men wearing ski masks burst through it.
"Everybody freeze! This is a stick up!”
"Of course, it is,” Rhiannon moaned. "Because why not? Maybe next, we'll have a killer-shark-infested tornado."
Lucas gave her a strange look and thrust the briefcase filled with money at her. Then he stepped in front of the two would-be thieves. In the space of a heartbeat, he transformed back into the lethal warrior she'd first met in that cage. "You will leave now, and I will forget this happened."
The smaller of the two men stumbled back a couple of steps, but the big one held his ground. "Get out of our way, asshole. Do you see this gun?"
With a lightning-fast motion, Lucas disarmed the man and then handed the gun to the bank manager, who clutched it awkwardly.
"There's nothing wrong with my vision. However, you might not be able to say the same if you don't leave immediately." Lucas growled.
But the big guy was evidently too stupid to be afraid, because he stepped right up, pulled out a wickedly large knife, and pointed it at Lucas's face. "Do you see this knife? I can make you bleed so much you wish you were dead if you don't get out of our way."
Lucas very slowly turned his empty hands palms face-up. "That's not a knife," he said calmly. "These are knives."
Rhi and everybody else in the room stared at Lucas's hands, which were suddenly holding two daggers, both nearly a foot long.
"And I know how to use them," he added, his voice as cold as winter in Antarctica.
This time, the big guy was scared too. He dropped his knife on the floor and started backing up, his eyes wide. "Okay, man. We don't want trouble. We'll just be on our way," he babbled.
"No, you won't," a new voice said.
Rhiannon turned her head to the side to see a security guard who looked to be at least seventy years old, wearing a crisply pressed uniform and a baseball cap, which was nicely accessorized by the shotgun he held.
"Earl, if that's you and Billy again, I swear that after I turn you in to the sheriff, I'm gonna call your mama."
The smaller bank robber, who'd been quiet till then, started babbling. "It wasn't my fault. Earl made me do it. He said –"
"I don't care who said what," the guard told them. "Come on, back to the office. Sheriff's on her way, and you're going to sit in the office and wait for her."
The two men swore and yanked the ski masks off their heads and threw them on the floor in disgust, then headed in the direction the security guard pointed. At the edge of the room, the big guy turned around to glare at Lucas. "If it hadn't been for you…”
"You meddling kids,” Rhiannon said, and then she clutched her head in her hands and put pressure on the throbbing in her temples that threatened to become a migraine.
Down the rabbit hole, Alice. Down the freaking rabbit hole.
Stevie loved that book. Suddenly, Rhi was fed up with this town, population 1800.
"We need to leave. Now," she told Lucas.
The manager grabbed Lucas's hand and started pumping it. "Thank you so much. That's the third time this month, and I'm sick to death of it. I'll tell you what. You need a car? You take mine. It's yours. It's a gift.”
Rhi's mouth dropped open, but Lucas calmly took the money case from her and handed it to the manager.
"Excellent.” He opened the case and took out several stacks of money, leaving what was probably a couple hundred bucks in the box. "Is this enough money for your car?"
The bank manager just stared at him and then stammered out a denial. "No. I don't want your money. The car isn't it worth that and… and…"
Lucas nodded solemnly. "I see. Do you need the fifty million?”
The manager looked like he was going to faint, so it was definitely time for Rhi to step in. She pinned him with an even look. "How much is the car worth? Quickly, we're in a hurry here."
"I just bought it for forty-five grand last month," he said. "I can get you the title and--"
She cut him off. "Here's sixty, for the inconvenience."
She counted out sixty stacks of a thousand dollars each and stacked them on the counter. "Thank you. We don't have time to deal with the licensing right now, but we'll work it out. You have our word as Atlanteans.”
Lucas raised an eyebrow, but thankfully said nothing. Instead, while the manager ran to get his car keys, Lucas sat on the floor and entertained five- or six-year-old twin girls with water tricks.
Ten minutes later, they were back on the road.
16
Rhiannon glanced over at Lucas, who was calmly leaning back in his seat like he hadn't just foiled a bank robbery after almost withdrawing fifty million in cash from that same bank.
"So, deep down inside, you're really a hero, aren't you?”
He snorted. "Hardly. I'm much more the villain type."
"Sure. Tell yourself that. But I saw what you did in there, and the way you took time to calm down those children with your magic tricks. You--"
"Hey. Those weren't tricks. That was actually magic. Also, I don't understand this orange food. This is not a color found in nature. There's no way these can be good for you.”
She had to smile at the sight of the big, bold warrior peering suspiciously at a chip. "They're called Doritos, and no, nobody ever found one in nature. But they're one of the main four food groups of travel munchies.”
He very cautiously took a bite of a chip and then popped the entire chip into his mouth and chewed. "Huh. This is oddly compelling."
"Yep, that's their tagline. Doritos: oddly compelling. You should be in advertising."
"I don't know what that means."
"Trust me, you don't want to know. It's mostly about selling stuff nobody needs to people who have more money than sense."
They passed the welcome to Montana sign, and her stomach clenched up again with the pain that she'd been hiding beneath her every attempt at calm conversation, and somehow Lucas knew what she was feeling, beca
use his eyes filled with compassion. "We're going to find her, Rhiannon," he said, putting his hand on her arm.
For some reason that simple touch helped to calm Rhiannon's fears. She didn't understand why Lucas had that effect on her, and she didn't have time to analyze it now. She decided simply to appreciate it, because she was going to need to be calm for just a little while longer.
"I've tried to call Tannis four times now, and it must still be her phone number, because her voice is on the voicemail message. But she won't pick up. Probably afraid to talk to me, that nasty bitch. I tried going to her for help when her son first started to hit me, since I don't have any family of my own, but she told me boys would be boys and it was my fault because I wasn't a good enough girlfriend." She looked down and realized her hands were clinched so tightly around the steering wheel that her knuckles were white. She forced her fingers to relax and then shook out first one and then the other of her hands.
"When a man uses violence against a woman, it is always and only his fault," Lucas said with such barely leashed ferocity that his voice was a little more than a growl.
She didn't want to think about Brock. "Let's not talk about him, though. Let's talk about you and your hero self. You are very brave in there, whether you admit it or not." She reached for her soda and took a long drink. Coffee and Diet Coke were underwriting this road trip, that was for sure.
He shrugged. "It didn't take much in the way of courage to face down those two fools. If they'd been vampires, yeah, maybe. I've had some problems going up against them. Shifters, too. But those two petty criminals were really not a problem. Speaking of courage, though, you were pretty brave in there yourself."
"I wasn't brave. I just didn't show fear. There's a difference. You learn pretty fast in a shifter pack not to show fear, or you'll find yourself in a great deal of trouble."
Lucas's hands clenched into fists on his thighs, and he took a long, deep breath before he spoke. "You said this Brock was the Alpha?"
