THE RISK OF LOVE AND MAGIC (25 page)

“Her? You know it was a girl?” Magnus had no idea how to interrogate the impossible—not while his main concern was Nadine. His heart was still pounding from watching her in action, and she looked too damned
fragile
to bully.

He would have to play this new phenomenon by ear and trust in Nadine’s knowledge of the impossible.

His heart nearly stopped at the thought. Releasing control to La Loca was a pretty long step off a steep cliff for him. His grip tightened on the glass she returned to him.

“She said her name was Mikala.” Nadine hesitated, apparently searching her memory banks. “She said the little kids were crying and that the general sent her. I didn’t get more than that, except that she seemed terrified.”

Nadine sounded as plaintive as the child she must have heard in her head. Magnus mentally cursed but stuck to offering more water. When she sat up, he rubbed his hand in a circle on her back, trying to ground her. “Does your head hurt?”

“Yes. No.” She rubbed her temple. “I don’t know. It was just weird, like talking to ghostly vibrations through some quantum break in the space-time continuum or whatever string theory is about. Except I think she’s alive.”

“I’m not a physicist, just a mechanic. I can’t explain any of that except in terms of Star Trek,” he said in resignation. “It’s late. We can’t do anything tonight. What will it take to get you to sleep?” He sought the fastening of her dress without being told.

“You,” she responded with a sigh. “You balance me.”

Magnus had no idea what that meant, but he accepted it with gratitude. Right this minute, he needed to be needed. It was the only thing preventing him from riding into the dawn with weapons drawn.

He must be growing brains because even he realized now that riding after a man as dangerous and demented as the general would be beyond stupid.

Tuesday morning dawned foggy and gloomy. At the breakfast counter, Nadine scanned her laptop screen and spooned cereal. “The info we added to the genealogy website has been picked up,” she commented. “And the IT guy is probably now following everything I do on this laptop. I can’t find anyone called Mikala through the search engine. I’d need to hack the back door to see if she’s been hidden.”

Magnus shoved a bowl of fruit in her direction but didn’t respond otherwise.

He had made gentle love to her last night after she’d practically begged him. Today, he was treating her like a piece of porcelain, even though she felt fine. He was probably plotting ways of locking her up again. Men! They were simply too exasperating. She crunched her cereal and ignored his taciturnity.

She would not be shut up again.

“Since the bug in that website probably tracked us, Jo-jo could be sending an astral scout to check on the students before he enrolls them,” she suggested. “I wonder if Mikala needs a strong location, like I do, before she can project.”

“
Astral
scout.” Magnus growled into his coffee, as if she’d offended him.

Okay, so he thought she was nuts. Astral scout sounded whacko even to her. But sometimes, one simply had to accept that the world was not as it seemed.

If he couldn’t cooperate . . . She hadn’t wanted to rebel against his protection so soon, but she couldn’t let that child suffer alone.

She clenched her teeth and steeled her nerves for whatever Magnus threw at her. This was it, the moment she broke the reins and decided her own fate. “I can’t wait for the general to find us. I have to find Mikala. I’m going out there,” she announced.

He raised one dark eyebrow and slathered a burned piece of toast with jam and said nothing. She wanted to fling things at him. She’d just declared independence, and he shrugged it off as if she’d said she liked eggs.

“If I can get closer, I might be able to lure Mikala out to me,” she said insistently, even though he wasn’t arguing. “I
have
to test my ability to reach her. She said the little kids were crying for their mothers!” Nadine squashed all her hopes into a tiny box and reached for the cell phone he’d left on the counter.

Mad Max’s large hand covered hers. “Not without me.”

She smacked his hand. He didn’t remove it. “You’re rather noticeable,” she pointed out in irritation. “I’m more inconspicuous. I could just be hiking along a country road. I can
do
this.”

“Not without me,” he repeated. “The general could just be baiting a trap.”

Admittedly, that hadn’t occurred to her. She yanked her hand away. “I need to go
now,
while I can still feel her . . . thought waves . . . or whatever it is. I need to be able to reach out and find her mind inside the school.
Soon
.”

He picked up his phone and hit speed dial. When someone answered, he began snapping orders. “We need an RV, one large enough that thermal imaging won’t find us inside. We’ll exchange it for our rental a few miles from the general’s freak school.”

Nadine froze in astonishment. She assumed he was talking to Conan. Magnus generally wasn’t rude to anyone but his brothers.

“We’ll need a driver so we can hide inside. We have to make the RV look like it has a flat when it’s near the school,” he continued. “The driver can make a show of riding off with a tow truck, so it looks as if he’s abandoned it. And apparently, we need it now. Or by the time we get up there.”

When he put the phone down, Nadine was still dazed. Mad Max had listened? He was helping with a
child
instead of insisting they find the general first? Glory, hallelujah! She hadn’t realized how much she hadn’t wanted to do this alone.

She leaped from her seat and hugged him. “You were already planning! Thank you. I’ll fix food.”

“I’m not buying ghosts,” he muttered, returning to finishing his cereal. “But if the general is sneaking holographs into the house, it’s better if we’re not here.”

“Holographs!” She laughed and started digging through the refrigerator for enough food to last them a few days. “Have it your way, Mr. Mechanic.”

“If he has heavy security near that school, this is an insane idea,” he warned. “They’ll play kick the can with us.”

“He may be doing worse to
children
!” she yelled back from inside the enormous refrigerator. “How do we sneak out of this place in broad daylight?”

“We don’t. We put on our Goodwill duds—no spike heels, please—wear hats, get in our trashy car, and drive to the grocery store like normal people. You take only what fits into a large purse. If you think we need a change of clothes, wear them on top of each other.” He carried his bowl to the sink and rinsed it out. “We’ll have another rental waiting for us at the store.”

She stared around the stainless steel door at him. “Special Forces training? Or are you just this way all the time?”

“Both.” He laid his palm against the SubZero door and shoved it closed, then grabbed her waist and hauled her off her feet. “You’re the only woman in the world who can push me this far. Don’t get too smart, okay?”

She was too dizzy to reply. He kissed her before she could even begin to think. His words had her spinning as much as the kiss. His arms enveloped her in steady strength and a security that didn’t leave her feeling trapped. When he set her down and stalked out, Nadine stood there stupidly with her fingers over her swollen lips.

She
was the only woman who could push him? What the dickens did that mean? Any way she took it, it had her inexperienced heart thumping faster than it should.

***

Hours later, in the fields outside of Topaz, Magnus examined the RV that Conan had provided. He offered a thumbs up to the RV driver waiting for his approval. “This the tin can that Oz was living in when he was stalking Pippa?”

“Oz says he bought it at a DEA auction for a steal,” the driver agreed. “It has special insulation. Those druggies have to be seriously paranoid worrying about infra-red. Glad it can be put to use helping kids instead of hurting them.”

“People like you and Oz restore my faith in mankind,” Nadine said fervently, bouncing on the narrow cushion of a couch like a manic elf. “The possibility that we should even need this thing is the real crime.”

“Good versus evil, old story.” Magnus turned to the driver. “Conan explained what we need?”

“We’re about ten miles from your destination now. I think we’ve got the rear tire rigged to go flat just before we reach it. This area is too far out to call a tow shop, so I’ve got a bike on back. We’ll drive out, and I’ll stop the RV in the safest wide spot along that route, then bike away as if going for help. If our calculations are off, I can drive the rim for a while. Oz doesn’t care. There’s a box of those mirrors you requested on the table.”

Magnus nodded his approval. They’d argued over the distance from the school on the drive over. Nadine had scoffed that a child who could project hundreds of miles would have difficulty finding them half a mile down the road. Or that the distance would deter her mind reading. Magnus couldn’t argue since she’d
seen
the general across an entire state.

“That works, thanks.” He opened the mirror box while studying the seating in the rolling tin can. “If the general’s security is any good at all, we can’t move around much once we get there,” he warned Nadine. “Choose your position.”

As the RV rolled down the deserted road toward the school, and Max installed his mirrors, Nadine fluttered about the doll house interior, exploring every cranny. “This is adorable! I’ve never been inside one of these. Look, the bench lifts to make a bed!”

“Not big enough,” Magnus muttered, even though he knew they wouldn’t have a chance to try it out. And that he needed to prepare himself for farewells if the gambit should actually work.

Nadine was counting on finding a kid. Magnus was gambling that they’d draw out the general. Either way, their adventure was almost done.

He didn’t like farewells. He liked things loose and easy. Uncomplicated.

No one was more complicated than Nadine. And irrationally, he liked it that way. Working that out required a wrench in his hand. The screwdriver he used on the mirror had to do.

When he was done, he folded the table under, opened the bench beneath, and took the biggest seat in the room.

Nadine produced her laptop and sat down beside him as if she belonged there. He kind of liked her confidence—or her lack of boundaries.

“Don’t worry, I’ve turned off the tracking devices and disconnected the internet,” she told him. “I’m just making notes.”

Definitely lack of awareness of anything but the project at hand, he concluded.

She smelled like orange blossoms. The fragrance suited her. Magnus wanted to ask if the general had bought her perfumes or why she’d chosen to appropriate this one, but he couldn’t let himself get any more involved.

He and the general were heading for a knock-down, drag-out, and he needed to push Nadine far, far away.

“You won’t need to move around much once we stop, will you?” he asked at one point, while she was shifting for a better position—and the brush of her leg sent his mind to the bed beneath them.

“No, I’m good. I’m working out the kinks now. Once I hit trance stage, I don’t notice anything.” She kicked off her shoes and wriggled her bare toes at him.

“My second toe is longer than my big one,” she said, holding up one foot and examining it critically.

“I think it’s sexy,” Magnus said, because he did. Which was probably nuts. He’d never thought about a woman’s toes before, but he loved her long, lean ones. “The freckle on the back of your neck is sexy, too. And your eyes are so far beyond sexy that they ought to be banned in respectable places. Is insanity contagious?”

She giggled. Giggled, when they were hurtling down the highway for a confrontation with the impossible.

“The sex is that good, huh?” She leaned against his shoulder as if she belonged there and continued typing.

“Yeah, that must be it,” he replied. “It will probably wear off in a few months. Don’t get yourself killed before then.”

She elbowed his ribs.

The RV started rolling awkwardly, making loud flap, flap noises.

“Almost there!” the driver shouted. “There’s a shady spot up ahead. Not many of those hereabouts. That will keep the temp down a bit.”

Magnus figured nothing would keep his blood from boiling while Nadine lay curled against him. He rolled over her and took the bench seat on the other side of the aisle, propping his boots where he’d been sitting.

She shot him a quizzical look but busied herself shutting down their communications.

“How soon do you want us to send someone out?” the driver asked.

“We’ll buzz Conan when we’re ready.”

“It could be night,” Nadine said apologetically. “That’s when they relax their guard.”

Magnus figured she was talking about the kid’s mind and not security, but he saw no point in explaining Nadine’s mind tricks to the driver, not any more than he’d explain the mechanization of a satellite.

The driver climbed out, removed his bike, and pedaled off, leaving them stranded in the desert with the general’s minions half a mile down the road. Or less.

“Can we talk?” Nadine whispered.

“Not too loud. Don’t you need silence to connect with the kid?” He was curious. He couldn’t help it.

“Yes, but I didn’t want to worry about anything I might say aloud while I’m connecting with her. I’m never certain what will happen or what I’m doing when I’m . . . elsewhere. I’d rather look out the window and direct my thoughts toward the school, but that’s probably not a good idea, right?”

“Right. Security will be scoping us out right now, if they’re any good at all.” Which gave him an itchy feeling between his shoulder blades. “Let’s see if we can make this quick.”

“All right. Here goes.” She sat cross-legged, shut her eyes, and curled her hands palm upward on her thighs.

Leaning against the RV’s wall, with his boots propped across the aisle, Magnus studied Nadine’s pointed chin and pert nose and felt an ache in his midsection that he’d prefer to ignore. Even the tiniest bit of thought would tell him that he had to let her fly free, once this was over. The gap in experience between them was unbridgeable. She had an entire life to catch up on.