wore a crooked smile, as if to say, “Gotcha.”
“I say it,” said Rhys, “because somebody tried to kill me today.”
Chapter 2
When we reached JFK, Lex turned the car into an open space at the far reaches of the Central Terminal Area lot and shifted into Park. August sunlight bounced off a stretch of windshields and rearview mirrors between us and the terminals. His engine idled almost imperceptibly, to keep the cool air blowing.
He unfastened his seat belt and turned to me.
Here it comes, I thought. Until this moment, Lex’s only reaction to my announcement that I was flying to Egypt had been three words: “I’ll drive you.”
I expected a protest.
I didn’t expect him to take my left hand in his.
“Mag,” he said. And he slid a gold band onto my ring finger! “Wear this?”
Gold band. On the finger reserved for engagement and wedding rings.
And I’d thought concern for Rhys and last-minute flight plans had been stressful? This sent the day’s pressure into heart-pumping overdrive.
Damn, I thought, staring at the ring. And we were just starting to get along again. Except for the panic attack at the thought of kissing him, that is. Still, I’d already refused to marry Lex Stuart, several times, even before this business about chalices and secret societies had come up.
The timing hadn’t exactly improved.
“It’s company policy,” Lex explained with his usual composure, drawing his thumb across the band. “Women wearing wedding rings invite less harassment in Arab countries than women who are recognizably single.”
“Policy,” I repeated numbly—and the world shifted back into place again. Policy. The ring meant nothing. Then the rest of his statement caught up with me, and I regained my full voice to challenge it. “Invite harassment?”
“Attract less harassment, then. Point being—”
“Point being you think I need the illusion of a man to protect me.” I started to tug the ring off.
He closed his hand around mine, stopping me. “I didn’t say that. God help any Egyptians who try to harass you.”
Appeased, I waited for him to explain himself.
“I just wish you weren’t going,” he said softly.
Which, as far as ways for him to explain himself went, sucked. “Well that’s not your call to make.”
“Did you hear me asking?”
Actually, no, I hadn’t.
Lex opened his hand enough to look at mine, at the ring that now loosely circled the top knuckle of my finger. “You’re the one who complains that we don’t talk enough.”
I couldn’t help it—I laughed. I had to get rid of nervous energy somehow. “I complain that you’ve taken a vow of secrecy to an organization that’s tried to kill me. And you. More than once. That’s not the same as whining that you don’t tell me often enough that you love me.”
He said, “I love you.”
I sank back into the leather seat and closed my eyes, still anchored by his hand holding mine. My reaction to that really shouldn’t have been to think, Crap, should it?
I mean, this was Lex—my first date, first love, first time. My first, second, and third heartbreak.
But damn it, my plane was leaving soon, and I still had an international security check to get through. “Lex…”
“I love you, and I hate that you’re leaving. This is the Middle East you’re talking about, Mag.”
When I opened my eyes, there that ring sat, peeking loosely through our fingers, undecided. “Egypt isn’t the same as the Gaza Strip.”
“It’s not the same as Cleveland, either,” insisted Lex. “Less than a decade ago more than fifty tourists were massacred in the Valley of the Kings.”
“I’m not going to the Valley of the Kings, I’m going to Alexandria. It’s the other direction.”
Lex stared at me, unswayed.
I fisted my hand in his, ring and all. “I’ll be fine.”
“Like you were the last time you went after a chalice that certain people didn’t want found?”
“Certain people don’t know I’m going this time.” Or… Old suspicions settled in my chest. “Do they?”
Lex took his hand back and released the parking brake in an angry movement. “You’ve really got this not trusting me business down, haven’t you?”
Again—crap. I reached awkwardly across my lap to reengage the brake, since my left hand was still fisted to keep from losing the ring. “Hey. I wasn’t saying you told them. Did you hear me saying that?”
Then again, if they learned about my quest some other way, I wasn’t sure he could have told me, either.
When Lex turned back to me, his expression was impassive—and his eyes desperate. “We really don’t communicate well, do we?”
I might not be able to tell him that it would all work out, not with any certainty, but I could at least reach for him, cradle my palm across his clean-shaven cheek. If words couldn’t ease his uncertainty, maybe simple touch would.
As if I’d drawn him, Lex leaned nearer, braced his forehead lightly against mine. “I can’t lose you again.”
Which on some levels was so tender, so vulnerable, that I felt half-ready to ditch everything, just to taste his lips, just to ease some of the uncertainty from this man’s deep, golden eyes. When I looked at him I saw too much—a boy dying of leukemia, a teenager grieving his dead mother, a man determined to keep promises he should never have had to make….
But on some levels, intentional or not, his words were manipulative as hell.
“You first,” I whispered, turning my head to rest it on his shoulder. Lex really had great shoulders, solid and strong, even without the crisply tailored suits. He would make a really great leader of warriors.
“Me first, what?”
“You promise to stop doing dangerous things, taking transatlantic flights to unsafe places—”
“Mag.” The sardonic note he put into my name told me we were done with the puppy-dog eyes for now.
“…move to the suburbs, ditch the sports car….”
He sighed and leaned his weight into me, hard enough to nudge me fully back into my own seat.
“Then maybe,” I finished, silently laughing at his scowl
