Fin snorted, but I didn’t look at him. I locked my eyes on the not-so-friendly scowl of the captain.
“Why can’t you stay here? It’s far more secure,” he said.
“Because I want to sleep in my own bed, in my own home.”
“Our beds are better.”
I ambled a step forward, clutching my fists to filter some sense into my brain. It was hard to appear menacing in a sparkly dress, but I would give it a go. “You don’t know a single thing about my bed, so you can’t possibly know yours are better.”
“The beds here are recreations of clouds. Nothing beats them.”
I patted his shoulder a little harder than I meant to. “Great, you sleep in them, and I’ll go home and sleep in my inferior one.”
His lip twitched, but I couldn’t tell if it was the beginning of a smile or another scowl. Knowing our history, probably the latter.
He ground his teeth and asked Fin, “Is this an order, sir?”
“I’m afraid so, captain. She’s quite insistent. I tried to convince her to stay.”
The Captain looked at Fin over my shoulder. “You could convince her.”
Don’t punch the security man, I told myself over and over.
“Run along, soldier boy. Hopefully, I won’t see you later.”
I shifted around the captain and walked out into the hall. If any of the guards along the corridor heard our little tiff, they didn’t acknowledge it.
The SUV sat in front of the house and I climbed inside.
“I don’t know who is coming along, but I assume at least Fin,” I told the driver.
He nodded in the rear-view mirror and I stared out the window at the rolling fields around Fin’s home.
This was a lot to process. Between the growing awareness of Fin, in ways I shouldn’t be thinking about him, and the tension between us when I didn’t do exactly what he expected, I didn’t know how this would end. With my history, badly, but I didn’t want it to.
I wanted to trust him. I wanted to be his friend. But I didn’t know how to be.
There would be a greater chance of me forming a friendship with the captain than Fin. Despite his clear dislike of me, I enjoyed our little spats.
I waited for twenty minutes and was about to climb out and demand they hurry when Fin exited the mansion, followed by several men with gear who climbed into another vehicle I didn’t even realize was parked behind us. He crossed in front of the car and then climbed in beside me on the opposite side.
“Ready?” he asked.
I glared and pressed the side of my head to the window. “I’ve been ready for oh, a half hour. You’re worse than a woman when it comes to packing.”
“It wasn’t just packing, I spent most of that time convincing the captain we needed to do this. He is adamant about my safety, so don’t be too hard on him.”
I traced a circle in the fog from my breath on the window. “But he likes it when I poke him with a stick. Gives him something to wake up for in the morning.”
Fin huffed and faced out his window to peer into the darkness. The SUV pulled away, and I wrapped my arms around myself, chilled despite the heat in the car.
Fin draped his suit jacket over my upper body and because I was a paragon of chill, I froze up and didn’t move until he stared back out his window. Then I curled into the coat, the scent of him wafting from the fabric. A stray honey hued hair lay across the collar, but I didn’t pull it off. I couldn’t wait to get home and see how the captain reacted to the fact that all his men weren’t going to fit inside my apartment.
Ah, it’s the little things that keep you going from day to day.
We managed to get back to my apartment and I went straight to bed, ignoring the fact that I had a rich fae in my living room. After all, tortured dreams were waiting for me.
Chapter Six