Apple of My Eye (Tiger's Eye Mystery #7) - Alyssa Day Page 0,26

to the Orlando Museum of Dental History on your first date." His grin lit up the room. "That's a lot to compete with."

"I'm going to strangle you both."

"Later. Right now, we have to get moving," he said, glancing at his watch. "Our transport awaits."

But when we opened the door, I realized that he'd driven to my house on his motorcycle.

"I am not getting on that bike in this dress."

"Oh, Tess. Do you still doubt me?"

"Well, you did just disappear for weeks with very little word," I pointed out. "And there was the time you and your friends caused me to zip line upside down into an alligator pen, and—"

"Never mind," he said quickly. "Here we go."

I glanced up. Nope, no private Atlantean jet flying up. "Here we go what?"

He donned his jacket and took my hand. "Here we go this."

I blew out a sigh and glanced at my front yard again and saw… a shimmer.

A sparkly shimmer, not unlike the magic that surrounded Jack when he shifted shapes. It elongated and grew longer until, seconds later, a large, glowing, magic—because what else could it be?—oval floated over my lawn, just steps away from my flower bed.

Jack tightened his hand around mine. "Okay. Let's go!"

I planted my feet and glared at him. "If you think for one minute that I'm going anywhere near that, you are seriously mistaken."

The sound of male laughter had me whipping my head to stare at the magic oval again, and a tall, dark-haired, extraordinarily handsome man stepped out of the oval and onto my lawn.

"So desperate you have to kidnap beautiful women, Kitty Cat?"

I blinked.

Kitty Cat?

Jack, instead of growling or attacking or any other thing I might have expected when one alpha male started trash-talking another, just grinned.

"Erin leave you yet, Fish Boy?"

"That's Fish Man to you," the newcomer said, and then he looked at me and bowed.

He bowed?

"I'm Ven. Will you please introduce me to this lovely lady, Jack, so we can get on with this dinner date you hoodwinked my beautiful wife into arranging?"

"I'm Tess. Hello, Ven," I said, finally snapping out of my speechlessness. "I take it you two know each other?"

"We've met," Jack said, gently nudging me to follow him down the steps.

Ven laughed. "There's an understatement. Met, had a few beers, battled a few hundred rogue vampires, saved Atlantis from a demon incursion. Yeah. We've met."

They shook hands, and then that turned into one of those inexplicable man-hugs, with lots of back pounding, and then Jack turned to me, his face split into a huge smile.

"Tess, let me introduce you to Lord Vengeance, the king's brother, Prince of Atlantis. Ven, meet Tess Callahan, family friend, owner of Dead End Pawn. She's the one I told you about."

My ears perked up at that last bit, but I was too busy digesting the first part of the introduction to pay much attention.

"Did you… did you just say Prince of Atlantis?" I didn't know whether to bow, curtsy, or run back into my house, change into shorts and a T-shirt, and spends the rest of the night eating ice cream.

Ven's dark eyes twinkled. "Yeah, yeah, but my brother has a son now, so that heir to the throne crap is over. And if you call me Your Majesty, I'll have to kick Jack's ass."

"Why Jack's?

He held out a hand to me, but I shook my head. "I'm sorry, but I can't—"

A flash of understanding crossed his face. "Right. Jack told me. I just forgot. And I'll kick Jack's ass, because you, Tess Callahan of Dead End, are far too lovely to threaten. Shall we go have dinner before my wife designs an unpleasant punishment for me for the delay?"

From the expression on his face when he mentioned his wife, I knew this was a man head over heels in love. I sighed a little with wistfulness.

"Is she an Atlantean princess too? I'm sorry, but I don't know how your royal family works. I don't have much time for celebrity watching, I'm afraid."

They'd been on the cover of People magazine almost nonstop since Atlantis had appeared, but I only read stuff like that in the salon when I got my hair cut, and it had been a while.

Ven laughed. "Great. Now we're celebrities. Erin will hate that."

Jack put an arm around my waist and aimed a narrow-eyed look at the prince. "Quit flirting with my date, or I'll tell your wife on you."

Ven pretended to shudder. "Oh, I'm in trouble now."

"I find it hard to