flat—and exasperating. And if I’d thought it was coming from a place of ‘me man, you woman, you do as I say,’ we’d have had a problem. And in fairness, I didn’t know that that wasn’t what this was.
But it didn’t look like it. His jaw was hard and set, but his eyes were haunted. Something about the expression made me want to protect him, which was absurd. Louis-Cesare didn’t need anyone’s protection. But it didn’t feel that way right now, and emotion softened my tone.
“We complement each other,” I said. “You can do things I simply can’t, especially now. I can do things you won’t, or wouldn’t think of. And Dorina is my sister. He knows where she is. We find him, we find her, or at least where to look for her—”
“I said no!” The blue eyes, so vulnerable a moment ago, blazed. And he did pull back then, an angry, abrupt gesture.
I let him go. “And you think that ends it?” I demanded. “That you forbid it and that’s it?”
“I think I know Jonathan a little better than you do! If you would listen—”
“I can’t listen when you’re not talking to me.”
“I’ve told you all I can—”
“You’ve told me nothing—”
“Damn it, Dory! Let it go!” He threw out an arm, which happened to be the one cradling the flowers. They went tumbling to the floor and, apparently, the silken ribbon keeping them all together hadn’t been tied properly, because they scattered everywhere. I got down on my hands and knees to gather them back together, and after a moment, Louis-Cesare joined me.
For a moment, we just picked up flowers.
“It isn’t enough,” I finally said.
He didn’t reply.
“Why is this so hard?” I asked. “I thought we were a team—”
“We are a team.”
“But not on this. I want to understand. Explain it to me.”
More nothing. It was starting to piss me off. I felt for whatever he was going through, I really did, but I was going through something here, too.
“Okay, then I’ll explain it to you,” I said, sitting back on my heels. “Dorina is my responsibility. Ray is my responsibility. I don’t know what happened to either of them, but I’m going to find out, and Jonathan is the key.”
“The fey—”
“I don’t know the fey. I can’t track the fey. I can track him.” I met his eyes. “And I will—with or without you.”
I had expected anger, possibly even an explosion considering how things had been going. I didn’t get it. Instead, Louis-Cesare looked . . . bewildered, as if he’d never before been confronted by someone he couldn’t simply order around. You, sit there. You, come with me. You, hang out and do your nails until I return.
Assuming I ever do.
“Boy, did you marry the wrong woman,” I told him frankly.
“I didn’t.” It was rough. “I love your spirit, your independence—”
“Except right now.”
He paused, but he was fundamentally an honest person and always had been. “Except right now,” he agreed.
He sat down among the profusion of flowers, some of which were clinging to his trousers. I picked off a rose that had gripped him by its thorns so that it wouldn’t stain. It was blood red and velvety soft—the petals, anyway. It reminded me of the ones he’d scattered on our bed on our original honeymoon, which had been in the room I was renting from a friend, because things had been too crazy to allow us to get away right then.
They had stained, too, crushed and ground into the sheets by morning to the point that I’d had to throw that bedding away.
I grinned.
Worth it.
“Why are you smiling?” Louis-Cesare asked, watching me.
I twirled the rose around in my fingers. “I was thinking about Radu,” I lied, because I wasn’t ready to make up yet. “He’d love it here. He’d be in full-on Napoleon-during-his-Egyptian-campaign mode: flowing burnoose, silk cummerbund, turned up shoes—”
Louis-Cesare’s lip twitched.
“—maybe he could even talk some sense into you.”
The smile faded. “I’m not the one who needs to see sense. I want you protected!”
“And I want to find my sister—”
“I will find your sister. I promised—”
“To never treat me like an inferior again.” I looked at him. “Or did that only apply to Dorina?”
I was referring to another, similar incident, when Louis-Cesare had taken it on himself to try to fight one of my battles for me. That had not ended well, with Dorina coming very close to attacking him for the implication that she couldn’t handle herself. That sort of thing was