about waiting to talk to Declan. “Let’s go.”
* * *
The car the valet brought was a stunning silver Bentley, so polished and shining Barrie could see her own reflection in the hood, an unbelievably classy classic car. And way too nice for a reporter’s car.
As the valet ran to open the passenger door for her, she was roiling with envy and suspicion and desire.
Who is this guy?
As she dropped into the passenger seat, she had a momentary flash that she was doing exactly what she’d just promised Declan she wouldn’t do.
Oh, come on, he’s a coworker, she told herself. Even so, as Mick stood outside the car and tipped the valet, she took out her phone and texted both her cousins using code to let them know where she would be.
Mick went back to the trunk before getting into the car, and when he dropped behind the wheel he was carrying a coat, which he handed to her. “Not that I want you to cover those legs for any reason, but you’ll need this out on the water,” he said, and she blushed, pleased with the compliment and surprised at his thoughtfulness.
The coast road was gorgeous under an almost full moon as they drove down PCH, the Pacific Coast Highway, toward Marina del Rey where the ferry to Catalina docked.
Catalina was a small island off the coast, home of the town of Avalon, created as a resort in the 1920s. Barrie thought back to the last scene of Otherworld; Catalina had stood in for the fictional island depicted as the heart of the Otherworld kingdom. That part of the story was totally make-believe. There were certainly Others on Catalina, but not a large population, and they tended to be reclusive, mostly weres who wanted the wide-open spaces the island offered or who had a taste for bison, which roamed there in herds. Elven hated Catalina because of the water. Elven had a pathological dread of water; it was often lethal to them—a fact the movie never went into.
Barrie felt a stir of significance at that last thought, but before she could pursue it, Mick spoke, looking out the windshield at the almost-full moon.
“Weres will be out on the prowl any minute,” he joked, and she laughed and realized how comfortable it was to be with someone who just knew, who she didn’t have to hide things from or struggle to keep the Code.
Her romantic history wasn’t exactly a disaster, but she’d never been in love, real love, either, and it had started to feel like she was missing out on a rather large and essential part of life.
She wasn’t like some Keepers who thought intermarriage between mortals and Keepers, or marriage between species, should be banned. That attitude smacked of miscegenation, and there were always couples—not many, but some—who could make it work. It just seemed to her a sensible policy to keep a professional distance from the species she was entrusted to protect.
But it was hard living between two worlds. It was hard to date Others because she knew their foibles too well, and they were, after all, a whole different species. And it was hard to date mortals because she couldn’t talk about her life’s work without breaking the Code. If she were ever to find that...One, then she would of course tell him everything about who she was and what she did, without reservation. The trouble was, she hadn’t found him yet. Or he hadn’t found her. And she was getting a little tired of waiting.
She envied her cousins, who seemed to have found their soul mates so easily. Rhiannon and Sailor hadn’t even been back in town for six months before they’d run straight into the loves of their lives: Rhiannon wasn’t having any trouble at all making it work with an Elven, and Sailor’s fiancé, Declan, was a Keeper himself, as well as entrenched in the entertainment business, a perfect match.
“Penny for your thoughts,” Mick said beside her, and Barrie jumped...then reddened. She couldn’t very well tell him.
“Oh, I was just...wondering why Johnny was out on Catalina after the movie was wrapped.” And then she realized what had been bothering her about it. “He was Elven. They hate water. Of course he’d tolerate it for the movie, actors do whatever it takes. But why would he ever voluntarily be on the island after they’d wrapped?”
Mick’s face tightened, but he didn’t answer; they’d arrived at the ferry dock, and the dark water of the Pacific spread