Steal the Night (Thieves #5)(74)

“And if she doesn’t succeed?” Lee asked, his mouth tight with worry.

Jacob shrugged. “Then nothing will matter, will it?” He turned to Terry. “What do you say, Terry? Would you like to play Sancho to my Don Quixote?”

The Australian seemed confused. “I got no idea what you mean, mate.”

“Not a big reader then,” Jacob mused. He hit on the right phrasing. “I’m going walkabout. Want to come with?”

Terry nodded over at the prophet who had once been a Greek god. “Count me in. I want to get as far away from this war as possible.”

“Not so fast,” I said. “I still have questions.”

“I’m sure you do, Your Highness,” Jacob replied. “But they’ll have to wait for another time. As for you, Vorenus, I see the way you look at me. You think I lied to gain your cooperation, but I assure you this is not the case. You’ll have your death, vampire, and sooner than you think.”

“Wait,” I insisted as Jacob went to stand by Terry.

“I can’t,” he replied with an enigmatic smile. “And you have a phone call to answer. Tell Donovan he’ll need the sword if he wants to wake the wizard, but remember a demon is always a demon no matter how helpful he seems.”

He put his hand on Terry’s shoulder and then they winked out of existence. One minute they were there and the next they were gone.

Just then Lee’s cell phone rang. He flipped it open and answered it before holding it out to me.

“It’s Nim,” he said. “She found Merlin.”





Chapter Eighteen





“And these people speak English?” Neil asked as we passed the sign for the ferry to Ynys Ennli.

We’d stopped for directions since the ones Nim had given weren’t the clearest. We were on the coast of Wales, and it had become very clear to me that the Welsh did not, in fact, speak any type of English I understood. Everything that came out of their mouths sounded like it had been stuck at the back of their throats for a while.

“It’s all right, Neil,” Daniel reassured the werewolf. “I’ve listened to it for long enough now. I can translate.”

Dev drove the Mercedes along the lonely road. We’d been driving most of the night and dawn was close now. I was glad that vamps picked up on languages quickly because when the Welshman had opened his mouth to tell us what road to drive on and where to turn, I’d just stared openly, trying to figure out what the heck the dude was saying. Our vampire, however, made a nifty universal translator. It made travel so much easier when all I had to do was wait for Danny to soak up enough local speak that he could order another beer for me without having to refer to a handy basic phrase book.

Daniel sat in the front seat with Dev. I looked out the back and saw that Zack and Lee were keeping up nicely in their car. There had been almost no traffic at this time of night. We left Hugo’s home at dusk and spent the night on the road. It would have been faster to let Daniel fly, but I put the kibosh on that idea. We needed to stick together from here on out. I didn’t want Daniel facing things on his own while Marini had the Blood Stone.

During the day, while I sat waiting for all our travel plans to come together, I had been struck by one of my awful, terrible, shouldn’t-even-consider-it plans. Jacob had made it very plain to me that this was my show. Danny might be the king and Dev might be the man with the plan, but they weren’t a nexus point. I was. If the fate of the entire Earth plane was up to me, then that could only mean one thing. Someone, somewhere needed a thief.

If I was going to save us, I would have to steal that damn Blood Stone back. I didn’t think either one of my husbands would like how I was going to have to do it, though.

The plan was simple, as almost all good plans were. I had to get close to Marini. That might have been hard if it wasn’t a state he had devoutly pledged to attain one way or another. I would just have to make his little fantasy come true. I would surrender myself and play into his demented delusions that I was unhappy with Daniel. It would get me close to the Blood Stone and my blood would do the rest. I would need a way out or a way to tell Daniel once I had the stone, but this little plan in my head was a work in progress and I hadn’t shared it with anyone but Neil yet. His pale blue eyes had widened, and I could tell he had wanted to talk me out of it but couldn’t think of another way.

“You called ahead?” Daniel asked Dev for the thirtieth time.

Dev’s voice was calm and patient. It made me wonder about the changes being with me and Daniel had wrought in Devinshea. If the prophet was right about Dev’s past death wish, then the changes were phenomenal. “Yes, Dan. The boat will be there to pick us up. Nim and Stewart are waiting at the inn.”

Daniel’s fingers drummed against the dashboard of the rented Benz. I could feel his leg bouncing, too, a sure sign of his nervousness. I reached up and placed a hand on his shoulder. He covered my hand with his palm and gave me a little half smile. “You all right back there, Z?”

“It’s not how I planned our first trip out of the country.” I’d been to Faery and the Hell plane, but this was my first Earth plane foreign country.

Dev’s hands tightened on the steering wheel. “I know, sweetheart. I promise, once all of this shakes down, you, Daniel, and I will have that honeymoon we’ve talked about. We’ll go to Hawaii and drink and have sex and just relax.”