War of Hearts(62)

They’d been on the road for more than an hour, mostly driving in silence. Over the last few days he’d learned that Thea, like him, wasn’t particularly loquacious unless you asked her something that required detail. He liked that about her. Their silence was easy, like two friends who had known each other a long time. However, it left Conall to his own thoughts, and his own thoughts were not a good place to be.

Thea had told him her weakness was pure iron. That revelation opened his mind to the most absurd conclusions that couldn’t possibly be true. Which was why he was taking her to his friend, Vik. Vik was a two-hundred and thirty-four-year-old vampire who split his time between Glasgow and Oslo. They’d met when he’d bought one of the oldest bottles of whisky in the GlenTorr collection. Conall had delivered it to him in Glasgow and been surprised to find the buyer was a vampire. They shared a similar sense of humor, and Vik’s breadth of knowledge on many subjects fascinated Conall. He was a devout researcher, with a plethora of degrees from several of the world’s best universities, and contacts all over the planet.

They’d kept in touch and Conall visited anytime they were both in Glasgow. He knew Vik was at his Oslo home because Conall had just sent a small crate of whisky over before he’d left to find Thea.

If anyone might know what Thea was, it would be Vik.

He knew everything about the supernatural world.

He’d be able to dispel the utter nonsense rolling around in Conall’s mind.

Conall flicked a look at his companion. He enjoyed looking at her. Too much.

She’d trusted him.

Fuck but that pleased him.

He wanted to reach over and tuck her hair behind her ear so he could better see her face, but he resisted. Wanting to touch her all the time had crept up on him. And he knew Thea was attracted to him too. He’d scented it.

It was a complication they didn’t need.

One Conall had to ignore.

For Callie’s sake, for the packs’.

For his and for Thea’s.

Conall needed to distract them both. “Did your parents know? About the iron?”

Her cognac eyes were almost black in the shadowed interior of the SUV. Her eyes appeared dark as jet in the photos Ashforth first showed Conall, and their rich warmth in real life had been unexpected. As was their soulfulness. How could he have thought this woman had any evil in her?

Arse, Conall. You’re a total and utter arse sometimes.

Thea’s voice pulled him from his self-derision. “There aren’t a lot of objects made from pure iron. Well, there wasn’t.” She shot him a sardonic look. “Recently there’s been a trend in using pure iron for decorative railings and such instead of wrought iron. That’s been fun.”

Conall thought about that. Pure iron was a silver-gray metal, a little more pliable than iron but it was still strong enough to do damage. Thea’s back was evidence of that. Then again, if it was as poisonous to Thea as she said, it wouldn’t matter how strong the iron was. Like silver to a wolf, one touch to the skin would burn.

He blanched, imagining what it would feel like to be whipped by a silver-tipped cat-o’-nine-tails. Fuck, but he was in awe of Thea’s strength.

“So they never knew?”

“Honestly, possibly. But it never came up. Pure iron has less carbon in it, so it isn’t as strong or frequently used as other iron materials. Now there’s more of it. They use what they call commercial pure iron, but it still affects me. It’s what blacksmiths use to make those goddamn decorative railings … but …” She exhaled shakily. “It’s also used in aviation. Pure iron was one of the first things I googled when I got away from Ashforth. There was this page that said commercial pure iron is utilized in aviation.”

Conall was silent as he let this sink in. Did she think … “Thea,” he said, his tone gentle, “most planes are made of aluminium.”

“Aluminum?” She pronounced the u like “ooh” and excluded the last i.

“Aye, that one. But the way I said. The right way,” he teased, trying to coax the taut expression off her face. She couldn’t possibly think she was to blame for her parents’ deaths.

She didn’t smile at his teasing. “But what about all the little parts a plane is made of? There could be commercial pure iron in there somewhere.”

“Enough to make you bring down a plane?” He shook his head. “I dinnae think so, lass. Were you …” He hesitated to take her back to that place, but he felt it was important to assure her. “Did you feel pain or the flu-like symptoms you spoke of when you got on the plane with your parents that day?”

She swallowed so hard, he heard it. “No,” she whispered. “I didn’t know it at the time but what I felt was the feeling I get when I know something bad is going to happen. I get this tingling burn down my neck, my heart races, and a feeling of dread comes over me.”

Conall raised an eyebrow. “And you feel this every time you sense danger?”

“Yeah.”

“But you didn’t feel pain that day?”

“No.”

“Then it stands to reason, Thea, that your instincts knew there was something wrong with that plane. You didnae bring it down. Your instincts were just screaming at you it would go down.”

“But what if my emotions made it worse? I fried Ashforth’s plane, blew the windshield off it before that.”