Page 13 of City of Love

Gideon’s cheeks colored. “Vikkras Knight, meet Lexi Cross.”

“My lady, nice to meet you.” He made a formal bow at the waist, his graceful movements a perfect match to the charm of his British accent. “And please, call me Vik.”

Lexi responded with a dainty curtsey, already enjoying his company.

“Vik and his wife, Alana, are close friends of mine,” Gideon said. “He’s also our local weatherman and general thorn in my side as often as he possibly can be.”

“Eh, don’t listen to him. He’s merely envious of my good looks.”

Everyone laughed, including Gideon, though he made a point of rolling his eyes.

“You have a lovely accent,” Lexi said.

Vik beamed his radiant smile. “I was raised in London. My father is British and my mother from India.”

“It’s a pleasure to meet you, Vik.”

Gideon’s face shifted back to serious. “I took the liberty of telling Vik about your ability,” he said. “He and Alana would be happy to talk with you tonight.”

“I’m about to join up with my beautiful wife for dinner. There’s a new place we’ve been meaning to try, and we’d love for you to join us.”

Wait. This was all happening so quickly. Would Gideon be joining them, or was she being shuffled off and out of his hair? His behavior with her kept flip-flopping; one moment he seemed to ooze interest in her, the next he acted as though she were an annoyance to be dealt with.

“Why don’t you come too, brother? All four of us. It’ll be fun.” Vik zigzagged his gaze between the two of them. “We might need you as buffer. You know Alana will want to fawn all over Lexi and we’ll need to rein her in before she smothers our girl here.”

Gideon studied Lexi, then looked back toward the club, pausing long enough that she considered waving a hand in front of his face. “No, I’m already late for my appointment to see the papyrus. And I need to stay around the club, especially in light of Alana’s concerns this week.”

“You’re probably right about that. No worries, we’ll take great care of Lexi.” He cast a conspiratorial nod her direction. “And we’ll pretend he did not just throw you over for some dusty Egyptian grocery list.”

Great. So, she was being shuffled off, and with people she didn’t even know. Curiosity and desire were quickly giving way to annoyance. The entire evening, starting with Margot springing this huge surprise on her, she’d been pushed and pulled at the whim of other people.

Powerless, that was her middle name. Apparently in every universe.

Vik offered her a warm smile and the crook of his arm. “What do you say?”

She glanced up and down the street. Horse carriages. Floating men. No cell phones. No electricity.

The weight of the timer tugged at her wrist. Margot said she would hang with her, but she was currently nowhere to be seen. And dream boy was apparently not an option. She might as well try and learn something about her precognition, if that really was a possibility.

Lexi hooked her arm through Vik’s. “It’s a date.”

She fixed Gideon with a stare, her chin lifted in a dare. “Will you please let Margot know that I’m taking off with Mr. Knight?”

He returned the look, and then his eyes roamed over her arm where it linked with Vik’s, his jaw muscles clenching tight behind those full lips. He nodded, the dare not taken. “Of course.”

Gideon raised his face to his friend. “Thank you, brother.” Then he turned back to her. “I’ll see you later tonight when you get back. Have fun.”

He gave them a quick nod and strode back toward the club.

As they watched him re-enter the salon, Vik tipped his head. “You know, for a moment there I thought he was actually going to come with us. I’ve never seen him that close to walking away from a scientific opportunity in favor of some fun.” He spun to face her, his smile bright enough to clash with the torches bordering the club doors behind him. “You might just be the first woman in nearly a hundred years to have him good and truly muddled. I’ve never seen him fuss over an otherworlder like he did about you when he came and got me just now.”

Lexi blinked. Did he just say a hundred years? That had to be a figure of speech. Gideon mentioned they lived longer here, but she’d figured it meant they were still playing a hearty game of tennis into their nineties, not that they tacked on an extra century or two.

And she had Gideon muddled? If so, the feeling was certainly mutual.

She looked back towards the club, shaking her head. “I can’t figure him out. Nothing about him makes sense to me. Hell, he doesn’t even look like a scientist.” Maybe the sexiest, most physically imposing scientist she’d ever seen.

Vik tipped his head back and laughed, then swung them around and began to head down the sidewalk, his countenance growing more serious with each step. “He was a soldier once, you know. We all were. Taught from a very young age to be fighters. Unfortunately, he felt he came up short in that regard a long time ago, so he’s trained hard in the defensive arts ever since. But make no mistake, Lexi, that’s not the essence of who he is. He’s a scientist, one who works with sound. A master musician. It’s his work that opened the portal, you know.” He stopped and turned to face her. “Gideon Ashe is a lot of things, but first and foremost, he’s a creative genius. And he’s madly in love with our world.”

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