Page 82 of Girl Anonymous

“Whoever had taken control of her security camera.”

“Now you’ve done it.” Connor laughed. “Did she realize what she’d done?”

“As soon as it was joined.”

Connor surreptitiously glanced toward the house. “I’ll bet that went well.”

“Not immediately.” The understatement of the century. “Connor…when she kissed me, the bottle and stopper gave off this flash of heat.”

“Like…like they’d been waiting all these years and… You are shitting me.” Connor glanced around as if in this sunny suburban backyard he saw the Daire and Arundel ghosts watching him.

Dante comprehended the feeling. “Not sure…but I suspect the stopper fused to the bottle.”

Connor gently twisted the stopper.

It didn’t budge.

Connor stared at him in consternation. “The fifteenth century for the win!”

“I’ve got to stop challenging fate.” Dante glanced toward the house. Was Maarja carrying his child? Why would she say no?

Because—lowering thought—she didn’t want to marry him. Couldn’t she see the advantages?

He was rich. He had a few scars, but last night she’d enjoyed his body. He’d made sure of that. The way she responded… Oh, yeah. He would definitely make sure she craved him time and again. That was only fair, since he craved her. He could keep her safe…although she wouldn’t be in such danger if she hadn’t been there for the explosion… “If she isn’t pregnant from the first time, she’s probably pregnant from what she did to me after the attempt to run us off the road.”

“What she did to you?”

“You know. Death too close and all that.”

“Yes, I know.” Carefully Connor handed the bottle back to Dante. “Congratulations, man. You picked a good one. Or fate picked a good one for you.”

Dante placed it on the glass patio table in the sun. Together they stared at it, at the blending of colors, blue to purple to red, all rich and glorious, casting shimmering rainbows in circles around its base. “It’s a promise of peace,” Dante whispered.

Connor hummed softly, then seemed to make a decision. “Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay.” He paced each repetition of the word as if he needed the seconds between to clear all the circuits in his brain. He stripped off his T-shirt, his pants, and underwear, and jumped naked into the pool. “Come in. It’s easiest. No one close. No one wearing a device.” It was a subtle accusation at Dante. Connor didn’t necessarily trust him.

Good point. No matter how you arranged the letters in Arundel, they always spelledcorrupt. Dante stripped off and jumped in. “Son of a bitch! Your pool heater is broken?”

Connor grinned evilly. “Don’t have one. Did your dick shrink to the size of a peanut?”

“When you hit me with the water, yeah!”

“Come on. Into the middle.”

They swam to the center of the pool.

“Who are your suspects?” Connor demanded.

CHAPTER 39

Owen watched out the window fondly. “Look at them. They’re getting along so well!”

“Goodie. I’d hate to see them break up.” Maarja refused to look. Instead she shredded cheese and beat eggs.

With his first sign of snappishness, Owen said, “You would. In this family, you need every ally you can get.”

“I’m not of this family.” She could do snappish, too.

“Maybe you should have explained that before I let you blast my living room ceiling!”

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