Page 102 of Torin and the Princess

He blinked.

I said, “I’m just saying this is your defense.”

He said, “I wouldn’t marry her? What do you mean...? It just wasn’t the right time. I would have married her, I wanted to, it?—”

“Bullshit, you didn’t want to marry her, you could have asked her a million times. She thought you were going to ask her this weekend and?—”

He groaned again. “No... no, really? Is that what she thought? Damn... I had no idea.”

“Honestly, Coop, I love ya, you’ve been like a brother, but if you didn’t know that Lexi thought you were going to ask her to marry you, then you are a dimwitted fool.”

He exhaled, shaking his head. “I couldn’t figure out why she was so intent on going to Falls Landing.”

“Yeah, because you’re an idiot, and you’ve only been thinking about yourself for, I don’t know,months.”

“Shit, but... what do I do? How do I make it up to her? She’s gone.”

I shrugged. “I have no idea, she’s pretty bummed, she was even planning what she would wear to the big dinner.”

He had his hands on his head again. “Jeez, Jen, you’re right, I’m a fool. I’ll ask her, first thing, soon as I find her — We need to figure out how to get her back.”

I leaned against the rail. “Let’s think about thisrationally. If it’s not time travel, then she’s here somewhere, right? And likely they won’t treat it like a missing persons case until twenty-four hours have passed. I saw that in a show.”

Cooper said, “True. That seems right.”

“Could she have run into the woods?”

He said, “I didn’t see it. Did you?”

I said, “Nope.”

“Put on your shoes, we ought to go look.”

I said, “But… to continue being rational. If it was time travel, then we are not going to find her around here. Those medieval dudes did not just chase her into the woods surrounding her house and then disappear.”

Cooper nodded.

I continued, rationalizing, “And the thing is, she’ll probably be back soon. If you think about it, Torin has landed here like five times in a few days. She’ll be back in a few hours, probably. Right?”

Cooper said, “It would follow, yeah.”

“So maybe we don’t get the police involved, there’s not much they can do, right? If it’s time travel they can’t do anything but be a great big hassle.”

Cooper chewed his lip. “Okay, but seriously, Jen, if she’s not back by… I don’t know, we… we call it in.”

“Yeah, let me put on some shoes and we’ll start looking.”

I sprinted up the steps and slammed into the house. I put on my hiking boots and then I left a note for Lexi:

Hey Babe,

Where did you go? Coop and I are out looking for you, if you come back here, stay put.

Love,

Jen

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