Absolutely Captivated (20 page)

He handed it to her, his fingers
shaking. They brushed her palm, and a heat ran through her. She
struggled to keep her breathing even.

The penny was shiny and
new. She rubbed her fingers over it, feeling the pressed metal, the
perfection of the coin. It didn’t have that slight sense of
fragility that Faerie money had—the sense that if you squeezed too
hard, the money might vanish.

“It seems real,” she said.

“You mean it might not be?” he
asked.

She smiled. “Magic is mysterious and
it follows its own circular rules.”

“I thought it followed the Fates’
rules.”

“What they do is more like build dams
in streams. They try to control the magic and don’t always
succeed.”

Travers was very close to her but she
didn’t want him to move away.

“You’ve been quiet since we left the
hotel room,” he said.

“There’s a lot I don’t want to tell
you,” she said, and then her breath caught. She hadn’t meant to say
that out loud.

“Really?” he said.

Zoe shrugged, planning to brush the
comment off. Instead, she said, “Really.”

He stared at her. She
stared at him, noting the fine blond lashes over his sky-blue eyes.
He was the most handsome man she had ever seen, something she was
about to tell him when—

“Crap!” she said and thrust the penny
back at him. “You keep this. Get it away from me.”

“What?” he said.

“Take it!” she said. “Take it
quickly.”

“Why? What does it do?”

“Think,” she said,
struggling not to say more. “What did you say to me before you
conjured up the penny?”

“I said ‘A penny for your
thoughts.’”

“Precisely.” She stuck the penny in
the pocket of his polo shirt. “Keep it. I don’t want it. And you
can’t have my thoughts.”

“Not even the ones you’re hiding from
me?” he asked with a smile.

This time, she didn’t even feel the
urge to answer him. The moment had passed. Returning the penny
negated the magic.

“You don’t understand, Travers,” Zoe
said. “You really wanted to know what I was thinking.”

A slight frown marred his forehead.
“Yes, I did. I thought that was clear.”

“I mean, you weren’t just making
conversation.”

“I know,” he said.

“So,” she said, “when you created the
penny, you created a spell that got you what you wanted. And I
bought into it.”

“Interesting choice of words,” he
said.

“Maybe a little too accurate,” she
said.

“Actually, no,” he
said. “I’m the one who supposedly purchased
your
thoughts.”

“And apparently you got your penny’s
worth,” Lachesis said as she brought the silverware into the dining
room. “Giving the penny back probably wouldn’t make the spell
continue. Apparently, a penny’s worth of thought is only a sentence
or two.”

Thank heavens, Zoe thought, but didn’t
say.

Travers gave her a sideways smile.
“Why’re you so relieved?”

Zoe shrugged one shoulder. “I’ve
always been a private person.”

“Doesn’t my son make you nervous,
then?” Travers asked.

“I know how to prevent a broadcast
thought,” Zoe said.

“Most of the time,” Kyle said from the
kitchen.

Zoe’s heart jumped, and then she
realized that Kyle was, after all, eleven. He might have been
simply saying that to make her uncomfortable.

Or he might have been telling the
truth.

Lachesis finished setting the table as
if they were going to have a five-course formal dinner.

“Wine for everyone?” Atropos asked as
she came in from the kitchen, carrying an open bottle of
Chianti.

“Not for Kyle.” Travers stepped away
from Zoe as he spoke, and she felt his loss, as if he were actually
touching her. She hadn’t realized that the air-conditioning was on
so high in this part of the room. Travers had been blocking the
breeze.

“The boy would like some.” As Clotho
spoke, something banged in the kitchen.

“The boy,” Travers said, “will not get
any.”

Lachesis took the bottle
from Atropos and poured each glass a little too full, as far as Zoe
was concerned. Atropos went back into the kitchen. Travers watched
the pouring as if it were the most important event in his life—and
then his shoulders visibly relaxed when Lachesis skipped one of the
wine glasses.

“That looks good!” Kyle said from the
kitchen.

Atropos emerged, carrying a large
salad.

“When did you have time to shop?” Zoe
asked. She hadn’t been gone that long, negotiating with the hotel
manager. Nor had she spoken to Travers longer than a half an hour.
The Fates still had to have time to make the meal and cook
it.

“You have such lovely conveniences,”
Lachesis said.

“Almost as good as magic,” Atropos
said.

“We called a local grocery store and
had the food delivered.” Clotho carried a large pan in each
hand.

“And you paid for it how?” Travers
asked.

“Paid?” Lachesis asked. “They didn’t
ask for money.”

“What did they say?” Travers’ voice
had an edge to it.

“That the hotel would take the
charge,” Atropos said.

“That’s not what they really said, is
it?” Travers’ eyes had narrowed.

Clotho paused before she set the food
down. “They said the charge would go to the room.”

“Violà!
The hotel pays for it.” Lachesis grinned. “I’m
amazed that you don’t even know your own
customs.”

Travers’ gaze met Zoe’s. “See what
I’ve had to contend with?”

“I’m beginning to understand why you
don’t want them left alone,” she said, trying not to
laugh.

“What did we do?” Atropos asked as she
took the platters from Clotho.

“Charging to the room means that it
gets billed to the person who is paying for the room,” Kyle said,
as he came in from the kitchen, Bartholomew at his heels. “Jeez,
even I know that.”

“Oh,” Clotho said. “And here we
thought they were all being so courteous.”

“We had feared that someone had
recognized us, and was paying us tribute,” Lachesis
said.

“We truly couldn’t believe our good
fortune,” Atropos said.

“That should be a sign for you,”
Travers said.

“A sign of what?” Clotho
asked.

“Whenever something seems too good to
be true, it probably is,” Travers said.

Somehow the cliché didn’t sound
as—well—clichéd when he said it. Zoe frowned at him. She had had
two major relationships in her past, relationships in which she
thought she had been in love, and she had never felt this kind of
attraction on the first day.

It had taken her years of friendship
before sliding into the relationship with Ramon, back when she had
just come into her magic. Three turbulent years later, years in
which he had left her four times and had two affairs, she realized
that however she felt about him, he didn’t feel the same way about
her.

And now, more than a hundred years
later, she couldn’t even remember what he looked like. But she
could remember how she felt around him. Comfortable, easy—at least
in the beginning. And constantly annoyed the rest of the
time.

She hadn’t yet felt comfortable or
easy with Travers. She felt a rapport, and she felt an attraction
so fine that it felt as if they were joined by an invisible string.
Part of her—the sensitive, magical part—believed that this man was
an opportunity, an opportunity that she didn’t dare
miss.

Perhaps she had been reading too many
Nora Roberts novels.

Atropos set the platters down,
revealing the pizzas. Kyle had been right; they looked fantastic.
Pepperoni, sausage, and a variety of vegetables thickly covered the
delicately golden mozzarella cheese. The tomato sauce bubbled
through, still steaming, and the crust looked perfect—thick and
golden brown and baked to perfection.

Zoe’s stomach growled. She couldn’t
believe how hungry she was.

“Well,” Lachesis said. “I think your
saying is foolish.”

Zoe frowned. What saying? And then she
remembered that Travers had spouted a cliché at the Fates. Perhaps
she should warn him about talking to the Fates at all, particularly
since he didn’t really seem to understand his magic.

“You’re in our world now.” Travers
shook his head. “I can’t believe I just said that.”

“But you did, Dad.” Kyle came out of
the kitchen, carrying one more platter. Three large pizzas for all
of them, plus a salad. It seemed like too much food. “Maybe you’re
changing.”

“Yeah.” Travers didn’t sound happy
about it.

“Actually,” Atropos said, pulling back
her chair, “you are coming into yourself.”

The Fates sat. Then Clotho
looked pointedly at Zoe, Travers, and Kyle. “You are joining us,
aren’t you?”

Kyle climbed into the chair closest to
the empty wine glass. Travers sat beside him. Zoe sat on the other
side of the table.

Lachesis cut all of the pizzas with a
carving knife. Apparently the Fates hadn’t learned everything there
was to know about cooking, or maybe serving utensils didn’t exactly
count.

Still, the pieces she cut were evenly
proportioned, as if she had always had such skill with a knife. Zoe
didn’t even want to think about that.

Atropos passed the salad to Travers,
who helped himself. Kyle took the first piece of pizza.

Zoe sipped her wine and wished that
she were at home. Her stomach, which had growled a few moments
before, was now churning.

She really didn’t want to tell the
Fates that she wouldn’t work with them. But they had left her no
choice.

“You look serious, child,” Lachesis
said to her, opening the door.

Travers’ gaze met Zoe’s. She got the
sense that he didn’t want her to say anything, that he was hoping
she had changed her mind.

Or maybe she was simply reading him
wrong. She didn’t have the psychic talents that Kyle did, and for
all of her imagined connection to Travers, it hadn’t been tested
yet.

“I am,” Zoe said, taking one of the
platters of pizza as it came by. She took three slices, even though
her stomach kept flip-flopping.

“We’re having a feast,” Atropos said.
“No need for seriousness.”

“Oh, but there is,” Zoe said, handing
the platter to Clotho. “I’m afraid I can’t take your
job.”

“Even after meeting those children?”
Clotho asked, nearly dropping the platter.

“I am not sure how they
relate to your task,” Zoe said, “but—”

“Because you never allowed us to
finish our explanation,” Lachesis said as she helped herself to
salad.

Zoe didn’t point out that the Fates
had made finishing any topic nearly impossible. She took the salad
bowl from Lachesis, and placed a pile of greens on her plate near
the pizza slices. Even though the food looked good, at the moment
the wine looked even better.

Zoe didn’t touch it.

“Your explanation doesn’t really
matter,” Zoe said. “The key is Faerie. You say I have to go in
there, and I’m not ready.”

All three Fates turned toward Travers.
Their movement was so obvious that he blushed.

“What?” he asked.

The Fates smiled at each other and
then Atropos said to Zoe, “You’re ready now.”

“Oh,” Zoe said, finally understanding
them. They believed Travers was her soulmate. Or they were
manipulating her into believing it so that she would work with
them. “You are all so—”

“So what?” Travers asked.

“So…so…” Zoe wished he
weren’t in the room. She didn’t want to say anything about true
love or soulmates or manipulation. “I’m just not going to endanger
my own life, that’s all.”

“Child,” Clotho said, “what’s the
point of living if you don’t have some danger now and
then?”

“Said a woman who spent that past four
thousand years in the same place, protected by the Powers That Be,”
Zoe snapped.

The Fates froze in position. Kyle
looked from one to the other as if he expected a fight. Travers
frowned.

Zoe couldn’t believe she had said
that. If the Fates ever did regain their powers, she might pay for
that sentence more than for refusing them.

“Point taken,” Lachesis said. “We have
endangered ourselves now.”

“So much so,” Atropos said, “that we
have had to go into hiding for much of our sojourn
here.”

“Yeah,” Kyle said. “The fortress. Was
it cool?”

“Kyle!” Travers whispered, obviously
trying to keep his son quiet.