Into Thin Air (26 page)

Oy,
Gawan thought. Not nearly as much as he.

Saints, if but things could be changed.

"Well, lady," said Jason, "while Sir Gawan may be considerably, er, old, I am still quite youthful, in truth, in case you find old no longer suiting you."

"Mind yourself, pup," Gawan said, then noticed Tristan had pulled onto a single lane track. Beyond, on a hilltop and overlooking the sea, sat a lone whitewashed cottage. "That must be your rental there, Ellie." He pointed to the small white building ahead. "Quite secluded, and Grimm is at least twenty-two kilometers away."

"I wonder why you were on Grimm's land?" Jason asked, leaning forward in his seat. "By the saints,

'tis a lonely little croft, aye?"

"I wonder how the heck I got out here. I don't see a rental car," she said. "And if the completely alive version of me is anything like the me now, I'd probably have been afraid to drive over here."

She glanced at Gawan. "The roads are too narrow and you drive on the wrong, well, left side of the road instead of the right."

He grinned. "I know. And I find it hard to believe you're afraid of anything."

She smiled.

Good,
Gawan thought. He wanted Ellie's nerves to ease a bit before they entered that cottage. In truth, he'd be going in before her, anyway, because more than once since finding out about the cottage, Gawan feared what he'd find inside. Nay, he knew Ellie was for a certainty still alive, else her body would no longer remain solid. In truth, his gut—along with the voices Ellie had remembered when last she vanished—told him she was being tended elsewhere.

By the saints, he prayed they tended her well.

They pulled in behind Tristan and got out. Tristan immediately made his way to Gawan.

"I hadn't thought of it before, but mayhap you and I should investigate the cottage first."

"Aye," Gawan said, interrupting. "I've just thought the same thing." He glanced at Tristan's wife.

"Lady, would you mind keeping Ellie company whilst we go in first? She's a bit jittery about the whole thing, as it is."

Andi smiled, the fierce wind whipping her hair about her face, her wee nose already red from the cold. "Absolutely." She turned and walked toward Gawan's Rover, the gravel of the drive crunching under her booted feet.

Jason joined them once Andi had replaced his company. "I would like to go in, too, sirs, if it's all the same to you?"

With a nod, Gawan said, "Aye, then. Let's be done with it."

Tristan pulled a key from his coat pocket, and as they managed the front walkway, the three were silent while he placed the key in the door and turned the lock. With an easy push, the door swung open.

Gawan stepped in behind Tristan, then Jason behind him. All three stood in the small foyer of the cottage and stared.

It was completely empty.

"Damnation," Tristan said.

With a pang of unease, Gawan moved around Tristan and hurried through every room, searching every closet, pantry, and the lone garderobe.

"Anything?" Tristan called out from another room of the cottage.

"Nay," Gawan said, just before all three met back at the foyer.

Gawan pushed a hand through his hair. "Bleedin' priests, man. It doesn't look as though she's even stepped foot in the place."

"Shall I go retrieve her and Lady Andi?" Jason asked.

Both Gawan and Tristan answered together: "Aye."

Dragging a hand over his jaw, Gawan stepped into the small larder and opened the refrigerator. "

'Tis empty, and clean as a whistle." He closed the small white door. "The bedchamber is the same, as well. Everything's as though not a soul has stayed here."

Just then, Ellie and Andi, with Jason in the rear, came through the doorway. Jason closed the door behind them.

Ellie simply stood, at first, looking around. Then, without a word, she moved from room to room, until she reappeared in the living area.

She scratched her chin. "Well. This was highly anti-climactic." She looked at Gawan. "I have a pretty good feeling that the real, very much alive me isn't quite this neat."

Andi went to the hearth and sat down on the stone ledge. "When did Ellie sign the rental release?"

"Just under a fortnight ago," Tristan said. "Yet the release has her letting the cottage for another two weeks."

"Maybe she"—Ellie closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose—"maybe I had finished whatever it was I came here for and had already packed everything up?"

Gawan moved toward her then, and took her by both arms. "I want you to search each room carefully, girl. Think." He tapped the side of her head. "Remember how you found your ear bauble beneath the rock on the beach?"

She nodded. "You're right." She paced for a moment, and everyone remained quiet, and then Ellie started in the larder. She went straight to the refrigerator and opened it, as Gawan had.

She stared for a moment, as though trying to decide what sort of snack to choose, and then she closed the door. Opening the freezer, she quickly inspected it and closed it, as well.

Next, the pantry, a small walk-in with just enough space for one person to step inside. She stepped inside, looked around, then came out.

The whole while she studied the rooms thoroughly, everyone else remained in the living area, quiet.

Several minutes later, Ellie walked back to join them, her face pulled into heavy concentration. She stood, her lips moving silently as she worked to decipher something in her head.

Then a spark snapped in her lovely blue-green eyes, and she went to the refrigerator and opened the door. Gawan and the others followed her.

On her hands and knees, Ellie removed the bottom drawer of the refrigerator—the one Nicklesby always filled with vegetables and such—and poked her hand in. There was a little sticky, ripping noise just before she withdrew her arm.

Holding up her hand, she gave Gawan a wide grin. "Wow."

Pinched between Ellie's two fingers was a blasted key.

Chapter Twenty-Two

"How did you know to look there?" Andi asked.

Ellie stood, closed the door to the fridge and shrugged. "It just sort of came to me." She looked at the key. "I guess I must hide things in weird places."

"Mayhap you suspected someone might try to find it?" Tristan said.

"Well, according to my voice mail, I did." She studied the key closely. "It's small, like it goes to a locker, or something."

"Might I?" said Gawan, who'd come to stand close to her.

She handed the key to him. "What do you think?"

Gawan nodded. "Mayhap a safe-deposit box or a locker at the airport." He glanced at Tristan.

Tristan took a turn looking at the key. " 'Twould do us little good, though, as we've no name to go along with the key."

Gawan rubbed his jaw. "Aye, but see you here," he said, and pointed to a series of numbers imprinted on the key. "These may be logged into their system. Mayhap, with a bit of persuasion, the key master might look into matters for us."

It amazed Ellie, still, as she looked at Gawan and remembered he had the ability to
coerce.

"Mayhap 'tis a postal key?" Jason said as he leaned over Gawan's shoulder and inspected it.

Andi glanced at her watch. "We won't know until tomorrow, I'm afraid." She tapped the face. "It's almost four o'clock. Closing time for everyone."

"Bloody right," Tristan said.

Andi moved closer to her husband and linked her arm through his. "I've got a doctor's appointment tomorrow," she said, then looked up at Tristan. "I can go by myself if—"

"Nay," Gawan said. "Forgive me, lady. It's not that I don't appreciate Tristan's aid." He scratched his brow. "But there's no way in bloody hell I'd ask Dreadmoor to miss his unborn's first appointment."

He clapped Tristan on the shoulder. "I'll ring your mobile with any news."

Tristan gave a short nod. " 'Tis agreed, then. I confess I feel the need to make sure the man responsible for bringing my babe into this world—and seeing to my bride in the meanwhile—is not a brainless twit."

Ellie watched the exchange between Tristan and Andi and felt a pang of envy at their obvious love.

"Ellie?" Gawan said.

Good Lord, she'd gone mushy.

Then it hit her again.

Again.

She walked back to the fridge, opened the door, and got back onto her knees. Pulling out the opposite drawer to the one on which she'd found the key, she felt with her hand, on the underside of the lid.

Just like the key, another treasure had been stashed, held in place with a piece of tape. Working it loose, she pulled it free.

"What is it, girl?" Gawan said, right beside her, where he'd come to crouch.

She pulled out a small rectangle of paper, maybe two inches by one inch. It had a name.

" 'Langston,' " she read.

Gawan leaned closer. "That's it?"

Ellie turned the paper over. "Yep, that's it."

"Damnation, lady, but you have the oddest of hiding places," Tristan said. "Clever girl."

"So your name may very well be Langston?" Jason asked, leaning against the honey-stained oak counters.

"There's the Langston estate up the way," Gawan said, rising and pulling Ellie with him. "Passing odd."

"Aye, but he's just an old croaker, last I heard," Jason said. "Caused quite a stir in the old day, though."

"Rather, his ancestors," Tristan said. "But that was centuries ago."

"It obviously means something, though," Andi said.

Ellie dug and dug inside what memory she had.
Langston, Langston, Langston.
Didn't stir up even a single dust mite of a memory.

"I'll ring Constable Hurley with these new finds this eve," Gawan said. He moved a hand to Ellie's elbow, which immediately sent tingles up her arm. "Tristan, Andi, thank you for your aid," he said, and with his other hand, he gripped Tristan's in a firm shake. "And for the services of your finest young Dragonhawk knight." He leaned over and placed a kiss on Andi's cheek. " 'Tis wondrous, the change you've stirred in this big oaf. I daresay none other could have succeeded at the like."

Andi, Ellie noticed, blushed clear to her toes, but she gave Gawan a big smile. "Strange, I guess, how things that were meant to be just work out when you least expect them to." She looked at Ellie, leaned forward, and whispered, "Everything will be okay. I know it." She took her hand and squeezed it. "See you soon."

Ellie smiled, although the first thought that popped into her head was
God, I hope you're right.

"Thanks. For everything."

Tristan placed a hand on Ellie's shoulder. "Lass, I leave you in capable hands, in truth. But should you need anything else, you have Nicklesby ring me straightaway." He leaned over and kissed her cheek. " 'Twill all work out." He glanced at Gawan. "Saints, you've a bloody Angel beside you," he said, then gave her a solemn smile. "And the best pair of warriors I know. How could it not work out?"

Somehow, Ellie thought as they made their way back to Castle Grimm, she really hoped things would work out for the best a little bit quicker. No way would she tell Gawan that she had started feeling different.
Yeah,
she thought, taking in a deep breath,
maybe just different.
She didn't feel like running a marathon, for sure, but overall, not too bad.

Different.

And then she threw a prayer Heavenward that
different
didn't necessarily mean
dead.

As she watched the blustery northern English seascape flash by through the window of the Rover, Ellie let her thoughts drift, allowed them to wander, to make up a bunch of what-ifs—almost like a roadtrip game.

What if,
say, the whole mystery of Who Is Ellie was solved?
What if
Gawan rescued her, from wherever she presently was. He'd meet his Angel retirement requirements, she'd be completely and wholly
alive
—always a plus in her book—and they'd be free to ... what? Date? Well
duh,
of course, they'd date. They were each other's bloody Intendeds! Of course they'd date.

A sound pulled Ellie from her what-if game, and she glanced to her right, from where the sound originated.

Gawan's gaze focused straight ahead.

Obviously not him, so she turned in her seat and peeked at Jason.

His head was tilted backward, and his eyes were closed.

Sleeping. Some guardsman you are, cutie ...

Gawan covered his mouth, coughed, and cleared his throat.

It was only then that Ellie recalled the juicy info Jason had revealed the night before.

She narrowed her eyes and stared at Gawan, who continued to face forward.

She smiled, and knew if she could have seen that smile in a mirror, she'd have described it as
evil.

Oh, gosh, Gawan is so hot.
She watched him. Not even a muscle flinched.

Mmm, his hair is so sexy. Wild, loose, looong curls that feel so soft. And his eyes—wow. A girl could
get lost while gazing into them.

Gawan shifted in his seat but his eyes stayed glued to the road.

And the way his hands feel, mmm, nice and rough, like a man's hands should feel. And good Lord
Almighty, the way he kisses—the way his tongue feels. God, just thinking about his body pressed
against mine almost makes me—

"Come now, Ell," Gawan said, squeakier than what he probably would have preferred, all while shifting again in his seat. He patted her awkwardly on the knee. "Wake up, girl. We're almost at the gatehouse."

Ellie laughed out loud. "Ha! You are a naughty Angel, Conwyk." She turned to him, and stared until he glanced at her. "You were reading my thoughts, weren't you?"

He said nothing, just stared at the road.

"Knights don't lie, so don't even think about it."

A slow smile lifted the corner of his delicious mouth.

" 'Twas only a peek, girl, and you'd been so silent, I was worried." He brushed a knuckle across her jaw. "Truly. And 'twas you being the naughty one, aye? Saying things that nigh onto made me swerve the Rover into a pile of snow."

Jason let out a snore.