THE RISK OF LOVE AND MAGIC (38 page)

Magnus eyed him long enough to make the other man squirm. “I probably could. She worked as an unpaid flunky instead of the highly-trained professional she is for years. Don’t make me push it. Try being a better person than your father, and maybe Nadine will be there for you when you need her. She’s extremely handy to have on your side.”

Chang scowled, but he nodded. “We give new meaning to the word
dysfunctional
. Tell Nadine I’ll help where I can.”

“That’s all she asks. I’m sorry for your loss, and so is Nadine, probably more than either of us will ever know. But it’s time to move on. Thanks for the books. They mean more to her than money.” Magnus carried his box up the stairs.

“We have positions in Adams Engineering for men with your talent,” Chang said as he escorted him to the door. “I’m not my father.”

Magnus snorted at the offer but replied semi-politely. “For which the world gives thanks. I may have reason to hire your firm in the future. We’ll stay in touch.” Gravely, Magnus shook Chang’s hand and walked into the desert sunshine with Nadine’s past and future in his hands.

***

After spending the morning with the judge and lawyers and more legal documents than even her formidable brain could process, Nadine rewarded herself by accompanying the social worker when she took Mikala back to the school.

“You’ll come visit?” Mikala demanded when they pulled down the long drive.

“I’ll be here so often, you’ll hate to see me coming,” Nadine told her. “Today, you need to take me around and introduce me to everyone.”

Having a purpose was far better than wandering rootless. Homelessness—now that was a different problem.

Oz’s RV was parked on a concrete pad near the school’s parking lot. One of Conan’s drivers must have left it there after their little escapade the other night. Maybe . . . She let that thought tease at the back of her mind while she concentrated on the school.

Walking up the path to the sprawling, one-story adobe building, she admired the manzanita shrubbery and the succulent garden. Someone had been taking good care of the property. The open desert was easier on her mind than the population-clogged cities. She might be able to make a home out here.

She didn’t know if Magnus could.

Inside, the building had high ceilings and lots of light, bright open space. Mikala was broadcasting her nervous eagerness with her fidgeting as much as her mind.

“Go find your friends,” Nadine told her. “I’ll be here for a few hours more if you need me.”

Mikala sent a blinding mental
thank you
that resembled a rainbow in Crayola colors, then ran off down a corridor from which childish voices could be heard.

“Can you introduce me to the staff?” Nadine asked with a trace of trepidation. She was used to computers, not people. But Magnus had returned her confidence that she could learn anything.

***

Later that day, Magnus called to locate her and promised to swing by to pick her up. By the time the Camaro raised dust down the drive, Nadine had met all the teachers and most of the students and had been invited to share dinner with them.

She’d pretty much reached her limits of sociability and would rather share dinner with Magnus. She had so many things she wanted to talk about . . . And so many hopes she didn’t dare consider until she understood what he wanted next.

Speaking with the school’s administrator, Nadine waited for Magnus to come inside to get her. But the Camaro’s dust settled without any sight of him. Puzzled, she excused herself and wandered out to see what had distracted him.

He was just hopping down from the camper. He looked like the football player he’d once been, with his shoulders straining his long-sleeved, charcoal, ribbed t-shirt and his narrow hips encased in black jeans. His hair had grown out just enough to promise dark curls in the future. He strode toward her with the supreme confidence of a man who had the whole world in the palm of his hand. Her heart fluttered like a trapped bird as she watched him.

The smile curving his chiseled lips released her anxiety, and she sashayed in his direction, flirting the skirt of another of Pippa’s wardrobe selections. This one was a swirl of turquoises and darker blues. She wore a dark blue blazer over the halter top, but she had hopes the jacket would come off shortly.

His gaze fastened immediately on her cleavage. He slid his big hands beneath her jacket and lifted it from her shoulders, just as she’d hoped, inspecting the bare skin revealed. “Yeah, I like this one, too,” he said with appreciation. “How did your day go?”

“Pretty well, I think,” she said, almost shyly, uncertain if she’d accomplished as much as she thought. “It will take time and money and some persuasion, but I think once we apply for a proper charter, the school can be kept open.”

“Good. Come see what I’ve brought you.” He caught her arm and tugged her toward the RV with unusual enthusiasm.

“You brought me something? A surprise?” she asked with more excitement than she’d experienced in a long while. “No one has ever brought me a surprise.”

“It’s probably hard to surprise someone plugged into the universe,” he said with his usual gravity, although he was still smiling. “I’m hoping this one surprise will last a lifetime.”

“You brought me camping equipment?” she asked facetiously, stepping into the tin interior.

“It’s not exactly the mansions we’ve been living in, granted, but the RV isn’t what I’m talking about.” He closed the door and switched on the lights.

“It has lights?” She glanced around at the various sconces in surprise, then at the table where he’d set plastic place settings for two. Steaming boxes of Chinese carry-out apparently constituted dinner. “No pizza?” she asked, laughing.

“I couldn’t find pizza nearby, a definite downside to this set-up. There’s a complete RV pad here, with water and everything. The original owner probably had a trailer here for guests.” Magnus filled the tiny aisle as he steered her into the booth. “But that’s not what I want you to see.”

He took off her jacket and folded it over the driver’s seat. He helped her into the booth and lit candles.

“I love this!” she cried in delight. “Can we do this often? Carry-out by candlelight, who can ask for anything more?”

His whole face crinkled when he smiled. “We could have carry-out by the sea next. The advantage of camping equipment is portability.” He opened the storage under the couch and produced an enormous gift-wrapped box. “But this, I can only do once, so I’m trying to do it right.”

Nadine covered her mouth and tears sprang to her eyes. Big blue ribbons covered the silver-foil paper, and she remembered happy holidays with her mother and sister. “You’re making me cry,” she whispered. “If you bring out a Christmas tree, I’ll never stop crying.”

He tipped her chin up and kissed her tears. “Christmas isn’t for a few months. I’ll bring you Rockefeller Center if you want it. But not today. This is a gift you’ve earned all on your own. Open it.”

He handed her a pocket knife so she could slit the ribbon and tape without damaging the packaging. She folded the paper while studying the dusty, ordinary old UPS box beneath. “I’m afraid to look. There aren’t any spiders in there, are there?”

He snorted and pulled back the cardboard tabs. “Maybe pressed and dried, along with eye of newt and all that.”

She had to stand up to peer inside. The blue binders looked vaguely familiar. She lifted the top one, and the memories flashed back so vividly, that she nearly dropped her beautiful, beautiful gift.

“Mama!” she whispered, and tears rolled down her cheeks. “These are Mama’s! Marvelous Max found Mama’s diaries.”

Weeping, she set the book down and flung her arms around his neck and covered his face in kisses. “I can’t begin to thank you. I’d thought them lost forever. Vera will be ecstatic! It’s a piece of the home we lost. I can’t even begin to explain . . .” She was weeping too hard to talk more.

He squeezed her and let her cry. “I think I’m getting used to this,” he murmured. “Especially if it means I can carry you to bed again.”

She sobbed and hiccuped and laughed. “Yes, I think you definitely deserve a reward for putting up with my tears. And for bringing me the best gift ever. And just for being you. And because once I have my hands on you, I can’t think of anything else.”

“That might wear off someday, maybe in New Zealand. Or the Congo. When we’re eighty or so.” He carried her toward the back of the RV. “Until then, I vote we try as many beds as we can find until we find the perfect one.”

“It doesn’t have to be just beds,” she reminded him. “There’s sand and kitchen counters and Jacuzzis and . . .”

“We’ll never run out, excellent.” He deposited her on the covers and fell down beside her. “Our dinner will get cold.”

“I know microwave,” she informed him. “I am the world’s best microwaver.”

“No danger of starving, then,” he said in satisfaction, trailing kisses down her throat, to the cleavage exposed by her halter.

“I’ll keep you well-fed,” she promised breathlessly as his mouth found a particularly succulent bite.

“I hear South American ants are tasty this time of year.” He unfastened her bra and they both gave up on talking. Or thinking.

Sometimes, action was the only way to go.

***

Still glowing with pride that he’d found the way to his woman’s heart, Magnus watched Nadine skim through her mother’s journals while she speared chicken bits with her chopsticks. She’d put some kind of wash on her hair that had removed more of the brown dye and let the sunset color shine through. He hoped she would let it grow out again. He loved digging his hands into those soft curls. He loved the way her wide mouth curled upward when something pleased her. He loved . . . everything about her.

He produced a booklet and piece of paper from the shelf where he’d dropped them. “I checked with the DMV. You can use this address as your permanent address if you put the utility bills in your name. I think there’s separate meters for the RV.”

She tore her gaze from the journal to read the booklet title, and her whole face lit up. “I can get a driver’s permit! Will you teach me?”

“Do you think anyone else could?” he asked wryly, remembering their discussions of having fits in the middle of traffic.

She flashed him a smile. “I’m a quick learner. Can I drive the Camaro?”

“About that . . .” He forked his chicken and waffled now that they were talking something resembling permanency in their relationship.

She raised her auburn eyebrows and waited expectantly—trustingly.

He loved that about her, too. She accepted him just as he was, without asking him to change. “The car is part of a security system I’m working on. It contains software that can hack keypads and interfere with wireless.”

She looked alarmed, and he held up his hand to prevent the flood of questions.

“I’ll probably sell it to the government when it’s perfected. Drug honchos have impressive security systems, but my mechanics will fritz them out in ten seconds flat. But what I really want to do is build a hack-free system, so people like Oz can feel safe in their own homes, and businesses won’t be easy prey for a new breed of thieves.”

She nodded, wide-eyed with understanding. “And your infrared camera can detect paparazzi and probably thieves, too. You have a whole security industry in your head. I might even be able to help you with the hacking end.”

He breathed a sigh of relief. “Exactly. Once I’ve worked out the mechanics, I’ll have to travel to set up the systems, but I can have a home base anywhere. All you have to do is tell me where.”

“Here, for now,” she said without hesitation. “This school is what I want to do, at least until Vera graduates and has some experience and can take over. I want to leave her a solid foundation to build on.”

“Ummm, we might have a minor problem with that.” He dragged his chopsticks through his rice, looking for the best way to say this. “I kind of agreed to take on a pretty extensive library, one with some valuable old books that will probably need professional maintenance.”

“That will require a real librarian?” she asked in delight. “What kind of library?”

“Your family’s,” he said with a shrug. “All the journals that Feng Po-po and her fellow scientists collected over decades, probably. Some of the books are so old, they’re in Latin.”

If it was possible, her eyes widened to fill her face. The candles illuminated the green to a fiery hue that was almost witch-like. That’s when Magnus knew she’d grow her hair out to reach her shoulders—because this was who she was meant to be. The Malcolm Librarian.

“We can build a temperature-controlled room right here,” she murmured. “We can use it to help the children. And their parents. We’ll be a world-wide resource . . .”

Magnus rose from the booth and pulled her out of her seat. She was wearing only a robe, and his hands slid beneath it easily, finding smooth skin. She purred and cat-like, licked his stubbled jaw.

“And you can copy all that information into computer archives for everyone to access—when you’re not accompanying me in global adventures,” he finished for her.

“Yeah, that, too.” She stood on her toes and bit his ear lobe and they left the chicken to be microwaved again some other time.

THE RISK OF LOVE AND MAGIC

The California Malcolms, Book 3

Patricia Rice

Book View Café ebook: July 8, 2014
Copyright © 2014 Patricia Rice

ISBN: 978-1-61138-370-6 ebook

ISBN: 978-1-61138-371-3 trade paper

Publication team:

Beta reader: Lisa Waters

Proofreader: Jennifer Stevenson

Formatter: Vonda N. McIntrye

Cover design by Killion Group

All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book, or portion thereof, in any form.

This is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real locales are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.