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“Is there some problem?” she demanded sourly. He wasn’t in the way of the TV, but he was distracting in the extreme, just standing there. It was like having a giant statue at the foot of her bed.
The statue spoke. “You are upset about the visit with your mother and that has put you in a contrary frame of mind. It’s possible you will rethink your decision to go to bed at this time. I see no reason to become comfortable if you’re only going to go elsewhere.”
“Comfortable? What are you talking about? You never become comfortable. You never even sleep.”
“I sleep. Perhaps not as you would perceive sleep to be. I am capable of maintaining a state of readiness while technically sleeping.”
“A state of readiness.”
“Yes.”
She resisted the urge to hurl the remote at him. “Hauk.”
“Yes?”
“Lie down.”
He dropped to his blankets, disappearing from her view.
She petted her cats, watched back-to-back Buffy reruns and told herself she was ignoring him. A state of readiness. Oh, fershure.
At eleven, she turned off the television and rolled on her side. By midnight, she couldn’t stand it. She sat up and turned on the lamp and grabbed the phone.
“Who are you calling?” His voice came from the foot of the bed. She couldn’t see him. He hadn’t even sat up.
“My mother. And I’m not putting it on speakerphone, so don’t you dare try to make me.” She clutched the phone tightly, ready to whack him with it if he rose up from below the footboard.
She thought she heard him sigh. “All right. Keep your word. Say nothing to endanger your visit to your father.”
“I hate you, Hauk.”
“Make your call.”
Her mother answered on the first ring. “Elli?”
“I love you, Mom. I’ll be fine. Please don’t worry.”
There was a silence, then Ingrid said, “I won’t.” They both knew it was a lie, but a good lie, a loving mother’s lie. “Thank you, darling. For calling. I’ve been lying here thinking of you.”
“I know. I was thinking of you, too.”
A low, sad little chuckle came over the line. “Isn’t it ironic? Liv is so headstrong. And Brit? Well, we all know Brit is the type of daughter to make her mother prematurely gray. But you? An excellent student, always so reasonable. You were the one I went to when I needed help convincing one of your sisters not to do something dangerous or harebrained.”
“Mom…”
“Oh, I know, I know. This is something you feel you have to do. And it’s your choice to make.”
“That’s right.”
“Hilda will be over tomorrow to pick up Diablo and Doodles.”
“That should work.”
“Elli.”
“What, Mom?”
“Have a good trip. A safe trip.”
“I will, Mom. I’ll be back before you know it and…our lives will go on.”
“Good night my own sweet Little Old Giant.”
Elli whispered, “Good night, Mom,” and hung up the phone.
From the end of the bed, there was silence.
“Hauk?”
“Yes?”
“I don’t really hate you.”
“I know.”
Elli turned off the light and rolled onto her side. Within a few minutes, she was asleep.
Hauk lay awake.
Wide-awake.
As a rule, he possessed considerable discipline when it came to the time for sleep. He’d been trained and trained well. Sleep, like good nourishment and regular physical exercise to muscular exhaustion and beyond, was a main building block of superior performance. He could sleep in a snow cave, in subzero temperatures with enemies on every side—and be ready to snap wide-awake at the smallest strange movement or sound. As he’d told Elli—
He caught his own dangerous thoughts up short. Not simply Elli. Never simply Elli.
She was the princess. Her Highness. Princess Elli.
But never her name by itself.
From thought sprang action. And he couldn’t allow his thoughts to become too familiar. It was unacceptable. More than unacceptable.
It was forbidden.
He wanted her on that plane. He wanted her safe with his liege and out of his hands.
But she would balk, would stall—would keep insisting she had until Thursday and she wasn’t leaving until then. The more he tried to get her to go, the more determined she became to stay.
Dangerous, the games she played. For more reasons than she allowed herself to understand. Not only was she stuck with him, every moment, as she never seemed to tire of reminding him; he was stuck with her. He could go nowhere, do nothing, without keeping her in sight.
This was the kind of assignment that, under most circumstances, he could do with one eye closed and a hand tied behind his back. Second nature. To watch. To guard. To remain detached and yet vigilant. Over the years, he’d delivered a number of important personages—and dangerous prisoners—into the proper hands.
But this, he was learning, was not most circumstances. This was the daughter of his king. And something was happening to him, in this period of forced proximity with her. Something that had never happened to him before.
He let himself think it: She draws me. I want her….
He could hardly believe it. He’d thought himself well beyond such ridiculous weakness. A warrior, in particular the king’s warrior, learned early to effectively sublimate physical needs—especially sexual ones, which were no use at all to a soldier in his work.
And yet, in a mere twenty-four hours, it had happened. This troublesome princess had somehow managed, all unknowing, to get under his skin.
He found himself doing things he despised. Noticing the fresh, flowerlike scent of her. More than noticing. May the three Norns of destiny curse him, he was constantly sniffing the air when she was near. And he watched her. All the time. Yes, it was his duty to watch her. But he was not supposed to take such pleasure in the task.
It was hopeless, this growing hunger he felt for her. Counterproductive in the extreme. The woman was so completely beyond his touch. So far above him that his king had not even bothered to remind him to keep his hands off.
Hauk didn’t know for certain what scheme his king was hatching, but he knew that Queen Ingrid was right. His lord had plans for Princess Elli. And those plans did not include her lying down with her father’s bastard warrior. It would be a huge and unpardonable betrayal of honor and his king’s trust for Hauk to lay a hand on her, except as required in the furtherance of his duty.
Still—in spite of how wrong it was, no matter the complete lack of discipline it showed—the woman enchanted him. She wove a spell over him, with her huge eyes and soft mouth, her clever tongue and quick mind. And her heart.
Yes, that was surely her most alluring feature. That seeming contradiction of softness and strength only found in a woman with a true and loving heart. She would be a prize beyond price to the man who claimed her.
And he would never be that man.
Yet his orders forced him to this—to spending the nights at the foot of her bed—scenting her, listening to her small, sweet sighs as she dreamed.
It was the purest kind of torture. A taste of Valhalla. A visit to Hel.
And there was no way to make an end to it until she gave up and agreed to go—or until Thursday came at last.
Chapter Seven
When Elli woke in the morning, Hauk was gone from his place at the foot of her bed.
But this time she had no illusions that he might have given up and returned to Gullandria without her. She tossed back the covers and went into the bathroom to wash her face and get dressed. When she got back to the bedroom, there he was, dressed in a fresh black shirt and black slacks, his square jaw smooth from a recent shave.
Waiting.
Elli sighed. “Let’s get some breakfast.”
“As you wish.”
Over scrambled eggs and toast, he suggested again that she pack so that they could leave.
Elli just looked at him, a long look. She knew a bleak satisfaction when he was the first to glance away.
Hilda came knocking at a little before noon. She scowled when she saw that Elli had a houseguest.
“Why is he here? He doesn’t need to be here.”
Elli finessed an answer. “I told you, he’s my escort. We’re leaving together tomorrow.”
Hilda never stopped scowling the whole time she was there. Elli put the cats in their carrier and Hauk helped her haul all the cat supplies down to Hilda’s 4×4.
“Do I get a goodbye hug?” Elli asked the housekeeper just before she drove away.
Hilda relented enough to bestow the hug, but kept her scowl in place. And of course, about fifteen minutes after she and the cats departed, Ingrid called.
“You didn’t tell me that thug was staying at your apartment.”
“Oh, Mom. It’s no big deal. I have a spare room.” Too bad Hauk refused to sleep in it unless she did.
“Still, he has no right to—”
“Mom. Let it be. Please.”
A silence echoed down the line. Then her mother murmured, “Yes. I suppose you’re right.” She wished Elli well again and reminded her to call.
“I will. I promise.”
They said goodbye. Elli hung up.
Hauk was right there, maybe three feet away. Watching. Listening.
Elli decided she might possibly go insane if she had to stay cooped up in her apartment all day with two hundred-plus pounds of Viking observing her every move. She reached for her purse. “Come on.”
He frowned at her. “You wish to leave now?”
“That’s right.”
“You have yet to pack your belongings.”
“You are so very, very observant.”
He might have flinched at that one. But if so, it was a tiny flinch—so small it probably hadn’t really happened at all. “You don’t wish to take anything with you?”
“To Gullandria?”
“Yes. To Gullandria.”
“Well, as a matter of fact, I do intend to take a few things to Gullandria.”
“Then hadn’t you better pack them?”
“Not now.”
He looked at her steadily, his expression especially bleak. He knew by then that she was up to something.
And she was. “We’re not going to Gullandria. Not yet, anyway.” She waited. She wanted him to ask, Then where are we going? But apparently, he’d decided not to give her the satisfaction. Fine. She told him anyway. “We’re going to a movie.”
“A movie. Why?”
