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"We used to have several vehicles on the premises. The garage is behind the house."
He clasps my hand, leading me around the backside of the huge mansion where I see the garage he mentioned. It has four big doors in front, but we head for the human-size door on the side. Once we enter the building, he flicks the light switch.
The garage houses super-expensive vehicles. I'm no car expert, but even I can tell the two sedans, one SUV, and one sports car boast price tags so far out of my budget that I couldn't afford to buy a tire for any of these vehicles.
"You're super rich, huh?" I say as I scan the interior of the garage.
"Money hardly matters anymore." Dax approaches the nearest vehicle, a four-door sedan, and opens the driver's door. "I doubt creatures from the Echo accept dollars or pound notes. They want payments in blood."
He finds a key tucked under the visor and tries to start the car. Nothing happens. He pops the hood and gets out to inspect the engine. Screwing his mouth up, he slams the hood shut.
Something I'd almost forgotten springs up in my mind. "I meant to ask you something earlier, but I didn't want to do it in front of Sefton."
"What is it?"
"You said your parents died exactly thirteen years ago on the day Sefton cast his world-destroying spell."
"That's right."
"Well, um…" I hunch my shoulders and avert my gaze, but then force myself to look at him. "My parents died on that day too."
Dax goes completely still, his body rigid, his gaze unblinking. "What?"
"Our parents all died on the same day thirteen years ago. I don't know what that means—"
"I do. Sefton believes the number thirteen is vastly powerful, remember? He somehow discovered the coincidence and used it in his spellcasting."
"Coincidence?" I move closer, tipping my head back to meet his gaze. "Sounds more like fate to me."
"Perhaps it is."
Dax resumes his search, checking the other three vehicles and screwing up his mouth even more with every peek under a hood.
Finally, he returns to me. "Sefton has removed the batteries."
"Of course he has. I knew the garage was too easy. But why can't I teleport or whatever you want to call it?"
"I assume he cast a spell to prevent it."
"Aw, come on. I only got to do that whisking thing twice, and now he's taken it away."
Dax isn't wearing his leather coat today. That fact had escaped my notice for a while, but I don't feel stupid for not realizing it until now. I mean, we're in the middle of an apocalypse, and our host is a lunatic who expects me to marry him and "consummate" our so-called relationship. So yeah, I'm not thinking at the highest level today. Or yesterday. Or the day before.
"Perhaps your 'whisking thing' isn't gone," Dax says. "Not for good, at least."
"Sefton is way more powerful than I am."
"Is he? Sefton keeps talking about sharing the Echo power with you. And you are the catalyst, which must mean all the magics he employed to create the Echo originated from within you."
"That's an awful lot of supposition."
He slides his hands over my shoulders, down my arms, and all the way to my hands. Then he slips his fingers between mine. "Nothing is a certainty anymore. We have to accept that."
"Maybe. But I don't plan to sit around twiddling my thumbs while Sefton is out there doing who knows what."
I like the feel of his fingers threaded with mine a little too much. It feels so good that I want to forget everything and just be here with him. It's crazy. But the whole world has flipped upside down, so maybe I need to stop judging my actions and his based on the way things used to be pre-apocalypse. Yes, he behaved horribly at first. I understand now why he did that. I don't agree with his actions back then, but I get it. He's as scared as the rest of us, though he also needs time to recover from his years in the Echo.
But I cannot, will not, just sit here doing nothing.
