He held out one cone toward her, the golden-brown ice cream dripping slowly down the cone.
“You have chocolate,” Zina blurted as she took the sticky cone from him, her shock at his appearance finally loosening its hold on her brain, though not enough for her to say somethingnotcompletely asinine.
“Yeah, but this one’s mine,” Trent said, lifting it to his mouth and licking up the drips. “Go ahead – don’t let it melt. Well, any more than it already has.”
Swallowing, Zina did what he asked – and then realized the method in his madness. Holding the ice cream in front of her mouth meant if either of the guys who were following her could lipread, they’d have a much harder time of it now.
Grudgingly, she took a long lick of her ice cream. Despite the tension in her stomach – in herwhole body– she had to admit it was pretty good ice cream, sweet and creamy.
“So,” Trent said quietly after a minute or two of ice cream licking, as the tour guide began wrapping up their tour. “You wanna tell me what all this is about?”
Zina took a deep breath. She’d known this was coming. She’d thought, obviously, about what she’d say and how she’d explain it. But now, she found her head was curiously empty. Maybe she hadn’t truly believed he’d come after all – and now that he was actually here, she’d forgotten everything she’d wanted to say.
“Maybe not here,” she said softly. She moved her head slightly, indicating the loitering men.
Trent’s eyes didn’t move. “Yeah. I clocked them already. We’re downwind of them. Keep your voice down and they won’t hear a thing.”
Huh.Zina supposed she would’ve known that if she’d had her shifter senses about her. But as it was, these subtle changes in the wind were invisible to her for the moment.
“I don’t really have all that much time to explain,” she murmured. “I don’t know how much an explanation would help. Or what it would fix.”
“Try me.”
Zina glanced at him out of the corner of her eye. He wasn’t looking at her, his eyes on the tour guide as she said,And with that, our tour is concluded! Don’t forget to leave us a review on social media if you enjoyed your time today!
Licking her lips, Zina realized she’d have to hurry this along. The group was already beginning to disperse, drifting away to look for a better angle to take photos of the giant pointing statue from.
“You don’t really need to know more than you already do,” she said. “I just need you to takethis–” she hefted her bag slightly “– and get out of here. You won’t see me again after that. That’s all I need from you.”
Trent frowned as he looked down at her.Damnbut he was tall – it wasn’t like she was a short woman, but she still had to look up to see his face.
“And what’ll happen to you after that?”
Zina shrugged. “It’s not really your concern. Once you have what I need to give you, I’ll be the decoy and lead them off. You just take these back to your boss and then we’re – we’re done. Okay?”
Zina’s heart thudded in her chest as she spoke, in a way she didn’t remember it doing since she’d been a raw cadet, still wet behind the ears.
“Zina.” Trent’s voice was completely stripped of any of the joking tone he’d been using earlier. “I can’t help you if you’re not forthcoming with me.”
Swallowing, Zina shook her head.I can’t drag him into this. I started it, so the consequences are mine alone.
“I’m notaskingfor your help, except to take what I’m going to give you and get out of here. That’s it.”
That’s already too much,she added silently.
“I don’t have a lot of time,” she said lowly. “Come on. Follow me. I need to get this over with, and then I can leave you in peace.”
She started to walk away, briskly moving around the other side of the statue, out of sight of the men who’d been watching her. It was clumsy, but she had no other choice. She’d just have to hope there’d be enough doubt in the men’s minds that they’d split their resources, and she could lead the one following her away, and Trent could evade the other.
“Zina, I –”
She interrupted him, reaching into the bag she’d kept clutched against her chest this whole time. Her fingers curled around the large, black leather box inside, pulling it out the moment they were out of sight.
“Take this,” she said quickly, “and get out of here. I don’t have time to explain. You’ll just have to figure it all out on your own.”
Trent blinked, looking down at the box, a frown carving its way across his face as he lifted the hand that wasn’t still holding an ice cream to take it from her.
“Is this what you… took? The thing that got you burn noticed?”
