“True, we’re not.” I’d be with this man the rest of my life. Waiting a few extra months to tie the knot was okay by me as long as the wedding was something we wanted.
“They’re not in the office yet, likely,” Mack mused. “Not with the time difference. Let’s call them during lunch, see what their openings are.”
“Sound plan, let’s do it. This place will be formal, so black-tie affair?”
“I think we all deserve to dress up and party, don’t you?”
“Hell yeah.”
Then we paused and looked at each other, and I could feel him thinking the same evil thought because we both broke out into grins and then snickered.
“Don’s going to kill me.” I laughed, already imagining his reaction.
“We must tell him in person,” Mack urged. “Just because his face will be meme gold.”
“It really, really will. Mum to my parents or him until we’re home.”
Mack mimed zipping his mouth up.
Talking about this had put a happy little spark in me. For a man who’d had no faith he’d even get an anchor, I loved how much Mack had grown, becoming someone who held perfect faith in me. He knew he was loved, loved me just as fiercely in return, and showed it by doing sweet things like thinking of the perfect venue for our vows.
I couldn’t let him show me up, though. He’d thought of the perfect venue, so now it was on me to think of the perfect honeymoon.
Then he leaned in against my ear and purred, “We could go to California for our honeymoon and tour the Winchester Mystery House.”
“Dammit, stop beating me to the punch! I was trying to think of a good honeymoon destination!” He would pick the one place I’d been dying to go see.
Mack cackled, pleased with himself, gremlin that he was.
All right, I had one last chance here. I had to get him a rocking wedding present. Something not really expensive, because that would just stress him out, but something good. Something he’d love.
Absolutely nothing was coming to mind. Granted, I was a little distracted with driving, and part of my brain was still stuck on calling the hotel.
“Cher, slow down, the vibration’s dying.”
I slowed abruptly, more or less edging forward.
“I think we’re there. Stop.”
I stopped. Mack immediately threw a leg over and walked forward another two feet before he grunted.
“There?”
“Yeah.”
I fished out a hammer and a stake, and drove the stake into the very brittle, dry ground. Now I knew why Seiji had it planned out the way he did, and why he gave us instructions on which way to turn. We’d be following this general line if possible, taking a left turn from here and heading generally back toward the road, hopefully to meet up with Beau and Hannah at some point.
The sun was already rising; it was going to be a very warm day, as expected of Arizona. I sipped from my water bottle as we got back on the four-wheeler. I’d be covered in red dust and likely parched by the time we got done. But if we were lucky, we’d mark it all out today.
And hopefully during the course of today we’d nail down what needed to happen next.
27
Now, I was born with the Sight, mind you, enough that I could see the spectral energies of the beasties, but even then, I could barely track what Seiji was doing. Likely ’cause all of those energy wires he was pulling from thin air made no sense at all, but he clearly knew what he was about. He didn’t falter, not once, a fierce frown of concentration on his face.
Gwyn, she was right there with him, even managed to tie a few strands of energy under his guidance. She was delighted with her own success, as she should be, because if Seiji had asked me to do that? Well, it’d be a snarled mess, much like if a kittencaught hold of a ball of yarn and then was caught by his human and made a mad dash for it.
I let them work, just tooling about the area, looking out for things. Ghosts wandered by without notice or care of us. Fine for now, not like I wanted their attention.
