The real problem with Wonderland, Ivy quickly decided, is that while nothing—absolutely nothing—made any sense, everything still looked exactly the same. It just wasn’t fair.
And neither was having three Guardians and five Wardens all ganging up on her to insist that she was the one who wasn’t thinking logically. All she needed was a hatter, a dormouse, and a white rabbit. But even without them, she was ready to stand up and shout “Eat me!” at the top of her damned lungs.
And yet, here came Baen, ignoring the rest of them chattering away in the background. He stepped forward to kneel in front of her chair, blocking most of the room from her sight. Ivy drew her knees to her chest and shrank back into the cushion, because damn it, she didn’t even know who to trust anymore. Baen was a Guardian, which meant he had to know that stupid legend. Did he believe in it, too? Did he think they were some sort of fated pair of mates, like characters from a sci-fi television show? Had he thought that all along? Because as far as Ivy was concerned, that was the kind of thing it was important to share with the girl you were fucking. Preferably before the fucking started, when she might still be thinking clearly.
Or, you know, at all.
“Little one,” he murmured, his voice quiet, just for the two of them. He seemed to understand that she curled in on herself because now wasn’t the time for a snuggle, so he didn’t reach for her. Instead, he braced his hands on the arms of her chair and simply fixed her with that dark, burning stare. “There is no need for fear. I would never do anything to harm you. Do you not know that?”
Ivy scoffed. “Turns out there’s a whole lot of things I don’t know, doesn’t it, Baen? After all, I didn’t know about this story you all seem to have memorized. And I sure as hell didn’t know there was a possibility you were looking at me like some sort of bloody magical mail-order bride. What the hell is up with that?”
His mouth tightened a little at the corners, but his gaze remained calm and level on hers. “I told you as soon as we met that you were my Warden, Ivy. I knew that if I had not been summoned awake by a member of the Guild, the only other explanation had to be you.”
“You told me I was your Warden, sure, and that was hard enough to believe, but I’m pretty damned certain the words ‘fated,’ ‘legend,’ ‘maiden,’ and frickin’ ‘mate’ never passed your secretive, stony lips, buddy.”
“We have not exactly been blessed with an abundance of peaceful moments together, little one. Or did you want me to shout it at you while I fought the ukobahk? Or maybe during the car chase earlier tonight? After all, Rose was driving, so I did not have to worry about my actions causing us to crash.”
She narrowed her eyes and curled her lip at him. She might not have fangs, but she could damn well still snarl with the best of them. “Don’t pull that ‘we were in danger’ crap with me. Were we in danger last night when you were pounding me into the mattress? Or what about for all those hours before we met Rose this evening? You couldn’t find thirty seconds during one of those times to mention, ‘Hey, Ivy, by the way, I think you’re my destined mate. Just FYI?’”
“You believe this is only taking thirty seconds?”
Her palm itched to smack him like a volleyball, but she resisted. Barely. Mostly because right then, she didn’t want to touch him. At all.
He must have read her fury in her expression, because he sighed and bowed his head a little. She could see the tension in his shoulders and neck, and she hoped his head was killing him. It would serve him right.
“I apologize,” he said. “That was unfair of me. I understand that you are upset, and you have the right to feel that way.”
“Gee, how magnanimous of you to grant me permission to feel my feelings. You’re just a big ol’ softy, aren’t you?”
His eye twitched at that one, but at least he wasn’t dumb enough to point out that she had resorted to sarcasm. Apparently, he wanted to keep his balls intact and unflattened.
“I am willing to accept the blame for the shock you are feeling.” He spoke slowly and evenly with a degree of control that made it clear he had to work at it. “It must be a challenge to take in news of this kind without warning, but please do not think that any of what has happened was ever intended to hurt you, amare.”
Ivy didn’t know what that meant, but she recognized it as a pet name. As long as it didn’t translate as “little one,” she might be able to let it slide.
Her stomach felt all twisted and uncertain, and she really didn’t know what to think anymore. Part of her got what Baen was trying to tell her. They had been kind of preoccupied pretty much since the first moment they met. Even when they hadn’t been in the middle of running for their lives—or being driven for them—they had still needed to be careful and wary and watchful for the next thing that would jump out from behind a corner to attack them. So, yes, finding a time to drop this kind of news probably hadn’t been (a) easy, or (b) at the top of his to-do list, but that didn’t make it any easier to take.
It wasn’t the sort of thing a girl wanted to hear when she was trying harder than she had ever expected to not have her head torn off by a bunch of angry demons and demon worshippers. And it certainly wasn’t the sort of thing she expected to hear after an acquaintance of approximately two days. Or, even worse, after ten minutes, if Baen was serious about having figured it out right from the start. Who fell in love with someone after ten minutes? People might talk about love at first sight, but that was a bigger fairy tale than the one Wynn had just told her. It simply didn’t happen.
Of course, Ivy realized, a chill spreading through her, Baen had never said anything about love. There had been plenty of talk about destiny and fate and even more talk about this just being the way things were, but no one had even brought up the subject of emotions. She didn’t know if that realization made things better or worse.
On the one hand, it took some of the pressure off. If Baen wasn’t proclaiming his undying love for her, then she didn’t need to sort out the snarled mess of her own emotions any time soon, and thanks to the bloody Light for that. At this point, Ivy didn’t think she even wanted to know how she was feeling, especially as it pertained to the behemoth currently kneeling at her feet. So, no L-word meant no hurry in deciding how she felt about him in return, and that was a huge relief.
But on the other hand, what did it mean that he could call her his mate and assume that she was meant to free him from the eternal cycle of being trapped in his stony cage, and yet have no special feelings for her whatsoever? Was that really any better? The idea that he might want to stay with her out of some notion that the rules required him to, actually made her a little queasy. It sounded too much like some kind of medieval marriage of convenience, and what girl in her right mind would agree to that kind of nightmare? It certainly would not be Ivy.
And that brought her full circle, right back to the point where she felt overwhelmed and confused and exhausted and somehow terrified of something way scarier than the end of the world as she knew it, even if she couldn’t quite decide what that was.
Ivy dragged her eyes away from Baen’s and looked around just to give herself time to clear her head. To her horror, she found every other occupant of the room watching her and the man at her feet as if they were performing a scene from a newly discovered Shakespearean drama. Like she needed that kind of pressure.
But it did give her the impetus to decide that whatever the hell was going on at the moment, it could keep going on for a few more hours until she felt damned good and ready to deal with it. Whatever was happening between her and Baen wasn’t going to kill them or anyone else. Therefore, it could be tabled for later discussion.
Of course, that didn’t mean she was going to let him off the hook until then. She wasn’t an idiot.
She pursed her lips. “Do you honestly think the idea that upsetting me was an accident makes it all right?”
He shook his head. “Of course not, but I could not stand it if you thought me capable of causing you deliberate harm, either physically or emotionally. I would never hurt you, and I would destroy any other who even made the attempt.”
Okay, at some point she would need to tell him that while protectiveness could be sexy, threatening other people with murder and/or mayhem really was not.
“All right,” she said after a moment. “I’ll take your word for it. You didn’t mean to hurt me, but that doesn’t mean I’m suddenly okay with all this, because I’m not. We’re going to need to talk about things a lot more before I can even wrap my head around them, let alone figure out how I feel about everything.”
She stretched out her legs, and Baen immediately sprang to his feet to help her stand. “Anything you say, amare. I will answer every question you want to ask, and I will hide nothing from you. I swear it.”
“You’d better not.”
Ivy turned to the group and reached for some tattered semblance of dignity. “Rose, I don’t know if you intended to put us all up for the night, but I’m exhausted. Is there any chance you have a room available for crashing?”
“Mais oui.” The dark-haired woman rose from her perch on a settee almost as elegant as herself. “Come, I will show you.”
“Thanks.”
Ivy fell into step behind her hostess, only to jerk to a stop when Baen moved to follow. “Uh, and where do you think you’re going, big guy?”
The Guardian blinked down at her, opened his mouth, then caught himself. He clearly had second thoughts about what he had been about to say. “I—you—it—”
She folded her arms across her chest. “Take your time. I can wait.”
His jaw closed with a snap, flexed a few times, then opened to allow for a very cautious second attempt. “This has been a very dangerous time for you, amare,” he finally managed. “I wish to see you safe and well protected at all times.”
“That’s very nice of you,” she acknowledged, conscious of Rose standing beside her and fighting a smile. “I appreciate the concern, but we’re in a house full of Wardens. A safe house. And now there are two other Guardians here besides you. I think the chances of me staying safe in another room are pretty high, don’t you?”
“But…” He trailed off. His expression told Ivy he had a thousand things to say but had wisely figured out that none of them would gain him anything other than a knee to the crotch. He deflated, his shoulders sagging and his expression turning down into what on any other person in the universe Ivy would have sworn was a pout.
She smiled. “Good night, Baen.”
He grumbled in return. “Good night, amare. Sleep well.”
“Oh, I will,” she said, and with that she spun on her heel and gestured for Rose to lead her out of the room. A small wave to the company and they disappeared behind a set of closed doors.
It felt good to win that round. Now they would just have to see what happened when the bell rang to start the next one.