“Okay but payphones are a bit twenty years ago, don’t you think?” I wrinkled my nose and glanced over at the diner in question. “Didn’t they die out with the old Nokia brick phones?”
“Uh, technically yes. But there is a sign that says ‘payphone available inside’ right there in the window. See?” He gave me a shy grin and pointed to the window and the sign itself.
“Thank God for that,” I groaned. “I was not looking forward to explaining these to a truck driver if we decided to hitchhike.” I held my cuffs up and waggled them at him. “In fact, how are we going to get to the payphone without anyone questioning us? I didn’t want to mention it earlier, but you kind of look like shit, Wes.”
He really did. Blood had been running from a cut on his head and was soaking the collar of his baby blue T-shirt. Fortunately the weather in California was positively balmy versus what it had been in Canada, or he’d have frozen half to death by now. Not that I was one to talk, in a dark gray tank top and sweatpants.
“Um.” He hesitated a moment as we crouched behind some bushes. “I have no idea. Just... do it and hope the guys get here before the cops get called?”
“Sounds good to me,” I shrugged, standing up from behind the bush with him.
Just as we were about to cross the road, a cherry-red mustang GT came to a screeching halt in front of us and Caleb flew out of the passenger side, almost knocking me to the ground with his hug.
“Uh, Cal?” I grunted, trying to wriggle free from his anaconda-like grip. “Can’t breathe here.”
“Oh, sorry, Kitty Kat.” He loosened up his grip a little and pulled back to look at me. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah, we’re fine. How the hell did you find us?” I frowned past him to Austin, who’d just gotten out of the driver’s side and was hovering behind his twin.
“You okay, baby girl?” Austin asked in his deep, quiet voice, and I gave him a smile of reassurance.
“I’m fine,” I reiterated. “But how did you find us?”
“I’m fine too, you guys!” Wesley added, lightly punching Caleb in the shoulder.
“You,” I corrected, “are actually not fine, Wesley. You’ve been bleeding from the head and are limping badly.”
Caleb released me to look over at Wesley and then seemed to notice our handcuffs.
“Uh, yeah.” I held up my linked wrists. “Magic cuffs. No keyhole and they block our magic.”
“Shit,” Caleb murmured, and Austin just scowled, holding out a hand to me.
Placing my hand in his, I shivered at the contact between us. Damn it if these guys couldn’t just make me feel safe with only a touch. It was... incredible. And worrying. Was I becoming too dependant on them?
Frowning down at the cuffs, Austin patted his pockets—probably looking for a marker pen—before clicking his tongue in vexation.
“Cal, it’s on you. I don’t have any ink handy, and I don’t think we really want to do a full mage ritual to break these the normal way.” He arched an eyebrow at his brother, then met my eyes again. “And I think we all know Princess will just end up in more trouble the longer she’s left tied up.”
“Ha-ha, very funny.” I narrowed my eyes at his weak attempt at ribbing me. “But you actually have a point.”
Caleb nodded, flicking his fancy switchblade out of his pocket and stabbing his fingertip with it. His jaw clenched, and I saw the tips of his fangs descend as he dropped several droplets of blood onto each of my cuffs, then Wesley’s.
Like magic—ha-ha—the seamless cuffs popped open and fell off our wrists, clattering to the ground in a clink of metal. Austin scooped them up and tossed them into the back of his car before giving us a tight nod and pulling a marker from his back pocket.
“Oh look, I did have ink after all. We’ll look into those cuffs later.” With a firm grip he took my hand and inked a little design onto the back of it, then did the same to Wes. “An illusion, to make you two look less like you just in case anyone is looking for you. Shall we go into the diner and you can tell us what the fuck happened?” His gaze was locked hard on me, and I immediately felt my hackles rise.
“Don’t look at me like that,” I snapped, narrowing my eyes at him. “This wasn’t my fault. Besides, you never told us how the fuck you found us so fast.”
“Come on,” Caleb interjected before Austin and I could really get into a proper argument. “Let’s get you something cheesy and some coffee. Wesley could do with a cleanup too.”
Austin was lucky his twin had just uttered the magic words because I was more than ready to fight with him. He gave me a glare back, then slipped back into his car to pull it into a parking space in front of the diner.
It wasn’t exactly a highly populated road—not a single other car had passed since we’d been standing there, but there were a couple parked at the diner, so we definitely weren’t alone.
Caleb placed a hand on the small of my back and nudged me in the direction of the diner entrance where Austin already stood waiting, flipping his keys in his hand. I really was pretty hungry, given Simon and his goons had shown up right before we were going to eat lunch. I’d no idea how much time had passed since then either, but it was at least a couple of hours.
We didn’t speak again until we’d slipped into a booth at the back of the diner and Wes had gone to clean himself up in the bathroom.
“So,” I prompted the magical twins. “How did you find us? How did you even know we were in trouble?”
“Vali,” Caleb responded, taking my hand in his under the table and linking our fingers together. “His Romani sixth sense told him you were in trouble, but he and Cole couldn’t work out where you were.” At this, his gaze flicked across the table to his twin, who met my gaze unflinchingly.
“Austin,” I growled. “What makes me think you’ve done something I won’t like?”
He shrugged. “Because I often do things you don’t like?” He paused. “But this time it was a little bit of a tracking spell worked into your ink.”
My eyebrows shot up, but I couldn’t find the energy to be mad. His typical Austin do-what-I-want actions had actually been really beneficial. If we hadn’t managed to free ourselves, then that tracking spell could have led the guys straight to us... wherever Simon had been transporting us to.
“I see,” I murmured, narrowing my eyes at the Ink Mage in a promise of a scolding later. His own green eyes sparkled back at me, and I got the distinct impression he was looking forward to it. Sick fuck.
Wesley returned from the bathroom then, his blond hair wet and pushed back like he’d run his fingers through it about a hundred times on the way from the bathroom back to our booth. There wasn’t much to be done about the blood stain on his shirt, but Austin tossed him a jacket to put on, which hid most of it.
“What did I miss?” he asked, looking around at the three of us.
Caleb snorted a small laugh. “Just Austin fessing up to a sneaky tracking spell in Kit’s ink.”
“Huh,” Wesley cocked his head at the Ink Mage. “That was really smart. Why didn’t I think of that?”
“Oh my god.” I rolled my eyes and picked up my menu. Clearly I should know better than to expect the guys to see that tracking spell as an invasion of my privacy or anything like that. Not that I was really going anywhere I needed to hide from them... but that wasn’t the point, was it?
Ugh, whatever. I was exhausted, and starving. This diner served a good selection of burgers too, which would help.
“Don’t stress, Princess,” Austin teased. “It wasn’t a permanent one. I’m actually surprised it even lasted this long. I thought it had worn off already.”
Wesley started quickly running the twins through what had happened while I debated my burger choices, eventually deciding on a double beef and bacon burger with extra cheese.
“Wait, how come the other guys aren’t here with you? I asked when Wes finished telling them about how we’d crashed the van.