She did some quick mental calculations. “I’ve known Cage for about six or seven months.” Penton had been a real, whole place then instead of a burned-out shell they were trying to rebuild.
“Practically newlyweds then. Or mates, as the vampires call wedded bliss.” Fen cocked his head, glancing at her left hand. “Or perhaps you’re just friends, I might hope?”
Seriously? “Look, I don’t mean to be rude, but we don’t know each other well enough to be having this conversation. What’s taking Cage so long?”
Melissa frowned and glanced around Fen’s shoulder, relieved to see the trucker climbing back into his cab and Cage heading their way.
“Sorry, no offense meant.” Fen held up his hands in surrender, turning to Cage when he finally reached them. “Feisty mate you have here.”
Cage raised an eyebrow, and Melissa shrugged. He could trust this guy all he wanted. Didn’t mean she had to. And she’d ignore the “mate” assumption. What she and Cage were, or weren’t, could in no way be considered his business. “I was just about to ask Fen how long he’d been turned.”
“I’d like to know that as well, but we need to get back in the car, get our petrol, and move along toward Penton.” Cage glanced down the exit ramp where the truck driver was pulling his rig onto the road, heading away from the lights of the convenience store. Two other eighteen-wheelers had passed by on the interstate, and there were more oncoming in the distance. “Otherwise, we’ll get more well-meaning freight drivers stopping to help.”
Cage walked toward the sedan with Fen on his heels.
“You’re going to take him to Penton?” Melissa didn’t want to hear Mirren’s tirade when Cage arrived with a stranger an hour before daysleep. “We could drop him off in Opelika and let Aidan talk to him tomorrow night when there’s more time.”
Cage stopped and turned, looking from her to Fen and back. “I’m pretty sure Aidan got rid of all our safe spaces in Opelika and Auburn after the dustup with the Tribunal. He thought they’d all been compromised.”
What? Where would Cage get such a stupid idea, unless . . . Melissa gave herself a mental slap on the head. Cage didn’t trust Fen, either. He wanted him close at hand until they found out whether he was trustworthy.
“Right.” Melissa shook her head. “Sorry I’m such a ditz tonight. Driving in Atlanta traffic always shorts out my brain.”
“Understandable, although it’s not half as bad as any large city in Europe,” Fen said, hesitating when Cage opened the front passenger-side door and motioned him in. “Dublin is a nightmare. I sincerely believe Irishmen weren’t meant to operate automobiles.”
Damn it. It was bad enough this guy had interrupted what might be her only chance to talk to Cage alone. Now, he was going to sit next to her the rest of the way into Penton while Cage sat in back?
She shot Cage a look to convey her annoyance over the whole Fen Patrick situation and got behind the wheel again. Cage sat in the backseat behind her, where he could keep an eye on Fen. Good sense from a security standpoint; bad timing from a sorry-but-we’ll-always-have-Omega relationship standpoint.
As soon as they got to Penton she’d lose him to Mirren and the Army guys, and no telling how long she might be left wondering how he felt about her—and examining her own feelings for him.
Cage leaned forward and put a hand on her shoulder. “Wait a second, Mel. I need to make something clear to Fen before we take him to Penton. My apologies, mate, but the only advantage our old acquaintance will get you is a foot in the door. Aidan Murphy will make the call as to whether or not you can stay. Our security chief, Mirren Kincaid, will have a say in it as well.”
Melissa looked for any glimmer of irritation to cross Fen’s face, but she found none. He turned a wide smile toward Cage. “No problem. Can’t be too careful these days given what all happened in Penton, from what I’ve heard. And would that be the Mirren Kincaid, the Slayer? I’d heard he was around, but one never knows which rumors are true and which ones are sheer fabrications.”
Cage relaxed against the seat back. “The one and the same Kincaid. Only I wouldn’t call him ‘Slayer’ to his face. He can be a bit surly.”
Melissa had to smile. Surly was the Mirren Kincaid version of jovial.
Once they’d bought gas and gotten back on the interstate, the final forty minutes of the drive into Penton told Melissa more about Cage’s life than she’d ever heard. Not so much from what he said—he was as unforthcoming as ever—but from Fen’s easy reminiscences that shone a small bit of light on Cage’s shadowy pre-Penton days.