She won, Remi had reported with apparent jubilation, with some dish which included salmon wrapped in pastry dough.

At the reminder, Apollo clenched his teeth.

He unclenched them to ask, "Is she at The Swan?"

"She is," Derrik answered and Apollo didn't understand the emphasis on she.

He also didn't care.

He pushed from the desk, dropped his arms and murmured, "Then I'm away to The Swan."

"If you don't want her, I'll have her."

At Derrik's words, Apollo stopped dead and pierced his friend with his eyes.

"Pardon?" he whispered.

He wanted to believe he didn't understand his friend.

But he had a feeling he understood his friend.

He watched as Derrik planted his feet apart and his fists to his hips.

Oh yes.

He understood his friend.

"If you don't want her, I'll take her," he repeated.

By the G.o.ds, he had to jest.

"Are you talking about my wife?" Apollo asked low.

"She's not your wife," Derrik returned.

"She's my wife," Apollo bit out.

"She's not your b.l.o.o.d.y wife," Derrik clipped.

"G.o.ds, man!" Apollo exploded, coming to the end of his patience and swinging out a hand. "You know she is just as she isn't."

"No, Lo. I just know she isn't," Derrik returned.

Apollo felt his eyes narrow. "Are you deranged?"

"Not in the slightest. She told me you told her that you didn't want her. If that's the case, I'll take her. We'll be away this eve. We'll go to the Vale, Fleuridia, somewhere you don't know where we are but also somewhere far away from you so you'll never see her with me."

Suddenly, Apollo's palms itched, his skin p.r.i.c.kled and through this he warned, "I suggest you stop talking."

Derrik shook his head.

"I won't. You left her alone, forlorn and frightened. She will not be alone, she'll not be frightened and she'll never be forlorn. Not with me," Derrik stated.

Apollo held his friend's eyes-his closest friend-and a sick feeling snaked up his throat.

Because of this, his voice was deadly quiet when he asked, "In saying this, are you saying that you held feelings for Ilsa?"

"Don't be daft," Derrik spit out. "In saying this, I'm telling you I have feelings for Maddie."

Apollo's head jerked. "Who the b.l.o.o.d.y h.e.l.l is Maddie?"

"She's our Ilsa," Derrik replied.

Apollo crossed his arms on his chest and inquired, "Our Ilsa?"

"Me and the men. Maddie is our Ilsa. We called her madam out of respect and because it was too difficult to call her Ilsa remembering the one before her. Through that, she became Maddie."

This intimacy, this shared history, no matter how recent, struck Apollo in his gut and the poison again started to rise in his throat.

He didn't have time for this discussion or these feelings. He needed to end both right now, get to Ilsa, speak with her, get her to Karsvall and get on his way.

"You speak of my wife so you knew my response before you made your p.r.o.nouncement," he declared. "You'll not take her. She isn't yours to have. She's mine."

"She isn't. She's Maddie. And she's free to do what she wishes with whom she wishes it," Derrik returned.

His meaning clear, it was another blow and more poison choked him.

"Careful, brother," Apollo whispered.

"I understand you," Derrik told him, his voice gentling. "I understand what you're feeling."

"You have no b.l.o.o.d.y idea," Apollo gritted.

"I do," Derrik retorted.

"Then, if you did, you'd know, your closest friend, a brother of the horse if not of blood, walking into your study, telling you he'd take the woman who's the spitting image of your dead wife to the Vale, to Fleuridia, to his bed, is beyond the pale. You could take her to the stars, you would still lie awake at night knowing I was lying awake at night tormented in the knowledge that she was pressed to your side. And you'd do that knowing in your gut that was the worst betrayal imaginable."

Apollo watched Derrik flinch but he didn't back down.

He bit off, "You can't not want her and still have her, Lo."

"I can do whatever I G.o.ds d.a.m.n want, Rik," Apollo returned. "I paid for her to be here. She's my wife. I'll see to her and I'll protect her."

"How? By doing the same thing that toad of a husband of hers did to her in the other world?" Derrik shot back. "But abusing her through neglect rather than with your fists?"

His vision darkened and Apollo strode forward. Derrik prepared as he did so, bracing, ready for a confrontation.

He didn't get one.

Apollo moved by him and threw open the door.

He turned in it and leveled his gaze on his friend.

"Think on this," he ordered.

"I have, for four months," Derrik replied.

"Then think longer," Apollo ground out, slammed the door and stormed down the hall.

He paced the secluded room he'd demanded for this meeting, its fire warm in the grate, but Apollo didn't feel warm.

I'm sorry.

He heard her whispered words, her voice had been sleepy but those words were heartfelt.

And he felt her soft body burrowing into his.

I'm sorry.

He stopped pacing and closed his eyes.

But when he did, he saw her eyes, scared, confused and holding pain, peering deep into his.

You're not a hallucination.

He opened his eyes and muttered to himself, "Where the b.l.o.o.d.y h.e.l.l is she?"

He was at The Swan.

He'd managed to drive Torment, his roan, through the snow and into the town with his mind consumed with finding reasons not to murder his closest friend.

But he'd been at the inn for twenty minutes, waiting for her, and thus he was having difficulty controlling his thoughts.

Thoughts he'd kept tightly leashed since that morning he slid away from her somnolent body and understood he'd made a colossal mistake.

Not saving her from her husband, that was not his mistake. But he could have arranged that without seeing her.

No, his mistake was seeing her.

Touching her.

Hearing her.

Smelling her.

Understanding instantly that she was not his Ilsa.

But the Ilsa she was was dangerous.

Something he now knew categorically considering his conversation with Derrik.

Therefore, when he should have been planning for an attack, he was making other plans.

And those plans included him negotiating the purchase of a chalet, a large one, a luxurious one, but one miles away from any of his estates.

And he'd already opened an account and deposited enough money in it that she could live and do so with every desire met but without her ever having the need to come to him and ask for a thing.

And live far away and well taken care of she would do, after they dealt with whatever was coming.

Unfortunately, until that time, for her safety she needed to be at Karsvall, with his men and with the witch who was watching over all of them.

And also with his children.

He'd explained all about Ilsa carefully to Christophe and elan, and watched closely after he did so.

His daughter had been a year and a half when her mother had died. She was now six. She didn't remember her mother, though she was excited about meeting Ilsa, as she was excited about everything under the sun.

It didn't take much with his elan. The flight of a sparrow could brighten her day.

Where she got that, he had no idea. It wasn't from him.

It also wasn't from her mother.

His Ilsa was quick to smile, droll with words, and so G.o.ds d.a.m.ned smart, it was, at times, alarming.

But she was not a dreamer. She did not antic.i.p.ate excitement around every corner. She did not rush out to meet life, like her daughter.

Christophe, on the other hand, had been four when Ilsa was lost to him. He was now eight, almost nine.

He remembered her. Those memories were elusive due to his age but he'd carried a locket with his mother's tiny portrait in it since he'd found it on Apollo's dresser when he was five.

He was never without it.

He was also not excited to meet Ilsa. He tried to hide it from his father and sister.

But he failed.

This concerned Apollo but he intended to have a word with Achilles about it.

Achilles would keep an eye on things.

On this thought, the door opened and Ilsa moved into the room.

Apollo clenched his teeth and braced inwardly at the sight of her.

She looked exactly like his wife. She sounded like her. She even smelled like her.