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The knowledge rattled her.
She sat back in her seat, with a new tightness in her chest, while Tallak started the car and rejoined the traffic on the main street.
“I will still tease you mercilessly about this,” she said, to fill the silence and to loosen the ache in her chest.
“I’d be surprised if you didn’t.”
“All in good fun, of course.”
He shot her a glance somewhere between annoyed and indulgent.
She felt a smile curve her lips. “I can’t believe you actually threw your phone out the window.”
An easy shrug. “It’s sitting pretty in your driveway behind an iron fence and a fuckload of witch wards, so it’s not like it’s going anywhere. I’ll just grab it when we get back.”
“Where are you taking me?”
His smile was positively smug. “You’ll like it.”
She waited a beat, then she said with surgical precision, “Tell me why.”
“Look, I’m not gonna ruin the surprise by—” He broke off, paused, and then sent her a mildly murderous glance.
“Tallak, you need to quit playing games and tell me where we’re going.”
“Hazel,” he squeezed out.
Ruthlessly, she went on. “I know you planned this as a surprise, but you need to tell me. Because…I want it that way.”
“Babe, I swear, I will turn this car around, drop you off back home—”
“And say, ‘Bye bye bye’?”
He narrowed his eyes. “All right, that’s it.”
With a maneuver straight out of some action movie, he turned the car around in one swift, drifting motion that let loose a swarm of butterflies in her stomach, and stepped on the accelerator again to propel the Tesla in the other direction. Luckily, there was barely any traffic, the road open and quite forgiving to Tallak’s roguish driving style.
“That was highly illegal,” she squeezed out once she caught her breath, her heart thumping wildly.
“Sue me.”
She bit her lip to keep from grinning. “Tallak,” she said, drawing his name out and infusing her voice with equal parts pleading and soothing. “Please turn around. I do want to go out with you.”
He glanced at her. “No more song references.”
She nodded, then added in a loud whisper, “This I promise you.”
When he growled, she raised her hands in surrender. “That was the last one, honestly.”
He bared his teeth. “Fine.”
And without a word of warning, he yanked the car into another sharp U-turn. The swarm of butterflies erupted in her stomach again, a fierce kind of delight buzzing through her veins, the thrill of danger and something forbidden making her giddy. A high-pitched sound tore from her throat, veering straight into surprised laughter. She clapped both hands over her mouth.
“For someone who loves being on the right side of the law,” Tallak drawled, “you sure seem to enjoy breaking it.”
“That,” she gasped, effervescent joy bubbling inside her, “is not true.”
His grin was all sorts of wicked. “You squealed like a girl on a roller coaster.”
