“Hmm,” Rene said thoughtfully as he negotiated his way across London. “That is most interesting that someone would want to kill you.”

“Yeah, it’s a barrel-full-of-monkeys sort of fun, but I could do without murder attempts right now.”

“Ah. Because of the bebe?”

My jaw dropped slightly at the last word, spoken with a delightful French accent. My head whipped around to glare at Jim. “What have you been telling him?”

To my surprise, Jim’s eyes were filled with righteous indignation. “Nothing! I didn’t tell him anything!”

“You just had to spout off about your wild theory about me being pregnant—which, I assure you, isn’t so,” I said, turning to face Rene. “If Jim didn’t tell you its silly idea, why did you say that? I don’t look pregnant, do I?”

“Non” Rene said hurriedly as I tugged the fitted bodice of the dark green viscose dress, one of a couple I’d bought for dragon affairs. “I thought I heard someone say you were enceinte!”

“Who would say something like that about me?” I demanded to know, intending on giving the rumormonger a piece of my mind.

Rene gave me an unreadable look. I pointed a finger at him. “When I’m done with all this dragon business, you and I are going to sit down and have a long, long talk.”

“That will be very agreeable,” he said.

I ignored that. “What I meant to say earlier was that I have enough stress in my life right now without trying to figure out who’s trying to knock me off.”

“Ah,” Rene said, but I noticed his gaze flickering in the mirror to my abdomen.

“I’m not pregnant!” I practically yelled. “Honest to Pete! Don’t you two think I’d know if I was?”

Jim rolled its eyes. “Ash, sweetie, honey, babykins— you’re not the most astute person in the world.”

“No, but I’m sentient enough to know if I’m pregnant or not.”

“My wife did not know for three months with our first one,” Rene mused. “But her monthly time, it was not very stable, you know? Yours is perhaps more reliable?”

I slumped back against the seat and rubbed my head. “I can’t believe we’re having a conversation about this.”

“I’ve only been with her for a few months, but she seems to be pretty regular,” Jim said. “Every three and a half weeks she’ll come home with a big bag of potato chips and lots of chocolate, and I know the next few days will be major grouchyville.”

“I’m going to wake up now. This is a horrible dream. Right. I’m waking up.”

“It is bad for her, the time? My wife used to be much worse, but having the little ones seemed to cure her of most of the trouble,” Rene said.

I wanted to bean him on the back of the head.

“You answer that, and there will be no lunch for you,” I told Jim, who had opened its mouth to answer. It hrumphed instead and looked out the window. “Rene, will you be available this afternoon? I don’t know when the meeting will get out, but I assume it’ll include a meal, so I’m guessing three or four hours.”

“You call, and I will be here waiting for you in no more than ten minutes,” Rene said, flashing me a charming smile.

“Great. I’m sure Drake will offer us a ride home, but...”

“I will not abandon you to him, have none of the fears.”

I opened my mouth to thank him, but at that moment, a white panel van slammed into the taxi, sending us with a horrible barrage of crumpled metal, breaking glass, and screaming tires crashing directly into a cement zebra-crossing barrier.

7

The screeching noise of the accident echoed in my head as I lay gasping with pain on the floor of the taxi. My first instinct was to go straight into full panic mode, but I haven’t been working on meditative exercises for nothing. Despite my brain shrieking at me to claw my way out from the twisted remains of the taxi, I kept a grip on my emotions and slowly tried to sort out my impressions.

My ribs hurt where I had fallen in front of the train, but no worse than they had earlier, which meant nothing there was broken. I was trapped under something big, heavy, and hot. . . which breathed, so it wasn’t the car seat, as I had thought.

“Jim?” I asked, wiggling my feet to make sure my legs weren’t broken. “Are you OK? Is anything hurt?”

“Aaaaagg,” a familiar grumpy voice groaned. “Did anyone get the number of that wrecking ball?”

I breathed a tiny sigh of relief. If Jim could crack wise, then it was all right. “Get off me if you can; you weigh a ton. Rene? Are you all right?”

“I think he’s unconscious,” Jim said, the tremendous weight lifting off me. A shower of glass sprinkled down as the demon struggled to get out of what remained of the taxi. ‘There’s blood all over and he’s slumped into the steering wheel.”

I swore under my breath, flinching when I used my right hand to lever myself up off the floor. Around us, voices called out questions, horns honked, and far in the distance, an ambulance’s siren sounded. “Crapbeans. I wrenched my hand. Can someone help me?”

Hands reached in through the broken window to pull Jim out. I got to my knees and looked over the back of the front seat at Rene. Two men were trying to open the driver’s door, but it was smashed against the barrier. The door on the other side escaped the impact from the van that hit us, however, so the Good Samaritans quickly got it open and gently pulled Rene out of the car.

“Don’t move him,” I yelled as another man and a woman helped me through the broken window. I held my right hand close to my body but shrugged off the man’s request that I sit and allow him to check me over.

“Rene? Oh, god, there’s so much blood!” I crawled over to where he lay on the pavement, surrounded by our rescuers and interested bystanders. “Is anyone here a doctor?”

“I have first aid training,” a serious young man said as he handed his messenger bag to a young woman. He knelt down on the other side of Rene and did a quick examination. “He’s breathing.”

“Is anything broken? Does he look like he’s seriously hurt?” I asked, using the hem of my dress to wipe some of the blood off Rene’s face. A gash near his hairline explained the blood all over his face .. . but curiously, the wound wasn’t bleeding anymore.