Page 84 of Defying the Relic Hunter

“Which park?”

Ella clapped her hands. “It got birdies!”

Well, that didn’t help. A lot of parks had birds.

Xenia place the fried ice cream on the table and sat Ella in a chair. “I got you extra chocolate sauce.”

Ella gave her a gap tooth smile and dug in.

Xenia linked with me.“Who’s her father?”

“Dixon Deeter, the head of a local biker gang.”

Her eyebrows shot up.“How did you meet him?”

“Ella had been kidnapped. I rescued her and to show his gratitude Dixon made me a member of his gang.”

“Seriously?”

“Oh yeah. I even got a gang tattoo.”

“That I’ve got to see.”

I flashed her a mental picture of the tattoo.

Xenia burst out laughing.“You have a screaming skull on your hip?”

“I do.”

“What did Ethan say about it?”

“Nothing.”

There a short, disbelieving silence, then Xenia cried,“Nothing?”

“My uncle had plenty to say about it, but Ethan? Not a word.”

“Maybe he didn’t notice it,”Xenia said.

“Aw, c’mon. It’s huge.”

“It must be the mating fog.”

I parroted incredulously,“Mating fog? What the hell is mating fog?”

“It’s when a warrior catches his mate and all he has on his mind is sex. Lots and lots of sex.”

“And all those raging hormones shorted out his good sense,”I added indignantly.

“Exactly.”

“You find my daddy?”

My eyes widened in horror. Ella had chocolate smeared everywhere. “Let’s get you cleaned up and then we’ll go look for him, ok?”

“Kay.”

I escorted Ella into the restroom and washed the chocolate off her face, hands and princess dress. “Good as new.”

---