Page 95 of Truly, Madly Viking

"I don't know. It just is." He'd already adjusted his clothing. Now he went over to unlock the door.

When Rita rushed in, he made a disgusted sound. Turning back to Maggie, he reached out and took one of her hands in both of his. "My instincts tell me that this is something I must do."

Maggie pulled her hand from his clasp. She couldn't think when he touched her in any way. Besides that, her skin was still extrasensitive from their lovemaking.

Pacing the room, she tried to get her emotions under control. "You want us—me and my two daughters—to take a fruitless, two-thousand-mile trip, all based on an instinct?"

"Yea, I do."

She noticed a familiar expression on his face. "Oh, don't you dare throw that trust business in my face again. This isn't about trust. It's about a whim."

"Mayhap it's about control, Mag-he. Mayhap you just can't bear to give up some of your precious control. I admit that I should have discussed this with you first, but I did not do it to usurp your authority.

I was so excited over the idea that I blurted it out."

She took a deep breath. "Listen, Joe, we can go next summer when the girls are on vacation—"

"Next summer! What makes you think I will be here next summer?" His words were angry and bleak at the same time.

Maggie felt as if a vise were squeezing her heart.

"I'll go myself then. I will reserve a seat for myself on a gray dog."

"Gray dog?" Maggie laughed briefly. "You mean Greyhound... like a Greyhound bus?"

He waved a hand dismissively. "That is what I said, is it not?"

The idea of a tenth-century Viking boarding a modern bus and traveling a great distance to a place where he knew no one was so outlandish that Maggie hurried to convince him he was being unreasonable. "I can't let you do that."

His eyes threw flinty sparks at her, as if to say, Try to stop me.

"Joe, try to understand. I'm the only one who drives. Even if I could drive nonstop, it would be two days going and two days coming back. With at least one overnight stay in a motel, we're talking three days each way of driving alone.

Were you planning that we would go, examine the closed-to-the-public village from the outside, then turn around and come right back?"

"You know I have made no specific plans. It's just something I want to do—nay, something I need to do."

As he needed my touch? No, don't think. You're softening, Maggie. Whatever you do, don't soften.

"Don't you think you're being selfish?"

He seemed to give her question serious thought. "Nay... yea... it does not matter."

"And there's another thing: do you think it's wise to go so far away from the point of your time travel entry? There's a chance you'd cut yourself off forever from returning to your time."

"On the other hand, Thora may have traveled north to colder waters. Mayhap she awaits me there.

Mayhap that is why it is so important to me."

That prospect staggered Maggie. "You think that this might be a sign from Thora?"

"Mayhap."

"And you would abandon me and Suzy and Beth in Maine?" Maggie hated the pathetic tone of her voice.

"Not willingly." He drew himself up resolutely. "Heed me well on this, m'lady: I am going to this Rosestead village, but your arguments make good sense. So I will offer this compromise, though it vexes me no end to think of doing it."

He had her full attention now.