Ruby Fever

Epilogue

I lay on the grass and stared at the sky. It was very blue. The grass was itchy, and I was naked, but I didn’t have enough energy to get up, so I just lay there trying to catch my breath.

The Russian prince panted next to me, also naked.

We had brawled for the better part of an hour. Maybe longer. I wasn’t sure how long, but Catalina and Alessandro got tired of waiting and went inside. I was pretty sure the other Russians had also gone inside, too.

We should have stopped before both of us ran out of magic. I had never fought that hard for that long before. Apparently when I ran out of anger, I reverted to my human shape. Good to know for the future.

It was starting to get really warm. If I didn’t get a move on, I would get sunburned on my boobs. Most of me was tan, but my natural skin color was somewhere between mozzarella and snowflake.

I groaned and forced myself to sit up.

The prince was looking at me. I could either demurely clutch my chest to cover up or look back. I decided to look back.

Okay, so they built them really well in Russia. Like, really well.

“You didn’t win,” I told him.

He just kept staring like I had grown a second head. All things considered, a second head would have been less shocking. He must have thought he was the only giant in the world. Ha!

“You’re lying next to a fire ant hill,” I told him. “Roll left when you get up.”

I climbed to my feet, a little unsteady, but upright, brushed the dirt off my naked butt, and started toward the wall. Knowing my sister, she would have left a robe or a blanket out for me.

Our home was smoking, and there was a big crack in the wall, which would be expensive to fix. Later on the so-called authorities would show up and want things explained but none of that was my problem. I had done my part. Arkan was dead, my sister and Alessandro would get married, Grandpa Linus was officially part of the family, and nobody I cared about died in the final battle.

Now we just had to fix the gaping hole in our wall. Money didn’t grow on trees, but it did crawl somewhere in our office, and I had two hundred and fifty thousand reasons to find it. Jadwiga and I had a date.

It promised to be another beautiful day.