A.K.A. Goddess by Evelyn Vaughn Page B

driving-lesson thing was ironic. I had only vague suspicions that Lex might be involved with the bad guys, here. But I had absolute proof that the lessons he’d given me had saved our butts. Maybe our lives.

    Damn, my life was getting complicated.

    Tai Chi is a moving meditation, a choreography of ancient circular motions done slowly and with purpose. Everything resolves into its opposite—expansion into contraction, inhaling into exhaling, tension into release—and back again. Yin and yang. Softness and strength. Mind and body.

    I did a few basic forms in my hotel room in Poitiers, just to ground myself for bed. Though there are older, lesser-known combat techniques involved in Tai Chi, its main focus is on harmonizing your Chi, your life energy. After the previous two days, I figured my Chi could use all the help it could get.

    It helped me sleep, anyway, despite some children yelling in Italian across the hall.

    The next morning I compensated with a more intricate routine, not just to harmonize my Chi but to remind myself of those ancient combat techniques. As my sifu has explained, their seeming mildness gives them a special power. Few people look at Tai Chi and see beyond the synchronized patterns done the world over by senior citizens, children, people in wheelchairs…blatant noncombatants.

    They mistakenly equate exclusivity with strength.

    As I stepped into the beautiful Wind Blowing Lotus Leaves form, I could hear more Italian shouts. I smiled—easing a blocking arm slowly up, a fisted hand slowly down, feeling the Chi. Moving this deliberately was like swimming through water—and like my regular swims, it was strengthening. Even those children could probably do this.

    I turned into a double kick, finished the turn on landing, and sank into a smooth lunge and elbow strike. Then I rose into the form called Fair Lady Works at Shuttles. That, too, had martial potential…but only if I wished it. The power to do injury carries with it the power to choose against doing injury.

    By the time I’d finished, turning my palms toward the floor in the original start position, I felt…strong. Calm. Confident.

    And not just because I heard the children across the hall being herded off toward the elevator. Because I didn’t have to sink to the level of whoever chased us last night…and because it was my choice to not sink to that level.

    Choice. That’s the real power.

    A knock sounded at the connecting door to Rhys’s room.

    “Magdalene?” Rhys called softly, trying not to wake me if I were still asleep. We’d left the door cracked between us, in case there was further trouble. Only as I glanced up and saw him framed in the doorway did it occur to me that I was wearing nothing but what I’d slept in.

    Yesterday’s T-shirt and panties.

    “I could go get breakfast while you—” he offered, then stopped, most of him hesitating between the rooms and all of him staring at me with those blue, blue eyes.

    I was suddenly, stupidly glad Aunt Bridge had insisted on us traveling together.

    For a long moment I just stared back. I had no desire to cover myself—why should I? A T-shirt is hardly a Merry Widow, after all. High-cut blue panties do not a G-string make.

    Rhys turned away first. “Why don’t I just do that?”

    “A croissant would be great,” I said. “With fruit. And herbal tea, if they have it. I’ll shower while you’re out.”

    “I’ll have it in here.” He pushed the door back to a crack.

    I considered saying, “Be careful.” Or even protesting that he shouldn’t go anywhere without me. But it seemed overly paranoid, even after last night, and no small bit egotistical.

    Instead I called, “Thanks.”

    A shower. That was the ticket. Shower good.

    Afterward I toweled my hair semidry and combed it, and changed into clean panties and my one clean replacement shirt, a mauve camisole. I gave my face the barest hint of blush and eyeliner, not being a big makeup person, and put