They said nothing until they were in the Ferrari and even then, conversation was agonizingly polite.
"I take it you're still angry with me," he finally said.
"Yes. No. Okay, yes, annoyed I guess. But I'll get over it. It's no big deal."
No big deal, she repeated to convince herself.
He sighed. "Right. Good. You had me worried for a while—I thought I might be getting those flowers shoved up my nose back there."
She laughed despite herself. "Now why would I do that? And how did you know lilies are my favorite?"
"Bob told me."
Traitor. "So explain to me why we're going to a protest rally," she said, returning to their mutually safe topic of turning her into a rebel.
"Street cred. It'll get you into the papers, people will talk—especially after I mention it at Louisa's party—and you'll become an instant celebrity around town. Dug-E will hear about it and he'll think you're cool."
"Sounds ingenious but how will you get me in the papers in the first place?"
"Leave it to me."
She didn't like the way he said that. It had an ominous ring to it. "You're not going to make me do anything illegal are you?"
He laughed. "Not unless you want to. I know a couple of photographers and journalists who'll be there. I'll slip them a few dollars to take a photo of you in the crowd and to spell your name correctly. No sweat."
"But Dug-E's from out of town—do you really think he'll hear about me on the grapevine?"
"Just to be sure, we'll slide the newspaper under his hotel door and I'll get a few people to mention your name in his presence. Easy."
Yeah, easy. So why was she so nervous? Probably it had something to do with spending the entire afternoon with Mr. Cool.
Zack found a parking space close enough to City Hall that it was probably illegal. The rally had begun without them and a mass of people stood chanting and waving placards at the building.
At the office she'd changed into jeans and a T-shirt bearing the slogan Animals have rights too. Zack wore his usual black jeans and T-shirt, no slogan.
"They only had one T-shirt I suppose?" she said as he hustled her past a line of police keeping the chanting crowd under control.
"It's not my image."
"But it's mine?"
"Who knows what your image is, Babe."
Not the same as yours, that's for sure.
They moved into the thick of the crowd and quickly picked up the chant. Someone handed her a banner and she waved it with gusto over her head, managing to bump Zack in the face with it a few times. Accidentally of course.
After nearly half an hour, she'd gotten into the rhythm of the protest. It was a good cause and she was an animal lover after all. Maybe she should go to other protests—
"Oh hell!" Zack cursed. She glanced up at him, but he was looking behind them. "My car's being towed!"
Good. Served him right for driving such an arrogant car. And for sleeping with her. And for leaving right after.
"Wait here until I get this sorted out." He raced away and was quickly swallowed by the crowd.
But fifteen minutes went by and he hadn't returned. The protesters were getting edgy. The mayor hadn't appeared on the steps of City Hall as promised and they wanted his blood.
The leaders up the front started to storm the building, and like sheep, everyone followed, sweeping Annie along with them. The momentum forced people at the back to surge forward but for some reason the front of the pulsing crowd had already stopped. From her vantage point of five feet two inches Annie could see absolutely nothing. And with the crowd pressing in around her, she couldn't go anywhere.
Then chaos erupted as police on horses and on foot cut swathes through the protesters ordering them to get back. Everyone more or less did as they were told and tried to back away but the people behind hadn't heard the order and continued to push forward. What ensued was something akin to an accordion and Annie got stuck in the middle.
Later, she couldn't remember if she shrieked, but she did remember being nearly trampled by feet and hooves. Flinging her arms up to protect herself she accidentally hit someone leaning over her. Next thing she knew she was hauled to her feet by the front of her T-shirt and dragged off. When she finally dared to open her eyes, she saw it was a cop, and he wasn't amused.
He cuffed her, read her the rights she knew by heart from TV shows and practically threw her in the back of a police van.
Great. Thanks to Zack, she was going to get a police record. She'd kill him when she got her hands on him.
CHAPTER 13
"Good going," said a long-haired kid dressed in the same T-shirt as Annie. "We showed 'em."
Annie had a hard time working out what she'd showed and to whom, but she accepted his congratulations with relief. At least she wasn't in the back of a van with real criminals.
They took her and the three other over zealous protesters to the police station, recorded their details and gave them all one phone call.
She used hers to call Zack. When she finished using every swear word in her vocabulary, she managed to calm down enough to tell him where she was. When she hung up, she couldn't remember if he'd said anything. Actually, she wasn't even sure if she'd got him in person or his voice mail, but it had felt damn good to let off steam.
The cop who marched her back to the cell eyed her with caution and the other protesters backed away from her a little when she rejoined them.
"Wow," said a sixty-ish woman with wild gray hair sticking out at weird angles as if she'd been playing with an electrical socket. "You've got a set of lungs on you, Girl. Way to go."
"Yeah," said the same kid who'd spoken to her in the back of the van. "You tell them pigs where it's at."
She didn't have the heart to tell him she hadn't yelled at the police. Besides, she could chalk up the episode as being good for her image. Maybe she could get one of them to talk to Zack's journalist friends.
An hour later she was let out of the cell and led into a waiting room where Zack paced like a caged lion. He looked horrible. His hair stood on end, his face was as hard as granite, and a small muscle twitched in his jaw.
But she barely had time to notice these things. He scooped her up and held her so tightly to his chest she thought she'd snap in two.
"Jeez," he breathed into her hair. "I'm sorry, Annie. I'm so sorry." He rubbed the back of her neck with his big, warm hand. With her ear pressed to his chest, she could hear his heart beating fiercely.
So he was worried about her. Maybe she should get arrested more often.