The inner door burst open with Battle's words. "McMahon!" he shouted. "Is this shit true?" Actually, it only scratches the surface," Mike told him. "F...r obvious reasons we decided to only print stuff that could be documented, but we, well, actually Henry, found out a lot more than we felt we could print." I thought that idiot was up to something," Battle fumed, his voice a little more muted – but only a little."Gingrich?" Mike smiled. "It was pretty clear to us that he wasn't all he was cracked. I swear,” I whispered as tears filled her eyes.“You don’t understand. The Church felt the pulse of magic when you held the orb and are already looking for you. It’s only a matter of time before they come.” She cried.“You just made a big assumption there. That some asshole could take me away in the first place,” was my only reply.I did something I had wanted to do since I first saw her. I pressed my lips against hers and felt heaven. After a moment, she pulled away and looked at me. I could see. Could I handle that? I reckoned so, mindful of the discipline that had allowed me to obtain an advanced academic degree, that kept me in the gym several times a week to insure that my six-foot plus frame stayed hard and muscular. At age twenty-nine, I weighed a solid two-hundred pounds, the same as my senior year in high school. Never married, I was a single guy playing the field, a couple years removed from my last ‘serious’ romance. Emotionally, I felt ready for another deep, long-term. In all of their eyes Tempest could do no wrong. They would tell him to handle it, or ignore it- he was the adult after all. Well he tried desperately to ignore her but it didn’t work, she wouldn’t allow it. He should ignore it, she was only 13, but she was a very smart and cunning thirteen year old, he knew plenty of adults that were not as clever as she. *** In the car on the way home, Tempest listened to her parents discuss Diago’s running away. She doodled in her note book as their words.