“You keep saying that,” Trent said just as softly. I’d never have heard them if I hadn’t been in the front seat.

“Well, you keep pushing the pedal to the floor,” he shot back, his voice putting him in the ashtray, not the rearview mirror. “You should trust her. She had every right to dump you on the side of the road for freeing Ku’Sox, and she didn’t. That must have been some conversation you had in the john, because if it had been me, your ass would be under the grass right now.”

Sleep vanished, but I didn’t move. Jenks would know I was awake because of my “aura brightening” or some such crap, but Trent wouldn’t, and I worked to maintain my slow, sedate breathing. Vivian, too, must be asleep or Jenks would never have brought up the demon.

“You don’t know when you got it good, elf boy.”

It had been a soft mutter, but I knew Trent heard, as there was a creak of plastic and the vent started blowing cold air. “I have my reasons,” Trent said.

“You have trust issues is what you have,” Jenks said. “And turn the air off. What are you, a friggin’ penguin?”

“You don’t know half of what’s going on.”

You got that right, I thought as the air turned warm again. My nose was tickling from a thread on my coat, but I didn’t move, hoping Trent would say more. He might. Jenks and Trent had been spending a lot of time together while the rest of us slept, and Jenks liked to talk. Especially when he was cranky. Anything over 2,500 feet above sea level and he had a hard time flying. Hit 3,000 feet and he was down.

“Well?” Jenks said sarcastically, almost daring him.

A small sound of mistrust slipped from Trent. “You’d tell her.”

“So?”

“So I don’t want her sympathy.”

Sympathy? I cracked my eyes open enough to see a faint haze of pixy dust in the ashtray, glowing in the predawn gloom. “Come on, Trent,” Jenks wheedled as he shoved the doughnut napkin off himself and sat up. “What is so damn important in Seattle? Maybe I can help.”

Again came Trent’s huff of disbelief. “You talk too much.”

Indignant, Jenks flashed his wings. Making a wobbling flight to the dash, he stood with his hands on his knees, bent over and wheezing. “I helped Quen lift your paperwork from the FIB,” he said between breaths. “I never said anything. I can help. It’s allowed. I checked. If you’re really on an elf quest, you’re allowed a pixy. Pixies helped elves on quests all the time.”

Elf quest, I thought. It sounded so…undignified, like an overdone renaissance fair show, and I stifled a smile imagining Trent in costume riding through his woods to rescue the imprisoned princess. Crap, is he going to come back to Cincy with Ellasbeth?

“I’m breaking into a high-security location, not riding across the countryside on some fairy-tale adventure,” Trent said tightly, his thoughts clearly akin to my own.