Aylwyn and Barric exchanged glances, as Barric’s face broke into a huge guffaw, frightening both in its rarity and display of teeth.
“I like you!” Aylwyn’s voice was filled with admiration, and Katie Cooper smiled at him.
Col heard a growl —where was it coming from? Just as he realized that he was making the sound, he charged at Aylwyn, and just like that, the two were brawling, with the sounds of Barric egging them on.
And one more sound, just as Col was about to lose his human form and really rip into Aylwyn.
A door slamming.
Col rolled away from striking distance, breathing heavily, Aylwyn watching him warily.
“The female is crying,” Barric rumbled. He was looking straight at Col. “It’s your fault. Go find her, and fix it.”
She picked her way through the woods, past the backyard, the branches of the shrubs scratching at the loose skirt of today’s medieval outfit, fresh from the Faire’s wardrobe department. It was still late afternoon, with plenty of sun. Plenty of time for Simon to realize what a fraud she was, and fire her sorry ass.
It was impossible. She didn’t know why she ever thought she could do this. It was completely idiotic of her to think that she could tame these…these overgrown action figures that were even more badly behaved than the most tantrum-my of tantrum-my preschoolers.
Why would she think that she could do this job, or accomplish anything good, when her whole life was nothing but a cautionary tale? Don’t be like Lily. Broke, homeless, on the run. Years of her life wasted on an abusive manipulator who turned out to be a drug dealer.
With luck, a bear would pop out of the bushes right now and eat her.
The ludicrous thought put a quick stop to the pity party that she was spiraling into, and she stopped her walking and her wallowing at once.
Take a second to breathe in the fresh air, she counseled herself.
But it didn’t work.
Without the self-pity she was free to feel the fear. She was about to get fired. And if the owner of the Faire fired her, her future at Staff Childcare was probably over as well, even as short staffed as they were. Her car would be on perma-hold at the auto-repair shop, and she still had less than two hundred bucks.
Actually the pity party would be preferable to her stomach turning in on itself.
“Please do not be angered with us.”
She let out a shriek, as she jumped out of her skin. It was the last person she expected —that she wanted to see, calmly walking up behind her.
“How did you—how did you come up so silently?” Her eyes lit on Col’s large, broad-shouldered form.
In the quiet of the woods, he seemed to fill the space around her, his nearness waking up all her senses.
“Perhaps you were lost in thought,” he said. His voice was rich and smooth, flowing over her like warm honey. The concern she heard in it disarmed her. “Mayhap it would help to share the burden of what troubles you.”
He was…he was offering to talk with her about why she was freaking out in the woods? Did the world turn upside down while she was beating herself up?
“Why do you care?” she asked bitterly.
He seemed to be taken aback by her question.
“I—I do not wish to see you ill at ease because of our malefactions.” The earnestness in his voice touched her.
She quirked a sad smile. “Good vocabulary, although the word malefaction might be too formal. It’s a bit outdated. That’s the sort of thing I was hoping to help with, but it turns out that I’m just hopeless at it. I don’t want to waste everyone’s time. I’m sure Simon’s drawing up my walking papers as we speak.”
“Walking papers? You need papers, to give you permission to walk?” Damn, up close when he wasn’t an asshole, he was devastatingly hot. And that quizzical look on his face just made Lily want to cuddle him and let him know everything was okay.
Yeah, cuddle. That’s what she wanted to do with him.
Wait—she wasn’t supposed to want to do anything with him at all. What the hell? She was apparently losing her mind, along with her job.
“Sorry, that’s an idiom. It’s a phrase meaning that Simon will be ending my job, given how bad I am at it.”
His quizzical look deepened, along with her urge to—yeah, sure cuddle.
“That will not happen. Even if he were to do something so ill-advised, I wouldst not allow it.”
Wouldst? These men had the oddest way of speaking. Sometimes they sounded almost normal, and then their strange, formal turns of phrase betrayed them.
Where did they learn English from, anyway? A discarded Renn Faire pamphlet?
She forced herself to focus on what he was saying, even though her senses were buzzing “You? You were the one dead set against my being hired.”
“That was because—” he struggled for the right words, while she patiently waited. “That was due to my own shortcomings. When you are near, I find it impossible to focus my thoughts. It has been that way since the first moment I met your eyes – in the parking lot. But that is my own burden to bear. You have been a great boon to all of us, and particularly a salve to the prickly natures of Barric and Merek.”
Shock jolted through her. He felt the same thing that she had, when they’d first locked gazes.
And she didn’t expect to hear such a positive assessment coming from Col of all people. The one who seemed to have it in for her from the beginning.
Maybe, just maybe, she wasn’t total garbage at what she was supposed to be doing.
And then he surprised her further by reaching out and grabbing her hand. A jolt of sensual pleasure sizzled up her veins, and she squirmed a little, praying he didn’t notice.
It was just a touch, just a connection formed by two hands held, and yet Lily felt a sense of rightness about this, a wonderment that she had never experienced before.
“You will not leave. If you left, I would pursue you.”
His words should have alarmed her, but the thought of being stalked by Col stirred an odd heat in her. “What would you do when you caught me?” she asked, her voice gone husky.
Because there was no doubt that he’d catch her.
His eyes seized hers, burning into her. She couldn’t look away as if her life depended on it. “What would you like me to do?” There was a hint of a growl in his voice.
Her face flushed. “I…nothing.” Her voice went squeaky as she chickened out.
His sensual lips curled up in a smile, and suddenly, there was a predator’s gleam lighting his eyes. “Katie Cooper. It is not like you to lie.”
Her heart broke a little when he said that. Because everything about her was a lie.
“What do you want to do to me?” she murmured, her gaze sliding away.
“I want you to tell me something.” His words rumbled up from his chest, warm and rich and strong. “How would a modern…I mean…an American…how would an American male tell an American female that he would worship her if she wouldst but allow it?”
Did he just say—
His words flew into her, and burst into butterflies that fluttered about within, lifting her up as if gravity no longer applied.
“I—I imagine that would be the perfect way,” she whispered.
“And does she?”
God, those eyes. How had she ever thought them cold? The gold flecks in the hazel seemed molten. Standing less than a foot apart, she felt as if she could be enveloped easily within those muscled arms. Or maybe that was just wishful thinking.
The butterflies fluttered, furiously batting their wings inside.
“Wh-what?” She had forgotten the question.
“Does she allow him to worship her?”
She wasn’t dreaming it, then. The earnestness in his voice, the warmth spreading throughout her body from a single point of connection in their clasped hands, the unexpected desire that leapt up to experience his arms around her…
“Yes,” she breathed.
“And how
would he best show that he worshipped her?’
She was as stunned as he was by her next words.
“He would kiss her.”
For a second Col wondered if his senses were running pell-mell again, particularly his hearing. But no, her head was tilted upwards towards his, her small, delicate hand still within his own, allowing his compulsive, rhythmic sweeps of his thumb over that silky smooth skin. That lower lip, plump in its ripeness like a berry begging to be tasted.
Col could restrain himself no longer. His free hand lifting to gently slide under her jaw. His fingers brushed against the softness of her skin, as he lowered his mouth onto hers. As their lips made contact, a wave swept through him, a song whose silent tune reverberated in the very depths of his soul.
She moved beneath him, parting those lips, inviting him in, and he was lost. She tasted of nectar, and honey, and dreams, and sunlight. A rich scent rose from her, earthy arousal that summoned his own.
When the kiss ended, it was as if slowly rousing from a sublime dream. She looked at him, her eyes filled with wonderment. He felt he would give anything to always have her look at him that way. She lightly placed two fingertips, slightly trembling, on her lips.
“That was…I’ve never…”
He took her hand again, the one that was against her lips, and placed it against his own, kissing the palm tenderly as she shivered. He gently pulled her against him, and held her, marveling in the feel of her body within his own.
Col had never felt this way before, this urge to protect, to cherish, to possess another. He had lain with women, but never had he experienced joy simply in their presence, in their look upon him with favor, in the quiet resting of their cheek against his heart.
“Tell me,” he said. “I would know all of your thoughts.”
“I’ve never been kissed like that before.”
A glow filled him from within, along with a fierce, brutal possessiveness. He did not want to think of another male tasting those lips, or holding her as he did now.
“I am glad of it,” his voice was gruff.
“Still, I just…this is strange, for me. As a general rule, I don’t go off into the woods and kiss someone that I was convinced hated me only a few hours earlier.”
He lifted her hand to his mouth again, this time running his lips gently on the delicate skin that curved under her wrist.
“I never hated you,” he murmured, delighting in the feel of her shivers. “I feared what you would do to my senses, the confusion you cause in me. It was a fear that governed my actions, from the moment that I first laid eyes on you, through the window on the Fairegrounds.”
“You did notice,” she breathed.
“Indeed, how could I not,” he said. “You have ever been in my thoughts since that moment.”
“I—” She swallowed, and he wondered if she was dismayed at his admission. “I noticed you too.”
His heart was filled with joy.
“But—”
His senses went on full alert. But was one of the words he learned that was rarely followed by glad tidings.
“But I just got out of a relationship.” Her eyes fell, and she began biting that lower lip nervously.
“I see,” he said. “Just got out of a relationship” was one of those modern phrases that left a bad taste in his mouth. On the ‘reality tv’ shows that Aylwyn watched, those words usually led to tears, or ale. Copious amounts of ale.
“And what does that mean for…us?” Because there was an “us”. The moment her lips had touched his, he was sure of it.
“I meant we’re going to need to take it slow, whatever this is.”
“I will take this however you wish.” But sooner or later, he would take her completely.
He grinned so widely, his heart filled to bursting. And then he kissed her again, moving his mouth upon hers in a gentle caress that swept through his body, his tongue dancing lightly with hers as she melted against him. The scent and taste of the sweetest nectar enveloped his senses, as he felt her muscles slacken in his embrace. He took his time exploring her lips with his own, her shivers inviting a deeper connection.
Slowly.
As she wished.
Chapter Sixteen
It was really happening. Puma was officially letting Jordy take Trish’s place. The head of Ops was saying something about how it was an amazing amount of trust, but something made him feel like he could count on Jordy.
Yeah, something all right. That spell that Cadmus had given Jordy had overcome any resistance that Puma normally would have had. Compelled him to do things he ordinarily wouldn’t, same with Trish. Like a freaking love spell on the most heartless person, or the voodoo from the movies that made people follow your every command. It was worth every drop of blood, every piece of whatever soul Jordy had to cast it. Definitely not a ritual you’d find in any of those ‘hug-a-tree’ spellbooks for witches.
The cut on Jordy’s wrist was healing nicely. Too bad Trish wasn’t, although Jordy had heard through the grapevine that due to the circumstances around Trish’s accident, she wouldn’t be working there again anyway. Jordy smirked, and then remembered to quirk the other side of her mouth so it would look like an actual smile.
You know, like she couldn’t believe this unexpected elevation in responsibilities. And that she felt sympathy for Trish. Such a shame so many bones were broken, and who knew how long it would take before she would be able to work, or even walk, again.
Couldn’t happen to a better person standing in her way.
Puma’s massive key ring jangled as he removed a smaller set from it. That, along with the new, supercharged electronic all-access backstage pass key card, was now hers. The keys to the kingdom, almost literally, since as Puma’s new Second on the Ops team, Jordy would have access to virtually anything, anywhere at the Faire.
And then Puma handed Jordy her own customized utility vest, just like the one most long-timers or senior team members on Ops wore, with the letters spelling out OPS on the back and her name embroidered above it.
She eagerly turned it over to see.
An explosion of petulant anger flared through her.
Oh hellz no.
Instead of HADEEZ, the bright red thread proclaimed JORDY.
“Not to your liking?” Puma asked, with a faint undertone of annoyance. Jordy knew better than to make a stink about it with Puma. Her promotion wasn’t even a minute old, and he could still just as easily give it to someone else, spell or no spell.
Magicking wasn’t strong enough to cover stupid. For evidence, refer to Billy Bob.
“I love it.” Jordy said, with a fake shit-eating grin on her face, but Puma had already turned away. Besides, Jordy thought, as the new Second she could have a new vest made. She could have a vest made for each day of the week.
She wasn’t going to sweat it one more second, especially as Puma turned back to give her some more welcome news.
“You’re also moving into Trish’s room, which should be cleared out in the next few hours. Check with Rika on that, and for the other changes to your employment package.” Puma said.
Jordy was genuinely surprised. Turns out the spell Cadmus gave her was a gift that kept on giving. Everyone knew that Trish’s—now her room, was larger, filled with better furniture and situated in a more choice location at the Faire, unlike the converted motel where she had been grateful to share a bunk with Shady Roomie with the hidden ID, janky stuffed turd, and a boatload of secrets that made Shady Roomie somewhat interesting.
Jordy was going places, fast. Cadmus was the bomb.
Cadmus held up the pendulum from the ceramic saucer on which it lay, soaking up the moonlight on the windowsill of his rental. It felt potent in his hand, but would it do the job? Had there been enough of that man-wolf’s blood?
The only way to find out was to use it, but he would only have one shot at it.
He let the pendulum twist and turn from its chain in the morning light. It seemed to say, put me to use!
“I suppose I have to trust in the Infernal Gods,” he mused out loud. Just as he talked himself into activating the tracking, he heard the crunch of gravel in front of his rental house, as if a car had come to a stop.
“What the—?” He was not expecting Billy Bob, nor Jordy, until much later in the day. Perhaps it was some errant fool who had lost his way, or perhaps even another worthy sacrifice for His Terrible Majesty.
He shut his eyes, tapping into his senses, but they were still obscured. He opened his eyes, exhaling with frustration, and then the doorbell rang.
“We’re not meant to go on our journey just yet,” he said to the pendulum, as he settled it back onto the dish. He went downstairs as the fool at the door began pounding on it. Cadmus uttered curses under his breath as the pounding became louder. He hoped it would be a sacrifice, he’d love to show that idiot what he really thought of—
He opened the door to reveal the unwelcome, mocking face of Micah. Wearing a Gucci tracksuit, and carrying a leather carryall with the distinct markings of Louis Vuitton.
“Surprise, Cadmus! What’s up?”
Infernal Gods, if only he could make Micah splatter all over into assorted viscera and liquefied organs.
“Micah, what a….pleasant surprise. What brings you here?” Cadmus could barely restrain the snarl in his voice.
Micah brushed past him into the house, dumping the leather carryall to the side. “I got HTM all curious about the energies you talked about here, so he sent me to check it out for myself. See what you got going on down here.”
“Ah, I see.” Cadmus closed the door decisively, wishing that Micah were on the other side of it. Flayed.
He watched as the younger male prowled around the modest living room, before heading towards the kitchen. Where the doorway to the root cellar was.
Cadmus made some quick calculations in his head, as he adjusted to the fact that his nemesis was here. The situation was dire indeed, if His Terrible Majesty was now sending Micah to check up on him. Doubtless the hateful rival was filling His Terrible Majesty with untruths and slanderous smears about Cadmus.
Col: His Destined Mate Page 12