Rhianne pulled on the camisole, concealing her gorgeous breasts. Ben tiptoed to the veranda steps where shirts, jeans, and shoes lay strewn. He heard Rhianne’s giggle and realized she was beside him.
“No,” Ben whispered fiercely. “Hide.”
“Faster together,” she returned.
No time to argue. Ben’s hand landed on the pile of jeans as the veranda door opened above them, and the chipper tones of the tour guide floated out.
“Many of the roses were planted when the house was built and survive to this day.”
Ben yanked the jeans from the steps and dragged Rhianne down into the dirt, out of sight.
The tour guide, dressed in an antebellum gown with hoop skirts that swayed enough to reveal her sneakers beneath, strode onto the veranda. “From here you can see the path to the slave quarters and the kitchen, which was built far from the house so the smoke and smells wouldn’t bother the family within. We’ll visit those after we see the rest of the interior.”
She stood aside while her flock, mostly older women clutching phones they used as cameras, oohed over the view and the many roses that covered the railings. Wind chimes rang like laughter.
The tour guide, after pausing fifteen seconds to let her brood snap photos, zipped back into the house, skirts bouncing off the doorframe. Her followers trotted after her.
A small, white-haired woman, handbag over her arm, paused to take one more photo.
Rhianne, crouched with her nose almost into the crawl space beneath the house, stifled a cough at the musty air. The woman above paused and peered over the railing.
Whether she saw the two of them huddled there or not, she said nothing, and retreated indoors, her feet pattering as she hurried to catch up with the others.
Rhianne let out a breath. “Goddess.”
Ben stifled his laughter as he slid on his pants. “Get dressed, and I’ll sneak us inside.”
“How?” Rhianne shoved her feet into her jeans then reached up to the veranda and whipped down her T-shirt, pulling it on over the camisole.
“I have a secret way in. We can take ourselves upstairs. Or …” His mischievous side emerged. “We can hide there and make them think the house is haunted.”
Rhianne settled the straps of her shoes. “This is a sentient house. Won’t they already think it’s haunted?”
“The house behaves itself and doesn’t scare off the tourists.” Ben found and dragged on his T-shirt. “Jasmine needs the income, and she’s made the house promise to leave visitors alone. But the punters like to be a little bit frightened.”
“Punters?”
“Paying tourists. Ready?”
He grasped Rhianne’s hand and led her in a low crouch around the back to a half-door set into the foundation. The entrance was hidden by vines, but Ben had loosened them to create a swinging curtain that disguised it.
Ben pulled aside the vines, unlocked the door with the keys he always kept in his pocket, and opened it, going first to make sure the way was clear.
The space under the house was too shallow to be a cellar, more a crawl space than anything else. The ley line was strong here, Ben’s skin tingling with it.
He led Rhianne on hands and knees to the place he knew lay under the large drawing room. With a smooth stick he’d left here for the purpose, he tapped the underside of the floor.
Ben always tapped in a pattern so those above wouldn’t think they heard only random noises by a settling, old house. Ben paused, then repeated the thumps. Rhianne watched him, hands over her mouth, eyes glimmering in the darkness.
Ben next scratched the stick over the boards. The creaking sounded like the rusty hinges of an invisible door opening to nowhere.
Voices came to them through the floorboards. “What was that?”
“What was what?”
“Did you hear? A tapping? Like someone, or something, trying to get out.”
“The house is indeed haunted.” The tour guide eagerly took up the cue. She began the completely fabricated story of a girl child of the house trapped beneath the floor. She’d died there, the tour guide said, and now walked the house, searching for her way out.
The event had never happened. Ben had researched the entire history of the house and hadn’t found evidence of anyone dying under the floorboards, and besides, the house wouldn’t have let that happen. But a tragic story booked tours.
Ben laid aside the stick—overdoing it would only bring people down here to search—and ushered Rhianne onward.
In one corner was a trap door, which Ben had reinforced, that led to a hidden room behind the staircase. He opened the door and reached for the short ladder he’d positioned in the room above.
Ben hadn’t known about this room until a Shifter guest—more a fugitive really—had revealed it. He found it handy now for hiding from the tour groups or as a space to be alone. He kept records of the house there and other things he didn’t want found.
He climbed the ladder then assisted Rhianne up into the hideaway.
The room was lit by a tiny window, and Ben had made it cozy, adding a bookcase to the antique desk and chair that had already been there. He’d filled the desk drawer with snacks for the days he had to stash himself in here, like this one.
Rhianne studied the bag of potato chips Ben opened for her, then reached in for one. She scrutinized the chip then tentatively put it into her mouth and crunched. “Not bad,” she admitted.
“Careful of those. Addicting.”
“Mmm.” Rhianne took the bag from him and munched a handful. “I understand why. Like shrimp.”
Ben grinned as she dug in for more. “I could get you shrimp-flavored chips.”
Rhianne wrinkled her nose. “I’m not certain that would be as tasty. But more shrimp would be nice.”
“We’ll go to New Orleans again once we figure out what’s going on and how to keep your father from finding you.” Ben lounged against the edge of the desk and opened a bag of chocolate-covered pretzels. “Why is the guy so evil?”
Rhianne crunched chips thoughtfully. If her father’s perfidy hurt her, she made no sign—or perhaps she was so used to his cruelty that she’d ceased being sentimental about him.
“Tuil Erdannan can do anything they wish, as you know. We don’t like the hoch alfar, and battle them, but that doesn’t make us good. Tuil Erdannan don’t notice what goes on in the world beyond their interests. Everything else is distant.” Rhianne took a final chip and gave the empty bag a disappointed glance. “Most Tuil Erdannan keep to themselves, like my mother, who focuses on her garden, her circle of friends, her own life. Even I don’t always figure into her world.”
“I understand that,” Ben said in sympathy. “I don’t know Lady Aisling as well as you do, but it’s like she’s remote and sharp at the same time.”
“Exactly. She knows precisely what goes on around her, but she chooses whether to put her attention on it or not. Ivor is somewhat the same. The difference is that he enjoys mastering others. He wants power for its own sake.” Rhianne shook her head. “Don’t worry. I got over him a long time ago. When I was little, I thought that if my father came to know me, he’d like me and take me under his wing, but I learned I was wrong. Another thing about Tuil Erdannan is we don’t lose ourselves to love. If love is there, fine. If it’s not, we’re not going to pine away and long for it. I came to terms with what my father was long ago.”
Had she? Ben read resoluteness in her, but did he see behind her lifted chin the child devastated because her father had rejected her?
“Goblins are totally different.” Ben fished in the drawer for another bag of potato chips, pulled it open with a satisfying crinkle, and handed it to Rhianne. “We love absolutely. Gut-wrenching, soul-churning, pining-away passion. We love with everything we’ve got.”
Rhianne took the bag, her rich brown eyes on Ben. “That must be hard for you.”
“It’s absolute hell. On the other hand, it’s sublime. Drowning in love is happiness you c
an’t imagine. It can also bring with it a world of hurt—but only if you make that love needy. When you turn it around, and love hard without being dependent on it in return, it’s the most magnificent thing in the world.”
Ben stopped, out of breath, wondering why he was yammering on about love while lost in her eyes.
Rhianne touched his lips. Her fingers were salty from the chips, and Ben licked her fingertip.
“I’ve never met anyone like you,” she said softly.
Ben swallowed, her touch, her words, going straight to his heart. “I’m the last of my kind. Unique.”
“That is not what I meant.”
Ben wanted to answer with a joke, but he could think of nothing. As she gazed at him, Ben moved her fingers from his mouth and kissed her.
He tasted the saltiness of the chips on top of the fieriness all her own as she returned the kiss, the chip bag crumpling between them.
If Ben ever allowed himself to lose his heart to a woman—which he could not afford to do—she would be the one.
Rhianne ran her fingers through his hair and down his neck, pulling him closer. She enjoyed kissing, and Ben obliged. His lips, still tender from their wild lovemaking, gentled the kiss, caressing her in softness.
A dry cough made them jump. Rhianne’s teeth banged against Ben’s before they broke apart and swung around. Ben’s hand went to the nunchaku he kept in the desk’s drawer under all the snacks.
The white-haired woman who’d paused on the veranda gazed at them from clear blue eyes behind a thick set of glasses. Her face bore few lines but the weight of her life’s experience was palpable.
“Ghosts, my eye,” she said in a firm voice. She pointed at Rhianne. “You are Fae. Say your prayers.”
She lunged at Rhianne in a swift and sudden attack.
Chapter Fifteen
Ben was in front of Rhianne like a lightning strike, the wind of his passing brushing Rhianne’s face.
He closed his hands on the woman. Instead of crying out like a feeble, elderly lady, she snarled. Her body thickened, the guise of the genteel tourist dissolving into a massive creature with a wizened face and giant hands.
Ben froze in shock. The woman-thing wrenched herself from his grip and struck Ben, who slammed backward into the desk. His face was wan, eyes wide.
The creature rushed at him again. Rhianne shoved her hand into the drawer and yanked out the strange weapon she’d seen there—double sticks attached at the top. The sticks flailed, and Rhianne immediately whacked herself on the arm, but she advanced, everything in her wanting to bash at the woman and defend Ben.
Ben raised both hands. He growled something in an unfamiliar language, and the woman-creature halted abruptly. The grotesque form melted back into the white-haired woman, her clothes still neat, her handbag intact. She pushed up her glasses and peered at Ben with narrowed eyes.
“How do you speak the language of my people?” she asked in English. “It is a lost tongue. Gone, forgotten.”
“Not by me.” Ben carefully took the weapon from Rhianne and held a rod in one hand, tucking the second rod under his arm. “I’ve been speaking it my whole life. Who the hell are you?”
“I am called Millie.” Her thin finger moved to Rhianne. “She is Fae. The hated enemy of my people.”
“She is Tuil Erdannan,” Ben said calmly.
Millie lowered her glasses and peered at Rhianne over them. Her eyes widened.
“Oh, my stars. Look at that. A Tuil Erdannan.” She resumed her glasses and her scrutiny. “Are you certain? She doesn’t seem quite right.”
“I understand English, and yes I am,” Rhianne broke in. “A Tuil Erdannan. Are you a goblin? Like Ben?”
“Ben.” Millie rolled the word around her tongue, then her gaze filled with rage. “Wait a minute. Do you mean you’re Gilbenarteoighiamh?”
“Yes …” Ben said cautiously.
Millie screamed and went for him, hands curved into claws. Rhianne rushed between them and caught her, startled by the woman’s strength. Rhianne began to summon the energy for a word of power, though she’d rather not use it in this closed space.
“Who is … whoever you said?” Rhianne demanded.
Millie abruptly ceased struggling and tried to push her hair from her eyes with a shaky hand. “Only the one who destroyed us. Who made the Fae kill us all.”
Ben’s face was gray. “I was framed.”
“What do you mean, Ben made the Fae kill you all?” Rhianne asked.
Millie sent Ben a furious stare through her thick glasses. “If you hadn’t been making the karmsyern for the dokk alfar, they never would have come after us.”
Ben tightened his grip on the weapon he held. “You know the goblins were making trouble for the Fae a long time before that. There was an uprising, remember? And so many battles, so many dead. When I said I would help the dokk alfar, the hoch alfar used it as an excuse to crush us. How could I anticipate they would massacre us and throw us out? I’ve spent a thousand years regretting my choice.” A muscle moved in his jaw. “But at the same time, I was only one goblin. I didn’t act alone.”
Rhianne’s heart beat rapidly as she listened. It hurt to imagine Ben watching while his people were slaughtered, knowing that he couldn’t stop it, that he might have caused it. And then finding himself in a world he didn’t understand.
Millie sagged in Rhianne’s grasp. “I know. But we had to have someone to blame. It was easier—it helped me survive.”
Ben wiped his eyes. “How did you survive? For centuries I searched for others and found no one. What happened to you?”
“I expect the same thing that happened to you.” Millie tried to resume her crisp tones as Rhianne cautiously released her. “I made sure to lie low. I look like this …” She waved to her neat blouse, leggings that ended below her knees, and sensible walking shoes. “So that humans don’t pay attention to me. They think I’m cute. Funny. Harmless.”
Ben nodded slowly. He’d said almost those exact words to Rhianne when she’d asked him why he’d taken the guise he wore.
“I worked as a nurse or governess for various families through the years,” Millie went on. “I knew how to take care of people—it’s what I did in Faerie. I like looking after children and after those who can’t fend for themselves. In doing so, I found that humans weren’t so different from us after all. Of course, I couldn’t let them see me in true form. So, I stayed in the shadows and moved around, and now here I am. Millie Gainer. I like to shop and knit and bake cookies for children.”
Ben remained silent as she spoke. It was difficult to see what he was thinking behind his eyes, so dark, so shuttered to Rhianne even now.
She turned to Millie. “What are you doing here at the house?”
Millie shrugged. “It’s part of my disguise. I take tours of old houses. Attend improving lectures.” Her primly pursed lips softened. “The truth is, I heard this house was on a ley line. That there were odd things about it. Possibly haunted. I decided to see for myself. Call me curious.”
Ben gazed at her sorrowfully. “I’m sorry to tell you this, but none of our people are left. I went back to Faerie some months ago, and have been back and forth since. As far as I know there’s only me. And now you.”
Millie listened with a bleak expression, though Rhianne could see that she wasn’t quite convinced.
The chirpy tones of the tour guide came to them through the walls. “Seven, eight, nine, ten … Oh dear, we’re missing one. Has anyone seen Millie? Where’s Millie?”
A gaggle of voices took up the cry. Millie, where are you? Millie?
Millie rolled her eyes. “That’s my cue.” She pointed at Ben. “You and me, we need to talk.”
Ben nodded. “Agreed. Where can I find you?”
Millie’s gaze held impatience. “Don’t you have a cell phone?”
“Well, yeah,” Ben said, abashed.
“Then text me your number. Hurry.”
Ben, nonplussed, pulled out his
phone. Millie was no longer in attack mode as she removed a smartphone from her bag and shoved it in front of his face. Ben poked at the keys on his phone, and hers dinged.
“Got it,” Millie said. “And now you have my number.”
Ben nodded, closing his flip phone.
“You know, you really should keep up with technology.” Millie resumed her superior tone. “It’s easier to fit in that way. Truth to tell, I pretend to be a teensy bit slow, because people my age—the age I appear to be—are supposed to be confused by all this newfangled stuff, which is very silly. Most humans this age are quite intelligent. They’ve lived a long time and have gained much experience. If they don’t like the phones, it’s just because they don’t like them. Anyway, I’ll text you with a meeting spot.”
With that, Millie turned on her heel and walked out of the secret room. The panel closed behind her, shutting in Rhianne and Ben. The energy seemed to depart the room with her, leaving Rhianne and Ben in stunned silence.
Rhianne blew out a breath. “She is very interesting.”
“Huh. An understatement.”
They exchanged a glance. “Can we trust her?” Rhianne asked.
“Who knows?” Ben’s face softened. “But it’s been so long since I’ve seen any of my own people. Can you imagine? I found one.” He sank into the chair behind the desk, as though his legs could no longer support him. “I actually found one.”
* * *
Once the tourists had gone, Ben and Rhianne departed the secret room for the main house. The sliding panel opened into a tiny corridor which in turn led to the central hall.
Ben had a hell of a lot to think about. A goblin, here in this world, alive all this time.
Where had she been for ten centuries, and why the hell hadn’t she tried to find him? Or at least tried harder, even if she had wanted to kill him?
Rhianne was watching him, gauging his reaction. “Be careful, Ben,” she said in a gentle voice.
Ben knew she was right. What were the odds of Millie turning up out of the blue? The only goblin he’d seen in the past thousand years?
The Last Warrior: Shifters Unbound Book 13 Page 16