“Am I distracting you from something?” Her voice was brittle, but her words were steely and I could feel the insult like a punch to the gut.
“No, ma’am. I’m just checking the time.”
She scowled my way and I felt it. While her body was frail, her emotions were tough. I could admire that, at least. When she didn’t say anything else on the subject, I gestured vaguely with my right hand.
“We still have some time, so please continue. Your son couldn’t come out for—“
“Wouldn’t come out for my birthday. He wouldn’t visit. Justin claims it’s because Harold’s working so much but I just know he doesn’t want to see me. I’m surprised they even invited me to their wedding.”
“Which you didn’t go to, if I remember?” I physically flinched when she sucked in a breath. It was like being pelted with rotten oranges to feel her guilt and the outrage that I would bring that up.
“I couldn’t fly all the way to Massachusetts. I’d just had my surgery.”
“And was he hurt when you declined?”
Mrs. Q didn’t respond, sitting across my desk with a sour look on her ancient face, her bony hands clenched into fists on the arms of her seat. We watched each other in silence for maybe a minute. I kept my face pleasant, even though I wanted to jump to my feet and cry, “Begone, foul creature!” Maybe I could find a stool to jab her way and a whip to crack in case she needed some real encouragement to leave.
I don’t know why she insists on coming back to me every week. I can, no matter what she’s talking about, always feel an undercurrent of loathing within her. I generally consider myself to be pretty genial in the face of her rudeness—Chloe laughs when I mention this, but what does she know?—but I can tell she despises me. I can literally feel it, and it’s difficult not to absorb it and throw it right back.
“Our time is up,” she said finally, lifting her nose in the air. “We can discuss this later.”
I nodded as if I agreed, though I knew she just didn’t want to talk about her estranged son anymore. She only enjoyed it so long as I didn’t imply any culpability on her part. Pushing herself to her feet, she glared at the clock on the wall and turned to move toward the door. I knew she would refuse my help if I offered, so I waited until her back was turned before hopping to my feet and rushing to the door. Despite feeling her thumping insult against my skin every time I do it, the petty satisfaction of annoying her is worth holding the door as she hobbles past every week.
It took her longer to cross my small office and move into the lobby than it should have, and I wondered briefly if stalling was her way of getting me back. Unfortunately, I couldn’t probe her emotions to tell for sure; her irritation and unhappiness melted under the spastic, scalding sparks of emotion coming off the werewolf entering my little lobby. I was surprised I hadn’t felt it the second he stepped onto our floor, though I was grateful. Mel Somerset was the first werewolf I’d ever met, and I’d known the instant I’d felt his emotions that I didn’t want to meet another.
He shut the outer door and did his best to catch my eye. I studiously ignored him, smiling tightly at Mrs. Q as she hobbled out toward Chloe’s desk. I watched her tense as she caught sight of Mel, and I wondered what I would be feeling from her if he hadn’t been around to suffocate my empathy.
After a moment, I started to wonder instead why his emotions seemed to be crackling and popping more than usual. It was less a steady stream of discomfort, and more like being tagged repeatedly by children in wool socks running around on thick carpet. His emotions had a nervous tick. I felt it when Mel seemed to notice he was the sole male in a room full of women, and I watched bemused as he fixed his gaze on Ellen and let loose a stunning smile.
I can’t stand him, but he’s a good-looking guy, tall and muscled like a movie superhero, with a square jaw to match. His eyes are a blue that rivals the afternoon sky, and that morning his dark hair looked like he just rolled out of bed after having fantastic sex. To listen to Mel talk, he’d probably rolled out of bed after fantastic sex, then had more fantastic sex in the shower, while driving in the car, and maybe in the elevator on the way up to his office. I was betting that any day now he’d run out of legal, available women to bed and he’d have to move out of state.
It would be the happiest day of my life.
Chloe had hopped out of her seat to help Ellen through our little waiting room, despite the fact that the old biddy fought her every damn time she did so. I swallowed my own irritation, walled up my empathy, and tried to stand tall. It was tough, in the face of the morning I’d had and the fact that just being around a werewolf is physically painful.
Momentarily, at least, Mel was distracted by my elderly client. When Mrs. Q slapped at Chloe for trying to take her arm, Mel stepped in. Despite his defective emotions, his body language was typical, like he felt he was being heroic and charming.
“Here, miss. Let me help you. I was just on my way out, myself—“
“Get your hands off me,” Ellen ordered as she craned her fragile neck to challenge his lie. “I know what you are.”
The explosion of shock that came off of Mel vaporized every scrap of lust and yearning that I had come to expect and dread from his emotions. As a werewolf, he’s forever hungry. I hadn’t quite narrowed down the list of what he was hungry for, but sex was always at the top. Despite the fact that he could have literally snapped her in two if he really wanted to, Mel fell back a step as Ellen jabbed her finger toward his sternum. She didn’t quite make contact, her arm shaking and jerking like getting that close to him was painful, but he reacted like she’d punched him right in the gut.
“I’ve seen you with dozens of young women through here,” Mrs. Q continued before shuffling toward the door once again, cradling her hand against her chest as if he might try to grab for it. “Creep! Cad! Don’t touch me. I can walk on my own. Get away from me.”
We all went silent as Mrs. Q hobbled ever so slightly faster toward the door. She reminded me of an electric toy car that was working its hardest, despite being nearly out of juice. Chloe, whose eyebrows were in her hair, stood by the open door as Ellen hit the hall, turned the corner, and finally disappeared. I could still feel her moving at a snail’s pace toward the elevator, but I tuned her out and turned my attention to Mel. I shouldn’t have been able to feel her at all with him around, but she’d really done a number on him.
Closing the door, Chloe looked to Mel with wide, curious eyes, her mouth quirked up in half a grin. Neither of us had ever seen a woman react to Mel so viciously. Usually even married women were charmed when he so much as smiled their way.
“Wow,” I mumbled, looking him up and down.
“That was weird,” Chloe agreed. Mel turned to her, his eyes a bit glazed over.
“Did she just—“
“Tell you the old lady equivalent of ‘fuck off’?" Chloe offered with a small grin. "Yes, she did.”
“I—is she married?”
“She was, but her husband died years ago,” I said, trying to decide if I wanted to find him a fainting couch or laugh in his face. The events of the morning had faded into the background, behind the joy of being able to think straight this close to Mel. It had been months since I’d been able to stand him, and that had only been because I’d been magically blocked from his feelings.
“But she wasn’t even a little bit interested in me,” Mel said, his voice barely above a whisper.
“Well, she is pretty old,” I pointed out, as if it was possible he’d missed her age. Chloe stepped forward, rubbing her hand over Mel’s shoulder. She was gentle, pity greasing the edges of her psyche, though from the grin on her face that wasn’t all she felt for him in the moment.
“You need to sit down, big guy? Has it been a hard day?” she asked. Mel didn’t seem to notice that she was teasing.
“No woman’s been that mean to me since high school.”
I considered his words. I didn’t like the fact that the more his emotions flickered p
athetically, the less I was enjoying his bewilderment. Mel takes almost daily joy in making me miserable; I wanted to enjoy every second of his unhappiness. Feeling bad for him was not allowed.
“I don’t… I can’t…” He trailed off, staring down at me. I raised an eyebrow as something new tried to spark to life in his chest. It wasn’t the painful current of electric lust that usually grabs for my bare skin, but it badly wanted to be. His face changed slightly, the usual lust and hunger within straining toward the surface as he leaned into me and waggled a brow. I jerked back, expecting his pure and agonizing Mel-ness to flood back through him and drown me.
“What are you doing?” I demanded, a little flutter of panic jumping in my chest. I didn’t want him back to normal. I liked him better sad. “Stop. You’re being weird.”
“How you doin’?” he asked. I stood tense and terrified for what felt like a minute before realizing things weren’t getting worse. He wasn’t as cocky and persuasive as usual; not even a horny prostitute would have accepted his offer just then.
“Stop it. You’re creepy,” I said, looking him up and down. I wondered briefly if maybe he wasn’t Mel at all, but some broken, robot facsimile.
When he realized I wasn’t giving in or running off, Mel’s face fell. Chloe leaned around his shoulder to see his face and dissolved immediately into a fit of giggles, leaning against him to stabilize herself.
“This isn’t funny,” Mel pouted. “It makes no sense. I need to see if she’s—maybe she didn’t get a good look at me. That has to be it.”
“Yes,” Chloe said, snorting out one last laugh before controlling herself. “That’s the only explanation. It can’t be that she’s three times your age and has seen you rubbing up against the entire single female population of the office building.”
Mel didn’t seem to hear her, focused on the door. Without so much as a goodbye, he rushed out into the hallway toward the stairwell. Delighted that his usual slick demeanor had been ruined by a few nasty comments from a nasty woman, I didn’t even flinch when the door slammed behind him.
“That was awesome,” I said as Chloe closed the door after him.
“It was pretty funny,” Chloe agreed, swinging her gaze to mine. “He was so confused, though. I felt a little bad for him.”
“I didn’t,” I insisted, refusing to admit that I might not entirely loathe the man. “If only because it shut him up.”
“Shut him up?”
”You know,” I said, as if that would clear up what I’d meant. Chloe continued to watch me expectantly. Unsure how to explain myself, I waved my arms spastically around my head. “You know, with…his emotions.”
“Really?” Chloe asked. Her smile was intrigued, though the greasy pity oozed a little faster through her, thinned out by her concern over his well-being. I nodded.
“Once she called him a creep, everything went, like,” I dropped my flailing arms in front of me slowly like a wilting flower, “and then it was nice, quiet. I wish that worked with me. Why doesn’t it happen that way when I tell him no?”
“Because you don’t entirely mean it.”
“Allow me to give you the young lady equivalent of ‘fuck off.’” I flipped her the bird.
Chloe snorted out a laugh, indulging herself for a few seconds before settling back against her desk and crossing her ankles. As if in apology for the accusation that I would ever let Mel touch me, she pulled a handful of peanut butter cups out of the dish on her desk and held them out to me. I made a happy squealing sound, going at the foil-wrapped candy pile immediately.
“So, tell me why you were late.”
As if on cue, I felt Stan approaching from the stairwell. I can’t always tell each individual person by their emotions, but Stan was easy to recognize. Even in the throes of puberty he’d been calm, sweet, special. It was why I’d gravitated toward him in the first place. Using the candy as a distraction, I decided to let his presence speak for itself, leaving Chloe hanging until he knocked lightly on the door and opened it to lean in.
“Gwen?” he asked.
“Oh my god!” Chloe yelped, shock and elation going off like a nuclear bomb through her psyche as she slammed the dish of candies down on her desk. I grunted against the explosion of glee, stumbling back and dropping my last, freshly unwrapped candy to the floor.
“What?” Stan asked, his worry a minuscule vibration compared to the atomic cloud of Chloe’s excitement. I groaned against the feeling, staring down at my lost treat. Chloe keeps the floors pretty clean; she probably wouldn’t lecture me if she caught me eating it. “What’s wrong?”
“You’re Stanley Sneedley!” Chloe shrieked, rushing toward him fast enough that I could feel Stan’s panic at her approach. Deciding I could live without the candy, I looked up to watch them both, my own pity welling to the surface. Unlike with Mel, I didn’t try to tamp this down. I might not have spoken to Stan for the last third of my life, but I knew I’d always care for him deeply.
Chloe seemed to catch on to his discomfort as well and reconsidered the grab she was making for him. I think she’d been planning to hug him but realized he might not like the intrusion. “I love you!”
“Oh,” Stan breathed, flustered. “I… thank you.”
“I’m so excited for Airship!” Chloe said, grabbing Stan’s hand as she twisted to face me.
“The Floating Airship,” Stan elaborated automatically. Chloe was watching me, excitement naked on her face.
“Gwen! This is Stanley Sneedley!”
“We’ve, ah…met,” I said, not really feeling up to explaining that once upon a time I’d briefly been Gwen Sneedley. It would have been difficult enough explaining our history without Chloe being a giddy fangirl. Her enthusiasm only strengthened my desire to be swallowed up by the earth.
“He writes books!”
“I know,” I said, with a nervous laugh. I’d never read any of them, but I still bought them compulsively. I had no idea (because I’d seriously never counted) how many copies of his novels I’d stashed in the back of my closet over the years. It was a guilt-based action, of course, considering the fact that we’d only been married a year before I’d cheated on him and left. Run, actually. Fled. Scrammed like a cartoon, leaving a Gwen-shaped hole in Stan’s heart. “In fact, he’s here to see me.”
Chloe’s body language changed minutely and I could tell she’d caught something in my tone that piqued her curiosity. Still holding Stan’s hand, she nodded once my way before turning back to him.
“Could I get you to sign for me?”
“Of course,” Stan said, his cheeks going a bit pink. I had the sudden urge to pinch them. “I’d like to talk to Gwen first, though. If you don’t mind?”
“No! Go ahead! This is so exciting!”
Gently, as if worried she might try to keep it, Stan slid his hand out of Chloe’s grip, shuffling sideways to move around her without losing sight of her. It reminded me of an explorer who’d stumbled on a sleeping jaguar. Chloe just watched him happily as he closed in on me. I gestured to my office.
“In here,” I said. He nodded once and moved quickly toward the doorway. I caught a whiff of him as he passed close, and it brought back a ridiculous flood of hormonal teenage memories. His soap, shampoo, and maybe deodorant were different, but he still smelled the same underneath. I bit my lip and swallowed thickly, leaning away. Stan didn’t notice.
Chloe noticed, though. Suddenly feeling like my mom had caught me sneaking a boy into my room, I spun to rush after him, slamming the door. Relief rushed out of me in a sigh, but it was sucked up into a sudden vacuum of discomfort when I realized I was standing alone in my office with my estranged ex-husband.
“Oh god,” I heaved out, the words riding on an uneven laugh. I felt a puff of amusement and the slimy slide of sympathy from Stan but I tried to ignore it as I looked him over.
He did the same to me, his gaze doing a quick run from my sensible heels, up my legs, over my slightly pudgy curves and to my square jaw, roun
d nose, and green eyes under thick bangs. My dark brown hair was chin-length and had been for years, but the last time we’d seen each other it was considerably longer.
Possibly as a procrastination technique, I gave him another once-over, slower this time. He looked really good, slim and proper in his khakis and sweater vest. I felt a dozen impulses rise up from the parts of my brain, all of them rooted in sweaty habits formed with him when we’d both been teenagers. Embarrassment joined the guilt in my stomach and I felt it start to ache.
“When…did you get in?” I asked, my mind a blank. What does one talk about with one’s ex-husband when one doesn’t want to bring up what a colossal jerk one is?
“I took the train in on Tuesday. I haven’t been up this way in a while and wanted to take time to…relive some things.” His eyes darted off to the side and I felt discomfort jump out of him. I knew about a dozen things he likely didn’t want to relive, and they all involved me. Clearing his throat, he smiled, tried to lighten the mood. “Did you enjoy the drink?”
“What drink?”
I felt a wriggle of embarrassment as Stan explained, “I bought you hot chocolate. I was going to bring it up to you earlier but then…I didn’t need to.”
“Hot—Dammit!” I snapped, realizing Chloe had taken my drink before shuffling me in to see Mrs. Q.
“Excuse me?” Stan asked, taking a small step forward. “Was it bad? The woman behind the counter said it was your favorite.”
“No, it—I didn’t drink it. Chloe took it away.” At Stan’s puzzled expression, I waved my hand jerkily in the air. “She does that. She thinks I eat too much sugar.”
Stan’s lips twitched and I felt a pleasant roll of fuzzy nostalgia envelop him. “You? Too much sugar?”
I met his gaze and, though it is my habit to glower at disapproval over my eating habits, I couldn’t manage it with Stan. We shared a laugh and he turned to inspect my office for a moment before gesturing to the couch.
“Can we sit now?”
Business With Pleasure (Empathy in the Preternatural PNW Book 2) Page 2