Dearest Ivie

by J. R. Ward

  The best part? His sincerity was a winner across the board. He seemed honestly interested in Granhmen's stubbed toe, then her uncle's bad tooth, the cold weather, the disappointment that the Patriots had lost in the playoffs, more on the weather, the human government, the Syracuse men's basketball team's losing defensive strategy against Louisville, again with the weather, how to crochet a throw rug, why birds flew south late this year (Global Warming, we're all going to die), and finally, how best to prepare Swedish meatballs in grape jelly in a Crock-Pot.

  "I'm not familiar with that manner of cooking?" he said to her aunt. "Is it earthenware? But how do you then plug it in?"

  Ivie's aunt gripped his forearm as if she were about to faint. "You've never seen a Crock-Pot before."

  "Indeed, I have not. However, I believe this is knowledge I am suffering for a lack of--"

  "I knew you liked her! I knew it! I knew it!"

  From out of nowhere, Rubes launched herself at Silas, the redhead having apparently come in from the cold.

  "I knew it! I'm always right about these things!"

  As he scrambled to stay upright, Rubes was already pushing him away. "And now you're here!" She looked at Ivie. "He's here! With us!"

  Ivie hugged the female, partially because she was honestly touched by the enthusiasm, and partially because, dear God, her cousin was going to give herself an aneurysm.

  "Silas, you remember--"

  Rubes put her hands on her hips. "Can I just tell you how much I love your name. Silas? I mean, my God, that is the most perfect name I have ever--"

  When Rubes shut up midsentence, Ivie had a feeling what was going on. And sure enough, her father was coming out of the kitchen, a glower on his face, a carving knife in his hand.

  "Dad," Ivie said--as she tried not to put her palms up to protect her date. "This is Silas. I told you about him, remember? I told you he was coming with me."

  Silas went to turn around, and it was pretty clear the second he got a load of the male--because he almost, but not completely, hid his recoil. Then again, there was a lot to jaw-drop about her pops.

  Hirah was over six-five, with long brown hair, a beard like a woodsman, and tattoos down both arms that were right out of Sons of Anarchy. Naturally, he was in a muscle shirt--and you might have thought he'd done that on purpose just to flash his guns at his daughter's date, but nope. He wore the things no matter the time of night or the season or the occasion. Jeans were riding low on his hips, a heavy steel wallet chain swinging as he walked, his belt buckle in the shape of a deer head.

  As her father stopped in front of Silas, the other male immediately extended his palm. In the Old Language, he said, "Sire, I am Montasilas, son of Mordachy the Younger. I am honored to be welcomed into your home."

  Hirah's hard eyes went up and down. "I'd shake that. But I have a knife in my hand."

  Yeah, forget that your other one is free, Ivie thought. Hey, how about we bring a little more attention to that ten-inch blade in your fist? There are at least two people in greater Caldwell who haven't noticed it.

  "And as for the welcome part, we'll see about that." Hirah pointed toward the kitchen with the tip of the blade. "You two come talk at me while I cut things up."

  Oh, great. Ivie glanced at her mahmen for help--but nope. The female had taken a seat on the couch like she had done her best to derail this collision, but was resigned to failure.

  As Ivie and Silas headed for the flap shutters that partially hid the kitchen, there were a whole lot of murmurs from the DNA peanut gallery.

  "At least there will be witnesses," she muttered to herself.

  On the far side of those saloon flappers, pots simmered on the stove and hot dishes were on the counters and a dueling banjo of Crock-Pots were on the table where the buffet was set up.

  "So," Hirah said as he put a stack of raw carrots on the cutting board by the sink. "You're dating my daughter."

  Crack! went the blade through the defenseless root vegetables. And yes, that arm bulged like it was going to blow up from the force he put into the slice.

  Silas cleared his throat. "Yes, sire. I am."

  "Uh-huh." Crack! "And you've been to her apartment, have you?"

  "Yes, sire, I have."

  "Oh, you have, have you--"

  Ivie threw up her hands. "Dad! Come on, this is--"

  "And I don't really care for it."

  Excuse me? Ivie thought.

  Before she could say anything, Hirah's head cranked around like something out of a Chucky movie. "You don't really care for her apartment?" He motioned with that knife. "She pays for that place herself, you know. Not out of some trust fund. She works hard doing good honest work to earn her money--"

  "Okaaaay," Ivie said, getting between them, "let's just take this down a few hundred degrees--"

  "I worry about her during the day." Silas shook his head. "I mean, all those humans around her doing dumb things. What if there's a fire? What if someone tries to break in? She's defenseless. There's nowhere to go. No escape hatch. No one around to help her. I'm not saying she can't take care of herself. If I've learned anything about your daughter in the short time I've known her, it's that she is self-sufficient, smart, and capable. I just think independence is fine, but she would be better off out here." He turned to her. "Just as you were saying in the car. On the next hill. With a place of your own, but close enough so that your family can be there, preferably through an underground tunnel."

  Hirah blinked. And then also pivoted toward her. "How many times have I told you this? I can tunnel it myself, you know."

  "He has a very valid position, Ivie." Silas nodded. "No one wants to take your independence away, I'm sure."

  "Hell no," her father interjected. "Plus you can dematerialize to the clinic from here."

  "Which was my point," Silas agreed. "And I know you're going to insist on paying for it yourself--"

  "Always with the I've got it, I can take care of myself," her dad muttered.

  "But, Ivie," Silas implored, "if your father can do the labor, it will be less expensive. This is a really good idea--and you did say here is where your heart is."

  "She said that?" Hirah demanded. "Ivie, I thought you were all about the city."

  "And family is critical, Ivie. No one will ever care for you as much as your parents and your blood do."

  Hirah glanced at Silas. Looked back at Ivie. "Yeah. What he said."

  Bringing a hand up to her suddenly pounding head, she groaned. "Can we go back to when you wanted to kill him, Dad? I was actually enjoying that horror so much more than this testosterone collusion the two of you are rocking."

  Chapter Eight

  "When are you bringing him back?"

  Toward the end of the evening, Ivie laughed as she sat down with her mahmen on the old sofa in the corner. "I may not be able to get him to leave."

  Across the living room, Silas was sitting on a plastic folding chair next to her father and her uncle, and her older aunt--who was the card shark in the family. The four of them were playing gin rummy, all of them hunched forward over a rickety table, the cards flying fast, the verbal, one-upsmanship abuse just as quick. They had been like that for the past hour...and quite frankly, if anyone had tried to tell Ivie that this would be the conclusion to the evening?

  She would have assumed it was the setup for a bad joke.

  An aristocrat walks into a prefab with a biker's daughter, and the bartender looks at him and says, "How'd you like to get castrated with a carving knife?"

  Or something to that effect.

  Except Silas hadn't just fit in; he'd become one of them. In spite of his lofty accent and expensive clothes, he'd laughed and smiled and winked, charming the females, and meeting the males eye to eye.

  Rubes came over and squeezed in beside Ivie. "He's Prince Charming. That's what he is. And he couldn't have happened to a better female."

  All Ivie could do was shake her head sadly. "There isn't going to be a happily
ever after, though."

  "Whyever not?" her mahmen said. "He adores you."

  Rubes nodded. "He can't keep his eyes off of you."

  "He's going back to his people in the Old Country."

  As all kinds of No! That can't be's bubbled up around her, Ivie shrugged. "It's what he's doing."

  Guess he was putting his money where his mouth was when it came to that whole family-loves-you-best thing.

  Her mahmen took Ivie's hand. "Well, I'm sorry he's leaving. But the selfish part of me is relieved that you aren't going with him."

  Ivie shook her head. "We don't know each other well enough for that kind of thing. And we're also both smart enough to realize that long distance of those proportions just isn't practical. It's hard, though. And crazy. Like, how could someone you've only known for a short time mean so much?"

  "Love is like that," Rubes said. "You've thought I was nuts for years about this and now look--ha! I was right all along."

  "I still think you're nuts." Ivie gave the female a quick hug. "But that's what I adore about you."

  Rubes squeezed back. "I knew there was a soft caramel center in you, I just knew it."

  "Oh, Ivie, the time." Her mother tapped the Seiko she wore on her wrist. "You better go back now. It's almost five."

  "Crap. It is late."

  Ivie stood up, and the second she did, Silas's eyes went to her and he smiled. As she nodded over her shoulder at the door, he inclined his head and folded his cards.

  The goodbyes were long and vociferous and Silas took his time with these strangers who seemed to have become friends. And then Hirah was walking them out the door and into the snowy night.

  "Call me when you get home," the big male said gruffly as he pulled Ivie in for a hard hug.

  As she returned the embrace, she was instantly connected to all the times her dad had been there for her. All the bumps and the bruises when she'd been a kid, the worries about her transition, the insecurities as a young adult, the breakaway for independence that she was still doing. He wasn't an easy guy, for sure. Hirah was tough and he was brash, and in the back of her mind, she had sometimes been concerned he might actually kill someone who messed with her as opposed to just spout that hyperbole like other dads did.

  But he had never faltered in his love for her. He was the mountain and the bedrock that gave her the confidence to soar.

  "I'll call you, I promise," she said. "Soon as I walk into my apartment--and no, he doesn't stay the day. I know, I know."

  Of course, she wasn't about to bring up the things they'd done right before dawn had come. No reason to push the accord between Pops and the BF. Her father, for all his iconoclasm and biker vibe, was at his heart a traditional old-schooler who didn't cheat on his shellan, treated females with respect, and believed his daughter was too precious to sleep around.

  Stepping back, she gave Silas a chance to pay his respects. Which he did.

  Extending his palm, he said, "No knife in your hand this time."

  Hirah let out a grunt, and then grabbed Silas and yanked him in for a back slap that was so hard, her father looked like he was trying to burp a stone baby. But Silas took it and gave it back in turn. Then the two males released.

  "You hurt her, I'll kill ya." Hirah leaned in. "And I don't mean that in a threatening way. I will follow through on it, and it will be slow and painful--"

  Bingo. "Dad! Come on--"

  Hirah shrugged. "Just letting him know where he stands. You mess with my daughter, I'm going to put a hurt on you thatcha won't walk away from. Very simple."

  "I would feel the same if I had a daughter," Silas said quietly.

  "See! My man." Hirah cuffed him on the shoulder. "I like this one."

  Ivie coughed the ache in her chest away. "Love you, Dad."

  "Love you more."

  Silas helped her into her seat in the Range Rover, raised a hand to Hirah, and then they were easing on down the hill.

  Turning around in her seat, she took a last look at her oak tree of a sire, standing in the cold with nothing but a muscle shirt on, his bulging biceps and planted feet like something out of the Marvel Universe.

  "So much love in that house," Silas said. "Turns it into a palace, it does."

  "I love them so much."

  "The feeling is amply returned." He took her hand and held it. "I will say, though..."

  She pivoted back around. "What, you didn't like being stalked by my dad?"

  "Your aunt. With the cards. I think she cheats."

  "Oh, God, I know, right?"

  They talked the evening over as they headed down the rise and out to the main road. As they passed snowy fields and skeletal trees, she reflected on how it had been a long time since she had done this with someone else, this trading of recollection and opinion about a night out that had been shared.

  They had surmounted the next rise and were descending the far side when the Range Rover started to slow.

  And then stop.

  "Something wrong?" she said, looking at the dash and then out of the windows.

  Silas turned to her and said in a guttural voice, "There's not a lot of time before dawn."

  "Has this thing broken down--"

  "What would you say if I suggested you dematerialize home?"

  She glanced at the clock. The goodbyes had taken twenty minutes at least and that meant they had maybe only forty minutes before they had to start worrying about the dawn's arrival. Her apartment was a good fifteen miles away still, but they had time.

  "I think we'll make it." And in her heart, she kind of wanted him to have to stay with her. "I mean--"

  "But if I don't have to drop you off, we've got an extra ten minutes together."

  "Oh, okay, sure. Ah...I can just dematerialize out, sure." She reached down for her purse. "So tomorrow--"

  He went for her so fast, she didn't track the lunge. One minute he was sitting in the driver's side behind the wheel, the next he was all but dragging her out of her seat and into his lap.

  Well, this was something she could help him with.

  Kissing him back, she sprang her seatbelt as he reclined himself, and then she was straddling him, her thighs split wide, things digging into her, especially at her core. As his palms shot up under her shirt and captured her breasts, shoving her bra out of the way, she moaned into his mouth.

  "I want you," she said. "Oh, God..."

  "Pants, I need help with your pants."

  And that was when she went all yoga position on the sitch, twisting herself at strange angles so that she could strip off her black slacks. It was an ugly show, for sure. And she had to start laughing when her calf cramped up and she contorted involuntarily, her head flipping back and knocking into the window.

  "Are you okay?" he asked.

  "I've got a charley horse--here, let me just--"

  "Can I help with--"

  Her shoe popped off and ricocheted somewhere, and then her bra sprang loose, and she elbowed him in the face.

  "This always goes better in the movies," she said between giggles.

  They laughed so hard, she needed to recover with some deep breaths when most of punch-drunk funnies had passed. But she did get one pant leg free, and the second Silas's hand brushed her core, things got serious fast.

  Stroking her, his lids lowered and he growled, "Give me your mouth, female."

  He pulled her to him by the back of the neck and then she felt something between her legs that was hot and blunt.

  Ivie sat down on his arousal, and they both groaned and jerked. Controlling the tempo, she rolled her hips and used her knees to go up and down, the pleasure so acute, she couldn't decide whether to close her eyes so she could concentrate more or keep them open so she never forgot where they were and what they were doing.

  Her release was overwhelming and he was right there with her, even though they were straining in the confined space, and their clothes were tangled, and oh, crap, the bucket seat was sooo in the way, and
also the console--how great was it that none of that mattered?

  The sex was incredible and intimate and exciting and fun and poignant.

  And when it was over, they sagged together, and she put her head into his neck as he ran his palms up and down her back.

  "Now that," she mumbled, "was a good use of time."

  Silas chuckled, his chest vibrating under her. "I have moments of true inspiration, and that most certainly was one of them."

  Easing back, she stared into his eyes.

  As he looked at her, she nearly said it. But in the end, she kept the I-love-you to herself.

  "I'll see you tomorrow?" she whispered as she smoothed his thick, dark hair back.

  "I'm counting the minutes."

  "Where are we going? Greece? Or somewhere in Asia?"

  "Be waiting for me at your building door at six and find out."

  "Mmmm, can't wait." She brushed his mouth. "And maybe..."

  "Yes," he said in a low voice. "I will stay all the way through the night--"

  "Shoot."

  "What?"

  "A week ago, I agree to take an extra shift for a friend." Damn it. "So I have to work tomorrow night even though I'd usually be off."

  "That's okay. We'll go to dinner and I'll come back again at the end of the evening. I'm already hungry for you and I'm still inside you."

  Ivie laughed deep in her throat. "You say the sweetest things, I swear."

  "You better go."

  "I know."

  She stayed one more moment, her body loath to dismount from him. And as a wave of sadness came over her, she tried to tell herself it was too early to go into mourning.

  Stupid, too.

  Given that she had the rest of her life to miss him.

  Chapter Nine

  And then he stood her up.

  The following evening, Ivie was still waiting at the front door of her apartment building at six thirty-seven. Her phone was in her hand with no texts or calls having come through, and there was no car pulling up, and no Silas.

  He had gotten home safely. She knew that. He had rung her as soon as he'd walked through his door, and they'd talked until she had fallen asleep, her cell cradled to her ear like it was a pillow. At dusk, she'd woken up excited and ready to see him, and had dressed up a little, and rushed down here.

  Where things had stalled out.

  " 'Scuse me."