by Juniper Hart
I am coming, Nora, my love! Tell me where to find you!
He breached the Swiss border and lowered his massive frame across the alp, honing his sixth sense. Lucerne became clear, the city aglow with quaint lights as he swooped lower and eyed the countryside. Where was he going to find her? Where would he even begin to look for her? He circled lower, his eyes taking in everything at once. He flew away from the town, and as soon as he had left it behind, he felt a familiar jab in his soul.
She is nearby, he realized. She’s near! I can sense her!
But Ansel could sense more than just her presence—her fury was almost searing, and he allowed it to lead him toward her.
Soon, he saw her purple figure levitating over a field of white snow, her tail flicking dangerously from side to side. The closer Ansel got to her, the more he could see a figure cowering before her.
“I’m sorry!” the figure wailed in French. “I won’t do it again!”
If possible, Ansel felt Nora’s ire escalate, and she unleashed a wave of fire around her prey, burning through the snow. Once Ansel landed at her side, he noticed the figure was a man on his hands and knees, tears pouring from his eyes. The stranger’s face went translucent as he saw Ansel, and he fell to the ground.
“How many of you are there?” the man gasped, horrified. “I am hallucinating! Kill me now, Nora! I want to die!”
Nora turned her majestic head to Ansel and blinked at him.
You came! she cried, her eyes widening. You came for me!
Of course I did! Ansel replied. Who is this man? What has he done?
Nora shook her head slightly and released another spark of flame.
“Where is Adrienne?” she growled, her voice ethereal and terrifying to the man before her. “Where is that farm?” She was speaking in French, just like the man was.
“You can have her!” the man screamed. “I swear it, you can have her!”
“You’re going to guide me to her, Jerome,” Nora said. “Climb on my back and take me to her.” The man only gaped at her.
“Do it!” Ansel roared. He did not know the details of what had happened between them, but anyone who inspired that amount of rage in his gentle, kind-spirited Nora was no friend of his.
Jerome tried to rise unsteadily to his feet, but he was taking too long for Ansel’s liking. He reached forward to snatch the Frenchman by the nape of his neck, razor sharp teeth sinking into the fabric of his collar. He dropped Jerome unceremoniously onto Nora’s back, and together, they thrust themselves skyward.
“Direct me,” Nora snarled. “If you lead me anywhere but where I need to go, I will toss you from the stratosphere.”
“It is just down Libellenrain, near Rotsee,” Jerome mumbled through clattering teeth.
“You say that as if it means something to me,” Nora hissed. “Guide us.”
“That way!” he cried, pointing. Ansel eyed the man, trying to imagine who he was and what he had done for Nora to reveal herself before him. “A right at the water, Nora.”
Who is this man? Ansel called out to Nora, but she did not seem to hear his question as they made their way toward a lone farmhouse on a lake.
“Here, Nora!” Jerome instructed. “It is here, and she is fine, you will see!”
“As fine as I was when you held me in a similar place?” Nora snarled, landing on the lawn and tossing him from her scaly lilac body.
“What did he do?” Ansel asked aloud, his yellow eyes becoming slits as he advanced toward Jerome.
No! Nora called to him. Change back. There is a girl being held captive inside. She is already scared enough, we do not need to add to it.
Ansel snarled and gnashed his teeth, but Nora nudged him gently, her giant frame falling away to the girl he had fallen in love with hundreds of years ago.
“Come on,” she insisted. “I don’t know how much time she has left.”
“You stay,” Ansel hissed, and Jerome only nodded, falling back onto the snow in shock. He shifted with every step he took, his scales becoming skin as Nora entered the house.
“Adrienne?” Nora called, rushing toward the cellar door. “Adrienne, are you down here?”
Together, they ran down the rickety steps and landed on the dank bottom steps. Ansel stared into the darkness, and he saw a body crumpled on the floor.
“Jerome?” the figure weakly called out in French. “Is that you? I’ve missed you!”
“Merde,” Nora swore. “He’s already broken her.” She ran to the girl, and Ansel followed behind her. They helped her get up to her feet, and the girl gasped at them.
“You are not Jerome,” she whispered fearfully, her eyes on Ansel. “What have you done with him?”
“Shh, chérie,” Nora murmured comfortingly. “You are safe now.”
“He will keep me safe!” the girl cried, trying to fight them off. “He is the only one who can keep me safe now!”
Ansel stared incredulously at Nora.
“What has he done to her?” he demanded, but Nora could only shake her head, tears of rage filling her dark eyes.
“Nothing that cannot be undone,” Nora replied firmly. “We need to get her to a hospital. Jerome had a cell phone on him, and I would rather she not see anything else. She has been traumatized enough.”
“Anything you want, love,” Ansel agreed, his mind still trying to reconcile everything he had seen that day. They ascended the stairs, Adrienne still trying to fight them off.
“No, I can’t leave!” she cried. “Jerome will be looking for me!”
“Go ensure he does not say a word to her,” Nora instructed. “But do not hurt him. He is mine to dispose of.”
Ansel swallowed his protests and nodded. He had not earned the right to argue with her, no matter how much he longed to snap the weasel’s neck. He hurried forward to pick up Jerome where he had left him, a quivering mess in a pile of snow.
“I didn’t do anything wrong,” he whimpered. “No matter what she says, I didn’t do anything—”
“If I were you, Jerome, I would keep my mouth shut,” Ansel said quietly. “Nora has made me promise not to kill you, but I am not renowned for my patience.”
Suddenly, Jerome cocked his head to the side and stared at Ansel.
“You are Ansel Williams,” he gasped. “You—you’re that boxer… the one—”
“The one who murdered that girl? That is what they’re saying, yes,” Ansel agreed. “I would say you’ve picked the wrong crew to screw with, wouldn’t you, mate?”
“Jerome!” Adrienne screamed, catching glimpse of her captor. “Jerome, I love you!”
He opened his mouth to respond, but the look in Ansel’s eye seemed to stop him from speaking.
“What is she going to do to me?” Jerome whispered.
Ansel grabbed him by the throat, his fingers crushing into Jerome’s windpipe. The crunch of the bones was almost too good to give up, but he had promised to contain himself. “Whatever it is, I assure you, it’s a thousand times better than what I would like to do.”
“Ansel!” Nora yelled. “Put him down!”
Reluctantly, Ansel lowered the man, but he did not immediately release him. He glanced back at Nora, who stood near the entranceway of the house, huddling with Adrienne, her ear to a cellphone.
She is safe, he realized, exhaling slightly. She is safe, and we are together again.
“The police are coming, Ansel,” Nora said. “When we hear them come, we must leave.”
“He will only deny everything!” Ansel protested. “And she doesn’t know what is going on!”
Nora chuckled. “He is not staying here. He is coming with us.”
Ansel stared at her warily. “Nora…”
“What?” she asked. “You always wanted to get a dog. I’ve been told pigs make much better pets.”
16
Ansel couldn’t believe he was watching Nora pace around the sitting room. It almost didn’t seem real.
“You are making me queasy,” he in
formed her from his spot by the hearth. “It is done. He is not going anywhere.”
“I loathe that I cannot kill him,” Nora muttered.
“I can,” Ansel reminded her. “And I would be happy to do that for you.”
Nora paused her pacing to look at him, and her gaze softened. She must’ve been able to read the naked remorse in his eyes.
“You have nothing to feel guilty about,” she told him gently, covering the distance between them and sitting before him on the plush rug next to the crackling fire.
“You disappeared for ten years,” Ansel mumbled. “In seven centuries, you have never gone more than two months without coming back to me, no matter how angry you were. I should have known something was terribly wrong. I just never imagined that you could ever be in such danger.”
“I never imagined any of us could be,” Nora said. “He kept me drugged until he finally turned me into the woman he wanted me to be. Who knew beings as formidable as us could be so easily brainwashed.”
“You weren’t so easily brainwashed,” Ansel reminded her. “The second you saw that girl in trouble, you did everything in your power to save her. I am glad he did not get the chance to harm you any further.”
He carefully studied Nora’s face, going over the words he wanted to say to her. When he began to spoke, his voice caught in his throat.
“Nora. I… I don’t even know how I have gone on the last ten years without you,” he choked. “I thought you would eventually find your way back to me.”
Nora leaned forward to embrace him, cupping his face between her palms. “I would have if I could have,” she told him earnestly.
Ansel nodded his head at her.
“I have been banished from the kingdom,” he told her. “I refused to marry the last one, and I came looking for you.”
Nora chuckled lightly and looked around the room.
“You seem to be doing well for yourself,” she commented. “For a murderous boxer, anyway.”
Ansel groaned loudly and fell back onto his elbows. “Bollocks. I have to get to Nevada and release Titus. He’s going to have my balls on a skewer for this.”
Nora’s eyes widened.
“I am eager to hear all about that,” she told him, crawling toward his sprawled frame. “But first, I want to savor the moment I have been dreaming about since before the Great War.”
Ansel visibly relaxed, his body sagging comfortably as Nora straddled his body, stopping to strip off the too large t-shirt she had borrowed from him after her shower.
“I’ve missed you terribly,” she whispered, resting her lips against his. “Thank you for coming to my rescue.”
“I should have been there long ago,” he murmured, but she pressed her mouth against him harder to silence him. Ansel allowed his body to fall back against the softness of the rug, pulling Nora down with him as his palms explored the smoothness of her skin. Her fingers fumbled to undo his button-down shirt, her dark hair falling over his face as she moved her way down his body.
“I don’t know how I could have ever forgotten about you,” she purred.
“You didn’t,” he said. “I was always there. You will always find your way back to me.”
Nora’s teeth sank into the tender flesh of his nipple, and Ansel jumped, squealing slightly. She attacked the button of his jeans, roughly prying them off his legs while her tongue licked teasing circles across his belly.
“Never leave me again,” Nora whispered, releasing his solid shaft from his boxer shorts. “Promise me.”
“I swear it,” Ansel vowed. “I will never leave you, not even for a minute. We will always be together.”
Nora wrapped her mouth around him in one fluid movement, and Ansel groaned so loudly that it shook the floors beneath them. Hard but long strokes followed, her fingernails grating against the tight skin of his sack. His hands gripped her ebony hair and guided her smoothly against him as she increased the pace.
“Oh, Lord,” Ansel gasped. “You are going to make me—”
“No!” she snapped, whipping her head upward. “Don’t you dare. I haven’t had you in over ten years. You will not finish until I do.” She slithered her lithe naked form across his legs, rubbing her firm breasts against his throbbing erection until her hips squared his.
Their eyes locked, and Ansel jerked upward, wanting to feel the heat between her thighs like he had never wanted anything else before.
Nora leaned forward to press her index finger against his lips, sliding herself teasingly against his member as she sighed, seemingly relishing the sensation of him tensing against her. She finally lowered herself onto his huge, pulsating shaft, crying out as Ansel filled her.
“I had forgotten how big you are,” she moaned. Ansel’s fingers closed around her waist, and he began to guide her movements, fluidly and without mercy.
Nora’s breath caught in her throat as she was thrust forward, palms flat against the rug. Her nipples grazed against his parted mouth, and his tongue lashed to taste her as he pushed himself further and harder inside her.
Nora howled, and she almost collapsed against Ansel, but he kept her in place, his own grunts growing louder until the slapping of his sack against her smoldering rear stopped and hotness filled her center. She fell on top of him as he finished his climax.
“You have never been more in control that you are at this moment,” Ansel gasped, turning to her, his eyes filled with adoration. The words seemed to spark a great sense of relief in Nora, and she stared uncertainly at him.
“That is a strange thing to say,” she commented. “What do you mean?”
Ansel propped himself up and lovingly peered into her face.
“You have always been strong,” he told her. “But you have been at the mercy of others for far too long. I think, as much as I would like to flay the man alive, Jerome had no idea he was bringing out the inner beast in you when he kidnapped you. He deserves to be burned and strung up at the gates, but you are now stronger than you have ever been.”
Nora swallowed the lump in her throat. The rekindling of their bond meant that he could hear her thoughts if they were loud enough, and Ansel heard her admit to herself that something had changed in her. She had become stronger in some ways, despite feeling like he had been weak for so long.
Will I ever get over what he did to me? Ansel heard Nora wonder to herself. He sat up and brushed her dark hair away from her cheeks.
“You are already overcoming what he did to you,” he whispered. “I am here to help you remember that you had a full and wonderful life before that asshole stole all those years from you. We will recoup what we have lost. Don’t forget one valuable thing, love. We have a luxury no one else has.”
Nora looked at him curiously. “What is that?”
Ansel kissed her lips and smiled softly. “Time. We have all the time we need. And I intend to make good use of it.”
Nora allowed herself to fall back into his arms, pressing her ear to his chest.
“Nora?” Ansel asked, the warmth of Nora’s body against his starting to soothe him to sleep.
“Yes, love?”
“Do you think he heard us down there?”
Nora tensed in his arms. She sat up and glanced worriedly at him. “What are we going to do with him?”
Ansel pulled her back down toward him.
“We have another matter to worry about,” he sighed. “But I don’t want to think about either of them right now.”
“But Ansel,” Nora protested. “He could escape or—”
“He won’t escape,” he assured her. “Trust me. When you decide what you want to do, we will deal with him any which way you please.”
“I must also call about Adrienne tomorrow,” Nora muttered, but Ansel only squeezed her tighter.
“We will deal with Jerome and Adrienne tomorrow. Then we will go to the airport and fly to Las Vegas.”
Nora sat up and stared at him.
“You are going to rot in jail until your trial?�
� she demanded.
“Well,” Ansel said. “I can’t very well leave Titus sitting there, can I?”
“I can’t bear the thought of losing you again, though,” Nora protested. “And just after I have found you!”
“Shh,” Ansel mumbled. “No more talk about that. Tonight, it is just you and I rediscovering one another. Tomorrow we will deal with everything else.”
Nora sighed and snuggled into his chest. Ansel was about to succumb into a deep slumber when he heard her whisper, almost to herself, “I hope tomorrow never comes.”
17
The door to the inner room flung open, and Luca stood, his eyes wide.
“You were right, boss!” he exclaimed. “United Airlines, flight 378, tonight at seven.”
“I ain’t got no idea what the hell you’re talking about,” Tony snapped. “Why don’t you go back out there, knock first, and try it again.”
“The girl,” Luca said. “She’s coming here. The girl!”
Tony continued to stare at him blankly. “Get yourself together, Luca. What girl? What are you going on about?”
Luca took a deep breath. “The boxer’s girl. The one he was looking for. Nora Chambers.”
A combination of both worry and excitement filled Tony’s veins, and he bolted up in bed.
“Are you sure?” he demanded. “It’s her?”
“It’s worth a shot to check it out, isn’t it?” Luca asked. “I mean, if it is her…”
Tony’s eyes grew glassy. “If that is her, you find her and bring her here. Is she traveling alone?”
Luca nodded. “As far as I can tell.”
“Huh,” Tony said, smiling cruelly. “He’s gonna do time for killing that broad, and I’m gonna have his little bitch under my thumb. It’s almost Shakespearian, ain’t it, Luca? Now, not a word to anyone until she’s here with me,” he added, remembering the beast he had managed to lock away.
A small part of him worried that Ansel could simply break free with his otherworldly strength, but so far, he had not tried.
He is not a dragon, no matter what Luca thinks he saw, Tony thought, pushing away the memory of Ansel’s head shifting into the head of a beast. The man is schooled in the art of magic tricks and arson, nothing more. It’s a pity he fucked with me. I could have employed him real well in the family. Dumb ass kid.