by C. M McCoy
- John Donne, Stay, O Sweet
Hope is manic. The proverbial light at the end of a tunnel. In the same day, it either soothes like a candle in the night, or it blinds then pulverizes like a freight train. As Hailey gripped the corner wall, she clung to the image of her candle in the night and peeked around the corner.
Fin’s door was cracked open, and his lights were on.
Very cautiously, she tip-toed closer in her bare feet, hair still dripping wet, her white robe clinging to every goose bump on her body, and she swore she heard a drawer open and close inside his room.
Then a figure crossed in front of the door, and the whole scene felt suddenly familiar. She was in her Pittsburgh townhouse, staring at a door she was sure would open to reveal her lost sister.
And she was scared.
With her heart in her throat, she crept toward Fin’s room, and she caught another glimpse of the man, who bore a striking resemblance to her slain friend.
Dropping her shampoo, she quickened her pace and stopped just outside the door.
“Oh, hey Hailey,” said the man nonchalantly as he turned to face her.
“Sidney?” Hailey moaned, not even trying to hide her disappointment. “What are you doing in here?”
“Just . . .catching up . . .on some team business . . .?” he said frozen in uncertainty, his eyes bouncing right and left.
Rubbing her head, Hailey slumped her shoulders. “You shouldn’t be in here,” she told him, her heart dropping like an anchor.
And then the bathroom door swung open.
“I’ll see what I can do about getting you more time on the ice,” said a voice from inside, and Hailey’s lungs quit.
It isn’t him, it isn’t him, she told herself, tamping down any hope that threatened to lift her spirits.
A foot emerged from the bathroom followed by a body—a whole body.
Fin.
Bolting through the door, Hailey jumped on him. He staggered back, and she clamped her arms and legs around him.
“Fin!”
“Yes?” His normally sarcastic voice was constricted.
“I thought you were dead,” she cried as she buried her head in his shoulder.
“I’m not . . .”
“I’ll just catch up with you later,” said Sidney with a smirk, and Fin didn’t respond as he walked out.
“Hailey,” Fin said, “you can let go now.” He tried to remove her, but she was attached to him like a barnacle.
“Hailey—” He sounded clearly irked as he again tried to peel her off. Then he dropped his arms and huffed. “Are you naked under this paper thin robe?”
“I saw that Yeti tear you in half!”
She did. She saw it with her own two eyes . . .blood, guts, and everything.
“No,” he said unequivocally. “You didn’t.”
He made a concerted effort to not touch her.
“Hailey—you’re soaking wet!”
“I just got out of the shower,” she said, still clutching him. “And, yes I did.”
“Hailey—” he grumbled, and she squeezed her eyes shut, begging the universe to make all this real, because it sure felt like a dream.
Pressing her forehead against his, she laced her fingers through his hair and hung on. She couldn’t open her eyes, not even to gaze at him. God, she wanted to. But if she did, she might wake up.
Fin lifted his head and brought his lips close to hers, his breath hot against her skin as he kicked his door shut.
“Woman,” he said, breathing heavy as he hesitantly touched her thighs, “I am only human.”
Hailey slid off him and felt through his shirt for the wound.
“I thought I lost you,” she accused, and finally, she found the courage to look up at him. “Am I dreaming?” She searched his eyes for an explanation.
He brushed a tear from her cheek and gazed at her sadly. “No,” he said softly, reassuringly. “You’re not dreaming.”
Wonderful relief washed over her, and she let her hands fall to her sides. Fin wiped another tear from her face then gently tilted her chin up, brushing his lips across her mouth.
“How is this possible?” she whispered as he slowly laid kisses across her cheek and grazed her ear.
“It’s—” he inhaled loudly, “—a long story . . .”
Hailey’s own breath sped up, and when she leaned into him, he pulled her even closer and nibbled at her neck, his breath ragged next to her ear. It felt right. It felt like . . .a sudden jolt. He must’ve felt it too, because when she wrapped her arms around his waist, something moved against her hip. Startled, Hailey tried to pull away, but Fin’s arm tightened and jerked her back.
Sighing heavily, she pressed into him as he moved his lips across hers, kissing her softly even as he seized her by the hips and shoved her into a position more to his liking. Ever so gently, he parted her lips with his tongue, kissing her again and again . . .
Fire burned in every place he touched—positively raging inside, and she had absolutely no idea what to do. Her arms froze straight from elbow to fingertip even as the rest of her melted into his kisses. Very tentatively, she reached a trembling hand under his shirt, which must’ve been wrong, because when she brushed his skin, he shuddered, exhaled deeply, and shoved her away. Then he doubled over and pointed emphatically at the door.
“Go and put some clothes on,” he ordered in a rough voice.
Hailey stared at him in alarm. “Did I do something wrong?” she breathed, looking from Fin to her hands and back to Fin again.
“No—” he stopped to swallow hard and pant. “You didn’t. Look, I’ll . . .I’ll take you to dinner, and we can—we can talk.” His voice was strained, and he was still breathing heavy. “I’ll explain everything,” he said, patting the air with his hand.
Hailey backed away slowly, dropping her head. Why was he so turned off by her?
“Stop!” he shouted, sounding disgusted and thoroughly displeased. “Hailey, tell me what you’re thinking. Right now,” he demanded, pointing his finger at the floor.
“No . . .nothing . . .I just . . .” Hailey took another step back, but bumped the wall. “I just wish you wanted me,” she said in a small voice, unable to look up at him and trying not to sound like the pathetic little girl that she was. “I just . . .” she shook her head and pulled her elbows in.
Fin closed his eyes and breathed twice. Then he squared up with her as if he wanted to take a swing at her, set his jaw, and charged. Like an animal, he grabbed her head with both hands and plowed his tongue through her lips, nudging her legs apart with his knee as he pressed and squeezed her against the wall.
When he spoke again, his voice came more like a growl. “Hailey, if you don’t leave this room in five seconds, I’m gonna rip your Goddamn robe off.”
“Okay,” she breathed, and he kissed her again, savagely, his hands sliding roughly down her sides and grasping her hips.
“Dammit, Hailey,” he said, breathing heavy, still holding her to the wall. He spoke into the crook of her neck. “I always want you, but you are not just another girl.” He kissed her softly, loosening his hold. “And I am trying to be a better man.”
“Okay,” Hailey breathed again.
“I don’t want to screw this up,” he told her, taking her hands and backing away. Leading her to the door, he said, “You’re the only one I ever want.” Very tenderly, he kissed her knuckles and opened his door. “Go get dressed. I’ll come get you in ten minutes.”
Still on fire, Hailey turned to leave but turned again as soon as she crossed the threshold.
“Is this a date?” she asked eagerly.
“No!” he shouted, and he slammed the door in her face.
True to his word, Fin showed up at Hailey’s door exactly ten minutes after he’d slammed his on her face.
He escorted her to the Bruised Moose, where he led her to a booth in the back corner.
“You have to stop showing up naked at my door,” he began. Then he leaned back and shook his head. “I can’t believe I just said that.”
“You have to stop leaving me,” she countered. “Promise you will never let me wonder like that again.”
“Cross my heart,” he said. “And hope to die,” he added gravely.
“What happened to you?”
“Your boyfriend’s an asshole—that’s what happened.”
Hailey stifled a laugh.
“What?”
“Giselle says the same thing about you.”
“Giselle calls me your boyfriend?” He seemed very interested in that.
“No—she—never mind,” she shook her head and licked her lips. “So, you think Asher sent those Yetis after us?” It actually sounded plausible, especially considering the Envoy wanted her dead. Plus he was insanely jealous of Fin.
Fin sighed.
“Honestly, I don’t know, but he was there, and he did eventually . . .” Fin rolled his eyes, “ . . .rescue my legs.”
“That makes him an asshole?”
“No. He’s an asshole because he watched the entire Yeti attack and only intervened to keep you from spending the next year looking for me.”
“So, he healed you,” she surmised.
“Yeah,” he said reluctantly.
Seemed like a pretty nice thing for Asher to do—helping Fin put his parts back together, but . . . “How did you not die?”
“Actually, I did . . .die, or whatever.” He waved his hand. “I just got slapped back—like a paddle ball.”
“That’s your curse? What happens to you? What happens if you . . .say . . .get hit by a bus?”
“A miraculous recovery.”
Hailey’s face darkened. “What happens if you burn up in a fire?”
“A more miraculous recovery.”
“Does it hurt?” she asked softly.
Fin sighed heavily, his face haunted as he considered his answer. “It feels like a really long exhale,” he told her gently. “I’ve felt it many times.”
“How many times?” After her run-in with the poisonous quill, she couldn’t imagine feeling the pain of death again and again.
“A lot.” He pulled from his pocket a tarnished, antique gold ring and held it up. “This pretty much sums up my existence.” He stared at that ring, which seemed more like a plain, men’s wedding band than a life story. It was scratched, worn-thin, and bore a deep, crooked score along the side.
“Is that your wedding ring?” Hailey asked.
“Yeah. I mean, it’s not mine—I was never married—but it was once a wedding ring. Now it’s a reminder,” he said. “The man who gave this to me—” Fin paused. “He died in my arms. Right before he died, he pressed this ring into my hand, and he said, ‘Love beats like a drum—”
“—in the heart of a righteous man,” they both said together. Fin flashed his eyes at her.
“Did you tell Uncle Pix about this?”
“No,” he said suspiciously.
“Because he just wrote those exact words in a note to me.”
Fin blinked.
“I’ve never told anyone about that.”
“You’re the righteous man, aren’t you?”
“I . . . The man who gave me this thought so. He told me I was marred and worn, like his ring, but still worth my weight in gold.” He raised his eyebrows and released them, shaking his head. Then he replaced the ring in his pocket, his face darkening.
“I was a slave to the Envoys for a very long time, Hailey.” He didn’t meet her eyes. “I was made to do a lot of bad things.”
Fin reached across the table, taking her hands. “Because of you, the Envoy that tormented me for centuries—the one who marred me—is dead,” he told her. “You rescued me from an eternity of Hell. And you keep rescuing me.” Fin looked into Hailey’s eyes for several seconds, and she gazed back, unsure of what to say to all of this.
“I didn’t kill him.”
Fin pressed his lips together, smiling.
“Stop saying that. You just don’t remember.”
But Hailey did remember. She remembered Adalwolf’s rotting breath in her face, his skeletal fingers squeezing her throat . . .
Fin rubbed her hand, and Hailey blinked.
“It’s kept you safe from Cobon and the others all these years,” he said in a low voice, “so quit saying you didn’t kill him, okay?”
Hailey nodded slowly.
“And no matter what happens, no matter what I say to you, no matter what I . . .do . . .” He shook his head as he spoke. “ . . .promise me you’ll always be the fiery Irish-American girl, who slaps me in the face and tells me to go to Hell whenever I act like an ass.”
“I promise,” she chuckled, looking at her hands in his. “If you’re free now, and they can’t control you, what are you afraid of?”
“They still get in my head, Hailey. Especially Cobon. If he makes me break up with you—”
“Break up? Am I one of your women now?” she said smiling.
“What? No.” He almost yelled it, but Hailey couldn’t stop grinning. “Why are you smiling?”
“I’m just glad you don’t think I’m disgusting.”
“Nobody thinks you’re disgusting, Hailey, half the hockey team asked for my permission to date you.”
“What?”
“You have no idea how attractive this cute, disheveled, athletic, nerdy thing is,” he told her, gesturing at her with both hands.
“No, I meant, why are they asking for your permission to date me?”
Fin sat back in his seat and chewed his lip for a few seconds.
“Alright, look, I’m not gonna lie to you—I haven’t always been the kind and gentlemanly specimen you see before you. I used to date a lot. A LOT. And until I ended things, which was usually very quickly after things started, the guys on the team would respect the relationship for however long it lasted—”
“You mean however short it lasted.” Pig.
“AND they would wait until I was . . .” He hesitated before he spit it out. “...done . . .with whoever I was seeing, before they moved in on her.”
“You guys are pigs.”
“Were... No, they were respectful. I was a . . . I was fickle.”
Hailey curled her lip. He was a pig.
“But those days are over,” he said quickly. “They were over the day I met you, and in fact, I haven’t been with another girl since the day I met you—since my first day as a bartender.”
“I’ve seen you, Fin.” Hailey could name ten off the top of her head.
“What you saw was me tying up some loose ends and letting those girls know that I’d met someone.”
Fin shifted in his seat and changed the subject. “Listen, Cobon thinks he can make me hurt you...emotionally. The little pervert’s been watching my dreams about you.”
“You dream about me?” This was news.
“Don’t you dream about me?” Fin pulled his cheek back as if he couldn’t imagine that she didn’t spend her nights pining after him, and since he was sharing his innermost thoughts . . .
“I daydream about you,” she admitted.
“Yeah? Tell me more.” He leaned forward, looking wolfish.
“In my daydreams, you never kick me out of your room when I show up naked at your door.”
“Go on . . .”
“No.” She’d just shared enough embarrassment for at least a decade.
“You don’t dream about me at night?”
“No, not you.” Oops.
Fin pushed back from the table. “Who do you dream of?”
Hailey pressed her lips together.
“It’
s Asher, isn’t it?”
She looked away, hoping he’d just drop it, but Fin fixed a stubborn stare at her.
“That’s where I met him,” she said, her eyebrows raised.
Fin gave her a look she couldn’t quite place, and when she tried to apologize, he cut in.
“Look, there’s something I want to ask you,” he said rubbing her hand and looking grave. He was going to ask her to stay away from him, she just knew it—to protect her from Cobon, but that was harebrained, and she opened her mouth to tell him so, but Fin held his hand up.
“Hailey,” he began, and she made a preemptive frown. “Would you allow me to take you out on a proper date?”
Hailey blinked.
“Yes,” she told him, but it came out sounding like, “Finally!” and she couldn’t stop her smile from spreading across her whole head. “When?”
“This weekend. There’s someplace I want to show you.”
“Where is it?”
“You’ll find out tomorrow,” he said taking a bite of his pizza, and Hailey tried to keep her leg from shaking. Asher would not be happy.
And she didn’t care.
Fin wiped his mouth and smiled at her.
“So,” he said leaning over the table, “was that your first kiss,” he asked, poking his tongue in his cheek and looking very pleased with himself.
Hailey bit her lip.
“No?”
“You left me!” she said pulling her eyebrows together. “You left me all alone, and Asher was there, and I was . . .” She gnashed her teeth and shook her head, tracing a scratch on the table with her finger and concentrating on not telling him about the second kiss.
“You kissed him?”
“Well, yeah.” Asher wasn’t exactly gross. Hailey flicked her eyes at Fin’s then back to the scratch in the table.
Fin leaned back, crossing his arms over his chest.
“Not like that!” she said waving her hands in front of her. “Not like . . .” she put her ear on her shoulder, unable to say the word, “tongue.”
That seemed to brighten Fin’s mood considerably. Leaning forward, he smiled at her, and she could feel her cheeks burning.
“Stop looking at me,” she smiled.
“Never.”