by Kris Tualla
This was not the mood Sveyn hoped for, but knowing Hollis as well as he did he knew this was going to be the best he could get for now.
“Hollis McKenna, you are the greatest love of my overly long life.” Sveyn slid off the chair, unable not to. “Will you please become my wife?”
Hollis’s eyes rounded and her lips formed a silent O.
Then she began to cry.
Big gulping sobs shook her shoulders and she covered her face with her hands.
“Hollis?” Sveyn pulled her hands down. “What is amiss?”
“Noth—nothing,” she wailed. “I just—I didn’t…”
Sveyn’s gut clenched painfully against his incision. “Do you need time to think before you answer me?”
“No!” she yelped.
Sveyn frowned. “No, you will not marry me?”
Hollis shook her head, sending unruly red waves tumbling across her shoulders. “No—I don’t have to think about it, Sveyn.” She sniffed wetly and ran the back of one hand under her nose. “Of course I’ll marry you.”
Sveyn leaned in and kissed her. Nothing in their dreamt encounters could prepare him for the impact of actually claiming her lips with his in the real world. She responded fully, huffing little breaths against his still-bearded cheek. He felt a vibration in his throat and knew he had moaned his pleasure.
He was undeniably her captive and he would serve her for the rest of their lives.
Hollis pulled away and stared into his eyes. “I love you, Viking.”
“This is why I could never live with you the way Matt did. Promising a future but denying it at the same time,” he said.
Hollis blushed beautifully. “I’m so happy.”
Sveyn touched her cheek. “How soon can we marry?”
*****
How soon, indeed.
Sveyn looked happier than she had ever seen him—and with good reason. His immortal existence was ended at last and in the most surprising way. Now reunited with his body, he should be able to finish his life span like any normal man.
Any normal man born in the eleventh century and living in the twenty-first, that was.
“We have a few problems to solve first,” Hollis said.
His brow twitched. “What problems?”
“First you have to recover from your surgery.”
He nodded. “Yes. This will not take long.”
“And then we have to get you a birth certificate and social security number.” Unfortunately the social worker at the hospital was stymied by Sveyn’s situation and hadn’t gotten back to the former Viking with a solution.
I should ask George for help.
“After that, we can get a marriage license.”
“So we can marry in perhaps one month?” His tone was so hopeful that Hollis hated to continue.
But she had to. “We’ve told everyone that we just met, remember? If I tell people that I’m marrying a man I’ve only known for a month—and a gypsy at that—there’s going to be a lot of push back.”
Sveyn’s expression turned serious. “Ah. I understand.”
Hollis reached for his hand, so glad to finally be able to. His long fingers wrapped around hers and his skin was warm to her touch. “I will marry you, Sveyn. As soon as we are able to do so without raising all sorts of red flags.”
“Red flags?”
Hollis thought about how to explain a common expression that she really didn’t know the origin of. “Warning flags are usually red. I guess.”
Sveyn seemed to accept that. “So we will marry as soon as the people whom you love have no objection.”
“Yes.”
Sveyn peered into her eyes. The blue in his was brighter than when he was an apparition. “Where will I sleep?
Hollis ran her fingers through his hair. It needed washing, but she didn’t care. “Please sleep beside me, like you did after the incident with Sage.”
“And what about intimate relations?” he pressed.
Hollis felt a stab of trepidation. “Let’s wait until you’re better and talk about that again.”
“I will be your second lover. Is that correct?”
“Yes.” She felt her cheeks heating. “And you?”
Sveyn tipped his head. “I laid with three women before I was stabbed. And I loved another.”
“Linge.”
“Yes. But I never loved her as much as I love you.”
Hollis smiled. “And truthfully, Matt could never be the man that you are.”
*****
When George returned with the pizza and garlic knots, Sveyn thought he would burst from the explosion of sensations.
First was the fragrant aroma of the garlic, yeast, sausages, tomato sauce, and cheese. So much more intense than before. So much more enticing.
Then came the tastes. When he bit into a garlic knot and the butter ran down his chin, he thought that even Heaven itself could never be this good. He moaned a little.
“This is better than I imagined it could be,” he said when George looked at him, amused.
But then he tried the pizza.
He moaned again, but louder. “Å min gud…”
Hollis grinned. “Took the English right out of your mouth, did it?”
Sveyn chewed slowly. He had no more words in any language.
Hollis stood. “Would you like a glass of wine, George?”
“Sure.” He looked at his watch. “I’m picking Stevie up in an hour.”
“White, please?” Sveyn forced the word past a fresh bite of pizza.
“That’s right. You wanted to try the chardonnay.” Hollis opened the refrigerator and pulled out the bottle.
“Let me open that. You sit down.” George took the bottle from her hands. “Where’s the opener?”
Hollis opened the drawer holding the corkscrew, collected three wine goblets from a cabinet, and returned to the table.
George uncorked the wine and poured the three servings. “I’d like to offer a toast.” He lifted one of the half-filled glasses. “To true love conquering the impossible.”
Sveyn claimed a glass and lifted it as well. “And to marriage. May ours follow closely upon yours.”
A sudden and wide grin split George’s cheeks. “Did you propose while I was gone?”
A sweetly smiling Hollis pulled the third glass toward her. “He did. And I accepted, of course.”
“Spectacular!” George cried.
Their three glasses clinked in clear crystal chimes.
Sveyn sniffed the wine before he drank it. The scent was smoky and floral at the same time. When he drank it and breathed in, his head was filled with the complex mix of flavor and aroma.
“I like this,” he said. “I like this very much.”
Hollis smiled. “You have so many new experiences in front of you. This’s going to be fun.”
George faced her. “When will you marry, do you know?”
“After people get used to the idea of Sveyn’s presence and us dating.” Hollis set her glass down and reached for Sveyn’s free hand. He held hers tightly in return. “And we need to get Sveyn documented.”
Hollis turned to George. “As my very favorite attorney, can you help us with that?”
George stood and gave her a perfect Regency bow. Sveyn smiled.
I should know.
“It shall be my great pleasure to assist both you and the good gentleman in this worthy endeavor.”
Hollis giggled and looked happily at Sveyn. He smiled back.
My heart is wholly hers.
Chapter Eight
When George left, Hollis turned to Sveyn. “It’s time for you to take a shower and wash your hair.”
He combed his fingers through his tangled shoulder-length locks. If he was truthful, he could smell himself: stale dirt and a hint of underarm sweat. “I agree.”
“Good.” She looked pensive. “Will you need help?”
He wanted to say no, but he honestly wasn’t certain. Lulled by a belly full of pizza, g
arlic knots, and delicious chardonnay, Sveyn was about to fall off the chair into a dead sleep.
“I think yes,” he admitted.
Hollis nodded. “Let’s get started. And then we’ll get you to bed.”
Sveyn rose to his feet and slowly followed Hollis down the hall to her bedroom. Hollis went into the bathroom and turned on the water while he removed his t-shirt and sweat pants.
Getting clean will feel good.
Sveyn walked into the bathroom and stopped. Hollis turned to look at him, her eyes moving over his body from scalp to toes.
“You have old scars,” she murmured.
That was an unsettling comment. “Is my body unpleasant to you?”
Her cheeks pinkened. “No, not at all. I just never saw them in our dreams.”
Sveyn shrugged a little. “I do not think about them. But I believe the new ones will not be so obvious. The skill in stitching a man back together has vastly improved since my last manifestation.”
Hollis looked at the neat incisions on Sveyn’s belly and back. “Now that they do all the stitching on the inside you’re probably right. Makes showering easy, anyway.”
Hollis stuck her hand under the running water. “You can’t change the pressure of the spray I’m sorry to say, but this lever adjusts the temperature. Cold to the right, hot to the left.”
“Yes. I have seen this.”
She withdrew her hand and dried it on a towel. “Adjust it a little at a time. It’s pretty sensitive.”
“Yes.”
Hollis stepped out of his way, but she had an odd look on her face.
“What is on your mind, Hollis?” he asked.
The pink in her cheeks darkened. “I’ve never seen a flesh and blood man who wasn’t circumcised.”
Sveyn looked down at his member. He knew what she meant, but circumcision was not common in any era in which he had manifested. Was it now?
“I saw a few Jewish soldiers in the war with Germany, so I know the difference,” he said before meeting her eyes. “But you saw me in your dreams.”
The pink was now full-on scarlet. “Yes, but it wasn’t like it is now. All calm, and everything.”
That made Sveyn laugh. “This is true.”
Hollis waved toward the steaming shower. “Go on, get in.”
Sveyn stepped over the little ledge that kept the water inside the doorless shower. The spray hit his feet first.
Too hot.
He reached through the stream and adjusted the temperature.
Better.
The water hitting his skin as he moved under it was both painful as needles and pleasurable as a hot bath. Sveyn drew a deep breath and stood still, hoping his body would adjust to the new sensation and begin to let go of its over-sensitivity.
“You’re too tall.”
Sveyn looked at Hollis. “What?”
“You’ll have to duck down to get your hair wet and I don’t think you should try to. You’ll stress the incisions. Hold on.”
Hollis left the bathroom and Sveyn returned to his previous pose. He turned slowly, allowing the water to pummel his arms, shoulders, neck, and back. Water streamed over his arse and down his legs.
The heat was heaven in spite of the pain.
He picked up Hollis’s soap—lavender scented—and began to wash his body. The slipperiness of the soap mercifully eased the sensation of his hands scrubbing his skin, because scrubbing was required. His last bath was eight days before he was impaled.
Sveyn’s non-physical body had no odor, thankfully, nor could it get dirtier. A blessing, considering that the bath was nine-hundred-and-fifty years ago. Give or take.
Sveyn took special care washing his privates, pulling back his foreskin and cleaning the rim. He lathered the soap and continued, cleaning himself front and back. The last thing he wanted was for Hollis to sniff anything unpleasant as he slept beside her.
As the centuries passed, Sveyn noticed that people grew increasingly concerned with cleanliness. Running water and flushing toilets had truly changed the world for the better.
Hollis returned, carrying a stool. “I see you’ve tried my soap.” She giggled a little. “Not the most masculine scent. But I love it.”
Sveyn placed the soap back in its dish. “Any scent is better than lye,” he observed.
“I suppose.” Hollis set the stepstool inside the shower. “Can you sit on this to wash your hair?”
Sveyn used his leg to slide the stool under the water. Then, bracing himself against the shower walls, he lowered himself onto the stool. When the spray hit his scalp it felt like a thousand fingers massaging his scalp.
He closed his eyes and let out a little moan.
“Feels good?” Hollis asked.
Sveyn nodded. “Each minute that passes hurts a little less.”
After another minute, he pulled a deep breath and opened his eyes. “What should I use to wash my hair?”
Hollis handed him her shampoo. “Use this first to clean it, and then we’ll use conditioner after you rinse the shampoo out.”
“Conditioner?”
“Takes out the tangles and keeps your hair from getting dry and flyaway.”
Sveyn looked at her, wondering if she was jesting with him. “Keeps my hair from flying away.”
“You know—when your hair gets static electricity.”
Electricity in my hair?
“And it stands out from your head.”
Understanding arrived, along with half-a-dozen questions. Sveyn settled on, “The conditioner stops that from happening?”
“Yes.”
“How?”
“I have no clue.” She grinned apologetically. “But it does. You’ll see.”
Sveyn had no recourse but to test her words. He squirted shampoo into his palm and worked it through his hair, using his fingertips to clean his scalp.
Thank God I did not have lice when I transformed.
Once the shampoo was thoroughly rinsed from his hair, Hollis had him turn his back toward her. She took off her jeans and sweater, and stepped inside the shower stall in her bra and panties.
“I’ll do this for you. Let me know if I hurt you.”
At that moment, with the love of his life in the shower with him, nearly naked, and combing her fingers through his hair, Sveyn could have been run through again and doubted he would feel it.
The only upsetting factor was the dark red and purple bruise blooming outward above and below her bra. The sign of her life-threatening injury, however, was also the reminder of how Hollis saved him.
“Okay, rinse.” Hollis stepped back out of the shower and grabbed a towel.
Sveyn turned around and leaned his head back, under the shower’s stream.
After a minute, Hollis said, “Now squeeze out the water.”
Sveyn straightened and did as she said.
“Now lean forward.”
Hollis wrapped the towel around his hair, then reached in to turn the water off. “Sit up.”
He did and she handed him another towel. “You’re done. If rubbing hurts, just blot your skin.”
The towels were unbelievably soft. “How do they make these tiny loops?”
Hollis laughed. “You ask so many questions about things I never thought about. I don’t know. They just do.”
Sveyn leaned forward and used his weight to help him stand. He carefully dried his body, trying not to irritate his skin. Then he exited the shower and stood on the cushioned rug.
Hollis smiled up at him. “My turn.”
*****
Why am I suddenly shy?
“You can hang your towels on that rack.” She pointed to the one over the toilet. “I’ll use this one.”
I mean, in his imagination we’ve done all sorts of intimate things. In all sorts of interesting places.
Hollis opened a drawer. “Use this comb.”
But Sveyn wasn’t imaginary anymore; he stood right in front of her now. Six-and-a-half naked feet of muscled masculinity
, solid, warm, and drop dead gorgeous.
And he’s mine.
Sveyn draped his body towel over the towel rack’s bar then unwrapped the towel from his head and hung it there as well.
She’d straighten them later.
He looked at himself in the mirror and lifted the comb to the top of his head. When the comb slid effortlessly through his shoulder-length hair, he stared at her image next to his, his eyes as wide as they could be.
“There are no snarls or knots!”
“I told you.” Hollis raised a warning finger. “Don’t ask me how. Just enjoy it.”
Sveyn continued combing his hair for longer than the task required. “I am amazed.”
Hollis moved to the side and turned the shower back on. “I think you’re gonna like twenty-first century life.”
Sveyn leaned forward, peering into the mirror. “I have some white hairs in my beard.”
“I noticed. They appeared about a week ago or so.”
His startled glanced jumped to hers. “I changed?”
Hollis nodded. “They showed up when your abilities to taste and smell got stronger. And when your hair started to move.”
“I did not notice.”
“Do you want to shave?”
Sveyn shook his head and dropped the comb back into the drawer. “No. I want to go to bed.”
Hollis left the water running and walked into the bedroom. She pulled the covers back on the side that she didn’t sleep on.
“Go on, get in. I’ll bring you a bottle of water.”
Sveyn followed her and eased himself onto the mattress. When she returned with the water, he was lying on his back and covered to the waist.
Hollis twisted the top off and held the bottle toward Sveyn. “Do you want a drink?”
“No. Thank you.”
She set the bottle of the night table. “Are you okay sleeping naked?”
His brow wrinkled. “How else should I sleep?”
Nope. No other way at all. “I, um, don’t want you to get cold.”
“I am fine.” His eyelids drooped. “Go have your shower.”
Hollis didn’t take off her bra and panties until she was behind the mostly closed door of the bathroom. Her relief that Sveyn wasn’t going to see her naked just yet started to relax her.