“Don’t touch me!” I shouted as I remembered my dream about waking up to them the first time. I pulled back and hit Dain with my head again. This time I think I got him in the nose because it didn’t hurt me that much. “Fudge sundae with a cherry on top,” I said, pulling out a euphemism since I hadn’t quite concussed myself again.
“Is she injured?” Kheelan said.
“Again?” Aeric groaned. “She’s so clumsy and soft,” he complained.
“Let me up,” I demanded. I was going to show Aeric just where he was soft and vulnerable. These jerks broke into my apartment and then insulted me?
“No,” Dain responded. “I told you what you had to do if you wanted to have this next conversation face-to-face. You were gone three days, plenty of time to get it done.”
How could they have expected me to take them seriously? This was like a joke taken too far, except all of them were staring down at me and waiting for my response.
Dear god, they were serious.
“I did my research,” I said. Well, the twins had done it for me, but they were even better than Google, condensing my results into only the relevant knowledge.
“You treat Dain like this after your research?” Eloden said.
“Death wish,” Aeric muttered.
“I heard that,” I said from under Dain. “Why don’t you say that to my face, little boy?”
There were sounds of a struggle, and then Kheelan said, “Let Dain handle it.” He sounded just as stern with his younger brother as he had with me.
Something cold slithered up my foot. I screamed.
Dain slapped a hand over my mouth. I tried to bite him, but he avoided it. He must have been experienced with smothering screams. It made me worry more.
“Stop teasing her, Falin,” Dain said.
Of course, it was Falin doing whatever nasty thing to my foot. I kicked back, hoping I could nail him, but he was one fast bastard. All I caught was air. The cold thing disappeared, and my foot was left with cool wetness.
“Turn her over so she can see,” suggested Eloden.
I was a hissing, spitting beast, but Dain managed to turn me over and keep my mouth covered. I glared up at his face, matching him for annoyance.
“Mmfp,” I said, trying to talk against his hand.
“Falin, come put the ice on her head,” Dain said. “She hit it enough times and humans are fragile.”
“Keep it in the cloth,” Orin suggested.
Falin’s scary, pierced face appeared over mine. He very gently palpated my scalp, looking and finding the minuscule bump left from hitting the car roof a few days ago. Hitting Dain’s head hadn’t left a mark, despite how hard headed he was, and I merely winced as Falin’s hands found my tender spots, giving them away.
“Don’t move or yell again,” Dain ordered, taking his hand off my mouth and then backing off my body.
Everyone else came back into view. They crowded around me, kneeling and sitting on the bed.
“Cold,” I complained as Falin put the ice to my head. My nipples pebbled against the thin tank and I shivered.
“Looks pretty hot to me,” commented Falin.
I closed my eyes and counted to ten. When I opened them none of this had gone away. How was this not a nightmare? I had to wake up.
“Do you feel better?” Orin asked.
“I’m fine,” I said, pushing the ice Falin was holding away. “I need to go to work,” I added with a sigh. I didn’t even have time to start dealing with this right now. I would have to call a locksmith to change my locks after talking to my landlord. That was the logical, grown-up action to take. I started to get up.
“Dain told you not to move,” said Eloden, freezing me mid-roll.
I looked over at Dain. “I stayed still. I even counted to ten.” I told him.
“Everyone out,” Dain ordered. “Not you,” he added to me. Yeah, I had figured that part out.
I narrowed my eyes and tried to look mean. “Actually, you can all leave. I need to shower and change without a bunch of strangers that broke into my apartment. None of you are paying rent!”
Nobody listened to me. I could hear them all shuffle out of the bedroom and into the kitchen, dishes clattering and my fridge opening. Good luck raiding the kitchen when I barely kept it stocked. I was too tired of throwing away food I never finished, and I ate out a lot, anyway.
“Come here,” Dain said.
No avoiding this short of jumping out of my bedroom window and trying to fly away.
I crawled over to the side of the bed and sat down. I left plenty of room for Dain, knowing how big he was, but he dropped to his knees, putting us closer to face-to-face.
“Tell me about your research,” he said.
“This is stupid,” I said, looking over his shoulder.
Dain put a hand on one of my knees, a little gesture of touch that connected us, pulling back and then laying the reassuring warmth again when I didn’t jerk away. I felt myself tighten up, recognizing the body language from all the pats on the back I got in counselling.
I wiggled back and the hand on my knee followed. “Fae have magic,” I started. He didn’t say anything to that unbelievable statement, so I kept on going. “They use glamour. Light Fae are like elves and they reside in Summer and Spring Courts. Dark Fae are like demons and monsters and they reside in a hell realm in the Winter and Autumn Courts.”
A little muscle ticked in Dain’s temple at the mention of the Dark Fae. Maybe I had screwed something up? This whole thing was crazy, off the deep end, completely bananas.
“Tell me more,” Dain said. His deep voice rumbled through the room and I obeyed.
“Most Fae can be poisoned by iron, but some of the really Dark Fae and royalty are exceptions. Fae cannot lie, and they don’t have sex much.”
I heard someone snickering in the kitchen. How could they make out the details of our conversation out there?
“I can hear you!” I shouted over Dain’s shoulder, and the snickering stopped. It had to be Aeric again.
“Ignore them,” Dain advised. “Is there anything more your research taught you?”
“Fae live a long time?” I said, leaving it kind of a question. I wasn’t sure what more he wanted to know.
“What about the Dark Courts?” Dain said.
“The Winter Court is the strongest,” I said. “I already told you about the iron. I guess since that’s a big weakness, it makes the Winter King the strongest Fae,” I said, hoping he understood I was postulating at this point.
“Yes,” Dain said. I felt relieved. This was possibly the craziest quizzing to which I’d been subject. We were talking mythology. The whole point was that everything was made-up, so you couldn’t technically be proven wrong no matter what you said.
“What about Halflings?”
“Human and Fae parents,” I answered.
“From the times when the Fae have some exceptionally infrequent sex?” Dain said.
I rolled my eyes. He seemed sensitive about it. “Strong swimmers, I guess? Something must make up for their high rate of infertility. Maybe they’re limp sticks most of the time but once in a blue moon they transform into horn-dogs like werewolves.”
That muscle in Dain’s temple ticked again.
“Don’t tell me anything more about what you think of Fae sex. Just talk about Halflings,” Dain redirected.
“Goblins trade them to steal human babies?” I said, making it a question again. The baby stealing was super creepy. Dain didn’t react. “They have to choose to live with the Fae or humans, but it’s not really a choice because they’ll be killed if they don’t pick the Fae.”
“You have a basic understanding,” Dain said, sitting back on his heels. “Most of it is completely wrong, but you know enough to understand what I’m going to tell you.”
I realized I was in the room with someone crazier than me. Dain believed this stuff, and from what I had seen and heard from the rest of them, it was a contagious belief they al
l shared. I had to get away before I started wishing on faeries and trying the pixie dust to fly away from my problems.
“How long is this conversation going to take?” I asked, trying to think of an escape plan.
Dain needed help, professional stuff with all the shoulder patting and a daily dose of colourful pills. Getting me to listen to his delusional beliefs wasn’t going to accomplish anything but make me late. I needed to be at the lab already. I had a locksmith to call. And I really needed to be alone in my room so I could armour with more clothes, especially a hoodie.
“Is your brother coming again?”
No, but was the magic answer to my freedom a yes?
“Yes,” I lied.
“You don’t have any tells when you lie,” Dain said, sounding admiring.
“Then, you’ll never know when I’m lying,” I stated. “Can we discuss your fascination with the Fae a bit later?” I proposed. As in never. Just wait until I got new locks.
“No need, it’s very simple,” Dain said. He tipped my chin up towards him with a couple of fingers, trying to get my attention from the phone I was discreetly checking for the time.
‘Hmm...’ I said, trying to look sideways. I got double vision.
“We are all Fae and Eloden found you by luck. Halfling females like you are usually kept locked up from birth as they are especially important for breeding, showing higher fertility rates than full Fae females, which is related to miscarriages and high infant mortality rates, not infrequent sex. We are taking you for ourselves.”
My eyes rolled back to him, abandoning the phone. “Not funny,” I said.
“Fae don’t lie,” he reminded me.
“Fae aren’t real,” I retorted, pushing him away with two hands on his chest. His probing look was way too close.
He sat back on his heels and I stood up.
“I’m late for work,” I repeated.
They were looking for a baby incubator to feed their fantasies? I don’t know what I had expected when they brought up the Fae to start with but a proposal to make them all my baby daddies was not something I saw coming. It was too ludicrous to even be a joke. I was stuck in my apartment with a bunch of nuts. Horny nuts, my shocked brain reminded me.
“Not interested,” I said to Dain. “I’m waiting for my one true love. If you see him, pass along the key you used to break into my apartment. He’s got pearly teeth, rides on a white steed and goes by the name Charming.”
More laughter rang from my kitchen. It sounded like all of them after somebody out there relayed that I was looking for a prince charming.
Dain chuckled.
I corrected them and yelled that I was looking for a fucking fairytale prince and no regular charmer was going to do.
Dain smiled at me indulgently. It made me want to bust his lip, only I didn’t have the room with him standing so close to me. I used my best weapon and opened my mouth to tell him to simply fuck off.
“Don’t you want a kiss from your prince?” Dain teased.
Oh, he was enjoying this way too much. He should be the one embarrassed after his terrible excuse for why they were all after me, but I was the one left blushing. I felt gauche and young, with a vulnerable sense of femininity I usually suppressed as he stared at my lips.
It was one of the first times I was taller than him, and even with him sitting on his heels, it was a close thing. He surged up and caught my face in his hands, cradling it as he brought his lips under mine. He captured my weak protest and swallowed it. It was so soft, his generous lips barely brushing against mine, constantly moving like a butterfly’s wings so I couldn’t avoid his kiss.
An unfamiliar warmth suffused my body like a blush had worked its way down to my feet, and I curled my toes, rocking back from the strange, new sensation. His grip was gentle, but he didn’t release me as I shifted, following my movements instead of holding me still for his attentions. I tried standing on my tiptoes and he stretched up, finally coming up on one knee and beginning to stand as I pulled away.
That was exactly what a kiss from a prince should feel like.
I gasped for breath and sanity as our lips parted while he jostled me, one hand letting go of my face to cup my bottom and drag me up his body to rise with him. I wrapped my legs around his hips and my arms around his shoulders, hanging on while I gathered my scattered thoughts. He bussed my forehead as I ducked down, embarrassed and excited and scared of all the implications from that one kiss.
Had that really just happened?
Dain carried me into the kitchen. I tucked my head into his shoulder, so I wouldn’t have to face any of the other guys, the other Fae if Dain was to be believed. I needed cool cheeks and composure to tell them what I must. I was the last person with which anyone should risk starting a family. It seems so cruel and unfair that I should even have a taste of the forbidden, leaving me craving so much more. The self-pity party was what helped me straighten out my feelings.
I didn’t pity others or myself. I faced hard facts and I dealt with them. This was crazy. I knew it. Six men I hadn’t met until last week all wanted to hook up with me? It was the start of a porno, not a sweet date. Dain had already stolen my first kiss and if I wanted to keep my virtue under wraps, I was going to have to shoot the big guns and startle the bulls into running.
I looked up as Dain sat me on top of the table and met some very curious stares. They all knew what Dain had been doing to me in the bedroom. They may have even planned it out. I would be such an easy mark to a group of guys if they knew my pathetic background story. Poor, dateless girl, too afraid to love, never been kissed until now.
“My answer is no,” I told all the curious faces, shutting down their expectations with my cold, final tone.
I wasn’t buying their story. They wanted something from me, but it wasn’t love.
Chapter 9:
THE ROOM WAS QUIET for a few moments after my refusal, then everyone except Dain burst into noisy, chaotic conversations that were indecipherable to me. Eloden seemed to be winning the argument by being the loudest and thumping his fist on my table, sending it trembling under my butt. The Ikea knockoff wasn’t meant for the abuse it had been taking lately.
“I heard what you wanted to say to me, Dain,” I yelled above the din, competing with even Eloden. “I have my own reasons for refusing and I will not be changing my mind.”
Dain reached for me. I shied back, putting myself dangerously close to where Falin was sitting, but all Dain did was lay his palm over the left side of my chest. My heart beat against his hand like a personal lie detector, nipples tightening with him so close and the warmth of his palm seeping through the thin cotton of my tank. I was too tense to even take a deep breath.
What the hell kept happening to my body every time one of them touched me?
“You should find some other Halfling girl for your games. I’m defective,” I warned.
“What is she talking about?” Aeric asked. He was sitting surprisingly close to Falin. I thought those two were enemies. They didn’t act like friends. Hell, they all seemed to bicker with one another.
“It’s genetic,” I explained.
“A disease of the gene inheritance?” Aeric clarified.
I dry swallowed as Dain kept his palm on me, feeling the lies and truth through my chest wall. My heart was beating so hard I could hear it in my ears. I wondered if the others heard it, too.
“Fae don’t have disease like humans,” Kheelan dismissed.
Eloden abruptly left the kitchen to go into my bedroom. I wanted to follow and lock myself inside, although preferably alone. Dain’s hand wasn’t letting me go anywhere before our conversation was done.
“It’s not a disease you catch,” I told Kheelan. Unlike his brother, he didn’t understand the genetic part. I thought everyone knew about DNA. “It’s inherited from an affected parent to child in a dominant fashion. It’s passed on in the genes that create cells and cells make babies.”
And those babies grew up
and passed on the suffering to their own children.
“You are not defective,” Orin said. He was at the far end of the table, thankfully. One mysterious episode of putting me into an almost coma was enough for me. I still didn’t know what Orin had done to get me back to sleep so quickly. Hypnotism was a bunch of baloney.
Eloden appeared beside Dain. He had grabbed my phone, holding it out to me. I tried to take it, but he didn’t let go. “Is this why you think you’re defective?” he asked. “The Chinese lady with the sick daughter?”
“It’s similar, although Ai Lung got it much earlier, a juvenile version of Huntington’s Disease that is more severe,” I answered.
Eloden released my phone. I quickly unlocked it and saw that there were messages from Ms. Chang and they had already been read. I quickly looked back up at Eloden. Did he read all my texts?
“You’re not going back there alone,” he said.
I blanked my face. My keyring was now charm-free, so they wouldn't be able to follow me around. I should change my passcode on my phone, too.
“Do you believe you are a Halfling, Eve?” Dain said.
“I believe you think I am. More likely, you want me to think it. So then, I can play whatever game you and your buddies have going. But no, I don’t believe in magic or Fae or that I’m anything other than ordinary.”
“What did you tell me about glamour earlier?” Dain asked.
“It’s magic,” I said. “I’m sure it’s really sleight of hand and costumes.”
“We have to use glamour to hide in the human realm. Dark Fae are especially inhuman,” he said. “I believe you called them demons and monsters.”
I was pretty sure that Dain thought himself Dark Fae or was cosplaying one. I guess that had been an unintended insult. I pulled my feet up on the table and hugged my knees before answering, determined not to mindlessly insult him further. I could be strategically politic until I got him out of my apartment.
“The examples of Dark Fae I researched were goblins, which can have a non-human appearance. So can orc and elves. It’s what is on the inside that counts, right?”
No Faerie Tale Love (Faerie Series Book 1) Page 12