Totally Spellbound

by Kristine Grayson

  “Besides, driving from here to the hotel wouldn’t leave a magical trail.”

  “Oh.” Apparently, that convinced her. Not the pleasure of his company, not the warmth of his presence. “I guess you can come then. If you want to leave now.”

  She looked pointedly at the papers in his hand. He set them down.

  “Now’s fine,” he said.

  They were being so oddly formal with each other, as if they didn’t know each other.

  Of course, they really didn’t. They hadn’t met before last night—if that even counted in the realm of meeting anyone. After all, they hadn’t had much of a conversation last night, and today, mostly, they’d dealt with the Fates.

  He’d only assumed she was as attracted to him as he was to her.

  And that was probably a false assumption. Considering his lack of experience with modern women, and considering her ability to turn on the compassion when she needed it, he had probably misread every single signal she’d sent.

  “Let’s go then,” she said, and led him out the door.

  He followed her through the hallways of his own company. He tried to imagine what it looked like to her. Cubicles and neutral brown walls covered with tasteful prints picked by his interior designer fifty years ago.

  Someone had recently told him that those prints were worth money—collector’s value, hard to come by—but he had ignored it. Everything half-a-second old in America was considered an antique. Even the office equipment here, except for the ugly cubicles, of course, and even those were ancient by American standards. He’d bought them at the insistence of his team, almost twenty-five years ago, when the Age of the Cubicle was just beginning.

  But Megan didn’t seem to notice any of it—not the art, not the Eames chairs, not the gray, functional desks with the state-of-the-art computers. She didn’t even nod at the employees as she passed them. Instead, she kept her head slightly down and headed toward the stairs and, ultimately, the exit.

  Those Interim Fates had called her an empath, and her abilities in that library had seemed uncanny. Now she was acting like an empath as well: in room after room, all filled with emotion, she was walling herself off.

  Just like he had done when he had returned from the Interim Fates. He had walled himself off so that he could fight an important battle.

  She walled herself off just to get through a crowd.

  His heart went out to her again. Did she know that her discomfort around large groups of people came from her natural magic talent? Or did she assign something else the blame?

  And how could he explain to her that the abilities she’d shown—the way she had talked to those girls, the profession she had chosen—were as much a part of her as that mind-reading ability was a part of her nephew?

  She hurried down the art deco staircase that he had installed against the advice of his first designer, a man he had hired when this building was being built. That man had had no idea that deco was going to be classic; if Rob had taken his advice, the place would be an outmoded curiosity, instead of one of Vegas’ hidden architectural wonders.

  He had always gone his own way. Always. Even when he’d fallen in love with Marian.

  He’d married her toward the end. But in an era when everyone married, remained chaste, or had mistresses in other towns to hide the bastard children, he had lived in sin with a noblewoman in the forest, no less.

  For centuries, everyone had told him to date, and he’d tried on occasion, only to fail.

  And now he was falling for an empath nearly eight hundred years his junior who had no idea what kind of windmills she was tilting at.

  Was that why he was falling for her? Because she was tilting at windmills?

  Hardly anyone did that. The true idealists were as rare as empaths, and just as fragile.

  “Megan,” he said, “wait.”

  She stopped at the main glass doors. The security guards watched him approach her as if they’d never seen him like this.

  Maybe they hadn’t. He felt vulnerable again.

  Sometime in that walk from his office to the front of the building, his emotional walls had crumbled.

  She looked over her shoulder at him. “Wait for what?”

  He didn’t know the answer to that. He just wanted to be beside her. Walking with her, instead of behind her. At her side.

  For as long as she would have him.

  He didn’t say any of that. He was afraid he would scare her.

  “For me,” he said simply. “I just wanted you to wait for me.”

  Twenty-one

  Wait for him.

  Megan had waited for a man like Rob all of her life.

  And, in this postfeminist era, she was embarrassed to admit it, even more embarrassed to admit she was attracted to man whose attitudes were so out-of-date that they had been old-fashioned in the medieval era.

  She was tired. And very confused.

  Those Interim Fates had taken all of her energy, and she still wasn’t sure she’d helped them.

  She wasn’t sure she had helped anyone.

  The doors in front of her were warm from the Vegas sun. Above her, an air-conditioning vent sent chills down her spine. She needed to move.

  She pushed on the doors just as Rob caught up to her. He slipped a hand onto the small of her back, sending a different kind of chill up her spine.

  Maybe she was attracted to him because he was so very handsome. He moved beautifully, and she was always attracted to graceful men. Then he had that melodious voice, with its unusual accent, and she was lost. Just lost.

  He could be a Neanderthal and have those qualities (although a Neanderthal wouldn’t have those qualities—not in the looks department or the movement department, but maybe in the voice department [although the accent would be completely different, provided, of course, Neanderthals had the physical ability to speak a complicated language like English]) and she’d still be attracted.

  The bottom line was, simply, that the combination of looks, brains, movement, and accent was just lethal, at least for her, and he could think she was property, hit her over the head with his club, and drag her away by her hair, and she would let him.

  She’d probably even enjoy it.

  And that just made her even more disgusted with herself.

  They stepped outside into the blazing afternoon heat. It didn’t matter that there was an awning above them or that the nearby building pumped cool air onto the street; it was still the middle of the desert and so incredibly hot that she felt as if she would melt at any moment.

  The chills from the air-conditioning dissipated immediately. The chills from Rob’s hand remained.

  She walked at her normal pace to the parking garage, forcing him to keep up with her. She had blamed him all day for having emotions that ran the gamut from anger to kindness, but her emotions had been all over the place, too.

  Too many times, she’d let a man’s kindness blind her. A man who treated her with respect, a man who listened to her, a man who acted as if she were important, she used to misread those signals and think that he was falling for her.

  She rounded the corner into the parking garage. It smelled of old gasoline, and wasn’t really much cooler than the sidewalk.

  Rob had managed to keep up with her and keep his hand against the flat of her back. She liked that.

  She liked it a bit too much.

  Even if she discounted the fact that he believed women needed to be taken care of, even if she ignored the way that he had stomped all over her in the conversation with the Interim Fates, there was still the matter of their eight-century age difference.

  Yes, he might have a love for Maid Marian that had lasted for the ages, but she had died ages ago. And in that time, he had to have known other women.

  Maybe this was how he met them, charming them, showing flashes of himself, using his magic to woo them, and then getting what he wanted—whatever that was (could a man who had lived 800 years still think with the wrong part of his an
atomy? She’d always heard that older men started using their upper brain long about fifty, but did that apply to men who aged slowly over several centuries? And who could she ask? She didn’t know anyone else who had met someone as old as Rob. Except Zoe, whom she didn’t know well either).

  “You’re very quiet,” he said, his voice echoing against the concrete dividers.

  “It’s been a difficult day.”

  That was an understatement. She had discovered that her brother was not only magic, but engaged; that her poor nephew had been able to read minds ever since he could remember; and that there was not one, but two, groups of Fates—ditzy women/girls who somehow controlled the universe.

  Anyone would be stressed after all that.

  Her Mini Cooper sat alone in the section of the parking garage designed for small cars. Hardly anyone owned a small car anymore. Across the divide, dozens of SUVs vied for space.

  She waved her hand at the passenger side—she didn’t even want him to think he could drive her car—and unlocked the doors. As she crawled in, she watched Rob fold himself into his seat.

  He looked comfortable enough.

  She closed her door, put the key in the ignition, and started the car. Rob turned toward her.

  “I make you nervous, don’t I?”

  She wasn’t sure how to answer that. He did make her nervous, but not in the way he thought. She wasn’t nervous because she was afraid of him. She was nervous because she was attracted to him, and how could she admit that to a man who was famous not only in his own time but also throughout the generations?

  And, under another name, he was famous in this time, too. Only as a billionaire playboy who jet-setted from place to place.

  So she decided for bravado instead: “I was just thinking that I must make you nervous.”

  “Me?” he said after a moment. “You? Make me? Nervous? I—”

  Then he laughed.

  “I guess you must,” he said.

  She grinned at him. She hadn’t expected him to make her smile.

  Then she backed out of the parking space. The car turned easily, and she didn’t even come close to the SUVs. She probably should have checked her bumper before backing out, though. One of those monstrosities had probably hit her.

  She clicked the air-conditioning higher, not that it did any good yet, and rolled down her window. Rob’s was already down.

  She turned left, trying to remember exactly how she had gotten here.

  It felt like a lifetime ago. In fact, she could hardly remember how to operate the car. Of course, that probably had something to do with the man beside her.

  He was a powerful distraction.

  “You know,” he said, looking out that open window, “the Interim Fates called you an empath.”

  “They called you a hottie,” Megan said.

  “Well, in your case, it’s true.”

  What an obscure compliment to give her. At least he wasn’t repeated tried-and-true lines.

  Lines tried and proven true over centuries.

  She shivered. The air coming from the blowers had grown chilly. She rolled up her window and turned the air-conditioning on full blast.

  “What they said about you is true in your case too,” she said.

  He grinned at her sideways. “I’m not trying to butter you up.”

  “I’m not trying to butter you up either. They’re right. They’re too young for you, but they’re right.”

  And there it was, in the open. The age thing.

  “They’re too immature for me,” he said. “I’ve learned over the course of my long life that age really doesn’t matter.”

  So there had been other women, probably hundreds of them.

  “I would think it would have to.” Megan came to an intersection, thankful that the stoplight ahead of her was red. She needed a moment to remember the route to the hotel. “I mean, after all, what do people have in common anyway? A shared history—not just the time they spend together, but the time they spend on the planet—accumulated wisdom, and years of observations—”

  “Does my age bother you?” he asked.

  “Um…” It was her turn to stammer. For a moment, she wished she was an interim fate and could say well, duh! with impunity. “Sure. I mean, yeah. I mean, shouldn’t it?”

  “I don’t know,” he said. “Should it?”

  “You were in the Crusades,” she said. “Not on a crusade, but the Crusades. You know, the historical event. And I’m sure the more I talk to you, the more historical events I’ll learn about. You’ve lived like 25 times longer than I have. And that doesn’t bother you? There’s no way I can be as ‘mature’ as you are.”

  “That’s a kind way of saying that I’m an old fart.” He grinned. “If the hotel’s anywhere near the Strip, you just missed your turn.”

  She cursed, fought with the wheel, and glanced in the rearview mirror. How could he tell? In this stretch of Vegas, all the neighborhoods looked alike.

  But the Eiffel Tower and the Empire State Building were suddenly on her right, instead of slightly to her left.

  “Turn here,” he said, “and you’ll be fine.”

  She nodded, feeling dumb. Here she was talking about maturity, and she suddenly felt like she was on a practice drive with her driver’s ed instructor.

  She followed his advice and found herself on a six-lane road filled with cars, and the Strip glowing like a neon mirage ahead of her.

  “I wasn’t saying you’re an old fart,” she said, wondering if she had implied it. She had trouble picking the right words while she was also driving and pretending not to be lost. “I’m just saying that a person like me has got to be dull to a person like you, no matter how mature I am for my age.”

  “It doesn’t work that way,” he said. “After a certain point, all adults have a lot in common.”

  “Whatever that means.” She turned again. The streets were starting to look familiar.

  “After a while, who you are is more important than how long you’ve lived.” He shrugged. “Think about it. With the exception of your parents, don’t you feel like you’re the same age as most people who are over thirty and not obviously frail and elderly?”

  She did. She gave advice to people twenty years older than she was without thinking about it, and talked to people who were in their sixties as if they were the same age.

  She let out a small breath. “I understand the ‘you’re only as old as you feel’ concept, but it has nothing to do with eight hundred years of living versus twenty-five.”

  His eyebrows went up. “You’re only twenty-five? Well, then, forget it. You’re much too young for me.”

  She opened her mouth, shook her head, and then realized she had no response to his comment at all. None.

  “We’re just going to have to wait until you’re thirty,” he said.

  She reached the hotel and turned left into the parking garage. The attendant waved at her. She waved back.

  “Wait for what?” she asked as she pulled into the same parking space she’d had that morning.

  “A relationship.”

  She shut off the car and shook her head again. “A relationship?”

  She couldn’t quite believe that. Why would he be interested in a relationship? A friendship, a one-night stand, but a relationship?

  He chuckled. “You actually believe me.”

  Her face grew so warm that it almost hurt. He had tricked her into admitting her feelings. How could an eight-hundred-year-old man make her feel like she was in high school all over again?

  He frowned. “I meant about being twenty-five instead of thirty. Not about the relationship.”

  She nodded, made herself breathe, then popped the car door open. “It’s hot in here, don’t you think?”

  He took her hand. “I’m actually interested in you, Megan. The relationship comment wasn’t a joke. Seriously.”

  “Sure,” she said and got out of the car, slamming the door so hard that the sound echoed in the
concrete bunker so like the one she had just left.

  He got out, too. “I mean it. I haven’t met a woman who has attracted me like you have in centuries.”

  “See?” she said. “There it is again. Centuries.”

  “You want me to say years?” he asked. “That’s trivial in the context of my life. I mean centuries. Since Marian.”

  The last two words hung between them. He looked appalled by them; she felt helpless, as if she were floating against a tide she had no control over.

  “Is that a line you use on all the women?” she asked after a moment.

  He shook his head. His expression was tight.

  She suddenly regretted her question. She had wanted him to feel as uncomfortable as she did, and she had clearly achieved that. In fact, she had made him feel more uncomfortable.

  She had hurt him.

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “That was rude of me.”

  He blinked and seemed to get control of himself, but his eyes were wide and pain-filled. Still, he forced himself to smile.

  “I deserved it,” he said. “I guess it’s odd to think that someone like me, someone who has been around forever, would fall for someone else in less than a day.”

  Her breath caught. Fall for? He wasn’t lying. She would be able to sense it if he were lying.

  Wouldn’t she?

  “It does seem improbable,” she said, and her words sounded lame. Worse than lame, they were slightly cruel.

  Why was she hurting him? Because she was afraid of him?

  Not him, exactly.

  She was afraid of the powerful emotions he was drawing up from inside her. She had worked for most of her adult life at masking her emotions, hiding behind the screen she’d learned, being as calm as she could be.

  She was anything but calm around Rob.

  “Yeah,” he said and smiled again ever so slightly. “It does seem improbable. But everything about me is improbable.”

  She had to give him that. She had to give him more than that. She had to stop fighting whatever it was between them.

  “Everything about this day has been improbable,” she said.

  “I’m moving too fast for you.” He leaned against the car and rested his arms on the roof, staring at her.