by Karen Kelley
All was quiet.
Too quiet.
Had he left? Maybe he hadn’t existed in the first place. This might go back to her thoughts that insanity probably ran in her family.
An unexpected flash of disappointment swept over her. He’d been really sexy, and it had been cool watching him transform into a powerful jaguar.
Right there, that should tell her something. No one could change form. She’d imagined the whole thing. And now she had all these men’s clothes. Callie supposed she could donate them to the shelter. For now, she let the bags drop to the sofa, then walked to the bedroom. She glanced toward the bed. It had been a great fantasy.
She turned to go back to the other room just as the bathroom door opened. She screamed.
“I apologize for scaring you. I washed,” he said. “It wasn’t the same as standing beneath a waterfall and letting the water cascade over me, but it was pleasant.”
Oh, right, she wanted that image in her head! She could see he’d taken a shower, his hair was damp. Rogar had no right to be this hot. Not when she knew what she had to do. Her line of charity had gone way past the limits of her comfort zone.
Not that it would be easy. A lock of his hair fell forward. It looked sexy lying on his forehead. Her gaze wandered down his body, the hard ridges, the six-pack abs. Thank God he had on the towel or she would be tempted to ravish him.
“I’ll get your clothes.” She hurried out of the room and grabbed the bags, taking them back to the bedroom. He still stood by the bathroom door looking like a friggin’ god that had come to Earth to tempt mortal women.
She tossed the bags on the bed. “As soon as you’re dressed, we need to talk.” Without waiting for his reply, she hurried out of the room.
Callie paced the living room while she waited for him to join her. She turned when she heard his footsteps. It was so not fair that he looked almost as good with clothes as he had without them. The dark slacks fit him as though they were tailor-made. She’d chosen a maroon knit shirt and a size ten shoe. She’d guessed at the shoes.
“Do the shoes fit?” She pointed to his feet.
“Everything fits.”
She drew in a deep breath. “Then you need to leave. You can’t stay here.”
He took a step nearer, his intense gaze studying her. “You would deny who you are?”
She turned and walked to the door. “I’m not who you think I am. I didn’t come from another planet, and I don’t think you did, either.”
“Would you like me to change form again?”
“No!”
“But if it will prove to you that what I’ve told you is true…”
“I’ve seen magicians perform the same trick lots of times. It only proves you know magic.”
“I’m the only one who can tell you where your ancestors came from, Callie. I know you have questions.”
She did. How many times had she wondered who her parents were? Why they had abandoned her. Why they hadn’t loved her enough to keep her.
A familiar, lonely ache engulfed her. All her life she’d felt rejected. No matter how often she told herself her parents were the problem, not her, she couldn’t quite get past the hurt.
She drew in a deep breath and squared her shoulders. No matter how badly she wanted answers, she knew she couldn’t be part alien. She stiffened her spine and looked him in the eye. “I think you’d better leave.”
He was thoughtful for a moment, and she wondered if he might refuse to go.
“If that is what you wish. Good-bye Callie Jordon.”
“Good-bye.”
He went out the door.
At the last minute, she hurried to her purse and grabbed what little money she had left from her check—her last bill—a twenty. There went her lunch for next week. It would be PB&J sandwiches.
She ran out the door. “Rogar,” she called.
He stopped and turned. “You’ve changed your mind?”
She shook her head, then shoved the bill in his hand. “You might need some money. I’m sorry I don’t have more.”
He studied the bill, turning it over in his hand, before stuffing it in his pants pocket. “Thank you.”
“Good-bye.”
He smiled. One of those crooked half smiles that sent her pulse racing. Before she did something foolish, like ask him to stay, she turned and hurried back inside, shutting the door firmly behind her. She closed her eyes and willed herself not to open the door to see if he’d really left.
After a few deep breaths, she went to the kitchen. There was an empty cereal box on the counter. Darn, that had been her breakfast for next week. At least she had coffee. She could live without a lot of stuff, but never her coffee.
Her cell phone began to ring. She hurried to the other room and unearthed it at the bottom of her purse.
“Hello?”
“Me again.”
“Hi DeeDee.”
“Did your friend leave?”
“Yes, why?”
“Just curious.”
“No, I wasn’t lying, and no, we didn’t have sex.”
“I didn’t really think you had,” DeeDee said, sounding disappointed. “But a girl can hope.”
Callie laughed. “You know, the world does not revolve around having sex.”
“It does if you do it right.” She paused. “Come out with me tonight. It’s Saturday. We’ll go to a club and see what we can drum up.”
Callie almost said yes, but then she remembered she was broke until next Friday. “I can’t this weekend. How about next?”
“I can spot you the money.”
Callie cringed. Her friend made a lot more money, plus her parents were loaded and doted on their only child, but Callie refused to borrow from DeeDee. She made her own way in this world. Always had. She wouldn’t change now.
“Can I take a rain check? There are some things I need to get done around the house.”
DeeDee’s deep sigh came across the line. “If you insist.”
“I’m afraid I have to.”
Callie closed her phone a few minutes later, after DeeDee told her about the guy she’d met at a club last Saturday. DeeDee led an eventful life. Her motto was live while you’re young. She also thought Callie was old before her time. Maybe she was. Sometimes Callie felt older than her twenty-six years.
The next morning Callie stretched her arms above her head and yawned as she came awake, then stilled. Cautiously, she glanced around the room.
No one there.
She’d half expected to see Rogar sitting on the end of her bed, legs crossed, and stark naked. She was almost disappointed that he wasn’t. DeeDee was right, her life was definitely lacking male companionship.
The weekend dragged at a snail’s pace. She cleaned everything there was to clean, and still found herself going to the window and looking out.
Was Rogar okay? Had he found another female more willing to let him crawl into her bed? One who was more willing to believe his far-fetched stories?
She was glad when Monday morning came so she’d at least have her job to occupy her mind. The petting zoo wasn’t so bad. She enjoyed working with the baby animals. The kids that came to try to torture the animals were another matter.
If she was honest, most of the children weren’t that bad. It was just that there was always at least one monster in the bunch who thought pulling the goat’s tail was great fun.
Callie was tempted to visit Sheba first. Her place of Zen, gather her Chi, but she knew that would make her late so she headed in the opposite direction.
“Hi, Callie,” Gail said as Callie joined her coworker.
“Morning.”
Gail critically eyed her. “Rough weekend?”
She walked into the small enclosure that would hold the baby animals when they brought them out. “Do I look that bad?”
“Not that bad. You could never look bad. Just tired.”
“I read a book I couldn’t put down.”
Gail nodded, knowing Ca
llie was addicted to books. “Yeah, I get pretty caught up in them, too. Give me a sexy hunk over a boring rerun any day.” She laughed.
The phone rang in the small building next to the enclosure.
“I’ll get it,” Gail said.
Callie began to bring the animals to the enclosure. They had quite a few. A miniature horse, a lamb, a potbelly pig they called Morris, a duck, the goat, a very fat cat that wasn’t really a baby, to name a few. They were sweet, but they weren’t the big cats that she longed to take care of.
She looked up when Gail returned. “Everything okay?”
“You’re being pulled.”
Callie groaned. When someone didn’t show up for work, she was the one who got pulled to do their job, and why not, she had done everything at the zoo, from driving one of the tour buses, to mucking stalls—oh, God, she hoped it wasn’t that. She loathed cleaning the stalls, especially the elephants’.
She knew the only reason they had stuck supervisor on her name tag was so she would stay. The quarter an hour raise had helped, she admitted to herself, but it wasn’t like she would get rich from it or anything.
“You’re supposed to go to the main office.”
Callie’s smile was weak at best.
“The secretary said it had to do something with a private tour. Hey, don’t feel too bad, we have three classes of first and second graders scheduled to go through this morning.”
Callie was thoughtful for a moment, then she nodded. “You’re right. Nothing could be as bad as that.” She grinned, then made her way to the main office.
Still, she wasn’t particularly fond of private tours. If someone could afford the cost of a guide, and an open minibus or Jeep, that usually meant their kids were spoiled rotten. The last time she had chauffeured one, she’d ended up with a giant sucker stuck on the back of her uniform, and cotton candy in her hair. The generous tip had only mildly soothed her ruffled feathers.
She went inside the air-conditioned private office.
“Go on in, Mr. Campbell is expecting you.” His secretary waved her inside.
She took a deep breath. She always hated going inside his office. It wasn’t that she disliked him. Okay, maybe she did. He was superficial and pretentious, nothing like his father. If it made him look good, then he was happy, no matter whose toes he stepped on along the way.
She opened the door and walked in. Mr. Campbell was seated at his desk. The office was done in dark, rich wood—only the best, of course, but it was rather like walking into a cave. It took a moment for her eyes to adjust. When they did, she saw the man who sat across from Mr. Campbell. From the back, he looked familiar. Dark hair brushed his shoulders, he wore a deep green shirt and dark slacks.
“Callie, come in, come in. I want you to meet Rogar Valkyir, you’ll be giving him a private tour of the grounds. Mr. Valkyir, this is Callie Jordon.”
Rogar stood, then slowly turned.
She tried to swallow, but couldn’t. She choked instead. Rogar quickly poured her a glass of water from the pitcher on Mr. Campbell’s desk, then handed it to her. She gulped half of it down as she pulled her thoughts together.
“Are you okay, Ms. Jordon?” Rogar’s words were soft and silky, like a caress.
“Fine, thank you very much. I swallowed wrong.”
“Miss Jordon.” Rogar bowed slightly.
“Mr. Valkyir.” She said between gritted teeth. She didn’t know what the hell his game was, but she was damned well tired of playing!
“Callie is probably the one person who knows everything about the animals we have at the zoo,” Mr. Campbell continued as though the temperature in the room hadn’t suddenly dropped ten degrees. “He especially wants to see the big cats. I’d like for you to give him anything he wants.” He didn’t smile, he beamed.
“I’m anxious to see the park,” Rogar said. “Are you ready?”
No, she wasn’t, damn it! How the hell had he maneuvered his way in here and gotten Mr. Campbell to bend over backward and arrange for a private showing? And where did he get the new clothes? His clothes cost way more than the twenty dollars she’d given him. She had an awful feeling that she’d had the wool pulled over her eyes. Fury did not begin to describe the emotion she felt right now.
Don’t make a scene, she told herself. “Yes, of course, Mr. Valkyir.”
“Rogar, please.”
Her blood pressure shot up a couple more notches. “Rogar.” She smiled sweetly, trying not to bare her teeth.
Before she reached the door, he was there, opening it for her. The guy moved fast. Yeah, right, he definitely had some fast moves. Like convincing her he could change into a jaguar. Correction, almost convincing her. She hadn’t realized getting laid had taken on this degree of finesse. The guy was a master at it. And to think she had almost fallen into his trap. God, she was such a moron.
“What are you thinking?” he asked as they walked toward the covered carport where they kept the zoo vehicles.
She wondered if his sexy accent was even real. And that name, Rogar Valkyir. It had to be phony, too.
She glanced his way, her eyes narrowing. “You don’t want to know.”
He put a hand out to stop her. She could feel his strength, his heat, through the cotton of her shirt. Against her will, tingles of awareness rippled over her.
“Yes, I do want to know. You look angry. Have I done something wrong?”
She snorted. “Angry? Angry doesn’t even come close to what I’m feeling.” She jerked out of his grasp, which wasn’t difficult since his hold had been light.
“Then I will try to make it better. Just tell me what I need to do, anything at all, and I will do it for you.” He smiled and for a moment she was lost.
She quickly cleared her mind. “You’re going to be my hero, huh?” She drew in a shaky breath. He had the looks of a hero.
“Is that what you want? A hero?” His voice caressed her.
She aimed her thoughts down another road. “If you want to do something, tell Mr. Campbell you’ve changed your mind about the private tour, then go back where you came from. I don’t need a hero, nor do I believe you’re an alien either. Good line, though. It almost worked.”
“Line?”
“Yeah, so you could have…sex…with me.” She looked away as heat rose up her face.
“You think that was what I was trying to do?”
Her spine stiffened. “Weren’t you?”
“Everything I told you was the truth.”
“Sorry, I’m not buying it this time.” She opened the Jeep’s door and climbed in on the driver’s side. “If you’re going, get in.” She turned the key, not waiting to see what he would do. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw him climb inside.
This was going to be a very long day.
She smiled to herself.
And she was going to make it just as boring and painful for him as he would be making it for her. She was going to hit every speed bump, take him past the area where the refuse was dumped…
He was going to be so sorry he showed up today.
Chapter 4
“That’s where the monkeys are kept. Did you want to get out and look at them, too?” Everywhere Callie had taken Rogar, he’d insisted they stop and get out. He was only wasting his time because she’d made sure her answers were curt, and she refused to talk about anything except the animals.
There was no way she would lose her job if Rogar complained. What could he tell Mr. Campbell? Only that she’d pointed out the different animals, and given him details about them, which is exactly what she was supposed to do.
“Are you going to be mad at me for the rest of your life?” he asked, rather than telling her whether or not he wanted to get out.
“Yes.” Okay, her smile might look a little snarly, but showing teeth counted as being friendly. Right?
She thought of something that had been bothering her. “And I want my twenty dollars back, too.” She eyed his expensive clothes, trying not to look at the
cut or how well they fit his muscled body, but rather the quality of the material, which wasn’t easy. “Twenty dollars might not seem like a lot to you. For me, it means gas and lunch all week.”
He reached in his pocket and pulled out a wad of bills. Her mouth dropped open. There had to be at least a couple of thousand there. When he handed her a twenty, she pursed her lips to keep from saying something she probably wouldn’t regret, and grabbed it out of his hand.
“Did you want to get out and look at the monkeys?” She kept her gaze forward.
“No, I want to see the big cats.”
She shifted into Drive, and took off, only slowing when she left a little rubber in her wake. By the time she had gotten to the area where the cats were kept, she was a little calmer.
Why should she let Rogar get to her? It wasn’t as though she would ever have to see him again. And she would refuse another private tour if he was the one paying for it.
“We’ll have to walk from here,” she said as she parked close to the bridge. “We only have one jaguar right now, Sheba. The lion and her cub are a little farther away.”
He didn’t say anything, only climbed out. They walked across the bridge, and once more, she inhaled the scent of jasmine and ginger, and once again, she began to relax.
She also remembered the last time she had been here. The black jaguar had to be a pet of Rogar’s, and he’d done a switch of some kind. Okay, maybe she did envy him for that. What would it feel like to be able to get that close to a wild animal? Everything she’d been taught in college, everything that had been drummed into her head, had leaned toward caution when working around the bigger cats. No one seemed to have told Rogar, though.
She still hadn’t quite figured out how he’d gotten the cat in and out of her house, but he’d probably rigged it while she slept, and then moved the jaguar after she’d fainted. There was no other explanation, except that he was an alien who could change form, and she wasn’t buying into that again.
“At night the cats are double caged over there.” She pointed toward the cages. “If we go around to the front, you can see something that closely resembles a jaguar’s natural habitat. We call it the pit.”