by Dani Wyatt
I’m frozen in mid-gawk when his hammer slams down with such force it sends a shiver racing from the base of my neck down to my heels. The onlookers surround me stand frozen in suspense waiting for the rhythmic bounce of the mallet. Anticipation tightens inside me, urging the forger to draw the hammer high and take the next thwack at the heated metal.
Instead, his hand lifts the hammer off the anvil slowly. Unlike the powerful motion he used a moment before, he lowers the hammer to his side. Hanging it down next to the soot-stained suede chaps that cover his dark canvas trousers, he straightens his back, and I hear a collective sigh from the unsteady crowd.
The suede apron, darkened to a gray swirling soot pattern just the same as the chaps, only partially covers a torso that sings the praises of what must be millions of whacks of that mallet onto molten metal.
The glory of his arms shows the indent and bulge of muscles I don’t remember from my homeschool human anatomy class. It’s as though God created new musculature to be bestowed upon him as a symbol of masculine perfection.
Oh my God. He twists his head then shrugs his shoulders as though he needs me to rub his neck. A task for which I would gladly raise my three fingers and volunteer as tribute.
As he shifts and stretches, there are ripples of tendons and layers of hardness I see that defy all logic and reason. And all of it covered in this shiny, slightly gritty, warm-tan skin that is crying out for my lips.
My fingers grip the shoulder straps of my ever-present backpack as I try to find my breath, try to gulp back the dryness in my throat.
I’m not a purse sort of girl. Backpacks are more practical. My mind wanders to what sort of girl this metal-pounding god desires? Because right now I wish to be her in such a way it’s making my head and my heart ache.
I bet she’s leggy, right?
And pouty.
Stacked up top and pinned in nicely at the waist.
Which is fine. I think we all are who we are. Honestly, I’m comfortable with my body in all its glorious perfect imperfection. I don’t fat shame or skinny shame or shame at all. I just imagine him having a strong preference for someone not as average as me.
I’m just saying.
I think he has a type.
And possibly a new one every night, judging from the gawking crowd of women practically flashing him their goods in order to draw his attention. I’m sure they don’t give a hoot about sword forging.
I dip my chin and look down at myself.
I’m leggy, I tell myself. I have two of them, this I know. And any more than that would be greedy, wouldn’t it? So I’m leggy because I have legs. Plural.
Although, my thighs are a little thick. My hips round and flared out more than most. And I have a backside that would surely meet the criteria for ample.
On the other hand, I’m stacked up top. But my boobs do descend a fair amount as soon as I release them from the medieval torture device that is my bra.
The crowd begins to shift and mumble as the iron Adonis stands there, looking down at his creation, hammer hanging by his side as his chest rises and falls with grateful breaths of fresh air. Sunlight shines off the sweat that coats his body, glowing bright, drops of it falling from his protruding brow and sizzling as they hit the sword lying on the anvil.
His eyes raise as he lifts and positions the cooling metal into the arched opening of the forge for a minute, then those dark eyes set below the serious brow scan the crowd. I instinctively shrink back as his gaze heads in my direction.
His tongue comes out to lick this perfect spot on his bottom lip. He withdraws the sword again, placing it precisely on the solid metal of the anvil.
He raises the hammer back in the air, only to cross it over his body to wipe his forearm across his eyes and then hang it back down at his side. It’s as though he’s completely alone. In a bubble of silence without any awareness of the tense, frothing crowd around him.
I observe him assess and dismiss each member of the crowd in turn, watching each muscle flex and tighten. But when his dark eyes focus on me, they stall. I twist my head to the side. Pulling a shoulder to my ear, trying to hide, but his gaze fixes solidly upon me.
The intensity in his eyes lightens. His eyebrows loosen, and he cocks his head slightly to the left as his eyes trace up and down, such a quick movement most people would have missed it. I notice it more as a feeling than anything tangible, as every inch of my body tightens as it falls under his line of sight.
Just when my heart feels ready to seize, he drops his eyes from me and turns to the silent, fair-haired man standing behind him, raising his chin in a jerking motion. The man steps forward and takes the hammer and the half-forged sword from the hands of the eye candy, then shifts sideways and back before raising the hammer in the air, silencing the murmur moving through the crowd. “Just a minute. We just need a minute.”
To my horror and delight, the forger steps forward, and his eyes once again fix on me, like a predator on its prey. I turn my head to glance over one shoulder then the other, convinced I must be letting my imagination get the better of me again.
Surely there must be a tall, beer wench with breast flesh spilling out of her corset behind me, right?
When he steps from behind the ropes, the crowd parts like Moses is holding his staff above the Red Sea. Half of them are hawk-watching, eager, as the sweat-covered forger strides around the edge of the crowd. But his eyes are pinned on me, even as I try to shrink back and find myself entangled in the round belly of a bearded fairgoer with crumbs in his facial hair and a glazed look in his eye.
“I’m sorry,” I mutter, turning one way then the other, looking for a means of escape, but my boots are frozen to the soggy grass.
“That’s okay, little lady.” Dirty beard grins and bobs his eyebrows, and my first instinct is to look down.
What is going on today?
I’m caught between the advancing forger and this beard man with lust in his eyes. I don’t understand what is happening. I’m not the kind of girl men usually notice. I’m the kind of girl who wears the same pair of Timberlands until the leather starts to crack. Normal girls have closets full of high heels and flats and shoes for every purpose, but one pair of hiking boots is it for me. Life in an Airstream teaches you to live simply.
But right now, I’d do anything to have just one decent pseudo feminine outfit put aside. Because he is here. I say a silent prayer, staring down at my worn boots as the growing dark wetness covers the toe from the mushy footing.
I feel him near me before I hear him. I notice the way the beer-belly man is pushed back by some unseen force, notice the prickling over the left side of my body, like a low current has been spread over the skin. Then, as much as I can’t believe it, he lights up the rest of my senses—the sound of his breathing. The mix of smoky, salty and sweaty, somehow more of an aphrodisiac than I could imagine.
I’ve been around sweaty men before, obviously. Trust me, living on the rig sites with my dad, those men out in the middle of nowhere with no women around do not cotton to hygiene.
But this is different. The forger has a scent. Not a smell and it’s got my mouth watering and ears ringing.
If someone’s scent can make your ears ring, you know you are in deep guano.
“Name.” His single word hits me like blunt force trauma to the head, knocking me senseless and rendering me unable to respond.
Instead, my eyes stick toward the ground, fixed on his black boots, my hands digging down into the front pockets of my shorts, fingering the dog-eared letter from Dan Sullivan. The letter that spells the end of my nomad life. The ringing in my ears turns to an eerie, low hum. The same sound you hear when you hold a huge conch shell to your ear.
The next thing I know, my senses are all focused on a single point of contact, as a rough fingertip applies pressure beneath my chin. An unsteady chirp escapes my throat.
Gentle yet firm motion shifts my gaze from the black boots. Moving my eyes upward, taking in every inch
of the view as they go. I focus on the dark chest hair that peeks out from the top of the soot covered suede apron.
The pressure from his single finger turns to a pinch of two as he adds his thumb to the front of my chin, lifting, raising my gaze further. Any other stranger, at any other time, touching me like this would be on the receiving end of an uppercut or a knee to the groin. Valuable lessons I learned from the many pseudo fathers and brothers I’ve had over the years.
“Name.” That word again, and just as it hits my ears, my eyes take the leap and look into his face.
A tremor starts at the crown of my head, slamming down my body until my knees threaten to buckle.
His eyes are near black. I’ve seen brown eyes, even very dark brown eyes, the kind that look like midnight on a dirt track, but his are the color of Guinness. They have a hint of golden flecks around the edge of his iris, drawing me in. I’ve never seen or dreamed of eyes like that, but on him, there could be no other. They are perfect.
He is perfect.
And I am barely touching the ground.
Name, dummy. He asked for your name. An admonishing voice in my head breaks the trance.
Okay, so what is it?
“My name?” My half-wit reply turns my cheeks fifty shades of embarrassed.
He doesn’t show any amusement at my clearly addled brain. He simply regards my words and my face with such a calm intensity that any rational thoughts I had left fall out of my ears.
“Yes. I’m hoping you will tell me what it is,” he says. His words rumble out from between full lips that I imagine kissing their way down my body. Enjoying every inch on the journey where they end planted smack between my legs.
That thought alone has my heart skipping beats. I’ve never thought anything like that before. And I’ve certainly never done that before. I’m shocked at my own crudeness, my own base sexual craving.
He drops his fingers from my chin.
“Maybe this will help you remember,” he whispers as his lips come down and press into mine.
Everything stops. For a moment, there is nothing. No sound, no time, no universe.
And then something new starts.
The kiss is soft but demanding, needy. His warm lips hold on to mine for a long moment. Not taking more than he should. His tongue sweeps out of his mouth, glancing along my lower lip, going no further.
It’s as though he’s not just tasting me, but savoring me. When he’s done, he stands back even taller. His shoulders hitch up then back, and I watch in awe as every muscle and tendon seems to turn to solid iron. Each one stands taut and stretched under his skin, as though they are spring-loaded and ready to go off.
Our eyes are locked. His hand comes to graze down the front of my neck and rest there at the base, without hesitation, as if it belongs right there. His fingers tighten, ever so slightly, in a way that is possessive and yet not threatening.
The sunshine that covered us evaporates. A cloud of gray pushes in front of the yellow fireball and turns all the hues around us soft and desaturated.
My lips open. I’ve remembered my name. I’m ready to give it to him, to let him take it and hold it, but somehow the spell breaks, the magic dissipates, and the sound of horns and shouts of merriment break through the hypnotic draw of those eyes.
“I’m—” I start.
I dare to look into his eyes. His face is that of a man who needs nothing from anyone else. He is as rugged as he is refined. His left eye droops, just a bit, along with the eyebrow above. Crooked, yet perfectly so. Somehow, he is the sexiest specimen of maleness Mother Nature ever created.
I take a breath, calm my nerves and try to continue. “I’m Le—”
An arm loops around my waist and jerks me backward, nearly pulling me right off my feet.
Just then, a resounding bang comes from the demonstration area. I glance forward to see several drunken fairgoers have ignored the rope barriers and are grabbing up hammers and forged knives from the display, banging them on the hot furnace and laughing. Another miscreant grabs a sword and holds it in mock triumph over his head. The derelict crew is swinging them around, hitting the furnace and coming dangerously close to each other.
I stumble back into whoever has grabbed me, unable to regain my footing, while keeping my sight on the action in the front of the dissipating crowd. The forger’s assistant struggles to control the escalating situation, but the four men are clearly substance-impaired.
The blacksmith flips his head around to regard the commotion, then back to me. Then back to the forge again. Distress clouds his dark eyes as I find my feet and turn to see my dad’s smiling face over my shoulder.
“Come on, you,” he says, and I smell the hint of Guinness on his breath. “Time for one last parade before we have to leave. Our last one, sweetheart. Let’s enjoy it.” His voice is a strange mix of joy and melancholy.
He’s too lost in his excitement to even notice what I was doing. He clearly missed the kiss in the chaos of the parade. I want to stay, but how can I deny him? I’ll be back. I’ll come back after the parade. I will.
I nod, feeling myself being sucked into the Royal Parade with him. I can’t, I wish for just one more moment. “Just one sec,” I nearly beg, turning back to find the forger stepping forward, following me, but the chaos behind the ropes is heading for disaster. “It’s my dad,” I tell him. “I have to—”
An angry shout from his assistant rises over the other noise, and he turns from me. The parade shifts behind me, bodies pressing in all around, and the wave of humanity carries me forward with my dad beside me, a smile on his face, unaware of what he just interrupted. His hand comes down to grip mine, and his voice rises in excitement. “I’m going to miss you so much, Lela. Thank you for today. This is the perfect send-off for my little girl.”
I twist my head around, but I’m surrounded by bodies. My five feet two inches has me lost in a sea of taller fairgoers, and the forger is gone. Panic grips me.
I will never be back here. Doesn’t anyone realize? I’m going away. The letter from Dan Sullivan in my pocket says it all. My little training video impressed him. I’ve been hired. An actual job of my own, training dogs for a living. For a famous The Animal Channel celebrity. Doing the thing I love most in the world.
And all I can think is, I’m never going to see the forger again.
“Wait, Dad!” I gain my footing and strain my neck, trying to peek over the crowd.
Another earsplitting boom from the direction of the forge, and the flashes of polished silver spark above the crowd. Swords are raised into the air like some sort of medieval declaration of war. Voices from the demonstration area turn angry.
I give in, allowing my dad to pull me away and let go of the few moments of fantasy that still lay in my chest like a flower frozen in mid-bloom.
“Lela,” I whisper toward the ground, to no one in particular, as I let the momentum of the parade and my dad’s joy carry me away. “My name is Lela.”
AVAILABLE NOW ON AMAZON
Also by Dani Wyatt
Standalones
Wrangler
Perfect
Sweet Ride
Reining Her In
Valentine’s Rose
Forging Forever
Love, Daddy Series
Angel
Mastering Her Heart
The Forever Collection
Where She Belongs
When She’s Mine
Promise Duet
Promise
Cherish
Southside MMA Series
Force
Push
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