Addictive Rimeshade (3 page)

I'm not religious, but what if he was god testing my character. What if this one night determines an afterlife of strife or one of peace. What if once every twenty years the angels fall from heaven and hope to know what it's like to be human, to eat, to be cold, to get warm after being cold, to sleep in the arms of a woman with her nipple not a centimeter from the tip of his nose.... what if...

“What if you think too much because you're a closet full of crazy,” I grumble to myself, going back to the kitchen with my supplies and dumping them next to him, blushing when he gives me that dark stare of suggestive accusation.

“
Sorry, I'm operating on the only brain cell the lightning strike didn't fry. It's pointless giving you one dry item to wear while your toes go blue, plus nothing chaffs worse than wet jeans. I hate them wet, I'd rather be naked.”

Clamping my mouth shut I want to kick myself, slam my forehead on the counter in head-desk style for saying that to this man. He must feel so fucking harassed by me. It's like everything I say and do is to get the man nude and rude, which is not my agenda. I sound like a pathetic stereotype who can only shut up when she has a thick long pacifier stuck in her mouth.

My cheeks are burning and I hinge out of my chair, stalking back to the coffee and cursing when I realize I forgot my mug in the bedroom. “Fucking fuck it.” Yanking the cupboard door open I extract another mug, twisting to ask him, “Do you want coffee? Or.. um... I think I might have beer in the larder's fridge ... or... um... wine maybe? Shit, let me go look.”

“
Beer would be great,” he nods, fiddling with his food as if finding it putrid but unwilling to say as much considering he's a guest and all.

“
Oh uhm, the bathroom is just through there if you want to change – or uh, I could just go find that beer and give you some privacy.”
Yeah Lara, why don't you do that, why don't you give this man some privacy. You are overwhelming him, you are smothering him, and when you smother men they run away. Stop snuffing him!

The serial asphyxiator strikes again.

“And if you don't like that curry you don't have to eat it. My feelings won't be wounded, promise.” Halting the verbal diarrhea I go striding off to the larder. Opening the back up fridge, I'm relieved to see I do indeed have beer chilling next to a virgin bottle of lime vodka. Hmmmm, is it too early for vodka?

Yes Lara, it is too early for vodka. He's a stranger, and you need to be as paranoid as your sister or the big bad wolf is going to eat you.

My, what big muscles you have grandma. My what a cunning smile you have grandma. My what broad shoulders you have …

I'm an idiot. I know it like a shark knows blood in water.

Decided, I grab three of the beer bottles, prepared to leave two in the kitchen fridge so they're within reach.

Swanning back into the kitchen I'm pleased to see the man in my hiking socks with his shoes neatly placed at my oven to dry out. He kept the jeans on though. I don't know how he can handle that. It's like having incontinence and sitting in a pool of lukewarm pee eating away at your skin with uric acid.

Placing the beer in front of him, I put the other two in the primary fridge to chill next to the butter, returning to sit with him, reclaiming my coffee when he pops the top and takes a pull deep enough to strain the veins out on his neck.

Isn't this cozy. How did we get to, 'man stay there while woman run around in circles making you fee l like the king' so fucking fast?

Planting the bottle down, leaving his hand circling the bottom with long nimble fingers, which have neat fingernails that are clean (three stars added to the stranger's chart), he asks without any compunction whatsoever, “So who do you light the candle for?”

“
Huh?” Why does he naturally assume I lit the candle
for
someone. Why can't I just have a candle fetish?

Dark eyes engage my own, our gazes meeting halfway across scrubbed pine cloaked with girly adornment, the frisson palpable when he repeats, “You are holding a vigil for someone. I wondered who it is.”

“Is that why you stopped at my house? Was it the candle?”

He offers a skew smile, rounding his left cheek into perfectly peachy, answering with a half shrug, clearly expecting me to answer him now that he's harnessed the courage to engage me in conversation.

“My sister. It's for my sister Deliah. She's lost,” I pause, pointing to my chest with my free hand, “In here, ya know? Her heart looks for love in the wrong places. She ran from her ex and I don't know where she's gone, if she's alive or dead, or if she's in pieces. I just want her home safe. I want to hug her and tell her it's gonna be okay.”

“
So you lit a candle and offered a prayer, letting the light call her home?”

“
I don't offer prayers, I state my demands. Pleading falls on deaf ears because one only pleads for mercy. And if you have to resort to a plea there won't
be
any mercy. The word please includes
plea
in it, the fact that parents insist their children plea for anything with their demand of 'say please or you can't have it' sits badly with me. We should never teach children to beg, it robs them of their power. If you desire something you have to be concise, and clear, and state your intentions and parameters at the get go.”

Two eyebrows pop up and he smirks at me, “Oh yeah?” He scratches idly under his chin, clearly wondering what me yanking his clothes off says about my intention. I feel like the wicked witch coaxing innocents into my kitchen so I can roast them for Sunday lunch, or lick them until their flesh is raw on their bones. Licking him is a highly tempting concept. He makes me feel evil even though that was the last motivation I harbored.

I have a niggly sixth sense reeling in psychic facts, daring me to test my hunch by asking, “Where is your dog?”

The expression on his face is truly priceless. I love it when I'm right without a shred of proof but my gut instinct.

“How do you know about my dog?” he says, slowly lowering his fork, the tension in him making the movement stiff.

None of this makes sense to me but I'm going on blind faith, telling him the things I intuit, “You are Leuk. Lugh was first known as Leuk, the K being silent, and although you have dark eyes and hair, I don't believe this is your true form. Your coloring is like my own, because you are the spitting manifestation of the Celtic god Lugh. You are blonde, you have blue eyes, and you have many skills at your disposal, one of them being trickery. You enjoy disguises, role playing, hoping it will make you forgettable to those you meet. But you can never blend in because your name not only means trickery, it also means glorious. Inside you is a forge of spiritual strength, it makes your aura blinding, and despite you sitting at my table as a pauper, you sir are a noble king.”

“What does this have to do with my dog?” he sidesteps deftly.

Leaning my elbows on the table I examine this mystery, smiling at him, “Lugh has a loyal hound -
Salinnis, you could call him his kin. He is undefeated and Lugh's sidekick in battle. You may think I'm creepy and crazy but I would bet my hair that you have canine reinforcements.”

To my surprise he sits back, folding his arms and dropping his eyelids to stare heavy lidded at me, in an almost seductive fashion, “My hounds, as you put it, are outside. And yes, they are my companions and very much my kin.”

Glancing at the deluge splattering the kitchen window in vicious globs of storm spit which slide slowly down the pane to obscure the darkness with razor rivers of rain, I'm annoyed, jumping up to open the door, “How can you leave them outside in this shitty weather? You're an asshole!”

He pounces off his chair, blocking my path, preventing me from reaching the back door, obstructing it completely with his stature, “No. They keep guard. This is no hardship for them, they are immune to the cold.”

“No Leug! Bring them in to dry at the Aga, they need rest and food too.”

He claims my hand, squeezing it to the point of painful pressure, “Lara, your compassion makes you weak prey. How often do you open your door to strangers and their companions? How do you trust so blindly that no harm will befall you?”

Because no god would allow more pain to my stomp on my welcome mat.

Instead I say, “A man who leaves his best friends outside in the cold and rain has no conscience or respect for sentient beings. You bring them inside or you can fuck off back out there with them.”

His laugh is robust and contagious, spreading a sinful heat through my belly. “You've got balls lady, I'll give you that.”

He nods agreement, turning around and unlocking my door, opening it wide to lean across the threshold, droplets coating his hair in the baptism of icy rain. A flash of light pulses once across my yard to the copse at the rear. It could be sheet lightning to peripheral vision, but it's plain to me that he was the source of it. Staring through the kitchen window into the night I watch two enormous forms launching from the darkness, slithering across the blackened lawn with stealth and speed, forcing him to step aside to allow them entrance.

They are pitch black, and it's hard to tell if they are Alsatians or wolves. I've heard of white German Shepherds, but these two are as black as midnight and larger than any dog I've ever known.

My kitchen is dwarfed and the scent of wet fur is thick and cloying.

Glancing at their master, I don't know if it's pertinent for me to command them. Normally I'd not hesitate to tell them to sit and lie down.

Leug points to the one closest to me, who's shoving his enormous skull and muzzle into my crotch, nudging me hard against the kitchen counter while he has a deep pull on violating my privacy. “That's Sköll the ring leader, and this is Hati.”

Gripping the dog's muzzle I force his chin up, using effort, looking into his eyes and saying, “Sit. Behave, or you're going back outside.”

He understands, staring up at me with pale eyes, panting hot breath when he complies to my demand, his bushy tail sweeping my floor in complacent wags.

“You too, Hati,” orders Leug, who closes the back door and locks it again, giving me a glimpse of his amused smirk.

Looking at the man who is tall and dark haired, I wonder if I'm right. Does he have the fair hair of his namesake? He has the hounds, and he called them using an energy signature he didn't expect me to witness. My hunches are never wrong. Why didn't Deliah listen to me when I told her Dias was a bad man? She likes her men homicidal and I hate watching her get hurt.

“What should I feed them?” I ask Leug when he leans his hip against the counter, lurching to examine me with brazen fascination.

He wanted me to feel intimidated and afraid, but he doesn't scare me, and neither do his hounds. My bones never lie. My gut instinct is this is a harmonious man with a bad reputation that sticks to him like a shadow at dusk. He's misunderstood and that causes him more pain than anything else. He's a good guy, I'd stake my life on it.

“They eat what I eat, mostly,” he smiles.

The suggestion is blatant. He referred to food when he said
they eat what I eat
... but he referred to me when he said '
mostly
'.

Gee C.M.

The longer he's here the deeper my sensation of having invited into my home a complication so profound I'll get lost in the maze of his duplicity.

Ignoring him, not ready to contemplate what he's doing here and what that means for me, I point at the floor, telling Hati and Sköll, “Lie down.”

They slide down paws first to stare in doggie adoration while I extract bowls from the cupboard, scooping curry into both, depleting my industrious domestic binge, leaving the pot empty when I place the crockery in front of each muzzle.

“
Wait,” I order, unearthing my enormous stainless steel mixing bowl and filling it with water, placing it down in the corner for their parched palates.

Male laughter pulls my attention back to Leug, and he gives me a sexy shrug, “Sorry Lara. I don't mean to be ungracious, but the boys prefer beer to water.”

“Beer?” I'm sure the NSPCA would have an issue with that. As do I.

As if reaching a decision he stands up straight, losing the relaxed slouch to stalk closer to me, leering his aura into mine when he drops his disguise, glowering at me with frigid blue eyes and hair the shade of rime, “They are like me. They are not what they appear to be. It is not animal abuse.”

Holy shit. It's one thing intuiting subterfuge, and it's quite another to be face to face with a changeling. Now I know I'm right, yet find no comfort in the knowledge.

“
Were my thoughts so easy to read?” I grumble, my heart hammering uncomfortably with his proximity.

“
Yes.”

It's a soft declaration, embroidered in a tone of affection which gives me a brief flirtation with vertigo.

His presence is intoxicating and overpowering, as if he is a vortex sucking energy into his core, making anyone in his orbit a little dizzy and breathless.

Or maybe that's just the affect he has on me.

Sucking on my lip while I savor the pain inching up my arm from his grip, I stare directly into his eyes and challenge, “So which name are you going by now? Shall I call you Lew, or Loki?”