Total pages in book: 16
Estimated words: 13969 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 70(@200wpm)___ 56(@250wpm)___ 47(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 13969 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 70(@200wpm)___ 56(@250wpm)___ 47(@300wpm)
She laughed, and it sent vibrations down his spine. “Yes, that’s Harry. But I think he’s supposed to be a box of cereal.”
“Shall I take that more seriously?”
Her laugh turned round and playful, and the sound absolutely delighted him. It was rolling, golden joy, a delighted uprising inside her. A flurry of images barraged him—his mouth on her stomach, nipping, tickling, licking that light from her skin—and he sucked in a breath, momentarily disoriented.
“Who are you here with?” she asked.
“Only myself.”
She frowned, that heart-shaped mouth turning into a pout he wanted to devour. “Then who do you know here?” she pressed.
“I don’t know anyone,” he admitted, knowing how stiff and awkward he must seem, so unaccustomed he was to conversation. “Who accompanied you?”
“Accompanied?” She laughed again. “My newly ex-boyfriend.”
“Newly? Cheers. I’m glad to hear it.”
“You are? Why?”
He could tell she found him odd, and dug around in his thoughts, searching for the words. Already it was the longest conversation he’d had with a human in decades, and the skill felt rusty and slow in his mind. “Because he looked like a bloody fool dragging you through a party and abandoning you immediately.”
Her eyes turned guarded. “He looked like a fool?”
“Do you think it’s appropriate for a man to treat a woman that way?”
“No, but if anyone looked like a fool back there, it was me.”
“For being with him?” He leaned forward, wanting to understand. For so long, he hadn’t bothered to care about human feelings and motivations beyond what he needed from them. He felt, at once, like he was learning a new language.
She parroted his words back to him: “For letting him drag me through a party and abandon me immediately.”
“Did you really let him? You seemed rather taken aback.”
“And you seem to have been paying very close attention.” Her voice had a thin film of unease.
“You’re beautiful, little lamb. Everyone in that room noticed you.” He smiled. “I’d wager everyone in any room notices you.”
She turned her gaze from his then, behind him to the door, and he had to shove down the instinct to command it back, suspecting it wouldn’t work. Her hazel eyes were like glimmering amber; her focus made him ravenous. He wanted her with a keening drive that felt like a twin heartbeat just beneath his skin. But the novelty of conversing with her was too hard to give up.
“Why did you stay?” he asked. “Why not just leave the party?”
“I don’t know,” she admitted. “It feels rude somehow.”
“Ruder than walking into poor Harry’s bedroom uninvited?” he teased.
“Ruder than crashing someone’s party you don’t even know?” she parried back.
He laughed. “Touché.”
She studied him, tilting her head. “This party seems like a weird fit with . . .” She gestured a hand down the length of his body. “Your whole vibe.”
Frowning, he asked, “My ‘vibe’?”
The lamb lifted her hands daintily, mimicking a cup and saucer, and pretended to take a sip of tea.
“Are you accusing me of being posh?” he asked, grinning.
Her British accent was both terrible and charming: “Quite right. Fancy a turn around the room?”
He gave a wary glance around. “I’d be afraid of what the cereal bloke’s got shoved behind his dresser.”
“Fair.” Her smile straightened, and he dug around in his thoughts for something to keep her talking. She beat him to it: “Who are you?”
“My name is Brigan.”
He stilled after he said it, his smile evaporating. Why had he said it? Brigan hadn’t told a human his real name in . . . centuries. The closest he’d gotten to even speaking it had been words like twig or rig, which had always felt like a familiar echo on his tongue.
It had been Michael, Edgar, George, Louis . . . He’d rotated through a handful of names for decades. The old driver’s license in his wallet said Samuel James Miller, an identity he would soon need to abandon because the date of birth printed there was 1943 and—at least until the curse was broken—Brigan would forever look twenty-five, not eighty-one. But right now, here with her, it hadn’t even occurred to him to prevaricate.
But she, of course, was unaware of his shock. “Why did you come in here?” she asked.
Honesty slipped free: “I followed you.”
At this, she stiffened, pressing back into the window, and he shook his head. “I’ve scared you. I’m sorry.” He stepped to the side, giving her a clear path to the door, and reached back to open it. “I’m not trapping you in here.”
I’m not here to hurt you.
Her brow creased. “What did you just say?”
“I said I’m not trapping you in here.”
“No, after that.”
He shook his head, shocked again that she could hear the voice but that it didn’t reach that obedient, instinctive part of her. “I don’t—”
“So I’m imagining it?” she asked, frustrated. “Why did you follow me in here?”