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by M. L. Ryan

  He removed his hands and my hair returned to its normal brown.

  “Why would you want to look different?” he asked, a perplexed look spreading across his face as I studied his reflection in the mirror.

  “Oh, I don’t know. I’ve always wanted to look less ordinary.”

  He frowned again, but said nothing. After a few moments, he replaced his hands on my shoulders and I felt the electric buzz once again. This time, however, he didn’t close his eyes, but stared into mine in the mirror. I found myself staring back, until he said, “Look” and inclined his head toward the mirror.

  When I peered at my reflection, there was a stranger instead. I couldn’t put my finger on what exactly was different, but every part of my face looked… better. My hair was shiny and luxurious and looked like I had just spent hundreds of dollars on highlights. My skin seemed to glow from within. Even my run-of-the-mill brown eyes seemed more deeply colored and exotic.

  “Wow. I don’t know what you just did, but I look phenomenal. If you could market this, you’d be a very rich man.”

  Without moving his hands, Alex leaned down so his mouth was almost touching my ear and whispered, “All I did was let you see yourself the way I see you.”

  I immediately felt a rush of embarrassment and dropped my head so I didn’t have to look at him.

  “Don’t you know how beautiful you are?”

  “Oh sure, if boring brown eyes and hair and unremarkable features are considered attractive,” I countered quickly.

  Alex turned me around so that we faced one another, or would have if I didn’t still have my chin jammed into my sternum. He gently lifted my head until I couldn’t avoid his now heated and intense gaze—his voice alone was like a caress.

  “Unremarkable? Hailey, you are stunning. Your eyes are not boring, they are so dark and mysterious, and I want to find out all the secrets locked behind them every time I look at you.” He smiled and brushed a stray curl off my forehead. “And your hair is a gorgeous shade of chestnut and when you stand in the sun it is alight with strands of copper and gold.”

  Before I could concoct another smart-ass comment to counter my feelings of unease, Alex softly pressed his lips to mine. Then he twined his hands in my hair and slowly trailed kisses from my forehead down to my neck and back up before he found my mouth again.

  This time, it was more fervent and my lips parted as his tongue skillfully stroked them. The heat that moments ago had flooded my face had now moved much lower, and definitely not from being embarrassed. Although if we continued with what our tongues were currently doing, bare- assed wouldn’t be far away.

  I stood on my toes, but the difference in our heights made kissing standing up awkward. He quickly solved this logistical dilemma by smoothly lifting me onto the counter without his mouth ever leaving mine. Now comfortably seated, I wrapped my legs around his waist and nestled my hands between the collar of his flannel shirt and the back of his neck.

  Alex must have liked this new arrangement, if his low groan and the grinding of his hips into me was any indication. The rhythmic pressure of his now obvious arousal moving against me was going to quickly send me over the edge. And I really, really wanted to go over—maybe more than once if I was lucky.

  I vaguely realized that I probably should get a hold of myself—although Alex had pretty much taken care of that now that his hand had found its way under my shirt and was currently teasing my right nipple.

  Then I remembered we weren’t really alone. As much as I wanted Alex, as much as I longed to have him inside me, I was, unfortunately, full up already.

  As if he had the same thought, Alex pulled back slightly, sighed deeply, and leaned his forehead against mine.

  “God, I can’t believe I’m going to say this,” his voice ragged. “Please don’t be mad, and this in no way has anything to do with how I feel about you or how much I want to continue this, but I don’t think I can do this while you and Sebastian are…”

  I placed a finger to his lips to silence him and gazed into those impossibly blue eyes.

  With both frustration and acceptance, I groaned, “I can’t do it either, damn it,” then scooted back on the counter to increase the distance between us. “But as soon as he is back where he belongs, you’re mine, blondie.”

  He rewarded me with one of his mind-bogglingly breathtaking smiles.

  “I’ll hold you to that,” he said as he tenderly kissed the top of my head. “But for now, if you don’t mind, I’d like to take a very long and very cold shower. You can take one after I’m done.”

  “Are you crazy? I haven’t warmed up since we got here. Besides, I know a better way of dispelling sexual tension without having to freeze myself.”

  I left the bathroom and retreated to my room counting “One hundred, ninety-three…”

  After fifteen minutes, I was only at sixty-something. Counting backwards by sevens was not easy for me under normal conditions, but I kept getting distracted thinking about what had just almost happened and I had to start over about eight or nine times. I did change into some shorts and a long-sleeved, thermal-weave t-shirt and got into bed.

  When Alex finally emerged from his shower and peered at me from just outside the open door of my bedroom, he was wearing almost the same outfit as mine, except his shirt didn’t have little pink bunnies.

  “You know, Alex, just because we can’t euphemistically sleep together now doesn’t mean we can’t actually sleep together.”

  I hadn’t planned on saying that, maybe Sebastian was influencing me to invite Alex into my bed to assuage his own sexual frustrations. Whatever the motivation, I just wanted to be held.

  “I can do that.”

  He climbed under the covers with me and reached across to turn off the lamp on the nightstand on my side of the bed. I rolled on my side, and he enveloped me with his long, warm arms as he molded his body to mine. It felt nice to be spooned. It would have been better to be forked, but at this point, I would take whatever I could get.

  We lay there silently in the dark, and as I was almost asleep, he nuzzled my neck and murmured softly, “Good night, my sweet.”

  ~15~

  The next morning when I woke up, Alex was on his back and I was snuggled against him with my head on his chest. I watched him sleep for a few minutes and took in every gorgeous feature of his relaxed face. When he opened his eyes and saw me looking at him, he smiled and draped his arm over my waist.

  “Morning,” he said sleepily, and he leaned over and kissed me before pulling me closer. “I must admit, I would have preferred making love to you all night long, but just waking up with you is not bad.”

  We were already pressed together, and when he kissed me again, I had to force myself not to roll on top of him.

  “This is harder than I thought,” I muttered through clenched teeth.

  Alex looked at me with a hooded gaze and a devilish grin.

  “Thank you.”

  I was confused at first. Then I caught his meaning, which had nothing to do with the difficulty of restraining our passions until we were Sebastian-free. I laughed but gave him a playful punch in the ribs.

  “You know what I meant, and talking about what you meant isn’t helping.” In fact, now that was all I could think about.

  I begrudgingly got out of bed to not tempt myself any longer. I took a shower, not a cold one, but going through my regular morning routine did manage to ratchet down my lust to a tolerable level.

  Alex was eating a bowl of cereal when I finally made my way into the kitchen, from which wafted the enticing scents of freshly made coffee mixed with something sweet. I poured myself a cup, added just enough cream and sugar to mollify Sebastian without repulsing myself, and breathed in the rich, fragrant aroma before taking my first sip.

  Alex looked up at me from his seat at the table. “I made some cranberry-orange muffins. They will be out of the oven in minute or two.”

  So that was the source of the sugary smell. Could it get much
better than this? I wondered.

  “You know, there’s nothing sexier than a man who can bake.”

  “If I had known that, I would have been wooing you with my skills as a pastry chef from the beginning.”

  His use of the word “wooing” made me smile. Most of the time, it was easy to forget he was old enough to be my great-great grandfather. After all, he barely looked thirty—but every so often, he used some outdated term or phrase that made me remember not just his age, but that he wasn’t human.

  Human or not, the guy made a mean muffin. My first bite into the warm, moist goodie made me swoon.

  “Oh my god, this is fantastic!” I moaned, greedily consuming the rest of the little piece of perfection.

  I ate three in rapid succession before I realized that Alex was gazing at me wide-eyed and grinning from ear to ear.

  I planned to say, “Sorry, I didn’t mean to go crazy, but they are delicious” but I was still chewing, so I only got out what sounded like, “swurry, I dint men to gwo cwatzy” before I covered my mouth with my napkin and started laughing.

  Alex reached across the table and laced his fingers in mine. “I hope I get the same reaction when we finally make love,” he said with a wink.

  Hearing him say that made my groin clench, and even though my heavy sweater prevented me from being certain, I was pretty sure my nipples were now erect, and I wasn’t cold.

  “If you make love the way you bake, it’s a sure thing,” I replied as I took a swig of coffee and grabbed another muffin. “But you’ve got to stop saying stuff like that, or Sebastian or no Sebastian, I won’t be able to control myself.”

  “I just want to be sure you don’t lose interest,” he said with a smile that promised his interest was far from waning.

  His voice was rich and seductive, and it was likely that whatever he said, unless it concerned oozing pustules or parasitic worms, was going to arouse me. I’d just have to learn to deal.

  After breakfast, Alex went down to the compound while I hung out in the house. It was still cold, but clear, so I bundled up in every bit of clothing I had and sat in the sun on the back porch for a while. It was weird, I was kind of hot and cold at the same time, but I enjoyed getting outside. Being this far north, winter days provided fewer hours of daylight than I was accustomed to back home, and sometimes I went through the entire day without seeing the sun.

  Sometime in the afternoon, I realized that Sebastian had been unusually silent all day. Normally, he would pipe up now and then with some acerbic comment or at least contribute to our conversations. I didn’t recall hearing from him since last night, and the more I thought about it, that was right before Alex and I almost had sex. If that was the cause of Sebastian’s sudden lack of communication, I needed to find out what his problem was.

  “Yo, Sebastian.”

  Nothing.

  “Sebastian, it’s not like you can pretend you’re not there.”

  I guess he could have been asleep; I never really considered his resting habits before, I just assumed that he slept when I slept. Did he even have to sleep? In any case, even if he was napping, we needed to talk.

  “SEBASTIAN!

  Once again, only silence. Exasperated, I blurted, “If you’re not going to talk, then you’re definitely going to listen.”

  I sounded remarkably parental, all I needed was to add “young man” and it could have been my mother talking. That was enough to make me change my tone, along with briefly considering smacking myself repeatedly for letting my upbringing get the better of me.

  “Okay, I can guess that you are upset because Alex and I almost… and then didn’t… and you were thinking that, finally, you could release some of your pent-up sexual urges. But we aren’t as adventurous as you, and we just weren’t comfortable doing it the first time with you in attendance.”

  “You believe that is the reason for my brooding?” he said finally.

  “It’s not?”

  “Not even close, my dear. Alexander is like a son to me. It would be as uncomfortable for me to be part of such a thing as it would be for the two of you.”

  Huh. If that wasn’t the explanation, I was stumped. If he wasn’t ticked off because he missed out on a three-way by proxy, why was he so mad?

  Suddenly, I had an epiphany. Maybe all the sexual innuendo throughout the weeks we had shared my body had less to do with his baser needs, and more to do with his feelings for me.

  “Uh, Sebastian, you aren’t jealous by any chance, are you?”

  He let out a long sigh. “No, not jealous. Envious. As you are aware, I have been with many, many women in my life. Most have lasted one, maybe two nights. Some have even been what I like to call ‘serial one-nighters’—one-night stands that repeat over a number of years. There are even a few women with whom I have had longer associations, but never with any serious commitment, at least not on my part.

  But throughout all those liaisons, the multitude of sexual encounters, I have never experienced the kind of intimacy that I sensed between the two of you last night. Not the torrent of passion in the bath, but later, when you slept, chastely entwined. I have never awakened with a woman with whom I did not have sex the night before. I have never given or received pleasure or comfort from mere physical contact. And yesterday, when I was able to feel what you were feeling, I realized how shallow I truly am.”

  It doesn’t happen to me often, but I was speechless. Any of the cliché-riddled comments one might turn to in such circumstances seemed so inadequate when Sebastian had just stripped himself bare emotionally. The pain in his voice made me want to cry. Just when I thought I understood the narcissistic bastard, he goes and confuses me with an eloquent revelation of self-awareness.

  The moments ticked by, and I knew I had to say something, even if it turned out to be stupid. All I could come up with was “I’m so sorry.” Then we just sat there in silence, and I tried my best to let my emotions tell him what I couldn’t find the words for— that what he had confided was both beautiful and devastating, and I hoped he could allow himself to find someone with whom he could experience more than what he had throughout his long, lonely life.

  That’s how Alex found me sometime later, still sitting quietly on the sofa. Sebastian hadn’t requested it, but I had decided that this was something between the two of us and I didn’t plan to mention any of what he had divulged to Alex.

  Alex looked pleased. “I think we finally know where Sebastian’s body is being held. It’s at Otto’s place in the Czech Republic. One of our Eastern European informants passed along the information yesterday, and we confirmed it a few moments ago.”

  Finally. “That’s fantastic! When do we leave?”

  “Tomorrow. We’ll fly commercial out of Boston direct to Reykjavik using our real passports. That way, if Otto is paying attention, he will think we are checking out his Icelandic residence. We’ll take a private jet and use false documentation to get to Czech.”

  Not that I thought Boston was some Podunk town, but I was amazed that we wouldn’t have to depart from New York’s JFK airport.

  “There’s actually a non-stop flight from Boston to Iceland?”

  Alex chuckled softly and shook his head. “Leave it to you to focus on the itinerary. But, yes, Iceland air has one. It leaves in the evening and we arrive the next morning.”

  He walked over to a small table near the staircase and picked up what looked like a leather-covered notebook. When he handed it to me, I saw that it was actually closer to a zippered planner, but without calendar pages. Inside was a passport and driver’s license; both had my photo, but the name “Callista McMasters” was there instead of mine. Thank heaven it wasn’t Bertha. There were even a couple of credit cards with that name as well.

  “You people think of everything, don’t you?” I said as I carefully examined everything.

  “We certainly try. I’m going to need to confer with Sebastian for a while, so if there’s anything you need to do that can’t wait, you should
probably take care of it now.” His expression softened a bit and he added, “We’ll have dinner and a chance to relax later, I promise.”

  The only thing pressing at that moment was my bladder, so I made a quick trip to the bathroom and then made myself comfortable on the couch while Alex and Sebastian went over the details for our trip.

  I didn’t mind their magical, non-verbal exchanges of information, although I had to admit, holding hands with Alex was probably the reason. I did make a point to look for any changes in Alex’s demeanor that might indicate Sebastian was divulging his inner angst as he had to me earlier. I didn’t notice anything out of the ordinary, so I figured I was correct in my original assumption that he wanted it kept confidential.

  Alex made good on his promise of dinner and relaxing, and we spent most of the rest of the evening watching movies and snuggling on the sofa. Now that I was about to embark on my first trans-continental trip, I wished that I had brought some nicer outfits, but Alex pointed out that bringing so few things when we left Tucson meant I didn’t need to waste a lot of time packing, which meant more time on the sofa with him.

  Alex excused himself a little before eleven to make a few calls, and I went into the kitchen to finish the dishes from dinner. When everything was clean and put away, I turned out the lights and went to get ready for bed.

  I didn’t see Alex in the living room—he was probably still on the phone in his room. I came out of the bathroom, breath minty fresh, and clothed in the least alluring outfit I could find—grey fleece sweat pants and an oversized University of Arizona t-shirt that hung down almost to my knees. Hey, no reason to make things more difficult with sexy nightwear.

  Alex was already in my bed under the covers, and I paused for a moment when I saw he had claimed the left side. Since as far back as I can remember, I’ve always slept on the left side of any bed bigger than a twin. It’s probably just habit, and after my initial hesitation, I started over to the opposite side, because, really, what’s the big deal about one side over the other? As I pulled back the covers, however, Alex stopped me.