by Lisa Daniels
Dropping the shovel, Taja darted out of the stall and ran out of the barn as Semaj began to yell. Damaris appeared in front of her as she ran. His massive hand reached out and grabbed her. “And just what do you think you are doing? The work isn’t done, but you think you can turn your quickie into something more?” His face leered at her. “And what is all of this howling about?”
The large man pulled the young woman behind him as he went to see what had happened.
Blood was pouring from Semaj’s nose as he yowled in the stall.
“What is going on here?” he demanded, looking between them. “I will not have lovers’ tiffs on my time.”
Semaj pointed a finger at Taja. “She hit me with a shovel! That bitch just reached up and smacked me with it. Then she tried to run off with my money. But I held onto it!” He picked up money that had fallen out of her pocket – the money that she had left over after her chores the day before. She had planned to use that this evening to buy dinner for her and her mother.
“I told you not to, but you wouldn’t listen! And that is my money! It was left over after-”
“It was not! You were trying to make me pay for it, and then when I refused, you grabbed it and hit me!”
Damaris grabbed her by the back of her shirt, not even caring that Semaj wasn’t giving a consistent story. “Oh, ho ho! So you finally show your true colors, eh? Trying to get it where you can? Well, the law is going to hear about this.”
“I didn’t do anything wrong!” She tried to get out of his grasp as men came running into the barn.
“You hit me in the face with a shovel!” Semaj cried. “That’s something very wrong!”
It didn’t take long before the police arrived. By then Damaris had clearly sided with Semaj, saying he saw the whole thing and that she had tried to steal from the poor boy. Given her history, the cops did not even wait to listen as she pleaded with them. They asked the stable hand and the acting master to come with them to get statements while they put the dangerous woman someplace where she could not harm anyone.
“I can’t go with you!” Damaris responded. “Someone has to take care of the stable, and there ain’t no one I can leave to do it.”
“Sir,” one of the officers said, “we need you to come with us to make sure she is properly charged. I understand you are concerned, but we will keep it as short as possible.”
Damaris stepped toward Taja and struck her hard across the face. “Look at what you are doing to me! First you distract my boy from his cleaning. Then you get the law in here. I should have fired you as soon as I took over.”
The officers took Taja, each holding onto one of her arms.
As he followed behind them, Semaj spoke up, “You had better hold her good. That girl is slippery and will hurt you as soon as look at you.”
There was no response from the officers or Taja. She wanted to run away, to go to the mansion and ask for one of the men. They knew about what she had been through. One had even offered to help if she had trouble with Semaj.
“We need to talk to the staff. They can tell you,” her face turned toward one of the officers. “Semaj has been after me for a while. One of them said to come to him if the boy didn’t stop. He can tell you.” Her eyes were pleading.
The officer looking at her seemed inclined to do as she asked, but the other tightened his hold on her. “I’ve no doubt you’ve found a way to charm him into doing what you want. Get the men on the inside to take care of you so that you can do whatever you like.” He looked down at her as she turned her eyes on him. “No, I think we have everything we need right here. Not only is it obvious you hit the poor kid, we have someone who saw you do it. No one inside saw what happened, as the two gentlemen who were here a bit ago said. We don’t need any of your protectors to muddle this with fake alibis. No, we don’t.” He pulled her along. “Now let’s get you where you belong.”
Chapter 4
In Despair, Hope
Taja looked through the bars of the cells. She had placed her body in the only place where the water dripping from the ceiling and walls wouldn’t reach her. The puddle on the other side of the cell took up nearly half of the space, making it difficult to get on the bed. Not that she would have slept, even if the bed had been dry.
Her eyes stared out of the window into the cloudy sky. It was night now, two days before her birthday, and she had no idea what was in her future. A tear ran down her cheek as she remembered what had happened just the day before. How the stranger had taken care of her and asked for nothing in return. How she had hoped that things may turn out alright in the end. It had been nothing more than that. Hope.
Her eyes followed a dark figure as it moved across the courtyard and headed toward the palace. Something looked familiar about it. Standing up and focusing on the figure, Taja realized it was the stranger from yesterday. She moved to the bars leading outside and watched his movements. His steps were certain as he headed to the palace door. It was dark, but there was no doubt about who it was. She had never seen anyone with such a gait before, more like a tame animal than a noble man. The way he moved was too graceful and effortless to be that of a normal person.
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Tia’s Mate
By: Dalia Wright
Prologue:
Blood. Blood, everywhere. Hands swimming in it, the floor saturated with the iron tang of rusting death. It clings to his pants and shoelaces, finding all the impossible places, making him feel as if he would never be clean again. The boy wants to be anywhere but here. The mocking eyes of his father watch him as he backs into the corner, away from the male corpse splayed out on the floor, head turned toward the boy with eyes like clouded green glass.
“Come on, boy,” his father urges, mouth twisted like a grinning demon. “How are you gonna learn to like the taste if you’re too scared to take the first step?”
The boy shakes his head, shivering. That man with the empty green eyes, he had been alive only moments before. “He was alive. I spoke to him. He was scared.”
“And now he’s dead. Useless whelp,” his father snarls, yellow eyes gleaming as his son turns away. He strides up in a swoop of malice, and seizes the trembling boy by the cuff of his neck, shoving his face into the pooling blood of the freshly killed human. “Eat!” A manic expression enters his father’s face. His fingernails lengthen, his canines become that little bit longer. Passion is leaking, the emotions manifesting in physical form.
The boy trembles and cries, as he is forced to bring his mouth to the dead man, and tear into his skin, resisting the urge to retch the whole time.
Chapter One
Tia locked gazes with a man across the bar. He was sprawled out on a black leather stool in a white shirt and blue jeans, not dressed to kill, but as if he had rolled out of work and walked straight in. In the orange light, under tufted, messy, iron-gray hair, protruded amber eyes, which made Tia blink, and investigate the odd combination of color. She contemplated whether he was faking the whole appearance, with contacts rammed over his irises and hair dyed in the rebel manner of teenagers acting out against their bonds. She estimated his age to hover around the thirty mark, noted the casual button shirt, still trying to figure out if she found him handsome or pretentious.
Certainly, there was something there, brooding under the fathomless features. Despite the much hotter women to his left, baring a scandalous amount of flesh, he focused only on Tia Winters.
The lights in the bar deepened to a violent red, and heavy rock music blared out the overhead speakers. Those already on the dance floor spasmed faster to the beat of the music, and others pushed past Tia and Anna in a scream of noise and laughter, all deciding at once to grind their sweating, heat trapped bodies on the floor. One man spilled his foaming yellow drink on someone who had no right to the amount of muscle on his broad-shouldered frame. It made Tia think of the image of a gorilla in a suit, and the image brought a
smirk to her face. The larger, bald man proceeded to beat the absolute shit out of the drink-spiller, which drew her attention away from the stranger with the unusual colorings, and a face smeared crimson by splotched lighting.
Anna watched as well, and tapped Tia’s drink closer to the edge of the table, prompting her to pick it up. “Hey, Tia. Totally saw you checking out the fake hair dude over there,” she stated, slurping her drink in a manner that would make Tia’s father turn in his alcohol-soaked grave. “You could do worse. Gonna try for him?”
Tia shrugged casual dismissal, and ran a hand through her thick dark hair. “I probably won’t.”
“Why not?” Anna asked, genuinely curious. Of course, they both had come here for one thing and one thing only – the chance to get lucky. Anna had recently broken up with her boyfriend and had been practically clawing at Tia to be the honorary wing-woman – though she didn’t have anyone trapped in her sights. Any man would do, as long as they were reasonably good-looking and could form sentences longer than three syllables.
Tia preferred keeping it simple. She was quite the fan of an uncomplicated life, though Anna argued it was because Tia hadn’t met the right man, or she tended to scare people away with dead baby jokes. Tia conceded she was probably right on that score, but still thought anything could be funny in the right context. In the seedy haze of the nightclub, Tia examined her blonde-haired friend, who hid a depressed mind under mascara and a wide smile. Although she insisted she was here to get Tia out of the house, in truth, Tia was here for Anna, to make sure she didn’t do anything stupid, or hook up with the wrong sort of guy. She considered it friendly and saintly duties.
“Well,” Anna said, once more slurping at her drink, “he’s coming over. If you don’t go for it, I will.”
“Fine,” Tia said, rolling her eyes, but feeling a thrill of excitement course inside. “Since I did the soul-searching eye exchange, I’ll deal with him.” What Tia had to look forward to back home was a cold apartment, where she was stuck within the crumbling walls of a place for which she barely made the rent every month from hour-based retail work. She had the independence, but it went hand in hand with a smash of loneliness. Prices had to be paid.
The gray-haired man weaved through the thong of people fishing for new drinks from the bar and up to Tia and Anna. Paying little regard to Anna, he examined Tia with those peculiar amber eyes. He smiled wolfishly, pulling Tia’s attention in further, finding the expression mesmerizing on a level. Anna, of course, flicked back her blonde hair and puffed out her substantial chest, but he continued to ignore her.
Eventually, Tia cleared her throat. “Are you going to introduce yourself or stand there awkwardly?” She plumped some sass in there, with a healthy dose of eyebrow raising.
His lips curled at the corners, revealing jagged canines. “Danny. And you?” He slid into a spare seat by the women. Anna glowered, a little put out, though true to her nature, she gave Tia a wink, before scouring the crowd for any other potential men to hook up with.
“Tia.” When he reached out a hand to shake, Tia took it. She noticed that his nostrils were flared, every now and then making sharp inhales, as if absorbing the scent of everything around. Several questions sprang to mind. “Is that hair for real or are you just a fan of the color?” she asked, not sure if she would believe him, even if he said yes.
“Real. So are the eyes,” he confirmed, before politely enquiring for Anna’s name as well. Tia liked the sound of his voice, a musical baritone with a hint of gruffness to it. She liked the way he looked at her, attention flickering from top to bottom, the fascination shown in his leaning forward body language, though she couldn’t exactly tell why. There were plenty of other choices, and far more attractive women willing to give everything in a night. Maybe he appreciated the way Tia wasn’t trying to thrust her breasts into his face, like Anna preferred in her man-snaring methods. Or perhaps it was because of Tia’s charming personality. Of course, sometimes Tia could do with some extra lessons, and with less inappropriately-timed jokes, but she wasn’t about to turn the guy away at a whim. Shivers rippled through her spine at the presence of him and the strong, pine needle scent emanating from his skin. She detected a kind of field around him, something that naturally attracted and repelled at the same time. It was hard to describe how it worked or felt, only that Tia knew that there was something about him scratching at her subconscious. The eyes, though they crinkled at the corners just right, seemed cold and apathetic, even as he flirted and smiled.
Danger, Tia thought. The primal instincts of her brain stirred. This man reeks of danger.
“I can’t place your accent,” Tia continued, shortly after the man had seized drinks from the bar to share with her. Anna, at this point, with a hug and a whisper in her ear to stay safe and enjoy the romp, had advanced onto the dancefloor, under the neon lights, joining the grinding mass. “But, then again, what would I know about accents? I’ve never even made it out of the state of Virginia.”
“Really?” Danny acted surprised. The drink of choice was something Tia had never tried before, and it sported a strong, cherry aftertaste.
“Never.”
“You’re missing out, then! There’s an entire planet with amazing things and people. Some people, not so much. Is normal, though. Depends on the places you pick.” He drank a long draught of his drink. “This is Belgian beer. Cherry flavored. Belgium is quite famous for it. I went to Bruges, once. Magnificent city. If you ever travel, I recommend you go there. I can show you pictures on my phone…” He started thumbing through his cellphone, making Tia smile as he gestured for her to peer over his shoulder at the glitter of buildings and lights. Most of the designs made her think of the gingerbread house from Hansel and Gretel, as they held that same, edible look. Despite the initial reservations she had about him and the cold glint of his eyes, she liked how emphatically he talked about the places he had seen, insisting she shouldn’t limit herself. He put his phone away, not wanting to be attached to it or miss out talking to her. He eventually admitted that he came from Bulgaria – a place Tia had only ever thought about when it was mentioned as a Quidditch team in Harry Potter.
Maybe I was mistaken about the danger. Or maybe I wasn’t. She kept on the cautious mask, in the meanwhile switching between her conversation with the charming Danny and making sure Anna wasn’t making a fool out of herself. Thankfully, her best friend was not snogging the face off anyone yet, and had instead fallen in what appeared to be an engaging discussion between her and a short-haired girl with high cheekbones and pixie-like curves.
“Do you think I’m ignorant for never having traveled, Danny?” Tia bombed the question. In his place, she thought she would, but she wanted to know his response.
“Well…” Danny gave a shrug. “Yes. I think those who do not see the world limit their minds. But that is not to say I haven’t seen travelers with closed thoughts as well. But, is more likely. So why? Why stay in one place?”
The honesty was refreshing. It prompted Tia further, down the path she felt most comfortable with, but what Anna insisted was terrible social manners. Tia didn’t think her manner uncomfortable. She just preferred honesty. More honesty than strictly necessary, perhaps, but Tia strongly believed the world would be a much better place if people admitted to things more often.
“My mom’s a druggie, my dad was an alkie, and my brother’s the biggest redneck you could ever imagine. Let’s just say that between them, I had to grow up pretty fast and snag myself a job so I could move the hell out. I’ve just honestly not given the outside world long enough thought past working my job, scouring the internet at home, and dealing with my best friend over there.” Tia jerked her thumb at Anna, who was now laughing uproariously with the short-haired woman.
The Bulgarian took a moment to process the words, before nodding. “Bad parents.”
“Mm. Happens. Not much we can do about it growing up. They’re everything, you know.”
The ghost of an expressi
on flitted over Danny’s face. “Yes. We unconditionally love our parents.”
“That’s right. We don’t see what’s wrong. And if there is something wrong, we don’t understand it. It’s only later we have a choice. You can’t always help what happens to you. You can choose how it defines you later. And I,” Tia announced proudly, taking another sip of the cherry beer, “do not let it define me as a victim. Simple.”
Danny nodded along to her words, apparently rapt. Hastily, he raised his drink. “Good thinking. I must say, I find you a little more interesting than expected. Is not so often to hear this for me. Is almost a shame you have not given thought to travel.” He glanced down to the pocket where his cellphone buzzed. After a moment’s hesitation, his eyes shifted into a glint of resolve. “You should explore the world. You really should. You will have time. Maybe,” he said with a soft smile, “you ever want to come to Europe, you can call my number. I show you the best places.”
Tia sensed a dismissal in his words. “Are you going?” Disappointment flooded her. Anna was right. She shouldn’t have just launched into the topic and presented her views on attitude so soon. But honesty mattered. It always mattered. However, she wasn’t entirely sure if he was planning to depart because of her forwardness or not.
“Yes. But not because of you. Because,” he pointed at his cellphone, tucked away in his pocket, “someone is waiting for me. They have texted. I give you my number, though. I would like to talk to you again. If okay?”
“Sure.” The disappointment twanged, even in spite of the offering he gave her. She didn’t want the man with the amber eyes to vanish from sight, or to lose the earthy, pine scent of his body, which relaxed and aroused her at the same time. She would have seriously considered accepting if he offered the invite to go somewhere a little more private. His pale skin, and the eyes that had turned from cold agates to something more malleable and soft, shone regret as he stood up, her number secure in his cellphone.
