by Michele Hauf
“I’ve been friends with the women who work with me for years,” she continued, “so it was a natural progression to open the place and share our passion with the public. Mireio is the master brewer, although I formulate a lot of the beers for her. Valor is the muscle who likes to haul bags of grain and mill it, and she’s also our promotion guru. And Geneva is our good luck goddess. She’s out of the country at the moment. On holiday with her latest billionaire.”
“Her latest?”
“She doesn’t like to settle in with anyone. Just hang out long enough to have some fun. We’re all very young. Relationships should be fun and easy and not too serious, don’t you agree?”
“I do. But what if you meet the one? You do believe there is one out there for you?”
“Of course, I dream about him all the time. Oh.” She pressed her lips together. “That wasn’t for sharing.”
“Does this dream lover have a name?”
“No. Not even a face.”
Dane gaped at her.
“Not like that. He has a face. I just never see it in the dream. Okay, fine. I’ve confessed I’m a witch, so I might as well roll out all my strange secrets and really chase you away.”
He touched her hand and she curled her fingers into her palm, but he wouldn’t let go. He didn’t want to. “It will take a lot to send me fleeing from you. I promise. I do have an open mind, much as you might believe otherwise. I always listen to both sides, research, check stats and perform tests, before coming to conclusions.”
“That’s so not sexy.”
He smirked. “I realized that the moment it came out of my mouth. But it is my truth.”
“I get that.”
“So what, beyond being a witch, is your strange secret?”
She huffed out a sigh. “I dream about a great love I once had and lost. You know, in my past lives. I feel as though someday I’ll see him again. Recognize him. Like...”
“Like?” He bowed his head to catch her straying gaze. She was telling him something she didn’t ordinarily share with others; he sensed that. So he didn’t want her to clam up. And if he were to form an opinion about this woman, he must get all the details. It wouldn’t be fair to her to make a judgment based on a few pagan symbols he’d found in her home. “How will you recognize this man if you’ve never seen his face?”
“My soul will know his,” she said. She suddenly clasped his hand and stared hard at him. “Dane?”
“Yes?”
“Do you...” She tilted her head. Her eyes were ever so blue. An ice queen’s prize. “Well, I know you don’t. As you’ve already said, you believe we all come to this earth for just the one lifetime. Death takes us. Nothing more.”
“Exactly. Why would there be anything else?”
“For the very reason that we have much to learn—or rather remember—and it takes more than one mortal lifetime to do so. Have you ever wondered, though? I mean, just for a moment?”
“About life after death? Never.” Dane sat back, baffled over her sudden intensity. He’d asked her how she would recognize the man in her dreams and she’d looked at him as though—no. She couldn’t possibly believe that. He was no woman’s dream man. And he did not believe in reincarnation, so that ended any possibility that her lost love could be him. It was simply a wish for a man who could sweep her off her feet and into happily-ever-after.
But he couldn’t help but wish they did have a deeper connection.
“I believe,” Eryss said with quiet confidence, “and that’s all that matters to me.”
“So these visions you have...is this to do with the nightmare that woke you this morning?”
“No. I’m not sure. I certainly hope not. That man—you couldn’t possibly be him.”
He really didn’t want to know.
Maybe a little.
All right, fine, he needed to know. “Him?”
“I suspect you haven’t a mean bone in your body,” Eryss said with a strange note of hope in her voice.
“Mean? I think I’ve fallen off this conversational track, Eryss. Weren’t you talking about soul mates?”
“Sorry. Yes, in the one dream, it’s my soul mate. But in the nightmare I had this morning...oh, I’m rambling. And you don’t need to hear this. I’ll figure it out.”
A sudden gust of wind rattled the window in its frame.
Eryss shrugged when Dane looked to her with raised brows. “Storm is coming. I forgot to close the garage door. Do you want to park your rental inside? There’s another space. You probably should. It’s going to get cold tonight.”
Colder than the icebox this state already was?
“Uh, sure.” She’d abandoned the conversation thread too quickly. Had he been cruel to dispute her beliefs? He didn’t think so.
“Give me the keys,” she said. “I’ll run out quick and do it.”
“I can do it.”
“I want to shovel the walk from the garage to the house while I’m at it. Keep ahead of the storm. And I need to check the gas in the snowblower. I suspect I’ll be blowing snow in the morning.”
“Uh.” Dane raised a finger. “Man in the house here. I could do that for you. Besides, I rather enjoy playing with the snowblower.”
“Okay.” Then with a wince she asked, “Are you in or out for the night?”
“Which do you prefer?” he countered.
“In. But I don’t want you to feel obligated to stay with a person you can’t understand.”
“Religion, or lack of it, should never be the wedge that separates two interested parties.”
“It’s a lifestyle, not a religion. Witch.” She pointed at her chest as she stood, then carried the dishes to the sink. “If you’re in, you’re in. If not, I won’t feel bad if you drive away.”
“Really? I was hoping you would feel something if I decided to leave.”
“Oh, I would. I mean—screw this talking around the subject. I want you to stay the night, Dane.”
“Then it’s settled.” He grabbed the garage keys from the copper bowl. “I’ll drive the rental car into the garage, then check the gas in the snowblower. Afterward, I challenge you to a snowball fight.”
“Is that so?”
“Yeah. And I’d say your odds of winning are quite good, matched against this surfer guy.”
Chapter 8
By the time Dane pulled the rental car into the garage, the sky had begun to toss down light, fluffy flakes. Eryss had walked around the side of the garage, disappearing from view. She wore only a coat and boots, thin gloves and a light scarf. Minnesota woman. He did respect her resilience.
As he got out of the car in the garage, he pulled up the wool coat collar to his chin and shivered, then clapped his gloved hands together. He knew he’d never experienced this kind of bone-deep cold while surfing the fifty-degree waters.
A quick check to the snowblower’s gas gauge confirmed the shiny red machine was ready for further adventure in the morning. Did he really like the girl that much that he’d suffer the frigid cold so he could get a little snuggle time?
“Yes,” he confirmed out loud.
But what about the witch thing? He really needed to address that. Was she completely delusional, or had she actually been born a witch?
Either way, he wasn’t going to like the answer. How to deal with a real witch? But did he have to deal with her? This was not a job. And besides, Agency workers didn’t approach paranormals in a confrontational manner. They simply made sure none were out to cause innocents harm, and judged the situation as either safe or possibly volatile. From there, decisions were made. Sometimes the Order of the Stake was called in to handle violent vampires. But Dane had no clue what the protocol was for witches.
On the other hand, no proof had been put forth.
“Kitchen witch,” he muttered, and left it at that.
He walked outside and spied Eryss with her arms spread out and head tilted back. Big, fluffy flakes landed in her hair and on her face. And he forgot a
ny worries he’d just been considering.
She motioned for him to join her. “Like this.” She leaned back and stuck out her tongue.
Dane closed his eyes and tilted his head, mimicking her.
“You have to look,” she said with a giggle. “It’s a trick, knowing when to close your eyes and when to keep them open.”
It took a few seconds for him to catch a snowflake. It melted instantly across his tongue. “Ah! Got one!” He pumped a fist, then swung around and swept her into his arms. “I know when to close my eyes.” He held eye contact until their noses touched, then he closed them and his cool lips met hers.
And winter was swept away as her body warmed his shivering bones. While snowflakes melted on their hair and cheeks, Eryss’s kiss melted Dane’s reticence about engaging with a possible witch. She pulled him closer and hugged him. His deep growl, without breaking the kiss, urged her to seek more. Their tongues dancing, she hiked up a leg and he caught it with his hand. And...they toppled, and landed in a thick coating of fresh snow.
“Sorry,” he said against her cheek. “I didn’t calculate the angle of two bodies swaying in bliss to the instability of the snow cover.”
“Stop being a scientist and start making a snow angel.” She rolled away from him and swept the snowy ground with her arms and legs.
“I can do that,” he said decisively. After rolling a few feet in the other direction, with his head pointed toward hers, he began to do the same. “These are the only kinds of angels that exist, you know!”
“Dane!”
Right. He was not trying to debunk angels.
“Sorry! Not being a scientist right now. Just being a guy. A guy who is freezing his ass off lying in the snow trying to impress a girl.”
Her face appeared above his head and she smiled upside down. “You’re not doing a very good job. Your angel’s left wing is crooked.”
“Don’t judge the disabled.” He cracked a smirk and she swatted loose snow onto his face. The ice crystals stung and then immediately melted. He reached for her head upside down, and bracketed her cheeks. “Answer me this one.”
“What?”
“Tell me why you live in a place where the air hurts your face.” And on a whim, he raised his left arm and blasted her in the face with a fluffy ball of snow.
Eryss gasped and then backed away. “Oh yeah? Guess it’s time to teach surfer guy how to lose in the battle of the Snowmageddon.”
Dane stood up from the angel as Eryss bent to scoop up some snow. He thought he’d made a reasonably good one. And since angels did not exist, it could look however he made it. Opening his mouth to correct her assessment of his creativity, he got a mouthful of snow.
“Yes!” Eryss pumped her fist and scampered off into the yard beside the conservatory, bending to scoop up more fresh-fallen snow.
The next snowball just missed his head. He saw that one coming and managed to dodge it. He flung his own ball toward Eryss, but without aiming. She laughed as it landed five feet in front of her, a dysfunctional missile. He shrugged and grinned.
“Listen,” she said suddenly. The snow queen closed her eyes and tilted her head again, lustrous chestnut hair falling over the scarf and down her back.
Dane studied her as she listened—he didn’t hear anything—and observed snowflakes falling softly in her dark hair. Melting in tears down her cheeks and kissing her mouth more reverently than he could imagine doing himself.
Please let her be normal. Not delusional.
He cast his gaze around her yard, but didn’t spy squirrels or anything that could make a noise. “I don’t hear anything.”
“Exactly.” She opened her eyes with a wide smile. “The exquisite quiet of a snowfall. Isn’t it the greatest thing ever?”
Now Dane closed his eyes, focused on the fall of cool flakes hitting his face and realized there was no sound. Scientifically, he knew the snowflakes were getting in the way of the sound waves, scattering them so that less sound reached their ears. Also, the snow absorbed sound. And yet he felt as if he stood in his own world. With Eryss.
When he turned his head to agree how great it was, she stood next to him. He saw the kiss coming half a second before it landed on his mouth.
She wrapped both legs about his hips and he carried her up the side steps without breaking the hot, heady connection between them. He crushed her against the door and moved the kiss to the edge of her mouth. He licked away a melted snowflake with a dash of his tongue. “You taste like winter and wine.”
He playfully nipped the edge of her jaw, then tugged aside her scarf to kiss her neck. “We could make out here in the storm,” he said, “but I sense we’d melt a hole right through to the grass for the heat we’re generating.”
“Take me inside, lover.”
He opened the door and strode through, stomping his shoes clean of snow without setting her down. Eryss kicked off her boots and let them drop, and he followed suit. Then he angled them both through the kitchen and toward the stairway. “Conservatory or the bedroom?”
“Upstairs!” she said with a giggling laugh, and he took the steps in a bound, clutching her to him for the bouncing ascent. “You’re so strong.”
“You weigh very little. And we’ve asserted that I work out. Any more obvious facts you want to point out?”
“Only that that was a sarcastic way of calling me an idiot.”
“No. Ah.” He paused before her closed bedroom door, setting her down. Eryss let her shoulders relax against the wall. “I’m sorry. The guys I work with are so...it’s a work thing. Scientists battling for king of the lab.”
“I bet you’re king a lot.”
“Not so often as I care to be, but on occasion, yes. Would you forgive my cruel words if I did this?” After tugging off her scarf and dropping it to the floor, he opened her coat and kissed his way to her breasts.
“Forgiveness is yours,” she cooed as he kissed her through her dress and gently bit her nipple. “But I’ll be even more forgiving when we get all these clothes off.”
She backed away from him, drawing her dress down her shoulders and slipping it off. The red tights followed just as quickly. The woman was not into bras or panties, and he was just fine with that. Shedding his shirt and unbuttoning his pants, he quickly disrobed to his skivvies and swept the naked seductress into his arms once more and walked her into the bedroom.
“Whew! You’re still cold.” He bent to lick her rock-hard nipple. “Do I make you hard?”
“You do. And soft. And hot. And—” she lashed her tongue along his jaw “—wet. Strip off your boxers and let me warm up that hard-on, yes?”
He shoved down his boxers as he set her on the bed. Eryss quickly grabbed him by the cock, and while astonished she was in such a hurry, he was also eager to sink himself deep inside her heat. So when she directed him there, they both groaned in pleasure, and he bowed his head to her shoulder.
“I am at your mercy, Ice Queen.”
Chapter 9
Dane rolled over, his arm sliding off the side of the bed. He smiled at Eryss, a dreamy, sex-satisfied grin that twinkled in his eyes thanks to the candlelight.
“What?” she asked.
“Everything,” he said. And then he turned his head away from her, as if that was all he was willing to offer.
Not “nothing” but “everything.” She wanted to ask him more. But it didn’t matter. She felt the same. Everything about the man was awesome. He was sexy, handsome, kind, generous, smart, even accepting of her being a witch. (Though he didn’t believe it for a second; she knew that.)
What was wrong with Dane Winthur?
Not a thing. And even when a little voice in her head that sounded a lot like Mireio suggested that he could be a witch hunter, Eryss shoved it away in disbelief. Not this too-perfect man. If anything, he was her long-lost love. She had found him. They had a future to explore together.
And then the dreaded thought that he was leaving in a few days shot her down from the h
igh. She rolled to her back, trailing her fingers along his arm and to his buttocks, where she tapped lightly. How to keep him here longer? Did she want to do that?
What kind of vindictive luck had delivered her the first man she’d really connected with in a long time and...he was just passing through?
And yet her soul did recognize him. She hadn’t wanted to explain that one to him over supper. But she knew, with her very soul, that he was that long-lost love. She’d never felt this way with a man before. As if they’d simply fallen back into one another’s arms after being away for a short absence.
Just because Dane didn’t believe in reincarnation didn’t mean it hadn’t occurred for him, as well. How had they lost one another in previous lives? Was there a way for him to tap into his soul and experience the same recognition she did? If she could recognize him, he could surely do the same.
Of course, she believed. That was Dane’s main obstacle.
He leaned over the side of the bed and picked up something from the floor. “What’s this? Is it a decorative thing? It’s so delicate.”
He rolled over to show her the crystal blade she’d left sitting out after cleansing the bedroom during the new moon. Normally she tucked it away in the nightstand. How it had gotten on the floor was beyond her. Well, she hadn’t been using the most logical side of her brain since she’d met Dane, that was for sure.
“It’s not decorative.” She took it from him. The leather-bound hilt warmed instantly in her grip. “It’s a real weapon. I like to...keep some means of protection close. I am a single woman living alone.”
“Sure, but...the blade is crystal. That hardly seems a useful weapon to me.”
“Surely in your line of work you must have come across crystal weapons?”
“I have. Once even a three-foot-long blade. But it was decorative. What sort of weapon would that serve as? Is it even sharp?” He shook his head. “The things they make these days to appeal to female consumers.”
“I didn’t buy it as a decoration, Dane.” Eryss turned the blade to point upward. “It was given to me by Mrs. McAlister, the neighbor I told you about who was virtually a second mother to me. She used it as an athame.”
