Melt My Heart: A Valentine's Day Collection

by Rachel Cross

  Maybe he’d made a mistake this time. Maybe Calvin was someone else’s—someone with a high tolerance of inflated senses of self-importance.

  “We haven’t made love. We haven’t had sex. We haven’t screwed. We don’t have a shared offspring, if that’s what you’re getting at. And I don’t want your money!”

  For that matter, she wasn’t sure she wanted him. Her brain was waving little mental warning flags, though her heart didn’t seem particularly put off by The Douche.

  As if she could trust her heart. Hearts got people in trouble all the time. Maybe the cult leader Martin Davis was right about that.

  “Then pardon my candor, honey, but what do you want?”

  She opened her mouth and he wagged his index finger.

  “Nuh-uh-uh. Give it to me honest. Who are you, and what do you want from me?”

  An indelicate sound, that had never escaped her body before, rattled her chest. A growl. She was so frustrated she could throw something. Fortunately, there was nothing handy that would fly right besides that sticky dishrag. Not that her aim was any good. Suspected tomboys back at the compound got put in the queue for reprogramming.

  “You want honest?” she asked through clenched teeth, and she met his hard stare. She wasn’t afraid of him. She wasn’t going to let this man bowl her over and kill what was left of her spirit. Screw what Claude had said about not scaring the guy off until after the wards were in place.

  She’d had it. She didn’t have to stay anywhere where she wasn’t wanted, and where she wouldn’t be treasured. She would hold out until someone wanted her and would treasure her even if it meant she had to run from demons and angels alike because they didn’t know which side she was on.

  She was both, but neither: a human with some annoying supernatural contributions.

  “I’ll give you the honest truth,” she said. She strode to the living door and didn’t speak again until she was staring at the woods through the glass door. She couldn’t see the driveway from where she stood, and certainly not the road, but she’d hoped her brothers were still down there just in case she needed a ride out of Appalachia. It was a long walk back to civilization, and she was underdressed for it. She hadn’t needed a down coat back in Arizona.

  “I was raised in a cult in the Arizona desert. I recently left it when I was assigned to be some old man’s wife. My mother is borderline insane and the descendent of a nephilim. My father—my real father—is a fallen angel named Gulielmus who’s now a powerful incubus. There are lots of people like me. Cambions. Demon spawn. I’m meant to be a succubus, but I don’t want that, so not only am I running from my human stepfather who has to report to his cult leader, but also my demon father, who apparently reports to Satan. My half-brothers brought me here because demons are blind to this spot, and my brother Charles swears you’re supposed to be my match.”

  Calvin said nothing. Just stared at her, unblinking, for several long moments.

  “For the record, I think he’s wrong.”

  • • •

  Do what, now?

  Calvin was pretty sure she said demon spawn, but maybe he’d heard her wrong. “Demon spawn” was what the Arizona Desert Devil baseball team’s fans called themselves. Maybe his dingbat wolf, who was pressing at all Calvin’s psychic seams for want of his attention, was distracting him so badly he couldn’t think straight. His wolf didn’t care if she was crazy. That was the human’s hang-up.

  Her expression was as blank as the white paint in the guest bedroom he hadn’t let his mama loose in yet.

  Julia was being serious, apparently. Well, demons didn’t exist, and neither did vampires, contrary to what the CW Network would have young girls believe.

  He swallowed and put his hands up, palms-out, in a calming gesture. “Lady, I think you might need help,” Calvin said finally. “Is there somebody you want me to call? Maybe the institution you walked out of without signing out? I doubt they’d let you go if they knew what kind of stuff you’re spewing. I knew my luck had to give out soon. Figured I’d be okay holed up like this, never seeing the public, but I guess The Fates are getting their goddamned chuckles by sending trouble right to my front door. Naturally, trouble would have to look like a fantasy come to life, huh?”

  “You don’t believe me.”

  “King Arthur wouldn’t believe you, and you know what kind of company he kept.”

  She just looked at him blankly. Guess there wasn’t a lot of secular reading material at the cult. Then her face crumpled, her shoulders slumped and her face kind of crumpled. Damn it. She was even gorgeous when she was about to cry. Calvin felt his resolve slipping. Julia sniffed wetly, but set her shoulders and raised her chin. “Okay. Fine.” She reached for her bag, and took several tentative steps back to the door.

  “Wait!” Damn it.

  She paused.

  This was crazy. This was certifiably nuts. But there was something about this girl. Before he knew it, the words were tumbling past his lips.

  “You’re hired.”

  Something was seriously wrong with him.

  Chapter Four

  Julia worried the collar of her borrowed flannel overshirt and stared at the computer screen.

  Two weeks, and they kept coming back around to this. The first time Calvin had tried to introduce her to the device, she’d accidentally uninstalled his security camera software. The second time, she’d tried to use a web browser and had put in some benign search phrase, only to end up in an endless loop of pornographic pop-ups.

  Mortified, she’d called out to Calvin for help, and he’d come in, leaned onto the back of the chair, and muttered, “Lord have mercy, she’s flexible, isn’t she?” He’d laughed, and after getting rid of all the windows, he’d teased, “Doing research?”

  Her face had burned so hot, her ears popped.

  Here she was again, tasked with answering Calvin’s fan mail, and she couldn’t even remember how to access the messages.

  The computer she’d used once or twice back at the compound was a big plastic thing that took up half a desk, and it only had two functions. One was for the bookkeepers to track supplies and family allotments in the clunky spreadsheet program. The other was to screen brainwashing videos to the occasional wayward devotee.

  Julia had been one of those wayward devotees once. Technically, she’d been caught with her skirt hiked up and her legs wrapped around the thighs of the milk delivery driver.

  She’d been twenty then, and still dependent on the leader’s largesse to make her a match. Even if he had found someone for her then, no doubt it would’ve been someone old and gross and she would have just run off sooner, with or without her brothers’ help. The milkman, Loren, had been practically a cliché—tall, dark and handsome—and he’d been flirting with her for months. He was so patient. Sweet, even.

  He’d stirred things in her she’d always been taught not to stoke. He was young, worldly, vital, and he’d looked at her out of all the others. Naturally, she’d been flattered. Young men at the compound usually were sent away like John had been when they became a threat to the middle-aged set. Julia had tried to avoid Loren at first, but how long was she supposed to accept not being looked at that way—not being touched when she wanted it? By whomever she wanted to be doing the touching? What the hell did people expect? Seemed like a basic human need to her, but the cult had preached that she should err on the side of caution and covet nothing. Well, sometimes the line between needs and wants blurred.

  After that, they’d tried to reprogram her, but she was immune to that stuff. She’d always been a secret skeptic, unlike her vocal brother John. She, however, had had no choice but to toe the line, because she was just a woman with no education. If she were thrown out, who would want her? Who’d hire her?

  No one.

  She blew out a breath and let her gaze drift to the framed picture next to the computer.

  A trio of baseball players in pinstriped uniforms embraced and mugged for the camera. Calvin, at th
e far right, looked to be in his early twenties. The good looks were there, but the weariness that now resided at the corners of his eyes hadn’t settled in yet. She didn’t understand the man one bit, but really, she didn’t see all that much of him. Sometimes, she had to track him down to ask him to give her something to do—anything to do. She was going stir-crazy, and couldn’t even risk stepping off the porch for fear her brothers weren’t done burying the additional mojo bags.

  Calvin would give her some small thing to do, like organizing his socks, and then he’d disappear into the woods to throw baseballs. She spent most nights curled up on the guestroom bed, scrolling through the cable television offerings and trying to make sense of the world she’d never known.

  What had made Calvin so tired? He couldn’t possibly want for anything, living in a place so grand. The house she’d lived in back in the compound had been large, but her stepfather had a merry-go-round of wives to shelter. Besides, that place had been no-frills and uncomfortable. Didn’t even have plumbed bathrooms.

  Did he miss baseball, maybe? His friends?

  Did he even have friends? None had certainly come by since she’d been there.

  She pulled the frame closer and tipped it back to remove the glare. His number was 28. He played for some team called the Land Sharks.

  Maybe good-looking was an understatement. He’d, literally, taken her breath away when he opened his front door. He was nearly sinful to look at. His hair was so dark it was nearly black, and he wore it a little long, but not nearly as long as Charles. (Her brother should have bought stock in ponytail elastics.) Calvin had marvelous hazel eyes, though one looked a little darker than the other; that’s why she’d stared that day on the porch. His lips always seemed to be on the cusp of either a grin or a smirk, and she wasn’t sure which she liked more. Even if he was teasing her, it was okay, because it meant he’d smile.

  Forgetting the fan mail, she tapped the right arrow key and moved the cursor until a folder named PHOTOS highlighted. She wanted to see more Calvin—wanted a chance to stare at him, memorize him, without one of those dark eyebrows arching up at her. She was about to press the enter key when Calvin stepped into the office doorway and crossed his arms.

  She dropped her hands to her lap guiltily.

  “If you want to go shopping or something, get you some shirts that don’t have Calvin Wolff taint, I can call you a cab.”

  She looked down at the red and blue plaid and hooked her fingers beneath the hem. She’d been wearing it over her blouses and dresses pretty much everyday because it was warm. Seemed part of her uniform now, and she’d be sad to give it up even if it didn’t smell like Calvin anymore. “You want your shirt back?”

  “I’ve got lots of shirts. Clean ones, too, thanks to you. You don’t need to iron them, by the way.” He stepped into the room, leisurely, and stuffed his hands into his jeans pockets. “Ironing’s for fancy people.”

  “I iron my clothes.”

  He nodded. “Fancy.”

  “Fancy and insane?”

  The slow smile that had been spreading on his lips faltered.

  “I-I guess I can’t blame you. Sounds crazy, right? Succubus?” She thought maybe he’d soften to the idea a bit if she made it a joke. Neither of them had broached the topic in two weeks, but to Julia, it’d always felt like the elephant in the room.

  He nodded again, and hooked a thumb toward the living room. “Why don’t you take a break? Bloodsport is on. Everyone should see it once.”

  “I ain’t your pal, dickface.”

  He raised both of those expressive eyebrows. “You’ve already seen it?”

  “It came on my favorite channel last night, last thing before the infomercials started.”

  “Infomercials start at 3:00 a.m.”

  She shrugged.

  “Can’t sleep?”

  How could she, when every time she closed her eyes, her thoughts flooded with Calvin?

  He eased around to the back of the desk and leaned his butt against the edge. “Haven’t been sleeping so great, myself.”

  She knew. She’d heard the tossing and turning across the hall. The pacing.

  “Almost forgot. Package came for you. It’s on the table with the rest of today’s mail.”

  Finally! Claude had said he was going to get her some protective charms, so maybe that was it. She pushed back from the desk and stood. She’d taken one step toward the door when Calvin reached his arms around her waist and pulled her in close.

  Her breath seized as she scanned up his chest to the eyes that seemed to take on an unusual yellow cast all of a sudden.

  People didn’t come with eyes that color, but maybe demons did. If Claude could have red, why couldn’t …

  She thought her heart was going to pound right out of her chest. No. He can’t be. I would know it if he were, wouldn’t I?

  That would certainly explain all the spine prickling and goosebumps when he was near. Maybe he was hiding from someone, too.

  “Why do you wear your hair like that?”

  His deep voice was like a clarion, pulling her free of her thoughts. Her hand went to her braided bun and patted it. “My hair?”

  “Mm-hmm. Style is out of place in the current century.”

  “You don’t like it?”

  He worked his fingers into her bun and pulled pin after pin until her heavy braid fell to her rear. Then he went to work loosing the other braid.

  Guess that meant no.

  “Back at the compound, when girls turn a certain age, we had to put our hair up so we didn’t scandalize the old men.”

  He spilled the stolen bobby pins onto the desk and fixed her in his golden stare. “See any old men here, honey?”

  She couldn’t speak. She was absolutely pinned in his gaze as he separated her plaits, seduced by his large, but gentle, fingers arranging her just so. The fact that he had a preference about her looks at all made her face burn hot. “No. No old men here.”

  That sound came from his throat—the one she’d thought was just his tic, a need to constantly clear his throat, but being up close she realized now it wasn’t that. It was more like a growl, but things that growled didn’t look at people with such tenderness. Things that growled generally wanted to eat you.

  He dragged his thumb pads lightly along her jaw and tipped her chin up. “You gotta work a lot harder to scandalize me.”

  “Okay. I’ll work har—”

  His lips against hers muffled her words.

  She stood there, eyes wide, with her toes rooted to the floor unmoving for a few seconds, and then he tightened his hold on her. Deepened his kiss.

  She closed her eyes, and was overcome by the symphony of sensations. His tongue tasted of black coffee. His clothes and skin smelled of the woods he kept escaping into. He held one hand at the back of her head and the other on her ass, holding her just where he wanted her, so close to him she couldn’t help but wonder if she’d scandalized him after all.

  No old men, here.

  She gasped when his sharp teeth nipped at her bottom lip, not from pain, but pleasure. Still, he took a step back, his eyes had gone back to their familiar hazel, and his expression was penitent.

  “Calvin—”

  He took another step back. “That won’t happen again. I promise.”

  Well, she wasn’t going to pretend it didn’t happen. She liked being in Calvin Wolff’s embrace. She’d felt safe, and wanted. More importantly, she’d wanted him, too. She’d never wanted anyone as much.

  Charles had been right.

  Calvin strode from the room without looking back. The front door slammed, and she was at the window in time to see a coatless Calvin running into the woods as if he had Satan at his back.

  Well, maybe he kind of did. If she were him, she might run, too.

  Chapter Five

  “Calvin, you can’t survive on delivery meals, and neither can I. I’d like a fresh vegetable every now and then.” Julia fondled the odd amulet dangling betwe
en her breasts and stared at her sneakers.

  She wouldn’t even look at him, and hadn’t since he’d stolen that kiss. He wish he could say his wolf made him do it, but the man part of him wanted it just as much. She was crazy, but she was obviously his. Maybe a girl would have to be a special kind of cuckoo to put up with his shit.

  She just hovered around, working in a quiet efficiency. Feeding him, cleaning up his messes, answering his fan mail in that cheerfully naïve way she did. She actually thought the “F” in “Calvin F. Wolff” was his real initial.

  Everyone knew the “F” stood for “Fucking.”

  She didn’t seem to know anything about him, really, and he’d kept poking. Kept asking. She hadn’t even thought to Google his sorry ass. She was so stinkin’ cute. Sometimes he went out into the woods to pitch baseballs through the trees just to see how far they’d go before he struck one. He had no shortage of baseballs, but every morning, he’d find a basket of the retrieved balls on the porch. She’d go out and gather them like Easter eggs when he wasn’t looking.

  “If you want to go out, Julia, you have my blessing. I’ll call you a cab.”

  “Why can’t you take me?”

  Hell, he’d love to take her, just to make sure some other wolf didn’t like what he sniffed too much. The only thing he went out for lately was beer, and that was just because the lady who owned the nearby booze shack was his cousin Deenie. He could growl all he wanted at Deenie, and the worst that would happen would be she’d whack him on the nose with a rolled-up newspaper like she did all the cranky unmated wolves.

  “I just can’t, honey.” He closed the e-mail from his hound dog of an agent, and sighed. There were a lot of fucking digits in that signing offer. He wouldn’t even have to try out, that’s how bad they wanted him, and they wanted him now. Season was about to start. “Wish I could.”

  “Explain to me why you can’t. Afraid you’ll run into a fan?”

  “Fans are the least of my problems.”