Dark Sexy Knight (A Modern Fairytale) (13 page)

“What’s that?” asked the customer.

Verity looked up in surprise, smiling at the young woman as she reached for the necklace Colton had given to her. “It’s the Yggdrasil tree.”

“Irish?”

“Nope. Norse,” she said. “Viking.”

She sorted through the charms, finding another one just like hers and setting it on a display tray of black velvet on the counter.

“Ohhhh. What is it? You know, like, what does it mean?”

Verity grinned at the woman, remembering Colton clasping it around her neck last night and everything that came after. “They believed that Yggdrasil was the crossroads between heaven and earth.”

“Oh, wow. That’s so romancey.”

“Mmm. You bet.”

“I’ll take it.”

“Want a chain too?”

“Yeah. I want it to look just like yours.”

Verity wrapped up the charm and chain and placed both in a little black box, running the woman’s credit card before waving good-bye.

“Well,” said Beverly, looking around the almost-empty main hall as the last of the matinee stragglers headed out to the parking lot, “I guess we can start straightening up for the evening shift.”

“Mind if I go to the bathroom first?”

Beverly shrugged. “Don’t take forever. We only have an hour before Annaliese and Desiree get here, and that birthday party of little brats messed up all the princess dresses and crowns. They all have to be restocked.”

“Two minutes,” promised Verity, grinning at her crotchety coworker.

“Save your smiles for the Viking,” she grumbled.

“Beverly,” she said, “I’ve told you, there’s nothing between me and—”

Beverly’s eyes shot with precision to the necklace around Verity’s neck. “I
might
have believed you yesterday . . . but not today.”

Verity felt her cheeks heat up, but she refused to be sorry or feel embarrassed about the wonderful thing that was happening between her and Colton, so she decided to say nothing. She smiled again, then ducked under the counter and headed for the bathroom. “I’ll be right back.”

Still fingering the Yggdrasil charm, she exited the main hall through the double doors that led to the employee hallway and walked toward the bathroom, hoping Colton might arrive a few minutes early and she’d get a glimpse of him. Unfortunately the only knight headed in her direction was Artie Kingston, still in costume, sweaty and dusty from the matinee.

“Hey, princess!” he called, waving to her.

“Hi, Artie,” she answered, giving him a half smile. She didn’t want to encourage him, but she didn’t want to get a reputation for being an unfriendly bitch either.

“Where you headed?”

“Bathroom.”

“Can I come?” he asked, a devilish gleam in his eye as he stopped before her, blocking her way.

“To the bathroom?” she asked, giving him a look.

“Nice and private,” he said, grinning.

“And superromantic,” she deadpanned. “Thanks, but no thanks.”

“Aw!” he said, beating his chest with a flattened palm. “You wound me, milady.”

She laughed, taking a step forward. “Have a good rest of the day.”

But Artie didn’t move out of her way, and his playful expression straightened as he put his hands flat on the hallway walls on either side of them, completely blocking her way.

“Stay and chat.”

“I need to get back.”

“You can go when I say so.”

Uneasiness.
Verity gulped, looking up at him. “I’m in the middle of a shift. Beverly will—”

“She can wait,” he said, his eyes trailing down her body, pausing at the small swell of her breasts in her princess dress before climbing back up. His look made her feel uncomfortable. Dirty. “You’re starting to hurt my feelings. When are you going out with me, gorgeous?”

Enough was enough. She took a step back, crossing her arms over her chest. “I’m not.”

“You’re seriously going to choose that Neanderthal over
me
?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She looked over her shoulder, but no one was coming down the hallway, and her uneasiness was growing into something more like low-grade panic. “Please let me pass.”

“I’m not done talking yet,” he said, his voice superficially affable but laced with taunting meanness. He leaned forward. “You know what? We don’t have to go out, Verde. We could just fuck in the stables after the show sometime.”

Fury lashed through her, and her chin snapped up. Before she could stop herself or think better of it, she whipped her hand back, then launched it forward, connecting with his cheek with a loud crack.

“What the
hell
?” he demanded, dropping one arm from the corridor wall to cradle his bright red cheek with his palm.

“You’re a
filthy pig
! Leave me alone.”

Hurrying past him, she ducked into the ladies’ room before he could grab her. She stood with her back against the door, panting with anger and adrenaline. For just a split second, she worried that she might have isolated herself in a place where Artie could finish what he’d started, so she was relieved to hear the sound of conversation by the sinks.

Well,
momentarily
relieved, anyway.

“Go for Shawn . . . or Sebastian.”

“He’s kinda short.”

“So what? He’s hot.”

“Superhot.”

“Not as hot as Artie.”

“Or Colt.”

“Colt’s bod is hot, but he’s a prick.”

“Yeah. A big one.”

Snickering.

“You know he’s
got
a big one.”

“How do you know?”

“Remember Sandy? She used to work here? Holy shit. She used to go on and on about his dick. Apparently, he’s hung like King Kong.”

Verity’s cheeks blazed with heat as she listened. She had felt the enormous bulge of his erection against her stomach last night, and Sandy hadn’t been lying, but she didn’t like the way these women were talking about Colton.

“I’d do him.”

“You would?”

“Yeah. In the dark. So I didn’t have to look at his face.”

“You think he’s
that
bad-looking? I could, like, forgive a lot of ugly if his dick was a magic wand.”

Verity cast her eyes down, anger boiling inside her. She’d had just about enough of this. It was bad enough that they were talking about her Colton like a piece of meat, but now they were just being catty bit—

Wait.

A slow smile spread across her face, eclipsing Artie’s crudeness and the girls’ meanness.
Her
Colton.
Hers
. And that’s when she knew—saw it in her head like a flash of lightning or in blinking, hot-pink neon:

I’m going to fall in love with him.

It’s going to happen.

(It’s already happening.)

And there’s not a thing I can do to stop it, even if I wanted to.

Accepting the absoluteness of these thoughts with a shaky sigh of surrender, she tuned back into the women’s conversation.

“No one’s going to be offering him a modeling contract anytime soon, that’s for damn certain.”

Verity cleared her throat, raised her chin, and walked down the dim corridor from the bathroom entrance to the stalls and sinks. As she rounded the corner, both women, who worked as bartenders, but whom Verity didn’t know by name, stopped talking and looked over at her.

“Oh, hiiiiii,” said one of them in a singsong voice.

“Hey, Verde,” said the other.

Her cohort snickered, then adopted puppy-dog eyes. “I hope you didn’t hear what we were talking about.”

“I did, in fact,” said Verity, putting her hands on her hips.

“Aw,” said the first, shrugging with a sorry-not-sorry grimace. “We didn’t mean it. He’s not
that
bad-looking.”

Her friend smirked at Verity, then turned to her pal and whispered loudly behind her hand, “In the dark.”

Verity chuckled softly, nodding her head at them for a moment before freezing her face in disgust and narrowing her eyes.

“Just remember . . . his King Kong dick belongs to me.” She leaned closer, lowering her voice to a purr. “And mark my words, girls, that’s no exaggeration.”

They both stared at her with their jaws dropped and eyes wide, and she left them like that, walking past them into a far stall and slamming the lock shut.

After a moment of silence, one of them said, “I take it back. I
wouldn’t
fuck him. I wouldn’t even want to be alone with him. I heard he killed somebody in high school.”

Verity winced, holding her breath as she sat down on the toilet fully dressed.

“True dat. He only got off because of a technicality.”

“Google it, princess,” one of them called loudly, over the stall.

“Come on,” said her friend. “Let’s go.”

No. Way.

Killed someone?

Impossible.

Totally fucking impossible . . . right?

She listened to their retreating footsteps, hating it that their words had sown a seed of doubt when the man they were discussing had been nothing but kind to her and Ryan. But she gulped, thinking back to the motel parking lot where he’d broken that guy’s leg for harassing her brother. He’d barely thought about it—just brought down that crowbar like the hammer of Thor and smashed the guy’s leg to smithereens.

“Did he
kill
someone?” she whispered, worrying her bottom lip between her teeth.

Well, it wouldn’t be hard to find out. Her phone was in the purse under the counter at the gift shop, but she was suddenly torn between wanting to look up his name and refusing to lower herself to such malicious gossip.

Then again, she was living with him. Could she be placing herself and Ryan in danger? She rubbed her forehead and clenched her eyes shut because the idea was beyond troubling. It was . . . frightening.

By the time she left the bathroom, her heart was galloping, and her freshly washed palms were sweating. She walked back down the hallway, totally consumed by her own thoughts. So consumed, in fact, that she didn’t notice anyone else was in the corridor until he’d grabbed her hand and pulled her back up against his chest.

“Oh!” she cried, assuming it was Artie and ready to fight him off until she took a sharp breath through her nose and recognized his smell. Soap and clean laundry, a little sweat and a whole lot of man. That was
all
Colton. And whatever misgivings she’d had a moment before were traded for a crashing wave of lust and affection and relief. He was here. Holding her. Anchoring her. Suddenly she wasn’t adrift in dark waters anymore. Just like that, she was safe again, just as he’d promised her last night.

“Come with me,” he whispered close to her ear.

“I have to get back,” she protested weakly.

“Two minutes,” he said.

She nodded, letting him drag her into a janitor’s closet. It was pitch-dark and smelled strongly of bleach. She couldn’t see anything, but Colton still held one of her hands, and she reached out with the other to touch his chest, flattening her palm over his heart.

“I missed you today, sunshine,” he said, pulling her into the warm haven of his arms.

Sunshine. Oh, my heart.

She knew that she should ask him about the terrible rumor she’d just heard, but she couldn’t. All she could do was close her eyes and lean into him, forgetting about Artie’s crude offer and the catty bitchiness of the girls in the bathroom.

He was hard and strong but somehow managed to be gentle, rubbing her back as she rested her cheek against his chest.

“Long day?”

For just a second she thought about unburdening her heart, but he didn’t deserve her suspicion. After everything he’d done for her, he deserved her trust.

“How’s Melody?” she asked.

“She’s fine. We had breakfast together, I drove her to work, and then I went back to her place to update and fix a few things before coming here.”

“You’re a good cousin.” A good
man
, regardless of what she’d overheard. Even if it was true—even if he had, God forbid,
killed
someone—there had to be a reason, a story, a logical explanation for what had happened, and until she had all the facts, she wouldn’t allow her imagination to run wild.

“I can’t stop thinking about last night,” he murmured, and she felt his lips press down on the top of her head.

“Me either.”

“I want a repeat,” he groaned as she wound her arms around his waist.

“Me too.”

“Sunday?”

She nodded against his chest, taking a deep breath and smiling next to his heart. “Sunday.”

***

Verity’s willpower not to Google Colton’s name lasted until she and Ryan boarded the bus for his house an hour later. Plagued by the thought that he could have killed another human being, she made sure that Ryan was happily settled with his banged-up iPod and a Baggie of Goldfish before opening the Internet browser on her phone.