Bridget stood in the doorway with a black coat in her hand. She pressed the garment into Fiona’s arms. “Go. I’ll watch the shop. And take pictures. Well, not of the accident, but you know.”
Leave it to her aunt to push her across the line of proper to ill-advised. “Are you sure?”
“Yes. Go.”
“Okay. But I’m not taking any pictures. That’s just tacky.”
A dozen others joined Fiona as she walked, not ran, down the street, passing the collection of shops that made up the core of the town that was founded on the backs of loggers and copper miners. Cedar was like any other town that was wedged between the old and the new. The city was a few hours journey down the mountain, and the dense forest of the Cascades provided a buffer from the fast-paced lifestyle that comes with city living. On the surface, Cedar wasn’t that special, except when it came to one thing. Or rather, person.
It wasn’t the potential carnage that drew Fiona and the nearby citizens to the scene of the accident, but the possibility of seeing
him
.
A good-sized crowd was already gathered at the intersection when she arrived, obscuring the view of the worst of the damage. Even on tiptoe, all she saw was the top of the jackknifed trailer and massive jumble of logs that looked like a giant dropped a box of oversized Lincoln Logs.
“Fiona! Up here,” came a voice from the left.
She turned to see Mags waving from the top of the play area across the street. Fiona wove through the crush of people to the big toy and warily eyed the metal ladder. Condensation covered the rungs and were icy cold as she wrapped her fingers around the rod.
“I don’t think my insurance covers falling from a jungle gym,” she muttered.
“Just don’t look down.” Mags threw open her arms to encompass the view when Fiona reached the top. “Isn’t this the dopest spot?”
“Dope. Right.” Fiona caught her breath and clung on to the railing as she squeezed onto the platform with Mags and three other ladies. “Is this sturdy for so many adults?”
Mags blew her a raspberry. “He’s not here yet. But he will be. I just know it.”
From their perch Fiona was able to see more of the wreckage and cringed over being there to witness the spectacle. Prudence urged her to go back, but her inner teenager kept her feet in place as if she were waiting to see her favorite rock star bolt out of the back of an arena, and nobody, not even the braless bimbo with the fake tan and miniskirt was going to push her from her primo location.
Only there were no bimbos gawking at the accident, just soccer moms, business owners and police. Oh, and Janice Harbinger. Correction. There was one bimbo.
The chaos surrounding the scene was movie-quality surreal. It appeared that the logging truck tried to take the corner too sharply, tipping enough to throw off its balance. The resulting shift in weight broke the bindings on the multiton load. The spill of logs caught two cars, crushing them against the side of the nearby building.
“Geez Louise.” Fiona whistled and kept her gaze off the worst of the wreckage. “Is anyone hurt?”
Mags shrugged. “Haven’t heard. The police arrived just as you did, but Officer Dhavin has been trying to get to the drivers.”
Fiona followed the direction Mags pointed in and saw Officer Dhavin searching for a way to relieve the pressure and get the occupants out of their smashed vehicles. Meanwhile, more officers set up barricades and were trying their best to push the onlookers back.
Suddenly a ripple of energy ran up her spine and the crowd began to vibrate as they all felt the surge.
“I see him,” someone shouted and all attention was shifted to a black blur and a swirl of mist barreling down the street.
The whirling mass stopped and there he was. The Chameleon.
No one knew who he was or where he came from, only that he definitely wasn’t local. And by local, that meant of the entire planet Earth. He swooped in when people had need and left just as fast, never asking for anything in return. He was Superman and Spiderman rolled into one delicious hunk of man.
Fiona had only seen him from afar on a few occasions, and he wore a cowl that covered his head, so she didn’t know what he looked like, or even what color his eyes were. But he had one of those chiseled, manly chins, and lips that looked as if one kiss would be so powerful, it could straighten her hair.
And that body…my oh my. Tightly muscled with lightning-quick reflexes, he was strong enough to bench-press a car. And he had too. He once pulled a school bus to safety that had slid off the end of a bridge during a flash flood.
Besides his incredible strength, he also had super speed, which made her wonder if he was super everywhere. Man, there were parts of him she wanted to dip in chocolate and lick clean.
Stretched across his broad chest was a tunic made from some type of mystical fabric that shimmered silver one moment then blended in with the environment the next, hence the nickname, the Chameleon.
Fiona sucked on her bottom lip as she watched him speak with Sheriff Briggs and Officer Dhavin. What did his voice sound like? Was it deep and raspy? Did he have an accent? Was he as quiet as he was humble, or were there moments he revealed a playful side? Did he have a family, friends? A girlfriend?
So much about him was a mystery, which was part of his appeal. In Fiona’s mind, he was the perfect fantasy lover, kind of like crushing on a famous actor. He’d treat her like a princess and never give her cause to cry.
The roar of fire engines sent heat streaking across her cheeks. She pressed her frozen fingers to her face and mentally groaned.
What was she doing? Lives were in danger and here she was mentally undressing a stranger and indulging in wicked thoughts. She was so going to burn in hell for this.
Dhavin tried to shake off the wave of lust that slipped down his spine and grabbed him by the balls, but the ache wouldn’t ease. People’s lives were at stake, yet he couldn’t think beyond the sweet throb that made his cock as hard as the baton at his hip.
“Officer Kilsgaard, are you listening?” Sheriff Brett Briggs asked. The stern snap in her voice broke through his haze.
He sucked in a bracing breath and turned toward the sheriff. “Ya. You said the tow trucks will be here in ten minutes.”
She frowned, obviously not believing his lie for a second. “Are you all right?”
“I’m fine.” He pulled the wide strap of his gun belt down to cover his erection.
His cousin Kristos, aka the Chameleon, chuckled and leaned close to whisper in their native language, “It’s a good thing she can’t sense emotions like we can. She’d make you be the Chameleon all the time if she knew how some of these women felt about her husband.”
Brett clicked her tongue at them. “You do know Amaryllis is teaching me Skandavian? Soon you won’t be able to talk around me.” She smiled sweetly. “Now, if we can get back to the task at hand.”
Dhavin nodded but his attention drifted back to the sea of emotions rising from the gathering crowd. The appearance of the Chameleon always inspired a mixture of reactions from awe to curiosity, as well as admiration and a high level of desire from the female population.
But today there was a headier sensation in the air. A sense of longing that was dark and rich, like a chocolate from his favorite sweet shop, and the sensation thickened his blood. He looked over his shoulder and spotted the source of the sweetness standing on the top of a child’s play structure.
Fiona Corrione.
Owner of the Sugared Thistle Candy and Bakery, and from the moment he first saw her two months ago, the star of his wickedest fantasies.
He couldn’t name exactly what it was about her that fascinated him, but all he wanted to do was scoop her up and carry her away to where he could caress every inch of her soft skin and make her cry out his name as he gave her orgasm after crashing orgasm.
And she hated him.
Well, maybe hate was too strong a word, but she definitely didn’t like him. His knowledge of American slang was feeble at best, but the conversation he overheard her have with her aunt earlier did not sound encouraging. And he’d be damned if he knew why she felt that way.
He was always friendly to her, gave her lots of compliments, and spent a good chunk of his paycheck at her store. He had so many of her confections, he had to tack twenty miles to his morning run to burn the extra calories. Yet nothing he did eased the wariness he sensed coming from her whenever he approached. On the outside she’d smile and be the epitome of politeness, but she’d watch him like one does a cat that allows you to pet them yet has a history of rearing back and biting at a moment’s provocation.
What did he have to do to have her look at him the way she was looking at his cousin right now? Standing on that structure, she was like a character out of one of the epic human novels he read on his journey to Earth. The wind played with the loose curls that escaped her bun, and her cheeks and nose were the most charming shade of pink. The soft pad of her lower lip was trapped between her white teeth and those chocolate eyes shimmered with heated thoughts he’d give his trusted sword to know.
“Are you coming or not?”
He jerked at the shout. “What?”
The cutouts in Kristos’ mask highlighted his narrowed stare and downturned mouth. “What is wrong with you? There are people we need to save, or is there somewhere more important you need to be at this time,
botjka
?”
“Fuck off,
Chameleon
. I’m right behind you.” He didn’t need his cousin calling him an inept, untried virgin warrior to add to the injury he nursed from Fiona’s coldness.
He joined Kristos at the front of the big rig and pointed to a cross-section of logs. “That area right there concerns me the most. If we lift the logs in the wrong order, the rest will come crashing down. Can you move fast enough and not be crushed into the side of the building?”
“I guess we’ll find out.” Kristos placed his foot on the grill, ready to climb.
Dhavin stopped him with a hand on his shoulder. “Careful.”
“Thank you,” Kristos said with a grin. They may cut each other down on occasion, but blood was blood and family meant everything.
The Chameleon scaled up the side of the trailer and began to carefully pluck the thousand-pound-a-piece logs as if they were kindling and dropped them to the asphalt below. Each resulting boom as wood smacked into ground made Dhavin flinch and emphasized the seriousness of the situation.
Two tow trucks arrived and Dhavin waved one to the front of the accident where he stood and the second around the back to where Officer Reutgers hung half in and half out of the broken back window of an SUV, tending to a victim.
Dhavin waved to the woman huddled in the driver’s seat of the car on his end. “Hang tight, Ms. Shurgard. We’ll have you out soon.”
She gave him a weak nod and sank farther into her seat, curling into a tight ball and warily watching the roof above her creak and moan as the weight crushing the car was lessened.
He accepted a hook from the tow truck driver and crawled under the vehicle and attached it to the front axle. The sound of shifting timber encouraged him to work quickly and shimmy out to a safer location. He climbed back to his feet and reached for his radio. “Ready. Reutgers, you secure?”
“We have a go. In three. Three. Two. One.”
Dhavin waved the go-ahead for the driver to start pulling, and he heard the wrecker on the other side begin to drag its load. The scrape of wood on metal made his teeth ache. As the cars began to move, the blockage of logs shuddered.
“Chameleon,” Dhavin shouted. “We have to move.”
Kristos nodded and stepped up his movements.
The SUV cleared the barricade sooner than the sedan, tipping the rest of the load in Dhavin’s direction. A log with the diameter of a big-wheel tire slid toward his head. With lightning-fast reflexes, he threw up his hand, stopping its momentum an inch from his nose.
His arm trembled under the weight as he held the avalanche up so the sedan could continue its slow slide to safety. Sweat rolled down his face as his muscles spasmed with the exertion.
“Come on. Come on,” he muttered through tightly clenched teeth.
With a grunt, he kicked at the bumper, sending it skidding the last several feet before he dropped his hand and leapt to the side.
The ground trembled and a tremendous dust cloud arose, obscuring all vision as timber crashed to the road.
Dhavin swatted at the bits of flying wood splinters. “Is everyone all right?”
Brett ran to his side. “Were you hit?”
“No. I am good. Is everyone clear?”
“Yeah. Barely. Smooth move there.” Her features tightened as her eyes widened and her pointed glare went to the car with the boot-sized dent in its bumper.
“Just performing my duty, ma’am.”
All around them the crowd cheered and waved their arms. Their elation raised the hair on his neck and made him feel like he was floating on air. He helped to save the day, yet no one was looking in his direction. Following their gaze, he spotted the Chameleon on the roof, one hand lifted in acknowledgment of their praise. Kristos nodded once then fled, skipping from rooftop to rooftop away from the scene.