Touched (The Marnie Baranuik Files) (60 page)

“What happened here?” Batten indicated my hair. “Wind storm?”

I patted my wild, tangled mop. He didn't need to know about my misadventures with mousse, so I distracted him by taking the mug of coffee out of his hands and sipping it. And was immediately sorry.

“This is probably the worst coffee ever made.”

Batten accepted his limitations with a shrug. “Gonna be okay?”

“Of course, it's just coffee,” I said.

“I mean, once we're gone?”

“Are you kidding? With you two nosey cop-types out of my house, I can be alone for a while. Hunker down like a hermit.”

“Should I run to Mum's Market and grab you a stockpile of cookies?”

“I don't think I could eat em,” I sorta-confessed.

Batten crooked his finger at me. The motion both irritated and aroused me in a mingling goulash of emotions, but I accepted this with defeat. Mark Batten was probably going to annoy me until the day my consuming lust for his hot bod finally killed me. I followed him into the hall, and while he put his boots on and shrugged into his coat, I watched his butt. Frankly, if I had to give up cookies to save his ass, I should be able to look at it whenever I want.

“Hood's giving me a lift to the airport.” He lowered his voice. “Do something for me?”

Hell, yes. “I doubt it, but there's no law against you asking.”

He sucked his teeth and his eyes narrowed. “Just check on Gary for me, once in a while?”

“Oh sure, stick me with nerd-sitting duty while you go play hockey up north.” I smiled. He answered with one of his own rare smiles, complete with deep laugh lines and a glimmer of straight white perfection. My heart lifted like someone had pumped it full of helium. Those teeth had once teased along my jaw line to toe-curling results. I couldn't believe I wasn't going to have the pleasure again. Life was so unfair.

Batten grabbed his duffle bag and his grandfather's tan belted hunting kit and hovered with one boot on the bottom porch step, looking like he had something final to say, some last goodbye. Like the hero at the end of a black and white drama before he heads out of the heroine's life forever. Maybe he'd put some thought into it. Maybe it was going to blow my socks off. Or, maybe it would make us both incredibly uncomfortable. Or downright miserable. I headed him off.

“If you take much longer, I'm gonna have you arrested for trespassing,” I warned.

“Ran those pills to the lab while you were sleeping in,” he said. “They came back as…” He checked his hand, where he'd scribbled it in pen, and sounded the word out a syllable at a time. “Bremelanotide. Treatment for hemorrhagic shock. Considering the stab wounds, that's not odd.”

It wouldn't be, I thought, if Harry had just started giving them to me, but I'd been taking these same little white “vitamins” for a decade. “What else are they used for?”

He smirked, as though he knew a secret. “Erectile dysfunction and sexual arousal disorder, nothing that applies to your injuries.”

Why the hell would Harry want to make me hornier and then refuse to sleep with me until absolutely necessary?

“Good working with you, Snickerdoodle. It's been… interesting.”

“I kicked ass,” I said flatly. “Don't you forget it.”

Batten took a long, shrewd look behind me into the cabin then flashed a second smile that nearly brought me to my jelly-filled knees. “Whatever you say. See you in a few weeks.”

I watched his ass until it was stowed in the passenger side of Hood's truck. Then I heard it: weeks?

Cutting my eyes back at the threshold, I watched Chapel come to give a two-fingered salute goodbye to Batten. “What the hell did he mean by weeks?”

“He's going to Costa Rica for three weeks. He needed a break.”

“And then Michigan…” I let it hang so he could fill me in or correct me.

“No, Boulder. Mark turned down the promotion. He's staying with me at the new head office.”

Lost in my boggling, I tried to ignore the soaring ridiculous hopes of my idiot heart.

When I didn't reply, Chapel continued, “Mark said the winters in Michigan would, quote, ‘kick his ass.’ Funny, I thought he grew up there. It's what he's used to.”

We stood watching Sheriff Hood back out of the drive, and long after the Ford F150 was out of sight, we stood listening to the sound of it bounce back from the gravel road. Then even the sound was gone, and all we had left to keep us company out there was the cold wind that the trees were sheltering us from. He can't do this. Batten living in Colorado? My Colorado? What the hell for?

“Is he touched in the head or something?” I finally said.

“Touched,” Wesley snickered, joining us from the kitchen, dressed in his usual plaid button down flapping open over a white t-shirt, and threadbare jeans. The lake's depths had tangled his dreads with dull, winter greenery and I'd been forced to chop a few of his long dreads off. He had a strange gap on the left side of his head, and didn't seem bothered by it one bit. “Touched is one word for it.”

“When did he decide this?”

“Last night, after a long talk with Harry, oddly enough.” Chapel offered, looking away. “I should get my things packed.”

“When you're up to it,” I said. “Don't push yourself. If you're still weak, just crash here.”

He cleared his throat, considering Wes and me over the tortoiseshell rim of his glasses: the new revenant, and the klutzy DaySitter whose physical pain he channeled. “I think I'll get out of your hair. Will I be seeing you Monday?”

I hadn't officially accepted his offer. Working for the PCU (especially now that I knew Batten would be at the Boulder office) sounded like work. Yuck. Part of me would really rather lounge around with Harry and do whatever it was the idle rich did all day.

“I'll be in touch,” I promised him, and watched him go upstairs to pack.

Wesley said, “That Batten dude's teeth look like they belong in a damn Colgate commercial.”

“Wes, please.”

“It's Wasp.” And then, “Big ole Tom Cruise mouth when he grins. Should have seen him last night; after they smoked some
cigars and Harry gave him the Bugatti. I thought he was gonna do the jumping-on-couch thing.”

My mouth went dry, and while I struggled not to show it, I knew damn well my brother the fledgling telepath was hearing all the questions skittering in my brain. I turned to search his Nordic sled dog eyes as he wolfed down a second Oreo. He seemed to be enjoying watching me squirm.

“Harry did what?”

Wes shrugged. “Just before the sun came up. Harry told Batten he'd store the car until he got back from vacation, but after that it was all his.”

My brain did some painful gymnastics. A four hundred thirty-five-year-old man does not just give away a two million dollar sports car to a vampire hunter. What kind of deal had they hashed-out, exactly? Wes scarfed down another Oreo. I wasn't allowed to eat Oreos anymore. My eyes narrowed to slits.

“Do me a favor, Bumblefang,” I snipped. “Before you eat any more real food, Google: eight hundred pound Fat Dracula.”

Wes gave me an alarmed look; Point: Marnie. He read from the archives of my brain everything I knew about adipose tissue and revenant physiology in a split second then tromped muttering towards the pantry.

I heard the phone, and hoped Harry would pick up on his line in the basement. I didn't want to talk to anyone who would call my home line. After seven rings, Harry hadn't picked up, so I went to the office, trying not to see the burn marks, the stains from ghoul scum on the rug, the desecrated pentagram and the black ink fangs on my frogs.

My sister Carrie. I slid into my office chair and started spinning it in circles, laying my head back against the rest.

“I found Wes,” I told her. “He's gonna hang with me for a bit.”

“Is he broke?”

“Broke?” I smiled in spite of myself. “Understatement of the year.” Gulping cold coffee I winced at the bitterness of Mark Batten's awful brew. I gave Carrie a quick update of my love life, such that it was, because that's all Carrie's ever interested in. I left out the bondage with Harry, and how my struggling turned him on. I didn't wanna give her nightmares.

“So what should I do about work?” I asked her.

“Concentrate and ask again.”

I thought I heard someone in the kitchen. My voice dropped to conspiratorial. Pulling a light blue Moleskine around and scribbling on the inside cover little doodles and hearts and then starting a Pro and Con list about my future sans cookies. “What should I do about working with Mark?”

“It is decidedly so.”

Decidedly so? “Do you think Harry bribed him to go, or to stay? I mean, why the hell would Harry want Mark Batten to stay?”

“Most likely.”

“Carrie, are you just reading from the Magic 8 ball? I told you not to do that.”

“Works on Dad,” I could hear her smile through the phone. I rubbed off my glove and pressed it to the phone. Carrie was happy. I was happy. A minor miracle for those two things to occur simultaneously. My cheeks pinch up into a silly grin.

“Oh, really?” I replied. “Our booze-addled father doesn't realize you're acting like a plastic novelty prognosticator? Shocking.”

“Look, why would your little ‘partner’ Harry ask a hottie like Batten to stay with you? Oh… is the vampire impotent?”

“Revenant,” I reminded her.

When I didn't disillusion her about Harry's manhood, she took it as a yes and continued her path of reasoning. “Harry's paying a man-whore to do you. Suddenly, Buffalo makes much more sense.”

Harry made no noise as he entered the office, but the cool push of air preceding him bristled the hairs at the nape of my neck, and without turning around I whispered, “Hi, Harry.”

“Good day, ducky,” he greeted. His garnet cufflinks and wrist tattoo crossed my view as Harry set a cup of espresso on the scorched desk blotter in front of me. Then he took the phone from my ear and said with grand town crier-like pageantry: “Good morning, Carole-Anne!”

No one called Carrie “Carole-Anne” except Harry, who didn't care that my sister hated it, and was not afraid of her retribution. “Yes, I am quite sure that you do,” he replied to something my sister
said. “Could one inquire as to the nature of your call? I see. Only, I regret to inform you that MJ simply cannot abide your manner of counsel right now, for I am given to understand she is in the market for, how did she put it… uncritical affection.”

Without waiting for my sister's response, he hung up. I mentally scored him another million points on the scoreboard of my mind as he moved into the middle of my office. In a rush of black wool, he removed his tuxedo jacket and dropped it in a puddle on the floor. His top hat he casually tipped forward off his head into a waiting hand, then tossed on my desk, barely missing my pencil holder. I smiled around the lip of my espresso cup. Though amused by his sudden carefree attitude, I watched in silence with the upward curve of my eyebrows expressing astonishment.

My Cold Company aimed the stereo remote out the office door to the kitchen, and my little cabin filled with the slow early strains of Tom Waits’ “Little Drop of Poison”. The immortal extended to me one pale hand of invitation and my forearms quilled with goose bumps in reply.

Sliding around the desk I went to him, wanting to ask him about the Bugatti, and the “vitamins” of bremelanotide, sensing I should let both questions lie. For now.

As though he'd read my mind, Harry asked, “Do you trust me, my pet?”

“Of course, my companion,” I said immediately, forcing doubts from my mind.

“It has been ages since we danced the Tango.” He cupped the small of my back. “Do you remember the steps?”

“Please, Lord Dreppenstedt.” I looked up at him through my lashes, bluffing. “I could Tango your argyle socks off.”

“I think you will find me most pleased to discover this,” he said huskily, drawing my body in a tight jerk against his.

As his agile hips rocked one leg forward in a sensual advance, I retreated one of my own, led by his powerful stride. His slinking, sinuous sway was impossible to duplicate with my human body, but I held my own. The platinum rings in his brow twitched with approval. Casting me out in a whipping spin, he tucked me back forcefully before I could recover, pressing me back with his brazen stride once
again. When he drew one hand down the length of my arm I shivered, and his pupils bled rapidly to lambent silver in response. The abrupt dip was unexpected; I went soft and limp, letting him arch me. His chin brushed mine, smooth-shaved at this time of the morning, smelling of his fresh 4711 cologne. A hint of cool soft lips drew along my skin. I heard the metallic clink in his back pocket as he drew us upright, knew the sound immediately: the keys of his big iron shackles. When my heart kicked into a hard rhythm of anticipation, it pulled a happy little murmur from his throat, and the sound of it made me laugh with delight. With victory.

When he brought his eyes up to mine, they were lit with a dark and wicked light.

“Oh, my only love.” Harry grinned around full fang. “Such a fuss you make…”

THE END

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

A.J. Aalto is a proud native of the Niagara Region. Originally born in St. Catharines, she currently resides in Thorold, Ontario with her wonderfully peculiar husband Jason and two quirky kids, a puppy that drives her bonkers and two cats who are undoubtedly plotting her downfall. When not writing horror or dark urban fantasy, you can find A.J. researching inappropriate subjects, braying her unladylike guffaw at dirty jokes, mentally undressing strangers or sitting cross-legged on her front porch eating peanut butter M&Ms by the spoonful.