Chapter 10
T he gray winter day barely penetrated the curtains in her front windows, making her even grumpier. Lily wasn't a morning person. Took her a bit to get up and at 'em, if she were honest with herself. She did it, pushed herself through morning face washing and teeth brushing and coffee until she felt a little more human each day. This Sunday, her one day off every week, was no exception. Maybe even worse, as a lot ran around her head.
Lily pushed herself too much. She felt exhaustion hovering. To keep up with the Christmas orders, she was working later and later every day, which was good and bad. Light appeared at the end of the tunnel, though. Christmas would come in a little over a week, which meant a full week shutdown until the new year. She’d given herself this one break every year since she opened the shop. Mostly because all the shops in downtown closed their shutters then so she didn't feel bad following suit.
Another bright spot: her chat with Madison post-Ryan went well. She talked hard numbers, realistic ways to move forward, and gave Lily her unvarnished professional opinion: if this quarter ended as she projected, she saw no issue with Lily slowly expanding. Once the quarterly numbers were tallied, her first order of business was hiring another sales associate to help out, at least part time, during the day. Her second required hiring someone to revamp her website and add a web store, so she could say goodbye to those pesky Etsy rules and fees. It'd be awful nice to do things the way she wanted to do them and not have to give someone else her money for the privilege.
All good, but it didn't help her current weariness. Which, to be honest, could be from fretting over what Ryan would do next. Or the fact Boreas hadn't shown his face, or left any surprises, since they kissed on Wednesday night. She thought they’d worked it all out, but something still held him back. She stewed over all of it.
On that thought, as if conjured by her annoyance, the phone on her wall rang. Lily sighed, knowing exactly who it would be. Everyone else used her cell. Not Ryan. Not when he wanted to be a pain in her ass. She ignored it. Until about the eighth ring. She stomped around her small fire, slammed her coffee cup down a little too hard on her counter, and whipped the receiver out of its cradle.
"What do you want today, Ryan?" she huffed into the phone.
Nothing. Of fucking course.
She was done. With all of it. With Ryan being an ass at every opportunity. With Boreas refusing to acknowledge the connection between them and running scared. Done.
"Look here, ass. I'm hanging up and calling the sheriff. Getting a restraining order, like I should've done years ago but didn't, because you were scared shitless of Michael. I'm not waiting for my brother to roll back into town, so you're going to stop some other way."
A soft chuckle hit her ear before silence. The dial tone blared in her ear before she slammed the headpiece back into its cradle.
"Damnit all to hell," she yelled and stomped, trying to get her anger out in some way.
She did just what she told Ryan she'd do. She grabbed her cell and called the sheriff's office to ask about a restraining order. Lily learned why he chuckled–it took far too much to get one. Apparently, because he hadn't physically hurt her—yet—they couldn't do anything about it. She could file a report and request, they told her, but seeing as Ryan was a lawyer, they doubted a judge would grant it unless he physically assaulted her.
Cursing the ridiculous way the law always seemed to fail women, she seethed for a good few minutes until her mind turned to the other male annoyance in her life. Boreas. Ryan freaked her out. Boreas just needed a swift kick in the pants.
Lily mumbled to herself about stubborn men as she pulled on a thick sweater, fleece-lined leggings, her big puffy coat, and her wool hat and gloves. She stomped into her hiking boots, pausing to think about how the last time she wore them she hurt her ankle down in the hollow. Shaking the idea away, she grabbed her keys and motored out the door, not once thinking to check the weather or consider the dark clouds gathered in the distance.
S he huddled into herself as much as she could, curled around her body to conserve warmth as she hunkered down behind a jutting rock. She'd cursed men earlier, but now cursed herself for a fool. Lily shivered, stuck in a damn snowstorm, lost in the woods somewhere around the Daniel Boone National Forest, and it wasn't looking good for her.
She’d gone tearing out of her house, driving a little too quickly to the place where she'd first met Boreas. Fueled by annoyance and desire, she made her way to the hollow, ignoring the small flakes of snow when they first started to dust the ground. Soon enough, however, the dusting became a flurry and the flurry became a downpour, and she found herself trudging through snow as she followed the creek deeper and deeper into the forest in search of the wind god.
"Idiot," she said aloud to herself, about herself, as her teeth chattered. Before she knew it, her path back became obscured by falling snow. She might have gotten turned around, and the snow made everything too blurry to notice how or where or when. She'd never come across the rock before she leaned against it to help break the wind, she knew that much.
Shivering, she closed her eyes, trying to move her hands quickly up and down her arms to get more warmth there. Lily wasn't in danger. Yet. If she didn't find her way out of the forest, though, it might be touch and go. In the deep woods, where light barely existed in winter, the sun set quickly this time of year. The cold set in even quicker.
God, she'd done something similar only weeks before. Even thought on it when she put on her boots that morning. Determined to make a man face her and his issues, she ignored it. Didn't think straight. She laughed to herself, mirthless, thinking she might just deserve it for trying to force something from a man who didn't seem to want it. Or, at least, didn't want it enough.
Her granny would've blistered her butt for the stupidity she’d shown every step of the way.
Pushing her head into her knees, she turned her cheek as a particularly hard wind flowed over her head. She thought of him then, of his smell, and she whispered his name into the wind, layers of frustration and need mingling dark and heavy in her voice.
Her eyes closed for a good three or four minutes, then she took a deep, cold breath to shake herself out of her self-pity once again and figure a way out (once again), when she heard a growled call rip through the sky. "LILY!"
She'd recognize his voice anywhere, even though she'd literally heard it only a handful of times. Lily found her feet and turned her face to the sky. "Here, Boreas. Over here!"
Lily waved her arms around blindly because she couldn't see more than a few feet in front of her face. Then the god appeared almost out of nowhere, feathered wings flapping in the snowy sky, his face hard and as cold as the wind around them. He looked unhappy to say the least.
He said not a word as he landed. Boreas grabbed her by the shoulder, looking over her body to make sure she wasn't injured. When he seemed satisfied she appeared well and mostly whole, he hooked his head up toward the sky, a silent question she somehow understood. Nodding yes, she gasped slightly when he scooped her up in his arms, cradling her behind her knees and shoulders, and shot off into the sky.
She was too cold, too relieved, too nervous to take it all in. Not to mention all the snow. Her heart thumped hard at the warmth of Boreas around her and the idea of them flying in the sky together. Sadly, it didn't last long. Boreas landed with a thud in front of a large cave opening, and without a word, headed into the dark recesses with Lily still in his arms.
L ily knew she'd been stupid. Reckless. More than once. A lot more than once if she thought back on her life. She got a wild hair and ran, not often thinking of consequences. Now, despite her shivers and the anger etched in Boreas's face, she fleetingly thought it worked out all right in the end this time. Because she stood inside Boreas's home.
Couldn't exactly call it a house because it was deep in a cave. They'd travelled a good lick down into the dark recesses, the walls coming in closer and closer until the god squeezed them sideways through a small opening that led into a big, bright, warm, cavernous room. The ceilings high above their heads held beautifully formed stalactites, varying shades of earthy brown flowing down and frozen in place like icicle chandeliers above them. A few stalagmites peppered the floor, some glistening off white like they were made of gypsum or some other cave crystal.
Intermixed with the natural wonder of the place were modern conveniences. A crammed bookcase stood by an overstuffed leather chair and ottoman seated on a beautiful, intricate, thick rug in the center of the room. Off to one side was a large fireplace, roaring with orange and yellow flames. All kinds of cooking utensils she'd seen in her school visits to living history frontier towns hung beside it: a large kettle on a turning hook that could easily be pushed into or pulled out of the fire, a toaster, a long-handled pan. A massive platform stretched across the far wall, piled with covers and pillows in a comfy mishmash. Had to be his bed.
"I like your space," she said, turning in a circle to take it all in.
When he didn't reply, she stopped to face him. He stood as still and firm as the stalagmites on his floor, arms folded and hard as stone. His face remained cold, and then she noticed the odd swirling of dust and cave bits around him, as if his wind was picking up speed and force, becoming a mini cyclone.
Lily cocked her head. "Boreas?"
She didn't get to get anything else out, because he exploded with a gale force that whipped her hair back. "What the fuck were you thinking?"
Lily blinked in the face of his anger. "I came to see you," she said, her voice small. She knew she'd done wrong. Hadn't thought it all out. Then again, she wouldn't have had to do it if Boreas hadn't kept doing this cryptic disappearing act.
On that thought, she straightened and faced off with the god. "Because you couldn't be bothered to talk to me like a damn adult."
His lip curled in answer, a soft growl came up his throat, and the soft light in the cavern glinted off his wicked canines, but Lily had no fear. Felt no need to defend herself physically. No. Instead, she would give him a piece of her mind.
"What? You thought I'd just wait around for you? Pine like some silly girl, begging for whatever scraps you'd give me?"
The questions echoed as he stared in shock and dawning understanding. "Lily," he said, stepping closer then stopping himself, his wind dying down along with his anger.
"No. Don't say 'Lily' in that way that sounds like you're winding up for some lecture on how the silly human doesn't understand the ways of gods. Maybe I don't. Maybe I don't know what it is to be a god, but you don't know what it is to be a human woman, either. To feel what I feel and be left high and dry every single time. I thought we'd gotten past this, then you don't come see me for days."
"I did not..."
"Because you're a scaredy cat."
"Excuse me?" His voice hit low, menacing, in her ears but she ignored it.
"You heard me loud and clear. Big, bad god of wind terrified of little old me. Despite knowing we should be together. Hell, the book proved that weeks ago."
"Do you think me unaware of this fact?" He yelled, stepping closer, no longer stopping himself. "I attempted to give you space, even if I have no quarter in my own mind. You are everywhere for me. In my nose. Under my skin. Invading my dreams."
"I don't want space, and I thought I made that point pretty damn clear Wednesday night. All I want is you."
"You remain unaware of all we are, and what being together may mean."
Stepping closer to him, making the distance between them mere inches, Lily pushed into his face, wrapping her arms around his shoulders. "I don't know anything about magic, and frankly, I don't care. I feel you everywhere. Think of you all the time. Dream of you touching me. I ache for you, Boreas. Please, help me stop the ache. That's all I ask."
His eyes closed a fraction of a second then opened wide, their icy depths a piercing glow in the dark cave. "As you wish," he said right before he slammed his lips against her own.