Chapter 19
RABID RACCOONS AND SPIT RAGS
MORGAN
When we arrived at the door of the nearest cabin, Nelson didn’t whip out a lock-picking kit or break a window. He was clearly a more sophisticated kind of break and enter artist. He shifted into his super cool, fog-like shadow under the faint glow of a row of weak exterior solar lights instead.
I’d seen his shadow a few times now, but it still amazed me. Then I watched, mesmerized, as he slipped through the keyhole into the cabin. He must have switched back to his human form as soon as he was inside, because the lock turned, the door swung open, and he was waiting there for me.
And just like that, we were inside.
“Neat trick,” I said as I kicked snow off my shoes before I entered.
Having that kind of magic would come in handy. It was so much more useful than my own magic. I mean, making rainbows when you laughed wasn’t exactly a sought-after or overly marketable skill set.
Could you even call it a skill when it was just biological? Probably not.
My horn was a little more useful, since I could use it to gore people. I hadn’t tested that theory, but it seemed possible. Although I did think I’d enjoy sticking something long and hard into Nelson, but it wouldn’t be with the horn on the top of my head.
Oh, this would make a brilliant Reddit. I could already picture the title: “How do I tell if the mysterious biker (35M) who just saved me (26M) is into me?” Nelson said he was older than he appeared, which I took to mean over a hundred.
But I couldn’t exactly use that—it’d make people think I had a weird geriatric fetish, and they’d fixate on that instead of the important things. So thirty-five was close enough.
Hmm... Did using the word “biker” give the impression that Nelson was a burly man with tats and a grizzly beard?
Maybe I should go with: “I (26M) am super-duper attracted to a guy (35M) who saved me from a bad situation. Should I make the first move?” Nah, if I posted that, a bunch of people would say I had some kind of white knight crush or whatever. But he wasn’t my white knight. He was my magical sidekick.
Huh, maybe it wouldn’t make a great Reddit.
I bent down to tug at the laces on my shoes. It took longer than it should have to undo the ice-caked laces with my numb fingers, but I managed to kick them off eventually. I wiggled my toes. They all felt okay, so I didn’t think they’d turn black and fall off. Hurrah.
I grabbed a pair of abandoned slippers by the door and jammed my feet into them. That was better. I wasn’t ready to give up my… or rather, Nelson’s… jacket yet, but if I could find a blanket in here, I could be convinced.
“Do you want to look in the cupboards while I make a fire?” Nelson said from where he was kneeling in front of the fireplace.
“See if there is any food? I know we ate supper already, but we should know what we’re dealing with in case we’re here for a few days.
” Then he glanced at the screen on his phone.
“Or do you want to sleep first? It’s late.
Yeah, why don’t you go and see if there are extra blankets in the bedroom?
” He nodded toward the door on the far wall.
“If there are, grab me a few, and I’ll sleep out here on the couch.
Unless you want to sleep out here with the fire.
Yeah. That probably makes more sense. We should pull the bed out here for you, so it’s closer to the heat. ”
Was Nelson rambling? It was sweet how he was worrying about me.
But wouldn’t we be better sleeping together? For warmth, obviously. I waggled my eyebrows, even though he wasn’t looking at me and didn’t know what was going on in my head.
I wasn’t ready to abandon my sex-up-Nelson plans yet. But time was on my side since the chances of our getting out of here tomorrow were rather slim. I had at least one full day and another night to break down his defenses.
Excellent. Gotta love a plan.
I pushed open the door to the other room, since cocooning in a blanket sounded marvelous.
“Uh oh,” I whispered as the door swung open to reveal a small bathroom.
I moved the door to peer behind it. Nope. No bedroom. No bed to purloin. Nelson wasn’t going to like that. It looked like we were going to be up close and personal tonight. I rubbed my hands together and barely resisted the urge to cackle.
Then I caught a reflection of myself in the mirror above the sink. The room was dark, so I did a double take. I gasped at the horror that was my face. The murky glow from wimpy solar lights outside the bathroom window did me no favors.
“Oh my freaking magic!”
I resembled a rabid raccoon who aspired to be that clown from It. Holy sweet mother of chipmunks. No wonder Nelson kept shying away from me when I flirted with him. I had to fix this.
The towel rack was empty.
Shit, shit, shit.
“What did you say?” Nelson called from the other room.
I slammed the door shut. Could I hide here forever?
I tugged open my borrowed jacket. I no longer cared if the air was cold enough to freeze my breath.
This was an emergency. I grabbed the hem of my shirt and tried to tug it up to my face.
The stupid dress shirt was too tight and didn’t have enough give to reach my face.
I tried to work the buttons open, but my fingers were too cold.
Son of a spider.
There had to be something. A dusty cotton ball?
A stray roll of toilet paper? I wasn’t picky.
I groped inside the large freestanding cupboard in the corner and found a container of sanitizer and a stash of stale-smelling towels.
Hallelujah. The sanitizer wouldn’t help me now, but I set it aside for later.
Then I sent out a silent apology to the cabin’s owner, because I was totally going to destroy at least one of their towels. But needs must.
I wiped the rough terry cloth over my face, then squinted into the mirror to see if that helped. It was a teensy bit better, but a towel alone was clearly not going to cut it. I tried turning the tap. Nothing came out. Right, the owners would have turned the water off for the season.
“Okay,” I muttered to my reflection. “Don’t panic. You can figure this out.”
“I still can’t hear you.” Nelson projected his voice.
My panic spiked.
I needed snow. Excellent. Now I had a plan.
But that’d mean going back to the other room like this. And I just couldn’t do it. Not when Nelson must have the fire going by now. A fire meant light. A light meant Nelson would see the atrocity that was my face.
I tried prying open the window. Nope. It didn’t budge.
What else…? Then I knew.
I produced as much spit as I could and dropped it onto the towel.
Okay. Here we go. I gagged a little when the warm, wet towel touched my face, but I ignored the grossness factor and got to work.
It didn’t take long for my spit glands to protest and go on strike.
I squinted into the mirror. Lingering streaks of makeup coated my skin.
“Come on,” I encouraged the deities of spit, whoever they were. “Just a little more.”
“Hey,” Nelson whispered. He very quietly knocked on the door. “Are you sleeping?”
The doorknob twisted, and the door opened before I could block it.
“Ah!” In my panic, my body jerked. My dirty, spit-covered towel flew out of my hand and smacked him in the face.
He froze. Stunned. The towel dropped to the floor with a muted thud.
“Oh Magic! I am so sorry.” I crouched down to scoop up the disgusting thing. I wadded it up in my hand and hid it behind my back. Gah. Why was I acting like this? I swore my mane was all in tangles around him right now.
“I’m sorry, I thought this was a bedroom…” Nelson backed away slowly. “I just wanted to grab a blanket.”
I laughed as I followed him out of the bathroom. Bubbles danced around my head. I sounded hysterical, but I needed to take his mind off being hit in the face with my spit towel. “It sure is cozy in here, hey?”
Cozy was the polite way of saying amazingly tiny, right?
Then he glanced around the main room again. His gaze bounced from corner to corner. When his gaze returned to me, he was frowning. “There isn’t a bedroom, is there? I didn’t think the place was that small. We should…” He eyed the door.
Seeing such an unexpected opportunity to leave this whole moment behind, I sprang into action. “Yes, yes…”
My borrowed slippers slapped against the floor as I skipped to the door and flung it open. The wind and snow howled around me, but I didn’t stop. I plunged into the great outdoors. One step. Two steps.
Then my foot kept going without my permission. Whoosh. I was down. Snow flew up all around me.
That had not been part of my plan.
I scrambled to sit up. My hands were covered in snow. My legs were covered in snow. My whole body was covered in snow.
Cold, wet, melting—
Oh!
Mother Magic was listening to me! She’d answered my unvoiced wish by giving me the opportunity for a freezing snow bath. How… um… kind of her. I scooped up a handful of snow and scrubbed it over my face.
Ouch… That nipped.
I’m sure I saw a documentary about people doing snow spas, bathing in the white stuff shrank pores or something. At the time, I just kept thinking about how that wouldn’t be the only thing shrinking. But no one in the show had minded, probably since there was a hot tub close by.
I wished we had a hot tub too.
“Morgan! Are you okay?” Nelson kneeled beside me.
I blinked at him as I wiped the last bit of snow off my face.
“What are you doing?” His forehead was all furrowed with worry as his gaze swept over me from head to toe. The corners of his mouth dipped down too.
I held out a fistful of snow to him. “Did you want to try it? It’s quite refreshing.”