Chapter 13
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
W ald had pulled off the highway about a half hour ago. He’d taken some narrow roads, but the final one was a dirt track with pine forest on either side. A dead-end barrier was coming up fast, but Wald wasn’t slowing down.
Bracing for impact, I screamed, “Stop!” my insides in full panic contortions as we drove through the sign—which apparently wasn’t there.
“What the hell?” I yelled at him. “You could have told me the sign was a fake.” I focused on getting my breath steady. Goddamn it.
“It isn’t a fake, it is an illusion.” He didn’t even glance at me. “My father’s gift. He has the ability to make illusions. He’s quite proficient at what you call magic. Our eyes work differently from yours. I can see the barrier isn’t real.”
“Like wizard magic?” I rubbed my forehead, trying to wrap my head around seeing something that wasn’t there.
“Not the movie kind of big explosions. Illusions to conceal, like my shaped form that you see. ”
“The hair is real then? The skin is not?”
“Real is a learned definition. You sort things into boxes because humans are taught to do that, but to me, the imaginary is a form of real illusions. I call them seideir-draumr , literally, a magic dream in our language which is older than Norse or Viking. A time when all words had power if you knew how to use them.”
“Well, that’s murky as fuck. It’s a spell then? Like a witch casts a spell? An incantation or something?” I pushed my hair out of my face and braced against the dashboard as Wald went over more bumps. He hadn’t slowed down. This car was a tank.
“Connection with magic by a human is a complex process. Not impossible but very rare without the help of an old one. We’re almost there,” he said, turning onto a paved driveway.
The tree line broke on one side, revealing the sprawling Victorian I’d seen before, painted a matte forest-green.
The monochrome infused it with eeriness.
The weirdest thing I’d ever… Well, perhaps not counting today.
The driveway went around the house and then ended in the concrete pad that I’d traveled down before.
“Hang on, we came down the driveway I drove out on, right? Why didn’t it end on the dirt road?”
“Ah, that’s another trick of Father’s. It makes it hard for people to find the house unless we need them to find it.”
I cracked a window, sucked in some deep breaths. “I’m guessing the paint means the house is an illusion too?”
“Sort of. It’s more a spell that enhances what’s there, and it’s not one dimension.”
I squinted to see if I could see it differently. It looked the same. “How does it look different? I don’t see it.”
“From the air, there is no house. You’d see only trees. ”
I glanced up at the sky, the sunlight scalding. I shielded my eyes and yawned, wondering what exactly they needed to hide. We were almost to the house. I repositioned the left itchy bra strap.
Wald glanced over at me. “Sorry, price wasn’t an object, but the options were limited.”
“Stop reading my mind,” I snapped, trying to think of mundane things I didn’t care if he knew as the dented garage door opened in a grinding screech of metal.
“I’ll have to get that fixed,” he said as my heart pounded. Meeting the family wasn’t exactly what I had in mind, but explaining the damaged door and how Wald and I had met might be entertaining, or dangerous, or—I was going with entertaining.
Wald led me through the sliding door out of the garage, but at the first four-way division, he took the pristine path. “There’s not even a speck of dirt on this floor.”
“The other floor is made that way. They’re all clean.”
“What, for burglars?”
“No, so we can remember which one takes us to the garage.”
I groaned. That was obvious if you understood it. The dirty trails were the red herring, and I’d fallen for it. These weren’t normal people. I stopped. “Hang on, are you sure you want to do this? I’m not exactly the kind of girl you take home to meet Mom and Dad.”
“Yes, well, we haven’t been on a date yet, so that’s not really a concern, is it, Tails?” His lips curled up.
The yet echoed in my head. Was he thinking of asking me out? “Exactly. I’m not the dating type and certainly not your type. Plus, please stop calling me that.”
He stopped and turned. My heart pounded in my chest as he moved toward me. His size was more than his proximity. He owned the air I was breathing.
“I wasn’t aware I had a type. What would it be?” His voice had lowered in a blend of predator and sex god. My fingers twitched. He was so close.
Squaring my shoulders, I stood my ground. “You know, blonde and petite, weighs about a buck ten, and has delicate parts. You like dresses and PINK.”
He clamped his lips into a hard line, and then he burst into laughter.
The blend of gravelly throaty chortle and deep belly laugh rubbed me like fur.
“Well, you’re wearing a dress and a pink bra.
I think you’ll do fine.” He dipped his head, as if his eyes were moving from toes to face, but the damned sunglasses blocked his expression.
“And for your future information, I prefer brunettes who stand up to me and don’t break easily—and ask a lot of questions. ”
The butterflies in my gut did Olympic-worthy backflips as he turned and continued down the hall.
I raced after him, my black boots clanging against the metal. “Hey, don’t you dare walk away. I don’t ask too many questions. I’m naturally curious. I’m intending to open a private investigator business.” If ever got out of this mess. Were my dreams literally dead ?
He stopped at the door and turned back to me. “Intriguing. You’ll be excellent in that profession but tell me more later. After we enter the house, I would follow my lead if I were you and try to make your questions minimal and your answers short.”
“Good luck with that.” But my stomach fluttered again with a churning nest of anxiety.
I had no reason to be nervous, but things didn’t always have to make sense.
I tugged up the bodice to rearrange my assets and hide the pink bows the best I could.
The door slid open as I smoothed the skirt down.
Making a prayer to some unknown gods I didn’t believe in, I stepped through.
C rossing the threshold was weird, like feathers tickling me.
The hall ended in the foyer, which opened into a massive living area.
High ceilings with big windows and a fireplace with a mantel taller than my almost six feet.
The decor was well-traveled pseudo-Victorian with lots of jewel-toned plush fabric and dark wood.
Old eclectic stuff everywhere with clocks, lamps, and gewgaws sprinkled liberally.
Thousands of books filled a soaring second-story library, which had a curving staircase to get to it.
There were four gold and green brocade chairs and two ruby leather sofas.
All oversized and sturdy looking. A house for tall people. I bet the chairs were comfy.
A stunning brunette old enough to be my mother appeared out of nowhere and extended a finely boned hand. “Ah, this must be…” She looked at Wald.
I realized I was staring and stuck my hand out. “Harlan.”
The woman’s lavender silk dress clung to her curves like it was a second skin. “Yes, of course, Harlan.” Her makeup was so perfect she looked more like an older sister than a mother. It was only her bony hands that gave her age away.
Her grip was much stronger than I’d expected and holding her hand was luxurious, almost plush.
“I’m pleased to meet you, Harlan. I’m Victoria Forndaur, Waldemar’s mother.
When Waldemar said he was bringing home his girlfriend, we were quite surprised he hadn’t mentioned you before.
” She narrowed her feathery lashed eyes, as if it would squeeze out information.
I focused on the purple rhinestone brooch pinned to her shoulder.
It killed me not to glance at Wald. “Ah, no, we were keeping things secret for a while.” It wasn’t exactly a lie, and avoiding outright lies was probably smart.
Her reply was cut off by the arrival of a great presence.
There was no other way to describe the towering man shifting weight to a cane, who’d entered the room.
He was easily six-foot-seven with linebacker shoulders, but despite the cane, he moved with a grace that had nothing to do with his frame.
He looked human too, but there was something about him that was off.
His purple-blue shirt matched hooded piercing eyes framed with double-thick dark lashes.
I actually batted mine at him before examining his shiny brown loafers. He extended his hand.
I took it and gushed out, “Harlan, pleased to meet you.” Before he asked. Except for the height, he looked nothing like Wald. Perhaps genetics worked differently in their race. I don’t know what I was expecting, but Wald’s parents looked human to me.
“Charmed.” He held my hand as if it were a shell on the beach. His voice was rich and smooth like an aged cognac with charisma that flowed off him like nectar. I looked at our connected hands and couldn’t pry my gaze away until he let go .
“Maverick,” he said as I took a step back to clear my head.
I was trying to find a not completely rude way to tell him he was an asshole for not giving Britannia a choice when Britannia slunk into the room.
Her black pantsuit covered her from ankle to wrist in a flowing fabric that wafted around her curves.
She weighed way less than she deserved to with those hips and tits.
She threw me a tight-lipped smile, flung back her long dark-brown hair, then plopped into a chair by the window.
I took a step toward her, my fingers snapping into fists. Wald stepped in front of me.
His mother’s voice soothed and redirected my attention. “Waldemar, perhaps your guest would like to freshen up while you change for dinner? Lisa has readied the Magnolia Room.”
Of course they had rooms with names.