Out of This World

Presexual healing.

This made me mad, and it had little to do with the green-eyed monster.

Okay, it had everything to do with jealousy.

Marilee put her hands on her hips and thrust out her perfect breasts a little, demanding all eyes on her.

I would have liked to compete with that, but I was also still stunned over the realization that Kellan had been hiding a little secret.

A big secret.

“Where were you just now?” Kellan asked Marilee, and if I hadn’t been so blindsided by his secret, I’d have fallen a little in love with him on the spot for not noticing Marilee eating him up. “The B &B was locked, and you didn’t answer the door.”

“I was busy,” she said with apology but no excuse.

“We got locked out,” he said.

“And the windows were locked, too,” I said. “So he had to-”

Kellan shook his head at me. He didn’t want me to mention the breaking-the-door thing. But if she so much as looked, surely she’d see the gaping hole.

“They were painted shut,” Marilee said, not taking her eyes off him. “Don’t feel bad. No human could have opened one.”

I wrapped my chilled fingers around the steaming mug she’d handed me and considered different ways to get her to stop drooling. Strangling her seemed like a good option.

Apparently not much of a mind reader, Marilee moved toward Kellan and the couch, as if yesterday had never happened.

But no one messed with Kellan’s head. Well, no one but me, damn it. Secrets or not, hot or not, Kellan was mine. I put down the mug. According to Axel, I wouldn’t want to drink it anyway.

Before I could step between the two of them, Marilee put her hands on Kel’s shoulders and rubbed. “Oooh, you’re tense. We have some massage therapy appointments open today, if you’d like one.”

And that green-eyed monster bit me hard. The bitch! Those were my shoulders to touch, not hers. “Okay,” I said grimly, giving Kellan a dirty look. Damn men. They were such stupid, easy creatures, led around by a single appendage, which didn’t even have the capacity to think for itself. Honestly, it was a miracle they managed to function on a daily basis. “Thanks for the coffee, but I really have to talk to Kellan now. Privately.” I added a smile that could be called such only because I bared my teeth.

Marilee shot me a measuring look, which I returned, probably with some fire added, and she lifted her hands in a little gesture of surrender.

She moved toward the door, making sure to brush against Kel as she did, even stopping to practically purr, just before she pulled out her ace card, which was to stagger slightly, then put her hand to her head, letting out a quivery little sigh and saying, “Oh dear.”

Kellan put his hand on her arm. “What? Are you okay?”

“Yes. Yes, of course…” But she wavered unsteadily, then fell right against him so that he had no choice but to catch her as her legs buckled. Her eyes rolled up, lashes fluttering, as she began to faint.

What a pathetic, novice move, I thought. Kellan could see right through that fake faint.

But no, his face had gone all tight with concern and worry, and he’d caught her up in his arms. Clueless!

I’d have let her head hit the table. “Oh, Axel,” I said sweetly but loudly, aiming for the front door. “How lovely to see you this morning.”

Marilee bolted upright in Kellan’s arms, her gaze darting to the front door.

Which was open, and empty.

My eyebrows shot straight up as I sent Marilee a top-that-beeyotch look.

She lifted a shoulder as if to say she’d had to try, then she slid down Kellan’s body. With a touch to his jaw, she smiled once more. “I’m okay now, thanks. I feel all better.”

Uh-huh. I’ll bet.

“You sure?” Kel asked, clearly still concerned.

Unbelievable.

“Oh yes. Really.” Marilee smiled. “I’ll be in the big house making breakfast.”

“Uh…” Kel said, clearly remembering her sauce. “Yes.”

“Give me about half an hour.”

And then she was gone.

“Huh.” He scratched his head and turned back to face me, looking like that rumpled, bemused professor again. A rumpled, bemused professor with no shirt and loose sweats slipping down his narrow hips, a gap between the string tie and his flat, firm stomach wide enough to dip a hand in-

My brain was out of control. “That was a fake faint.”

“Rach, she was shaking.”

“I’m shaking.”

“You are not.”

“Well, I could be.”

When he shot me an even, patient look, I lifted my fingers and made then tremor. “See? And oh…” With dramatic flair courtesy of freshman high school drama class, I laid the back of my hand across my forehead. “I feel funny…”

Kellan’s eyes narrowed. “Stop it.”

“No, I mean it.”

“Rach.”

“I’m going to faint, Kel. You’d better catch me.” I staggered backwards.

He crossed his arms. “That’s not funny.”

Damn it, why couldn’t he look at me with all worry, catching me up against himself, as he had last night?

I wanted more of last night!

Trying for it, I let my momentum take me backwards, confident that he’d catch me.

Only I went down like a ton of bricks, smacking my head on the corner of the coffee table and seeing stars.

Kellan swore sharply and dove for me, firmly scooping me up against his deliriously warm chest, stroking a hand over my face to scoop back my hair, and everything was as I’d wanted before I’d found out that exactly nothing was as I’d thought.

Now he’d say how sorry he was. How much more beautiful and smart and wonderful than Marilee I was. And then he’d kiss me…

“You idiot,” he murmured, and kissed my jaw.

You’d think I’d be happy with one out of three, but no. “You lied to me, Kel.”

He didn’t pretend not to know what I was talking about. “Didn’t lie.”

“You omitted.”

“Okay, yes. I omitted. How’s the head?” He slipped his fingers into my hair, cradling my head in the palm of his hand. “Hurt?”

“A lot. And for the record, omitting is as bad as lying.”

He sighed and pulled back, denying me those arms. His hair was all over the place, and now he wore an unreadable expression, one that made me want to turn the clock back to last night, when he’d held me and made everything okay.

He rose to his feet and went straight to the window. He put his hands on the ledge, the muscles in his back and arms going taut as he pulled.

The paint gluing the window to the ledge cracked, and the window opened with ease.

Kellan stood there, utterly still, hands on the window, which was now lifted above his head. With the early morning sun slanting in over his gilded body, he made quite the picture, but that wasn’t what had me walking towards him, gently putting my hands on his back.

“Kel.”