Sandra Hill (4 page)

Jillian never phoned to chitchat. “What’s wrong, Jillie?”

“Does something have to be wrong for me to call you?” Her voice broke mid-sentence with a little catch.

“Oh, Jillie, what now?” Meredith sank down to the sofa, and then immediately stood up again when she realized she was sopping wet. She walked a few steps and leaned against the wall, raking her fingers through her hair distractedly, hooking the wet strands behind her ears. She heard the faint sounds of Jillie’s sobs. “Honey, what’s wrong? Where are you?”

“I’m in London, but I might have to be in Chicago tonight.”

“I thought you had to stay in London for another month, doing that museum exhibit on Jelling Age Jewelry.”

“I do. Mer, I need a favor of you. A
big
favor.”

Uh-oh! Jillie was thirty years old—five years younger than Meredith—and she was always looking for favors. Two failed marriages, a bankrupt boutique, a juvenile delinquent daughter, endless lovers. On and on Jillie’s troubles went. When would they ever end?

“George called me from Chicago,” Jillie explained. George Huntley was Jillie’s first estranged husband, a psychologist. They’d been married when they were both high school seniors, and Jillie was pregnant. “He said I have to come back immediately.”

“Why?” she asked, fearing the answer.

“Gourd was arrested for shoplifting, and the police are threatening to put her in a detention home.”

“Gourd?”

“That’s Thea’s name
du jour
. She’s going through a Mother Earth phase this week.”

Meredith giggled. How like her niece! Always trying to find herself. Hating her real name, Theodosia, almost from birth, she took on a different
nom de plume
every other week.

“It’s her third arrest in the past five months,” Jillie informed her in a rush.

“Oh, Jillie.” And poor Thea. The kid had been diagnosed with everything from ADD to hostile behavior syndrome in her twelve short years of living. Meredith would probably go off the deep end, too, if she had to live with her crazy sister. And it was no kind of life for a young girl to ping-pong back and forth between
schizo parents who weren’t overjoyed to have her.

“George said he’s wiping his hands of the kid. Said I have to come back from London immediately and be a real mother to her. No more moving from city to city. I was wondering—”

“No.”

“No?”

“No, you are not shoving your problems off on me again, Jillie. It’s about time you took responsibility for yourself.”

“But they’re going to take Thea away from me.” Jillie started to cry. Her racking sobs tore at Meredith’s heart. She pressed her forehead against the wall, knowing she was going to be a sucker…once again.

Geirolf was angry.

No woman teased him to the point of aching hardness, then stopped mid-coupling, without an explanation. Games like those belonged to immature youthlings, experimenting with first thrills. He had long passed his majority, and Merry-Death was certainly well beyond her first bloom.

He wanted answers, and he wanted them now.

After drying off briskly, he applied the ointment she’d supplied to his cuts, then shrugged into an old pair of her brother’s soft “sweating”
braies
she’d left for him, along with something called a “T-
shert
” with the words “JUST DO IT” emblazoned across the chest. He’d like to “do it” all right, and he would, too, once he’d wrung the wench’s feckless neck. In the end, he put the talisman belt on as well, since it seemed to help him understand Merry-Death’s peculiar language.

Finally, he stormed barefooted into the great room—something he would never do in his own keep where
unmentionable items often hid in the rushes. Then, he stopped dead in his tracks. Merry-Death was talking into a little black box that she held up to her ear. A box? Well, why not? He’d heard of wizards who talked to trees, or animals, even the wind. Ah, hell, she really was a witch, then. Did he want to chance rutting with a witch?

Yea, he answered himself immediately, the evidence still lying like an anchor betwixt his thighs.

“Give me that,” he yelled and grabbed the box out of her hand, intending to throw it into the hearth. But it was making a peculiar noise, like a woman sobbing. Alarmed, he raised his eyes to Merry-Death, who was trying to retrieve the object. “What is that noise?” he demanded, holding the box above his head, out of her reach.

“My sister.”

“Your sister is a box?”

“No, my sister is not a box. Lord, maybe Jared really did find you in a jungle. That’s a telephone, and I was talking to my sister in London.”

He snorted with disbelief but still, proceeding warily, he held the box up to his ear.

“Who is this?” a feminine voice asked.

His head jerked up with surprise. “Geirolf,” he responded tentatively, though he felt rather foolish talking to a box. He rubbed the talisman clasp for aid. “Who are you?”

“Jillian. Meredith’s sister in England. What’re you doing there?”

The box actually talked, claiming to speak from the land of the bloody Saxons. Merry-Death must be a more powerful witch than he’d thought possible. “Well, I just took a shower, but—”

Merry-Death groaned and put her head between her hands.

“A shower?” the voice hooted. “Meredith just came from the shower, too. Were you in there together?”

“Well, yea, we were both in the shower, but—”

“Give me that phone,” Merry-Death hissed, but he sidestepped her clawing hands.

“What do you do for a living, Geirolf?” the box asked.

“I’m a Viking.”

“A what?”

“Viking. Have you ne’er heard of
Nordmanni
…a Norseman? Is everyone addled in this godforsaken country?”

“Oh, God, this is too hilarious. My sister and a Viking!” She giggled. “And where are you staying, Mr. Viking?”

Geirolf misliked the condescending tone of the woman’s voice, and he refused to answer.

“Are you and Meredith lovers?”

“’Tis none of your concern who shares my bed furs.” Geirolf had never been a man to boast outside the bedchamber, and he would not start now.

The box was laughing, hysterically. He threw it to the floor with disgust, and Merry-Death quickly picked it up.

“Jillie, I’ll call you back later,” she said. “No, he’s not my lover. No, I’m not fixing you up. No, he doesn’t have a big—” she looked up at him where he stood, hands on hips, and she blushed—“boat.”

Hah! He would show the wench good and well, and soon, the size of his…
boat
.

A half-hour later, Meredith sat at her kitchen table across from her “Viking.” He filled out her brother’s T-shirt and sweatpants as Jared never had. His long hair—light brown, sun-streaked with blond now that it had dried—was pulled back at the nape with a rubber band that she’d had to show him how to use.

She’d changed into another silk blouse and slacks before returning to the kitchen to prepare dinner.

Rolf sat picking at his charred rabbit, eyeing the plate of pasta sitting in front of her with a side of Caesar salad. They both had glasses of ice water.

“Are you sure you wouldn’t rather share my meal? There’s plenty,” she offered.

He hesitated. “It looks like white worms covered with blood.”

She smiled. “Yes, but it tastes delicious.”

“You are not quite so plain when you smile, Merry-Death. You should do it more often.” He propped an elbow on the table and braced his chin in the cupped palm, watching her intently.

Her heart lurched oddly at the backhanded compliment and his hot scrutiny. Then he spoiled the effect by adding, “And you have good teeth.”

“Like a horse?”

He grinned. “Nay, not like a horse.”

Nervously, she slurped one strand of spaghetti into her mouth. Not wanting to back down from the challenge in his sparkling eyes, she smacked her lips with satisfaction.

“Bloody hell! You could bring a corpse’s poker to life with such a lewd gesture.”

“Huh?”

He winked.

And it was as if a tingly caress rippled over her
entire body. She was in big, big trouble with this guy.

“I will try one of your worms,” he declared. Instead of waiting for her to get another plate and silverware, he reached across the table and picked up one strand. Arching his neck, he held it above his parted lips, like a sword swallower, then slowly sucked it into his mouth and down his throat. Holding her eyes the entire time, he licked his lips, then his thumb and forefinger.

It was the most sensual thing Meredith had ever seen a man do in her entire life. Like foreplay, but better.

“Did you like it?” she choked out.

“Immensely.”

Was there a double meaning in his terse reply?

“Do you want to know what I would like even better?” he asked.

“No!” she said quickly and jumped up to get him his own place setting.

The brute just laughed knowingly behind her.

A half hour later, Rolf gave up trying to eat the spaghetti with a fork. He had tomato sauce splattered on his white T-shirt. Strands of pasta he’d tried to twirl on his fork had landed on the tablecloth or the floor. And Meredith was laughing so hard she had tears streaming down her face.

Pushing the plate aside, he growled, “I think this is a dish some woman invented to bedevil her man.” Using a napkin, he wiped his face to make sure no sauce remained, then threw it to the floor, and stood. “Why do you try to punish me, Merry-Death? Because we did not complete the game you started earlier?”

“What game?” She stood as well and started to back away into the living room.

“You know. In your shower.” He drew the stained T-shirt over his head and tossed it aside, then stepped
toward her, a predatory, determined look in his eyes.

Meredith’s traitorous eyes froze on his lightly furred chest and splendidly ridged abdomen. He’d put the wide belt with the ornate clasp on, and it called attention to his narrow waist and slim hips.

Uh-oh, here come the hormones again
.

“Why did you run from my embrace, my lady?” His voice was a husky, sinful insinuation.

My lady?
Feeling far from ladylike at the smoky, silent invitation in his eyes, she gulped. “Because the phone was ringing.”

Every time she took a step backward, he took one forward. He stalked her. But it didn’t feel threatening. It felt…exciting.
Oh, my!

“And that was the only reason?”

She nodded.

“Why do you pull your hair back so severely, like a chaste nun? You have beautiful hair.”

“I do?” Meredith was behind the sofa. Rolf stood, poised to spring, on the other side by the fireplace, which had burned down to embers.

“You do. When it spilled out earlier, I pictured it spread down your back, over your bare breasts, on my bed furs.”

Her eyes widened at his outrageous words and her breasts peaked and began to ache.

He noticed immediately and a slow smile of appreciation spread across his lips. “Come,” he said, holding out a hand in invitation. “No more malingering games.”

Meredith was almost tempted. Almost. She shook her head. “I think you must have cast a spell over me with that…that talisman you keep talking about.”

“Nay, ’tis you who have cast the spell, my sweet
witch. Now, come,” he coaxed, “do not gainsay me with pretenses that you do not want the pleasuring as much as I.”

“I don’t,” she lied, even as she felt an insistent heat coil in her midsection and move enticingly downward.

“I will show you how a true Viking makes love,” he vowed silkily, “and you can show me your witchly arts in the bedding. ’Tis a bartering I anticipate with great fervor.”

“No, you don’t understand,” she protested weakly. They had circled the sofa. Now her back was to the fireplace, and he was on the other side of the couch. “We have to talk. There seems to be a big misunderstanding here.”

“We can talk later.
Afterward
. And the only big thing here is—” His hand, which had been rubbing his bristled chin—he must not have shaved in days—moved lower to demonstrate.

“Don’t you dare.”

The progress of his hand halted midway and he fingered his belt, rubbing it in an almost erotic fashion. He was playing with her, like an overconfident cat with a helpless mouse.

But her eyes homed in on the ornate clasp of his belt, and she recalled the primitively carved figurehead from a ship’s prow lying outside. Sanity began to return.

At first, Meredith had believed that this guy—this very attractive guy—had been sent by her brother, in collaboration with Mike. But maybe that was just what she had wanted to believe. Something wasn’t right in this picture.

He was a stranger who’d shown up unexpectedly in her home. He claimed the bruise on his forehead came
from the falling mast of his dragonship. A new wound—a shallow, six-inch slash across his back—had resulted from the sword of someone called Storr Grimmsson.

All of the modern gadgets in her home fascinated him. Not just the telephone or refrigerator or stove or running water or electricity. Even little things like ice cubes or metal cans or rubber bands.

And another thing. He knew a lot about tenth-century history. In fact, he claimed to be living in that time period, which she’d discounted as a joke earlier. But maybe he hadn’t been joking. Oh, God, maybe he was an escapee from a mental institution. Some nutcase with delusions of being an ancient Viking prince.

“Listen, Rolf,” she said sternly as they circled the sofa once again, “we
are
going to talk.
Now
. It’s important that we get a few things cleared up.”

His jaw stiffened and he seemed about to argue, but then he shrugged. “If you wish, we can talk,” he conceded, “but then we
will
make love.”

Her heart hammered. She was an obsessively honest person. She’d never been coy or prone to games. “Maybe,” she agreed as a blush heated her face.

“Maybe?” he questioned, tilting his head cynically, bracing his hands on his sexy hips. “Maybe?”

“Try to understand. One-night stands with complete strangers were never my style—”