Читать книгу The Billionaire Werewolf's Princess - Michele Hauf - Страница 11

Chapter 2

The beautiful man with impossible muscles—he wore an oddly tattered shirt that revealed oh, so many tight, bulging muscles—held a sword and fought weird black creatures that flew in the air about him. In the middle of Paris.

And as Indi was lying there on the ground, watching with her mouth hanging open, she thought, for a moment, the tall, handsome man...changed. When he looked at her, his head was shaped like a wolf’s.

The eerie image made Indi scream, and she pushed herself up abruptly. And hit her head on something above her. Dropping her cheek back onto the hardwood floor, she groaned.

That had been a weirdly detailed dream. Very real. Almost as if she could smell the strange black creatures’ ozone scent and hear the man’s sexy voice as he had bent over her. Prodding her. Asking if she was okay.

Eyelids flashing open, Indi darted her gaze about the room. She was lying on the floor? Not a familiar floor, either. She didn’t have hardwood in her home. And...what had she hit her head on?

Rolling to her side, she realized she still wore the ball gown. The beaded leaves on the bodice crunched as her body turned on the wood floor. Above her stretched a flat piece of wood, supported by a table leg...

“Why am I lying under a table? Oh...”

It hurt her brain to talk. Had someone taken it out, rolled it across the ground like a pétanque ball, then shoved it back in through her ear? Mercy, what a bender. Champagne hangovers were the worst!

But this didn’t look like her friend Janet’s floor. And Janet had moved to New York two months ago.

Where was she? And how had she gotten here?

“When I got up this morning I couldn’t figure why you were under the table,” a male voice suddenly said.

A pair of bare feet, with a slouch of blue jeans hanging over them, stopped but a foot from her face. Indi placed both palms on the floor before her and craned her head up as far as she could manage, but her neck ached, so her line of sight only stretched as far as his crotch. Not a terrible sight to wake up to. Just...unexpected.

She dropped and rolled to her back.

“You insisted on crawling under there after I deposited you on the couch last night,” he said. He bent to display two mugs. “Coffee?”

Heartbeat suddenly racing, Indi inhaled deeply a few times to calm her panic. But really, she should be panicking. “Where am I? Who are you? I, uh...”

“My name’s Ryland James. I don’t know your name. You were buttered when I found you last night.”

Buttered? Hell yes, she’d been so drunk.

“When you found me? What the hell? What did you...?” She winced. No, she was still dressed. Which didn’t mean much. If the man had had his way with her while she was inebriated...

“You stumbled onto a strange scene,” he said, sitting on the black leather sofa and setting one coffee cup on the floor near her shoulder. “I wanted to bring you home, make sure you were safe, but I didn’t know where you lived. And...after a bunch of wild-and-craziness you passed out. For the night.”

She closed her eyes and slapped a palm to her chest. Wild and crazy? Seriously? She’d let that bastard Todd get to her that much? And now she was lying on the floor in a strange man’s home.

The coffee smelled deceptively good. But from experience, she knew if she drank any she’d get sick. Hangovers were never kind to her.

She spoke her fears. “I need to get out of here.”

“I can drive you home if you’ll give me your address.”

“I don’t think I should do that. I can hail a cab.”

“Suit yourself. I’m not going to hurt you. I just wanted to make sure you were okay after...”

Indi skimmed her fingers over her chest and throat. Something hurt. She winced at the slight pain and felt the rough line of skin along her collarbone. Had she been cut?

“It should heal more quickly than you expect,” the man, Ryland, said. “I tried to get you out of there, but you were, well...”

Buttered.

“Sorry. Some guy broke up with you?”

She’d told him that? What had happened last night?

“He dumped me at the ball. And I was feeling so pretty.” She sniffed, feeling all the emotions well in her gut again. Oh, she couldn’t do the ugly cry in front of this handsome stranger!

Turning and crawling out from under the table, she managed to bump the coffee cup and topple it. It soaked into her skirt.

“I’m so sorry.”

“Don’t worry about it.”

A strong hand helped her to stand by grabbing her upper arm. And when she swayed near his chest, Indi smelled fresh, outdoorsy aftershave on him. Or maybe it was his innate scent. Like wild captured yet never tamed. The man was handsome. Long dark hair, trimmed mustache and a beard that was short and hinted at the dark hairs that might grow on his chest. And so many muscles in the biceps she clung to.

Indi had never been one to let opportunity pass, but...

She also wasn’t stupid.

“Thank you for, uh...” She wandered to the door, tugging up her wet skirt and realizing a long piece of it dragged behind. The outer tulle layer had torn, and the hem was blackened with dirt. One of the chiffon poppies dangled from a thread.

“Oh, God, you must think I’m the worst case. I was...upset. And yes, he broke my heart. I have this tendency to get attached, too—” What was she doing? She didn’t need to detail her pitiful emotional failings to a stranger. “I needed a good cry and...”

She turned, thinking Ryland looked like the man she’d seen in her dreams. He had been. She’d never forget such a handsome face. And those brown eyes pierced her with intensity. “Last night.” Peering intently at him, she asked, “Did you change?”

“Did I, uh, what?” He set the mug on the table and approached her.

Indi backed up until her shoulders hit the door. She slumped. Her head was spinning and she predicted the hangover would play revenge on her soon. And she did not want the guy to witness that.

“Change,” she muttered, though she wasn’t sure why she’d asked him that. How could a person change? Yet she had seen something odd last night. Maybe? “Were there flying creatures?”

He bent before her, and long brown hair spilled over his chest and the T-shirt that he wore inside out to expose the seams. Earth-brown eyes studied her for a pitiful moment. “I think you might still be a little drunk, Princess Pussycat.”

“Princess...” She reached for the top of her head and felt the cat ears sitting up there, but at a tilt. “I’m not drunk. Not anymore. And my name is...”

She should leave. Right now. Before things got weird.

Indi turned and grabbed the doorknob, hoping the door wasn’t locked and that he didn’t have plans to toss her in a dirt pit in his basement. It opened. She exhaled and dashed across the threshold.

“I hope you feel better!” he called after her. “And I hope the guy who did that to you gets his just. No woman deserves to be treated so poorly.”

Indi paused at the top of a stairway that led down to the building’s entry. She lifted her skirts and imagined she must look a nightmare to him. A kind man who had only wanted to ensure that she was safe last night.

“My name’s Indigo,” she said, then took the stairs, hands firmly clutching both railings for support.

By some strange luck that she was not accustomed to, a cab was parked curbside. Indi climbed into the back seat, gave the driver her address in the eighth arrondissement, then flopped down, hugging the seat as if it were a life raft. Shoving her hand in her skirt pocket, she was relieved her phone was still in there. She checked her texts. There were none.

Had she expected to hear from Todd after his night with Melanie?

Oh, that she could even think of him again. Stupid, stupid, stupid!

She needed to talk to Janet. To spill all the details of her horrible, terrible, no-good very humiliating night. She’d call her when she got home.

Ten minutes later, the cabbie offered to help her to the front door, but Indi said she’d manage. She paid him with a scan of the credit card app on her phone and then meandered up to the house.

Her head wasn’t quite so spinny now, but her limbs felt heavy. As if she’d run a marathon. Exhaustion hit her hard as she opened the front door and wandered inside. She could only think to lie down. Right. Now.

She eyed the alpaca rug before the white velvet couch and stepped down into the sunken living room. Dropping the phone on the couch, and then falling to her knees, Indi collapsed onto her stomach on the soft, inviting rug. She curled her fingers into the fur and closed her eyes.

And then she fell asleep.

For a very long time.

* * *

Ry strolled into the small office he kept in the fourth arrondissement. His secretary, Kristine, blew him the usual good-morning kiss and handed him a full and steaming mug of coffee.

“How’d hunting go last night?” she asked while focusing on a spreadsheet she had opened on the laptop before her. Her long purple nails clattered on the keys.

“It was...” Ry sipped the coffee and winced. He could never get her to add even a smidge of cream to the wicked black concoction she brewed. “Different.”

That got her attention. Turning on the swivel chair and crossing her legs, she dangled a very large pink vinyl high heel and eyed him through a flutter of thick false lashes. She didn’t need to speak. He could hear her thoughts plainly.

“A human woman stepped onto the scene while I was slashing through collectors.”

“Oh, mon cher. That is not acceptable. How did that happen? I thought FaeryTown wasn’t something we humans could even access.”

“Exactly. Not unless you’re wearing an ointment to see the sidhe. I’m not sure how she saw me or the collectors, but she did, and...” He sipped again. He probably shouldn’t tell Kristine everything. But then, she was a confidante, and he trusted her with the information about his nature. “She was scratched by one of them. Would have died had I not rushed her to a healer. By the way, I need to send Hestia a million-euro check.”

Kristine sighed. “Really? The old girlfriend? I’ll take care of that.”

“She was not a girlfriend. More a—”

Kristine put up a palm. “Nope. Don’t want you to mansplain that one to me. So, what happened after that big adventure?”

“I took her home with me, and she spent the night on the floor under the coffee table.”

“Ryland Alastair James.”

He winced at the admonishing tone. “I put her on the couch, but she wouldn’t stay there. She was drunk and...the healer drugged her with some wacky faery stuff. I’m surprised she could even stand to run away from me this morning.”

“You let her run away? Without making sure she got home safe? Who are you?”

He sighed heavily. Kristine knew him well. Normally he would never allow a woman to run off like that without seeing to her safety. But she had been freaked by him. And he’d not been given an opportunity to explain the cut on her chest, which might have been a good thing, all things considered.

“She’ll be fine,” he said. “And both collectors are dead. No babies stolen last night.”

Kristine crossed her arms, and her dangling foot increased in bobbing speed.

“I don’t know her last name, so it’s not like I can look her up and check in on her. She was dressed fancy and I think she’s probably well-off.”

“Doesn’t mean she made it home safely.”

“I accept your admonishment, and confess I’m worried about her, too. But there’s nothing I can do now.”

“Can’t you track her down with your sniffer? Didn’t you once tell me you werewolves can smell a peppermint candy five miles away?”

“She wasn’t wearing peppermint. She smelled like champagne and roses.” And not just any kind of rose perfume. She’d smelled like fresh-from-the-garden roses.

“Was she pretty?”

“Does that matter?”

“No, but she’s going to stay in your brain until you know what became of her after she fled your place. Fled! Seriously, Ry, what did you do to her?”

“I offered her coffee.”

Kristine chuckled and turned back to her work. “Only you can manage to simultaneously slay weird faery marauders and hook up with a pretty young thang.”

“We didn’t hook up. I set her on the couch and...in the morning I found her under my coffee table.”

Kristine raised an eyebrow in judgment.

“And that’s the end of this conversation. Did you compile research on the Severo Foundation?”

“I did. And I’ve a report for you. I’ll print it up and bring it into your office in two twitches. This is a good one, cher. You’ll want to donate to them.”

“Thanks, Kristine. Give me ten minutes before you come in. I need to—”

“Think about the poor sweet thang that fled your place this morning?” She winked at him. “You have some weird problems.”

Ry entered his office and closed the door behind him, thinking Kristine was right on. But oddly, the human interference last night had been the weirdest. Not the faeries.

Only a desk, a chair and a couch decorated his tiny office space. The far wall opposite the door was completely window, and no cabinets blocked the view of the nearby Seine River. He didn’t do the fancy. Much as his multibillion-dollar philanthropic foundation could afford it. He wasn’t into the bling or showing off his riches. It wasn’t him. And while he could put on a suit and blend in with the wealthy at the snap of a finger, he preferred the casual look and lifestyle.

Yet he did do the expensive watch. He liked to know the time to the exact second. And right now it was eleven fifteen, on the nose.

He sat on the leather sofa and stretched his arms along the back of it. Clouds were rolling in, and rain was in the forecast, yet the color of the sky was wildly vivid.

“Indigo,” he muttered.

Interesting name for a woman. She’d been more of a soft pink last night, mixed with a few streaks of jet-black mascara. Poor thing.

Kristine was right. He should have followed her out of his building this morning. But he’d watched from his loft and seen the waiting cab. She’d beelined into it and it had pulled away. She’d made it home safe.

What hell of a hangover would she have? If not from the alcohol, but from the mysterious concoction of herbs and who-knew-what Hestia had given her?

“Should have gotten her last name,” he said with a regretful twinge that he felt in his heart. “She was pretty.”

And she had seen too much. That wasn’t good. He needed to keep his secret, and the secret of FaeryTown, from the human public. And if she had seen him in those few moments when his rage caused him to partially shift, then he needed to make sure she thought it was just an effect of the alcohol. Not the truth.

Because his truth always managed to fuck things up.

* * *

Indi lifted her head from the alpaca rug. It was dark. Really dark. She was lying on the floor in her living room for reasons that escaped her...

“Ah, really?”

She dropped her head and realized she must have slept the entire day. Twenty-four hours had passed since Todd dumped her last night. And what had happened after that had been even more remarkable. She’d watched a handsome man with P90X abs and biceps kill weird sparkly creatures with a sword. And then she’d woken up under his coffee table.

“This is definitely one for the diary,” she muttered as she sat up. “Oh, my aching bones, have I become an old lady?”

She pressed a hand to her back and winced as she stretched. Either she was growing old quickly or sleeping on the floor was no longer something she could do and recover from with ease. Her college days had often found her sleeping on the floor, or a table, or even in a big box once.

“Shouldn’t have sucked down all that champagne.”

With some groans and grunts, she managed to stand. Inspecting her tattered and dirty gown made her moan. “It was so pretty. I was pretty. Asshole.”

Grabbing her phone from the couch, she intended to call Janet, but...

“It’s ten at night?”

Now she stomped toward the curving marble staircase and her second-floor bedroom. She didn’t bother to turn on the lights. Passing through the bedroom, she clutched the cat ears still clinging to her head and tossed them onto the king-size bed. Tripping a few more times on her torn hem, she made it into the bathroom and flicked on the lights as she stopped before the wide vanity mirror specially lighted for putting on makeup.

Indi chirped out an abbreviated scream. Then she slapped both palms over her mouth. Staring back at her from the mirror was a bedraggled bit of tattered lace and smeared makeup. Her mascara had streaked down her cheeks, but—perhaps when she’d been passed out on the floor—most of it had rubbed off. Had that happened before or after she was at the handsome stranger’s place?

“He saw me looking like this? Oh, Indi, you really know how to impress a guy, don’t you?”

Her hair was half out of the messy bun. One jut of hair managed to stick straight out on the left side. “What hurricane did I walk through?” She pulled out a leaf from her hair. “Where did this—Oh, I want to die! I just...”

She slammed her hands to the vanity and shook her head. But instead of tears, laughter burst out. Lung-tugging, gut-clenching laughter. Dropping and settling onto the soft pom-pom rug in front of the tub, Indi laughed until her ribs ached.

“Lowest point in my life? Last night,” she muttered. “Lesson learned? Lay off the champagne. Never date a guy whose most important accessories are his cell phone and day-planner app. And...” She sighed and wiggled her toes through the tear in the pink tulle. “Always thank the handsome stranger who rescues you from the idiocy of yourself.” And from a strange creature she thought might have been trying to eat her. “Did I thank him? I don’t think I did. Ryland James? And he never did answer my question.”

She had seen things while shivering in the alley last night. More than a few weird things. And he had most definitely changed into...something different. It hadn’t been the alcohol. Couldn’t have been.

“Who are you kidding, Indi? Of course it was the champagne. People don’t change shapes.”

She touched her chest where she had rubbed over a cut earlier this morning at her rescuer’s place. Her skin felt smooth now.

Indi stood and studied her collarbone in the mirror. The skin did not show a cut or mark of any kind. And if she had been hurt, shouldn’t there be, at the very least, a faint or red mark?

Was it possible she’d imagined it all?

“Anything is possible,” she said to the tawdry princess in the mirror.

He’d called her Princess Pussycat. And his eyes had smiled before his mouth had.

Indi smiled. A weak, pitiful and bedraggled smile, but it was the best she could manage. It would be a crime not to see that man again. And she really did need to thank him. At least some man had been concerned about her last night.

More important, she wanted to ask him questions. To make sure she wasn’t going crazy and hadn’t started to imagine strange creatures walking the streets of Paris.

“Tomorrow,” she said to the disaster in the mirror. “Now a shower, and a bath, and maybe another shower after that.”