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“I DON’T KNOW MYSELF, MY MIND, MY THOUGHTS. AND THAT SCARES ME.”
“It’s horrible,” she said to the man, meaning it.
He breathed out, the sound jittery and tentative, as if breath itself were likely to disappear.
As Fabian watched him, listened to his words, she felt something happen in her body. At first it was like she was going to burst into panic, but then the push of adrenaline turned into warmth, filling her body with feeling, and then she was washed with a slight desire, the same that she’d had the day before as he’d slept against her body while she read to him on the sofa. Her mouth opened before she could think, the same problem she’d had in school, but instead of smarting off to a teacher, she said, “Do you want me to stay here with you? I mean, sleep here with you?”
Without pause, he said, “Yes.”
Fangs But No Fangs
KATHY LOVE
KENSINGTON PUBLISHING CORP.
http://www.kensingtonbooks.com
For Emily.
You can read this in fifteen years,
but by then, I bet you won’t want to.
Contents
Acknowledgments
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Epilogue
Acknowledgments
Thanks to the Tarts. Thanks, Janet, for the “tying one on” info!
Thank you, Mom and Dad, for the month-long writing boot camp.
Thank you, Lisa, Chris, Sheryl, and Karen. I so appreciate the great feedback.
Thanks to Sandie of the Underground, who I missed last time. Sorry!
I really want to thank a few of my best writing buddies who have made this whole adventure tons of fun: Julie Cohen, Christie Kelley, Janet Mullany, Kate Dolan, Beth Ciotta, Jordan Summers, Arianna Hart, Julia Templeton, Mary Stella, Sue Fickel, and Suzanne Walter. You are the greatest!
I also want to thank all the wonderful authors at Romance Unleashed, with special thanks to: Lori Devoti, Kathleen Long, Kristina Cook, Kate Rothwell, Flo Fitzpatrick, Teresa Bodwell, Jessica Trapp, and Sally Mackenzie.
You were the first of the group I met, and you made me feel very welcome.
And to all the ladies there—you keep me sane. Thanks.
Thanks Jul for the last minute read through.
And, finally, thanks Kate. You were so right.
Chapter 1
The pink flamingos had to die!
Christian groaned and slammed a flattened, musty pillow over his head, trying to block out the grating noise. But the endless whirring would not be silenced. Add the clack, clack, clack of the little man sawing wood, and the noise was almost unbearable.
He threw the pillow aside and sat up on the sagging mattress. A spring poked at the back of his thigh, although he barely registered the stab.
He shoved up from the bed and walked to the window, or rather stepped to the window, as the square room was about the size of one of his Monte Carlo bungalow’s walk-in closets.
Grime hazed the small rectangular window, but he could still see the offending noisemakers. He wished he could grow accustomed to them like he had his lumpy bed. But the racket never seemed to end.
The goddamned lawn ornaments would be the thing that finally drove him stark raving mad.
An enormous assortment of ornaments rose from the neighboring trailer’s lawn like a twirling and spinning army of kitsch. Flowers, flamingos, other random animals, their petals, wings, and appendages whirling deafeningly in the breeze. And then there was that little man with the saw like an army sergeant, bobbing away, clacking endlessly, spurring the others on. Damn, he hated that little man.
He even hated the ornaments that didn’t move. The gnomes. The plastic geese. The wooden cutout that was supposed to look like a lady with an unusually well-endowed backside, bending over among the bedraggled flowerbed.
Christian closed his eyes for a moment, but the menagerie of tastelessness just appeared behind his closed eyelids in full, swirling color.
Giving up the hope of peace, he left his closetlike bedroom to enter a dark, paneled hallway that was just wide enough for the expanse of his shoulders. As he passed the bathroom, the toilet, which seemed to have a will of its own, gurgled to life in greeting. The hiss of water was a welcome distraction from the saw man.
He walked out to the narrow galley-style kitchen, which was large enough for a stained and nicked counter, ancient appliances, and a kitchen table with metal legs and a speckled gray and white top. The cracked linoleum chafed the soles of his bare feet.
