cabin and then farther up the mountain to Korbinian’s place was narrow. She couldn’t imagine two cars of a normal size passing without tires leaving the road and easing onto the perilously crumbling shoulder. The narrow strip of dirt along the sides of the road was uneven and narrow, and beyond the edge was a slope that varied in height from a few feet to a frightening vast drop. Miranda found it best to stay on the pavement. It wasn’t as if there was any traffic along the road to deal with.
At least, not much traffic. When she heard the approaching vehicle she knew it had to be Korbinian. He’d been gone for hours, so he must’ve done more than grocery shopping while he was out. Not that she cared where he had gone or what he had done. Miranda moved to the shoulder as far as was safe, glancing down to the tangled green and brown growth on the slope below. She took small, cautious steps, waiting for the vehicle to come around the corner and pass. If she was lucky her neighbor wouldn’t feel he had to stop and offer her a ride.
She caught sight of the front of Korbinian’s massive black truck. As soon as he rounded the corner he’d see her and move to the other side of the road, and even if he didn’t, as long as he kept his tires on the pavement she’d be fine. Too close for comfort maybe, but safe enough. The driver came into her line of vision, and she caught sight of his shaggy dark head and stern face. A cell phone was pressed to his ear and he was talking with animation and passion to whomever was on the other end of the line. Passion for work, she imagined, unless that was a girlfriend and they were arguing. It was definitely not a happy conversation.
How come he got a cell signal and she didn’t? Talk about unfair. That was Miranda’s last thought before Dee shouted, “Look out!” and pushed. A ghost should not be able to gather the strength to physically disrupt the living, but this one did. Miranda felt the force against her shoulder as she lost her balance and scrambled wildly to regain her footing. Korbinian’s head snapped up and he spotted her, and he quickly swerved his vehicle to the side. But it was too late. Miranda tumbled off the side of the road.
Bren ended the call without warning, put the truck into Park and set the brake, then threw the door open and jumped out, running to the side of the road and leaving his truck crossways in the narrow roadway with the door standing open. He’d been trying to finish up his business call before he hit the next curve, where cell service ended, and he hadn’t been paying attention, here where he never saw another car much less a pedestrian.
He looked over the precipice where Miranda Lynch had stumbled and disappeared, and breathed a sigh of relief when he saw her sprawled on the ground just a couple of feet below. She’d been winded and there were leaves and twigs caught in her long hair and on her pale pink sweater, but other than that she appeared to be unhurt.
“What the hell were you doing walking on this road?” he snapped.
Blue eyes looked up at him. He had never known that eyes could actually shoot daggers, but hers did. “I’m fine, thank you,” she said coldly, still not moving.
Properly chastised, he took a couple of steps down the steep slope so he could help her. Loose dirt and fallen leaves made his footing uncertain, so each step was cautious. “Are you hurt?” he asked.
“Thank you for your concern, but it comes too late,” she said, struggling to sit up. The ground here was not too steep, so she should have been able to manage on her own in spite of the loose dirt and leaves. Still, he offered a hand. A hand she ignored as she struggled to stand without assistance. As she had this morning, her head snapped to the side and she whispered, as if there was someone there, “I will not take his hand! The idiot ran me off the road!”
Obviously she’d scrambled her brains, though he wasn’t sure that had happened when she’d fallen. They’d been pretty much scrambled when he’d met her. And still, his body responded to the very sight of her.
She worked her way to her feet without assistance, even though righting herself on the uneven ground would’ve been much easier with a hand to hold on to. So, she was stubborn, as well as scrambled. After a moment Bren found himself working to restrain a smile. The woman would go to any lengths to avoid touching him, apparently. A twig with a few leaves attached had wound itself snugly in a tangled length of blonde hair. One lucky leaf had landed on a tempting swell of pink sweater. He remained steady, hand offered, in case she changed her mind about accepting help, but she was determined to make it on her own.
When she had regained her footing, she shooed him out of the way so she could climb back up to the road. He obliged, taking two long strides up the slope to the shoulder of the road, then turning to watch her try to do the same on her short legs. After taking a couple of steps only to stumble back down the hill a bit, then failing in her attempt once more, she looked up at him—ah, there were those daggers again—and shot out her hand in a silent and decidedly surly request for help. Bren reached out and clasped her hand, taking it firmly in his own.
As soon as his flesh touched hers, Bren felt as if an electrical current had been set loose within him. Before he had the chance to explain away the phenomenon, again the unexpected happened. Clear as day, Bren saw his ancestors, the Korbinians who’d lived thousands of years ago, breaking from human form to a flock of birds so massive they blocked out the sun. As if he were there, he saw a time when his kind was prevalent and united and powerful, when they ruled the skies and the night.
Then he felt and saw this woman beneath him, a part of him as she was meant to be, as she had been born to be. She smiled, a lover’s smile. Her body took him in, and together they found pleasure like none other he had ever known.
He saw himself on the deck of the house where he now lived alone, but in the very real vision he stood there with his sons who, like him, were human and yet more than human. They all transformed to take to the skies together, blocking out the moon as they took flight across this mountain they called home.
She was the one. She was Kademair. No wonder he had been so strongly called to her. No wonder the very sight of her damn near made him crazy. Miranda Lynch was the only woman in this world he could bond with; the only woman who could save him from being the last of his kind as he had always accepted he would be. He’d thought this special woman, who his mother had always told him would come one day, to be a myth, and yet here she was, standing before him with her hand in his.
“A little help?” she said in frustration, and only then did Bren realize he’d been standing there holding on to her for a too-long moment.
He gave Miranda’s hand a tug, pulling her gently up the hill until she was once again standing on the narrow shoulder of the road. She released his hand as soon as she was able, shaking her head mightily, a move that dislodged a few leaves but did little to right the effects of the fall. Bren reached out and gently pulled the largest twig from her hair. She found the move too personal, too intimate, and slapped his hand away.
“You should watch where you’re going,” she said sharply.
His voice was much calmer as he responded, “You shouldn’t be walking on this road. It’s too dangerous.”
“Dangerous? How about talking on the cell phone while driving a monster truck up a narrow winding road? That’s dangerous. What carrier do you have?” she asked, picking that lucky leaf from the swell of her breast. “I can’t get a signal at all.”
“There’s nothing past the next curve,” he said, trying not to see this woman in an all new light, trying to forget the mental image of her beneath him. The vision had been so real he could still feel her; he could smell her; he knew how her flesh felt against his, how her body gave and took. Forgetting was impossible, even though he wasn’t sure he wanted what she could offer.
There was no
