Blood and Fire (McClouds & Friends #8)(27)

But the deal was struck. He unlocked the doo and preceded her into an apartment as severe as a monk’s cell but less attractive. Tony had been the ultimate minimalist. A bare overhead bulb. A crucifix on the wall. A color photo of Tony’s parents, aged and scowling. A faded old sepia-toned photo of Tony’s grandparents, clad in dusty black, also scowling. A sagging plaid couch, a beat-up coffee table, an antique TV. An ashtray still full of Tony’s cigarette butts. That gave him a pang.

It smelled of dust, emptiness. It was frigidly cold, so he switched on the halogen space heater. The stench of burning dust fluff floated up to tease his nose as it flared eagerly to life. “Sorry,” he said.

She laid her bag down and went to the window. “What for?”

He tried to turn on the lamp next to the couch, but the bulb was burned out. The brutal overhead was the only light. It made his tired eyes water and sting. “That the place is so—”

“The place is fine. I am not fussy.” She lifted the corner of the blackout shades and peered out. Nothing to see. Dawn was long in coming. Lily came back to stand over the heater, rubbing her hands. She wouldn’t meet his eyes.

“I could heat some water for tea,” he offered. “I could run down to the diner and get some—”

“No, I’m good.”

That left him speechless, at a loss. Nothing to do, nothing to say. He considered and abandoned several ways to make her laugh. What came out of his mouth surprised him. “Is your hair dyed?” he blurted.

Her eyes narrowed. “Why? Does it look wrong?”

“Oh, no, no,” he backpedaled. “It just seems, um, dark. For your skin. It’s pretty. Sexy. It’s just a really tough look. That’s all.”

Her chin went up. “I really am tough. Very tough.”

“Never doubted it for a second,” he said hastily.

She stared at him for a long moment. “It’s a wig,” she confessed.

Oh. A wig. Imagine that. “I see,” he murmured, and gazed at the fake coif for a long moment before taking his courage in both hands.

“Can I, uh, see your real hair?” he asked.

She looked like she was about to refuse. Then she dropped her mascara-loaded eyelashes in a gummy black fan to hide her eyes, pulled off the cat-eye specs, and reached up to pluck out the pins.

No moment of revelation had ever been as sexy as the moment she pulled it off and faced him, her eyes defiant.

Her real hair was strawberry blond, curly wisps plastered fuzzily close to her head, like some retro, pin-curled twenties ’do.

She’d been stunning as a brunette. She blew his mind as a red blonde. The harsh eye makeup and the violently red lipstick had made sense with the severe black bob, but their effect was different now. She looked vulnerable, delicate, lost. An innocent child who’d been all painted up. She’d lied about her age. He would swear to it.

She reached back and unwound the coil of tangled hair. Fluffing it loose so fuzzy corkscrews unwound, dangling voluptuously over her shoulders. So pretty, he could hardly breathe. His fingers itched to touch that flossy, soft mane. “Your real hair is beautiful,” he said.

She let out a sniff. Unimpressed with his compliment.

He felt that prickle again. The buzz of wrongness, danger. Something wrong with this picture. She’d declined to answer before, but he tried again, with different words, in a different tone.

“What do you want from me, Lily?” he asked softly.

She took off her coat, tossed it on the back of the couch, and shook her hair loose. “Turn off the light,” she said. “I’ll show you.”

He stared at her. This wasn’t like him. Why couldn’t he just take it at face value? A beautiful girl he hardly knew, hot for him and saying yes. It had happened before. “Yes” was good. “Yes” should not scare him to death. He played for time, lamely. “You mean, ah . . . you want . . .”

“You know exactly what I mean.”

The blood in his body rushed to his groin, leaving his brain dangerously undermanned. Lighten up, he lectured himself. She was just a girl. Not a cosmic love goddess, wielding the power of life or death, dangling his destiny carelessly in her hand. He cleared his throat. “Are you sure . . . I mean, wouldn’t it be better to wait until—”

“No,” she said.

“Look, I don’t want to come across like I don’t want this—”

“You don’t,” she said. “I know you want it.”

Her calm bothered him. So sure of herself, when he was a stammering mess. “Don’t confuse me,” he snapped. “I don’t know why I’m resisting, because my dick is about to explode. But this thing with you is important. I don’t want to start it off wrong.”

She glanced at her wrist, miming looking at a watch. “Looks like we’ll never start at all, if you have anything to say about it.”

He tried again, doggedly. “If we just do it, then it’s done. And we can’t ever undo it. We can’t ever do it over again.”

“We can’t?” She sucked in her lower lip, blinking. “Aw. How sad.”

“Don’t mock me,” he ground out. “You know exactly what I mean. The first time is a one-time deal, and if we blow it—”

“Shut up, Bruno,” she said. “This is actually harder for me than it may seem, and I’m reaching the end of my nerve. When that happens, I’ll panic and disappear in a puff of smoke. Bye-bye. You get me?”