Gods and Mortals: Fourteen Free Urban Fantasy & Paranormal Novels Featuring Thor, Loki, Greek Gods, Native American Spirits, Vampires, Werewolves, & More (111 page)

Therese was glad when Pete’s smooth voice penetrated the dance hall from the sound system in perfect harmony with his background singers. She watched with delight as he plucked the strings of his guitar without missing a note, looking handsome in his white cowboy hat and starched denim shirt and jeans. The microphone was perched on a stand, and Pete swayed behind it, strumming the guitar. He winked at her, which made her smile. He had always been the big brother she never had, and she wanted everything to be just right for him tonight. His voice rang out to an old Mac Davis song her father used to sing
,
“Oh Lord It’s Hard To Be Humble
.
”

Therese pushed down the memories of her father to think instead of Than. The song described him to a tee. He was perfect in every way.

Her thoughts were interrupted when Todd was at her side asking to dance.

“Sure,” she said and took his hand as she followed him to the dance floor.

Waltzes were the easiest dance to follow, in Therese’s opinion, and Todd was a strong lead. He twirled her around the dance floor, giving her that fake feeling of freedom again. She smiled when she saw Bobby and Jen join them and the other couples moving across the floor with the smoke and the laughter and Pete’s smooth voice. She glanced back at Than, and a thrill moved through her entire body when she saw he was looking back at her.

When the song ended, Todd asked for another dance—a polka to “The Yellow Rose of Texas”—and Therese loved to polka, so she gratefully accepted. Round and round they went, flying across the floor. Todd was good at this too. As he turned her once again, she noticed Carol and Richard standing next to Mrs. Holt. Carol had tears in her eyes and a huge smile, obviously relieved to see Therese could still have fun in a world where her parents no longer existed. Carol’s tears sobered Therese, though she knew her aunt would be utterly grieved by that knowledge, so she bravely smiled and gave a quick wave before Todd pulled her around again. When the song ended, Todd ushered her off the dance floor to join their friends.

“Thanks, Todd. Come here so I can introduce you to my aunt and her boyfriend.”

Therese introduced Carol and Richard to the group, though they had met the Holts briefly last Christmas, and Carol had met them one other time years ago, before Jen’s father had left. Richard stood a foot taller than her aunt, about six-four, the same height as Than, and his chocolate complexion and dark brown eyes shimmered in the sparkling light thrown off by the disco globe above them.

“An investigative journalist?” Mrs. Holt asked as she shook Richard’s hand. “How interesting. Political or criminal?”

“Mostly political, but a bit of both.”

After the introductions and Richard’s attempt to field Mrs. Holt’s barrage of questions about the war and the president and Homeland Security, Richard pulled Carol out onto the wooden floor to dance the Texas Two-Step to a George Strait song, Pete’s voice easily matching the inflections of the original.

“Jen, ready?” Todd asked.

“Let’s go,” Jen beamed.

Therese was aware of Than when he stepped beside her to watch the band and the dancers.

“Can you teach me to do that?” he asked.

“What? Dance?” her mouth dropped open. Was this god—no, not god—was this really hot guy asking her to teach him to dance?

“Yes.”

She could feel the blood rush to her face as a nervous giggle popped from her throat. “Um, I don’t know. I guess so. Have you ever Country-Western danced before?”

“Never. I’ve never danced, period.” He bent his brows and looked troubled. “These past few days I’ve come to realize how much I’ve missed out on while living down, down in the south.”

She scrutinized his lovely face. She knew people danced in Texas, but she didn’t mention it. He looked like an angel flung down from Heaven. His soft frown moved her. “Sure. I can teach you, but maybe we should go outside and practice before we try it on the dance floor. We wouldn’t want to get run over out in the crowd.”

She told Mrs. Holt what they were doing before leading Than outside, but not before noticing the glare Meg cast them as they left.

“I don’t think your sister likes me,” Therese said once they stepped from the smoke-filled dance hall and out into the cool night air. Stars twinkled down on them from the clear sky, and the full moon illuminated the otherwise dark parking lot. The gravel crunched beneath their boots. Somewhere, far off in the distance, a dog was barking.

“It’s not you,” he said.

She studied his face. “Then what?”

“She’s worried about me forming attachments. We can’t stay long.”

Therese cleared her throat as she looked for a spot on the edge of the parking lot. “When do you leave?”

“My father gave us forty days. He was quite firm about that.”

It was approaching the end of July. “So how long do you have left?”

“We’ve got about two weeks.”

She had only two more weeks to spend with him? “Are you going to school in the fall?” she asked.

“Back to work.”

“Down south?”

“Yes.”

“What do you do for your father’s business?”

He sighed. “It’s complicated.”

Therese stopped in the open space at the end of the lot and squared herself in front of Than. He was so tall. He towered over her. She felt a little shaky. She decided not to pry.

The dog’s barking seemed to grow louder, and the two of them looked in the direction of its barking and giggled.

“He sounds scarier than Cerberus,” Than said.

The hair stood up on the back of Therese’s neck and she froze. “What did you just say?”

“I said teach me to dance already. We’ve been out here for ages.”

She knew that wasn’t what he had said, but she decided to dismiss it. Maybe he was a fan of Greek mythology.

“I’m going to teach you the waltz first because it’s the easiest. You can basically march in place, one foot and then the other, and not miss a step. You don’t have to spin around until you get the hang of it. Here, put your hand on my waist.” His warm hand on her body made her tingle with pleasure. She put one hand on his shoulder and took his free hand with the other. “If a girl is a good follower, she will put her fingers against the backside of your shoulder like this and her thumb against the front side of your shoulder like this.” His shoulder was thick with muscle. She couldn’t prevent her fingers from trembling slightly. “That way she can feel if you’re going to lead her backward or forward. She can also tell what you’re going to do by the pressure you put on her other hand with your hand, and here, too, at her waist. You have to use your hands, along with your body, to talk to her, to tell her what to do.”

“So I’m supposed to tell you what to do with my body, and you’re supposed to follow?” he asked with a wry smile.

She broke into a grin. “Are we still talking about dancing?”

He lifted his chin and laughed. Then he looked at her. “I like you so much.”

She bit her lip and looked down. He’d just told her he was leaving. Why let her heart get broken in two? “Okay, so the steps are in counts of threes, but like I said, it’s like marching: one two three, one two three.”

He tried it out and she followed, but he paused when he should have kept going, causing her to crash into his chest.

She righted herself. “Sorry.”

“My fault.” He swallowed hard. “Let’s try that again.”

“Ow!” She pulled her foot out from underneath his boot. “It’s okay.”

“Are you hurt?” His face was full of concern.

She couldn’t feel anything with his face so close to hers. He could have chopped off her leg, and she wouldn’t have known it standing here looking into his crystal blue eyes, his mouth so close to hers. “I’m okay. But I forgot to explain that the guy should always start with his left foot.”

After a smoother start, he seemed a natural leader: firm, but sensitive to her movements. He moved her across the parking lot effortlessly now, the gravel crunching beneath them and that dog in the distance incessantly barking.

“You’re very good,” she said. “The best leaders don’t try to master their partners. It’s like a cooperation of wills.”

“I like that,” he said. “A cooperation of wills. I like that a lot.”

He picked up on the movement quickly and after a few minutes tried to mimic what he had seen Todd doing with her on the dance floor earlier.

“Wow, you’re a fast learner.”

“You’re a good teacher.” He twirled her around.

“What are you doing in Colorado, besides working with horses? I mean, why’d you come?”

“I’m waiting for you to recognize me.”

Her mouth dropped open and a shudder worked its way down her spine. She stopped dancing, pulling herself away from him. She took several steps back. “But we just met two days ago.”

He frowned and looked at the ground. “Have you really already forgotten? Don’t you remember putting your arms around me and,” his voice faltered, but he swallowed and found it again, “giving me my first kiss?”

She stopped breathing.

“I haven’t forgotten,” he added, looking into her eyes. “I will remember it for all eternity.”

She shook her head and took several steps backward. “Do you have me confused with someone else? Or are you making stuff up? I’m sure I would have remembered that. I haven’t even
had
my first kiss.”

“If we had more time, I’d take things slowly. I don’t have you confused with anyone, and I’m not making stuff up. You kissed me in your dream that night I took your parents’ souls.”

She staggered back against a parked car, nearly falling. Her entire body trembled with fear. The hair on her neck stood on end. She found it difficult to speak. “And now you’ve come to take me, too?” She swallowed hard. “Good. I want to go.”

He took a step closer. “I’ve come to help you avenge their murder.”

“But, but the lieutenant has already…”

He stood only inches away from her. “He wasn’t the master mind. The real villain is still out there.”

She pushed herself up with the help of the parked car. She knew that. But how did he? Her knees were weak, and she could barely stand. “I don’t care about the real villain. I want to be with my parents. Take me, too.” She stumbled forward and into Than’s arms. “Take me to them,” she said again.

He kissed the top of her hair. “I told you, you wouldn’t be the same if I did.”

“I don’t care,” she whispered breathlessly.

“That’s not why I’m here.”

“Therese?” It was Jen calling for her through the dark parking lot. “Therese? Than? Are you guys out here?”

Than steadied Therese onto her feet. “Are you okay?”

She gave a near-hysterical laugh. “No! I’m not okay. I’m losing my mind.”

“Therese?” Jen’s voice was closer now. “Oh, there you are. Sorry. I didn’t mean to interrupt. Pete’s about to play his last song of the night.”

Therese turned to her friend and tried to hide her misery. “Already?”

“Yeah. It’s almost ten. The place shuts down early on weeknights.”

Therese nodded. “Of course I want to hear it. That’s why we came.” She took a step forward, but her knees buckled, and she fell on the ground.

“Geez, are you alright?” Jen asked.

“Um, yeah. Just tired,”’ she replied as Than helped her to her feet. “Still a little sore from yesterday.”

He kept his hand around her waist as he led her back to the Wildhorse Saloon. Once inside, their group gave them suspicious looks as she and Than joined them on the side of the dance floor, but no look was more scrutinizing than Meg’s.

Pete’s smooth voice soothed Therese as it carried through the building.

“It’s a waltz,” Than whispered in her ear. “Can we try it? Please?”

At first she shook her head. She could barely walk. How could he expect her to dance? But when she looked up into his pleading eyes, she couldn’t resist him. “Okay.”

Therese could feel the stares of everyone in their group as Than took her in his steady arms and practically carried her across the dance floor to Anne Murray’s beautiful song, a wedding song, she thought. It was called, “Can I Have this Dance for the rest of My Life?”

He was leaving in two weeks, but just as she had in the ride over here, she felt herself falling for this sensitive, beautiful guy who claimed to be a god. She was crazy, or maybe he was, or maybe both of them shared an insane delusion between them.

By the end of the song, though, she felt better and could actually return Than’s smile. She clapped along with the others to congratulate Pete, but then, before leaving the floor and rejoining the others, she whispered to Than, “This can’t be real, can it?”

He whispered back, his breath hot but somehow managing to send chills down her scalp and neck, “Give yourself time to process it. I’ll see you in the morning.”

He walked her over to her aunt and the rest of the group to say their goodbyes. Therese rode in the backseat of her aunt’s red Toyota Corolla and stared out the window at the darkness around her. She tried to push off into the sky to turn somersaults, but she remained planted beneath the seatbelt. It hadn’t been a dream. It hadn’t been a dream at all.

A
fter the dance
, Than hovered with Alecto, both of them invisible in the air conditioned air above a man at a desk in a small room at the back of a shoe store in Indianapolis. The shoe store was closed for the night, so there were only two others in the shop, taking inventory of their stock. The man Than and Alecto knew as Steve McAdams had short brown hair and a suit that was old and too small with a slight brown stain on its lapel. He was about forty and the ring on his pudgy finger signaled that he was married. He was filling out forms with a ball point pen that bled black ink on the side of his hand.

The two gods materialized outside his door and knocked.

“Yeah?” the man called. “I’m busy. What is it?”

The two gods entered. “Federal agents.” They flashed badges. “We have a few questions.”

“And what is this about?” He sat up, flustered, tossing the pen on the desk.

“Do you recognize this man?” Alecto showed him a picture of Kaveh Grahib, the man that had shot Therese’s mother and caused the death of both of her parents.

Steve McAdams shook his head. “No. Who is he?”

“Think carefully,” Alecto said in a threatening voice. “Be sure before you reply.”

“His name is Kaveh Grahib,” Than said. “Ever heard of him?”

The man looked at Than and then back at Alecto, whose eyes were narrowed and appeared to be shooting invisible darts into the man’s skull.

“No,” Steve McAdams said. “Why? Should I?”

Alecto walked across the room and put both hands on the desk, leaning her face toward the man’s within a foot of his. He leaned back as far as he could in his chair.

“I swear I don’t know him.”

The room began to shake, and hot steam jets shot up from the Lethe River through the floor on each side of the man’s chair.

“What the…?” the man flinched and cowered further back in his chair.

Pouring up from the two jets were swarms of black snakes, hissing and darting their tongues as they quickly curled their way up from the floor, onto the legs of the man, and up to his wrists and neck.

“Ah! Ah! What’s happening? What the hell is happening?”

“Think carefully,” Alecto said again. “Are you sure you do not know of this man?”

“Help!” the man screamed, but Than knew his cries were futile, for Alecto had already immobilized the two others in the store with her acrid steam from the Lethe, putting them in a funk they would not recall.

The steam enveloped the man.

“I swear I don’t know him!”

Alecto stood up and turned to Than. “He’s not the one.”

Immediately the snakes rushed back down from the man back into the holes in the floor from whence they came. The man fell in a stupor on his desk covered with the foul steam. The jets stopped and the steam began to dissipate. Than and Alecto left the man, but not through the door.