Birthday Shift (4 page)

With his free
hand, he cupped her face, stroking the pad of his thumb tenderly over her jaw
and up her cheek. His touch sent tiny rivers of sensations flowing inside her,
rivers that all led to the same sensitive spot between her legs. When his thumb
moved to her lips, caressing gently, her mouth seemed to open of its own
accord. She heard herself sigh.

“More?” he
whispered.

Helpless to do
anything but nod, a gasp escaped her when his lips replaced his hand, and the
sweet flavor of him filled her. He stroked his tongue over hers in a soft,
sensual dance, and the rivers of sensations became tidal waves. They continued
to flow to the same spot, and she ached for him to touch her there.

He nipped her
bottom lip playfully, erotically, and then his kisses moved down, dotting over
her chin, down to her neck, where the slide of his lips and tongue
simultaneously tickled and aroused her. As she giggled, he captured her lips
again, the kiss so tender that her heart bumped in her chest.

As he returned to
kissing her neck, his hand lifted to cup her breast, his thumb finding the
already firm point of her nipple and teasing it to hardness through the soft
fabric of her boat neck t-shirt. She strained towards him, only wanting more,
more, more-

He stopped.

Molly’s eyes
snapped open. “What…”

“I cannot
continue unless you want me to, my lovely one,” Cade told her, green eyes
seeming to stare straight into her soul. “When that is, you can come to me.
Until then…” He turned away, and in the blink of an eye her black cat sat
before her, those same green eyes focused on her face.

Aching with need,
every nerve thrumming, Molly covered her face with her hands, so confused and
tired.

She needed her
best friend.

But don’t forget, Lil isn’t what she seems.

“It doesn’t
matter,” she said to herself out loud. “I need some answers, and I need them
now.”

Before she did
something she might really regret.

~ * * * ~

Forty minutes
later, Molly sat in a café around the corner from her apartment, a steaming
coffee before her on the table, drumming her fingers on the much-used, slightly
graffitied surface.

Whatever delayed
Lil, Molly didn’t appreciate it, especially considering the circumstances.

When Lil arrived
a few seconds later, hair flustered, an apology written all over her face, Molly
held up a hand to stop any words in their tracks. “Save it.” She pointed at the
chair on the other side of the table. “Sit.”

Lil did,
obediently, and shrugged off her coat in a single motion. “You found out, huh,”
she said, and it clearly wasn’t a question.

“Did you think I
wouldn’t?”

Lil had the good
grace to look ashamed. “Well-”

“Why didn’t you
tell me that you’re some spooky voodoo goddess or whatever, and all your
animals are enslaved to you and can turn into people? Hmm?” Her voice rose at
the end of the sentence and other customers in the café looked over worriedly.
Molly glared at them, but, being nosy New Yorkers, that didn’t put anyone off.

“Ignore them,”
Lil advised. “They’ve certainly heard crazier.”

“Is it true?”
Molly demanded, ignoring the urge to laugh at her friend’s comment. “Are you
some crazy otherworldly realmbinder… person?”

Lil nodded,
playing with the silver ring on the third finger of her left hand. “It kinda
is, yeah.”

Molly felt a long
breath leave her body, as if she’d been waiting for the confirmation or denial
for years, instead of less than an hour. “But how? And why didn’t you say
something? I mean this is huge! This is… this really happens? Think about what
could be learned from this? This is just… mind blowing.” She paused for breath,
briefly. “And I’m supposed to be your best friend. Why didn’t you tell me? I
mean, you tell me all the other details of your life. I even know how often you
wash your panties, for God’s sake! Wasn’t this a weeny bit more important?”

“Two reasons.”
The waitress came over with a little pad hooked into her black apron, and Lil
ordered a caramel latte. “One, would you have believed me?”

After a few
moments of thought, Molly had to admit that she wouldn’t have. “You know, I’d
probably have said that the men in white coats were on their way. Even though I
live in
New York
, and I’ve seen it all, I would’ve thought
twice.”

“Exactly.” Lil
fiddled with her ring again, twisting it clockwise on her finger. “And number
two, what do you do for a living? You write about stuff. You investigate stuff.
See how hyped you were getting just now? I think, once you’d proved I wasn’t
lying, you’d have written about me. About the portal.”

About to open her
mouth to disagree, Molly stopped and thought.
Is she right?

She is right. I would.
As Lil had spoken, Molly’s
mind had already started working overdrive, thinking about the angles she could
use to pitch a piece like this. It was just how she thought.

“I suppose you’re
right,” she conceded after a pause. “But all the same… you can’t just dump
something like this on me. So what, you thought I should have a man in my life
so you send one to me? To be treasure-bonded or something? It’s forever
apparently.” Her voice had started to climb in pitch again. “What if I didn’t like
him? What if he’s some sort of killer? What if he’s destroying my apartment
right now? And what do you get out of it?”

The waitress
hovered by the table, looking concerned. Lil sent her an apologetic smile and
the young girl set the latte down and hurried away, her shoes clicking on the
tiled floor.

Lil sipped her
drink, wincing a bit from the heat, then licked her lips. “God! I’d be a dress
size smaller if I could just give up lattes. Okay. This is how it works. In
return for passage into our world, and being matched with a mate, or a
realmbound partner, if you will, they bring me things from their world.
Precious gems. Gold. Something valuable that I’ll keep or sell.”

“But you can’t
possibly make enough money from that to live,” Molly protested.

Lil shook her
head, looking pained. “You’re telling me. No, I actually
do
run a pet store slash animal rescue place. The realmbinder thing
is just a nice lucrative side deal, a favor for a…persuasive friend of mine
called Etienne. Sort of one of her otherworldly outlet stores, if that make
sense. You’ll have to meet her someday. She’s something. But Cade – oh boy, is
he a looker.”

“Wait!” Molly cut
her friend off. “I am not being fobbed off any more. Who is Etienne?”

Lil set her mug
down. “She’s in charge of Spellbound Treasure, which deals in
things.
Lost things. A long time ago, I
lost something dear to me and Etienne saw I got it back. By the time she
returned it, we’d gotten well acquainted and she commented on the affinity I
seem to have with living creatures. She said she didn’t have enough resources
to cover all the opportunities to link our world with the Faery one, and did I
want a job?”

Molly blew out a
breath. Her head started to ache. “And you just said yes?”

“Of course not!
Well, not right away,” Lil admitted when Molly sent her a knowing look.
“Etienne took me to the world of the Faery. And I was drawn to the Faewild.
What do you know about it?”

“Well.” Molly
finally sipped from the coffee she’d been nursing before Lil had arrived, and
wished for something stronger. “Cade said that they were separated from the…”
She couldn’t say it out loud, not yet. “The other realms.”

“That’s true.”
Lil fiddled with the little ceramic pot in the middle of the table which held
sugar and sweeteners. “Years and years ago in the Fae realms, war divided many
of the races. The Faery of the Faewild, possessing shifting magic, fared far
better in the war and were considered dangerous. So they were segregated to
their own lands, on the outer border of the Faery realms. Because the forest is
so thick and dark in this part of the realms, it was named the Faewild,
although they do have cities and towns, just like we do.”

Molly’s mind
boggled. “How do you…. create a portal?”

“It’s not easy.”
Lil furrowed her brow as she bent a sugar sachet in on itself. “And it doesn’t
always work. Once a human month, Etienne helps me set up shop in the Faewild,
in a popular city called Bracken Hill. Fae who seek human mates come to me, and
I set them up.”

 
Molly chose her own sugar sachet to fiddle with,
as it seemed to make Lil’s words easier to digest. “Why humans? Cade said
something about us looking similar, but it must be more than that.”

“It is. They want
to find a mate in this world, to explore it, to feel human love. The love of
the Faewild, the fairy world, well, it doesn’t always last, polygamy is
expected… the world isn’t as finite as this one. They don’t really have
marriage, they don’t have the sort of emotional love we do.”

Molly scoffed,
shaking her head. “Like marriage is lasting in this world. Do they know what
they’re in for?”

Lil paused with
the mug to her lips. “Realmbinding a Fae to a human is different. It’s an
unbreakable bond, one that lasts because of the different genetic makeup of Fae
and human. Once they crossover, Fae have to be bonded to a human within a month
of arriving, or they’re pulled back into their world, and need to wait a
hundred years before they can cross over again.”

“Wow.” Molly had
forgotten all about her coffee. Her mind span with what Lil had said. “That’s
crazy. It’s a huge risk.”

“Yes. That’s why
I let them observe humans first.”

“Oh.” Molly
didn’t like to admit it, but she didn’t feel so wary of Cade now. It seemed he
had taken a lot of time to find her. “How do you pick the women? It can’t just
be random.”

“It isn’t. It’s
people I know. Friends, or customers of my rescue center, who are unlucky in
love, who’ve given up on human men. Or who just deserve someone really great. I
offered Cade four other women after you, but you were the only one he had eyes
for. And I thought, hey, why not, I mean, you’ve had some awful luck with some
awful men. And Cade was just so different, so special – he was yours even
before he picked you.”

“I know you
were.” Heart heavy, Molly reached for Lil’s hand. “That’s why I had to see you.
I need some answers.”

Lil squeezed her
hand. “Well, ask away.”

“First.” Molly
discarded the sugar sachet she’d been twisting in her fingers. “How do you open
the portal?”

Lil winked.
“Trade secret.”

“No, really.”

Now her friend
looked uneasy. “
Promise
you won’t
write about it.”

“And if I did who
would believe me? Come on. You’ve meddled in my life in a way that even my
mother is beyond, so I at least deserve this.”

“Okay,” Lil
sighed. “Anyway, after I make a match, I need something from the Fae. Blood, a
lock of hair, anything like that. Then I need the same from the human.”

Molly gasped.
“Don’t tell me-”

“No, don’t be
silly.” Lil chuckled. “I found a sweater you lent me which had a lock of your
hair on it. I haven’t been going around in your dumpster or anything like that.
Besides anything else, rooting in trash is hell on my fake nails.”

Molly had to
laugh, it was so absurd. “All right. So you get hair, then what?”

“Then I read from
these books Etienne gave me. There’s a set spell. Then the portal opens… and
the clock starts ticking. From then on, my duty is done. It’s up to the Fae, in
this case Cade, to convince his human that they want to be realmbound to each
other.”

Molly felt her
romantic heart bump. “That’s… strangely sweet.”

“Yeah. Anything else?
You must have more questions. I half expected you to arrive with them bullet
pointed in a notebook.”

“I do have more
questions.” Molly wished she had brought a pad along. It made things so much
easier. “They’re about Cade.”

“I figured they
would be.”

The waitress came
past again and topped up Molly’s coffee.

“Well,” Molly
began, hesitantly.

“Spit it out,”
Lil encouraged her. “If you go away without asking you’ll only wonder about it.
Then we’ll be back here and I’ll have another latte and then have to suffer
another session in the gym. I don’t want that.”

“How long will he
live?” The first, most important question, Molly supposed.

“Once he’s
realmbound to you, the normal human lifetime. Eighty years, give or take a few.
Depends, of course, on whenever he lives well, what he eats, if he takes risks,
etc.”

“What if he
changes his mind?”

“Honey.” Lil
chuckled. “He’s spent all this time choosing you. He won’t change his mind. Fae
are stubborn creatures.”

“And what if I
change my mind?”