Page 10 of Better Love Next Time
She tilted her head.
Julian grabbed the pastry. “Just to oblige your generosity.”
“Yes, of course.”
He gobbled down the bun. The fairy was polite enough to turn away. She pushed her cloak from her shoulders and plucked out a carrot slice from a salad in an earthenware bowl. Salad? When there were biscuits?
A bubbling, purring sound arose from her breast. He leaned around her left. Tucked in a scarf wrapped around her flat chest, a creature with white whiskers and a pink nose nibbled on the carrot.
“What the bloody hell is that?”
“Daisy.”
“That doesn’t look like a daisy.”
“She’s a guinea pig. Would you like to hold her?”
Not giving him the chance to answer, she pressed the snuffling rodent to his chest. He was forced to hold it, and so as not to insult her, he lifted the creature’s nose to his chin as she directed.
“Isn’t she magical?” she enthused. “One cannot be sad with whiskers tickling your face.” Daisy made a sound, something between a whistle and a squeak. “Oh, she likes you. Don’t you girl? She has a soft spot for those who are sad.”
Daisy snuggled at his neck and the fairy traced a finger down the beastie’s back. As her hand lifted, coming back to thecreature’s head, she touched Julian again. On his jaw. He hadn’t been touched this much in his entire life.
“You’re beautiful,” she said to him.
He really couldn’t hit a fairy or a girl, so he let the insult lie. “One day, I’ll have a scar and a beard and look more like a man.”
“But you look like one now.” The back of her hand grazed his cheek. “Like Adonis.”
“What do you know about sadness?” he asked.
She shrugged. “My mother died. She gave me Daisy.” She settled the guinea pig in her skirts, dropped a few more carrot tidbits there, and gazed over the space. Behind the winsome curve of her mouth, Julian saw the sorrow. “And together, we found my lair. And she read me these books and taught me to read. And how to play cards. Would you like to play cards?”
Rummaging in the trunk, she brought out a deck of cards and a velvet purse. Loosening the gold string, she upended the purse.
He gawked at the neat pile of coins spilled out to the quilt. “You gamble?”
“Is that what you call it?”
“Yes.”
“Oh. Then, yes. My brother lost five pence to me last Christmas and refuses to play with me again. But you are strong and brave. You aren’t afraid to play me, are you?”
“Of course not,” he said, looking down his nose at her. Julian had fleeced Anthony of ten shillings once. “But I have no money.”
She studied him. “I say we split my coin, and in payment, you give me a lock of your hair.
“Done.”
She withdrew a basket from the trunk and snipped a length of blue ribbon. He held still as she searched his hair for what he assumed to be the perfect specimen.
Swish. She cut close to his scalp, smiling over a very generous length of his black hair. But what of it? It was only hair. Like the devil, his father called it. Like Julian’s left-handedness.
After tying the ribbon to his hair at three points, she slid it in her pocket. “Now, one more request before we play. You tell me why you are sad.”
She wheedled like a girl. Boys didn’t give a scratch about feelings. The only thing inside a person of importance was courage. “My father sent me to my uncle’s, and the old man made me sleep in a closet and fed me porridge.”
Her eyes rounded like an owl.
