Page 35 of Hell Hath No Fury
“I don’t know what my name is,” he muttered. He was still holding onto me.
I should’ve stepped back now that it was clear that he was not in his right mind, and it was unethical for me to participate in anything physical when I was in my right mind …ish.
But I didn’t.
“You don’t know your name,” I repeated.
He shook his head once.
“Do you know how you came to almost die on the side of the road in the middle of nowhere?” I asked.
Another head shake.
“Curious,” I mused, reaching up to brush his inky hair out of the way so I could examine his forehead. There was a large bruise there, and a cut I’d bandaged last night.
“Amnesia,” I speculated, staring at the bruise, not noticing the way his entire body had tensed at my featherlight touch.
Our eyes met.
Something knocked to the floor with the force of the wind I was creating.
“Bellona,” I whispered against the wind.
“The goddess of war,” he murmured back.
I eyed him skeptically. “You can’t remember your name, how you got to be dying on the side of a desolate road, but you can identify the origin of my name?”
He nodded once, somberly, not catching on to or not acknowledging my sarcasm. “So it seems.”
I wrestled with my self-control not to lean forward just a little so our lips touched. I didn’t need sight to know what would happen from there. The air was drenched in it. Our mutual need.
But no.
He was injured, body and mind.
And I needed to get tangled up in this like I needed a hole in the head.
When I stepped out of his grasp, his hand flexed for a moment as if he were considering fighting me, but then it relaxed enough to let me go.
I tried to calm myself down enough for the wind to blow at a subtle breeze. If he didn’t remember his name, he likely didn’t remember me performing a little bit of magick on him when he was awake.
Best not tell him I was a witch.
History dictated that telling strange men, no matter how attractive, that you had power enough to snuff out his life like an ant never boded well.
Though the cottage itself wasn’t exactly subtle.
Luckily, this generation of women were obsessed with all things metaphysical. I could pass as an eccentric mortal.
As long as I didn’t set anything on fire.
Which meant I needed to stay away from him. Logically, it meant I should heal him and put him on his way.
But not yet.
“You can stay here,” I decided, moving to a respectable distance, once again cradling my coffee. “While you heal. As long as you’re not a serial killer.” I paused, tilting my head tothe side, regarding him. “Though even if you were, you wouldn’t remember.”
“How do I knowyou’renot a serial killer?” he asked, his voice still thick with hunger. And not for the muffins I had in the oven.
