Medusa's Heart: A Contemporary Paranormal Erotic Romance Novel Read online

  “I trained in the warrior arts at the temple,” she said stiffly, not mollified. “All of us did. I have continued my training here. As I have told you, I am quite competent.”

  “Then it would be my honor to fight at your side or back if the need comes, my lady. You can never have too many hands in a fight. Easier to call up a reserve when you need him than to find yourself outnumbered. Right?”

  “Hmm.” She moved on. “A book of scribblings.”

  “A notebook. Those are portal calculations. Tells me where on the island to find them and how to open them. Portals can exist in a lot of unlikely places.”

  “Portals to go back to your world. Or to let others through.” She surged up and away, prowling around the room with agitated movements. “So you can outnumber me.”

  “If that was the case, my lady,” he said steadily, “Why would I tell you about them? You’re holding my knife and my eyes are blindfolded. Why would I reveal all my options while you have such advantages over me?”

  He was thankful for his battle-honed instincts, because she moved so swiftly and silently he never heard her, even with the augmented senses. He caught her wrist as the knife plunged down. Twisting it to make her drop it, he couldn’t maintain the hold, both because he had no interest in hurting her and because she left him no choice. She wrested free and leaped back from him with a swirl of movement he would have liked to see.

  The grace and effectiveness of the defensive move underlined her abilities, yet he noted her movements had been as deliberately controlled as his own.

  “That is why you would tell me,” she spat. “Because removing an advantage does not make you less dangerous. You seek to win my confidence with trinkets.” A thump and clattering told him she’d swept a pile of the pack items from the table. “That is half the battle in overcoming a foe.”

  “Perhaps,” he said quietly. “Has anyone attempted it before?”

  “It was only a matter of time, since so many other strategies have failed. No one comes to this island without a strategy to kill or capture me. I ask nothing but to be left alone. Why will you all not leave me be?”

  The sudden harsh despair was meant for her enemies, not for him. She didn’t yet know the difference. He told himself that as he swallowed the shards of glass her words made him feel. He could only answer for himself, not the others whose purpose in tormenting her he despised, and regretted not being able to prevent.

  “I’ve traveled a long way to meet and be with you, my lady. During my months of preparation, I was far more worried about how to make my company bearable to you than in planning how to overcome you. At least not that way.”

  “What way do you mean?” she demanded.

  “I told you,” he said patiently. “I’m here to claim you for my own.”

  “Ridiculous,” she scoffed. “And I am no one’s slave.”

  “I think you know that’s not what I mean. Else you would have already turned me into rock. And I would deserve it.”

  Something else was puzzling him. She could have tried and likely succeeded in damaging him during their scuffle, but she hadn’t. He knew when his opponent had every intention of doing violence. That heat had pumped off of her, yet she’d called it back. He’d felt the same thing when she first dropped him in the ocean, before it had morphed into something cautiously playful.

  There was rage and darkness there, a violence pretty close to the surface, but she kept reining it back. He didn’t want to use up whatever meager bit of luck that afforded him, but as the stillness between them became more weighted, he wanted to reach out and close his hand on hers. Shift that grip to her delicate wrist and let her feel how he could hold her, touch her. She hadn’t rejected his words outright, after all.

  Or he was deluding himself. His reasons for being here might seem mad and suspicious, but an insane diversion was better than no diversion at all.

  “You might still deserve to be turned into a rock.”

  He grinned. “That may be true. Will you come back and sit with me? Tell me what else about my pack interests you? I tried to bring what would amuse or intrigue you. I don’t want any of it to cause you worry. Any item you think is a threat you can take and hide as you wish.”

  He’d prefer her not to destroy the notebook, but he’d memorized several of the calculations in the event he lost it. He could still open a portal. For both of them, if the need arose. He’d done an inventory of the boats on the beach and concluded several things from their rate of decay and size. The attempts to harm her happened far too frequently, and they’d been sending greater numbers each time.

  He put the sobering thoughts aside for now, because she returned to the chair, evidenced by the closeness of her scent, the brush of her bare soles on the floor, and a creak of movement from the chair. Further sounds told him she was pushing around the remaining items on the table. “Why do you have these?”

  He reached out and found the satiny strips dangling near his face. After he touched them, she took them away. The whisper of fabric suggested she was sliding them between her knuckles, testing the silken feel. “Those are for your hair, my lady. Or to adorn your clothes, or wrists or throat. However you wish to use them. You can also tie your hair back with—”

  “I know what ribbons are, John Pierce,” she said with a touch of impatience. “These are lovely. I meant, what are their practical purpose?”

  “Their purpose is to please you. Same reason I brought the two—”

  “Books.” He heard the riffle of the pages. “Soft, thin books with pictures.”

  “They’re what we call magazines. They can show you more about my world.”

  One was a women’s magazine, the kind filled with fashion, beauty and home decorating tips, as well as a handful of recipes and celebrity news. He and Lot had picked it up in the grocery store.

  “This one,” Lot said. “The home decorating tips are focused on outdoor living spaces. She’ll find that useful.”

  The female shoppers who’d seen him and Lot standing shoulder to shoulder, trying to figure out the right one, had been helpful and amused. Lara, a divorcee with a yoga-toned body, had told them the magazine they chose was her favorite escape treat. “I learn a little bit about everything without being too serious about any of it,” she’d said.

  Lot had charmed her into dinner, and probably afterward into revealing the sculpted body under her designer jeans and trendy tunic top.

  The other magazine was a thick Time-Life edition, The Century in Pictures. The issue had been created at the end of the millennium. Maddock had thought magazines the perfect conglomeration of info that would initiate discussion about JP’s world, prove he came from a different time and, most importantly, increase the chance she’d expect different things from him.

  “Those are yours,” he added.

  “Another gift.”

  “Yes. I can read the text for you whenever you’re curious about what the pictures mean.” Maddock had said he could give her the words to the translation spell to help her read them—if she knew how to read her own language—but JP liked the idea of the more intimate interaction.

  She paused. “There is more in your…notebook. Not just scribblings. What is the rest?”

  “Quotes I want to remember. Pictures of my family. My parents. They died some years ago, but I like to have their picture with me. Another is of my dog, Ferdinand. He was a German shepherd. Went everywhere with me and died last year. I miss him, and my parents. I think about them every day.”

  He could hear her paging through the notebook, stopping as she perhaps saw the things he was mentioning.

  “These pictures…they are not like paintings.”

  He took a few minutes to explain photographs. After that she examined his toothbrush and toothpaste and asked about them. In return, he learned she used a finger wrapped in cloth and herbs like laurel or mastic gum, a sap from the mastic tree, to keep her teeth clean. He suspected that was one of those fragrances clinging pleasa
ntly to her he hadn’t been able to identify. Thinking of it lingering around her mouth drew his mind to the idea of tasting it firsthand.

  He had no idea what was in his toothpaste, something she found peculiar.

  “How do you know it will not harm you?”

  “Well, the company that sells it has to guarantee that it won’t.”

  “And you trust them?”

  He chuckled. “Well, more or less. It’s one of those things you don’t think about too much.”

  She had him explain a handful of other things in the pack, including a straight razor and sharpening strap. While not exactly what her people used for shaving, it was close enough his explanation of it seemed to satisfy her.

  “What is this?” She dropped the thin wrapped bar in his lap.

  His lips curved. “I brought this to test a theory. To see if a woman of your time would like it as much as the women of mine.”

  The eye branding, the decision to devote himself to her on her home turf, had been based on his belief that her heart had to be won in her reality, not his. But he’d seen no harm in bringing a few things that could increase his chances. Feeling her attention on him, he opened the wrapper on the chocolate bar. He was glad for the mild temperatures of the island and the insulated liner in his backpack that had kept it from melting too much. Though as he thought what he could do with melted chocolate and her fair skin, he was besieged by some very distracting images.

  Sight wasn’t necessary to experience color and wonder, after all.

  When he offered it, she managed to take the candy without touching his hand. He’d noted she’d avoided most incidental touch, except for their initial meeting when she’d scraped the claw down his hand. He knew all about sensory deprivation, how it could heighten the desire to have the senses fed. He was usually the one doing the depriving, rather than the other way around, but he was understanding better how his subs could reach a level of hunger for touch that had them straining against the bindings he’d put upon them, their bodies quivering with eagerness. He’d pretty much be willing to break someone’s arm for the chance to lay his hand upon her arm, her face, her slim throat.

  He counseled himself to patience as he heard the faint rattle of paper and smelled the aroma as she took a nibble. It had melted enough she’d either have to use a finger to scoop it off the paper or lick it directly.

  Imagining her tongue sliding through the chocolate, or her sucking on a coated finger, added to that hunger exponentially.

  "The snakes do not care for this,” she said.

  "How about you?”

  A pause. "I'm glad they do not care for it."

  She rose. “You will stay the night here so I will know your whereabouts. I will stay elsewhere.”

  “I won’t drive a lady from her home.” He shook his head. “I meant what I wrote in the sand. I’m here to serve you. I’ll climb back down and stay on the beach where you can see me. If you want, you can fly me there and drop me on the beach so I get there all the sooner. Though I would take it as a kindness if you didn’t interpret that literally. I’d prefer to land there instead of falling.”

  She said nothing, so he stood. “Just give me a second to repack my bag, minus any items you prefer to keep yourself. Including the magazines and ribbons.”

  Her answer was a long time in coming. “Very well. I will return you to the beach. I will keep the knife and your notebook. And the chocolate.”

  Chapter Four

  She did land him on the beach, but she didn’t stay for further conversation. After making him take off and hand over the blindfold once again, she left him with a curt, “Stay in this area, where I can see you throughout the night. Else I will find you and show my displeasure.”

  He didn’t doubt she was ready to dispatch him as a threat the second he proved himself one. What was curious was her almost palpable wish that he not be one, so she didn’t have to do so.

  Lore had painted her as cynical, bitter and guarded at the best; bloodthirsty, cruel and savage at the worst. So far, he’d seen nothing but a woman who’d learned to protect herself and was slow to trust anyone, but who was curious enough about someone new and different not to kill him outright. Her guarded nature hadn’t surprised him, but many other things had. Despite an abundance of justifiable caution, she had those delightful quick moments where she lowered her defenses enough to laugh, to play, and to investigate things that intrigued her.

  Was it a unique response to him? Could the bond he’d felt with her for so long be two-way? She hadn’t argued with him when he’d told her she knew what he meant about coming to claim her.

  But lack of dissent didn’t mean agreement. She could think him insane. His theory sounded like a romance novel, grounded more in wishful thinking than reality. However well things seemed to be going at certain moments, the thread of her trust was tenuous. Her parting words made that clear. And he couldn’t forget the message of those boats and crumbling piles of stone.

  It was far more likely her reasons for tolerating him had to do with missing pieces of the full story. There were too many things unsaid, things that he didn’t yet understand.

  “Remember,” Maddock had admonished him, like a hundred times. “Every single thing we’ve gleaned about her has come from poetry, myth and crackpot speculation. You won’t know the full truth until you’re there.”

  “And by then it will be too late,” Lot had said. “Just like getting married.”

  JP shook his head, though he was glad for the lift in his spirits the recalled banter brought him. He wouldn’t trade anything for finally being here with her, but he did miss his two closest friends. And he hurt for the darkness and despair he’d felt from his lady too many times today. Unrolling his mat on the sand, he laid down and considered the puzzle of her and the wonder of a sky full of so many stars. Most of his last ops and the time he’d spent with Maddock had been in more urban settings. He actually fucking loved the quiet here. The tranquility.

  When at last he fell asleep, she came back to him in dreams. He was still on the beach, stretched out on his mat. As she knelt by him, she woke him by resting her palm on his face, hiding his eyes until he woke and clasped her wrist, telling her he was awake enough to remember to keep his eyes shut around her.

  “It’s difficult,” he told her. “I want to look upon you more than I’ve ever wanted to look at any woman.” Her wrist was so slim, her skin soft, the pulse beneath beating against his hold like a tiny heart.

  “The dream is better than the reality,” she breathed, so close to his mouth. He imagined the fullness of her lips giving way beneath the firmer press of his. He tightened his grip on her wrist, wanting to draw her closer, to prove her wrong, but she slipped away, back into the fog of his dreams.

  “You cannot stay, John Pierce. You will turn my heart to stone.”

  At sunrise, he was alone, with only that disturbing comment drifting through his mind. Pushing up on his elbows, he ran a hand over his face and then felt a jolt. She had been here. Maybe not to touch him as she had in his dream, but she’d left several fresh fruits and a small bowl of seeds and nuts mixed with bits of dried bread, like a type of trail mix. There was also the surprise of a covered pitcher of goat’s milk.

  He’d brought some dried rations, one of the things in the pack he’d explained to her. She’d found them fascinating, in a different way from the pure curiosity invoked by the magazines or chocolate. Ways to preserve and store food were understandably a more practical priority. He set aside powdered eggs in favor of her offering, though, and enjoyed a sense of optimism about the day ahead. While his welcome wasn’t on a guaranteed footing, she was treating him somewhat as a guest.

  That is, when she wasn’t thinking she might have to kill him.

  After his breakfast, he decided to go in search of the goats. He found a dozen of them on the northern side of the island, all of them friendly. One or two kept him company for a while as he discovered their paths that took him to further f
resh water sources and grazing areas. He saw more deer. While they were shier than the goats, he noticed a brief hesitation when they saw him, as if they expected him to be someone else and only bounded away when they realized he wasn’t. It made sense. There was only one human inhabitant they were accustomed to seeing regularly. But it confirmed his theory that she wasn’t hunting game on the island, for the animals would be more fearful if she was.

  He also found several more of her garden sites. She was growing grapes, vegetables, and fruit and nut trees, the source of his breakfast. Legume vines were staked out in neat rows. A rough lean-to served as a garden shed, with a few tools and one bucket. She didn’t have a wheelbarrow or cart.

  As he started to consider the materials he had on hand for that, like what the forest could provide and other items salvageable from the beach wrecks, he thought of another project to pursue.

  He didn’t want to have easy access to her home until she felt comfortable with that, but when it happened—when, not if—he wanted a quicker, less perilous way to get there that wouldn’t impose on her. The spikes and clips for rock climbing would make it easier, but not less arduous or fast.

  Since he envisioned a stirrup-ladder system of sorts, on his way back to the beach, he stripped a few vines, plucked some grasses and tested tangles of tough, whip like branches for suitability. He had an overabundance of survivalist training, though he’d never actually created such a thing. He might end up cracking his head open testing it, but that was a concern for another day.

  He realized he kept thinking of this as a long term op, but was that the right word for spending the rest of his life in seclusion on an island with a fascinating woman? If so, it was the best job he’d ever had. Even if she did end up turning him to stone.

  Once back on the beach, he foraged in the wreckage of the boats for things to create a wheelbarrow or cart. He’d brought a small group of tools in his pack to help him build things. Surprisingly, she hadn’t kept those, but, except for the knife, she hadn’t kept things that would help him with his own needs, even though she could have made good use of them. Another clue to the kind of person she was.