Hair messier than I’d like, I put on a shawl (for appearances; I could have been perfectly warm naked in the middle of winter) and set out down the stairs.
“Miss.” Mr. Tom met me there, his tux wrinkle-free, his wings hanging down his back like a cape, and his expression still perturbed because I’d unintentionally called in reinforcements (add that to the grievance of not granting him the appearance of youth, and a real list was forming). “Shall you be requiring refreshments this evening?”
He always asked me this when I went out, but this time, I discerned a tone.
“No. It’s just a meetup. I won’t be bringing him back with me, Mr. Tom.”
“Whether you do or do not is no business of mine. If you do, however, you must remain cautious. Just because you can no longer contract diseases doesn’t mean you will not get pregnant. You are not too old to conceive.”
My mind stutter-stopped. “What do you mean I can’t contract diseases?”
“Magic. It cleanses the blood, in a way. You can’t get diseases of any kind. You won’t get cancer, you won’t get…whatever else Dicks and Janes contract with their weak immune systems.”
“But…Niamh said she lost one of her breasts because of breast cancer. You know, before Ivy House magic brought it back.”
He gave me a long-suffering look, which he seemed to reserve for discussions with or about Niamh. “She was not being honest. She lost it in the Battle of Five Spades. The enemy pierced her armor, and the golden sword tip lodged in her breast—gold is to her kind what silver is to shifters. Lethal. Losing her mammary gland saved her life. She lopped it right off, I’ve heard. After killing the enemy, of course. She never mourned its absence. No one else in town shared her view, especially when she walked around downtown wearing a thin white T-shirt, while braless, in the rain. The show she gave was apparently more than anyone cared to see, though I suppose it wouldn’t have mattered if she’d had one or both mammary glands in that instance.” He straightened up and put an arm behind his back like the ancient butlers in a place like England. “Should you decide to reduce yourself to a Dick’s level, there are condoms in the drawer of your never-used night table, the one on the guest’s side. Let him put it on—you’re clearly unused to the practice and would probably do it incorrectly. There are more in the bathroom. You have plenty to be getting on with, but if you need more, I can go—”
“Oh my God, I’ll be fine.” I hastened to the door. “I’m good, Mr. Tom. We don’t need to be so much in each other’s lives.”
“As your protector, miss, I must—”
I shut the door. Edging into middle-aged dating was uncomfortable enough; I didn’t need help from my ancient, wacky butler. I had to draw the line somewhere.
As I started walking, nervousness coiled within me. Wow, it had been a long time since I’d gone on a first date. A long, long time. I had no idea what to expect. The guy I was meeting was a few years older than me, with a couple of teenagers and a steady job as a winemaker, and lived one town over. We had similar interests, and though he was apparently big into crime shows, he also enjoyed comedy. If we went to a movie or something, we’d probably be able to find some common ground.
That was about the extent of what I knew, though. I supposed I could’ve exchanged a bunch more emails with him before taking the plunge, but I didn’t much like getting to know someone via electronic communication. Inflection was missing, as was tone. I had a large propensity for sarcasm—I couldn’t have someone mistaking that for genuine concern, because then where would we be?
The windows of Austin’s bar shone up ahead, the honeyed glow spilling out onto the sidewalk and highlighting a couple of Harleys parked out in front. A flicker of light caught my attention to the right. A man leaned against a thin tree trunk in front of the closed candy shop, his head bowed over his phone, the light not reaching his face. He glanced up as I passed, his face concealed in the shadow of a flat-billed baseball cap.
A familiar warning sensation crawled down my scalp and over my skin—something I felt whenever I encountered a male stranger lurking in the shadows. I pulled my gaze away, lest he took that as a challenge or as interest, watching instead for movement out of the corner of my eye. I held my breath as I increased the distance between us, speeding up just enough that I’d get out of there faster, but not enough that he saw I was scared and decided he liked chasing prey. I might not technically be prey to people anymore, but old habits died hard.