“No, that was too fake.” She returned her hands to a pleading position. “It felt wrong. The bat wasn’t giving me direction. See, the blood pack didn’t even move. Jen, you’ve got to smack me harder.”
“This is harder than the fake dagger in the last murder.” Jen weighed the bat in her hand, her somber expression unchanging. “I’m afraid I’ll hurt you.”
“It’s foam. You can’t possibly hurt me. Especially not with all my hair, plus this yoga thing.” Bird pointed at the wrap around her head. “Okay. Ready? I’ll start.” She cleared her throat, then bellowed, “Argh, argh, don’t kill me, ARRRRRRGH!”
Jen stomped forward, scowling more fiercely than all the villains in Game of Thrones combined, and whacked the foam bludgeon against Bird’s head.
The blood pack gave a satisfying splurp! next to her ear, and the bat’s gentle velocity pushed against her just enough to help her twirl away and fling herself dramatically onto the sand, just like she had practiced falling onto her bed at home.
“AWE-some!” Godiva bellowed. Bird had to fight to keep the grin off her face. Corpses didn’t smile. She managed to keep her face still as Godiva added, “Now, Jen, you whack her again, for a just-in-case, then steal her wallet—what the hell?”
“Awk!” Jen squawked. It was a much more realistic yell than even Bird’s best “argh.”
Two bodies thumped into the sand scarcely two yards from where Bird lay in her artistic pose of death.
“Do not move,” a male voice commanded. A warm, slightly husky male voice that, even angry, somehow sounded like sunlight splashing on water.
Every nerve in Bird’s body lit up as if that liquid sunlight had poured into her body, warming her in a way she’d never felt in all her life.
She sat up abruptly, turned her head, and found herself gazing into a pair of astonished eyes. They were silvery gray, with the depth of a stormy sky and the sparkle of sunlight breaking through. And though she’d never believed before that it was possible to read character merely by looking into someone’s eyes, as she looked into that gleaming silver, she perceived wisdom, courage, and passion. And the entire force of their gaze was on her.
Bird couldn’t move. She couldn’t even breathe. It was only when those winter-cloud eyes crinkled into a questioning glance was she able to take in the rest of him. He was a tall, slim man whose handsome face could have been any age from fifty to a very well-preserved seventy. His hair was pure silver, long and tied neatly back. A neatly trimmed beard in that same bright silver accentuated the fine bones in his face. He held himself in a way that would have told Bird that he was strong and agile...
...if she hadn’t already figured that out, given that he’d arrived out of nowhere so fast she hadn’t even seen it, and was currently holding poor Jen pinned face-down in the sand with nothing more than one hand on a polished walking stick.
“Help,” Jen wheezed.
“Uh.” Bird heard her voice, a faint bat squeak, as if it came from far away. “Can you let my friend up? She wasn’t trying to hurt me. Or anyone. We were... um... acting out a scene.”
The man looked from Jen’s gray hair to the stage blood dripping down Bird’s head, then lifted the walking stick with a quick turn of his wrist, releasing Jen.
“I am truly sorry. I seem to have misjudged the situation entirely.” His husky voice had a warm timbre that made Bird shiver. But not from the cold.
She snuck a furtive gaze at his long limbs, from his broad shoulders to his fine hands. He gripped the beautiful curved handle of his walking stick with grace and strength. His body was lean, with whipcord muscles and not an ounce of fat.
And he was still looking at her. At her, not at Jen or Godiva or Doris. Time seemed to have suspended in a way that she had never experienced before, so she felt as if she and the man were alone together in a moment that was also an eternity. It was a moment that Bird wished would never end.
The spell was broken by her friends’ voices.
Doris gasped. “Where did you come from? I just blinked, and there you were!”
“Same,” said Godiva. “Who the hell are you, Mr. Appear Out Of Nowhere And Jump On Harmless Old Women?!”
Godiva’s voice would have commanded the attention of the Devil himself. But the silver-eyed man didn’t so much as blink, let alone turn to her. His attention was still fixed on Bird and Bird alone.
“Are you certain you’re not harmed?” The man addressed Bird cautiously. He seemed as dazed as she was.
“I’m fine. Just . . . sticky.” She couldn’t meet his silver eyes. Her face felt so hot that it was probably scarlet as the stage blood splattered over her face and neck and—argh!—breasts. At that realization, she felt as if she might actually burst into flames.
He stepped forward and held out his hand to her. Bewildered, she realized that he intended to help her up. Now her face felt like a blast furnace. But as he stood there patiently, arm outstretched, she realized that the quickest way to take his attention off her and her red paint and redder face was to just take his hand. She grabbed it, planning to accept his gesture but stand up by herself.
His fingers closed around hers, strong and warm and sure. That was a grip that would never break unless he chose to release it. At his touch, a shock of desire went through her, so strong as to be impossible to deny, even to herself. She was so flustered that she nearly yanked her hand away. But before she could, he pulled her to her feet, with a gentle touch but irresistible strength.
And on
ce again, she found herself in that bubble of halted time and strange intimacy, holding hands with a stranger she felt like she’d known all her life. Bird gazed into the silver depths of his eyes...
...until she remembered the paint, the hideous tie, the sheer barminess of an old woman like her trekking out to a beach at dawn to pretend to be murdered. Her face flaming again, she released his hand.