CHAPTER THREE

NATALIE

I’m debating between triple brownie fudge or peanut butter chip cookies when an odd tingle begins between my shoulder blades. It’s annoying, like a vague thought that you’ve forgotten something important, but for the life of you, you simply cannot recall what it is.

I grab both bags of cookies and pass my money over to the grinning vendor. In a daze, I start to walk to the right when something compels me to instead turn left.

After only a few steps, I pause, trying to take in the man that’s striding towards me. He’s tall and lean, dressed in black, with long midnight black hair waving around his pale face. He’s handsome.

But that’s not what pins me in place.

Handsome men are everywhere.

No, there’s something about him that makes me want to toss down my bags of purchases and run to him. To hold on to him and never let him go.

My feet begin to move and it’s a struggle to force them to be still. I don’t know what’s come over me, but it needs to stop. Now.

Turning away from him, my eyes dart around, looking for the fastest way out of this crowded row when something or rather someone grabs my left hand.

With a will of their own, my feet point me back in the direction of the man. The man that is now grasping my hand tenderly in his.

My gaze travels from his hand up his body, only stopping when I come to his face. If I thought he was handsome, I was mistaken.

He’s gorgeous.

Dark, black slashing brows bring my attention to his high forehead and the raven black hair that flows from his head to his broad shoulders. His nose is long and somehow elegant above full lips that look like they were made to kiss mine.

But it’s his eyes that reach inside me and hold me in his powerful gaze. Eyes of pale silver. They shine and gleam with an inner light like there’s a spotlight behind them.

The need to be held by him overtakes me again and a soft whimper passes over my trembling lips.

Linking our fingers, he raises our joined hands and presses them to his chest, where the steady beat of his heart thumps. “My love,” he croons in a husky voice that sends a spiral of lust from my fingertips down to my core that begins throbs in need.

A bright bouquet suddenly appears in his left hand. He offers it to me with a slow slide of his lips, showcasing a smile that has my toes curling in my boots.

For a moment, it feels like we’re the only two people that exist in the world. Then loud applause breaks out from the crowd of people that have gathered around us, the suddenness of it fracturing whatever bubble of privacy we were in.

Hot embarrassment surges through me, squashing the insane lust that had overtaken me.

He’s a performer!

I’d seen a few others going around offering to tell fortunes, juggling, and doing various other tricks. This guy must be a magician, hence the flowers and the strange silver eyes, which are obviously contact lens now that I have time to think about it.

Ugh. Just my rotten luck to get picked out of the crowd to be part of this.

That happened to me years ago when my parents took us to the circus. One of the clowns hauled me into the center ring and made me “his assistant”. I remember crying and dashing back to where my family sat. For weeks after that, my brother teased me endlessly and called me a baby. I hated the attention and the harsh spotlights.

I’m no longer a shy seven-year-old and there are no spotlights now, just the amused gazes of the smiling people around us.

It would have been nice to have some warning, or maybe a slyly whispered hint about what this magician expects of me, but I can play along.

The guy offers me the flowers again and this time I accept them. Bringing them up to my face, I inhale and loudly ooh and aww over them as the crowd laughs.

“Simply lovely. Thank you,” I say, trying to pull my left hand free from his and off his chest.

His mouth dips down into a frown. With how full his lower lip is, he looks a bit like a little kid pouting.

Except with the hard muscle flexing under my palm and the devilish gleam in his silver eyes, there really is no mistaking him for a child. He’s a man, fully grown and sinfully attractive.

Those odd silver contacts of his are distracting though and have my stomach doing little flips.

“Come, let’s get away from the crowd,” he murmurs, linking his fingers tighter with mine and giving the people small shooing motions with his free hand.

He tugs me along and I stumble after him, my mind telling me to jerk my hand away while my heart is telling me to never let go.

Ducking into the back part of a tent, he suddenly stops, and I tumble into his back. My nipples tighten at the smell of him. He smells spicy, like cloves and nutmeg. He whirls around, both his hands latching onto my upper arms, and I stand there like a fool, my lips parted for a kiss.

“Your name?” he rasps.

Blinking, I shrug off his hands and take a step back. It’s dark here in the tent, making it difficult to see much around me. Him I can see clearly and since he’s still playing around, I decide I’ll go with it.

“Shouldn’t you know it already?”

His grin grows, his white teeth flashing brightly even in the dim light of the tent. “A test of my powers?” Tapping a finger to his lips, a lone dimple appears in his right cheek. “Surely you can do better than that.”

“The flowers are lovely,” I say, bringing them up to my nose once again. I expected them to be paper when he first handed them to me, because isn’t that how the trick works? Paper flowers tucked up his sleeve. These are real and not crushed at all. They’re full and beautiful.

I survey his costume again. Tight black pants and a black shirt. Not a bit of color on him. I wonder if his eyes are brown to go with his dark hair, or perhaps a bright blue under the concealment of his contacts.

“Well, you don’t have a hat, so I guess you can’t pull a rabbit out of it,” I say slowly, trying to remember other magic tricks I’ve seen. Maybe he has a deck of cards he’ll toss in the air, or a dove up his other sleeve.

His dark brows lower, and he cocks his head to the side. “You wish for a simple rabbit? Not jewels or gold?”

Laughing, I shrug. “A winning lottery ticket would be nice. If you could snap your fingers and whip one of those up, that would be some trick.”

“Trick?”

I wave the flowers at him. “I’m joking. I know you can’t do that. Are you a professional magician or an amateur?” Immediately, I cringe. That was insulting of me. Just because magic isn’t my thing, and it all seems so phony, doesn’t mean I should be rude to the poor guy. Besides, it’s obvious he’s still working on his act.