Charming (Exiled Book 3) (3 page)

Ana didn’t have any recent experience with being grateful or with being given a hand. But she thought she understood the concept.

“You want me to be nice. Okay. I can be nice.”

“Good. And there!” Rosie put the shears down on the counter just as the doorbell rang. “That will be your dinner. I’ll get that while you’re getting dressed.”

As soon as Rosie left the bathroom, Ana locked the door. She hadn’t looked inside the Bloomingdales bag yet. She pulled out the clothes and decided they weren’t bad. Skinny jeans. A long plaid shirt. A sheep skin vest. When she pulled out the Coach high tops, she smiled with delight. When she started looking at the price tags, she whistled to herself.

There was underwear at the bottom of the bag. Not the usual stuff. Lingerie so silky she gave in to the impulse to rub it against her cheek before putting it on. When she was dressed, she had to admit that she felt like a million bucks.

Clean. Trimmed. Pampered. Dressed in finery. Maybe it was her lucky day.

When she opened the door, there was a table set up with food that smelled so tempting she wanted to lunge for it and dive in with both hands. She was even hungrier than she thought.

Rosie pulled the stainless cover off the plate. “Here you go. I’m going to watch TV while you eat.”

“Thank you,” Ana said quietly. She sat down at the chair that had been pulled up to the table. The meal looked every bit as scrumptious as the aroma promised.

Rosie made a point of not looking over at Ana even though she was aware that the girl was eating like she’d never seen food before. Neither of them said a word until the last morsel was consumed.

“You done?” Rosie asked brightly.

“Yes.”

“If you’re still hungry, we can order more.”

“No. That’s okay.”

“Alright then. Let’s get your hair dry so we can go. My husband is expecting me to meet him in an hour.”

Rosie went to work blowing hair dry while Ana watched in the mirror. She wasn’t sure her hair had ever been so shiny or full of body and concluded that there must have been magic in the shampoo or conditioner.

The clothes fit perfectly and, even though the style wasn’t girlie, they made her feel pretty. After watching Rosie in the mirror for a few minutes, she said, “Why are you helping me?”

Rosie stopped what she was doing and met Ana’s gaze in the mirror.

“You could have run into anybody on the street. But you ran into me and asked for help.”

As if that was a complete and thorough explanation, Rosie turned the dryer back on and went back to work. She used a rolling brush to style the girl’s hair into a layered pageboy.

When she was satisfied, she switched the dryer off and grinned.

“I could have been a stylist. You look great!”

Ana nodded. “Thank you.”

“Okay. Here’s what we’re going to do. I’m taking you back to the place where you waited before while I go talk to my friend about giving you a safe place to stay.”

When Ana stood up, Rosie took her by the forearm. “Hold on tight.”

Ana found herself plunged into the murky clouds of the passes again, but it wasn’t as scary the third time. Likewise, being left on a flat rock with an invisible barrier wasn’t as worrisome as before.

“I’m going back to the hotel to get your things then I’m going to arrange for a safe place for you. I should be back in,” she pursed her lips and tapped her foot, “half an hour.”

Ana just nodded.

CHAPTER TWO

Charming had reluctantly stepped into a leadership role when his mother was injured because his father, the former leader, didn’t want to leave her side. Though he was still in his teens at the time, he’d managed to impress his entire community along with the humans and garner the respect necessary to lead effectively.

A lot of changes had taken place in the past six years, but unquestionably the biggest change in times of post Rautt occupation was the restoration of electricity and modern conveniences. Charming’s people, the Exiled, had moved to the city of Farsuitwail and integrated with the human population with the exception of his brother, Crave, and sister-in-law, Dandelion. They’d decided to live in the former Exiled settlement of Newland to oversee the orphanage that had been set up for Rautt children.

Some of those children were now almost as old as Charming had been when he’d taken over leadership of the Exiled. His people had been required to make a series of adjustments getting used to such things as electric lights, recorded music, hot running water, and all manner of household appliances large and small. But being both smart and adaptable, they’d quickly taken to the wonders and convenience of life with power.

Furthermore, many of them had been educated so that they were capable not just maintaining and repairing the machines, but designing and building them as well. Although Exiled had never seen television or used telephones, they understood the principles well enough to digest schematics and work on restoring cell towers for the eventual implementation of cell phone service.

In the second year after restoration of power, Charming had taken a top floor apartment in one of the buildings that faced the downtown park and had been abandoned during the Rautt years when elevators were inoperable. One of the humans told him they used to call them penthouses.

Charming loved it because he could see the desert to the north, the farmlands to the south, and the Newland hills to the west. It suited him just fine. When he was home, the views gave him the satisfaction of a big cat lounging high on a mountain outcropping, master of all he surveyed.

He was sought after by Exiled and human girls alike, partly because he held the most powerful position in Farsuitwail, but also because he was an incredibly good-looking and eligible male with a charismatic personality. His mother had named him Charming the first time he let go of a tit long enough to smile up at her.

He was in no hurry to find a mate and was happy with relationships that were casual, frequent, and short lived, meaning rarely lasting more than two days.

Rosie didn’t have to ask many people in Farsuitwail where to find Charming. It seemed that everybody knew where he lived. She looked up at the top of the skyscraper where they pointed.

She thought the polite thing to do would be to take the elevator and knock on his door, just in case he was engaged in an activity of a private nature.

Charming had been helping with a vineyard harvest and had returned home to grab a shower before going out to meet friends for dinner and ale. He pulled on a tee shirt over jeans as he made his way to answer the front door. The last thing he expected, or could have imagined, was to find Rosie standing there.

He gaped.

“Oh my gods, Charming!” she gushed. “You look so different!”

Before he could organize his thoughts she rushed him for a big hug and almost knocked him over.

When she released him, he said, “You look just the same.”

“Was that a nice thing you just said?”

He grinned. “You know it was.”

“You really do look different. You’re a man now.”

“Rosie. You know how long it’s been?”

“Yeah. Nice place you have here.” She walked toward the wall of windows.

“Where did you go? How could you just disappear like that?”

She stopped and turned, all levity gone. “It was a hard time.”

He stared for a full minute before saying, “It was. For
all
of us.”

“Did the best I could do at the time.”

“Okay.” He shrugged in acceptance, not wanting to spend precious time chastising.

“So,” she began again with renewed cheer, “what you been doing?”

“Well, actually, I kind of run the place.”

“Run the place? You mean like you’re the mayor?”

“No. There’s still a mayor. But we kind of share responsibilities. The mayor and I. So, yeah. Sort of.”

“What about Free?”

“After what happened, he didn’t have the heart for it anymore.”

“Oh.”

“We got Crave back.”

“I knew that. I sent Dandy something special to wear for her mating. Kellareal told me about it.”

“That’s right. I’d forgotten.”

“They’re still at Newland. They oversee the Rautt orphanage up there.”

“No way. Dandy and kids?”

“Yeah. They’ve got three of their own, plus a bunch they treat like their own.”

Rosie laughed softly. “I never would have guessed that.”

“Well, life is strange.”

“Indeed it is.”

“So are you going to tell me why you’re here?” He looked at the large rolling bag parked by the front door. “Does it have anything to do with that?”

“Well, I do need a favor.”

“You’re moving in.”

“No. Not me.”

“Okay. What is it?” He sat down on a couch.

“Can I sit?”

He made a gesture indicating that she could sit where she wanted. She sat on a large upholstered chair near where he’d parked himself on one of his sofas.

“There’s a girl who needs to disappear from Loti Dimension. She needs a place to stay.”

Charming nodded, waiting for her to go on. Then her meaning dawned on him.

“You mean with me!?! You want to leave some strange girl with me the way Kellareal left you with my family?”

“Yes. Exactly. Including the part that you may find her strange.”

“No.”

“You can’t say no.”

“I sure as fuck can say no. Let me reiterate. No!”

“You have room for a guest.”

“That’s my business.”

“I know. But it has to be you.”

“Why?”

“Because I trust you.” She could see that his adamant position weakened with that declaration. “And you have a spare room, what with being the grand poobah and all.”

She waved her hand in the air as if to indicate that he was overlord of the entire dimension.

“I know I’m going to be sorry I asked this, but what’s a grand poobah?”

“It’s the MAN, the big kahuna, the big giant head, yada yada.”

“Was that supposed to convey information or make you sound unhinged?”

“Look. I have a distressed damsel in tow. She needs a place to be so as to avoid death and dismemberment, not necessarily in that order. You have a place for her to hide out. So what’s the problem?”

“What did she do?”

“She’s taking the Fifth.”

He shook his head. “Rosie…”

“That means don’t ask, don’t tell. If she’s guilty of something, you don’t need to know. If she’s not, what difference does it make?”

“What diff…? You’re not taking ‘no’ for an answer, are you?” Rosie cheered in direct proportion to Charming’s posture of defeat and resignation.

“No.”

“Okay. New subject. Where have you been? Why did you disappear? Why is it that the first time you’ve spoken to me since my brother died is to ask for a favor?”

“When you put it that way it sounds rude and inconsiderate.”

“That’s because it is rude and inconsiderate. My family loved you, felt close to you. How could you just forget all about us?”

“I didn’t forget all about you.”

“Could have fooled me.”

“I’m sorry. I knew that facing you, and your family, would be painful. I guess I was thinking mostly about me.”

“But now you’re not.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, now you’re thinking about the needs of some stray human you picked up on the street in another world, right? Somebody you know nothing about. Am I right?”