Casey's Warriors (Bondmates) (9 page)

“My name is Lorn, and your name is Casey.”

“How did you know that?”

With an amused smile he slowly reached over the counter and gently lifted the ugly green vest all the employees had to wear. Though his fingers never actually touched her skin she swore his body heat burned through her clothes. “Your identification tag. Casey Westfall.”

Her brain refused to work until he withdrew his touch, and once he did, she was pretty sure her panties were soaked. God, the way he said her name, it was like he was slipping his hands down her pants and stroking her pussy. “Oh, yeah. Uh, nice to meet you, Lorn.”

He smiled at her and his nostrils flared. The blue of his eyes darkened and he abruptly shoved his hands into the pockets of his trench coat. “You honor me.”

Utterly thrown for a loop by this blond sex god she forced her gaze off of him and managed to focus on the cash register. To her utter embarrassment she noticed she’d fucked up his order so bad that she’d have to call her manager. Great, having Jerry, the sexist asshole, cut her down in front of a customer always made a great impression. Wishing the floor would just open up and swallow her whole she closed her eyes and took a deep breath before facing Lorn.

“I’m sorry, I’ve made a mistake on your order. If you’ll give me a moment I’ll have my manager come fix it.”

“There is no need to alert your superior.”

His odd speech reminded her of the way her German grandfather spoke; it suddenly dawned on her that all of his peculiar mannerisms must be because he was foreign. “You’re not from around here, are you?”

He tensed for a moment, then slowly nodded. “That is correct. I am from Europe.”

Poor guy, no wonder he looked and acted so out of place. People came from all over the world to attend the University of Michigan or work in Ann Arbor so she was used to getting all kinds of people renting homes in her small town. Empathy for him made her relax and she picked up the phone to call her manager. “I’m so sorry about this, Lorn. Just give me one second and I’ll fix it for you.”

The bemused smile he gave her made her want to giggle like an idiot. He really was too good looking to be real. She had no idea what part of Europe he was from, but holy moly, did they grow ’em hot over there. After a brief conversation with Jerry, the douchebag night manager, she hung up the phone and smiled at Lorn. Not even the thought of Jerry trying to rub his dick against her ass while he fixed her order could dampen her sudden happiness.

“So what do you think of the States?”

“It is very…different.”

“I bet.”

His gaze turned intense again and her conversation skills ran away with her mind when he leaned over and brushed a stray strand of her hair back from her face. “You have the most beautiful eyes, they remind me of
benali
.”

“What’s that?”

He stroked her cheek and she had to lean against the counter as her knees went weak from desire. Looking into her eyes, he continued to trail his big fingers lightly down her jawline, and the scent of leather from his coat and whatever awesome cologne he wore overwhelmed her with the need to tear his clothes off.  His voice lowered further until he was practically purring his words. “It is a rare gem in my…country. Very expensive and sought after for its exquisite brown color. Your eyes are like it…shades of brown and gold swirling together. Stunning.”

“Casey, what’s going on here?”

She jerked away from Lorn’s touch and turned to face her irate manager. Jerry was the youngest son of the family that owned the grocery store and an all-around prick. He’d been a few years ahead of Casey in high school and had been a spoiled asshole even back then. After failing out of three colleges his family finally gave him a job at the grocery store where he lorded over everyone like he owned the place.

For the last three years, Casey had worked here during her summers off from the University of Michigan and got along well with the owners of the store, but Jerry seemed to have it out for her. It probably didn’t help she’d turned him down repeatedly for dates. As if she’d ever go out with a guy she’d once overheard saying he dated fat chicks because they were easy.

Now his mean little face was flushed red enough that his spiked, gelled, and bleached blond hair stood out in an almost comical manner. While the rest of the employees wore the store uniform, Jerry always dressed like he was going out clubbing. Tonight his ensemble included a shiny blue shirt that stretched too tight over his steroid-built muscles and enough gold chains to make Mr. T jealous.

“I’m sorry, Jerry…”

He narrowed his eyes at her. “I told you to call me Mr. Hebbles. God, can’t you do anything right? I have better things to do than come over and fix your screw ups.”

“Sorry, Mr. Hebbles, I mis-scanned some of this customer’s items. I need you to clear them off the bill please.”

Jerry smirked at her then turned to look at Lorn and he suddenly blanched. Alarmed he was going to pass out, she moved to steady him but a low growl stopped her. Her jaw dropped open as she realized the almost subsonic rumbling noise was coming from Lorn. When she turned to face him she found the big man glaring at Jerry hard enough to make the other man shake.

“You are disrespectful to Casey. That is unacceptable. Apologize.” His lips curled back from his teeth and she swore his canines were longer than usual. “Now.”

“Sorry!” Jerry squeaked. He jerked the manager’s key off his hand so hard it left scrapes on his knuckles and practically flung it at her. “Here.”

With that, he fled, leaving her with a man who watched Jerry’s back with murder in his eyes. When he turned his attention back to her his gaze softened and he made a soft, almost pained noise. “I scared you. I am sorry.”

She shoved the key into the register with trembling fingers and cleared his order as quickly as possible, too shaken to even look at him. “No, no, it’s okay.”

Bagging his items as quickly as she could she said, “Your total is thirty eight dollars and ninety-five cents.”

He used the credit card machine to pay for his items and when she finally looked at him he appeared so sorrowful that some of her fear seeped away. “I am sorry for frightening you, Casey. You must understand that among my people we hold Matri…women in the highest regard. To see him so blatantly disrespectful to you is unacceptable.”

She let out a shaky laugh as his receipt printed out along with some coupons. “It’s okay. I mean he isn’t that bad, kind of a jerk, but I’ve dealt with worse.”

Anger flared in his expressive glowing blue eyes again but he took a deep breath and visibly calmed. “I suppose you will not tell me the names of the men who have offended you, will you?”

“Why?”

“So I may defend your honor.” Her jaw dropped slightly and he chuckled. “I take it that is not custom here.”

“Uh…no. I mean not for a long time. I guess guys in the old days used to do it but not so much anymore. Chivalry is dead and all that.”

He looked confused as she handed him his bags with the receipt inside. “What is chivalry?”

“It was like a code of honor knights used to live by. You must know what it is, but they probably use a different word in your language.”

“I will research it when I return to our base, I mean, my home.” He ducked his head the slightest bit so he was looking at her through his dark gold lashes. “May I call on you?”

“What?”

A line formed between his eyes, then cleared. “Dinner, may I escort you to dinner?”

“You want to take me to dinner?”

“Yes.”

He grinned at her and she couldn’t help but smile back, then sobered as reality intruded. Sex gods did not ask geek girls out. “Why would you want to take me to dinner?”

“Why would I not? I am new to the area and would enjoy the company of a local woman so I may learn about this place.”

Whatever silly hopes she’d had that this would be some kind of romantic dinner were quickly dashed as she realized he was just a lonely guy looking for a friend. Casey didn’t know what it was about her, but she’d had more than her fair share of guys wanting to ‘just be friends’. Trying to hide her disappointment she nodded. “Sure, sounds great.”

“Thank you, Casey.” He leaned forward and looked directly into her eyes. “Tell Jerry that if he ever disrespects you again I will find him and make him pay.”

“Uh, okay.”

This close she could smell his breath and its scent was unlike anything she’d ever experienced. Wild, rough, spicy, and utterly delicious. It was as if everything masculine had been distilled into one arousing aroma. She wanted to bite him, lick him, and kiss him until they passed out.

Before she could do anything stupid, Kimber walked up next to her with a too bright smile on her face. “Hey, Casey, Jerry called to say he needs you back in receiving to help the stock boys with an incoming shipment. And he needs his key back.”

Casey jerked back from Lorn like she’d been stung and nodded so rapidly she probably looked like a bobble head doll. “Okay, right. Um…nice meeting you, Lorn.”

Before he could speak she took off at a pace just under a run, her heart hammering in her chest while her body screamed at her to go back to that big hunk of man meat and climb him like a tree.

Five hours later at a little past one in the morning, stinking like the spoiled shrimp she’d spent the last two hours clearing out of a broken down freezer in the back of the grocery store, Casey dug through the plastic bag where she’d put her purse looking for her keys. Her clothes were stained with rotten shrimp guts and she had a bunch of empty plastic grocery bags to put over the seat of her car so she didn’t ruin the upholstery.

Her back ached, her stomach kept threatening to empty itself, and she was pretty sure Jerry was going to make every moment of her life at the store as shitty as possible before she returned to school in the fall.

The lights near the back of the lot flickered weakly as she neared her elderly sedan that had seen better days but still chugged along. Despite the late hour she was keyed up over her earlier encounter with Lorn and the memory of his—well, shit—everything. Kimber had come back a couple times to show her pictures she’d snapped of Lorn and Casey talking, much to her dismay. Seeing an image of them together, with Casey staring up at him like some love struck idiot, only pointed out how very far out of her league he was.

He was perfect. Absolutely perfect. From the top of his white-blond head to the bottoms of his ass-kicking black motorcycle boots, the man was a walking advertisement for everything hot and virile. Well other than his overly long canine teeth, but it was better than him missing teeth, as some of the people of her small town did. And his breath…she wondered if he tasted as good as he smelled.

While enjoying a rather vivid daydream of licking her way along Lorn’s body and finding out if his carpet matched his drapes, her gaze wandered to the anomaly in the night sky. Deep in the far reaches of space a brilliant point of light flared in blues, greens, purples and touches of magenta. It had appeared in the sky after the aurora from The Event faded, and for a brief time, everyone had thought the world was coming to an end. For two weeks things had been a little hairy but order had soon been restored. Everyone kept waking up with the world still spinning around as it had for the last four billion years with the same bills, the same politics, the same bullshit, and humanity had pretty much gotten over it.

Oh, there were theories aplenty about what the light was, everything from God getting ready to bring the end of times, to the ancient Atlanteans returning to earth. Casey, being a sci-fi fan, liked to imagine it was some kind of communications beacon from an alien race. Her idea wasn’t any more farfetched than the most, but for right now the only thing everyone could agree upon was that it was very pretty.

The lights in the parking lot began to go dim and flicker, plunging her section into semi-darkness. She could still see enough by the streetlights to make out her car near the tree line, but apprehension skittered up her spine. Trying to tell herself these shitty ass lights were always going out, that this wasn’t like a scene out of a horror movie where the dumb co-ed got chopped to bits by the serial killer clown, she walked faster. She swore she heard the sound of heavy footsteps behind her, but when she looked over her shoulder she couldn’t see anyone among the few vehicles still in the lot.

Putting some pep in her step, she hurried to her car and gripped the small canister of pepper spray on her keychain. She’d laughed at her dad when he got it for her, but as she flipped the safety off, she was grateful for the protection it offered. Another glance over her shoulder revealed a dark, vaguely man-like shape, around six parking spots away, heading toward her and she debated if she should scream for help or just make a run for her car. Then the shape began to quickly advance and she decided to say fuck it and do both.

With a loud, blood curdling scream she dashed for her car, hitting the locks so she’d be able to jerk the door open and slide inside. Just as she was about to reach the handle an impossibly large hand gripped her arm and she spun, spraying her attacker full in the face with her pepper spray. His startled yell cut off her scream when the figure’s long, pale hair flew back as he bellowed and rubbed at his face. She stood dumfounded when Lorn said something in a foreign language that didn’t sound very complimentary.

The sight of tears running down his face snapped her out of her daze. “Oh shit! Lorn, I’m so sorry! Wait, stop rubbing your face!”

“Woman, what vile weapon did you assault me with? I cannot see!”

He went to rub his face again and she gripped his arm, trying to pull his hand back before he touched himself. “No, wait, I’m so sorry I maced you. I thought you were attacking me. Don’t touch your face with your hands, use your shirt but blot, don’t rub. Oh shit, I’m so sorry. I thought you were a clown, I mean, not a clown, a psycho, but you’re not and I’m
so
sorry!”

Crouching down on the pavement he ripped off his trench coat, then his shirt. She shamelessly ogled his half naked body and creamed her jeans at the sight of his perfect six, no eight pack. The man had an honest-to-god eight-pack that was as smooth as a baby’s butt. His broad chest was equally built, and the way his massive arms flexed as he tried to remove the pepper spray from his skin, made her want to rub herself against him in the worst way even as guilt pierced her over hurting him.