It was a long walk around the enormous courthouse. I contemplated my fiasco of an afternoon while I trudged along. I wouldn’t even have been at the courthouse for whatever-the-hell-that-was to happen to me if I hadn’t been told to appear so papers could be served. The postcard notice I got in the mail said if I didn’t go to pick the papers up, I’d be served at work, and to save embarrassment, I should go in.
Of course, I’d received the notice in the mail on Saturday, so I had to wait until I got out of work on Monday to find out who in the world would want to serve me with papers.
It had been a old credit card that I hadn’t been able to pay. I’d lost my job the year before and had to take a lower paying position. I’d gotten behind on bills.Perfect. Since I can’t afford to pay you, sue me so I have to pay youandthe court costs.
My thoughts grew more morose with every step. I owed everybody money. My boyfriend disappeared into the night right after I lost my job, leading me to believe he was only with me because I made good money as a pianist for the local symphony.
I’d found work with the local school system, teaching piano and accompanying their choirs and orchestra—for half the pay. All in all, my year had gone to hell. The last thing I needed was to be taken to court, so I’d have to find a way to pay them.
The shiny blue paint job on my sedan was a welcome sight. A large glass of wine called to me, all the way across town from my tiny, one bedroom apartment. Pressing the button on the key fob, I unlocked the car, opened the door, and stooped to sit, but the stupid wings banged against the top of the car. They were too tall.
I looked up at them behind my head, craning my neck to see. “Argh!” I yelled. “Now what?”
Reaching behind my back, I tried to grab the large bone along the top of one of them so I could tug them off of my back, but I jerked my hand back when touching the wing caused it to flex outward.No!They were fully extended again.
Slowly rolling my head from one side to the other, I tried to gauge their span. Longer than my arms, they had to be four feet wide each. There was no way they were going in my car.
“I think it’s time to admit you’ve grown wings.” I jumped when I heard his voice. His approach had slipped past me in my attempt to figure out the wings. The wings started flapping again when I jerked, pulling me off the ground by about three feet.
“What have you done to me?” I looked down at the ground, marveling at the feeling of weightlessness. I’d never felt so light in my life. Not with my thighs.
“I’m trying to help you.” He crossed his arms and stared pointedly at my wings.
All the wind left my sails. I didn’t have the first clue what was going on, but I had to accept the wings were attached. I couldn’t continue to deny that I had feeling in them. I could feel the whisper of the gusts of air flowing through the garage on the soft skin covering them.
I focused on them and imagined them pulling inwards again and they complied. I dropped to the ground with a thump. I would've been flat on my face if he hadn’t been there to catch me.
Slumping against him, I sighed and ignored how strong his body was under the suit. “Okay. I don’t know what to do. Help me, please.”
He put his hand on my shoulders and squeezed, pulling me upright. “I’m happy to.” With quick movements, he opened the front and back doors to the sedan before looking around. “Crouch down here, if we’re lucky we can get you to change back to human and if anyone sees they’ll think you’ve just taken the costume off.
I dropped to my knees. “How am I supposed to change this? I don’t know how it happened.”
“I’ve spoken at length to some wolf shifters about how they change.”
Wolf shifters. “You know? I reckon I must be dead. Is this some sort of crazy version of Heaven?” I sighed as he stared me down. I wasn’t dead. “Okay. Lay it on me.”
“They say they center themselves. They’re cognizant when they’re shifted, every shifter I’ve ever known is. They describe the change much like meditation. Apparently if you can shift, you can unshift.”
Right, okay. Find my center.I couldn’t sit on my butt, the wings hung down too far, but I could settle back on my knees. I couldn’t twist to see how far back they went on the pavement, but I could feel the rough concrete against them. The feeling wasn’t pleasant, and I didn’t like the idea of the beautiful wings encountering dirt and oil on the pavement.
I closed my eyes, but meditation was the last thing on my mind. My studly stranger’s face, with his aristocratic nose and dimpled chin, was. I cracked an eye to find him standing with his back to me. His suit pants hugged his rump like a dream. “What are you?” I asked. “If I’m some special species and humans are ignorant, then you’re not human either.”
He didn’t even turn around. “I’m Dannan.”
“That tells me so much.”
“Shouldn’t you be focusing?”
I snorted. “Listen, my heart is going a mile a minute. I need a few moments to calm myself down before I’ll be able to consider meditating. “So what is a Dannan? It sounds like a yogurt.”
It was his turn to snort. “Humans would call me an elf or a fairy. Actually, not only humans. Most of the Unseen call us the Fae.”
Fairy. I was standing in the presence of a real life, sexy Legolas. It was about time my dreams came true. “And what is the Unseen?”
“It is a name we use to encompass any being that isother.”
It was all true. “Thank God, or whoever or whatever deity there is out there.”
