“That’s it.”
She blinks, then laughs, shaking her head like I’m ridiculous. “You really don’t make this easy, do you?”
I nod toward the door. “Time for you to go.”
She doesn’t move right away. Stubborn woman. Instead, she slings her bag over her shoulder and meets my gaze head-on.
“You’ll talk to me eventually,” she says, confident and calm. “Even the most reluctant people always do.”
Not me.
The bell jingles as she steps into the fog.
I stand there long after she’s gone, fists tight, chest burning. The red bulbs in the window flicker once, twice, then steady.
My tattoos writhe beneath my skin like they’ve been fed. The Rider stirs, hooves pounding against my ribs.
Outside, the bells keep jingling. But they sound wrong—out of sync, off-key.
That girl—the curious, pretty little bird with fearless eyes and too many questions—has no idea she just painted a target on herself.
CHAPTER THREE
Emery
What an absolute jackass!
I stalk into the fog, boots smacking the sidewalk harder than necessary. My cheeks burn. Not from embarrassment—nope—from pure irritation.
“Unbelievable,” I mutter. “Guy’s built like a Norse god, smells like sin and iron, but can’t string together more than two words without being a rude twatwaffle.”
Crowsbridge Hollow’s Main Street glitters like a holiday nightmare. Red and black bulbs blink in time with the music spilling faintly from a nearby speaker—a dark synth tune that could have been borrowed from the soundtrack of a John Carpenter movie instead of a cheery carol. A garland of pine and bones droops from a lamppost, sparkling in the fog.
I clutch my bag tighter. This whole creepy Christmas thing Crowsbridge Hollow does might be fun if I wasn’t just dismissed by the biggest jerk in town. What did I expect? Open arms and the keys to all the town’s secrets? Of course not. But I sure didn’t expect to get tossed out as if I’m a pesky salesperson popping up to push an extended car warranty.
The worst part? I can’t stop replaying the way his arms looked folded across that ridiculous chest, muscles pulling shirtfabric tight. Or the way his tattoos seemed to shift when I wasn’t staring straight at them. Or the way his dark eyes locked on mine, as if he could see every secret I store in the back of my skull.
Nope. Not thinking about him. Not worth wasting the brain power.
I slow my steps, dig in my tote for my notebook, uncap my pen, and scrawl across the page:Ink & Iron guy = hostile source. Revisit.Then, beneath it, almost against my will, I add,
Tantalizingly tall. Too hot for his own good. Grumpy AF.
My phone buzzes. I stop in front of a shop with a small wooden sign swinging above the door that readsChocolate Enchantments. Gold lettering promises gourmet fudge in twenty-five fantastically fudgy flavors, hand-stirred in copper kettles. The window display features candy canes arranged like bones and dark chocolate truffles shaped like tiny coffins.
My mouth waters. I’ll die on the hill that peppermint is Beelzebub’s candy, but I could devour a bag of those truffles and a pound or two of fudge right now.
My phone buzzes again.
Wren: Interview gold?
Me: Interview brick wall. A very large, very rude brick wall.
Wren: Sounds hot. Obsessed yet?
I snap my notebook shut like that’ll somehow silence her, even though she’s six hours away.
Fine. Maybe she’s right. But in my defense—when a man acts like he’s hiding the Ark of the Covenant under his shirt, it’s practically journalistic malpractice not to dig deeper.
