For The One(21)

I grab a flat shovelhead, commissioned by Goodman Meyer, a clan gardener. Holding it with a pair of tongs, I shove it into the fire, glancing at the clock to time myself. I’m deep in the middle of hammering—the rhythm and the force of the blows of metal against metal ringing through my arms—when I glance up at the clock again. I note that it’s well after the time Jenna told me she would arrive.

Is she late? Is she not coming? Maybe she’s changed her mind and doesn’t want to help. My hammer falters, stuttering off the anvil, and I frown. I clench my teeth and try to focus, attempting to regain the concentration I’ve lost.

I start hammering again, trying to take my mind off of her, but with each hit I hear, “Not. Here,” like a voice in my head, mocking me. I find myself first growing frustrated, then angry.

Why would she tell me she was going to be here at seven-thirty and not come? Would she call back? I glance at my phone over on the workbench and see no updates on the lock screen. I’m positive I have not turned it off.

Moments later, I get that weird yet familiar weighted feeling on the back of my neck and shoulders. Someone is watching me.

I swallow and my back muscles tense. I straighten, but don’t turn around.





Chapter 5

Jenna

Thanks to Alex’s kind offer of a ride on the way to her mom’s house, I arrived on William’s doorstep. Glancing at my phone, I saw that it was almost eight o’clock.

I knocked, wondering if he’d mind that I was late. Oh well. I shrugged, then after standing there for minutes with no response, I remembered that he’d told me to go through the front door and into the backyard.

Following William’s instructions, I headed through the house. He’d helpfully left the way lit all the way from the front door to the back—again, helpfully left ajar. He’d done just about everything for me besides lay down breadcrumbs.

His house was big but modest. A lot of the furniture was mismatched but comfortable-looking. For an artist, he sure had no sense of style for home decoration. Not that I was one to judge. I still used plastic-framed posters and hand-me-down furniture to decorate my rented place.

I was glad I’d worn my sweatshirt when I walked into the yard from the kitchen and felt a cool breeze. The path to William’s work shed was accommodatingly lined with solar lamps, and I made my way toward the glowing open doorway. Something mischievous in me wanted to surprise him so I bounced up on the balls of my feet, tiptoeing along. In my sneakers, it wasn’t hard to be silent on the brick path.

A hammer rang against metal with a rhythm so precise it might have been operated by machinery. I knew that William was a blacksmith for the RMRA. He’d been doing it for several years, as a matter of fact, and I’d admired the pieces he’d made. After the weekend, I imagined he had a lot of work to catch up on.

But there wouldn’t be any more blacksmithing tonight. We had important work to do. William had a duel to win.

I entered the workshop through the open door and, as I’d hoped, I caught him unaware. He was bent over his anvil, tongs in one hand and hammer in the other. He had goggles on and jeans with a full leather apron. I was briefly reminded of Hephaestus, blacksmith to the gods of Greece. But he had been deformed, and from what I could see, there was nothing about William’s body that could even be remotely described as deformed.

His arms and back were fully exposed, and seeing him like this hit like a punch to the gut. A pleasant punch, actually. I inhaled a deep breath and drank him in, watching as his biceps and triceps bunched and stretched with the rhythm of his hammering. His arms were sculpted, strong—superb. I hadn’t noticed under all that armor what good physical shape William was in. He’d never been unfit, but with all the working out and training he’d been doing over the last four months…now he was downright scrumptious.

My mouth went dry as I imagined those shapely, solid arms wrapped around me. Distractedly, I licked my lips and looked away, startled and even a little unsettled by this powerful jolt of attraction. I’d always thought William was good-looking and knew I was attracted to him. But it was never in a lusting, gotta-have-him sort of way. At least not until now.

Suddenly, the hammering stopped—along with the attractive ripple in his back muscles that accompanied the motion. Without turning, William straightened and said, “You’re thirty-three minutes late.”

My jaw dropped. How the heck did he do that? Had I been breathing too heavily or something? Damn. “Oh, uh. I’m sorry.”

He adjusted where his hammer rested against the piece he was working on, but he still didn’t look at me. “And you didn’t ring the doorbell.”