Page 38 of Touch

The female dashes toward her mate’s car, a smile blossoming across her face. Griffin revs the engine, evidently worried no one in this country will hear him. Either that, or he hopes the shrill noise will inflate the circumference of his cock.

This relentless shit-for-brains is going to thwart Love’s mission on a regular basis. She must stop them from driving away, prevent this male from wooing Holly.

Growling, Love rips an arrow from her pack and shoots the front passenger tire. The iron tip slashes through rubber, the gash emitting a wheezing piglet cry, and the tire deflates into a flabby puddle.

The arrow vanishes and manifests back into Love’s quiver. At the same time, Holly freezes in her tracks.

“What the —” she and Griffin balk in unison.

Griffin tears out of the driver’s side and stalls beside Holly as they gawk at the pile of rubber. She tries to reassure him, but his tirade stampedes over her words. He rants about the grand plans he’d had, including the village gazebo, her favorite coffee, the vanilla marshmallows, and the blanket he’d brought. A winter picnic.

Too bad those plans hadn’t included a spare tire.

Holly ventures next door and returns with her neighbors, along with a litter of children who swarm the driveway. One of the fledglings scales the car and proclaims, “I’m a knight, here to slay the enemy!”

Love approves and points to Griffin.There he is. Seize the fuckwit.

“It just blew on me,” Griffin explains to the couple.

“You’ll have to call it in,” the wife apologizes. “We don’t have a spare that size.”

Love perches on the car’s hood, crosses her legs, and celebrates. The neighbors return to their house with the children—who’ve stolen the marshmallows from the passenger’s seat—but the lovers remain outside, shivering and talking. Love monitors the situation, making sure they don’t find alternative transportation or a sexual form of distraction.

A tow truck arrives fifteen minutes later. Ulrik exits the vehicle, surveys the damage, and glances toward the couple, his leathery face squinting at Holly. “I know you.”

Love tenses. The female stiffens, her doe eyes widening.

“That was you with my son the other night,” Ulrik says.

“Your son?” she peeps.

“Famous recluse. White hair. Gray eyes. Built like a summit. Was that you with him?”

Apparently, Griffin has no idea about this. His grisly expression indicates as much.

Ulrik’s gaze ticks between the lovers. “The prick came home that night with a shiner.” He strides up to Griffin. “Lemme guess, you’re also the boyfriend—or maybe just the fuck toy—and that was your handiwork on my meal ticket. Though, it seems to me you got the brunt of it.”

The man’s sneer expands as he inspects the bruises on Griffin’s face and the braces on his knees, which Love hadn’t noticed until now. While she processes the evidence of what Andrew and she had done to him, the men size each other up.

Sensory overload ensues. The venomous taste in Love’s mouth, which is coming from Ulrik, must be directed at Griffin. At last, Andrew’s odious relative is going to defend him.

Yet before Griffin can flex his muscles and deny everything, Ulrik wipes his hands on his uniform. “Don’t worry, Second Fiddle. Andrew’s not fucking your woman.” He swaggers backward while declaring, “Because if he was, you’d be nothing but an afterthought.”

Insufferable pest! Love might commend Ulrik for boasting about Andrew, if not for two reasons. First, he’d referred to her target as a meal ticket. Second, baiting Griffin by flaunting Andrew’s skills as a lover will backfire.

Forget that Ulrik is indirectly advocating for Andrew as she’d hoped. For the tactic is all wrong. Love has learned plenty from her crew about anger, sorrow, and envy. This man is too furious at the world, too bent on wounding everyone in his proximity, to care how it benefits or harms a member of his family. He’s solely interested in provoking anyone and everyone,heedless of the consequences. If others around him hurt, he shall feel better about his own shortcomings.

Love despises her invisibility. She longs to be human, to dig her claws into this piece of shit, to pick apart every bone of his fragile skeleton.

Holly glowers with umbrage, and Griffin snarls, both of them digesting what they’ve just heard. Griffin wishes to atone for his mishaps, however the man is capricious and nursing a private demon, considering what Holly had implied earlier. He’ll dwell on Holly walking home with Andrew, then wedge himself into every encounter Love orchestrates, if only out of fear that he’ll lose her. And while this may work in Love’s favor if Griffin becomes overbearing, it will also cause friction in Andrew’s presence. In which case, Holly is wise enough to dismiss both men purely out of exasperation. The female knows her worth and won’t let a pair of alpha males disrupt her life.

Then there’s Ulrik. Agitator. Instigator. A spiteful impediment to Andrew and Holly’s match.

One moment, Ulrik badgers Andrew about getting into skirmishes over a female. The next moment, this loose cannon is inciting a rivalry. Likely, the shift in attitude has to do with Andrew’s jibe over breakfast, when Ulrik had pinned him to the refrigerator.

You’re just about the biggest dumbfuck if you let a woman run you into the ground.

You would know.

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