His eyes sparked with mischief. “You can, but I sure as hell won’t complain if you don’t. I’ll keep the speed down so you won’t get cold.”

“Don’t,” I said. “Speed is good.”

“All right, then. Let me get over to the curb so you can climb on without flashing.”

I didn’t understand what he meant until I had to hike my skirt up to get my leg over the seat. Then I had to keep it hiked up to wrap my legs around him, which explained his look when I’d asked about keeping the skirt on.

He reached back to grip my bare knee. “You need to hang on.”

“Right.” I felt down either side of the seat. “Where?”

He took both my hands and wrapped them around his waist.

“Oh,” I said.

“Yep. Now scoot forward and get a good grip.”

Getting that grip meant scooting all the way forward, against him, legs wrapped around him. When I fidgeted, he glanced back.

“Changing your mind?” he asked.

“No, just…” I closed any remaining gap between us and leaned against his back, my hands on his thighs. “This okay?”

He chuckled and looked back. “You need to ask?” he said, then revved the engine and pushed off.

TRESPASS

Patrick stood outside the diner and watched the motorcycle speed off.

“Are you going to say anything?” Ida demanded as she marched up beside him.

“It’s a very nice bike.”

She scowled.

“It is,” he said. “I’ve often thought it would be fun to drive a motorcycle, and if I did, that’s what I’d want. An understated Harley. Lots of power but not too flashy. I might even join a gang. I don’t think his would take me, though.”

“There was a Cŵn Annwn in Cainsville, Patrick.”

“Mmm, technically no,” he said. “The boy is no more cŵn than Gabriel is bòcan. Less so, even. Disgynyddion not epil. Grandchild, I’d wager. He has the blood. Nothing more.”

“He is still Cŵn Annwn,” she said. “He does not belong here. We should have—”

“—killed a boinne-fala boy who obviously has no clue what he is and no idea of the trespass he’s committing?” Patrick turned to her. “Kill him and insult his people? Cast the first spear in a war we don’t dare start?”

“The bòcan has a point.”

It was Veronica, coming out of the diner to join them. She took a place beside Walter, who said nothing in his consort’s defense, which suggested, more than any words, that he didn’t agree with Ida. He just knew better than to say so.

“The boy doesn’t know what he is,” Veronica said. “No more than Gabriel or Olivia know what they are. He committed no intentional offense. We could complain, but if the Cŵn Annwn don’t realize that one of their disgynyddion is acquainted with Olivia, I don’t think it behooves us to tell them.”

“It certainly does not,” Walter said.

“Do you honestly think they don’t know?” Ida turned on them. “They’ve hired him to seduce her. He is a criminal, after all.”

“A biker, not a gigolo,” Patrick said. “That’s clever, don’t you think? Cŵn Annwn running a motorcycle gang? It’s so hard to ride a horse down the highway these days.”

Ida glowered at him. “You aren’t taking this seriously.”

“If I wasn’t, I’d be back inside, finishing my chapter, not here, pointing out the idiocy of your theory. The Gallagher boy is a client of Gabriel’s. That’s how he knows Olivia, not because he was set on her by some shady stranger offering him money to fuck her.”

“There’s no need to be vulgar,” Ida snapped.

“Yes, there is. Boinne-fala nature is vulgar. The boy meets Olivia. She’s an attractive young woman; he’s an attractive young man. Both are unattached. Both are in their sexual prime. Do you really think money needs to change hands for that”— he waved in the direction of the long-vanished bike—“to happen?”

“It’s not just boinne-fala nature,” Veronica cut in before Ida could snap something back. “It’s their nature. From their old blood. I’m sure it’s no coincidence that Gabriel represents the Gallaghers. He met them; they recognized a connection. Cŵn Annwn and Tylwyth Teg may not trust one another, but we understand one another. Gabriel meets the Gallaghers. Gabriel meets Olivia. Olivia meets Rick Gallagher and that”—she gestured down the road— “is what happens. Just as it did for her parents.”

“Cach,” Ida spat.

Patrick looked over in mock shock at the curse. He did not, however, disagree with the sentiment.

A few other elders had joined them, silently listening, as they usually did. One—Minnie—finally spoke, her whispery voice tentative. “What if he isn’t merely Cŵn Annwn? What if he’s—”

“He isn’t,” Ida cut in. “He’s a boy. A random disgynyddion. Nothing more.”

“But if he’s with her, isn’t it possible—”

“No.” Ida turned a look on Minnie, and her anger rippled her glamor, light seeping out before she reined it in. “He is not.”

She turned her hard look on the others, daring them to disagree. None did, though Patrick knew they were all thinking the same thing. Wondering the same thing. Not daring say Arawn’s name, but wondering, fearing, nonetheless.

“It’s a fling,” Ida said. “Patrick is right. Their nature taking control. Nothing more.”

Walter rubbed his chin and said nothing.

Ida turned to Patrick. “Where’s Gabriel in all this?”

“Left standing on the sidelines, it appears,” Patrick said. “There seems to have been some tension between them lately.”

“What?”

“It’s nothing too serious, considering they were together last night. My guess is he’d done something to upset her.”

“Really?” Ida’s gaze bored into his. “I don’t know where he’d get that from.”

“About what happened last night…” Patrick said.

“We’re handling it.”

“I hope so, because it’s a problem, one that suggests the Gallagher boy might not be the only Cŵn Annwn trespassing in Cainsville.”

Ida said nothing. They all went silent. Last night was, quite possibly, the first time in decades that Patrick wished he’d been part of the inner circle, just to see their reactions to the news. One of their special children found murdered. In Cainsville, no less. While he doubted the girl had actually been killed here, the fact remained that someone had murdered Ciara Conway and put her body in the Carew house. It was a message. About Olivia. One they did not wish to receive.

“We’ll solve that,” Ida said. “You handle this.” She waved in the direction Olivia had gone. “Whatever is wrong between her and Gabriel, fix it. Now.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

When Ricky passed the town limits and hit the gas, I found the rush I’d been looking for all my life. My earliest memories of life with Pamela and Todd Larsen? Me on a swing, Todd pushing me. Me in his arms as he swung me. Faster, higher, the air whooshing past like hits of pure oxygen. My first taste of a drug I’d never forget. No merry-go-rounds for me. I wanted roller coasters. I wanted go-carts and snow sleds. Faster. Higher. I remember my dad taking me out in the Spyder, and even before I was old enough to drive, he’d hand me the keys on a lonely stretch of road just like this, letting me take the wheel and go. Just go.

The wind whipping over my bare arms and legs was the most delicious burn imaginable, something I’d never gotten in a convertible, even with the top down. I could feel the motorcycle, too, in a way I never felt a car, no matter how perfectly the engine roared and rumbled. This rumble went right through me, vibrating against my bare thighs and, yes, everyplace else that vibration feels so damned good, making me really glad I hadn’t put on a pair of jeans.

Leaning against Ricky’s back, my legs wrapped around his hips, the burn of the wind and the rumble of the bike … It was a rush—an erotic blood rush, head rush, oh-my-God-this-is-amazing rush. I won’t say it was better than sex, but I’ve had some that didn’t live up to this.