“I will…be fine,” he assured Christine again. “I will…stay here.”
“That’s probably for the best.” She nodded. “I mean, you can go out and pet the cats again if you want, just don’t let yourself be seen.”
Roarn frowned.
“Who would…see me?”
She sighed.
“No one, most probably. But I do have the neighbors from Hell up on the ridge above us. They’re the ones who started blasting that death metal music last night that gave you nightmares.”
Roarn nodded his understanding.
“Do they…come out much?”
“No, thank goodness! But when they do, they’re complete assholes. So it’s best to leave them alone.”
Roarn frowned. He was understanding more and more English, though he still had to reach for the words when he wanted to speak it himself, but he didn’t get all of it.
“I do not…understand how… a person can also be…an anus,” he said to Christine.
She burst out laughing—a warm, sweet sound that fell like music on is ears.
“Well, not literal assholes—it just means they act like jerks. They’re terrible,” she added, seeing he was still confused. “I’m pretty sure they’re the ones who put that trap on my land—the one you were caught in the other night. In fact, that’s one of my errands—I’m going to bring it to the Sheriff’s office and complain about them.” There was a dangerous glint in her mild brown eyes Roarn hadn’t seen before as she said it. “They can’t be putting traps on my land! It’s not lawful.”
“They do sound like anuses,” Roarn agreed, frowning. The Fury made it hard to remember, but the pain of the biter digging its silver teeth into his flesh was a vivid spot in the red static of the night before.
“Anuses who are going to have to deal with the law,” Christine said, nodding firmly. “But just stay out of their way—I’m pretty sure they have a bunch of guns and drugs up in that rusted-out trailer of theirs, so it’s better not to be getting crosswise with them. Just let the Sheriff handle them. If he will,” she added, more to herself than Roarn.
“I will…stay away,” Roarn promised her.
“Good.” She hesitated for a moment, then came to him and put her small hands on his shoulders. Standing on her tiptoes, she leaned up to kiss his cheek.
Roarn couldn’t help himself—he wrapped his arms around her and kissed her back—but on the mouth.
Her lips were soft and sweet and she melted against him without hesitation. The feel of her full curves pressed against his own much larger and harder body brought out his pleasure purr and he rumbled as he kissed her.
She tasted so sweet and felt so right in his arms, Roarn would have liked to do much more than kiss her. But after a long, breathless moment, he felt her small hands pushing gently on his shoulders.
Reluctantly, he let her go.
“Sorry, big fella but we’ll have to stop or I’ll never get my errands done and you won’t have anything to eat for supper.” Christine’s soft voice sounded breathless. “So we’ll have to wait until later.”
“Then we will…do this again?” Roarn asked hopefully. “I want to…kiss you, Chris-teen. Not just…your mouth. I want…to taste you,” he told her.
She blushed prettily, her smooth cheeks going pink in a way that was most appealing.
“Well now, we’ll have to talk about that later, all right? I already told you I’m too old for you.”
“You are…a Mature Elite,” Roarn insisted. “Beautiful…curvy…perfect.”
She laughed.
“I think my ex would disagree with you there, but we’ll talk about it more later. Right now I have to go to the Sheriff’s office and see if I can catch him before he goes out on patrol.” She made a face. “Which mainly means cruising around town and stopping for a milkshake at the Dairy Curl.”
Roarn sensed she wasn’t looking forward to this particular errand—trying to get the peacekeepers of her world to help her.
“I wish…I could go with you,” he told her. “To make…this Sheriff discipline…your anus neighbors.”
For some reason, this made her laugh but she shook her head.
“I’m afraid not, honey. You’re a wanted man—well, a wanted Monstrum. Let’s just keep you under wraps for a while until the heat dies down, okay?”
Roarn knew she spoke the truth so he nodded.
“I will stay,” he said. “But, Chris-teen…I will…miss you.”
“Aww, I’m gonna miss you, too.” She smiled and blew him a kiss. “I’ll see you in a little bit, I promise.”
Then she stepped out the door and was gone.
TWENTY-THREE
“There—that’s what those Fensters left on my land!”
Christine plunked the sprung bear trap in the middle of Sheriff Wainright’s desk and put her hands on her hips. The trap was dirty with mud and snow—she’d had to dig it out of the ground, where it had been anchored by a short chain—but she didn’t give a damn. Sheriff Wainright wasn’t going to weasel out of doing his job this time!