The shower turned out to be tiny.
Well, no, that was unfair. It probably wasn’t tiny. It was probably of a relatively reasonable size if you were the only person in it, and if you were smaller than he and Ros were together. So it was decided. The shower was a regulation size and did not deserve his grumbling.
“I mean, I’m not complaining,” said Ros, pressing up against him as she stepped out and reached for the towel. “It was fun, don’t you think?”
“Yeah, but I don’t always get in the shower to have fun,” he sighed. They hadn’t really been that interested in getting clean for the first fifteen minutes or so, and so they had spent the last five showering in cold water after the water heater ran out.
“No?” asked Ros innocently, and he growled at her, shoving his head under the cold water spray one more time before shutting it off. She knew exactly what she was doing to him, and God help him, but he never wanted her to stop.
“No. Sometimes you just have to get clean, and I can guarantee you that if I’m in the shower with you, getting clean will never, ever be my top priority.”
“Flatterer,” said Ros sweetly, drying herself off. “Honestly, you make a girl feel–oh my God why!”
One moment he was climbing out of the tub, and the next he had cleared it entirely, going to wrap his arms around his true mate and pulling her back from whatever it was that had made her make that horrified sound. His heart was beating like a drum, his eagle was screaming, and it took him a few seconds to figure out that there was in fact no one in the bathroom but them.
“Ros?”
She pointed, and he followed her finger to the single window. The bottom half of it was set with pebbled glass for privacy, but the top half was clear, which made it very easy to see the fire condor and the dead rabbit it carried in its beak.
“Aw, hell.”
“Ugh, I’m sorry for screaming,” Ros said, shaking her head. “It’s just that wasnotsomething I was expecting.”
“No, no, that’s fair,” Teagan said absently.
He had Ros in his arms wearing only a towel, and that was a terribly difficult thing to turn away from, but there was something about the fire condor on the other side of the glass that made him frown.
“What is it?” Ros asked, and he shook his head.
“It’s being weird.”
“Is that your scientific assessment?”
He glanced down at her with a smile, because if she was recovered enough to make a smart remark, she was probably going to be just fine.
“I have a bachelor’s degree in zoology, so yeah, it is. And that bird is being weird.”
As they both watched it, the fire condor turned its head from side to side, making the dead rabbit wiggle with a rather unnervingly lifelike motion. After a moment, it somehow managed to tap its beak gently on the glass.
“It’s sort of like it wants to be let in,” Ros said in fascination. “Is that agiftfor us or something?”
“No,” Teagan said, ignoring the first thing that leaped to his mind.
He reached out to lower the blind on the bird’s avid gaze. There was another tap, oddly forlorn this time, and Teagan shook his head, reaching for his own towel.
“Give it a few minutes, and he’ll wander away. They’re very sharp-sighted, but not all that bright. He’ll forget that he found that window at all in a bit.”
“That’s encouraging. Was he looking for a place to nest or something?”
“Maybe. Or a place to stash his meal. Some of them will stash food for later in hollow trees.”
There must have been something in this tone because now Ros was giving him a careful look. She got a little line between her eyebrows when she concentrated, and something that looked like just the beginning of a pout. Teagan had to pull himself back from leaning in to kiss her, because that would mean he was trying to distract her, and he wasn’t quite there yet.
“Really.”
“Yup. And as much I would love to do nothing but stay naked and wet with you, I should probably get out back and find out what our feathery guests are up to.”
“All right,” Ros sighed. “The sooner they’re gone, the sooner we can... Um.”