Delilah Dawson - The Damsel and the Daggerman

Knife after knife flew at the targets in time with the music, seemingly straight from their loops. He made it look effortless, simple, as natural as a hawk swooping from the air to capture a bludbunny. The crowd’s gasps grew fewer and fewer as he went on without missing a single shot. As if he sensed the exact moment their attention hung at a precipice, he stopped and pulled the bandanna down over his eyes. As the city folk murmured and nudged one another around her, Jacinda couldn’t help focusing on Marco’s sensual mouth, his cheeks cleanly shaven, and that little, delectable place above his upper lip desperately in need of kissing.

She shook her head. Nibbling on Marco wasn’t part of the story.

With his eyes covered, he took more time with each throw, and the crowd cheered after each blade hit a target. Jacinda would have bet anything that he could see through the bandanna, no matter how opaque and thick it might look from the audience. The hesitation was purposeful, part of the act. But then again, he had said he liked taking his time. The way he had said it, however, meant something else entirely.

As the final knife thudded into the bright red bludrat, the last untouched target, the crowd went mad with wolf whistles, clapping, and the frantic wailing of overexcited women. Jacinda clapped politely, well aware that she was not the only one in the audience who’d been waiting to see Marco without protective ribbons of steel up his thighs. Pulling off his bandanna, he bowed and straightened. His grin told her plainly, told everyone, that he was well aware of the effect he had on women, and when he winked at a buxom girl in the front row, the little ninny fainted dead away. Jacinda considered it significant that he caught her eye, just after that, one eyebrow raised in amusement.

As the applause built to a crescendo, Marco raised both arms, threw them down, and disappeared in another burst of smoke. Moments later, the crowd quieted and dispersed, still whispering about the mysterious knife thrower and the darkly dangerous look in his eye, so different from the soft, bespectacled men of the city proper, with their top hats and paisley waistcoats. Jacinda waited until the last giggling girl had given up on seeing Marco again before she walked around the backdrop, which had gone still. From behind, the mechanics were visible, a tangled orchestra of metal, cogs, pistons, and gears. She was almost tempted to touch the delicate mechanisms, but she suspected that everything in the caravan was rigged to punish people who were too curious or too foolish.

“Looking for more answers?”

With a blush in her cheeks, Jacinda spun around to find Marco standing at the front of the backdrop, grasping a knife to pull it free of the wood. He looked so pompous and self-contained that she wanted to beat on his chest with her fists until he spilled his secrets like angry bees from a hive. One by one, he pulled out the knives and slipped them into their hooks, barely looking down as he worked. With nothing else to do and desperately in need of distraction, Jacinda knelt to yank a knife from a red-eyed bludbunny. It was easier than it looked. Instead of handing him the first one, she stayed where she was and reached for another.

“Your show seemed to go well.”

“They always do.”

“Why didn’t you use the spinning target? From earlier?”

She looked up in time to catch a fleeting grin. “That trick’s no good without a pretty girl. Are you volunteering?”

Remembering the momentary flick of his fingers that had sent a knife hurtling toward her body and recalling the split second when she couldn’t tell if she’d been hit or not, she shook her head. “I need to be fully functional, thanks. It takes two hands to do what I do best.”

He smothered a laugh. “Are you saying you doubt my skills?”

“No. But I do doubt the proximity of a well-trained chirurgeon, should something go wrong.”

“I’ve never drawn blood, you know.”

She looked up sharply; he’d divulged more than he had meant to. But Jacinda knew well enough how to lure a witness into confidence, into revealing more. So she calmly pulled out another knife.

“I’ve heard it called the impalement arts.” She stood, three knives in her glove, holding them out with a welcoming smile. “But it doesn’t seem like much impalement actually occurs. At least, not if you’ve any talent.”

Had he been drinking just then, he might have choked, but as it was, he cleared his throat and took the knives, one by one, his fingers lightly dragging across her gloved palm.

“There’s more than one way to be impaled, Miss Harville.”

One fair red eyebrow rose. “It’s Mrs. Harville. So yes, I know all about that.”

The knives slid, one by one, into their loops with a whisper of cloth.

“You’re a very singular girl.” He paused to stare at her lips. “ Mrs . Harville.”

He stepped closer, his presence a dark wall. She didn’t move but tilted her head to look up at him. With careful fingers, she slid a knife out of its loop on his shoulder and drew it gently down his shirt, knowing he would barely feel it but enjoying the scratch of steel against cloth and the feeling of slight rebellion against a man who billed himself as the most dangerous thing around.

“You’re just accustomed to girls. I’m a woman. There’s a difference.”

With a quick flick of his knife, she popped off his top button. It flew into the night, landing somewhere in the dry grass, not that he bothered looking for it. In a flash, he caught her wrist in a steel grip that didn’t hurt so much as warn. As he slipped the knife out of her grasp, he leaned close to whisper, “Keep playing games with me, if you like. I know some games, too.”

Jacinda’s pulse was racing, and she realized she was up on tiptoes, waiting to see what he would do next. But he simply put the knife back and returned to his work, collecting the rest of his instruments until he was fairly bristling again. When he ducked around behind the backdrop, she followed him into the shadows. He turned on the machine, and Jacinda stepped back from the suddenly shuddering and twirling spears of metal.

“Let’s say I want to play,” she said, voice pitched low. “Let’s say I agree to play by your rules.”

His eyes raked her from hem to hat. “I have a show to put on. Now is not the time for distractions.”

“Think about it, then. Because I’m not giving up. You might as well have some fun, being pestered to death.”

The moment built, heavy and dark, the clockworks’ ticking as inescapable as sand in an hourglass. Voices began to gather on the other side of the backdrop, and Marco pressed another button to start up the fanfare. His eyes didn’t leave hers as he checked his bandanna, ran fingertips over the knives, and reached into a wooden crate for two round, paper-wrapped packets that smelled of powder and magic.

“Crowd’s gathering. You’re stuck, sweetness. You’ll have to wait out the show back here.”

“Oh, no. Time to myself in the dark with a bunch of well-oiled machinery. Whatever will I do?”

That surprised him. With the smoke bombs in each hand, Marco couldn’t reach out, couldn’t step too close or touch her or even shove her away. He glanced from Jacinda to the backdrop as if weighing his chances. Before he could say something dismissive or discourage her further, she stepped forward, curled her fingers into his shirtfront, and kissed him with the controlled passion only a very experienced woman could handle under the circumstances. He was helpless to do anything but take her kiss, his mouth warm and his jaw rasping against her cheek as she ran her tongue past his lips with playful possession.

“I’ll be right here. Not distracting you. Try not to hurt yourself out there.”