Jennifer Crusie - The Unfortunate Miss Fortunes

The bike was a thing of beauty, a moped on steroids, sleek and black with a baby blue tank and seat and piping.

‘It’s a Kreidler Florett,’ Crash said. ‘Built in 1964, 49cc, but it moves like you wouldn’t believe. Lightweight but fast, just like you. Took me a long time to find all the parts but it’s cherry now…’ His voice trailed off.

‘It’s beautiful,’ she said, trying to keep her voice flat.

‘The Florett is considered the best 50 cc bike ever made,’ he said, pulling back, clearing his throat. ‘It’s a real collector’s bike.’

‘I like the blue,’ Mare said.

‘It’s your color,’ he said.

‘And the logo thingy, that’s cool.’

‘That’s the Florett logo.’

Mare nodded. ‘The seat looks like leather.’

‘It is.’

‘Baby-blue leather.’

‘Yep.’

Mare nodded again. The bike was perfect. She handed the picture back to him, glad she had her sunglasses on. Her eyes were probably glowing.

Crash put the picture back in his wallet. ‘The thing is, I have a business there. I just bought a house. And it’s beautiful there, you’d love it. I can just see you riding that bike through the hills, and the Italians, they’d love you. I can take care of you now, Mare.’ He swallowed and then took a deep breath. ‘I think we should try it again. I’ll do better this time. Come back with me.’ He looked into her eyes, the blue depths of his aching with honesty. ‘We belong together. Come to Italy with me, Mare.’

Yes, she thought, but she sat back and tried to be cool. ‘Just like that. Five years go by, you don’t call, you don’t write, and just like that it’s “Come to Italy with me.”‘ God, yes.

I know’ He ducked his head a little. ‘I was going to try to take it slow, but we never did that.’ He looked at her, solid as ever. ‘We were always going ninety miles an hour, Mare.’

‘Yeah, that’s how we hit the trash can,’ Mare said, trying not to think, Italy. With Crash. She stared at the sugar dispenser, watching the granules inside start to stir. Italy. Where the sky was as blue as his eyes and he’d built a perfect bike just for her.

‘I know you need time to think about it,’ he said. ‘I have time. I don’t have to leave until Monday-’

‘Monday?’ The sugar dispenser rocked as Mare sat up, and she slapped her hand over it so Crash wouldn’t notice. ‘You think I can decide to just run off to another country with you in a weekend?’ She leaned forward, trying to make him understand. ‘I have a job here, I just got offered a great promotion, I’m on my way to the top, Crash. And by the way, have you met my sisters?’

‘You’re twenty-three,’ he said. ‘You can leave your sisters. I want to show you Italy. I can take care of you, Mare.’

‘You can’t.’ She took her hand off the sugar dispenser where the sugar granules were heaving on their own now, peppered with little blue sparks, probably because her heart was beating like crazy because she was leaning so close to him, kissing distance, and the excitement had to go somewhere. I can move that sugar with my mind. How are you going to deal with that?

‘I can,’ he said, leaning closer to her, too. ‘I love you, Mare.’

She pulled back at that, and he leaned to follow her, into the space where she’d been, and then his nose twitched and he shivered hard, three times.

‘Crash?’ she said, alarmed.

‘Marry me,’ he said.

Mare was the runner in the family, but Lizzie knew how to make tracks when she needed to, and the last thing she wanted was for a gorgeous, pissed-off, soaking wet wizard to catch up with her. She couldn’t believe she’d lost her temper enough to actually throw the water at him, and for half a moment she’d been paralyzed, half expecting him to dissolve into the floor like the Wicked Witch of the West. He’d just blinked at her as the soapy water landed, and she’d disappeared, racing out the front door before he could try any of his fancy tricks.

The sky was cloudy with the approaching storm, and the wind was growing stronger as she made her way up the cliffs outside of town.

She saw the huge oak first with nothing beneath it – no wet wizards lying in wait for her – and then she went into the stone circle, slightly out of breath, and started to climb up onto the great lump of boulder affectionately known as the Great Big Rock. Some ancient glacier had dragged it down, but now it was smooth and rounded by thousands of years of weather, and she reached the top of it easily enough, hunkering down, trying to catch her breath.

Something was definitely wrong, and Dee must have been right to call for the vote this morning. She’d been a fool to abstain.

She shoved her tangled hair out of her face, lifting her head to look down at the peaceful little town beneath her. No sign of any mysteriously colorful wizard searching for her -maybe his powers were like electricity and he’d shorted out. Maybe he’d given up…

‘I’m sorry.’

She almost fell off the boulder, but he reached out his hand to catch her. Touching him was even worse, but she managed to regain her balance on the rock without it, turning to look at him, fighting the impulse to run once more.

‘You’re not wet,’ she said.

He shook his head. He didn’t look the least bit ruffled -however he’d managed to follow her, it clearly hadn’t been at the same dead run. ‘I could see what you were going to do. It was easy enough to put up a barrier. I’m afraid your floor’s a mess.’

She sighed. ‘My fault,’ she said. ‘It needed washing anyway. Why did you follow me?’

‘We haven’t finished. I’m sorry I insulted your choice of life partners. Clearly there’s no accounting for tastes.’

‘Clearly,’ she said. She’d underestimated him. Her parents could never have appeared as he had, crossing time and space with seemingly no effort. They’d been better at flashy tricks to delight their television audience, not real power. She was dealing with something more complicated than she’d even known existed, and she had to be careful not to lose her temper again. Which shouldn’t be hard – she never lost her temper. Except for today. With this man.

‘I really don’t want you here,’ she said in what she hoped was a reasonable voice. ‘How can I make you just go away and leave us alone? Go back to where you came from, wherever that is.’

‘Toledo.’

‘Toledo?’ she echoed. ‘As in Ohio?’ Somehow he didn’t strike her as the Midwestern type.

‘As in Spain.’

She digested the information, ignoring the little pang of envy. She’d always wanted to go to Spain. ‘Listen, we have a comfortable life here, and we’re not bothering anyone. Can’t you just forget you ever found us?’

He looked at her for a long moment. She would have thought being outside would have muted him, made him less formidable when she wasn’t trapped in a room with him. She was wrong. Even at the top of a mountain he was a disturbingly powerful presence. One she needed to get rid of, fast.

He didn’t look like he was going to be easily swayed. ‘You want me to disappear from your life, forget you ever existed?’

‘Yes.’

‘Fine. Then you do what I tell you and we’ll have a bargain.’

She didn’t like making bargains with the devil, and Elric whoever-he-was was downright satanic. But she wasn’t sure she had much choice. And what are you going to tell me to do?’ she asked, wary.

‘Isn’t it obvious? I’m going to show you how to turn straw into gold.’

She stared at him. ‘I thought we weren’t supposed to cross elemental boundaries. I thought you were going to stop me.’