Curse of the Black Swan Read online

  It wasn’t. Sean O’Malley stood, large as life—and that was pretty darn big, considering those incredibly broad shoulders—in the middle of her shop, holding a hissing Persian cat.

  “You!” Sean and Brynn said at the same time, and then they both laughed.

  The cat didn’t appreciate the humor, apparently, because it lashed out with one paw and scratched the back of Sean’s hand. Sean didn’t even flinch, and he didn’t say a word of reprimand to the cat. Brynn liked him even more for that. Most creatures were jumpy when they came into a place that, no matter how clean, would always hold the scent of other animals.

  “Do you work here?” Sean glanced around. “Nice place.”

  “It’s mine.”

  Brynn felt a moment of fierce pride over her neat little shop. The rows of colorful dog and cat accessories behind the counter gave the place a festive air, and framed photos of happy customers and their pets lined the walls. She’d made a success of her business in spite of the challenges that came with the swan curse.

  “I was just closing, but you said you had an emergency?” She let the question ring in her voice. “Must be my day for it. I had a baby wolverine with a pickle problem earlier.”

  He grinned. “Sounds like an interesting story.”

  The cat in his arms yowled and lashed out again, leaving a second red stripe next to the first on Sean’s hand, and Brynn decided she’d had enough of that. She marched over to Sean and took the cat out of his arms before he could protest.

  When the cat hissed at her and started fighting in earnest, Brynn pulled it more tightly against her chest, wrapping the squirming bundle in her arms.

  “Stop it right now,” she said firmly, and the cat’s eyes widened at her tone, and then the tension seeped out of its body as it relaxed against her.

  Sean’s mouth dropped open. “What did you do? I’ve never seen Barty calm down like that for a stranger. He hates most people. Well, pretty much all people except for my mother.”

  Brynn smoothed a hand down the cat’s fur and crooned at him. “Barty isn’t a bad boy, are you, my beautiful one? Just a little misunderstood.”

  The beautiful white Persian closed his brilliant blue eyes and began to purr, and Brynn almost laughed at Sean’s stunned expression.

  “It’s a gift,” she confided. “If animals didn’t like me, I’d go out of business.”

  “Makes sense,” he said.

  His gaze swept her from head to toe and she suddenly flushed, realizing how she must look. Sweaty hair, no makeup, her Scruffy’s apron covering her T-shirt and jeans; she was no fashion plate, that was for sure. Of course, she’d been wearing feathers the first time he’d seen her, so it was all relative. Sean was wearing a dark green shirt and a pair of well-worn jeans and, even though the dark shadows under his eyes told her that he hadn’t slept much, he was still absolutely gorgeous.

  It was entirely unfair.

  “Your emergency?” she prompted.

  “Oh, right. He has a big wad of gum stuck in his tail. Neighborhood kids probably dropped it on his favorite spot on the stone wall in front of the house. My mom wouldn’t let me chop it out with scissors.”

  Sean dragged a hand through his own silky dark hair, which needed to see a pair of scissors, too, but Brynn kept that observation to herself.

  “You live with your mother?” It was none of her business, but she was curious.

  He laughed. “No, but we all go visit her a lot. She’s rattling around in that big house by herself now, and we worry. I caught some shut-eye and then arrived just in time for the cat emergency this afternoon.”

  “Let’s have a look,” she said, carrying Barty over to the table.

  The little cat started to protest again when he saw the grooming table, but Brynn took a clean, soft towel from a shelf and placed it down first, then set him on top of it.

  “Nobody likes a cold metal table,” she told Sean.

  He was watching her again—studying her as if she were a puzzle he needed to solve—and she didn’t like it.

  “Don’t stare at me.”

  “I can’t help it. You’re beautiful,” he said, and she was caught off guard by the sincerity in his voice.

  She covered up her flustered reaction by reaching for the tools she needed. A fine-toothed comb and a little oil should do it.

  “I’m not beautiful. You must not get out much,” she snapped, before pointing to the shelf behind him. “Please hand me that bottle of sesame oil from the shelf.”

  When he silently gave her the oil, she winced at the sight of the scratches on his hand.

  “There’s a first-aid kit under the counter. You should clean up those scratches.”

  “I’m fine. I’m sorry if I embarrassed you. I’m not really good at small talk,” he said, his face grim as if he’d had to force out the words.

  She rolled her eyes and started combing the edges of the gum out of Barty’s tail. “You practically grew up in the most popular bar in Bordertown, and you have four brothers. How can you not be good at talking to people? If you’d had my childhood, I could understand it. I spent most of my time alone.”

  He shrugged, but she was almost sure he’d flinched a little. Interesting. Deep cat scratches didn’t bother him at all, but questions about his social skills made him uncomfortable. Yet another thing they had in common.

  “Please go tend to those scratches. I’ll be stressed out about it until you do.”

  His gaze caught hers as if demanding her attention, startling her into perfect stillness. A spark of deep red-orange color pulsed in his pupils for an instant, and then was gone so fast she wasn’t sure she’d really seen it. When he turned toward the counter, she exhaled a shaky breath.

  Barty let out a particularly loud meow, startling Brynn into almost knocking over the uncapped bottle of oil.

  “Yes, baby, I’m sorry. Let’s try a little oil to work that gum out, okay?” As she started to carefully work the oil into the fur around the gum, she glanced up at Sean, who was disinfecting and bandaging his hand. “He has quite a loud meow, doesn’t he?”

  “That’s how he got his name.”

  “Barty?”

  Sean grinned. “Nope. Bartholomeow, if you can believe it.”

  “That’s a good one,” she had to admit. “I’ve heard a lot of funny pet names, as you can imagine. Today I had one of my favorite dogs in here; an enormous golden cross named Peaches. He’s quite an elegant, dignified dog, so I always wonder if he’s a little embarrassed by his name.”

  “I think I know that dog,” Sean said, after he put the first-aid kit away. “Tiny little Mrs. Mastroianni?”

  “That’s the one. Bordertown is a small place, isn’t it?”

  “Mrs. M. is a friend of my mother’s. They used to go for tea, before . . . before.”

  Brynn recognized the pain that stamped his face. She’d worn the same expression after her mom had died.

  “She’s gone?”

  “No. She’s—no. Cancer. She doesn’t have much time left. Maybe three or four months, they tell us.” His eyes were dry, but his voice was rough with the unshed tears that she knew must be clogging his throat.

  “I’m so sorry,” she said, wanting to do something—anything. Reach out to him, give him a hug, offer some comfort. But she knew better. Getting involved was dangerous.

  Caring about someone was worse. Look what had happened to her mom.

  She worked diligently to remove the rest of the gum, and then she washed the oil out of the beautiful Persian’s fluffy tail. He was purring now, lying on his side and enjoying the attention.

  “I can’t get over how calm and happy he is for you,” Sean said, gesturing to Barty. “He hates everybody.”

  Brynn gently rubbed the cat’s belly, and a thought occurred to her. “Has he always been like this? Persians are one of the best-tempered of all the cat breeds. It’s unusual to hear of one hating people.”

  “Come to think of it, he hasn’t. He was a perfectl
y good cat for the first couple of years she had him. Cute as a button when he was a kitten, too. It’s just for the past year or so—”

  Brynn knew what was coming when his voice trailed off. “When did your mom get sick?”

  “Right about the same time, I think, although she didn’t get her diagnosis until several months ago,” he said, his eyes widening. “Do you think Barty knew?”

  “It’s very common for animals to react when their people get sick,” Brynn said. “There are even doctors who use dogs to detect cancer in humans. They can smell the tumors or the difference in the bloodstream, or something like that, I think. I’m sure cats can do the same, only I haven’t heard of anyone trying to train a cat to do the job.”

  “I’ll be damned,” Sean said, lifting the now-clean and gum-free cat up off the table and staring into his eyes. “Are you just worried about Mom, Barty?”

  The cat meowed plaintively and quite loudly, and Sean smiled at him. Brynn’s heart stuttered in her chest at the sight of the big, masculine firefighter sharing a moment of compassionate understanding with the beautiful little creature, and the feeling rang every warning bell she had.

  “Oh, boy, you should be on a poster,” she muttered, going to wash her hands and drop the comb in the disinfectant.

  “What was that?”

  She turned around, and he was standing way too close to her, even though she hadn’t heard him move.

  “You,” she said, almost accusingly, backing away. “You’re like a movie poster. Hot guy rescues people from burning buildings and saves kittens from trees in his spare time. You don’t own a spandex suit, do you?”

  A slow, deliciously wicked smile spread across his face. “Hey, if you’re into that kind of thing, I’ll see what I can find.”

  SIX

  Sean watched the intriguing rosy glow rise in Brynn’s face, and the blood in his body rushed straight to his cock. He’d never been so glad to be holding Barty, whose fluffy sweep of a tail hung down and concealed Sean’s enormous erection. Damn, but he was suddenly acting like a teenager at his first sight of cleavage, although Brynn couldn’t be more covered up.

  His memory, though, was happy to rush in and supply her image, in full-color detail, from the night before. Her incredibly beautiful body, naked and gleaming in the moonlight, wasn’t a picture he was likely to forget anytime soon. His throat went dry, and suddenly he wanted nothing more than to pull Brynn into his arms and kiss the breath out of her. He could put poor Barty in one of the roomy crates lining the back wall—just for a few minutes, or an hour or two—and see if kissing her would quench the need that had been simmering at a slow burn ever since he’d first seen her.

  His cock strained against its denim confinement, and Sean knew the answer was a resounding no. Kissing wouldn’t do anything but make him want more and more of her. Long, slow, powerful kisses. Naked kisses. Long, slow, hard thrusts into her hot, wet, welcoming body, maybe right there up against the glass counter.

  He groaned, and Barty hissed at him, snapping him out of the fantasy and into the reality in which Brynn was staring at him like he was a lunatic, and they were standing in front of the floor-to-ceiling glass front wall of her shop.

  With people walking by outside.

  So, maybe not.

  Instead, he took a deep breath and told her a different truth. “It’s pretty impressive that you own and run your own business, when you have to deal with the curse.”

  She blinked, clearly not having expected him to say that.

  “I—it’s—thank you. I’m very proud of my little shop, actually,” she admitted, and her cheeks turned pink again.

  He caught himself staring at her like an idiot, and tried to come up with something to say.

  “Dinner,” he finally said desperately.

  “Excuse me?” Brynn looked around, probably wondering if she had a bigger pair of scissors nearby so she could use them to protect herself from the crazy man. He tried again, but this time he attempted to channel his brother Oscar, who was charming and funny and great with women.

  It didn’t work.

  “Dinner? With me? You?”

  Her lips quivered, and he realized with relief that she was trying to fight back laughter instead of yelling at him to get out of her shop.

  He hoped.

  “Is this a thing with you? One-word invitations to meals?” Her smile faded quickly, though. “Sean, I told you, I can’t get involved. The curse—”

  “It’s only dinner. You have to eat, right? Eat with me.”

  She glanced down at Barty, who seemed to be bored with the entire conversation, and then back up at Sean’s face. “Well. I do have to eat. How can I refuse an eloquent invitation like that?”

  “Tomorrow? No, I have the night shift. The day after tomorrow?”

  A shadow passed through her winter-blue eyes, and he remembered that she’d have to do swan duty then.

  “We can eat early, if you like,” he added, willing her to agree.

  She bit her luscious lip, which made him go right back to wanting to kiss her, but then she nodded. “All right. But just dinner.”

  “Just dinner. How much do I owe you for Barty?”

  Brynn smiled and shook her head. “No charge. Bring him back to me for a bath and grooming soon, though, okay? He’s looking a little scruffy.”

  “Scruffy,” he said. “Is that why the shop’s name is Scruffy’s?”

  She nodded at a framed picture of a shaggy gray dog. “Yes and no. That’s Scruffy, and I named the shop in his honor, too. A play on words. I’ll tell you about it at dinner.”

  “I look forward to it,” he said, and then he headed for the door before he could say something stupid and cause her to change her mind.

  “Sean,” she called after him, and he stopped with one hand on the door.

  “Any progress on finding that arsonist? The business owners around here were talking about nothing else at lunchtime,” she said. “We’re all worried.”

  “We’ll find him,” he promised grimly. “We’ll stop him.”

  “Be careful,” she said, and he carried the words—and the concern that had been clear in her voice—with him for the rest of the day.

  It was almost midnight before he remembered that, for once, he had a conflict in his schedule. He’d asked Brynn out for the same night as the one for which he and Liam had planned the family barbecue.

  No problem. Surely Brynn wouldn’t consider meeting his entire family to be “getting involved,” right?

  Zach shook his head when he caught Sean pounding his head against his locker. “Yeah, buddy, I’ve had days like that, too.”

  * * *

  Two long, quiet nights later, Sean left work almost as tired as if he’d been fighting fires nonstop. Sometimes, the slow nights were worse than the busy ones—especially when they were all on edge, waiting for an arsonist to strike again. He was hungry, exhausted, and on edge, but he wasn’t interested in food or sleep. He wanted to see Brynn. Needed to see her.

  He started out walking, with no particular direction in mind, since he didn’t know where she lived and he was pretty sure her grooming business wasn’t open at six in the morning. Nobody was around at dawn except cops, firefighters, and people who’d been up misbehaving all night, like the thugs hanging out on the street corner about a dozen feet in front of him. He should sleep. He was going to see her that evening, if she hadn’t changed her mind. He abruptly stopped walking and scowled so fiercely at the thought, that a couple of juvenile delinquent goblins who’d started trash-talking about him wheeled around and headed the other way. The few remaining made a point of studiously looking down at the ground when he passed by, but he barely noticed them, because his mind was still on Brynn.

  Please let her not have changed her mind.

  She’d attracted him with her looks, but she’d captivated him with her spirit. He’d always had a different idea of beauty from most; he liked rounded figures, not model-thin ones. Interesting,
intelligent faces rather than vapid, model-perfect ones. He was drawn to a sense of humor and a great laugh as much as he was to a pair of flashing eyes and a great ass.

  Hey, he was a guy. He wasn’t going to deny, even to himself, that a great ass wasn’t a big draw.

  But Brynn. Brynn. She was gorgeous, no doubt, with all that curly red hair and those winter-pale eyes. Her body, that he kept seeing over and over in his memory, was incredible. She was so much more than that, though. Somehow, in spite of the tough childhood she’d mentioned, and in spite of a curse that had hijacked fully a third of her life, she’d been tough enough to start and run her own business. She was compassionate enough to calm an angry cat and diagnose Barty’s fury as worry for Sean’s mom.

  How could a woman like that still be alone, the curse be damned? If he ever got lucky enough to have the chance to be with her, he’d never—never what?

  What did he think he could do? Tell her he was a fire demon and live with her happily ever after? Who was he kidding? Was it even possible for a worse combination to exist than fire and feathers? Just because something about Brynn touched the soul-deep loneliness he’d been living with for so long didn’t mean he had any chance with her, or even any right to try. He should call her and apologize, and then make a point to never see her again. That would be the right thing to do. The gentlemanly thing to do—an expression that his father had so often used.

  “Screw that,” he snarled, and a banshee hunched on top of a nearby roof screeched and took flight.

  “It’s only dinner,” he shouted after the creature, as it winged its way off into the sunrise.

  She had to eat, right?

  SEVEN

  After Brynn closed the shop and took a quick shower in her private restroom in the back, she dried her hair, got dressed, and wondered what she thought she was doing. She stared at her reflection in the mirror, and an unfamiliar person stared back: a woman who wore eyeliner and mascara and even a little lipstick. A woman who’d dressed to impress a man whom she had no intention of keeping.