The Matchmakers Read Online Free Page A

drawer under the counter where he
kept the sharp knives. Nothing seemed to be disturbed, but he’d learned the
hard way after a run-in with an angry hooker in a bar in Chicago never to
underestimate a woman on the edge. He put his hands up in a calming gesture and
gave her a shaky smile. `How’d you get in here?´ `I popped.Śhe delivered
her casual reply with a shrug. `Could you µpop’ out just as easily?´ `Sure.Ánd
she did. Nick blinked at the now empty kitchen. He whirled around to look
behind him at the equally empty living room, then turned back to the kitchen
again. His first and only thought was how he could have lost his mind so
quickly, with no warning whatsoever. One day he felt perfectly sane, working on
Miranda’s pool house and indulging in nothing stronger than a cold beer at the
end of the day and poof all of a sudden he’s plagued by a recurring
hallucination. Before he could calculate the odds that he’d inherited some
mysterious mental illness from either branch of his uptight family tree, she `popped´
back into the kitchen, all wide smile and sparkling eyes.
                `I’m ba-aack,śhe
sang. Nick sank into the nearest kitchen chair and stared at her. `I’m not
going to ask how you did that, because I probably didn’t really see what I
think I saw.´ `Yes, you did.Śhe crossed the kitchen and gently put her
hand on his shoulder. Nick flinched. Talking to a hallucination was one thing,
but feeling one touch him was something else entirely. `You’re not dead and you’re
not crazy.Śhe crouched in front of him and looked up into his eyes. She
seemed so real. He could even smell her perfume, a faint flowery scent, like
roses« `Are you a ghost?´ He’d read somewhere that ghosts tended to smell like
roses or tobacco, scents they carried with them from their former lives to
reassure the people they left behind. Of course, Nick didn’t believe in ghosts
or, for that matter, people who could disappear at will. `Not a ghost. I’m a
faerie. Though we prefer the term Fae.´ `A faerie.´ Well, why the hell not? `Like
sugar plums and Tinkerbell?Śhe shrugged and moved across the kitchen to
lean against the counter by the sink, once again cutting off his access to the
phone. `Those are stereotypes, of course, but you’re close.´ `Where are your
wings?´ `Wouldn’t you like to know?Śhe winked, crossed her legs at the
ankle and gave him a cockeyed grin. `If we succeed, maybe you’ll get to see
them. Right now, we need to start formulating a plan.´ `My plan is to get
myself to a rubber room ASAP. I’m not too proud to admit that I may need
professional help.´ `You don’t. Well, you do , but that’s another story. You’re not imagining me.´ `It’s funny, I don’t
feel crazy. I don’t think I’m asleep. Maybe I hit my head going over the
embankment, and I’m in a coma or something.Śhe sighed. `You’re not any of
those things. I’m real. You’re real, and we’re in a real fix. The Fae Goddess,
Freya, has sentenced us to the task of joining together three couples in true
love before the night of the Oak Moon. If we fail, we will both lose love
forever.´ Nick blinked again, hoping his visitor would `popóut of existence and
leave him to go quietly insane by himself. None of what she said made sense. He
still thought she might be a lunatic who’d broken into his apartment with plans
to kill him, or chain him to the bed and cut parts off like that crazy dame in
the Stephen King novel. He was beginning to think he should have stayed at
Miranda’s and duked it out with Skip. At least he’d be in jail or in the ER now
where he could get some professional help.
                She snapped her fingers,
and his drifting gaze bounced back up to her face. `Stay with me, Nick. We’ve got
a lot of work to do.´ `Right. Work.´ He rose and headed for the fridge, sparing
the telephone another longing glance. Why bother now? Might as well hear her
out. He opened the