She blinked as the world began to darken, despite the fact that the sun was shining overhead. Passing out became a distinct possibility.
“Uh, Andy? She’s looking a little…pasty.”
She turned to look at the guy with the wings and couldn’t help but grin when he waved at her with the tip of one of those beautiful, blue-tinted appendages.
Holy crap. The guy had blue wings.
And the man she’d slept with last night was a Yeti.
She had to tell Joss. She had to apologize for not believing in him. For occasionally thinking he was a crackpot and secretly patting herself on the back for being the sane sibling.
Joss was going to be a millionaire. A superstar. Forget about a cable show, he was going to make movies and…and…
She blinked and Andy stood in front of her again as a man. The hunky man he’d been before he’d turned into a seven-foot, white-haired snow monster.
Or—
No. She was going crazy. That’s all there was too it.
“Jenna, I think you need to breathe,” Andy said.
She automatically sucked in a deep breath and realized she’d been about to hyperventilate.
“What are you?”
She had to hear him say it. Had to know she wasn’t going crazy and seeing things that weren’t really there.
Andy’s chin went up and he drew himself to his full height, an impressive sight.
Then he bowed and Jenna had the urge to curtsy.
“I’m a member of the Yeti tribe. My home is in Nepal but most of the younger tribe members no longer live in the village of our ancestors.” His voice had taken on the cadence of the guy who narrated a lot of the whacked-out shows on the History Channel, odd breaks and all. “Now we travel the world, spreading—”
Fry reached out and smacked his arm.
“Please excuse him.” Fry’s words still slurred a bit and, combined with the accent, she was charmed. “He tends to get a little ferklempt,” hic, “when he talks about his roots.”
Andy shrugged. “Well, it’s kind of cold in Nepal and we get kind of sick of snow and all the freakin’ tourists. Yeah, we’ve got fur coats when we want them, but it’s still getting crowded in our neck of the woods.”
“And you’re really a…a Bigfoot?”
“No, my cousin’s a Sasquatch. I’m a Yeti.”
“Of course he is.”
“Jenna, you know I would never hurt you, right?”
She rolled her eyes at him. The thought hadn’t even had time to cross her mind, and now… Well, of course he wouldn’t hurt her. The guy who’d rocked her boat last night wouldn’t hurt her. And neither would the hulking, seven-foot white wookie. “Did you ever meet George Lucas?”
As Fry nearly fell out of the back of the car laughing, Andy’s adorable face screwed up in a frown. “Uh, no, I don’t think— Oh, wait. You think I’m a freakin’ wookie?”
Uh-oh. Jenna bit into her bottom lip at his offended tone. “I’m sorry. I actually think they’re cute.”
Fry did fall out of the car then, blue wings wrapped around his shoulders as he howled with laughter.
“Jenna,” Andy started then stopped to shake his head. “I’m sorry too. I’m sorry you got dragged into this.”
Damn, she totally knew where this was going. When a guy started telling you he was sorry for something, either he was about to tell you he’d cheated on you or he was dumping you.
And since it couldn’t be the first, all things considered, it had to be the second. Which totally sucked, even though she understood. Really, she did.
What had she been expecting anyway? A lifelong commitment? She’d gone into this with the idea that it would be a fling and that was what she’d gotten.
A fling with a guy who could turn into a Yeti. Which, up until this moment, she hadn’t believed existed.
It was enough to make a rational girl believe she needed a straitjacket and a rubber room.
And Jenna was nothing if not rational. Maybe too rational.
Maybe she needed to be a little irrational sometimes. Maybe she actually wanted to continue the romance with the Yeti.
Yeah, and what should she tell her brother?
Guess what, Joss? I met this great guy and he fulfills all my fantasies. And he’s an abominable snow monster and would prove all your crazy theories and make you famous. And make Andy’s life unbearable.
She couldn’t do it.
Better to leave now and promise to keep his secret. Besides, no one would believe her. They’d think she was just another crackpot. Just like Joss.
She forced a bright smile. “I’m not sorry to have met you, Andy. And I won’t betray your secret, not even to my brother. But what are you going to do with Mike?”
“Mike won’t be a problem. We’ve got ways of making him keep quiet. Jenna…”
Andy looked pained, so at odds with his normal expression that she lifted her hand to stroke away the lines.
“You don’t have to worry about me. I won’t tell a soul.” Not only would no one but her brother believe her but she’d be lumped into the same category of flake as her brother…which wasn’t so flaky anymore.
“I should be going. I’ve got a long drive home and I have to work tomorrow.”
Back to her boring life of numbers and equations and boring people who thought wookies weren’t as cute as ewoks.
And that sometimes the things that went bump in the night were actually more interesting than the people who sleepwalked through their day believing the only strange things in life were people who thought K was an acceptable substitute for C in given names.
How could she reconcile her boring life to the one he lived?
“Jenna,” Andy sighed. “Are you sure you’re okay to drive?”
“Yes, I’ll be fine. Really, I will.” Maybe not her heart but…
“I know this is a lot to take in. And I totally understand that you don’t want to talk to me right now. But, if you find you do need someone to talk to later, look up Carrie Benson. She works as a reporter for the Weekly World News in West Reading. She’s been in the same situation as you.”
“Carrie Benson. Sure.” Of course he wasn’t offering to come visit her himself. She figured as soon as she was gone, he’d go jetting off to another part of the country. Or the world. He was a freakin’ Yeti.
“Jenna.”
Instead of answering the entreaty in his eyes, she turned and took a step back rather than throwing herself at him then turned and forced herself to start walking.
Back to normal life. Which, after today, was going to be completely overrated. And oh so lonely.
Chapter Seven
“Jenna, are you sure you’re okay? You don’t sound like yourself.”
“I’m fine, Joss. Honestly. Nothing’s wrong. Tell me how the shooting’s going?”
For a few seconds, Jenna thought Joss wasn’t going to let her change the subject. He’d called her every day for the past week. Every time his question seemed legitimate.
Hey, Jenna, can you stop by my apartment and make sure I locked the back door?
Hey, Jenna, do you think I need to see a doctor for this rash on my leg?
Hey, Jenna, will you check to see if I paid the bill for my cryogenic storage chamber?
But she knew he was checking up on her. And here she thought she’d been doing a good job of hiding her depression.
She missed Andy. Which was ridiculous. She’d only known him for a day. Sure, it’d been the best sex of her life but he was a globe-trotting Yeti shapeshifter.
She was an accountant who lived in a house with a spotless white kitchen. Whose white kitchen was ever spotless?