Carly clutched her chest as deep hacking coughs wracked her body again. Ria’s chest ached just watching her.
Carly waved her hand. “Go away before you catch my cold.”
Ria hated leaving Carly, but she probably needed more rest anyway. After making sure Carly had a hot cup of soup, a glass of 7-Up over ice, and a new box of tissues, Ria left. Carly might be right. She was sure she could point out enough faults that people would start to despise Kristor. She nodded. It might just work.
Kristor looked around the locker room. Benches sat low to the floor making his back and legs ache, so he had chosen to stand. A distinct odor hung thick in the air, as though something had died, and they’d forgotten to bury the carcass. Not that he expected a room that housed warriors to smell sweet. He’d been around men long enough to know their body odor was not always pleasant.
That was something else that bothered him. These men did not look like warriors. Heath maybe, although he had gray running through his hair. His reflexes were sharp, though. When someone had tossed him an oddly-shaped, brown ball, he’d caught it.
And there was the man called Neil. He was younger. Heath said he was a deputy. Kristor understood most of the language and knew that probably meant second in charge.
But the others. He shook his head. They had let their bodies go. How did they expect to win a battle? Unless the ones they would battle were in worse condition.
These men came in different shapes and sizes: tall, skinny, short, fat. One man bent to tie the strings on his shoes and when he rose, his face was red, and he could barely draw in a deep breath. No, Kristor couldn’t imagine them winning a battle.
“I want to introduce y’all to Kris. He’ll be taking Smiley Wilson’s place, since Smiley has that bug going around,” Heath said.
“You ever play football?” a short, balding man asked.
“Play? I thought we were here to win a battle?” Kristor turned to Heath.
“Yeah! That’s the kind of attitude we want on this team,” another man yelled.
Kristor relaxed. Heath hadn’t lied. He did not come to play, but to fight. He was a warrior.
“We’re the shirtless team this year, guys, so take ’em off,” Neil told them.
“Anybody bring sunblock?” a pale man asked.
“I got plenty,” another answered.
Maybe they had powers since they could block the sun.
The men began to remove their shirts. They must be braver than he’d first thought if they planned to go out on the field without armor. They earned a measure of his respect for their act of courage.
“Y’all ready to win?” someone called out.
“Yes.”
“I can’t hear you.”
“Yes!” echoed through the room.
“Yes!” Kristor jerked his shirt open, buttons flying, material ripping, growling from the energy that burst from him. “Fight, kill, destroy!” He threw his shirt on the floor, raising his fists in the air and shaking them.
The men stilled.
It got deathly quiet.
“Can I put my shirt back on?” a scrawny man squeaked.
“Good Lord, man. I ain’t never seen muscles like that. What do you lift?”
“Lift?” Kristor thought for a moment. “Anything I want.”
The room exploded into laughter. Heath clapped him on the back. “I would imagine so.”
Heath quickly explained the rules of football. Kristor was disappointed to hear they couldn’t do anything more than steal a flag. A game of wits and speed. His brothers had often engaged in such sports.
This would at least pass the hours until he could convince Rianna it was time to go home to New Symtaria. The Queen Mother would be proud that he wasn’t using force—yet.
Chapter 4
There were already a few spectators sitting in the bleachers when Ria made her way to the sidelines. She noticed several women in the stands were talking on their cell phones: hands waving in the air, eyes twinkling, laughter erupting. She knew the symptoms well. They must have something new to gossip about. That was fine with her as long as she was off the top of their lists.
Then again, they could still be talking about her. Nah, the Miller Bend grapevine moved faster than the speed of sound—meaning they only heard what they wanted to hear. That was life in a small town. On the other hand, people were quick to help when someone needed a hand. She figured you had to take the good with the bad.
She tugged on the hem of her short skirt, feeling ridiculous wearing the blue-and-white cheerleading uniform. One of the women in the Women’s League had delivered it to her earlier in the week. As soon as she’d taken the skimpy, midriff-showing top out of the box, her heart sank.
It wasn’t that she was a prude. She had a dozen or more thongs and a couple of bikinis in her dresser drawer. For some strange reason wearing the cheerleading outfit made her think about strippers, poles, and men shoving money into the waistband of her skirt.
Her eyes strayed to the field. Some of her tension eased. She looked a hell of a lot better than the no-shirts team. Neil wasn’t bad. She could certainly tell he owned a set of weights and used them.
And for an older guy, Heath looked in pretty good shape. Some of the others should’ve left their shirts on, though. The next time Ben Dansworth made a smart-assed remark about her seeing an alien, she was going to mention his beer gut. That should shut him up.
Her gaze skidded to a stop when it landed on Kristor. No shirt. Bulging muscles as he stretched and turned. God, he was tanned and delicious.
Oh, baby, stretch a little more to the right.
He did.
Her mouth watered.
Get a grip! He could quite possibly be a serial killer. Just because he’d gotten Fluffy out of a tree, and had helped a little old lady up a small hill, didn’t mean he wasn’t a murderer. That could be a cover.
But it was difficult for her to believe that when she was staring at hard…sweaty…sinewy muscles. Her breath caught in her throat. “Now more to the left,” she murmured. “That’s it. Right there. Yum.”
So maybe he wasn’t a serial killer. Just crazy. Was it horribly wrong to lust after a guy if he was just a little off kilter?
Kristor suddenly stopped stretching as though he sensed someone watching him. Pffttt, as if everyone wasn’t. The guy had some seriously sexy moves.
Kristor scanned the area until his gaze stopped on her. He stared, apparently not caring that he was being rude. Yeah, right, why should someone who thought he was an alien care if he was being rude or not?
Turn away from him, she told herself. But it wasn’t so easy when he looked at her as if she was an earthly body he wanted to explore and conquer. That wasn’t going to happen.
His brain had probably been fried by too many Star Wars movies, and she was not about to play close encounters of the sexy kind with him. She didn’t want him pulling her against his strong chest, and she most certainly didn’t want to run her hands over all those muscles or…God, she couldn’t stop staring at him! He was like a freakin’ drug and she an addict looking for her next fix.
Heath pulled Kristor’s attention away, and she could finally take a deep breath. What had just passed between them? A blast of electricity?
No, she’d only reacted to a gorgeous body. The guy was built, she wouldn’t deny that.
Built? More like sculpted from fine marble, Shintara broke into her thoughts.
“Shut up!”
“Shut up is right,” Mary Ann said as she stopped beside Ria. Her hungry gaze latched on to Kristor like a starving cougar.
This was not the plan. Ria was supposed to make people question Kristor, not drool all over him. Not that any woman wouldn’t foam at the mouth. She sort of believed him about the warrior stuff. He had the broad shoulders of a man who would take command during a battle. But she refused to get the hots for a lunatic.