He was all hard angles and masculine power, with the face of a warrior angel...fierce and awesome male beauty relaxed in...
Paige gulped.
Oh gosh, she thought a little hysterically, had she just killed the hottest guy in the northern hemisphere? A guy who looked like he’d gone a couple of rounds with the Exterminator and survived. Only to be felled by a...a—
Reality finally hit her and she sagged against the wall, a shaky laugh escaping. It was filled with more than a little hysteria because... Wow. She’d done it. She’d totally taken out the bad guy.
In her head she did a little victory dance. She was awesome! Who’s the girl? Who’s the—?
From down a long tunnel she heard a tinny voice telling her to remain calm, that the police were on their way. Baffled, Paige looked around and noticed the receiver hanging from the wall unit by a long spiral cord. And blinked.
Oh. Right—911.
Eyes locked on the hot guy, she fumbled the receiver with shaking hands and lifted it to her ear, managing to whack herself on the cheek in the process.
“Ouch.”
“Hello, ma’am. Ma’am, can you hear me? The police are on their way. Are you hurt?”
Blinking back tears that were most likely from fear and the massive doses of adrenaline still pumping through her system, Paige managed to croak out, “N-no, I’m n-not hurt. But I’m p-pretty sure I just k-k-killed the hot guy.”
Her breath escaped in a loud whoosh. A seriously hot guy came willingly into her house and what did she do? She killed him, that’s what, she thought with a splutter of hysterical laughter. Frankie was going to disown her.
* * *
Dr. Tyler Reese swam up through thick layers of consciousness aware of a vicious pounding in his head. Having recently become familiar with the sensation, he let out a rough groan, thinking he was back in the ER after his accident.
A low husky voice ordered him not to move but he disregarded it and lifted a hand to his head before recalling that his arm was encased in a cast from elbow to knuckles. And the move had him sucking in a sharp breath of agony that had nothing to do with his headache.
“I told you not to move,” the voice said, sounding a little exasperated. “And use the other hand before you give yourself another bruise. But I warn you. Try anything funny, and it’s lights out.”
His head pounded harder and a burning pain radiated out from his shoulder. He knew without being told he’d dislocated it—especially as the pain was accompanied by the almost overwhelming urge to toss his cookies.
Wasn’t that just freaking peachy? Another damn injury to add to the ones he’d recently acquired.
“What the—?” he slurred, prying open his lids and blinking up into the faces swimming a couple of inches above him. Faces that looked remarkably like...faeries? He blinked again and two momentarily became one.
Yep. A freaking crazy-haired faerie. Although what the hell one was doing almost cross-eyed half an inch from his face was something he wasn’t ready to contemplate.
He narrowed his gaze until his vision cleared, revealing a faerie that was more likely to grace the pages of a graphic novel than a children’s bedtime story book—which meant he was hallucinating and his mild concussion had just been bumped up to serious head trauma.
Realizing he was scowling up at her, she gave a startled squeak and scuttled out of sight—too fast to see if she had any wings. The sudden move made him dizzy so he closed his eyes to prevent a brain aneurysm and gave a silent snarl.
Great. Just freaking perfect. His life officially sucked. He’d escaped an aggressive drunk intent on mowing him down only to be felled by a pint-sized attacker intent on splitting his head open like a watermelon.
What the hell had he done to deserve this?
His musings were interrupted by a soft sound of throat-clearing and a shaky but peremptory, “Hey.”
He cracked open an eye and mulled over the fact that she was still there, and couldn’t decide if it was good or very bad. Good that he wasn’t hallucinating and bad because...yep, there was still a wild-haired, wide-eyed faerie staring at him like he’d crash-landed in her flower patch.
Then he spotted the flashlight raised ready to bean him if he so much as twitched and he decided that if he was hallucinating she would be dressed in gossamer wisps, not a huge ratty old USMC T-shirt, looking fierce and crazy and ready to inflict more pain.
His heavy sigh emerged as a low groan. So much for that fantasy. He’d finally lost his mind if the sight of this wild exotic creature made him want to smile when he had absolutely nothing to smile about. His surgical career might very well be over thanks to a drunk who’d sideswiped him, leaving him with broken carpals and ulna in his dominant hand, along with damaged ligaments.
Suddenly his well-ordered life had been invaded by a horde of women eager to take care of him and to escape the chaos he’d packed a bag and headed for the one place on the planet he’d been happy—his father’s house on the Olympic Peninsula.
It had been an impulsive decision but Ty wanted to be alone. What better place than his childhood getaway in Port St. John’s? He’d spent summers here escaping from the rigidly stifling atmosphere of his mother’s house until he’d turned eighteen. Maybe he should have called first, but his battery had died and, frankly, it hadn’t even occurred to him that Henry Chapman wouldn’t be home.
Or that he’d be attacked by a wild faerie commando barely reaching his chin. It was humiliating, dammit. He just hoped his friends never found out or he’d never live it down.
And another thing—what the hell was this creature doing in his father’s house?
He pushed up with his good arm, intending to demand answers, and promptly froze when pain had him sucking in an agonized breath. Sweat popped out on his forehead and he was forced to sag embarrassingly against the nearest wall to breathe past the nausea.
“Who...are...you?” he gritted out in a voice guaranteed to send hospital staff running. “And what the hell did you throw at me?”
The faerie arched her brow at him as though he was a grumpy adolescent who’d momentarily forgotten his manners. “You first,” she said, with only a hint of a quiver in her voice.
It both irritated and earned his reluctant admiration because it took guts to hold off a guy almost a foot taller and a hundred pounds heavier with nothing but a firm little chin, a steely-eyed stare and a flashlight. All while dressed in nothing but a huge, faded T-shirt and a kick-ass attitude.
That mouth—wide, lush and soft—was another matter altogether. A mouth like that gave a man ideas. Ideas that would probably earn him another concussion.
“That way we can get the introductions out of the way before I inflict any more pain on you,” her mouth said, completely destroying the fantasy forming in his head.
He squinted at her silently for a couple of beats before looking pointedly at the flashlight. “Thinking of giving me concussion?” He gave a hard laugh. “Hate to rain on your parade, babe, but some idiot already beat you to it.”
“No,” she said, gesturing to his shoulder with a jerk of her chin. “I’m going to reset your shoulder, babe. You dislocated it when you took a header into the floor.”
Her tone suggested he was an idiot, which irritated the hell out of him enough that he tersely pointed out, “Which I wouldn’t have done if you hadn’t tried to split my skull open like a watermelon.”
“Which