A feminine gasp was all he heard before agile footsteps scurried off.
He sighed. “Is that how it’s going to be then?”
“That is how it’s going to be.” Gerard nodded in agreement.
Gods, he hated when his patrons decided to develop a backbone. “Fine.” He flicked his fingers, calling forth the dagger of fury. “Kill yourself then.”
Betty gasped, covering her mouth with her hands. Gerard’s jaw set and his breathing ratcheted up several notches.
The dagger was the length of Rumpel’s forearm and gleamed like molten steel. Handing the diamond-encrusted hilt to Gerard, Rumpel shrugged. “Well?”
“You can’t possibly be serious?” Betty’s eyes glimmered.
“It is a pity that a woman’s tears simply do not move me.” Rumpel frowned. “I can assure you, I am quite serious.”
Betty smacked Gerard’s hand as he reached for the blade. “How dare you!” she cried, looking not at Rumpelstiltskin but at her husband.
Again Rumpel felt the press of eyes upon him. This time he was fairly certain that the eyes belonged to none other than Shayera. Standing, he pushed the chair in before crossing his arms over his chest.
“Go ahead, take your time,” he said. “I can wait for you to decide.”
Snarling, Betty stabbed her finger in his direction. “You shut the hell up. And you!” She twirled that finger on Gerard, poking him hard in the chest with it. “No way.”
Gripping his hair, Gerard shook his head. “Do not worry, Betty, I will not let my death cause yours. Rumpel, can you sever our ties of Veritas if I do it?”
“What!” Betty shrieked.
“Yes, I suppose I could.” He stared at his fingers with a bored expression, taking several incremental steps back as he inched toward the kitchen partition, determined to discover just who it was lurking in shadow.
“It’s the only way, Betty.” Gerard shook his head. “He cannot have her.”
“No, Gerard, no.” She shook her head and there was no more fight in her. Her voice shook as she rested her hands on the sides of his jaw. “There has to be another way.”
Rumpel chuckled. “I can assure there’s not. His death or the girl. Your choice. And do hurry, for the clock is ticking.”
“No!” a dulcet voice screamed, followed a second later by a body barreling into the room.
All the air was jerked from him when the female flew inside. She was slight, not very tall, but she had an overwhelming presence. Something magnetic, almost larger than life, that demanded one take notice of her despite the homely way in which she was dressed. The blush of womanhood stained her swanlike neck. Dressed in a gown made of literal burlap, it was hard to determine just how she was proportioned since the fabric covered her from ankle to neck. A fiery mane of wild red curls cascaded around her slender shoulders. Hypnotic aquamarine eyes seemed to pierce through Rumpel’s very soul. Her cheeks were dirt smudged and there was a smell about her, not entirely unpleasant, but different. The girl was trying to keep from being noticed.
But he noticed her. A smile gripped him as his body buzzed with the faint stirrings of something he’d not felt in a very long time.
“I will do it,” she said. “I will go.”
Chapter Three
Shayera swallowed hard, refusing to even glance back at the blond-haired, freakishly handsome man standing in her parents’ kitchen.
“Shy, I don’t think—” Her mother’s eyes were wide and she was coming to her daughter to either shake her or hug her, Shayera wasn’t really sure which.
“No.” She held up her hand, warding off her mother. “No. I’m nineteen. I’m a woman and legally able to make up my mind to leave.”
“Shayera!” her father snapped in that strong, no-nonsense voice of his. The one she’d grown up hearing whenever she or her little cousin Briley did something naughty, like filch one of her mom’s costumes to play dress-up. “You will show your mother some respect.”
Crossing her arms, she was viscerally aware of the infamous, sexy, and deranged man staring daggers at her, probably wondering what she was doing hiding beneath the burlap sack. Oh, gods if that man only knew what kind of trouble he was asking for by requesting she go with him.
“Daddy, I love you. But I’m not going to stand by and let you die just to preserve your strange sense of honor.” Squaring her shoulders, she finally turned to glare at the blond-headed demigod. “What do you plan to do with me, Rumpelstiltskin?”
His smile grew slowly, like the gentle unfurling of a flower to the sun’s morning rays. Her stomach quivered. The man was potent, so different from the boys of her village who’d with one breath hurl insults and cast stones at her and with the next would beg her to come and give them just a taste of her forbidden charms.