Scythe & Sparrow (The Ruinous Love Trilogy, #3)(103)
“Well,” I reply as I read the homemade label before I place it on the floor behind me, “this dragon can’t sing, but I’m certainly going to do it anyway.”
“That’s my Sol.” Sloane leans over the center console and presses her lips to mine. Her scent of ginger and vanilla floods my senses as though it’s permeating my skin, embedding itself where it belongs. I graze her cheek with my knuckles, tracing the constellation of freckles that dusts her skin, a pattern I know by heart. As my fingers thread into her hair, she sighs into my mouth, pressing her lips harder to mine, moving closer, and just as I deepen the kiss, she pulls away.
“Gross,” she says, her nose crinkling.
“Gross? Gross, Blackbird? I am mortally wounded.”
Sloane giggles as she opens the compartment in the center console to retrieve a tissue and wipe her lips off. “Your makeup. You can’t taste that?”
“I was committed to the bit. I must be desensitized.”
“That does not taste like lipstick, Rowan.” She pulls the visor down and checks that she’s rubbed any remnants of green from her mouth. With a sideways glance, she assesses my face, her eyes lingering on my lips before she returns her attention to the little mirror. “Are you one hundred percent sure you used face paint?”
“Umm … mostly …?”
Sloane’s head whips to the side and she pins me with a scrutinous glare. “What do you mean ‘mostly’?”
“It wasn’t staying on super well, so I … augmented it.”
“Augmented it … with …?” When I break my gaze away with a cringe, she whacks my arm. “Rowan Kane—”
“Poster paint.”
The car sinks into an eerie silence. This might be how I die. My wife will probably murder me and dump my body into a field. I weigh my chances for survival. I can cook, that has to count for something, right? And she thinks I’m pretty—at least, she does when I’m not in a full dragon costume complete with foam horns and layers of silicone scales. But she’s pretty fast. And stabby. And she goes for the eyes.
It takes a long moment before I look at her. When I do, I’m not sure she’s actually breathing. She’s so lethally still that I don’t know if I should maybe just take my chances and run for it.
And then she bursts out laughing.
It’s so loud and sudden that it startles me, and that seems to delight her even more. She laughs and laughs and fucking laughs.
“What’s so funny …? The bottle said it’s water-soluble,” I say, and she wheezes, tears leaking from the corners of her eyes as she parrots my words back to me through strained vocal cords.
“Did you test it?” she manages to get out, though only barely.
“No …” I flip my visor down and open the cover on the mirror. My face paint concoction has definitely stayed put. Which is maybe a bit concerning now that I think about it. It’s been on there for hours. Maybe too many hours. I swipe my thumb across my tongue and rub at a spot on my cheek next to the scales. While the top layer smears, the skin underneath is definitely still green. “Ahh … shite. There’s gotta be a way to get this off, right? Blackbird? You like makeup. And painting. So you know how to get this shit off, yeah? It’ll come off … right?”
Sloane cackles through my questions, her eyes still watering as she keys the engine and reverses onto Magnolia Street. “Somehow, I don’t think a homemade apricot-turpentine scrub is the best option. But don’t worry,” she says as she reaches over to pat my hand, “I still think you’re pretty, even if you’re permanently green.”
“Permanently …?”
By the time we reach the cabin, I’m sure Sloane regrets letting the word permanent tumble from her grinning lips. I pepper her with questions for the remaining thirty-minute drive, about skin and dye and just how bad would it really be if I tested out this apricot-turpentine scrub idea? That one earns me a much-deserved smack to the shoulder. I guess she’s right. Testing out new things on my face has apparently not gone so well for me today, so ramping it up to another level is probably not the best idea either.
In fact, the whole costume was definitely not my best idea, though it seemed like a good one at the time. I guess I didn’t anticipate a barn dance detour that would cost us a precious hour and a half of time. I was hoping to arrive early so I could chase my wife through the woods and make her laugh as I fucked her on the forest floor. At least I’m extremely successful in the laughter part. Too bad it’s not just my wife who’s delighted by my costume.
“You feckin’ dumb bellend. What in the Christ Jesus are you wearing?” Lachlan says from the porch as we exit the vehicle. Sloane’s grin is maniacal as she stands off to the side to watch our exchange with unrestrained glee.
“What the fuck does it look like I’m wearing, asshat?”
Lachlan makes a show of taking off his glasses and polishing the lenses with the bottom of his shirt before he slides them back on. “Looks like an idiot suit. Is that the right answer?”
Sloane bellows a laugh as Lark pushes open the screen door, drying her hands on a tea towel as she exits the rustic cottage. She lurches to a halt as soon as her eyes land on me. “Oh holy hell.” Her giggle is devious, a bright contrast to Lachlan’s derisive snort. “Is that suit clean?”