GettingLuckyinGalway Read Free Page B

sweat
covering his flesh, told him everything he did and didn’t need to know.
    Fuck, he knew those sisters had been screwing with him. The
greatest treasure known to man, his lucky green ass. Setup was what had
happened, and him as gullible as a dew fairy to follow so easily the bread
trail they’d laid out.
    So now what? Roark didn’t see himself walking up to her and
informing of her newly mated status. Somehow, from the few minutes spent with
her, he knew without a doubt Calder wouldn’t take such an announcement lying
down. Hell, she probably wouldn’t take it at all. With his unusually bad luck,
Calder might just prove to be the only mate in the history of leprechauns able
to walk away and never look back at her mate.

Chapter Two
     
    Raindrops continually dripped down her nose, but Calder knew
from past experience to wipe them away would accomplish nothing. Instead she
sighed and dug further into the base of the wide old ash she’d chosen for her
night’s spying.
    Her quarry looked to be tucked in for the night, but some
sixth sense refused to let her leave and seek out her own warm, comfortable
bed. So she lay in the mud and grass, eyes narrowed until the beautifully
restored three-hundred-year-old white stone farmhouse was the only thing in her
sights.
    How, she wondered, did a renegade former Irishman land
himself such a sweet place to stay? Twenty minutes from Limerick yet with all
the privacy a shifter could need. The cottage had at least three good-size
bedrooms with attached bath and a true country kitchen. This all from her quick
peek through the wide bay windows before settling down to be miserable for the
night. The large ash trees swayed in the breeze while the leaves dripped
steadily with water.
    Even more stupid—why was she here? What point could she
possibly be trying to make to herself by scouting out his house? Prove that the
wily man was her mate? Pretty hard to do with the male being tucked away in the
house for the night and her being upwind. The scent of him had been tainted
earlier in the pub with assorted scents of humans, smoke, peat and numerous
others combing to mix the air into a hodgepodge of confusion.
    Be honest with yourself , her conscience insistently
prodded her. Fine , she grumbled back to the annoying voice. She could
have picked out his scent amongst the various others, but panic and fear had
kept her from doing so. She didn’t want to know if the minty-smelling human
belonged to her. After all, her whole life had been spent dreaming of the day
she found her cat mate, the shifter who would complement her life, not
complicate it. So was it any wonder she backed away from what instinct demanded
of her?
    How would she ever explain to a oney, the name the dual
natures gave run-of-the-mill humans, that she was his mate or wife and by
biting him Calder would join their lives for eternity? Yeah, that would go over
well with the species that preferred to shoot first and ask questions later.
    So instead of being in her rented cottage, warm and cozy,
Calder lay outside aggravated by the elements and getting more pissed off by
her potential mate. Where the logic in that line of thinking came from she
didn’t care. Somehow she knew it was Roark’s fault. She’d worry about finding
the reasons behind it later.
    The rain continued to fall in a slow, steady stream and
while nothing overtly changed, Calder felt a difference in the air around
her—something small, like a flash, normal one minute and then different.
Lifting her head, she sniffed. One good whiff and her body knew.
    Slowly, so as not to startle the male, she turned her head
and found herself face-to-face with the man so recently occupying her thoughts
and rousing her anger.
    “Hello. Rotten night to be out for a stroll,” he said,
sounding and looking so normal.
    Did he not see her? Not understand there was a
four-hundred-plus-pound lion lying wet underneath this large ash tree? She
sniffed again, searching for signs of