Fantasyland 03 Fantastical Read Online Free PDF

look on his
face. “I will protect you, keep you safe from harm, keep you alive
as I vowed to do as your husband and because your sister holds a
place in my heart. But for no other reason. You cannot carry logs
and cook meat and make me think you sweet. I know you. I know this
is not you. What I also know is that the only energy you will
expend is to connive and maneuver to take best care of yourself.
Don’t make the mistake of thinking me a fool.”
    I swallowed then began, “I –”
    “Planned it from the beginning,” he finished
for me. “Hunting,” he went on, “gave me time to think. You took me
because you had no choice but also because you could not have Dash
but it meant you could have what I could give you, your
home, your life lazy as you like it. But you schemed the whole time
knowing that you couldn’t have Dash but not wanting Rosa to have
him either. So you got what you could from the arrangement but made
sure your sister didn’t get what she wanted most in this
world.”
    Wow. That hurt. And, obviously, it was
totally untrue.
    “That’s not true,” I whispered.
    “I am no fool.”
    “It isn’t true.”
    “It’s pure you.”
    I held his eyes and he stared into mine, his
handsome, scarred face a cold, blank mask.
    There was no way I was going to convince
him. Apparently, the Cora of this world wasn’t all that great.
    And I didn’t like being her.
    This whole thing sucked, like a lot, but now
it sucked even more.
    I broke eye contact, started turning the
handle again and used the gathered juices to baste the rabbits.
    I looked at him again when he rose.
    “Call me when they’re done,” he ordered,
turned on his boot, strode to the opening, shoved the hides aside
and disappeared.
    I stared back at the fire and I told myself
it was the smoke that made my eyes wet.
    But it wasn’t.
     
     

Chapter Four
    Sleeping Arrangements
     
    I ate Thumper.
    What sucked was that Thumper didn’t taste
all that bad.
    I ate him because I didn’t want to suffer
malnutrition before what I hoped fervently would be my happy ending
and I was returned to my world.
    When I used a knife from the wall to check
the meat was done, I called Noctorno. He took the rabbits off the
spit, carved them on the table and handed me the bowl full of meat.
Then he watched as I ate my portion without a word (except to say,
“Thanks” when he handed it to me which got me a heavy scowl
indicting Cora of his world wasn’t polite either) as he ate his
portion, tearing it directly off the spit. Then he disappeared
again.
    This meant I was left to my unpleasant
thoughts and not much else. I’d get up every once in awhile to feed
the fire but other than that, I had nothing to do.
    From the small opening in the ceiling, I
could see night had fallen. There wasn’t much light outside due to
the bleak day but there was none at all when night fell.
    I was staring at the opening, half-asleep
and hoping when I woke up I’d be back in my bed in my
apartment.
    I didn’t think much of my life before I left
it.
    Just two months ago, I’d broken up with my
boyfriend of four years, Brian, because he’d refused to take it to
the next level, him telling me he surprised there was a next
level. Why he thought we could date for the rest of our natural
born lives was unknown to me. What stunk was, I loved him, I missed
him and I wanted him back. He was fun. He was funny. He didn’t
scowl at me, call me lazy or accuse me of scheming. Sure, the truth
was, he was lazy, case in point, him thinking that he didn’t
have to put more effort into a relationship beyond dating. But he
was fun to be around and furthermore he’d been around for awhile, I
was used to him.
    My job wasn’t all that great either. I got
paid well because I’d been there for ages but the air was rife with
rumors of layoffs, the agency wasn’t doing very well, and everyone
knew that the people who got paid the most were the first to go.
The economy wasn’t booming and even