Free Seduced and Enchanted by Stephanie Julian

sounded so sure she glanced back up into his steady, warm gaze. “You’re smart, you’re confident and you’re handling this situation without freaking out.” When he looked at her like that, she almost believed him.
    Taking a deep breath, she got out of the car and let him lead her up the sidewalk to one of the brick row houses. There was nothing special about the house, nothing out of the ordinary, except for the beautiful carved decoration around the door.
    “I need to warn you, Rosie.” Rio paused as he looked down at her. “You’ve never met anyone like Sal before. Just…don’t freak. He’s a great guy and he’s going to have answers.”
    Okay, that sounded completely ominous. But she didn’t have time to worry because Rio slid an antique silver key from his pocket and used it to open the front door.
    Stepping inside, he pulled her along before closing the door tightly behind them.
    “Hey, Sal, you home? It’s Rio de Feo.”
    Rosie took a look around the small entry hall though she couldn’t see much.
    Directly in front of her was a stairway to the second floor. To the left was a doorway that led into a sitting room and dividing the two was a hall that led to another—
    All the air left the room as she caught sight of the…the…whatever it was coming down the hall.
    It had the upper body of a man and the lower body of an animal, complete with hooves. They made strange little clicking sounds on the wood-plank floor as he walked toward them. He had a handsome face, dark curly hair and small black horns peeking out near the front of his head. Horns!
    And legs covered in a brown hide.
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    And hooves.
    He had hooves!
    “Hey, Rio,” the little goatman said. “What’s up? Who’s the babe?”
    “Rosie, honey, breathe,” Rio whispered in her ear. Then he turned to the…whatever. “Sal, this is Rosie Bianchi. She’s got a problem I’m hoping you can help her with.”
    Rosie took a deep breath then another, trying to calm down. But…there was a satyr standing in front of her. A living, breathing, walking, talking creature of myth staring up at her with his hands on his furred hips and an assessing look on his face.
    They stared at each other, Rosie afraid to say anything at all for fear she offended… him ? Definitely a him from the voice but no way was she looking any lower than his chest, because he didn’t have pants on and she didn’t want to—
    “So, Rosie Bianchi,” Sal finally broke the silence, his heavy New York accent just adding to the weirdness factor, “what can I do for ya?”
    She had her hands out of her pockets before she knew she’d done it. She talked with her hands, couldn’t help it. So she didn’t even have to open her mouth to show Sal what her problem was.
    The poor guy landed on his butt five feet away from where he’d started, a comical look of surprise on his face. Well, at least it would have been comical if this had been a sitcom. Or a cartoon.
    But right now it just made her want to cry. Carefully, she put her hands back in her pockets as Sal shook his head before pushing back up to his feet…ah, hooves.
    She had no idea what to expect. Would he run away screaming? It wasn’t impossible but considering how he looked, he must have seen a lot of weird stuff in his life. Her ability to move things by waving her hands was probably no biggie in his world.
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    Still, she dropped her gaze to the floor, shaking her head. “Sorry. I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean—”
    Clop, clop, clop. Then Sal stood in front of her. He put his hand under her chin, forcing her to look down to him. “Sweetheart, I’m a lot stronger than I look and I’ve been knocked on my ass a few times.” He grinned. “Never by a more beautiful woman though. Come on back.” At that, he turned and clopped down the hallway. “You look like you could use a cup of coffee.”

    While Sal made coffee, Rio watched the four-foot salbinelli glance back and