Free The Queen of Swords: A Paranormal Tale of Undying Love by Nina Mason

you want me to turn on a light?”
    “N ay.”
    “Do you fancy a cigarette? They’re not your brand, but—”
    He turned to face her, his hair sheening like pencil on paper. “Aye.” His eyes shone out of the darkness like a wolf’s. “A cigarette would do.”
    Sitting up, she opened the nightstand drawer, flushing as The Rampant Cock winked up at her. Ignoring the book, she fished around for the hard-pack of Marlboro Lights she kept there for emergencies. She started to hunt for her disposable lighter and then remembered she’d used it for the spell. Climbing off the bed, cigarettes in hand, she crossed to the altar, grabbed the lighter and approached him, again feeling the famished fledgling squirming at her core.
    He took a cigarette, but refused the lighter with a wave of his hand. He pressed the filter between his lips with one hand as he plunged the other into the front right pocket of his trousers. The lighter glinted as he pulled it out.
    “How long have you had that?”
    “What?” he asked , the cigarette dangling from his seductive lips. “Oh, the lighter.” A strange expression came over his face as he studied it—a mixture of nostalgia and regret? “A hundred years. Catharine bought it for me. An engagement present.”
    She felt jealousy’s hot lance, but quickly reminded herself there was no cause. She had been Catharine, after all. She studied the lighter as he lit up. It bore an engraving, but she could not make out the tiny, worn inscription.
    “What does it say?”
    He smiled at her, eyes twinkling with mischief. “It doesn’t speak so far as I ken.”
    “Ha -ha.” She pulled a face, but liked his sense of humor. “I meant the engraving, smartass.”
    Something flashed in her mind. A moment in snapshot. Her giving him the lighter in a red box stamped Cartier. Then, she knew. The inscription was in French and read, “I will always love you.”
    The next second, he said the words, sending a chill up her backbone. As the shiver snaked through her, he turned back to the window and looked out at the rain while he smoked. She wanted so badly to go to him, to touch him, to put her arms around him, to feel his arms around her, but she lacked the courage to initiate contact. What if he pushed her away? What if he didn’t? She was equally terrified of both possibilities.
    Lighting a cigarette of her own, she took it to the bed and reclaimed her perch against the pillows and headboard. Her heart panged as her gaze swept over the tarot cards beside her. Was Death the card of her future? Would she end the way Catharine had? Drained of blood and dumped somewhere like a worthless bag of rubbish?
    Swallowing, she dragged her eyes away from the cards and let them roam. The cottage had come furnished, so everything in it but the altar, her magical supplies, and her personal possessions belonged to the university. She straightened her robe and toked her cigarette, suddenly aware of the smallness of the footprint she’d made in this life so far. She taught, but otherwise her existence was insular, singular. His footprint, in contrast, was enormous, making her feel painfully inconsequential.
    “Where would you like me to start? Ab initio or in medias res ?”
    His use of the Latin literary terms for “from the beginning” and “in the midst of things” surprised her, though it probably shouldn’t have. Of course, he ’d know Latin. He’d been a Scottish nobleman in the eighteenth century. He’d have recieved a classical education. He also spoke French and probably Gaelic, given his Highland roots.
    “ Ab initio. ”
    He took a minute to organize his thoughts. “I can’t remember everything. A lot has faded over time. Like a lithograph exposed to too much light. But I will relay what I can.”
    In the silence that followed, s he heard him suck on his cigarette and saw the cloud he exhaled wreath his hair. The connection between them felt like a fraying rope bridge spanning a chasm. She longed