Chapter Three
As Natalie gathered up her cards and stowed them away, she could feel Patrick's eyes on her, or rather on her hands.
"You are very good at that," he observed. "Did you ever deal cards for a casino?"
"Not me," she said with a slight grin. "I really don't have much of a poker face, even if I have the hands for it. Is that your way of getting me to open up about what I did before you found me trying to tell fortunes for money?"
"I'll admit that the thought had crossed my mind," he said easily. "While it's interesting to imagine you selling fortunes since you were small until you turned, what, eighteen now? I prefer to think you had a luckier life."
"Eighteen?" she said with a laugh. "Seriously? I'm twenty-four."
He raised an eyebrow at her, and the look that he gave her this time was more considering, heavier and weighted with a kind of sensuality that made her heart beat a little faster.
"Twenty-four? You're doing quite well then. Is talking about your age the way you want to distract me from talking about what you did before this?"
"I don't know, can you come up with a better distraction?" she said, her eyes dancing.
The moment the words were out of her mouth, Patrick reached across the table to close her hand inside his larger one. The electricity that had leaped between them — which she thought that she had only imagined — came back to shock her, and suddenly she couldn't take her eyes off of his mouth.
Patrick had the blunt and handsome features she had seen on so many of the men in Dublin. She had heard his looks, black hair and bright blue eyes, called ‘black Irish’ before, but there was an almost distressing sensuality to his mouth that she knew would trouble her when she slept that night. Just looking at this man's gorgeous mouth made her swallow hard, and she knew that a red blush was creeping up from her collar.
"If you want to be distracted," he said in a voice that was nearly a growl, "I think that can be arranged. I could keep you quite distracted for quite some time if you wish."
Natalie was so entranced by the words coming out of his mouth and the way he spoke, like woodsmoke and velvet, that she nearly leaned in. In that moment, she wanted nothing more than to touch him as he had touched her, to see what that strong jawline would feel like under her hand. She imagined him butting his head against her hand like some big cat. Would he purr if she stroked his hair?
Then she realized what she was doing and pulled back from him, sitting up very straight in her chair. This was utter madness. She didn't know him from Adam, even if he had saved her from a pair of chavs, and even if he had paid for one of the best meals she’d eaten in what felt like forever. Pulling away broke the spell, or at least, it gave her the strength to resist it a little. She had an idea that touching his hair was going to be one of those temptations that didn't go away until she gave into it, and even then it might linger.
"Honestly, I'm not trying to distract you from anything," she said. "I have... let's say a very boring story. Yes, that's probably the best word for it."
He raised his eyebrow, obviously not content to be fobbed off with that, and she shrugged.
"Honestly, it's nothing interesting. I came to Ireland to follow a man I thought I loved, turned out that he didn't love me back. A few mean-spirited things were said during our breakup, and instead of going back to my life in the States, I decided that I was going to see what Europe had to offer.
"I'll admit, it probably sounds ridiculous. I'm flying through Europe on a wing and a prayer, and about the only safety-net that I have is the fact that I am not going to spend my ticket money back to the United States. A lot of the hostels I have been to have been wonderful, however, and I think that I'm getting along well."
To her surprise, Patrick didn't simply nod in understanding and change the subject. She had found that by and large, nothing bored people like talking about her travels. Unlike the others, however, Patrick frowned and leaned in slightly.
"So, this is your plan? You are just going to hop from moment to moment until you can't any longer?"
She blinked at him, startled at the disapproving tone in his voice.
"How old are you anyway?" she said jokingly. "You're certainly not old enough to be talking like that already, are you?"
He offered a thin smile.
"I'm thirty-four, which makes me older than you and in a good place to give you advice. And right now, my advice is that you should stop doing what you're doing and make your way home."
Natalie usually liked to think of herself as a rather understanding human being, but Patrick's officious tone made her feel very stubborn indeed.
"Really. You really think that."
"I do," he said gravely. Seriously, did he really think that she was going to follow his orders? "After all, you were nearly kidnapped off the street today, and clearly you are out of money..."
"Ah, but I was rescued by a kind and dashing stranger, and then I sold a tarot reading in exchange for an amazing dinner," she said with a grin. "I think things are taking a turn for the better, don’t you?"
Instead of smiling at Natalie's joke, he scowled instead.
"You really can't think that will keep up, can you?" he asked disapprovingly. "Your luck, no matter how good it is, is not going to hold out forever. You are going to find yourself in a much worst situation than you were in today, and there might not be someone to bail you out."
"Then I will figure it out for myself," she said firmly. "That's part of what this is all about. This is something that I am doing for myself. I don't want to back down just because things are hard, and I don't want to run away just because I’m scared."
Patrick shook his head, but she thought that there may have been a glint of respect in his eyes that he would never own up to.
'This is pure craziness," he growled. "What will your parents think?"
"Dad's out of the picture and mom's dead," she said bluntly, and when he looked startled and regretful, she amended it. "Don't worry about it. Dad took off when I was born, and Mom died when I was about fifteen or so. It sucks, but I've definitely had time to deal."
"Then you are all alone in the world."
"Yes," she said, "but I'm not the only one who is. I don't let it bother me."
"It bothers me, sometimes," Patrick said bluntly. "I lost my parents in a car accident when I was twelve. The lack is still there."
There was something about his blunt declaration that made her shiver inside, that made her want to reach for him.
"I'm sorry," she said instead, and he gave her a rueful half-smile.
"And I am sorry for your misfortune as well, but the point stands. There is a life waiting for you in the United States, and what you have here is tarot cards and a lucky dinner."
Natalie grinned at Patrick, undaunted by his grim words.
"Look, I can see that you're big on the idea of responsibility and stability. I mean, the cards would have told me that even if nothing else had."
Patrick snorted.
"Or you might have spent a few minutes with me," he said, and she nodded.
"But honestly? The world's a rough place sometimes. Tarot cards and dinner? That's not bad at all. I could be doing a lot worse."
She looked him right in the eye, and she could feel a shiver go up her spine again at how blue his gaze was, how coldly clear and direct. It was something that might have frightened her in another situation, that might have made her nervous or afraid. However, there was something about this man that told her she would not be afraid of him, not now and not ever.
"You kept worse from happening to me," she said softly. "Thank you."
This time, Patrick was the first to look away. She knew that he couldn't deny it by saying that anyone would have done the same. That was patently untrue. However, she could tell that he didn't want to let the matter lie.
"You mentioned a hostel. Is that where you are going tonight?"
She cringed and shook her head.
"To be honest, I was chasing the last reading that would have given me enough cash to get into the hostel," she admitted. "I'm a little short for the hostel I had in mind, and they're pretty strict on only letting you in if you have enough cash."
He looked confused.
"Do you seriously not have enough money to stay at a damned hostel?"
Natalie found herself unable to repress a slight laugh at his expense; he just looked so surprised, so shocked.
"Do you seriously not know anyone who doesn't have any money?" she returned, and Patrick looked at her chagrined.
"I'll admit, most of the people I know do not spend any time in hostels at all."
"They should, it's good for them. It gets you out of your rut, meeting new and interesting people."
"And occasionally getting mugged or kidnapped by them," he retorted. "There's always that. But getting back to the question I was actually asking... Do you have a place to stay tonight?"
Natalie shrugged with a nonchalance she did not necessarily feel.
"It's a fairly warm night. I can nap at the bus station for a bit in the wee hours. Other than that, I might just walk, see a bit of your city by night. There's something beautiful about a sleeping city. The lights are dimmed, the sky turns this wonderfully orange purple shade, and..."
"...And you might run into the same damned thugs who tried to make off with you earlier," Patrick said with disgust. "Absolutely not. I forbid it."
At that, Natalie laughed out loud, drawing glances from some of the other diners. When she had recovered, she looked at him, a slight smile on her face.
"And how do you think you are going to enforce even a small part of that? What makes you think that you have the right to decide where I can sleep and where I can't? Last I checked, you're not a parent or a guardian, and I am too old for that by far."
He ran a distracted hand over his hair. He had very nice fingers, Natalie thought absently.
"The way you are acting, I am not sure that you are too old to be turned over someone's knee and given one hell of a spanking," he retorted. "You can't think to simply walk around the city getting a bit of sleep here and there like some kind of vagrant—"
"You really think I'm new at this?" she cut him off, beginning to get a little steamed. "You really think that I'm some kind of child who can't take care of herself?"
"You tell me," he said, sounding just as exasperated as she felt. "You're the one who needed a rescue earlier today."
She could feel herself getting a bit hot under the collar, and it was getting a little harder to remember that this man had after all, saved her.
"Let me tell you something true," she said. "No fees, no fortunes, no cards, this is a present, just for you, because I like you. You and so many other men seem to think that if a woman plays her cards right, if she just sticks to well-lit streets and walks in groups and never ever takes any risks at all that she will be safe from all the bad things that happen. You think that all crimes and dangers are preventable, and that only little fools get mugged or kidnapped.
"However, the truth is that it doesn't matter how careful you are, or how smart or strong or prepared. You may have reduced the chances of something awful happening to you but you'll never put it away entirely."
"So by your logic, you should take all the bad risks you like, sleep rough at a damned bus station, wander the world, because there's a chance bad things would have happened to you anyway?"
At this point, Natalie could feel her patience running out. She glared at Patrick, and handsome or not, chemistry or not, the man was a jerk.
"Are you honestly telling me that you would tell a man to stay home and to never take any risks at all? That his television in his living room is just as good as the world that he lives in? That he should just be content to live a small life when there's so much the world has to offer?
"Ever since I started this experience, started all this travel, it's been amazing. I have seen so many people and so many wonderful things. It's true, tonight was a little rough. What happens tonight, I don't know. Maybe I'll find one more person interested in a reading tonight. Maybe I'll spend sometime sleeping at the bus station and wake up knowing exactly what I am going to do with the rest of my life. Who knows?
"The important thing is that I will be living my life and that when the time comes, I will have far less regret than I would if I had stayed right where I was put."
Patrick looked as if she had sprouted another head, and Natalie knew that it was time to be off. Sometimes, people could not communicate with one another, and the differences could be brutal. She learned long ago not to butt her head against granite walls, and now she was suspecting that Patrick was a granite wall.
"Thank you for dinner," she said, standing up. "It was delicious. And thank you for the rescue, because I truly am grateful. You're... well, you're amazing, and I hope you know that."
She slipped away from the table before he could say anything, and when he called after her, she kept walking.
***
Natalie had barely made it down the block when a hard hand looped through her elbow. She realized that she was still quite tense from the attack earlier because she swung around as if she were on a pivot, her free hand coming up in a hard fist with all the weight of her body behind it.
"Great God, woman!"
Patrick let go of her arm, barely dodging her fist. She stared at him because she had genuinely expected him to stay at the restaurant.
"What are you doing here?" she blurted out, and he shook his head.
"You truly are maddening, you know that?" he asked. "I think I gave the waitress the price of dinner as a tip. You wouldn't stop, and I just threw down the cash on my way out."
She grinned at him, almost against her will.
"Well, I have to say that you probably made her night. I bet you are not even going to go back to try to reclaim it."
He glared at her.
"Do I look so very miserly?" he asked. "What... why are we talking about this?"
"Well, I'm not sure what else you want to talk about," she said practically. "Unless you want another fortune read."
He glared at her, and Natalie hid a smile behind her hand. She had never really thought of herself as a playful person, but there was something so much fun about teasing this man, so much fun about watching his fine dark brows draw together in irritation.
"You are a girl who likes to play a dangerous game," he growled, and maybe he was right at that.
"And what business is it of yours?" she asked politely.
Natalie watched in fascination as a number of conflicting emotions ran across his face. There was definitely some irritation, that was easy to see. However, she wondered if she saw some concern, some consternation, and some worry as well. It was so strange to see those emotions from a stranger that she was tempted to believe that she had just imagined them.
"It's my business because I saved you just a short while ago," he said bluntly. "And now it looks to me as if you are going to trip off and undo all of my hard work."
She paused, because he had helped her. Natalie was not so foolish as to think that she would have been anything close to fine without him, and that did mean something to her.
"So what do you want me to do?" she asked, her voice gentler than her words might have implied. "Do you want me to change the course of my life just on your say-so, Patrick?"
He blinked at a little at her use of his name. There was a part of Natalie that liked saying it very much, but she thought that it would likely be a good idea to ignore that for a while, if not forever.
"No," he said, and when he spoke again, there was something soft about it, something almost hesitant. "I want you to have a place to sleep tonight," he said quietly. "I don't want you in a hostel where God knows who could be lurking behind a door, where you don't even have a bedroom of your own. I just want you safe. I don't want to think of anything bad happening to you."
Almost blindly, he reached out to touch her hand, and in her surprise, she allowed it. His touch was warm, almost beseeching, and with an uneasy feeling, Natalie realized that there was quite a lot she might be willing to do for this man if he only asked her.
"What do you want me to do?" she asked, and a little of her frustration came out at that. "It really doesn't matter all that much what you thought of my past choices. I can't reach back in time and undo them, no matter what you seem to think I should feel."
He opened his mouth to speak but stopped himself and shook his head, and she wondered what he had been planning to say. He drew a breath and started again. "Come back to my place with me," he said quietly. "Please. Nothing inappropriate. Nothing crude or lewd at all, I promise. I just want you to have a place to stay for the night. Tomorrow morning... well, perhaps just this once we can let tomorrow morning take care of itself."
Natalie studied him closely.
"You're not used to flying without a plan, are you?" she asked softly. "You like to know exactly what is going on no matter what, no matter what kind of situation is at hand."
He smiled at her, his hands shoved deep into the pockets of his trousers.
"You have no idea," he said gravely, and for some reason that made her smile.
"All right," she said, relenting. "We'll do things your way. I'll sleep on your couch tonight."
"And tomorrow we shall see what it brings."