She wouldn't be expecting him, not so early in any case. But since Darcy was being so cooperative, Aidan had taken off a couple of hours before closing to walk the road to Jude's cottage.

The night was balmy with the breeze from the sea. Clouds sailed briskly over the sky so that patches of stars winked out, glimmered, then vanished. The moon was round and fat, its light gentle.

A fine night, Aidan thought, for romancing the woman you intended to marry.

He'd brought her a clutch of fairy roses in delicate pink that he'd stolen from Kathy Duffy's garden. He didn't think the woman would mind the loss when it was going to such a good cause.

There were lights glowing in her windows, a warm and welcome sight to him. He imagined that in years to come, when they were married and settled, it would be the same. He'd walk home after work and she'd be waiting with the lights burning to guide his step. It no longer surprised him how much he wanted that, or how clearly he could see it all. Night following night, year following year, toward a lifetime.

He didn't knock. Such formalities had already slipped away between them. He noted that she'd already tidied from the party. It was so like her, he thought with affection. Everything was neat and orderly and just as it should be.

He heard music drifting down the stairs and walked up toward it.

She was in her little office with the radio playing soft and the pup snoring at her feet under the table. Her hair was bound back, her fingers moving briskly over computer keys.

He had an urge to scoop her into his arms and gobble her whole. But he didn't think that was the right move under the circ.u.mstances.

Persuasion, he reminded himself, didn't come from the fast and the hot, but the slow and the warm.

He crossed to her, moving quietly, then bent down to brush a soft kiss on the nape of her neck.

She jolted, but he'd antic.i.p.ated that and, chuckling, wrapped his arms around her so the flowers were under her chin and his mouth was at her ear.

"You look so pretty sitting here, a ghra, working away into the night. What tale are you spinning out?"

"Oh, I-" Her heart was in her throat. He was right that she hadn't expected him. Not just so early, but at all. She knew she'd been abrupt and rude, and even cold, and had convinced herself that what had been between them was done. She'd even begun to mourn for it.

Yet here he was, bringing her flowers and speaking softly in her ear.

"It's, ah, the story of the pooka and Paddy McNee that

Mr. Riley told me. These are lovely, Aidan." Since she was far from ready for anyone to see her work, she tipped the top of the computer down, then sniffed the roses.

"I'm glad you like them as they're stolen goods and the garda may come by at any moment to arrest me."

"I'll pay your bail." She turned in the chair to look at him. He wasn't angry, she noted with puzzled relief. A man couldn't smile like that if he was angry. "I'll go put them in water, and make you some tea."

When she rose the pup turned over with a grumble and a groan and recurled himself.

"As a guard dog he's a pure failure," Aidan commented.

"He's just a baby." She took the flowers as they walked downstairs. "And I've nothing to guard anyway."

It was such a pleasure to slide back into routine, the friendliness and flirtation. Part of her wanted to bring up what happened the night before, but she tucked it away. Why mention something that put them at odds?

He was probably regretting that he'd asked her, and relieved that she'd said no. For some reason that line of thinking had that dark, nasty brew bubbling inside her again. She ordered herself to settle down and tucked the pink roses into a pale blue bottle.

As she did, she noticed the time and frowned. "It's barely ten o'clock. Did you close the pub?"

"No, I took a couple hours. I'm ent.i.tled now and then. And I missed you," he added, laying his hands on her waist. "For you didn't come see me."

"I was working." / didn't think you'd want to see me. Weren't we angry with each other? she wondered even as he bent down to brush his lips over hers.

"And I've interrupted. But since that deed is done-" He drew back. "Come walking with me, won't you, Jude Frances?"

"Walking? Now?"

"Aye." He was already circling her toward the back door. "A lovely night it is for walking."

"It's dark," she said, but she was out the door.

"There's light. Moon and stars. The best kind of light. I'll tell you a story of the faerie queen who only came out from her palace at night, when there was a moon to guide her steps. For even faeries can have spells cast on them, and hers was that she was cursed to take the form of a white bird during the day."

As they walked, her hand linked with his, he spun it out for her, painting the picture of the lonely queen wandering by night and the black wolf she found wounded at the base of the cliffs.

"He had eyes of emerald green that watched her warily, but her heart couldn't resist and overcame any fear. She tended to him, using her art and her skill to heal his hurts. From that night he became her companion, walking the hills and the rock with her night after night until as dawn shimmered over the sea she left him with a flutter of white wings and a sorrowful call that came from her broken heart."

"Was there no way to break the spell?"

"Oh, there's always a way, isn't there?" He lifted their joined hands to his lips, kissed her knuckles, then drew her along toward the cliff path where the sea began to roar and the wind fly.

Moonlight splattered on the high, wild gra.s.s, and the path cut between it, turned pebbles into silver coins and weathered stone into hunched elves. She let Aidan guide her up while she waited for him to start the story again.

"One morning, a young man was hunting in the fields, for he was hungry and had no more than his quiver of arrows and his bow to feed him. Game had been scarce for many days, and that day, as others, the rabbits and deer eluded him until it came to afternoon and his hunger was great. It was then he saw the white bird soaring, and thinking only of his belly, he notched his arrow in his bow, loosed the arrow, and brought her down. Mind your step here, darling. That's the way."

"But he can't have killed her."

"I've not finished yet, have I?" He turned to pull her up. Then he held her there a moment, just held her as she fit so well against him.

"She let out a cry, filled with pain and despair that ripped at his heart even as his head reeled from lack of food. He raced to her, and found her watching him with eyes blue as a lake. His hands trembled, as they were eyes he knew, and he began to understand."

Turning Jude, tucking her under his arm, he began to walk again under the splattering light of star and moon. "Though he was half starved, he did what he could to heal the wound he'd made and took the bird to the shelter of these cliffs. And building a fire to warm her, he sat guarding her and waited for sunset."

When they reached the top, Aidan slipped an arm around her so they could look out at the dark sea together. Water rolled in, then back, then in again, a rhythm constant, primitive, s.e.xual.

And understanding that Aidan's stories had their rhythm too, Jude lifted a hand to cover his. "What happened next?"

"What happened was this. As the sun dipped, and night reached out for day, she began to change, as did he. So woman became bird and man wolf, and for one instant they reached for each other. But hand pa.s.sed through hand, and the change was complete. So it went through the night, with her too feverish and weak to heal herself. And the wolf never left her side, but stayed to warm her with his body and guard her with his life if need be. Are you cold?" he asked, as she shivered.

"No," she whispered. "Touched."

"There's more yet. Night pa.s.sed into day again, and again day into night, and each time they had only that instant to reach for each other and be denied. He never left her side to eat, as man or as wolf, and so was near to dying himself. Sensing it, she used what power she had left to strengthen him, to save him rather than herself. For the love she felt for him meant more than her life. Once again dawn shimmered in the sky, and the change began. Once again they reached for each other, knowing it was hopeless, and her knowing she would never see another sunrise. But this time, the sacrifice they'd both made was rewarded. Hands met, fingers clasped, and they looked on each other, finally, man to woman, woman to man. And the first words they spoke were of love."

"Happy-ever-after?''

"Better. He who had been a king in his own right of a far-off land took his faerie queen to wife. Never did they spend a single sunset or a single sunrise apart for the rest of their days."