My Naughty Valentine

Gaelic Goddess-4

“Do you like it?” she asked, blushing faintly.

“It’s…very nice.” The words came out in a strangled rasp. “But it’s a little fancy for what I have in mind. Maybe you’d like to wear something a little less…eye-catching?”

Rhiannon lifted her eyebrows, but nodded her acceptance. From the twinkle in her eye, Tom began to suspect she was enjoying the way her presence unsettled him.

All the better, he thought. The less she fears me the happier I am going to be. I won’t be able to handle it if she’s afraid to talk to me, or constantly shying away.

When he looked back, she was dressed much more appropriately, though she was no less beautiful. She wore a plain white t-shirt, cut off just above her waist, with a faded pair of hip-hugging blue jeans which left a tantalizing strip of her stomach and back exposed. As he followed her out the door, trying to pry his eyes from the delightful view of her rear, he sighed to himself.

Well, I suppose the next best thing to going to bed with an Irish goddess is living with one

.

***

He took her to Portillo’s, a Chicago burger chain he loved. Standing in the heat and the noise of the restaurant, people thronging around them, she grasped his hand hard, on the verge of panic.

He gently eased her forward to the head of the line as their turn came to order. “What would you like?” he asked softly.

Her eyes darted from side to side, resting for a moment on the menu, then to his face. “It has been so long,” she said, voice quivering. “Can you help me?”

Idiot! He snarled at himself. Brilliant idea! Take a woman who hasn’t been able to make a choice of her own for fifty years to a restaurant! Moron!

He smiled at her, squeezing her hand in apology, then addressed the server, who was waiting impatiently.

“One double-cheeseburger, American, onions, pickles, lettuce, no tomato, add bacon. One cheeseburger, American with everything. One large fries. One large onion rings. One large chocolate shake. One medium diet Coke.” She nodded and rang up the order. Taking the receipt, he and Rhiannon moved to the side so that the next customer could order.

“Everything’s so…loud here,” she said quietly. Her voice was nervous, almost fearful.

He smiled at her. “That’s why a lot of people like it. You can come here and have a conversation without being worried that everyone is listening to you.”

Her look was pensive. “Privacy in a crowd. Hmm.”

Their order was quickly up, and Tom and Rhiannon wove their way through the tables to a semi-private booth at the back. Rhiannon looked apprehensive as Tom unwrapped the food and tipped the fries and onion rings out onto the tray.

“Here,” he said, handing her a hamburger. “This one is yours.”

She frowned at him. “Why this one and not that one?” she asked, pointing her chin at his double.

“Because your burger has tomatoes on it. And I don’t like tomatoes. And my burger has bacon, because bacon is awesome,” he grinned.

“Well, you could have gotten me bacon on my burger, too,” she scowled.

Good, he thought. She’s starting to stand up for herself. He wasn’t stupid enough to think that decades of abuse could be reversed in hours, days, or even weeks. But the sooner she stopped seeing him as an authority figure and started seeing him as an ally in their mission to break the contract, the happier he would be. The memory of the groveling subservience with which she had greeted him earlier in the day made him cringe.

He sighed theatrically and pulled a couple of strips of bacon off his burger and handed them to her with a deep nod of his head, almost a bow. “Happy now?”

She smiled and lifted the bun to place the bacon on her sandwich. Tentatively, she took a bite, then ate with growing enthusiasm.

“Good, huh?” He took an onion ring and crunched it happily, making a low sound of satisfaction. Rhiannon tried one as well, and wrinkled her nose.

“Too greasy,” she said.

“That's why we have napkins,” he replied, and put one to good use, wiping off his hands and picking up his burger.

By the time they were done, Rhiannon had decided she quite liked onion rings after all, and had eaten all of hers and half of his. Cheerfully grumbling, Tom wiped the last of his fries through a pool of mustard and finished his shake.

“Ready to go home?” he asked.

Rhiannon started, then blinked. “Yes. Definitely.”

By the time they got back to his apartment, it was nearly dark, the late spring day slowly turning towards night.

“I'm going to pop in a movie,” he said. “Would you like to watch with me?”

She smiled. “Before I was captured, I used to love watching the movies your people made. I tried to tell my family about them. About how it was human magic. But they just laughed.”

“You'll have to tell me about them soon,” he said. He popped a DVD into his one luxury, a home theater system with a large-screen high-def TV and surround-sound. As the opening credits of “The Fellowship of the Ring” came up, he dimmed the lights.

Rhiannon was immediately entranced. She asked him soft questions about the movie, and the idyllic images of the Shire made her sigh happily. Soon, however, she was nodding off to sleep. Tom paused the movie and turned the TV off.

“Let's get you ready for bed,” he said quietly. He went into his linen closet and pulled out pillows, sheets, and a heavy afghan that his Grandmother Morris had knitted. Working quickly, he made up a bed for Rhiannon on the sofa.

“I don't care what you say,” Rhiannon said, talking through a deep yawn. “I still think Gandalf was stupid to let Saruman trick him like that.”

“Mmm hmmm,” he murmured. “I'll be going to bed in a little bit as well. If you need to use the bathroom, you'll have to go through my bedroom, but don't worry, I'm a heavy sleeper. And I'll leave a light on so you don't hurt yourself in the dark. Do you need anything else?”

“No, Tom,” she said. She paused, then reached out and held his hand. “Thank you for your care of me.”

He looked at his feet, but could think of nothing to say. Finally he looked up, muttered “Goodnight,” and went into his bedroom.

***

He read for a while, but could not concentrate on his book. His mind constantly turned over the bizarre occurrences of the day.

Twenty-four hours ago all you had to worry about was passing the bar exam, he thought bemusedly. Now you have an immortal Irish goddess sleeping on your couch.

And the contract! How could he break it and free her? As lovely as Rhiannon was, he did not fancy her as a permanent guest. She was too strange. Too odd. It was like going to a pet store to buy a cat and coming home with a leopard.

His mind ran over the clauses of the contract, seeking a escape, some way to render it void.

It has to be in there.

He couldn't see it yet. But I will.

Fuck it. I'm going to sleep.

Making sure the night-light in the bathroom was shining, he turned off his lamp and went to sleep.

***

It was the screams that woke him.

High, shrill, and piercing, they drilled into his head with frantic force. He clawed his way up into consciousness and staggered out into the living room, half-expecting Rhiannon to be fighting off a burglar or r****t.

She was, but only in her mind. Huddled into a naked ball on the couch, the blankets kicked onto the floor, she screamed as if her heart would break, caught in the terrible grip of a nightmare.

“No. No. No! Please, Mick, have mercy. Please! Stop hurting me. I will do whatever you want. Just stop hurting me!”

His heart aching with pity, Tom crouched by the sofa, easing her fisted hands open, speaking softly to her, hoping to reach her through her suffering.

“Wake up, Rhiannon. Wake up. I'm here. I'm here. Mick is dead and gone and buried. You're alive. Wake up. Please, wake up.”

At length, her cries stilled and her eyes fluttered open.

“Tom?” Her voice was as soft and confused as a young child's.

“I'm here. It was a nightmare. He's dead. He can't hurt you any more.”

She shuddered, a deep, bone-wracking spasm, clutching his hands. “By Lugh's Spear! I wish he was alive just so I could have the pleasure of killing him.”

“Do you...do you want to talk about it?”

Her face was solemn as she looked at him. She shook her head. “Let me forget. And have it be forgotten. There are some things you do not need to know, young one.” She reached an arm down to pull her blanket off the floor, exposing her chest.

Tom looked at her and gasped in shock. He rocked back on his heels, the blood draining out of his face, leaving him light-headed with horror.

Seen nude, Rhiannon looked like an anatomically incorrect doll. Her gorgeous breasts had no n*****s. Instead, a smooth expanse of barren flesh covered her mounds. Her pubic area was similarly disfigured. In the area where a human woman's labia was, instead there was only the smallest hole, suitable only for excretion.

Eyes blank with dismay, he looked at Rhiannon. She smiled bitterly.

“A gift of your grandfather. Even in death I cannot escape him.

“He was determined that I would never find any joy from our relationship. Or even from myself. So he ordered me to change my body. I was forced to emasculate myself. To take away the parts of a woman's body that I could use for my own pleasure. My n*****s. My nether lips.” She blushed. “My woman's bud.

“Only when he ordered was I allowed to have them. And that was seldom. Most-times, he would simply order me to please him with my mouth. Or he would take me from the rear, causing as much pain as he could, then leave.”

Tom's eyes swam with tears, dripping onto her hands as he held them.

“I was an object. A receptacle. Something that could be used to slake his lusts, but would never be able to find pleasure in return.”

“God damn the man. Damn him to hell. Damn him for eternity,” Tom whispered, loathing the very blood that he shared.

“He made you do this to yourself?”

She nodded.

A sudden, fierce joy swept through him. “Then I can undo it?”

“Yes, Tom, you can.”

“How?”

“You order me to. Or ask, if you are feeling polite.” Her lips quivered uncertainly.

Tom took a deep breath. “Rhiannon, I ask that you return your body to the form that most pleases you.”

Rhiannon's head snapped back and she gave a low moan. She stumbled unsteadily to her feet, hunched around her middle, bracing one hand on the arm of the couch. As he looked on, wide-eyed, a golden glow began to form around her body, centered on her breasts and her groin. He was forced to turn away, his eyes spouting tears, the light too bright to face.

Rhiannon gave a sudden shout, piercing and clear, and with a last flash, quick as a bolt of lightning, the light went out, leaving them again in the dim light of his living room. Blinking, Tom turned to look at Rhiannon.

She was standing by the sofa, a look of astonished wonder on her face. In her hands, she cupped her breasts. But they were not the blank, featureless orbs of only a few moments ago, as incapable of supporting life as a stone. Instead, they were now capped by pale n*****s, the flesh the delicate pink of coral.