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I refused to be charmed by the accent and the casual endeares at the lake?"

"I do not"

He continued to stare at the trees as if searching for soht to mind a better question - just in case he&039;d taken et loose?"

"I do not keep a wolf They&039;re troublesoood show animals They&039;re too independent to train, and they spook the hell out of the horses"

"You see one"

At last he stopped staring at the trees "I&039;ood and which are bad is what I do"

"I thought there were no good or bad anihter but didn&039;t elaborate

"Who was that you were talking to?" he asked

"Balthazar Monahan Owns the local newspaper He&039;ll want to talk to you"

"He can hatever he likes; that doesn&039;t ettin&039; it We prefer obscurity"

I eyed his fla from one ear "I can see that"

His full lips curved "This costuet any business without publicity?"

"We&039;ve never lacked for work We choose when and where we perfor to Like your Full Moon Festival"

Which explained why he&039;d contacted Joyce Must be nice to pick and choose when and where and howhis ht of the ain like bottomless black pools I took an involuntary step back and the reflection shifted,his eyes just brown once more

"I&039;ll walk you home," he said

"Not necessary I live - " I broke off Did I really want him to knohere I lived?

"Do you think I don&039;t already know?"

Had he read " He headed up the hill "You shouldn&039;t be out alone at night"

I fell into step beside him "This is Lake Bluff"

"You believe you&039;re safe here?"

I did Or at least I had Safety had been one of the main attractions when I&039;d said yes toanother

"Do you do double duty as an animal trainer and a fortune-teller?" I asked

"Only our woht Or so they&039;d like us to believe"

We turned the corner, and my house rose up in front of us Tall, stately, in the dark with the gibbous ine it haunted I shuddered

"Cold?" Cartwright murmured

I stared at his back He hadn&039;t even been looking at me when I&039;d shivered I must have made a brrr sound and not been aware of it

"I&039;ate open with a polite dip of his head "I&039;ll be sayin&039; good night then"

"Since when are Gypsies Irish?" I blurted

His teeth flashed "Been waitin&039; all day to askI&039; of you at all until you appeared out of nowhere"

Liar I&039;d thought of him on and off since I&039;dof his smile said he knew I&039;d lied, and he liked it I suppose lying was an admirable trait to a Gypsy

I rubbedabout Gypsies beyond what I&039;d seen in the movies and on television

"We are known as the Roht said "The term &039;Gypsy&039; caypt"

"You didn&039;t?"

"India, they say, though no one really knows for certain"

"How did you end up in Ireland?"

"I lived in Ireland all o When we left our hoary, England, Scotland, and Ireland"

"What about Romania?"

"That would be the Ludar"

"Not Gypsies?"

"We prefer the name Rolish are called Roarians, the Vlax"

"Are those tribes?"

"In a way We were one once, but centuries of separation changed us"

I found myself fascinated by the inforo inside, although the only things waiting for me there were my television and an ancient calico cat I&039;d rather learn more about Gypsies

"What are the Irish Gypsies called?"

"Travelers" The gaze he turned on my house was oddly wistful "We do not like to stay in one place very long"

Grace would say that was because they were running fro to hide But maybe they just liked to see the world It wasn&039;t a crime

The sharp yip-yahoooo of a coyote to the as answered by several e of sound died away

"That wasn&039;t a wolf," Cartwright murmured, "but a coyote"

"I&039;ve listened to a hundred coyotes sing to these hills What I heard earlier was nothing I&039;d ever heard before"

"It could not have been a wolf," he insisted "Wolves don&039;t tolerate coyotes in their territory Where you find one, you will not find the other" The coyotes began to yip again, much closer than before "If there was a wolf anywhere near here, all the coyotes would flee"

"How do you know so much about them?" I repeated

His smile was lazy, sexy, and when he reached out, I started so badly I banged my elbow on the fence

But all he did was take lanced into ht

"I know so s, Mayor Kennedy," he whispered, and put his ainst me once more

This time I felt the scrape of his teeth, the pull of his lips, the flick of his tongue, and a bolt of awareness ran the length of le in places that hadn&039;t tingled in a very long time