Salvation

He watched the child in silence, not that he could be heard even if he wanted. If his math was correct, she was three years old now. Stepping into the room and away from the window, he watched her small body shake as she pressed an ear against the door. He couldn’t see her face with the fall of wavy black hair covering it. But he knew the face under her messed hair was round and angelic.

From the other side of the door she was carefully leaning against, he could hear the yelling...again. Her parents spent most of their time screaming at each other and breaking things. He’d sat with the child many times in the last year while the adults in her world showed her all the wrong ways to live.

It worried him that she no longer cried; no longer curled her tiny body into the corner and tried to make herself invisible. At least the quarrelling adults had never brought it to her; he didn’t know if he could stand to see her hurt in any way. He closed his eyes and cursed himself; what could he even do to help if they did?

A loud crash brought him back to the moment; he opened his eyes to see the girl remove her ear from the door. Her face was visible now and it pulled at his heart to see tears rolling down her round cheeks. It made her dark brown eyes seem blurry and vague. She hugged her tiny arms around her middle, trying to comfort herself. A small part of him wanted to take her in his arms and shelter her from the sadness, not that he knew how to hold a child.

She took two steps back from the door but still watching, as if she was afraid it was going to fly open. She sniffled once and raised her face, then looked right at him. Did she actually see him? He was tempted to look behind to see if there was something there that would catch her attention, but he was afraid to look away and go back to being invisible to all.

She blinked and cleared the tears from her eyes yet continued to look right at him. With her chin up she used her sleeve to wipe across her face, then raised her chin with a determination he knew all too well. Her eyes appeared as if they were looking right into his, causing his heart, if he truly still had one, to jolt inside of his body.

Finally, she turned from him, went to the little table in the corner, and sat on the small chair. She opened a book, took colored sticks from a messy carton, and scribbled in angry motions over the outline of the picture in front of her.

Sighing, he closed his eyes. She would be fine. He really did need to stop coming here.

He had tried to stay away, as he knew he should, and had been able to watch from a distance. But the child lay on the bed with her face hidden, shaking and distraught. He didn’t know what he could do, but he liked to believe his presence would be sensed and she would somehow be comforted.

Glancing away from her, he noticed papers crumpled up on the floor. He couldn’t pick them up to look at them, but he could read part of one. “Happy 7th birthday.” She was seven already? Had not only a few months passed since she was that tiny cherub-faced child? He frowned. How had he lost track of four entire years? What did he have to keep track of except time? All he had was time, endless expanses of time.

Shaking his head, he stepped closer to the bed. If only he could offer a calming touch to let her know she wasn’t alone. But in truth, she was; he could hear the screaming outside of the walls of her room, and knew that she was very much alone in this world.

She rolled onto her back, clutching something to her chest. With an angry swipe she wiped across her face and took a long shaky breath. He leaned down to see her better and was surprised to see how she had grown since he last let himself get this close. Gone was the childish softness. In its place, the beginning of a more mature form was now visible. He sighed and stepped back; this small one was going to be a world of trouble for some man in the years to come.

Looking back he found her eyes looking right at him, as only she had ever done. He stepped back in shock. He told himself she was just staring into space and it happened to be in his direction, but her eyes moved over his body in a slow, measured way. If he spoke would she hear him? He clenched his jaw; hadn’t he spent years trying to be heard by others? He wouldn’t waste one more ounce of energy on that ever again.

When she stood up, he almost stepped back again, afraid she’d go right through him and make him feel undetectable. Instead, she stopped in front of him to look up at his face. Inside his head he smiled at her, but the movement did not show on his face. She couldn’t really see him; he must be creating this from years of desire. She turned and walked to a shelf in the corner. He hesitantly took a few steps to follow her.

He was astounded when she turned and motioned to a ship sitting on the top shelf. He looked at her for a moment and then moved his eyes to the ship. He smiled; it was a small model of a galleon. While it looked quite like a real one, very majestic and formed well enough, he frowned. Why would she want him to see that? Why would a young girl of seven even want a scale model ship? He looked back to see she had calmed and wasn’t the distressed child she’d been just moments ago. He noticed the tilt of her chin and recognized that determined glint in her eyes. He smiled at her and hoped by some fanciful miracle that maybe he was partially responsible for this.

So he was a completely spineless man, he thought as he entered her room yet again. He had not lost track of time and knew she was twelve years older now. He had only allowed himself to come this close while she slept over the last few years though, for he was uncertain of what her ability to see him actually meant. She stormed past him, opened her door, and screamed obscenities that he’d only ever heard from older, weathered males. She shocked him, made him wonder whether he should really be here. The door slammed, and he turned to see her take a leap and flounce onto the bed.

She had definitely lost that helpless, angelic look. Her dark eyes turned to him and he had no choice but to stand there and watch her look at him. She bounced off the bed, straight up as if she were pulled by a rope, and walked past him to the shelves along the wall.

He turned slowly. Gone were the childish toys and trinkets. There were no more coloring sticks in this one’s life. His eyes moved over the top of the shelf. She had, over the last several years, added to her galleon, and it now held a detailed frigate and shebec model. If he were the size of a mouse, he could have lived on them, they were that detailed. She had associated him with the ships, and he supposed she was observant to have done so.

With a hesitant movement he raised his eyes away from the ships he’d last seen in their real and true form to look back at her. She smiled at him, or possibly it was a snarl; it wasn’t easy to distinguish, but the point was she could really, truly see him and he was once more left to wonder what it meant. He heard a door slam downstairs and watched her turn quickly to the window.

Stepping closer so he could see, her mother was leaving, and with her was a man. Even though he had never seen this man before, he knew it was the sort of man any woman was better not getting close to.

Hearing her heavy sigh he turned. She had walked back over to the bed and was putting tiny drops with wires attached to them in her ears. He’d noticed most children of her age walked around with wires coming from their ears. Somehow he doubted it was to lessen the sound of cannon fire. He watched her for a moment longer, decided she was well enough for now, and left without further hesitation.

The sound of sob haunted him once again, without intending it, he found himself inside her room. In the last four years he’d managed to stay away, but in an odd moment of weakness, had spent a few brief moments here, just to assure himself she was well enough. The room had undergone enormous change; it now assaulted his senses to be in it. It was a mix of bright and dark, contrasting with each other in ways that it made him dizzy. Gone were the pretty pinks of childhood; in their place was black with blood-red splatters.

He stopped beside the shelf and wanted for one moment to touch the ships. Two more spectacular replicas displayed on the top shelf. A caravel, which, he thought with a smirk, looked as pieced-together in this size as he had always thought they were in the real versions. The man-o-war filled him with longing, just as the real thing had once done. There wasn’t anything that could compete with the force of it, the sheer threat its appearance on the horizon had wrought. Bringing himself from memories of a past long gone, he turned to find her sprawled half on, half off the bed. She was talking low into a phone; yes, he knew what a phone was—now.

“I hope he falls and breaks both of his legs and has to spend the rest of the year hobbling around on crutches! He’s such a loser; I don’t know why I even bothered.” She sniffled.

Pausing, he raised his eyebrows and tried to understand what she talking about. A male was no doubt involved; he was not so long gone that he didn’t recognize the tone that every female adopted when a male had done wrong. What he didn’t understand was the word loser; had there been a race? He shook his head and decided he needed to observe more television in his wanderings. It had been his only way to discover a world outside of his confinement. The only link that let him feel as if he were still part of the human race, not a lonely drifter who felt no peace. Of course, the first time he saw the wondrous thing they called a television, he was intrigued by such a puzzling contraption.

“Yeah, okay, later!”

Turning, he watched her hang up the phone and hop off the bed. He knew his eyes bulged when she stood up and walked over to close the door. He felt like he’d just been broadsided! What was she wearing? He seriously doubted she should even leave the building. Her shoulders were bare, as was her midriff, and his throat practically seized shut when he realized she was no longer a child in any sort of way. She had breasts! When had she gotten those? His eyes traveled down to see bare womanly legs beneath a short skirt. If he actually had such a thing as saliva left in his body, it would have dried right up inside his mouth.

She walked over and touched the man-o-war ship with a feminine hand, and he suddenly felt like an extremely old man. Turning with her hand still on the ship, she looked directly at him, and he froze, not knowing how to react. She was past sixteen years now and more than womanly, but he felt saddened to realize that she had never been allowed much of a childhood.

His eyes traveled the length of her again, noting that she was just a little more than a hand’s span shorter than his own height, but it was her eyes that swallowed him. Her dark hair hung to her shoulders, untamed waves of thick silk. Her deep brown eyes had been highlighted with coloured powders, and the result completely robbed him of air, or would have if he still breathed. A child of this age should not know how to look at a man the way she was looking at him.

He watched without movement as her hand ran over a sketch of a face propped behind the ships, he would swear it was a likeness of his own face—himself in a looking glass, the way he remembered looking. He moved a hand to touch the scar that ran from his temple to cross his cheekbone. The sketch was of him, including the scar. He glanced back at her and had so many questions, but none he would ever ask. She could see him, but how? And why?

Inclining his head to her, he turned to leave before he could change his mind, making a silent vow he would not return again.

~

Miranda got out of her faded, rust-covered car and slammed the door. “Great!” She looked down the dirt road only to kick the tire as she walked to open the hood. “You couldn’t die where there are actual people or traffic, could you? It had to be in this scenic, stupid, middle-of-absolute-nothing spot!” She propped the hood open and leaned on the front of the car, looking in. “Nothing’s smoking, sizzling, or hissing...which means I am so screwed! I can’t even fiddle with anything to make you start again, you stupid piece of—” She took a deep breath and tried to calm down. With a sigh she turned around, feeling defeated. “Okay, Randy, you just need a little reflection time here to come up with a new game plan.” She walked across the shallow ditch, and headed toward a large tree. “No need to stand in the sun and bake your brain while you do.”

Dropping to the ground, she sat with her back against the tree. “This has not been one of my better days.” An orange butterfly fluttered down to sit on the top of some weeds a few feet from the tree. She watched it for a moment. “It started out bad enough. Can you believe he dumped me? I mean, seriously, he was hardly the catch of a lifetime or anything, but to leave me a message, breaking up with me on the phone? That is so low!”

The butterfly’s wings flitted a few times, making her feel as if it were responding to her dilemma. “Apparently, I’m too blunt, and that bothers him.” She snorted and shoved her heavy hair back from her face. “I just tell it like it is. It’s not my fault most people prefer to be lied to.” The butterfly moved to another plant a few feet away.

Randy sighed. “I should have taken that as a sign and just stayed home, called in and played dead, or something... Going in to work in the mood I was in was such a huge mistake.” She beamed at the frantic fluttering from the creature. “But you won’t tell anyone I screwed myself right out of a job, right?” She shrugged. “The job sucked anyway. I should have left there a long time ago. I mean, really, I was hired to work in the art department...which for some silly reason I thought might have something to do with art...but, nooo, was I wrong or what? I spent all my time being the flunky and running this here and that there... I don’t think I was even allowed to contribute to more than a handful of projects the whole time I was there”—she huffed out a breath—“and the boss...what a chauvinistic asshole!”

The butterfly seemed to pause in its movement, and Randy nodded. “Yeah, you’re right. Telling the boss man that I was not his personal gopher was probably not the best way to go about it.” She pulled her knees up and rested her chin on them. “I’m single and unemployed all in one day. Oh, and let’s not forget that stupid piece of crap sitting over there.” She looked at her car on the road. Looking back, she watched the insect flutter up and hover for a moment at her eye level before it flew off in the direction of the car. “Yeah, I better see if it will start...not that I have anywhere to be, but I’d rather sulk at home than in the middle nowhere.” She got up and brushed off her pants.

She tried looking under the hood again. “Maybe you just needed a break, huh?” she said to the car. “I’m going to try to start you now, and if you can just be nice and get me home, I promise I’ll call someone to fix you up.” She patted the car gently before climbing in behind the steering wheel. “Impress me,” she whispered as she turned the key.

Three times she tried and although it made noise like it wanted to start, it didn’t quite seem to have the energy to complete the task. “Well, at least you’re not completely dead. I’ll just give you a few more minutes to get it together.” She got back out of the car and leaned against the side, peering down at the motor. “I should have taken shop in school instead of art,” she mumbled to herself.

Sighing, she closed the hood with a loud bang. She glanced up at the sky to see dark clouds rolling in fast on the breeze, covering the sun. “Oh, that’s just what I need to complete my—” The rain began so quickly she had to close her mouth to stop from swallowing it. It pelted her, soaking her before she could get to the door of her car.

Hopping in quickly, she slammed the door shut and brushed wet hair out of her face. “Perfect!” It was hitting the windshield so hard she couldn’t even see the road. She wiped her wet hands down her drenched pants a few times before she realized it was useless; they weren’t going to dry. “I have seriously pissed off the world today, haven’t I?”

Waving her hands around she tried to dry them before she dug into her purse for her phone. She held it in her hand and squeezed her eyes shut as she opened it. Opening them slowly she almost laughed. No signal. “I’m shocked,” she mumbled without emotion as she tossed the phone over her shoulder into the backseat. The rain ended as fast as it had begun.

Grasping the steering wheel, she slowly lowered her forehead to rest on it. A strange, yet familiar feeling prickled across the back of her neck. She didn’t raise her head, just smiled into the steering wheel. “You could do something to help.”

She lifted her head slowly, afraid to move too fast, and turned to look beside her. She watched the image of the man she’d been seeing for years become clearer. If she focused hard enough, he almost appeared to be real. Many times over the years she thought she was seeing things, possibly ghosts, but it was only ever him.

He gaped at her, his shock more than obvious. “How...you can see me? Truly?”

Randy sat there wanting to reach out and hug him. Hallucinations didn’t talk—did they? His voice was rough and deep, and she’d never been happier to hear someone speak. “I more or less sense you most of the time, but if I focus hard enough I can see you.” She looked at the scar across his left cheek. “You’re very clear today.”

He frowned. “And you can hear me?”

Randy tried not to grin. “I’m answering you, aren’t I?”

“That’s impossible...”

“And yet, here we are talking and being all visible-like.” She looked at him, from his long ebony hair down to his black worn boots. “I have a lot of questions, mostly pertaining to whether I’m sane, but right now...I don’t suppose you know anything about cars?”

Dark eyebrows shot up, he opened his mouth and then closed it for a moment “I have never actually been inside one until this moment.”

“Ah. I figured as much.” She reached around and grasped the key. “If this happens to start, I’ll be driving like a speed demon to get home ASAP, so will you be able to chill right there and come with me or am I gonna watch you poof away again?” Serious pale blue eyes looked over every inch of her face.

“I don’t think I comprehend the meaning of what you just said.” He said it softly, still frowning.

Randy laughed. “Sorry. I want you to come to my house with me, is that possible?”

He opened his mouth then closed it for a moment, a serious look in his eyes. “I am not certain I will remain with your car when it’s moving, but I will come to your home later on if I cannot.”

She bobbed her head a few times, smiling. “Cool.” She let out a quick breath. “Cross your fingers.”

Frowning again he looked down at his hands. “For what purpose?”

Randy chuckled. “Never mind!” She turned the key, it groaned a few times, a bit faster than before. She tromped on the gas and the car roared to life. Without looking beside her, she threw it into drive and slammed her foot on the gas, trying to get home as fast as she could just in case it died again.

“I believe I will meet with you at your home. I do not like being in this thing while it is moving,” he murmured between clenched teeth.

Randy glanced beside her and swore her ghost was slightly green and suffering from motion sickness. “Okay... Hey, what’s your name?” She looked back at the road and gunned the gas pedal again.

Closing his eyes briefly, he opened them again quickly and swallowed. “Jareth Blackwood.” He inclined his head to her. “Until later.”

She glanced over to see him gone already. “Jareth,” Randy whispered. Her ghost had a voice and a name; maybe today wasn’t such a sucky day after all.

Randy hopped into the shower and tried to get warm again and wash the chill from her body. It was just her luck that it would be hotter than a kiln one second and then torrential rain the next. Knowing how things happened in her world, it wouldn’t surprise her if it had only rained on her car and nowhere else in the whole county.

As she lathered up her hair, she smiled. The ghost she’d been seeing for longer than she could remember, had actually spoken to her. Finally. She didn’t know why today, after all the years of waiting, but it seemed to take the sting out of her completely rotten day. She quickly rinsed and turned off the water. She should have asked for a time when he’d said he’d come by “later.” Did he bother with time in his state? She wrapped a towel around her chest and tucked it under her arm, grabbing another one she began to dry her dripping hair.

She stood and looked in the mirror as the steam started to clear. She scattered her fingers through her hair to separate some of the wavy locks, so it wouldn’t dry a complete mess. “What does one wear for a meeting with a ghost?” She shook her head.

Turning, she opened the door and headed toward the stairs; she stopped as she glimpsed him standing on the landing.

Jareth let his eyes travel from her still damp ankles up to where the towel sat high on her thigh. He jerked his eyes to her face then lowered them quickly and looked at the floor near to where he stood. “I am... I apologize for being too early.”

Her lips quirked like she was trying not to smile. “It’s okay.” She placed her hands on her hips and looked at him. “I guess it’s been a few years since you’ve seen an almost naked woman.”

Jareth cleared his throat. “It has,” he said quietly, keeping his eyes on her face. She wore no makeup and was still the most alluring woman he’d ever looked upon. Those round dark eyes seemed to draw him in and make him wish he was still in his true form.

Biting her lip, she studied him for a moment. “Okay, I’ll run and put some clothes on... I’ll be right back.” She didn’t wait until he answered, just turned and quickly ran into her room.

Randy still lived in the same house she’d grown up in. Her mother had left it many years ago, and she liked having it all to herself. She used her old bedroom as a studio, and now slept in what had been her mother’s room. She barely remembered her father. He had left on her seventh birthday.

She stood in front of her closet trying to decide what to put on. Shrugging, she went over and grabbed her favorite worn jeans out of the dresser and pulled them on. Zipping them, she turned and quickly dug around for a tank top or something to wear on the top half. Her arms were already in it when she realized she hadn’t put on a bra. She chuckled. What was she thinking? He was a ghost, not a date.

In her bare feet she jogged back down the stairs and found him still standing at the door. She stopped and smiled at him. “Come in. We can sit in the kitchen or—”

“That would be fine.” He motioned for her to lead.

He followed along behind her and accepted that modern fashions did have many advantages. The curve of her bottom was clear for him to see in her trousers as she walked in front of him. Looking up from it he watched over her head as she led him into a room with a stove.

Randy motioned to the table. “Have a seat; I’m just going to make some tea.” She hesitated and turned to look at him. “I guess you don’t...or can’t...have some?”

Jareth sat in the chair, or at least he made it appear like he was. “It is my fondest wish to taste something again, but no, I cannot.”

She busied herself filling the kettle and putting it on before finally turning around and leaning back against the counter. “You are real, right? I’m not hallucinating? Because I have to tell you, when I was growing up I seriously thought I had just imagined you so I wouldn’t feel so alone.”

He remembered her childhood all too well. “I am real, or I am for you. No one else has ever seen me before.”

“Really? That sucks!” Her brows furrowed in deep thought. “How long have you been like this?” She waved a hand up and down his body.

Jareth heaved a sigh. “I believe, if I’ve kept accurate count, it is close to two hundred and forty-eight years now.”

“Wow!” She shook her head. “So you were alive in...seventeen...” She closed her eyes, trying to calculate.

“The year of seventeen sixty-one was when I last walked on land.”

Randy blew out a breath. “That’s really kind of cool.” She frowned. “Well, maybe not from your point of view, but it’s not every day I get to talk to someone from the eighteenth century.”

He slowly smiled. “I can see how that would be interesting for you.”

The kettle whistled, and as she turned to pour the water, she smiled at him over her shoulder. “So how old are you...or were you? Because I have to tell you, you do not look like you’re over two hundred years old.”

He grinned. “I was thirty-two years when I last drew breath.”

She nodded as she turned around with the cup of tea and set it on the table. She sat right across from him and looked at him for a moment. “What exactly happened?”

Straightening up, he studied her for a moment. “If I were to say I wasn’t completely sure, would you believe me?”

“So...did you die?”

“Not exactly, not yet.”

“Yet?” Her eyes went wide as she said it.

Jareth looked down at his hands. They looked as if they were resting on the table, for her sake, and maybe for his, as well, so he could feel normal for a few moments. “I had a run-in with a...gypsy, I believe you would refer to her as...and she cursed me to live in the in-between for all years to come.”

“That sucks!” She sipped her tea. “So you’re not dead, but you’re not alive, either?”

He nodded once abruptly.

“What did you do to piss her off?”

He smirked at her words. “I refused to tell her where I had hidden some objects.”

“Objects—like treasure?” She grinned.

Chuckling softly, he winked at her. “Treasures to her.”

Randy studied him silently for several moments. Her eyes moved over his billowy cotton shirt and then up to caress the scar on his cheek. “You were a pirate?”

He sent her a blank look. “I was a privateer more than I was a pirate, but I won’t deny it completely.”

“What’s the difference?”

Suppressing a smile, he looked at her; she was being so careful not to offend him with her inquisition. It appealed to him. “Privateering was legally sanctioned during times of war. Pirating was not.”

She beamed at him. “So you were a bad boy?” He gave her a genuine smile and watched as color flushed her cheeks.

“Indeed,” he finally said softly.

“What type of ship did you sail?” She watched his eyes.

“I had a sloop and seventy men who sailed under my command.” He shrugged. “She was a fairly small vessel, compared to the large galleons as such, but she handled well even in the shallowest regions...and if the wind was with us, not many could catch her.”

“You’ll have to see my ship collection then. I have a few sloops.”

A surprised look appeared in his eyes. “Truly?” He paused for a moment. “I could never understand why a child would want to collect such things.”

Randy leaned back. “I don’t know why I started it. The first time I saw one I felt a peace and wanted it more than any other toy my mother could offer.”

He nodded. “I understand that well enough.” He studied her for a moment. “I cannot believe how much you’ve changed over the years.”

Biting her lip for a moment, she squinted at him. “How long have you been lurking in my life?” She frowned. “I can’t remember anything before I was four that involves you.”

Looking down, he had an uncomfortable feeling. “I felt drawn to you the first time I heard you cry...you weren’t much more than a wee infant in your mother’s arms at that point.”

“Really?” She offered him a soft smile. “That’s kind of sweet. You’ve watched me since I was born?”

He felt he should explain. “I tried not to be intrusive.”

She shook her head. “You weren’t, trust me. I know intrusive and it’s not you.”

“Good, then.” He studied her again, trying his hardest not to let his eyes wander down over the tight shirt she wore. There seemed to be more skin showing than not and despite himself he liked it. “How many years are you now? I lose track from time to time.”

“Twenty-six.”

His was shocked that so long had passed. “And yet still unmarried.”

Humour filled her eyes. “This isn’t the seventeen hundreds, Jareth. Women don’t get married when they're children anymore.” She stood up and set her cup in the sink, then turned back to the table.

His gaze was moving over her, without his permission, and if he’d been a real enough man he would have wanted to express how much he appreciated how she looked. His gaze stopped on her belly. She smiled at him. “It’s a belly ring; do you like it?”

Jareth stared at the small stone dangling from her navel and was surprised to find it very arousing. “It is...very appealing to look upon.” He looked back up at her face and clenched his jaw shut when he saw the sensual look she had in her eyes. He stood up and cleared his throat. “I would like very much to see your ship collection.”

Randy took a moment to look at him. His pants, though worn and faded, were tight enough to let her know that a nicely shaped man lay under the cloth. He wore a single faded dark sash around his waist, the fringed ends falling over one hip to mid-thigh. She looked up to the chest she could see in the vee of his shirt. He was nicely shaped everywhere, or so it appeared.

His dark hair rested on his shoulders, and she wished she could touch it, just once to see if it was as thick as it appeared. When her eyes moved over his strong jawline and up to the scar, she once again wished she could touch it lightly with her fingers, for just a moment. His pale blue eyes were the shade of steel when she looked back to them. An unexpected heat moved through her.

Jareth stepped ever slightly closer to her and looked down into her eyes. “I must ask”—his voice was deep and husky—“that you refrain from looking at me so. I may be stuck between, but I can assure you I am still a man inside, Miranda.”

A shiver shot right down her spine at the sound of her name spoken in his deep voice. She swallowed. and fought the urge to step closer to him. “If you weren’t a ghost, I would be strutting around everywhere I could with you, just to make every female who saw us drool.”

He stepped back from her and smiled as he put his hands behind his back. “I thank you for the compliment.” He frowned. “drool is a compliment, is it not?”

She laughed. “Yes, it was.” She turned toward the door. “Come see my ships.”

Jareth mentally scolded himself as he followed her. He hadn’t felt urges like this in...he couldn’t remember when, but he knew it was well over a hundred years ago. And feeling them now, with the only person to see him in close to two hundred and fifty years, wasn’t a good thing.

Having longed for someone to talk to, he wasn’t going to botch it completely by lusting after her. His eyes went to her swaying bottom again, causing him to groan inwardly. Just think of her as that cherub-faced child, he told himself.

He felt better at that thought; until she walked to her shelves and bent over to slide open the pane of glass. Tamping the lust that quickly shot to his groin, he quickly went over to the case to look inside, rather than at the curve of her ass.

“Are any of the sloops I have close to yours?” She leaned on her knees and looked up at him.

Jareth reached his hand in and then remembered he couldn’t touch anything. He pulled it back out, put it behind him, and nodded. “The pale one on the end is quite like my Calico, if it had a few cannons on it.”

Straightening, she smiled. “We’ll have to get some and add them then. Your ship’s name was the Calico?”

He inclined his head. “It was.”

“Named after the notorious pirate John Rackham? Or was there another reason?”

“I was bold in my youth. The most feared pirates to ever sail were captured and hanged at least thirty years before I had my own vessel, but I’d grown on the tales of them and thought it would be a bold move to name my ship after Calico Jack.” He shrugged.

She chuckled. “I probably would have done the same thing.”

“I know you would have,” he said quietly. “I have watched you battle and win over all these years.”

Randy snorted. “And yet I still haven’t gotten very far.” She shook her head. “So what else can I add to this sloop to make it a replica of yours?” She reached into the cabinet and pulled it out carefully, then set it on top of the shelf. She watched his eyes as he looked at it.

He could not stop yearning for his ship.

“Did you have a Jolly Roger? I could make one to match yours.”

Continuing to look at the tiny vessel he answered. “I had two, one to fly when we were doing what we’d been commissioned to do, and one for when we were not.” He longed to touch the small wooden yardarm on the model. “Do you really wish to make it look like my Calico?”

Randy nodded. “Yes.”

Glancing at her briefly, he looked back to study the ship again. “Her name was painted across the back.”

Randy turned the ship to face the wall and looked at it. “I can do that. You’ll just have to tell me how the letters were formed.”

Jareth nodded and looked at her small delicate hands holding the miniature likeness of his ship. “I would like that.” He clasped his hands behind his back once more so he wouldn’t reach out to her.

She set the ship back in its place before she turned to him again. “I still have so many questions to ask...”

He looked down at the floor and then back to her. “I have more than my fair share of time if you want to talk.” He smiled. “As you are the first person I’ve spoken to in all these years, I’m not in a rush to finish our conversation.”

“Good.” She turned toward the door. “Come upstairs and you can look through font styles and tell me which one the name of your ship looked most like.”

Even though he was not certain he knew what a font was, he was more than willing to follow her. He made a point of looking into the rooms as they passed, rather than at her backside.

She had climbed up four steps when she spun around to face him. “Okay, I need to know. Do you have any tattoos? I’ve seen movies and things and the pirates always had tattoos.” She said it quickly as an excited child would.

He moved back down a step, so his face was level with hers. “Yes, I do.” She gave him an excited look.

“Would it be rude to ask to see them?” She clasped her hands in front of her and gave him a wide-eyed look.

“No, I would not find it rude.” He lifted his right arm and began to flip the cuff up. When he’d pulled the sleeve up to his elbow, he turned his arm over to reveal his forearm. From elbow to wrist was a picture etched into his skin: a long, narrow sword blade with a thick, black, jagged line down its length; extending from that line were vines, making it appear as if the sword were attached to his arm.

“Does it have a meaning?” she asked quietly.

Looking down at the image on his arm. “It did once. When I was doing other than privateering, I was known by another name.”

She raised her brows. “Your pirate name?”

He inclined his head as he rolled the sleeve back down. “Yes. I was known as the Black Brand.”

“How did you get that name?”

Securing the cuff in place, he took his time before looking back to her inquisitive eyes. “That is a tale I’d no wish to tell a lady.”

She watched him for a time and then sighed. “Okay.” She offered him a soft smile. “I am far from a lady, but I won’t push.” She bit her lip. “Do you have any more tattoos?”

The eager pitch in her voice made him smile. “I have been amidst those who are not close to lady like...and you are not one of those.” He watched her closely. “I do have one more.” He stood there waiting for her to speak and then realized she wanted to see that one also. He shook his head and turned on the step, putting his back to her. With slow, jerky movements he pulled his shirt free from his pants and bunched it up to pull it over his head. He stood there with his shirt hanging from his wrists, looking over his shoulder waiting for her to speak.

“It’s beautiful,” she whispered. “It’s very detailed for something done that long ago.”

“It hurt like the devil, too; I was very nearly drunk by the time it was finished,” he rasped.

She nodded. “No doubt.” As she looked at the etching done in his skin hundreds of years before, a soft look appeared in her eyes. The tattoo lay from one shoulder to the other and extended down just past his shoulder blades, like wings of a hawk. “It’s beautiful,” she whispered again. “Does it have a meaning?”

“The answer again leans toward my boldness in youth. It matched the pattern on the back of my ship, where her name was. I claimed my ship when I was barely twenty-four, something to boast about at that time... I was a bit of a braggart then.”

She didn’t comment on that statement. “Can I touch it? Are you even touchable? Will I touch skin or nothing at all?”

He sucked in a breath and pulled the shirt back down over his head before he turned. “I tried for years to touch objects, but I was left feeling incomplete when I couldn’t make any contact...” He looked down at his hands.

“I didn’t mean...” she dropped her head to hide her face from him.

“It will run through your mind until you find out, so let’s get it over with.” He tried to sound carefree, but he wasn’t certain he’d achieved it. He pulled his cuff up in one motion to reveal the markings on his arm again.

She looked from his arm to his eyes for a few moments before raising her hand to hover above his arm. “If you don’t want me to...”

“It’s all right,” he whispered softly, then looked down at her hand over his arm. If he had breath to hold, he would have been holding it.

Randy closed the space between her palm and his skin. As it got closer, she knew her hand was going to pass right through his arm. She couldn’t feel warmth or cold as her hand got closer. She stopped millimetres from his skin and looked up. “Do you feel that? It’s like a mild static charge.” She moved her hand slowly, careful to hold it away enough from passing through him. She moved her hand from his elbow back down to his hand before stopping there.

He looked at her hand and then closed his eyes. “It’s like a whisper of the wind touching against me.” He looked back down at her hand. “I’m inclined to try to touch you as well, but just feeling something, however slight after so many years of nothing is overwhelming me.” His eyes rested on hers. “You were going to have me look at something?”

Randy swallowed and dropped her hand back to her side. She nodded and turned to head up the stairs. Without turning to see if he was following, she went into her little studio.