Cuckoo in the Coven

Just then Cullen approached Ben and put out his hand, then withdrew it and offered a high-five instead, as he’d been taught by Eben. Her brother returned it, and Cullen said “down low.”

Again Ben returned the greeting, and Sunny breathed a bit easier. Cullen looked over Ben’s graffiti-print hoodie and baggy pants with a humor-filled expression, but didn’t comment.

“Wow,” Ben declared right at that moment, grabbing Cullen’s sword off the mantelpiece. “Cool.”

Sunny winced.

Celeste chuckled.

Cullen strode over to where the teenage lad was experimentally waving the sword about like a light saber. “Cool? Well, I suppose ‘tis cool to the touch, but it’ll warm in your hands soon enough.”

Ben squawked. “He’s funny.”

“Funny, and very macho,” her mother whispered approvingly, lifting her wine glass in Cullen’s direction and winking at the other two women.

Macho? Sunny blushed furiously. What was worse, the fact her mother had never approved of her boyfriends, or the fact she described the one from 1820 as if he were some 1970s beefcake? The travesty. Well it could be worse, she supposed—at least her mother seemed to approve, that was a first. And he did look gorgeous in snug blue jeans and a classic white shirt.

“I say,” her father declared when he saw the sword. He abandoned his scrutiny of the plasterwork on the ceiling and joined the scrutiny of the weapon. “Are you into re-enactment?”

Cullen glanced in her direction, eyebrows lifted.

And she’d thought she had prepared him for every possible conversation topic. “It’s an heirloom,” she blurted.

“Oh, how lovely, a man with heirlooms,” her mother murmured.

“Oh, he’s got heirlooms like you wouldn’t believe,” Sunny responded, wondering why she’d even bothered trying to prepare him. He seemed to be coping fine– unlike her—and was demonstrating sword moves to Ben and her father, both of whom were enthralled, as was her mother, who was watching with starry eyes.

Celeste patted Sunny on the arm. “I think he’s dealing with things very well,” she whispered, and then winked.

“You haven’t told us how you met Cullen,” her mother said, joining them.

Celeste looked at Sunny.

Sunny looked at Celeste.

Sunny drew in a deep breath. “Well, he was traveling through...the area, and we um, met when he called at the cottage...because he needed directions.” She was so bad at fibbing. Had she got away with it by mangling the truth?

“Some girls have all the luck,” Celeste chipped in, smiling cheerfully at Sunny’s mother.

“They certainly do,” her mother replied. “I’m pleased for you, my dear. At least something good has come of you burying yourself down here in the sticks.”

Glancing at the clock, Sunny realized she could get on with serving up lunch. The distraction would help.

“Cullen, could you carve for me?” They’d prepared for this one. “The carving knife is just over there in the Welsh dresser.” He loved technical gadgets and had taken to the electric carving knife as one might expect a swordsman might.

He nodded over at her and stepped sideways to the dresser, reaching for the drawer and grappling about, the sword still in his other hand while he talked his eager audience through a complicated fencing move.

“Oh dear,” Celeste said, her hand covering her face as Cullen looked at the object in his hand and then took in the changing expressions on the faces of his audience.

Sunny stared in disbelief, her jaw dropping.

Cullen glanced again at the silver dream-machine vibrator he was holding in his hand. “Hellfire,” he said, “that’s not the thing you taught me to use the other day, is it?”

There was a moment’s silence, then Ben sniggered, and Celeste chuckled. Sunny swallowed hard. How could this have happened? Then she remembered the stuff she shoved in the drawer. Bedroom stuff. Cullen’s confused expression remained. Her heart went out to him, even though he had no clue what he was holding. Her mum and dad both turned their astonished faces toward her to see what she would say.

“He’s got such a sense of humor,” she announced, fixing a smile on her face and marching over to extract the object from his hand. “Wrong gadget, lover,” she whispered.

“Oh, so what does that one do?” He looked at the shiny surface and the on-off switch with interest as it was snatched from his hand and shoved back into the drawer.