Pink Princess Fairytini (Fairy Files #2) (19 page)

“Please tell me you didn’t kill anyone,” I said.

“I should have,” she said with a scowl. “But I just punctuated my point. Get in the car. We’ll follow.”

Frost and I hopped into the car, Frost in the driver’s seat, as Sandra’s family, looking a bit like cartoon caricatures of rednecks, burst onto the porch. An old woman and five obese, mean-looking men. “We know where you’re going and we’ll find you,” the old woman, owner of the raspy voice, shouted. Frost gunned the engine, and we sped off into the night.

“They’ve never worked for a damn thing in their lives,” Sandra said over breakfast at a diner where we stopped four hours later. “They won’t make the effort to come find me.”

Frost, his eyes sleepy after letting me drive and getting in a nap, took a sip of his coffee, only to choke and spray it all over the table. He narrowed his eyes at me, but I gave him my most innocent face, as though I hadn’t slipped salt into his coffee when he’d gone to the bathroom.

“I know it was you,” he said, a growl in his voice.

“But you can’t prove it,” I said. “Hence, it being an effective prank.”

He shook his head, got up, and ordered another cup of coffee from the waitress at the counter.

“Sorry, about Frost,” I said. “He’s picky about his coffee.” Since both Sandra and Brace had seen me dump salt in his coffee, she chuckled. “You were saying we should be safe from your crazy family?”

“I don’t know,” Brace said, his eyelids at half-mast, the food falling off his fork half-way to his mouth. The poor guy had worked all night and then had to go on the run. He had to be dog-tired, but he hadn’t complained, at least not to me. “They might make the effort to track you down if it means they can avoid getting jobs.”

Sandra shook her head, drumming her nails on the table, clearly still revved by adrenaline. “No, they won’t even know where to look. Though maybe we should see if the gatekeeper will give us new identities while we’re there.”

“Good idea, babe,” Brace said. His shoved his plate forward, dropped his head onto the table and started to snore.

Sandra looked at him and rubbed his neck. “He’s been working two jobs to help me keep those assholes off my back. He’s exhausted.”

“Can he sleep in the car?” I asked.

She shook her head. “He’s got this weird thing where he can’t sleep in a moving vehicle.”

“We can all get some sleep when we get to my place,” I said. “We’ll go talk to the gatekeeper this afternoon.”

She nodded, and we finished our breakfast in silence.

“I sure hope whatever the gatekeeper has is worth all of this,” I said, once we were back in our rental car.

“Worth meeting your cousin and saving her from her crazy family,” Frost asked.

“Ask me that after she’s been living with me for a month.”

You can’t choose your family, but you can choose to cut them out of your life when necessary
. –Chloe Frangipani

If you think you can escape your family, you’re crazy. The moment you get away, will be the moment you wish you could go back
. –Althea Frangipani

“Welcome,” the gatekeeper said. Sandra hadn’t wanted Brace to go near Benny the dragon, but Brace claimed he needed to be there to protect her. Truly, my cousin was a lucky woman to have found a man that would put up with her family, leave town with her without question, and face down a dragon. “It’s so lovely to see you all here together, I’m tempted to lock you up and keep you.” Benny’s eyes narrowed. “Especially you, Brace. I believe you owe me.”

“Sandra belongs to me,” Brace said. “Whatever you take from her fulfills my debt to you.”

Benny inclined his head. “Perhaps I will agree to that, Brace, but we will have to see first what she has to offer and what you are willing to allow her to give.”

“Enough posturing,” Sandra said. “I’m sure your dick is the biggest, Benny. Just tell me what you want from me.”

Benny steepled his fingers under his chin. “You know what I always loved best about Christmas when I was a boy?”

“They don’t celebrate Christmas in Rubalia,” Brace muttered. I looked at him, more convinced than ever that he was fae and dying to know what kind.

Benny narrowed his eyes. “As I was saying. What I loved best about
Christmas
was the anticipation. It was always so much better than the reality.” He looked us over, his gaze like filthy fingers creeping over my skin. I fought a shudder and he laughed as though he’d sensed it and enjoyed my discomfort. “So I’d like to prolong the anticipation. Have tea with me in my private quarters.”

Both Brace and Sandra shot me looks that said I would owe them big time, and Frost had gone as still and tense as a statue next to me. “Lead the way,” I said, forcing a smile.

Benny stood and clapped his hands together like a giddy kid. “Let’s go,” he said. “I so rarely have company, especially not company with royal blood. The royals are such snobs.”

He led us through an ornately carved door, his bodyguards fanning out behind him as he strode down an ivory white hall wide enough for three full-grown men to stand shoulder to shoulder. The hallway opened into an enormous ballroom with works of art and portraits hung over every inch of the wall space. The room’s ceiling rose three stories high and there was no way it fit into the house we’d entered. There was some sort of magic there.

Benny walked us past a grand piano and toward the third door in the room. Brace stuck his hands out to his side and shook his head. “Do you think I’m a complete idiot, Benny? I remember where the third door leads.”

Benny shrugged and backed away from the door. “It was worth a try. You four would have been so entertaining. I don’t suppose you’ll go through the fifth door with me, either?”

“Nope,” Brace said. “Why don’t you play for us? We know how you love an audience.”

Benny tapped his chin again. “Grand idea.” We followed him to the piano and sat in the chairs arranged around it.

Benny sighed, cracked his knuckles and shifted into a ten-foot tall dragon. I leapt to my feet and Frost jumped in front of me, already shoving a hand behind him to push me back.

“It’s okay,” Brace said, grabbing Sandra’s wrist and pulling her back down into her seat.

Frost kept backing me up until Benny the dragon sat down on the massive piano bench. The room was so large that I hadn’t realized how big the piano and bench were until the dragon sat down and began to play.

“Autonomy,” I whispered and gripped Frost’s hand, my heart still racing, my body pretty sure I’d already been burned by dragon flame and was dead.

“Nice trick,” Frost muttered. He didn’t let go of my hand as we sat back down and watched a dragon, so purple it was almost black, with teeth as large as my hand and a barbed tail, play Mozart.

The music was well-played and gorgeous, but I couldn’t quite fight the impulse I had to run for my life, or to stop my thoughts from running to all the things we needed to be doing to find those missing kids.

The bodyguards passed around tea cakes as Benny started a more upbeat, recent tune. I wondered how long this torture would go on as I munched on the most delicious petit four I’d ever had.

Benny the dragon played five more songs before he shifted back to a, very naked, human form. Most of the shifters I’d ever known were quite fit in their human form, but Benny, without clothes to cover him, was rather soft and squishy and surprisingly not well-endowed for a man who could shift into a huge dragon. I felt embarrassed to be looking at him, but Benny stood before us as proud and confident as though he had the body of a god.

“You may clap now and tell me how amazing I am,” he said, without a hint of sarcasm or amusement.

So, facing a naked shape-shifting dragon, we clapped and hooted and praised him. He took his bows, nude, and then accepted a robe from one of his bodyguards and slid into it.

“Now,” Benny said, clapping his hands again. “Let’s go back to my throne room and spill some fairy-human blood.” He licked his lips. Sandra shuddered, and Brace wrapped an arm around her shoulders.

Benny took and drank Sandra’s blood just as he had mine. “Now that’s delicious,” he said, smacking his lips. “There’s nothing quite like royal blood, and the mixtures from you two is like nothing I’ve ever tasted before. Are you both sure you belong to the men with you? I could offer you everything you ever wanted.”

“I just want the information you promised me,” I said.

“And new identities for me and Brace,” Sandra said.

Benny snapped his fingers, still looking a bit woozy from his blood intake. “Make it happen,” he said to his guards.

“While we wait,” Benny said. “Allow me to detail the benefits package I offer to each of my concubines, just in case you change your mind. You would get a three-hundred dollar a week shopping allowance. You would never have to cook or clean or work again. And I would occasionally allow you to drink of my blood.”

“And what would that do for us?” I asked, curious in spite of myself.

“Ah,” he said. “Looks as though you have competition, wolf-man. It’s because you’ve seen my naked body, isn’t it?” He gave me a wink and a leer.

“You’re irresistible,” I said, sarcasm seeping through, despite my best effort. Frost’s grip on my elbow tightened, as though he were prepared to yank me out of the path of dragon fire. “What does your blood do?”

“Sharpens your weak senses, helps you to heal faster, allows you to carry my babies to full-term.”

I threw up in my mouth a little and Sandra shuddered. “Wow, tempting,” I said. “But I think I’ll stick with Frost. I enjoy working for my own money.”

“Ah,” Benny said. “An independent woman. Pity. How about you, Sandra?”

Luckily, the bodyguards walked back into the room at that moment. We took our hard-won rewards and ran.

“We’ve got another missing kid,” Frost said, once we were back out on the street. As impatient to get away from Benny as we were, none of us had been able to resist checking our phones as soon as we were outside. “Do you think you two can find your own way back to Chloe’s place?” he asked Brace and Sandra.

“Sure, man,” Brace said. “You folks go do what you need to do.”

“Let’s go,” Frost said, taking my arm and leading me away. I probably should have protested his alpha-male pushiness, but I wanted to go with him. “The place is in the brewery district, so we should take the bus.”

“Another teenager?”

“No,” he said, his expression tight. “A toddler.”

“That’s definitely not a runaway. Are you sure it’s related to the others?”

“Nope,” he said. “And that’s why I think you should go in to talk to the parents alone. If there’s any chance they’ll be more open with you, we should take it.”

My heart ached already for the poor parents and I wasn’t sure I was ready to hold full responsibility for finding their child. Still, I agreed with Frost that we might get more without him around. He was a man, and a werewolf. Even if they held no animosity toward werewolves, they might feel more comfortable talking to someone of the same general species. “Okay. Any pointers?”

“Nope,” he said, frustration obvious. “Nothing I’ve been doing has been getting us anywhere. We need a new tactic.”

I thought I was prepared. I had a list of questions to ask, and I had reviewed the details of the other cases. I was ready for anything, except tears. And there were copious tears.

The young, elven parents were glassy-eyed and frantic, shoving pictures of their little boy at me and begging me to find him. “Please,” I said for the third time. “I understand you’re upset, but I need you to tell me what happened.” I handed them both more tissues and gave them time to collect themselves. Looking at the pictures of the chubby three-year-old and hearing their desperate sobs were making it hard for me to focus. My own eyes were damp and the urgency I felt to find that little boy threatened to overwhelm any rational thought.

“Where were you when Herbert disappeared?” I asked.

“We were home,” Mrs. Elderwood said. “My husband and I had just bought a computer and we were trying to figure the darn thing out so we could look for better jobs. It got to be late before we realized it. Herbert is potty training, so we went in to check that he hadn’t had an accident, but he was gone.”

“Could I see Herbert’s room?”

Unlike the other fae we’d visited over the last couple of weeks, the Elderwoods were somehow able to afford a two bedroom apartment. Herbert had a room about the size of my current walk-in closet with toys and books scattered on the floor and a small mattress in the corner.

“This is where he slept?”

The Elderwoods nodded. I went to the window and looked out. We were five stories up and there was no fire escape or balcony anywhere near his room. “Was the window locked?”

“The lock is broken,” Mr. Elderwood said, his voice choked.

“Have you called the police?”

They shook their heads. “When we arrived the gatekeeper told us to call Frost if we had any problems. He said the human police couldn’t help with fae issues.”

They were probably right, since I didn’t think a human could have scaled that wall, but I didn’t want to take any chances. “The police have access to databases Frost doesn’t,” I said. “They can dust for fingerprints and find a suspect much quicker than we can. You should call them.”

“If you think it’s best,” Mrs. Elderwood said. “I’ll do anything.” She left the room and I followed her out.

“How long have you been in the Non?” I asked, while we sat at the kitchen table and waited for the police.

“Rocky’s been here a few months,” Mrs. Elderwood said. “He came over first to get a good job and a decent place before Herbert and I came over. We don’t trust daycare, so I stay home with Herbert, but if I’d worked maybe we could have found a better, safer place sooner.” The tears started up again and I patted Mrs. Elderwood’s shoulder. I needed her to calm down so I could ask my final questions before the human cops arrived.

“Why did you leave Rubalia?”