Fairy Godmothers, Inc.

by Jenniffer Wardell

  “Don’t worry about it,” he said kindly, reminding himself that this would be good practice for when he eventually had children. “I’m sure we can find another dress that will work. If I remember correctly, she actually went through a pink phase a few years ago.”

  “And I’ll fix this one, I promise,” Rellie said tearily, looking far more tragic than Jon was at all comfortable with. “I don’t know how hard it is to dry a feather dress, but I figured out a way to do it with the chickens back home and I can’t imagine . . .”

  “Shhhh,” Jon soothed, grabbing her hands in the hopes of calming her down. “I’m sure we’ll be able to . . .” The words died as a wave of dizziness hit him, the palms of his hands growing hot like he was holding them too close to an open flame. He immediately yanked his hands away from Rellie’s, only to have to grab her again when her legs buckled and she nearly collapsed. Another wave of dizziness hit, worse this time, and he staggered as she clutched at him like a drowning person.

  For a heartbeat, everything went completely silent, then he heard Rellie’s breath hitch. “Jon?” Her voice was faint, and Jon’s grip tightened as he felt an immense rush of protectiveness wash over him for the girl in his arms. He would never let anything hurt such a delicate, lovely creature, with hair like spun gold and eyes like the first violets of spring. He loved her, of course he loved her, and he would write sonnets to her beauty as soon as he reminded himself how the rhyme structure went on a sonnet. He couldn’t even imagine ever loving anyone as much as he did Rellie.

  No. Oh, please no.

  Slowly, he and Rellie looked into each other’s eyes. Even through the golden-tinged rush of adoration, he could tell she was just as terrified as he was.

  EIGHTEEN

  Slippery Slope

  Back in the middle of the darkened maze that was the office cubicles, Kate and Ned stood silently as they watched the final trace of magic from the doorway fade into nothingness. Kate could hear the cleaning crew working downstairs. The floor they were on was as utterly empty of people as she’d expected. Even the light behind Bubbles’ locked door was off, though Kate had to squash the quiet, paranoid thought that the woman was hiding in the dark waiting for them.

  She closed her eyes, letting out a long breath as exhaustion crashed into her all at once. “Can you make it home okay?” she asked Ned. His continued silence was probably a bad sign. “Or do you want me to drop you off?”

  “I’m fine.” The words had a slightly distant quality that usually meant shell shock, and at the sound of it Kate made herself open her eyes again. It was a perfectly reasonable reaction to have after the evening they’d both been through, but he probably wasn’t okay to go home on his own.

  She turned, watching him. He was staring off into the distance, eyes a little too wide. If she looked very, very closely, she could see him shaking ever so slightly. “Ned?”

  He swallowed, and all the shaking stopped as he turned to look at Kate. “I’ve changed the whole rest of my life, haven’t I?” The distance was gone, and in its place was the tremor of someone who’d realized he not only burned a bridge, but smashed the rubble with sledgehammers and then watched the dwarves blow up any bits that might have been left.

  Kate sympathized. “There’s still time to back out of this,” she told him, voice gentle. She didn’t know what she’d say to Rellie, but it would be better for both of them to let Ned go if he wanted. If nothing else, it would be one fewer person to worry about.

  He stiffened, flinching like she’d slapped him. “Just because Rellie didn’t make me promise doesn’t mean I couldn’t have,” he said tightly, angrier than she’d ever heard him. “Just tell me what I need to do.”

  Feeling her heart clench at the reminder of the promise she’d made to Jon, Kate rested a hand on Ned’s shoulder. “I just wanted you to be sure,” she said, knowing she’d never looked nearly as brave as he had just then. “Like you said, we’re about to change the whole rest of our lives.”

  Ned sighed at that, some of his tension dropping as he lifted a hand to rub his eyes. “Sorry.” He looked at her again, mouth flickering up. “At least my dad will be happy about all this.” Kate lifted her eyebrows and Ned’s smile turned wry. “He wanted me to become a shoemaker.”

  She couldn’t quite stop the burst of laughter that emerged. “If you had, it would have been the elves who’d gotten you into trouble.”

  Though they both made it home, Kate found herself lying awake all night. So, early the next morning they were back in the office conference room going over their plan one more time. It wasn’t a particularly good plan, depending mostly on paperwork and Kate miraculously getting better at lying, but at the moment they didn’t have much else to work with.

  Ned grabbed a blank contract completion approval form out of the supply room, and Kate faked the details of the supposed happily-ever-after well enough to hopefully convince Bubbles that Kate needed to see Director Carlson one more time to get the signature. For Carlson, they’d scoured the archives, looking for the number of clients married to royalty that had ended in either divorce or large therapy bills (records of when and where served as evidence against potential lawsuits). It would then be Kate’s job to convince Carlson that marrying Rellie off to a prince would end up giving him more, not less, responsibility for her in the long run, and it would be easier for everyone if he’d just cancel the contract.

  If that failed, she would say Rellie was prepared to countersue to get out of it, and the royal family of Somewhere was more than happy to hire her a lawyer to help the process along. Kate felt a little worried she hadn’t cleared this particular lie with Jon yet, but if he was crazy enough to want to marry her he’d probably be willing to fake a lawsuit for her.

  As they heard their co-workers arriving, Ned looked up at Kate. “Ready?”

  “Not really.” Despite the words and the hard knot in her stomach, Kate pushed herself to her feet and headed for the door. She’d promised Jon she’d come back, no matter what, and she couldn’t keep that promise until she’d gotten this part of things over with. “If you see bursts of magic coming from Bubbles’ office, be smart and go home early today.”

  “I won’t see it,” Nate said matter-of-factly as he handed Kate the folder. When she lifted an eyebrow, his mouth curved in a faint smile. “I plan on hiding in here until either you or Bubbles come get me.”

  Kate stood in the open doorway. “I wish I’d been smart enough to think of that.” Stepping into the hallway, she closed the door to give Ned what safety she could before heading into the main office area.

  The early morning commotion sounded exactly like it had every day since she’d started working here, the pockets of quiet conversation mixed with rustling files and the clicking of people typing. It was strange to think she’d never hear it again, or wave at the other Fairy Godmothers as they offered her a quick good morning and a sympathetic expression when they realized she was walking toward Bubbles’ office. She wondered if she’d miss it once she was gone.

  Of course, there was an equally good chance she was just trying to distract herself from thinking about the infinite number of ways this could go wrong.

  When she got to Bubbles’ office, Kate squared her shoulders, put Jon’s face firmly in the front of her mind, and pushed the door open. “You wanted to see me?”

  As she’d expected, Bubbles hesitated pointedly over the file she’d been reading before looking up. When she did finally deign to lift her head, she adjusted her glasses and peered at Kate as if the younger Fairy Godmother was an insect that had invaded her personal space. “I certainly didn’t call for you.”

  “Not this morning, but you told me to report back in when the assignment was done.” Kate caught her voice turning a little cajoling, and she reminded herself to flatten it out again. If she sounded like having to fill out routine paperwork was important to her, Bubbles would know something was up. “You wanted me to make sure I had finished all the paperwork and gotten a compl
etion signature from Director Carlson before noon.”

  Bubbles eyes brightened ever so slightly at that. “You completed the job? Without me having to come in and fix it for you?” At Kate’s nod, her boss turned to a stack of papers sitting beside her desk and began flipping through them. She hesitated occasionally, making Kate tense each and every time, but eventually she dropped the stack back down and looked at Kate like she would a rodent performing a trick. “Well, this is surprising, particularly with the added wrinkle of the last-minute prince substitution. I was certain you’d screw it up.”

  Kate felt the knot in her stomach ease, ever so slightly, but she kept her expression blank as she tried to gauge what kind of response Bubbles was expecting. Was that a deliberate dig, or had shock simply compelled her to be more blunt than usual?

  Finally, Kate just shrugged. “I know.”

  Bubbles’ eyes narrowed, as if that somehow hadn’t been the right answer. “Do you have the wedding date so we can include it in the final report?”

  Though they’d talked about it, both she and Jon had decided that particular bit of information would be too dangerous to fake. “I think they were delaying it because the brother was still missing.” Realizing what had caused Bubbles’ suspicion, Kate made her voice hesitant and a little embarrassed. “I kept trying to find out, but no one would give me anything specific.”

  As Kate suspected, Bubbles’ expression smoothed out again. “You’ll have to be the one to tell that to Director Carlson,” she said, pulling her wand from her belt to create the transport door that would get Kate into the secretary’s office. “I also expect you to continue following the case until you have the date secured—I can’t trust any of the rest of you to send the contingency measures, but my time is far too valuable to waste doing your cleanups as well.”

  Kate nearly relaxed, but her brain snagged on something Bubbles had said. “Wait.” The knot inside her squeezed tight. “What contingency measures?”

  Bubbles stopped, looking at Kate as if she couldn’t believe she was asking such a stupid question. “I started distributing a backup dose of True Love to clients after Thea had her ‘accident’ and failed.”

  The world went white as the floor dropped out from under Kate’s feet.

  “I have no trouble firing you people, but I will get contracts fulfilled in an efficient and satisfactory manner.”

  Kate stood frozen, afraid to speak for a moment because she was pretty sure the only thing that would come out of her mouth was a scream. Bubbles, considering the question answered, lifted the wand again to open the door, and Kate forced herself to inhale past the icy panic clutching her throat.

  “When?” She knew her voice sounded strangled, and she swallowed, reminding herself not to hyperventilate. “When did you give them the dose?” She didn’t dare let herself hope they’d somehow managed to escape it.

  Oh Jon, I’m so sorry.

  “Why do you care?” Bubbles said. “According to you, the contract was completed, which means you had already administered your own dose. I just hurried the process along.”

  Kate shoved her hands behind her back to hide her fingernails digging dark red furrows into the palm of her hands. “I just want to know for future assignments,” she made herself say, taking long, slow breaths through her nose and forcing her brain to stay only in the current moment. If she let herself think about how badly she’d screwed up, or picture Jon and Rellie staring lovingly into each other’s eyes completely against their will, she was going to do something completely useless like burst into tears. “It will help me do my job more efficiently.”

  Bubbles settled back, mollified by the answer. “New policy is to send out magic support first thing in the morning after the culminating event for a particular assignment. You’re forbidden from informing the other employees about it, however—if they know I’ll be there with a safety net, they’ll put even less effort toward proper Fairy Godmothering than they do now.”

  Anger slammed through the panic for just a second, and Kate clutched at it like a lifeline in a storm. “Fairy Godmothers, Inc. doesn’t even have a magic support staff,” she snapped, fighting back the urge to yell. For all she knew, that scream might come out.

  “Of course, we do,” Bubbles scoffed. “They’re just not there to support you or the customers.”

  Panic winning again, Kate grabbed blindly for the door handle. “That makes sense.” She opened the door, backing out with the deliberate steps of someone trying very hard not to run. “I’ll go find out when that wedding will be held. We really don’t need to bother Director Carlson until I have it.”

  She closed the door on Bubbles’ confused expression, knowing if the other woman devoted even five minutes of thought to the conversation they’d just had she’d realize something was horribly wrong (another mistake that was going to come back to hurt them, Kate was sure). Then she turned around and hurried back the way she’d come, barely managing to keep from running. There was another conference room around the corner—the old manager had used it for staff meetings, but Bubbles decided that it had too many exit routes and insisted on using a smaller one down the hall. Kate could create a transport door from there that would get her to the palace in only a couple of minutes.

  Knowing she’d be too late no matter when she got there was making it very hard for her to breathe properly.

  She turned the corner, nearly slamming into a worried Ned coming the other direction. He caught her shoulders to steady her, but as soon as his eyes met hers his face drained of color. “Kate, what happened?”

  She opened her mouth, but there was only a frozen silence as the words stuck in her throat. Ned, however, didn’t seem to have any trouble filling in the gap. “Does Bubbles know? What did she say? What did she do?” The panic in his voice climbed with every word. “What is she going to do to Rellie and Jon? What are we going to—”

  This time, it was her turn to grab his shoulders. “Ned,” she said quietly, knowing there was no way to make this easier. “They were dosed.”

  Ned’s expression crumpled. “Dosed?” he whispered. “Oh, no.”

  Her own chest so raw it hurt just standing here, Kate gave Ned a small shake. “We will fix this,” she said fiercely, hoping she sounded more confident than she felt. They had to fix this, though at the moment she didn’t have the slightest idea how they were going to do it. “I’m going back to the palace—” His mouth opened, but she shook her head before he could say anything. “No. Trust me, Ned, you don’t want to see this in person. I’m going to see how bad it is and tell them everything will be okay.”

  He took a deep, shaky breath, like he was trying really hard to collect himself. “Do we have any idea how it’s going to be okay?”

  There was another moment of despairing silence. “No.” she said. “But it’s our job to figure it out.”

  Remembering the “No Fairy Godmother” rule Jon had promised to put in place—which had unfortunately done nothing against Bubbles’ super secret army of support staff—Kate had the transport doorway open on the sidewalk across the street from the palace’s front gate. She stood there for a moment, watching the posted guards as she pushed her hand into her pocket to grab Jon’s ring. Her throat closed up as her fingers wrapped tight around the warm metal, remembering the look on his face as he gave it to her.

  This was what hope got you.

  Taking a deep breath, she pushed the ring onto her thumb and crossed the street like she knew exactly what she was doing. Walking up to the guard who looked like he was the better fed of the two, she held up her hand with the ring positioned so the seal was clearly displayed. “I need to speak to Monsignor Lawton,” she said calmly, not wanting to make the same mistake she had in Bubbles’ office. After all, she wasn’t one hundred percent certain this would work. Jon had assured her the ring would get him called to the front gates, but there was no guarantee it would have the same effect with Lawton.

  The guard peered at the ring, eyes widenin
g slightly when he realized it was inarguably genuine. He gestured to his partner, who came over and took his own look at the ring, then they both moved aside for a whispered discussion while Kate stood there, trying to look like she wasn’t about to do anything more stupid than she already had.

  Finally, the first guard approached. “Monsignor Lawton wouldn’t have given you that ring. Those rings belong strictly to members of the royal family.”

  Kate’s heart clenched. She couldn’t ask for Jon. “Monsignor Lawton said Prince Jonathan gave him the ring, which he then gave to me so I could come back here now and ask to speak to him despite the current ‘No Fairy Godmother’ edict.”

  The guards’ brow furrowed at her unprompted knowledge. Still, the second guard rallied. “Are you sure you didn’t get the ring from Prince Rupert?” He didn’t actually say the words, but his tone implied what circumstances he thought she and Rupert had been in before the ring was exchanged. “He sometimes gives presents to girls whose company he’s enjoyed.”

  Kate glared, voice sharp. She wanted to strangle them for doing this to her now, of all times, but she had more important things to worry about than getting herself killed. “First, I’d have to drop about fifteen IQ points before I’d even think about sleeping with Prince Rupert, and second—”

  The rest of the sentence disappeared as a blur of color shot around the corner of the palace, barreling toward the front gate fast enough the figure’s golden blond hair—and was that a bathrobe?—flew out behind it. When the figure hit the still-closed front gate, it shook the bars. “Kate! Tell them to let me out!”