It's a Charmed Life

by Selene Charles

  He snorted, understanding well enough.

  Her mention of IA—short for Internal Affairs—caught his attention. “Why’s IA there?”

  Pursing her lips, she peered into the glass bowl on Harry’s desk that he usually kept full of snacks. Flicking her fingers through the balls of truffles like she was looking for something in particular, she finally wrinkled her nose and sat back.

  “It’s Grimm. IA’s always up our arses for something or other. I did hear a little chatter about a copycat, Slasher Gang-style robbery. No doubt IA’s there about that. Been a year this case has gone unsolved, and I’m sure they’d like to see that stain against us handled sooner rather than later.” She shrugged.

  He knew a little of the Slasher Gang, a murder of shifter crows known for their ruthless and expert cunning when it came to robbing banks across several realms. The embarrassment was surely because their leader, Black Angus, had been held in the custody of Grimm PD, warded by level-ten witches and stones inscribed with runes of dark power. His escape had made him infamous, but it was the brazen robberies that’d begun only two days later that’d made him legend. It’d been in all the papers and the talk of Wonderlandians far and wide for several weeks afterward.

  “So we’ve got only about thirty hours or so, give or take, to crack this thing wide. No pressure or anything,” she said with an ironic snort.

  Again, she riffled through Harry’s bowl before growling beneath her breath.

  Grinning because she looked like she was ready to crawl out of her skin with nerves, a trait he understood quite well, Maddox said, “What are you looking for, Detective?”

  She twirled on him, the pupils of her eyes slitted as she grumped, “I’m bloody starving, and even this chocolate is sounding good right now.”

  Stepping away from the bench, he gestured toward a plate of lavender salmon sashimi, similar in succulence to the ruby-red salmon, but slightly sweeter in taste.

  “Oh goddess,” she moaned, unfurling her long legs from the chair as she almost ran to the plate. Reaching down, she took the whole platter in hand and grinned at him. “You don’t mind, right?” Not that she gave him much of a chance to answer, as she was already shoveling the gelatinous slivers into her mouth and chomping happily.

  “I’m disgusting when I eat. I’ll own it,” she said between bites, “so look away if it bothers you.”

  Chuckling, he rubbed at the back of his head, realizing it hurt less than it had just a while ago.

  “No, Detective. It’s rather refreshing to see a woman eating with such appreciation for her food. I’m rather a gourmand myself, you’ll hear no complaints from me.”

  She mumbled around her bites of fish but didn’t speak again until she’d demolished what had once been five pounds’ worth of salmon meat. He had slipped the order for it onto Harry’s desk before they’d left this morning.

  When she was done, she leaned back in her seat and rubbed at her slightly distended belly, a look of ease on her face.

  Taking his cup of tea in hand, he sipped the cooling liquid, not really tasting it as he said, “Considering we haven’t much time, perhaps we should go back to Goose’s—”

  “No. Crane will be here soon with my new card. I’m on strict orders to wait.”

  “Of course.”

  She slapped her hands down on her knees and stood. “I’m going for a swim. My skin feels too tight.”

  He nodded. “Perhaps I’ll join you.”

  “Pardon?” she asked with raised brow, and he chuckled, realizing how that had sounded.

  “Rather, I’ll tag along, as it were. I find that when I’m at a roadblock, it always helps to discuss what I know so far. Sometimes that helps jar the thoughts loose enough for me to make sense of the bigger picture.”

  He wet his lips, heart hammering as he realized he’d get to see her nude again. That thought hadn’t entered his mind when he’d asked to tag along, but now he felt heat settling into his cheeks. He frowned.

  “On second thought, Detective—”

  “Fine.” She flicked her wrist, looking unconcerned about him seeing her in the buff. “Come along, if it’ll help.” Then she turned on her heel and was already blazing a trail toward the fairy waters.

  For just a second, and only in the privacy of his own mind, he admitted that he was a little put out that she’d not seemed to care. He wasn’t sure he should follow her after all. He could just as easily talk things through with himself. The goddess knew he’d done it more than a few times in his years. And yet somehow, he found himself hard on her heels, pulse beating rapid-fire in his neck.

  Chapter 12

  Detective Elle

  I peeled off my clothes as soon I could. I’d only just been at my waters, so I shouldn’t feel a need to swim so soon. And yet, it felt like I was covered in thousands of sharp, stinging ants.

  I heard Hatter come up behind me, but I didn’t care. I kicked the clothes to the side and, with a relieved sigh, dove into water. The quick flash of the change burned me, transforming my legs back into a tail, and I trembled.

  I wished I could just live in my waters and never again have to leave them. I swallowed two quick gulps of the clean-tasting dew before reluctantly swimming to the surface.

  I found Hatter easily. He sat still as a statue, staring straight ahead. His jacket was off and lying on a boulder beside him. His elbow rested on his nocked knee, his cravat was undone, and his white sleeves were rolled up, exposing the art on both arms.

  I’d seen Cheshire grab hold of the demon, but I’d not known Hatter had an angel on the other arm. Her face was the same as the demon’s, though, and I noticed what I hadn’t back in the dimly lit chaos of the bar.

  Cocking my head, I studied the sweeping brows, the sloping cheekbones, and the heart-shaped jaw. It was Alice. The face on both drawings was Alice’s. I twisted my lips, and he finally seemed to notice me.

  “There you are,” he said with an easy, affable grin that made me feel queer flutterings in my nethers.

  I coughed to hide the fact that I was attracted to Hatter. Well, attracted was too light a word. I was aroused, madly so.

  With any other man, I’d just scratch the itch. Ich and I had done it on countless occasions. Ichabod was about as interested in a relationship as I was, which was to say, not at all. We had an understanding between us.

  I swam slowly toward Hatter, watching him as he watched me like a hawk eyeing prey. I was glad he couldn’t see the sudden ripple of bumps roll across my flesh at his visual caress. I swallowed hard.

  “Balls,” I muttered. I couldn’t wait to get back home.

  “Say again?”

  I shook my head. “You wanted to discuss the case, so let’s discuss,” I said, voice sharper than I’d intended it to be.

  He sighed, twisting a broken piece of tree bark between his fingers. “Where do we start? Crowley, for one, stripping me of the scene. Why? What was there that would make him—”

  I thinned my lips. “There was nothing more in that pool, Constable. I’m sure of it,” I said, holding up my hands as my tail flicked in the gentle undercurrents. “I found the only thing of true worth down there. What disturbs me more is that they must have known something was down there. Though good luck getting at it. Only another water elemental would have had the skills to do what I did.”

  His nostrils flared as he broke off chunks of bark and flicked them away. “But they closed down the entire scene. Why? What if there was more? Out of the water, perhaps? Something we didn’t see?” He looked at me, and for once, both his eyes were just eyes. Neither of them glowed.

  He looked tired.

  I frowned. “You read the cold-case file, yes?” I asked.

  The look he shot me said, “Clearly.”

  Grinning ruefully, I shrugged. “You can never be too sure. Anyway, what wasn’t in the file but that I discovered—and was the very reason why I was sent to Wonderland to further this investigation—was part of what you’d seen in your visi
on.”

  I tapped my eye, and he nodded. “The ribbon and horse’s head, yes. But I saw shears, too, and the woman with strange eyes. We’ve yet to find either of those.”

  “I’m sure we will, but whether we do or don’t, I’m certain we can solve this case before my coach turns back into pumpkin.”

  He grinned at the reference, and I couldn’t help but grin back. I liked his look. I wasn’t shy when it came to my sexuality. No nymph was. And Hatter was undeniably attractive. So very tidy and proper, at least on the surface, anyway. But beneath that façade was a man who’d, for a time, made a life with a woman who ran the local sex shoppe.

  “Your dichotomous nature intrigues me,” I said, realizing I’d spoken my thoughts out loud as a hard look suddenly flashed over his features.

  Wary was too fine a word for what Hatter was. This man was snake-bitten. He was like a feral animal, cornered and ready to snap if the hand that fed it got too close. It was a state I understood only too well.

  I was about to mutter yet another apology when I saw his tense shoulders relax.

  “I’m sure that I appear dichotomous, Detective. We all have our secrets, and the mask we show the world is rarely the truth.”

  I squirmed, understanding that his words weren’t just about him, but me too.

  “True enough. And I’m not trying to pry—”

  “Aren’t you?” he asked brusquely, his look flinty and intelligent.

  I snorted. “Fine, I guess I am. But I’ve never worked so closely with anyone for such an extended period of time, so call me curious.”

  “You know what they say—curiosity killed the cat.”

  “Yes, but they also say curiosity is the lust of the mind. And to be frank, neither of us wound up in this profession because we aren’t the curious types. Or am I wrong?”

  At that, his dark eyes glinted, and a slow, curving grin pinched the corners of mouth.

  “Indeed. Well, detective, we have time to kill. I’ll answer a few of your questions, if you answer a few of mine.”

  Licking my front teeth, I shook my head. “I figured you’d say as much. You don’t play fair, Constable.”

  “Neither do you, Detective. So, who goes first?”

  I grinned, eyeing his markings. “Those.” I pointed to his arms. “Why do you have them, and what do they do?”

  He held his arms out in front of him, looking first at the devil and then at the angel. “I was marked years ago by an old sea witch. They... help me.”

  When he looked at me again, his eyes were blazing, one deepest green, the other luminescent blue. His eyes gazed sightlessly behind me as he saw not me, or even our surroundings, but a vision of both the past and the future.

  Seconds later, it was over, and he turned his gaze my way. The angel on his arm now blazed the purest white.

  “You saw something?” I asked.

  “I saw you,” he said simply, but I shivered, wondering what he’d seen and dreading knowing it too.

  The way his jaw worked from side to side and the fact that he wouldn’t quite meet my eyes let me know all I needed.

  I knew if I latched on to the dimming glow of his tattoo, I would likely see what he had, just as Cheshire had done. But I shook my head.

  “My past is my past, Maddox. And that’s where it belongs.”

  A muscle in his jaw ticked.

  “Must be terrible,” I said softly, “knowing the darkest parts of everyone around you. Who can you trust when you see too much?”

  He rolled down his sleeves, covering both his arms before rubbing his fingers lightly over the angel, which still glowed bright.

  “I don’t judge, Elle, if that’s what you’re worried about.”

  I scoffed. “My life is an open book. All anyone has to do is hear my name, and they know all there is to know about me.”

  Bitterness dripped off my tongue, and I had to look away as I scrubbed at my hot eyes with the back of my wrist.

  “I know you were cast out long before you met your mate,” he said, the words spoken haltingly, like he wasn’t sure he should say them or that I’d want to hear them. “I know you weren’t... sane.”

  I hissed, rising up on the water so that I was eye level with him. “You know nothing. Nothing! No one knows why I was cast out. That part was conveniently left out of my story.”

  The air between us grew thick with a sudden blanket of tension, and I shivered as his hot gaze looked me slowly up and down, resting on my breasts long enough to make me moan as I imagined it wasn’t his eyes, but his hands that touched me now.

  It had been so damned long.

  “You’re right, Detective. No one knows that part of the story. So, why were you cast out then?” His voice was an intoxicating, heated whisper that almost lulled my deepest, darkest secret out of me.

  Not even Hook had known the real reason, though I sometimes thought, somewhere inside, he must have known why I was as messed up as I was, why I’d become what I’d become. Any time in my presence would make that fact abundantly clear, which was why I didn’t get close to others and why I fought so bloody hard to keep myself apart from the rest of the world, only showing them the mask, the superficial parts of me.

  Grabbing his collar, I fisted it tight and brought his face scant inches from mine. His strong hands braced themselves on my biceps, and all it would have taken to make his mouth mine would have been for me to close that last inch between us.

  He wanted me too. I’d have had to have been blind not to recognize the lust in his eyes.

  “You will never know my secrets, Constable. Not ever.”

  His jaw worked as he swallowed, but the way he looked at me made me feel cold and anxious.

  “As you say, Detective.”

  I could hardly breathe, and I wondered all over again just what he had seen.

  And that was how Harry found us when he came jogging up to us just seconds later.

  “Detecti—ahh,” he said quickly, turning on his heel as he looped back. “A thousand apologies,” he said quickly.

  Releasing Hatter’s collar, I shook my head, more irritated than I had a right to be at the interruption. “It’s fine.”

  I quickly sank beneath the waters just in case it was my nudity that’d embarrassed him.

  Hatter stood. “What is it, Harry?”

  He wrinkled his nose, making him look more like the rabbit he’d reminded me of the first night I’d arrived.

  “There be a Grimmer here, says he’s looking for the Detective.”

  “Crane!” I cried with a note of relief. “Send him back, please.”

  Rubbing the back of his neck, Harry bobbed an acknowledgement and turned. Hatter was yanking his jacket back on and dusting off his spotless coat as Ichabod, looking handsome in black, came through the gates.

  “Elle. Constable,” he said with a glance toward us both.

  If he found it odd that I was swimming in front of the constable, it didn’t show. What I did see was a harried expression pinching the corners of his eyes and mouth. Ichabod was the definition of cool under pressure, so this was different for him.

  “Ich? Are you alright?”

  He was reaching into his jacket pocket, walking past Hatter without sparring him a glance.

  “What? Hmm? Yes. The key.” He brandished the tiny golden key at me.

  I pointed to the spot where my clothes lay. “Just set it there. Thank you. Are you sure you’re okay?”

  He dropped the key into my pile of clothes. “Yes. No.” Then he turned on Hatter and nodded. “Might I have a word with my partner alone?”

  For just a second, a look of confusion scrawled over Hatter’s smooth forehead, but he was a master of disguising emotion, and in just moments was back to looking like an implacable and emotionless wall.

  “I’ll be in my office,” he said to no one in particular and was gone just as quickly as Ichabod had appeared.

  The second he was out of earshot I turned on Ich. “What the hells was that al
l about? And since when are we partners?”

  He swatted at the air with his hand. “I just had to clear him out of here. Don’t know who we can trust right now.”

  Ice zipped down my veins as I eyed my one and probably only friend at the precinct. “Come again?”

  “Bo couldn’t talk on the wire. We’ve got IA up our arses so high we can’t even take a dump without them knowing about it.”

  “That has to hurt.”

  He snickered. “Aye, well, the worst of it is not only is IA shoving their noses into whatever the two hells pleases them, but BS is all over the fecking place.”

  I could probably count on one hand the number of times I’d seen Ichabod lose his cool this way, which was pretty much never.

  “This reeks, and I don’t mind saying so. Ever since ye left, nothing’s been normal. Bo’s up to her eyeballs in red tape and bureaucratic bullshit. Even now, that jackarse Crowley is taking over our cold-case files and has barred us from the evidence locker. Argh!” He growled as he took fistfuls of his hair and tugged.

  Bo’s sudden reluctance to let me stay in Wonderland made much more sense now. I shook my head. “But why?”

  “Reports of improper handling and some other bull like that.”

  I swallowed, thinking about the key card Hatter and I’d recovered, the very one I’d not reported. But since no one knew about that, surely that wasn’t the cause of the kerfuffle. Right?

  I grew cold.

  “Bo did report that I brought some evidence with me to Wonderland, no?”

  “Aye. Thank the stars,” he snapped and sank onto the rock that Hatter had recently vacated. “Dammit all to the two hells, Elle. Something’s not right here. Add to that the stress of the Slasher Gang stepping up their robberies, and it’s mad back there. But you’re close, right?” He looked at me with his intelligent silver gaze. “With what Bo’s going through right now, that she’s even extended you a day tells me you’re close.”

  I nodded, though I was hesitant to tell him much more than that. “You know I can’t share the details of the case with you, Ich. Sorry.”

  He scrubbed a hand down his face and groaned. “I haven’t bloody slept in two days. You told me the royals were crooked. Well, I’m telling you now, there’s a cover-up, and you can be sure of it. Only someone with the kind of power the royals have could turn the precinct on its head this way. Find whatever the bloody hells you need to find, Elle, or we’re all screwed.”