by Julie Kenner
Careful to not make any noise, he started methodically going through each of her desk drawers, feeling like a jerk for doing it. Rent, remember. With a sigh and a silent apology to Emily, he kept on looking.
Nothing incriminating. Nothing at all. Not even any papers that indicated that she thought her husband was a slimy worm, which suggested that Mrs. Parker wasn’t the brightest bulb in the lamp, but certainly wasn’t going to satisfy Harold’s desire for divorce court ammunition.
“Well, hell,” he whispered. He sat back in the woman’s chair and glanced around the office, wondering if Emily Parker kept secrets hidden in picture frames behind photos of her wedding.
The sound of paper ripping broke the silence, and the door to the library whipped open.
“What in Hades are you doing?” Zoë stood there, furious, hands on her hips, glaring down at him. The ripped ends of the Read-A-Thon banner hung limply in the doorway behind her.
He shut the bottom drawer with his foot, hoping she couldn’t tell from where she was standing that it had been open. “How’d you know I was still in here?”
He asked the question to cover the noise, but he was also curious. The blinds were closed and he’d been as quiet as a mouse.
She rolled her eyes. “As much noise as you were making, rifling through drawers and cursing under your breath? It’s a wonder the whole school doesn’t know you’re here. So? What are you doing here?”
“Just dropping the flowers off,” he said, wondering when he’d made enough noise for her to hear.
“Try again. And it had better be good or I’m calling security.”
He sighed. Better to take the high road. “Information,” he said, shifting into professional-investigator mode. “I’m looking for information on Mrs. Parker.”
She frowned. “I’ve heard of going directly to the source, but breaking and entering seems a bit over the top.”
“Considering the way people gossip, it seemed more tactful than asking questions of her coworkers.”
The frown deepened. “Is she in trouble?”
“Not at all,” he said, trying out his smooth salesman voice. He passed her one of his fake business cards. “That’s why I didn’t want to start the rumor mill flying. I’m just doing a little background check.”
Her eyes flicked down to the name printed on the card, then back up to meet his. Her mouth twitched. “Buster Taylor?”
“That’s me,” he said, suppressing a cringe. His foster sister had been with him when he’d ordered the cards. She’d thought Buster sounded more like a tough-guy name than George Bailey.
Since he’d wanted a fake name to go with the fake business card, he hadn’t had the heart to argue.
Amusement danced in her dual-colored eyes as she looked him up and down. “You really sell insurance?”
“You sound surprised.”
“I just expected something more . . .” She trailed off, her hand circling as she searched for words. “Macho. Like a cop.”
His gut twisted. “Yeah, well, close but no cigar.” He couldn’t fault the woman for her intuition, but his serve-and-protect days were over.
“Close? What’s that supposed to mean?”
He plucked the card out of her hand and tucked it into his pocket. “I investigate. Claims, potential insureds.” That was not exactly a lie. He did all of those things. Just not for some insurance company. Instead, for jerks like Harold Parker.
“So what are you investigating Emily for?” She crossed her arms over her chest.
“Insurance,” he said, resisting the urge to reassure her he wasn’t the scum of the universe.
She scowled. “Duh. I think we’ve already covered that.”
“Right,” he said. That they had. Unfortunately, just being around this woman had turned him into a tongue-tied idiot. “I’m talking about . . . beneficiaries.” He flipped open his notebook. “My information indicates that her husband’s name is Harold, and she has two children.”
“Yeah, so?”
“Well, the policy she applied for identifies another male, not a relative, as a beneficiary,” he said. “We’re trying to confirm the relationship.”
“I hardly think Emily’s sleeping around.” Her voice rose, irritation and incredulity obvious in her tone.
“I didn’t say that.” He didn’t believe it either. But Harold Parker had paid him to find dirt, and that meant turning over stones. “So do you know who else she might have named as a beneficiary?”
She put her hands on the desk and leaned toward him, her eyes flashing, the floral scent of her hair making him a little nuts. “Mr. Taylor, I think it’s time for you to leave.”
Aw, hell. “I’m not trying to insinuate anything.”
“Could’ve fooled me.”
“I’m just looking for the facts.”
“Yeah? Well, the fact is, the door’s that way.” She held her arm out, her finger aimed at the door to the hallway, and he had the queerest sensation that the door actually jiggled.
“Leave?” he asked, all innocence. “You want me gone?”
“ ’Fraid so.”
“Say it ain’t so,” he said in his most charming voice.
“It’s so,” she said, but she was fighting a smile, and he held his breath. Then her face hardened, the amusement disappearing. “Don’t make me call security.”
Just leave, Taylor. There are other ways to find dirt on Emily Parker. True, but suddenly he didn’t give a flip about Mrs. Parker or her nutso husband. All he cared about was making sure Zoë Smith didn’t think he was the world’s biggest creep.
“Look, Zoë—”
She glared at him.
“Ms. Smith, I mean,” he said, backpedaling. “I’m just trying to do my job.”
“Why? You can’t tell me you like prying into people’s personal lives.”
“Maybe I do,” he lied.
“Funny. I used to be better at first impressions.”
“It’s my job,” he said tightly. “The only job I have at the moment, and I like to eat.”
“Peanut butter’s cheap,” she said. “As for the job, do it somewhere else.”
“You can’t blame me for trying to be thorough.” He was practically pleading, wishing he could start over again. Only this time he wouldn’t even mention Emily Parker.
“I’m not blaming you. I’m telling you to leave. Again.”
He had the feeling she was disappointed in him, and damned if he didn’t feel ashamed. “Well, thanks anyway,” he said. “I can show myself out.”
He left without looking back, and stepped into the polished hallway. As Emily Parker’s door latched behind him, Taylor sighed. He’d spent maybe five minutes with librarian Zoë Smith, and already she couldn’t stand him.
Which was a damn shame, really.
Because, given the opportunity, Taylor could handle spending a little bit more time around the feisty librarian.
“Damn,” he muttered, pushing open the doorway to the outside world. “I really hate this job.”
An entire continent away—in a penthouse apartment sixty floors above Manhattan—Mordichai watched his father pace in front of twelve huge monitors. As usual, one was tuned to the local news, one was playing a tape of Superman II, and nine were showing various financial programs.
Also as usual, Hieronymous was pointedly ignoring his son.
What wasn’t usual was the fact that on this particular day, Mordi doubted his father would even notice if the market crashed. Today, Hieronymous’s attention was focused on the twelfth screen—the one illegally displaying his cousin Zoë and her library.
Hieronymous pulled the red silk robe he wore tighter around himself, then turned to face his son. “I trust this does not concern you?”
“Of course it concerns me,” he said, hating the thought that Hieronymous was probably monitoring his house, too. “If Zephron finds out you’ve tapped into the council’s circuitry, he’ll have a fit. You know that only council elders are allowed to
monitor halfling home and work activity. The privacy laws—”
“I meant the girl. But I appreciate your concern.” He pressed a button on his desk and the twelfth monitor went dead. “Your cousin’s skills are increasing. Despite her pathetic lack of practice, the girl is finally developing some control.”
“Zoë’s an amateur,” Mordi said with conviction. “I’m not.”
Since Hieronymous was an Outcast, Mordi had been permitted only limited visits with his father over the years. Now, though, he was council age, and that meant he had options: join the council, or join his father. And the amazing, surprising fact was that Hieronymous wanted him. Needed him, even, and the feeling thrilled him. No matter what, he intended to prove to Hieronymous that he was worthy.
“I’ve been training all my life,” he continued. “Zoë’s mother doesn’t even know Zoë’s a halfling.” He paused at that. His own mother had known all along. And at the first sign of his powers, she’d passed him off to Hieronymous. He’d gone back to see her only once, right after his twelfth birthday.
She’d called him a freak.
“Your mother was a mortal and a fool,” Hieronymous said, and Mordi concentrated on the floor, ashamed he was so transparent. “Like so many mortals, she does not have the proper respect for what we are.”
Mordi nodded, gathering his resolve. He wanted—no, needed—to make his father proud. “Zoë’s not a threat,” he continued. “Uncle Donis and Hale work with her occasionally, but there’s no way she’ll be strong enough to beat me if it comes to that.” He stood up straighter. “No way at all.”
“Everything depends on the stone,” Hieronymous said. “My plans. Your future. Our future.”
His father made it all sound so simple. The council’s archaic philosophy needed to be swept aside so that someone with vision could step in. Hieronymous was simply ahead of his time, and the moment of change was fast approaching.
Right now, the council spun its wheels in a futile effort to protect mortals from their own stupidity. Instead of being gods, council members were practically slaves to mortals, running around saving them from burning buildings or runaway trains. Soon, though, that would change.
Hieronymous aimed a steady stare at Mordi. “You spent much of your youth with the girl. If it becomes necessary for you to face her, are you sure you won’t be adversely affected by some pathetic sense of familial loyalty?”
He considered the question. They were cousins, but they’d never been particularly close. Zoë, after all, had her family. And, truth be told, Mordi had always envied her for it. That little bit of envy had always sweetened his inevitable victories over her in each of the frequent tests during their training. “No, sir,” he said finally. It wouldn’t pain him at all to defeat Zoë again.
He frowned. Still . . .
“There is something you wish to say?”
Mordi took a breath. “It’s just that . . . Well, it is only a legend, after all.”
Hieronymous swept his arm, indicating the room lined with bookcases packed with rare, leather-bound editions and glass cases filled with odd archaeological finds. “I have spent half a lifetime pursuing this question. Aphrodite’s girdle is real, as is the gemstone that forms its centerpiece.”
“But the girdle’s been missing for centuries. Just because of that story you believe the stone’s going to somehow end up with me or Zoë?”
Hieronymous sighed. “Must you be so frustratingly pragmatic? There are too many coincidences not to believe the legend. You and your cousin are both halflings, both born on the same day. Your twenty-fifth birthdays fall on the day of the eclipse. And this, too.” He plucked a plastic box from his pocket and handed it to Mordichai. “The stone is in Los Angeles.”
The box blinked in his hand. “A tracking device? How?”
“Generations ago, the stone was set into a necklace that has certain unique properties, the characteristics of which remain a family secret. A legacy, if you will. I was able to create a device that honed in on those characteristics. This week, finally, the device detected a signal.”
Mordi nodded, silent, as he stared at the blinking green light.
“You will not fail me.”
“No, sir.”
“Excellent. When the eclipse comes, you will prevail,” Hieronymous said. “Little Zoë will have to continue her life as a mortal.” A slow smile graced his lips, and Mordi shivered. “An unfortunate existence, considering what we intend to do to the mortal population, but, hey, those are the breaks.”
“Well, if it isn’t George Bailey Taylor.” Harold Parker chewed on the end of his unlit cancer stick. Beside him, Tweedledum and Tweedledee shifted, practically snarling. Stupid oafs.
“You owe me eight hundred dollars, Mr. Parker.” Taylor had made up his mind to quit this case even before he’d backed out of the parking lot at South Hollywood Elementary. Now it felt good to finally be turning his decision into action.
“I can’t give you what I don’t have, Georgie-boy.” Parker leaned back against the worn vinyl of the circular booth and lit his cigarette.
“Taylor,” he said. “I go by Taylor.”
Parker waved a hand in front of his face. “Whatever. You know I’d help if I could. But I ain’t got a dime to my name. And your snoopin’ around hasn’t exactly helped me out there, now, has it?” He tilted his head back and belched.
“Look,” Taylor said, his fingers digging into the edge of the table, his biceps burning with the effort not to lash out at the little slimeball. “I did what you asked. But now I’m done with you. And it’s your turn to pay me what you agreed.”
Parker snorted and took a long drag on his cigarette. He exhaled toward Taylor, who stood his ground as noxious menthol smoke curled over his shoulders. “What I agreed? I think that bullet in your leg worked its way up to your brain.” He aimed a self-satisfied smirk toward his moronic bookends. “ ’Cause you’re talking pure rot, Georgie-boy. You didn’t do shit for me.”
The perpetual ache in Taylor’s thigh intensified to a dull throb. Eight years on the force, five commendations, a handful of awards, and a front-page spread in the local paper, and this was where he’d ended up. One mistake and he was reduced to spying on a perfectly chaste woman with a husband from hell.
“She’s not cheating on you.”
Parker took another drag on his cigarette, then ground it into the tabletop. “Maybe you oughta look a little harder.”
“Just give me my fee,” Taylor said, measuring each word.
He settled back into the booth, the Tweedledumdums snickering beside him. “You bring me the goods, capicse? You find some dirt; then you get your money.”
Taylor rubbed his thigh, forcing himself to stay calm as every cell in his body screamed at him to beat the little worm into a pulp. He should have avoided Parker like the plague. Dammit, he knew better. But like a damn fool, he’d let the need for cash suck him into a sucker’s deal.
He counted to ten, clenching and unclenching his fist. Just one misstep, and instead of looking at him like a hero, women like Zoë Smith thought he was lower than slime. “Forget the fee. I’m not interested in money that’s crossed your greasy palm.”
“You think you’re hot shit? Got your name in the papers back when you was a cop? Think that hero bullshit’s gonna keep you in clients? You’re a fool, Georgie-boy. A damned gimp fool,” Parker sputtered, his prune face turning red with his rising blood pressure. “I let on that you welshed on me, and ain’t nobody else gonna darken your doorstep again. You hear me, Georgie? You hear me, boy?”
The rubber band holding his emotions in check snapped, sending Taylor lunging forward. He plowed over the tabletop, arms out, hands ready to close around Parker’s oh-so-smug neck. He slammed on the brakes just before he touched him, his fingers hovering over Parker’s ring-around-the-collar. The Tweedle twins scrambled out of the booth and hightailed it for the kitchen.
“I should do it, you know,” Taylor whispered, the itch in his finge
rs seconding his words. “But I don’t think you’re worth the effort.”
Slowly, slowly, he backed away. Nice, even breaths. Nothing wrong here. Nothing at all.
Then, with one last look at Parker cowering alone in the booth, Taylor stepped out of the diner and into the heavy Los Angeles air. For someone who’d just told his one and only client to take a flying leap, he felt remarkably calm. Uplifted, even.
And he was absolutely certain that—if he ever saw her again—a certain elementary school librarian would be quite proud of him.
Three
She didn’t want to think about him. She had no reason to think about him. Which was why it was particularly annoying that for the last three days, thoughts of Buster Taylor had been filling her head—the sexy scar that marred his eyebrow, the sparkle in his eyes when he smiled. The cute way he’d tried to backpedal when he’d realized how furious she was.
And her heart had just about melted when her ears had tuned in to his gripe as he was leaving the building: “Damn. I really hate this job.”
In fact, she’d been so preoccupied with the irritating insurance investigator that she’d inadvertently shelved The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe with the arts-and-crafts books, and had completely blanked when a fifth grader asked if the latest Harry Potter book had made it to the library yet.
Ridiculous. She needed to get over this. Whether he hated his job or not, he’d still pawed around in Emily’s things. She shouldn’t waste another thought on him.
Right. Absolutely. She should just get up and get back to work filing or reshelving.
Sure thing. That was what she should be doing. Not fantasizing about some mortal, no matter how gorgeous he was, or how intriguing he’d seemed at first.
The man was mortal, after all, and what could come of that?
Mortal and a jerk.
Right.
Then again, maybe she wasn’t being fair. After all, he’d only been doing his job, and he felt really bad about it, too. Maybe she’d been thrown so off balance by the fact that she was, well, attracted to him that she’d overreacted.