“Best I can figure, one of two things happened.” I relayed what Mai had mumbled during the car ride to Orlando. “Either the selkies drugged her to get her out of their way while they traveled farther down the coast, or her predator pal paid the bartender to mix her a special cocktail.”
His lips compressed. “You don’t think the gray men are responsible.”
“No, I don’t.” Their fear of the Morrigan extended me some protection, and they knew hurting Mai risked bringing us both down on them. “There’s no reason why they would have risked retribution by drugging Mai when they could have swum away from the confrontation. They have one powerful enemy. I doubt they’re eager to make another.”
“Good point.” He nodded. “From what you told me, the last thing they would have wanted was a reason for the Morrigan to get involved, and dragging you into the fray made that a possibility.”
“Exactly.” I exhaled. “They’re terrified of her.”
A pause lent weight to his next question. “Are you planning on reporting this situation to the conclave?”
“No.” I held up a hand to stave off his scowl. “For me to pursue the claim past the filing stage, I either need an eyewitness to her crimes or sworn testimony from one of the victims. The selkies would have to be willing to press charges, and they won’t. All it would do is tip her off that a reckoning is coming, and I don’t want to risk her killing them off to avoid the fallout.”
“They could seek protected status from the conclave,” he insisted.
“The Morrigan is a goddess. The selkies can’t beat her in a fight—fair or otherwise—and the law can only protect them so far. A piece of paper isn’t going to stop her. Not after all this time.”
As much as her predation disgusted me, my hands weren’t any less bloody. I didn’t have a single stone to toss. She might pick the meat off fae bones, but that was after I had devoured their souls.
“She will pay for what she’s done,” I promised. “She will be answerable to me one day.” Soon.
Under his breath, he murmured softly, “Not if I can help it.”
Doubting I was meant to hear it, I let his comment slide and focused on our problem.
“The most likely candidate is the predator.” Whoever and whatever he was. “He left pissed off and hungry.”
“Finding Mai alone at the bar would have been tempting.” Shaw expanded that line of thought. “He either drugged her or had the bartender do it for him, but then you and your entourage showed up and spooked him. He had to let her go. Again.”
Meaning I had made myself a new enemy. Great.
“He didn’t know about my guards.” I fidgeted. “They were cloaked.”
“Are you sure the predator wasn’t playing along, pretending not to know they were there?”
“No.” The thought Mr. Linen Suit had played us worried me. “He didn’t acknowledge them, but fae being fae, that could mean he didn’t see them or they were beneath his notice. I don’t get why he would go after us at all, especially if he could see the guards. Unless he viewed our presence as a challenge?”
“Maybe.” The gears were turning in his head. “He may have been curious why you were there, why you stood up to him without flashing your badge. Maybe he thought you were working undercover and it made him nervous. Maybe he’s just that stupid and goes around challenging unknown fae in his territory blindly. I don’t know.”
Option two sounded good. Too good. “You don’t think he’s stupid.”
A half smile twitched his lips. “Do you?”
“No,” I grumped. “Idiots don’t live long enough to amass the kind of power the guards sensed.”
“You didn’t sense anything from Linen at all?”
“No, I didn’t.” The lack of sensation still bothered me. “Not even a blip.”
“Huh.” He turned pensive. “Odhran must have logged Linen’s magical signature when he sensed it the first time. It’s like a fingerprint some fae can recall and use to recognize or identify a person. It’s a rare talent, and it was probably his ticket to princess duty.” He palmed a towel off his bed. “That means Linen either stopped shielding himself, which seems unlikely since you didn’t notice him, or he expended enough energy to register with Odhran. If he was feeding in the vicinity, it might have caused a surge large enough for Odhran to notice.”
Feeding. The word made my skin crawl. All of us preyed on someone, but I stuck to fae. Humans reminded me too much of Mom, helpless against the strength of creatures who were centuries older than humanity, monsters who wielded their deadly skills with merciless precision.
“Did you phone in the issue to Mable?” I wondered.
Shaw’s interest shifted to the nubs on his towel. “Not yet.”
“Why not?” It hit me. “Ha! You’re not supposed to be down here either.”
“One of the terms of my return was that I can’t leave the region without express permission from the magistrates.” He eyed me pointedly. “I couldn’t get that without first explaining why I was suddenly free to travel—” which would implicate me, “—so I decided to risk it.”
Small wonder Linen wasn’t afraid to show his face again. The conclave hadn’t rapped his knuckles for reaching into the cookie jar after all, because Shaw couldn’t report him without tattling on us.
Only the tightness of his expression kept me from laughing.
His scowl sharpened. “You think this is funny.”
“It’s a little funny.” I snickered. “Did the fall off your high horse hurt?”
He growled.
I was not intimidated.
“After all the grief you gave me over not telling the conclave where I was, and they don’t know where you are.” I clicked my tongue. “Marshal Shaw, I am shocked by your sudden moral decline.”
“Hang around you long enough…” he started.
“Hey.” I narrowed my eyes. “You’re the one who made googly eyes at an underage cadet.”
The dimple in his cheek winked at me. “What you’re saying is my moral decline isn’t sudden. It was gradual and brought about by continual exposure…to you.” He stood and looped a towel around his neck and approached me. “Incubi don’t have strict age rules about feeding. Food is food. My brother never agreed with that stance. I don’t either. I never lost sleep over a missed opportunity until you.”
Seeing as how my sitting position put my eyes at crotch level with him, I clambered to my feet.
“The first time I saw you, you were terrified. Magic dripping from your fingertips. Your soul glowing with the lives you had taken. You were a scared kid who had made a terrible mistake. At thirteen, you should have been too young for me to notice. But I did. The incubus saw easy prey where I saw a child.” He clenched the towel in his hands. “If I had been a good man, I would have transferred to a different outpost first thing the next morning.”
Shaw was responsible for so much of my education, my self-worth, my restraint. No other creature could have understood the hunger coiled in my gut the way he did. Only someone as willing to fight their own nature as he was could have taught me where the line between black and white turned gray.
Unsure what else to say that wouldn’t crack open my heart, I said nothing at all.
Chapter 18
Two hours later, Daddy Hayashi stepped out of a rented town car wearing a tailored suit that matched his sleek, black ride. As if familiar with the hotel’s layout, he took the stairs with a bounce in his step and walked straight to the room I shared with Mai. Two beefy guys kept a few steps behind him, their shoulders so wide they collided trying to take the stairs at the same time. The taller guy fell back and let the shorter one close the gap on Hayashi.
“Is that Mr. Hayashi?” Shaw’s voice drifted over my shoulder.
I was hiding out in his room since Mai felt it was best to keep her father and me separated. At the moment, I was kneeling on top of the boxy air-conditioning unit in front of the window, being careful to keep the curtains shut
except for a slit.
“Yep.” I widened the gap. “Snazzy dresser, isn’t he?”
“He looks like a mob boss.”
Heat from Shaw’s body warmed my back where he leaned close. He had showered and dressed, but the scent of his damp skin filled the room and distracted me from my snooping.
“Mai says he watched The Godfather one too many times.” I glanced at Shaw over my shoulder and then back at the window. “Her dad is the reynard of one of the larger skulks in west Texas, maybe even the whole state. His kitsunes breed like bunnies.”
The Hayashis had money, but most of it was tied up in keeping so many tiny furry mouths fed.
“There are better ways to amass power that include changing fewer diapers.”
“Maybe, but they take too long.” I laughed under my breath. “He has gorgeous daughters, and I bet each of his ten eldest married into ruling families. His last kit who got hitched is the reason Mai and I ended up in Daytona. She married the reynard of a large central Florida skulk, who owns a condo.”
“Hmm.” He withdrew, taking his citrusy scent with him. “What about their tests?”
“All I can figure is the Hayashi girls fudged their answers.” I tugged on the coarse fabric of the curtains. “Otherwise, the odds of them all landing rich, influential and fated mates are pretty slim.” No family was that blessed. “Mr. Hayashi hasn’t pressured Mai—yet—but she’s his baby. He spoils her rotten. Makes her sisters crazy jealous.”
“I bet.” He lowered his voice. “No one wants to be forced into marriage. Mai’s lucky she’s avoided that fate.”
“So far,” I said.
“So far,” he agreed.
Afraid he might be wearing a tender expression to match his voice, I kept my back to him and avoided peeking at the sliver of his reflection in the glass.
Fifteen minutes later, Daddy Hayashi escorted Mai down the stairs to his waiting car. The taller guard slid behind the wheel. The other turned toward Mai’s coup with a grimace. It would be a long ride for a big guy like that. His legs would have to fold like origami to squeeze into the driver’s seat.
I jerked the curtains shut and spun around on the AC unit to hop off the edge. “And they’re off.”
“We should be leaving soon too.” He checked his cell. “We can’t wait much longer for Diode.”
“Give him a few more minutes.” I stretched out my back. “He’s been acting strange lately.”
“You’ve only known him a few weeks,” Shaw pointed out. “This might be normal for him.”
“I know that. It’s just…” I bit my thumbnail. “I feel connected to him somehow.”
“He was your father’s pet.” He shrugged. “It’s natural for you to want that connection.”
“He wasn’t Mac’s pet.” Diode would shred Shaw to ribbons for insinuating otherwise. “They were associates.”
He shot me an indulgent look. “That sounds like something a cat would say about his master.”
I laughed out loud because he was right, and because cat jokes never got old.
A burst of music from my pocket had me reaching for my phone. I checked the ID and rejected.
“Who was that?” Shaw asked oh so casually.
“A wrong number.”
“Don’t lie to me. You didn’t hesitate. You recognized the number.”
“Fine.” I warned him, “You aren’t going to like it.”
Explaining the odd calls made his face turn so red I expected smoke to come pouring out of his nostrils.
Oops. Guess I had forgotten to mention those during my purge earlier.
After drawing a calming breath, he began pacing. “You have no idea who’s calling you?”
I bumped my cell against my lips. “None.”
His steps slowed. “This guy knew you were in Florida how?”
“No clue. Mable wouldn’t have told him or anyone else. If he showed up in person, someone might have told him I was on vacation or out of the office.” I doubted any of my coworkers would use the S word with a civilian. Gossip about a suspension could discredit a marshal in the eyes of the public. “How this guy connected vacation to Florida, I have no idea.”
“Did he mention Daytona?” He paused for my answer.
I thought about it. “No. He sounded confident he could find me, but he never got specific.”
Shaw rubbed his jaw. “Is it possible some crackpot with an ounce of psy magic got your number?”
“Anything is possible.” The calls didn’t feel random, though. “I do pass out my number sometimes.”
Shaw pulled up short, and a white sheen frosted his eyes. “Why?”
“Informants. Victims. Coworkers.” I smothered a grin. “Hot guys who dig chicks with badges.”
He growled in response.
Still fighting a smile, I waggled my cell at him. “How do you want to handle my gentleman caller?”
“You will stay in my sight.” He jabbed the air in my direction. “If your mystery caller does have a way of locating you, I want to be there when he shows up. Otherwise, we focus on Linen.”
The slow shake of his head when he said Linen this time made me blush. My habit of nicknaming people amused him. These days, he just went with it. To me, Linen rolled off the tongue smoother than the guy who probably drugged Mai or freaky hotel guy.
“There’s one more thing I should mention.” I scrunched up my face. “I’m pretty much broke.”
“Still paying your mother’s bills?”
The way he said it, calm and without inflection, I could have ignored him. He would have returned the favor if I had, but he knew me, and he knew I wouldn’t let a comment like that slide. Not about Mom.
“That’s low, Shaw.”
“What will she do if you go to Faerie? Are you going to warn her that the gravy train is ending? Or will she keep her seat until it smashes headfirst into a wall? Will you even tell her where you’re going?” With visible effort, he reined in his tirade. “All I’m saying is, you see her as a victim—as your victim. You think she sacrificed everything for you, and maybe she did, once, but you’re missing the big picture here. She’s your mom. You love her—”
“You think?”
His voice softened. “She was scared, of you, of me, of all the things she didn’t understand. She did good by you. She brought you to folks who could help. But she never bounced back. She never tried to. She lives in a bubble where she feels safe again, and you’re so damn scared of bursting it you’re tightrope walking over a bed of needles to support her.”
“She’s my mom.”
“And you’re her daughter.”
“It’s my fault—”
“No.” He cut me short. “She had a relationship with your father. You’re the product of that. The result can’t be the fault of the actions preceding it. It’s a calculated outcome, one she was well aware of when she chose to be with your father. You don’t owe her anything. She’s an adult. She made her own choices. You’ve paid her back a hundred times over. She needs to know the truth. All of it.”
My lips pressed together until they startled tingling.
“Say it.” He studied me. “Before your head explodes.”
“She didn’t know who Mac was—what he was.” My chest ached. “Their whole relationship was a lie because if she had known the truth, Mom never would have been with him. She would have…”
I couldn’t say it. It hurt too much to bend my lips around those words.
She would have stamped out the spark of my life before it ignited.
Shaw’s expression gentled. “How is it your fault he lied to her?”
“It’s not,” I snapped.
“Exactly.” He dropped a kiss on the top of my head. “Talk to your mother.”
He gathered our things and headed for his truck, tugging the door shut behind him.
Anger clamped me in a chokehold. Even if I had had a comeback ready, and I didn’t, I couldn’t loosen my fury to spit it out. After a full minute
, I gasped for air and shouted, “Armchair psychologist.”
I found Diode lounging on the shady limb of a bitternut hickory tree with branches overhanging the back half of the parking lot. His furry butt was exposed where anyone looking could see him. I walked under him and yanked on the end of his long tail.
Yowling ensued as Diode tested that whole cats-always-land-on-their-feet thing.
He did, by the way. Land on his feet, I mean.
Morale on the drive back to Daytona hit rock bottom. Forced to cram his long, lean body into the tight space behind our seats, Diode overflowed the extended cab compartment of Shaw’s truck. I let him get away with draping his right front paw and tail over the back of my seat because I figured Orlando had seen stranger and dealt with it just fine. From a distance, Diode could pass for a lifelike movie prop or a plush toy won at a carnie booth in any one of the theme parks. Not that I told him so.
Shaw coasted to a stop at an intersection packed with bikini-clad women carrying yoga mats rolled up under their arms. “Is that the right hotel?”
“Yep.” I hauled my messenger bag onto my lap and groped around the bottom. “That’s it.”
He leaned forward to appreciate its height. “How tight is security?”
“Think muumuu.” Loose was putting it nicely. “It’s a busy hotel in a beachfront town in summer.”
“New faces arriving daily.” He picked up my thought. “Hard to track who is and isn’t a guest.”
“The stock rotates and the pantry replenishes itself.” No two ways about it. “It’s an ideal hunting ground.”
“It’s early.” He spared a glance at Diode. “We need to get a room and stash the cat.”
For once, the cat didn’t argue. He did add, “I’m hungry. There’s nothing to hunt here.”
I twisted around to face him. “You should have mentioned it earlier.”
His claws flexed in and out. “You are traveling light. I don’t want to be a burden.”
“Light? I have you and two guards and… Oh.” I reached behind me to ruffle the fur on his head. “You heard me talking about money.” Apparently, when Mom was handing out life advice, I missed the part where you didn’t talk finances in front of your children or your pets.
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