Dog Eat Dog World: Limited Edition Bundle (Black Dog)

by Hailey Edwards

  “Ryuu,” I breathed.

  His eyes sparkled under the overhead lights as he approached. “May I have this dance?”

  My head bobbled on my neck, and I took his hand, falling into the steps while marveling at how well he matched me. “How did—?”

  “I reached out to Thierry.” He pulled me as close as the skirt allowed. “She coordinated with Katsuo to make the costume and teach me the dance.”

  “I don’t understand.” The room whirled around me, dizzying. “You left. I went to Talpa, and the skulk was gone.”

  “I swore to your father I wouldn’t contact you, and I am a man of my word.” He stared down at me with a burning intensity I felt to the tips of my toes. “I returned to the camp one last time to retrieve…” Dusky red spots darkened in his already flushed cheeks. “I wanted the pillow you slept on in the holding room.”

  Already in danger of melting, my heart puddled. Ryuu had kept a pillow because it smelled like me.

  “I watched you sitting on that hill with tears on your cheeks,” he said softly, “and I never wanted to see you hurt that way again.” His thumb caressed the top of my hand. “I screwed up, Mai.” Heat followed in the wake of his touch. “You’re my mate, and I used you.”

  I suppressed the tingles ignited by his touch. “Yes, you did.”

  “I drove a wedge between you and your family in order to save mine.”

  “Again, not arguing with you.” Even though we both knew he could have made his case that the wedge had already been there, I just hadn’t felt the pinch until he exposed me to it.

  His harsh sigh told me I wasn’t making reconciliation easy for him. Boo-hoo. Time to face the music, hot stuff. The number ended, and he spun me into a dip that trailed my hair across the polished floor. His lips whispered over mine, and my heart stuttered. I didn’t remember leaving the stage, but the next thing I knew he had pinned me against the wall in a darkened corner of the prop room.

  “I moved the skulk to a subdivision in Kermit.” He gazed down at me, a spark of excitement lighting his eyes. “We’re putting down roots. No more tents. No more living out of boxes. No more fighting other skulks for land or fleeing our homes in the middle of the night.”

  I pressed my back flat against a mural to earn myself room to breathe. “How could you afford all that?” I had seen the way they lived. Moving so many bodies from tent town into brick-and-mortar homes would have cost a fortune.

  “Your father didn’t fund the move, if that’s what’s worrying you.” He captured one of my hair ribbons and rubbed it between his fingers. “My father was a shrewd man. He saved most of his income and made smart investments. Exile made working among fae difficult, so we turned to the human world for employment. The skulk paid me tithes, and I invested that too.”

  “You lived in tents,” I argued. “They were very nice tents, but why? When you had means to live better?”

  “My father moved us from the Hayashi territory into apartments while he decided what was best for our family.” He released the ribbon. “Another skulk had noticed us moving into their territory and forced us out within the week. We had no sentries, no one to protect us. So we ran.” He shrugged. “After it happened a second time, my parents decided to travel light and live sparsely on the fringes of society. It made the constant moving easier, and it allowed us all to save the majority of our incomes for the past eight years.”

  I tried envisioning him laboring alongside humans and failed. “What do you do for a living?”

  “I’m a welder,” he said with no small amount of pride. “It’s a skill I learned from my mother’s people.”

  And the type of job he could pick up and drop as he moved from city to city with relative ease.

  “I know you’re interning at the conclave’s youth center.” He studied me through dark lashes. “The question is why?”

  “For Thierry,” I answered. “Well, not Tee exactly, but for other fae kids like her. Ones who come into their powers and hurt others while learning to control them.”

  “You have a big heart. I’ve always known that.” He stroked my cheek. “I worried you would grow jaded by time and privilege, but you’re still Mai, still the little girl who wore princess dresses and carried a cardboard sword.”

  My head fell back against the wall, and I laughed. That ensemble I recalled with perfect clarity. It had driven my parents crazy. “I rode my white horse—” or should that be drove my green coupe? “—all the way to Talpa to save you.”

  “Still the warrior princess,” he said under his breath.

  “Mom entrusted my dowry to me.” I tugged absently at one of the ruffles covering his chest. The shock still hadn’t worn thin. “I own land and have control of my trust. I thought—I don’t know what I thought. I just wanted to see you. I wanted to help your family.”

  Ryuu’s thick arms banded around me, and he hauled me closer, despite resistance from my skirt. His cheek rubbed against mine, the smell of his skin intoxicating. “I don’t deserve you.”

  I fisted the lapels of his coat and jerked until he drew back. “I want a do-over.”

  A flicker of undefinable emotion crossed his face. “You want to test me?”

  I had thought about it. A lot. One of the defining moments of my life had been stolen from me, and I regretted that, but I had all the proof I required that what he claimed was the truth. Even if I didn’t feel that magnetic pull in my gut that made me yearn to be near him, and I did, I knew my father. He wouldn’t have acted so decisively, losing a valuable resource and a friend in Saburo Tanabe, if it weren’t.

  “No.” I couldn’t deny that which I felt to my bones. “You’re mine.”

  A pleased rumble vibrated through his chest. “You’re accepting me as your mate.”

  “On a trial basis,” I warned before the wig popped off his head as his ego inflated. “There’s fate and then there’s forever. I want us both to be sure.”

  He dropped a quick kiss on my lips that left my knees wobbling. “I will win your heart,” he vowed with such heated intensity that I couldn’t look away, let alone doubt him. “You will love me as much as you love Labyrinth fanfiction.”

  “How did you—?” A furious blush sizzled my cheeks. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Please, you’ve always wanted Jareth and Sarah to end up together,” he said on a snort. “You might not remember all the late-night Labyrinth marathons, but I do.”

  Shocked, I tipped my head back to stare up at him. “You’re telling me you’ve actually seen the movie?”

  “Only fifty or sixty thousand times.” He laughed at my surprise. “How else do you think I passed the shiren?” Magic was on the tip of my tongue, but his answer was more practical. “You were a persistent kid, and you carried that VHS with you everywhere. You always said at the end that Sarah was crazy for wanting her crybaby brother back. You said you’d trade any one of your sisters to be the Goblin Queen.”

  I choked on a laugh, because it sounded exactly like something I would have said back then. Or, you know, five minutes ago.

  “I am impressed, Mr. Tanabe.” I reached up and caressed the blade of his cheek with my fingertips. “We should do more of this.”

  “Necking in the dark?” He sounded hopeful.

  I slapped his chest. “Getting to know each other.”

  “That works too.” His arms tightened around me, lifting me onto my tiptoes to greet his lips when he lowered his head for a kiss. “I meant what I said, Mai.” He went stone-cold serious. “I will earn your love.”

  “I look forward to you trying,” I teased, threading my fingers through his wig and yanking his hot mouth down to mine. I caved to temptation, parted my lips and tasted him. Ryuu’s flavor sank into my bones, and my heart thudded against my ribs. “I won’t make it easy. I expect some first-class wooing to atone for that whole abduction-and-abandonment thing.” A wicked thought occurred to me. “I do have an idea if you can handle it.”

 
A groan escaped him. “Why do I get the feeling I’m about to agree to learning more choreography while wearing tights?”

  “You dance so well.” I ruffled his hair. “What’s one—” I coughed or three into my fist, “—more routine between friends?” I played my trump card. “Besides, you thanked me like a newb. You owe me one.”

  He slid a finger between his frilly collar and his throat. “Mai…”

  “Hold that thought. I’m having a flashback. There’s a small room. Bars on the windows. Guards outside the door.” I scrunched up my face. “Hmm. The guy who locked me in there looked a lot like you. You have the same eyes.”

  He rubbed a finger between his eyebrows. “You’re never going to let me live that down, are you?”

  “Chances are…” I pretended to think about it. “Nope.”

  It would make for one heck of a how I met your mother story for our kits one day.

  “Fine.” His chest rumbled against mine. “I put myself into your very capable hands.”

  “Hey, there are kids present,” a voice called.

  I craned my neck to see around his shoulder. “Tee?”

  She wiggled her fingers at me.

  “Mai,” a small voice squealed. “You look like a princess. Can I try on the dress later? Please?”

  “Gen? Hey, brat.” I ruffled her hair when she bounded up to me. “Sure you can.”

  Katsuo, who trailed Whirlwind Gen out of the shadows, scuffed his boots as he crossed to us. “Hi, Mai.”

  “Traitor,” I accused. “I expect this type of treachery from Thierry, but et tu, Katsuo?”

  He leaned in and kissed my cheek. “You can thank me later.”

  With a tug on Gen’s ponytail, he retreated with her to where Shinji waited with Thierry. The small gathering looked on, Thierry urging Gen to help her make kissy noises at us while Shinji leaned into Katsuo and sang Mai and Ryuu sittin’ in a tree under his breath.

  I returned my attention to Ryuu and the hard press of his body against mine. “It seems we have an audience.”

  Staring at my lips, he murmured, “Funny, I don’t see anyone but you.”

  Dead in the Water

  Gemini, Book 1

  Dead in the Water Blurb

  Gemini, Book 1

  Camille Ellis is the Earthen Conclave’s golden girl. Her peculiar talent solves cases with a single touch, and she isn’t afraid to get her hands dirty. But the brightest stars cast the deepest shadows, and her grim secrets lurk just beneath the skin.

  A routine job goes sideways when the victim’s brother barges into the investigation demanding answers. Consumed with grief, the warg will go to any lengths to avenge his sister’s death. Even if it means ensuring Cam’s cooperation at the jaws of his wolf.

  Chapter 1

  Seven out-of-state crime scenes in seven months was seven too many. Every fourth Wednesday dread ballooned in my chest during the short drive from home to the local marshal’s office until I marveled that my ribs didn’t crack under the pressure. On those days I had fallen into the habit of perching on the edge of my task chair, fingers cramped from gripping the desk’s edge as I stared at the phone, willing it not to ring.

  But it always did.

  Each time I hung up with Magistrate Vause, every time I agreed to consult on a drowning case, I told myself this was the last one, that I had atoned, that Lori wouldn’t want me to keep punishing myself. Then I grabbed the go bag I kept packed by the door and drove to the airport.

  Today’s call came as prompt as all the others, and so here I was, in a new state, at a fresh scene, decked out in my investigative best. Pressed slacks. Button-up blouse. Light jacket enchanted with a chill spell against the Deep South humidity that breathed steam down my neck the second I stepped from my frosty rental car onto the shade-dappled asphalt.

  “You must be Agent Ellis.” A wiry man made thinner by his sweat-drenched dress shirt approached me with his arm extended. His sleeves were rolled up past his forearms, and mud stained the cuffs. “I’m Decker Comeaux, and this is my crime scene. I appreciate you flying out to consult.”

  Out being Villanow, Georgia.

  “No problem.” I clasped hands with him. The low hum of his magic made my fingertips tingle. “Elf?” His grip went limp. “You’re using a third-tier glamour.” A quality one at that. “Those ears must be hard to cover.”

  The fingers of his opposite hand smoothed over the rounded top of one ear as if searching for a point. He dropped his hands and shoved them into his pockets to give them somewhere to go. Or maybe just to keep them away from me. “They warned me you had unusual talents.”

  I massaged the base of my neck, fingers slipping down into my shirt collar like a warning label was a physical tag I could hide. “Unusual is one word for it.”

  Plenty of fae were unique. I wasn’t special. Just different.

  His smile conveyed the exact right amount of empathy. It made me wonder if he practiced the expression in a mirror before work each day. “The body is this way if you’d like to take a look.”

  Like wasn’t the word I would have used. I wasn’t in Villanow because I wanted to be. I was here because the method of death called to me, a perverse obsession I had as much control over as taking my next breath.

  Comeaux eyed me expectantly, and I realized I hadn’t answered him yet. “Sure.” I tossed him the key fob to my rental. “Do me a favor and hold on to that.”

  After tucking the hunk of plastic into his pocket with an amused twitch of his lips, he led me past eight unmarked black SUVs overflowing the cramped parking area at the trailhead. We hiked for a while until a crater emerged from among the trees. It must have spanned three acres across. A more generous soul might have called it a dead lake, but that sounded morbid given the circumstances. Morbid or not, the empty bed was as dry as the grass crunching under my feet. Thanks to the summer draught, only the deepest portion of the bowl retained any water.

  Sweat trickled down my nape despite the cool weight of my jacket. Water, no matter how fresh, always carried the underlying scents of decomposition. Rotting fish corpses. Molding leaves. Urine. Feces. Ponds were swimming pools for bacteria, and my sinuses burned when I caught that first whiff of decay, stinging my nasal passages like I had inhaled a gallon of saltwater.

  Seagulls cried.

  Waves crashed.

  Lori gurgled as her head vanished beneath the swell of white foam.

  “Are you all right?” He squinted in the same direction as me. “That’s where she was found, if that’s what you’re wondering.”

  “Yeah.” Throat tight, I ripped my gaze from the water. “I figured.”

  “We documented the scene then moved the remains to a tent.” He indicated a white geodesic affair sheltered by the limbs of forgiving pine trees. “There’s a fan hooked up to make the heat more bearable, but the smell…”

  Nothing anyone could do about that.

  Showing the pond my back made the skin covering my spine twitch. But now that my sights were locked on the dingy material pitched several yards away, I focused there and on what waited inside for me. No. Not what. Who.

  My fingers didn’t shake when I lifted the tent flap. If they had, I was ready to blame all the chai I had tossed back during the long drive from the airport out to the middle of nowhere. Three other fae were congregated inside, and the tight-knit group had parked themselves in the far corner where a steady click, click, click made it obvious they were here for the cooler air and not for the body.

  They were all men, so it must have taken balls to stand beside a dead girl and whine about a few sweat stains under your pits.

  A ripple effect hit as each head turned until I held the group’s collective attention. What they saw on my face sent them bolting out the rear flap and left me alone in the oppressive heat with the victim. Drawing out the moment, I examined every sweltering inch of the interior except for what lay before me, until I caught myself reading the ingredients off a label of hand sanitizer and force
d my gaze front and center.

  A neon-blue tarp stretched across a commandeered picnic table. I got downwind of the oscillating fan, and it blasted me full-on with the stench of meat gone ripe from too much sun. A white and wrinkly maggot inched over the emaciated curve of the victim’s hip, and some primal response had me tasting what I ate for breakfast in the back of my throat. I kept down the cereal bar, but it was a near thing, and I didn’t think I would ever taste strawberries again without remembering this moment.

  A young girl was curled on her side on top of the plastic. She was nude, and her pale skin held a blueish tint. Without touching her it was hard to tell if temperature was a factor or if the reflection of the tarp was playing tricks on me. Her fragile limbs had bloated from her time spent in the water, and the flesh had burst in places like overstuffed sausage casing. One arm stopped at the elbow and exposed bone protruded, white and gleaming. Chestnut hair clung like freshwater seaweed to her spine, dripping brown-tinted liquid that flowed in rivulets off the table to quench the thirsty earth below.

  A quick check over my shoulder confirmed I was still alone. With the sun at his back, Comeaux’s silhouette was visible through the thin fabric separating us. He was half-turned, arguing with someone. One of the guys I had spooked away from the fan was probably tattling on me.

  “Enough with the stalling,” I muttered. Skin crawling with grim resolve, I pressed a single finger to the girl’s spine through the filter of her damp hair. Residual power answered that barest touch with sickening force, and I had my answer.

  Godsdamn it. I recognized the magical signature. She was one of ours all right. Another victim of a serial killer agents of the Earthen Conclave had nicknamed Charybdis, after a mythical sea monster.

  The girl’s species eluded me. A hint of earthy magic convinced me her people were native to this realm and not a descendant of Faerie. Indigenous magic registered on my scale in an indeterminate way, making the brush of Charybdis’s power all the easier to identify for it.