A Fairy Tale

by Shanna Swendson

  She was so busy looking up as she walked that she tripped and fell. While she was still on the ground, something pounced. She swatted it away, but then something else came at her. Things pulled at her hair, and she felt sharp teeth pierce the skin of her neck.

  Leaping to her feet, she shook them all off and ran back toward the light. Now she knew why she’d been able to escape. They didn’t have to worry about her getting too far. The dark areas where the barrier between fairyland and the real world was thin were too dangerous for her to pass through on her own. She no longer had a destination in mind. She just wanted to get away from these attackers. She ran blindly, as fast as she could go, toward the only source of light she could see.

  The light turned out not to be the flat twilight that counted as daylight in the fairy world. Instead, it was squares of windows. As she drew closer, she saw that the windows were set in a forest hut. Would it be a gingerbread cottage where a witch lured children to their deaths, or would it be the home of a kindly woodsman who would give her shelter?

  Right now, she didn’t care. She wanted these things with their sharp teeth and grabbing hands off her. If it was the witch, she’d just have to shove her in the oven. She reached the hut, wrenched open the door, and found herself in a library.

  Bookcases rose from the floor to a ceiling several stories high—far taller than the cottage had looked from the outside. In addition to the leather-bound volumes she expected to find in a place that looked like it belonged in an Ivy League university, the shelves were filled with battered paperbacks, a few textbooks, lots of magazines—many of them torn or stained—and stacks of yellowed newspapers. It looked like a library made up of things people had left on park benches.

  Once she caught her breath, a wave of exhaustion swept over her. Whatever time it was in fairyland, her body thought she’d been up all night. Even Sophie would be tired, and this library hut seemed like the last place Maeve would go, given the way she’d sneered at the book she’d given Eamon. This was probably about as safe as she’d get in this world.

  Feeling like Goldilocks in the bears’ home, she looked for a place to lie down. The bench by one worktable would be too hard, but there was an overstuffed chair by the fireplace that might be just right. She sat down, slumped against the back, turned sideways to drape her legs over one arm, and dropped off right away.

  She didn’t feel like she’d been asleep long at all when she woke with the sense that someone was watching her. When she got her eyes fully opened, focused, and adjusted to the light, she saw Eamon, her kidnapper, standing in front of her.

  “What are you doing here, Emily Drake?” he asked.

  Nine

  New York City, The Upper West Side—Murray Residence

  Wednesday 5:00 p.m.

  Michael saw Tanaka off, straightened Emily’s apartment from the search, then locked up and headed up to his own place. He had to stop at the top of the stairs to catch his breath and fight off a wave of dizziness, and then a burst of panic struck when he unlocked his apartment door. His heart raced and his hand shook, and he had to remind himself that it was his own apartment. The only individual on the other side of that door was the world’s laziest dog, unless Sophie had made it back without him noticing, and he didn’t think she would shoot him. A door phobia would not be good for his career, so he told himself to get over it and opened the door.

  Although he’d just feared finding someone on the other side of the door, once he was inside he couldn’t help but hold his breath and hope that his apartment wouldn’t be empty this time. But the only sound that greeted him was the jingle from Beau’s tags as the dog lifted his head to acknowledge Michael’s return. Michael let out his pent-up breath in a sigh. “I’m having flashbacks on multiple traumas today,” he told the dog. “That doesn’t sound good, does it? And I’m consulting a dog about my mental health. We’d better not share that with anyone, okay? I’d like to eventually be allowed to carry a firearm again.”

  His stomach growled, reminding him that he hadn’t eaten anything since a Pop Tart sometime that morning. He headed into the kitchen and opened the refrigerator to see if any food had miraculously materialized. Alas, the only thing inside that didn’t require cooking was a half-full container of the soup Emily had brought the night before.

  “Whaddaya think, Beau?” he asked the dog, who’d joined him in the kitchen the moment the refrigerator door opened. “Soup, or call out for delivery?” Beau barked once, letting him know that he wasn’t the only one who was hungry. While the dog danced eagerly around his dish—about the only time he showed much sign of life—Michael measured out dog food.

  There was a knock at the door, and Sophie’s voice called, “It’s Sophie. Don’t get up.” He went out into the hallway as the door opened, just in time to see a bedraggled Sophie enter, holding a plastic bag. She put down her umbrella and stepped out of her shoes in the entryway. Her legs were spattered with mud from the knees down, and the hem of her dress was damp and muddy. “I brought dinner,” she said, holding up the bag. “Has Detective Tanaka already gone?”

  “Yeah. He said it’s okay for you to go into the apartment. I’ve got the key. And Tank took your suitcase down.”

  She set the plastic bag on the dining table. “That was awfully kind of him.”

  “Did you have any trouble?” he asked.

  She frowned and looked down at her damp and mud-spattered clothing. “Oh, yes, that.” Without offering an explanation, she said, “I hope you like Chinese.” Before he could answer, she headed into the kitchen and came back with plates and silverware. “I didn’t get anything to drink. Is water okay?”

  “Yeah, water’s fine.” He stood there helplessly as she went past him back into the kitchen and filled two glasses with water before bringing them to the table, where she unpacked the plastic bag, bringing out several to-go boxes. He had so many questions about what was going on with her that he didn’t know where to start. Not that he’d get a straight answer out of her, so it probably wasn’t worth trying, he decided.

  “Since you’ve got a bad arm, I’ll make a plate for you. I got cashew chicken and Hunan beef. Would you like a little of both?”

  “Uh, yeah, that’ll be good,” he said, realizing that once again she’d taken over the role of hostess in his home. He got the feeling she did that everywhere she went. If she went to dinner at the White House, she’d welcome the other guests and ask the president if there was anything she could bring him from the kitchen.

  She loaded a plate with food and set it in front of him with a fork and a napkin. “Soy sauce?”

  “No, I’m good. And thanks for dinner. You didn’t have to do this.” Though he was glad she had.

  She dished rice onto her own plate. “Nonsense. I’ve put you to so much trouble. It’s the least I could do.” She finished filling her plate, took her seat, then asked, “Did you find anything interesting in Emily’s apartment, or are you not allowed to tell me?”

  “If she came home last night, she left again and took her wallet and her phone.” He recapped the rest of what they’d found, including the phone messages. “I’m sorry, but we don’t have a lot of leads.”

  “It’s still early,” she said, sounding so calm that he would have been suspicious if he hadn’t heard her frantic messages. “I can hardly expect instant results.”

  “I’m curious about one thing, though,” he said. “Your phone message mentioned the feeling you had being like another time with Emily. Was that anything that might be relevant here?”

  She reacted ever so slightly—so slightly that he couldn’t read her reaction. Then she waved her hand dismissively. “Oh, it was something that happened when we were kids. She got lost in the woods when we were camping, and I knew she needed me to come find her.”

  “I bet that knack of yours comes in handy.”

  “It’s brought me nothing but trouble. Trust me, you do not want to be the first one on the scene when someone dies.”

  “
I know that. Crime scenes are my job.”

  “But how often are you the one to find the body?” Her eyes softened into something that looked a lot like pity. He noticed what Tank had meant about her eyes being different colors. The difference was subtle enough that it wasn’t immediately obvious, but once noticed, it became disconcerting. “I’m sorry to put you through this,” she said. “Emily didn’t tell me about your wife, or I never would have involved you.”

  He nearly choked on the bite he’d just taken. “What?” he blurted before coughing as some rice went down the wrong way. She jumped out of her seat and came around to pound him on the back.

  “Can you breathe?” she asked, and when he nodded, she handed him his glass of water and ordered him to drink.

  Once he could get enough air to talk, he croaked, “How did you know?”

  “I couldn’t help but notice,” she said, returning to her seat. “You wear a wedding ring and there’s a wedding photo on your bookcase, but otherwise this looks like a bachelor’s apartment. Detective Tanaka seemed far more concerned about you than he was about me, which gave me the impression you’d gone through something similar. In fact, I suspect he came here more because of you than because he thought this case needed immediate action.”

  He nodded weakly and forced a smile. “Have you ever considered an investigative career?”

  She raised an eyebrow. “I’m sure the NYPD recruits a lot of ballet teachers.” She hesitated, then asked gently, “What happened to your wife?”

  Normally, he didn’t like talking about it because he’d had to talk about it so much when it first happened and it came up again whenever any cop found anything so much as resembling a lead. Now, though, he found himself wanting to discuss it with someone who might understand. “It was a lot like this, actually. She was even an actress. She didn’t show up for a performance one night. Sometime between having lunch with a friend and the cast call for that night, she vanished without a trace.”

  “That must have been very difficult for you, even as a police officer.”

  “Yeah, it was. When something bad happens to a woman, it’s usually the husband or boyfriend who did it. That made me the number-one suspect. Luckily for me, I was working crowd control for a big event that day. I was surrounded by cops the entire time between when she was seen last and when she didn’t turn up. I was on closed-circuit security footage that whole day. I had the most airtight alibi in the history of alibis. And the investigating detectives still acted like they thought I’d rigged the whole thing, or like I’d been so horrible that she’d given up everything to get away from me.”

  “She was never found?”

  He hated to answer and possibly dash her hopes, but he didn’t think Sophie Drake was likely to crumble from hearing the truth. “Not yet. I’m not giving up, though.”

  “How long has it been?”

  “Seven years.”

  Her eyes went unfocused, and she said absently, talking more to herself than to him, “Seven years ago Emily had just come to New York. Mama was violently opposed to that scheme, but it was all Emily ever wanted, and she didn’t see any point in waiting.” She blinked back to the present and added, “It seems like so long ago, doesn’t it?”

  “Yeah, it does. And some days, it’s like it was yesterday.”

  She followed his gaze to the wedding photo on the nearby bookcase, showing a man who now seemed like a stranger, so young and innocent, wearing a police dress uniform and smiling at a tall, red-haired woman in a wedding gown and veil. Sophie bit her lip as she looked at the photo, then abruptly pushed her chair back and stood. “Are you done with that?” she asked, indicating his plate.

  He wasn’t hungry anymore. “Yeah, thanks.”

  She gathered the dishes, took them into the kitchen, and came back for the to-go containers. “I’ll leave you the leftovers so you’ll have some meals for later.” He felt like a heel for sitting there while she cleaned up and washed the dishes in his home, but he did have an arm out of commission. Even with two good arms, he doubted he could have matched her pace. She moved so briskly she practically blurred.

  After she’d finished cleaning up, she came back to the table and said, “And now if you’ve got that key, I’ll get out of your hair. I can take Beau. You’ve had to do enough dog-sitting.”

  “I don’t mind. I should warn you that he snores. I can keep him out here and shut out the worst of it, but Emily doesn’t have a separate bedroom.”

  “I’ve spent enough nights in my grandmother’s room, and even a bulldog has nothing on her. But if you want to keep him …”

  It occurred to him that she might want the company. “You go ahead, if you want to keep him with you. But I’ll take him if he keeps you awake.”

  “Okay, then. Now, the key?” He took it out of his tracksuit pocket and handed it to her, but when he moved to stand, she shook her head. “You stay here. I’m quite capable of making it downstairs on my own. You need to rest.”

  She hooked Beau’s leash onto his collar, picked up her purse and umbrella, and said, “Does Beau also have supplies at Emily’s place, or will I need to take his things downstairs?”

  “He should have everything he needs.”

  “Okay. Well, have a good evening, and thank you again for everything.” Before he had a chance to respond, she was gone, and he was left with his head spinning. She’d suddenly gone frantic—or what passed for frantic in the unflappable Sophie Drake. Her mood had changed when she looked at the wedding picture, so he got up to get a closer look. What about it had upset her so much?

  One glance gave him a good idea. Funny, he’d never noticed any resemblance between Jen and Emily. They were totally different types, but now that he looked at the photo, thinking like a cop instead of like a husband, he realized that he’d use the same words to describe them if he were writing a report. It was too much to be coincidence: Two women who lived in the same building, who fit the same general description, and who even had the same profession had vanished without a trace, almost exactly seven years apart. Was this the break he needed?

  Or was he seeing patterns that weren’t there, trying to find sense in something senseless?

  He’d turned this case over to the police, and now it was none of his business. And yet, if they found Emily, they might find Jennifer, or at least they might learn what happened to her and he could put her to rest. He couldn’t sit on the sidelines now.

  He called Tanaka. “Say, Tank, there’s something I’d like you to check,” he said. “Could you run a missing persons search on all females in their late twenties at the time of their disappearance who are tall and have red hair? If you get any, see how many are actresses.”

  “You think this is connected to Jen?”

  “It is a pretty staggering coincidence.”

  “Was Emily Drake living in that building when Jen disappeared?”

  “No. But she was on the Upper West Side.”

  “Two points don’t make a pattern, Rev.”

  “That’s why I’m asking you to check for more points. I don’t expect you to find dozens of cases, or else we’d have noticed, but it’s possible that there have been others and they were too spread out for parallels to be obvious.”

  “Okay, I’ll check. Now, remember, you’re not working this case. Go lie down and take it easy. See if that little ballerina will cook you dinner. I bet she’s the type who’ll stuff you with home-cooked meals while she’s here.”

  “She already brought me Chinese.”

  Tanaka laughed. “Of course she did. It probably softened you up for her interrogation.”

  Michael was glad Tanaka wasn’t there in person, or he’d have surely seen from Michael’s face that he was right. She had managed to get a lot of information out of him. “While I lie down, you get to work,” he said.

  But he didn’t want to lie down. He didn’t feel like this could wait. Tank was good, but he was as overworked as every other detective in this city, and Michael had a
feeling that if he got Sophie on board, she might make more headway with the theater people. If they hurried, they might even be able to catch the cast as they arrived at the theater.

  Ten

  The Realm—The Library

  Immediately Afterward

  Emily tried to hide her surprise as she muttered, “Somebody’s been lying in my bed, and here she is!” Eamon didn’t seem to appreciate the reference. She sat up straight, swinging her legs around to plant her feet on the floor. With a glare she felt had to be as good as anything Sophie had ever dished out, she added, “What am I doing here? You kidnapped me!”

  He smiled at her, but the firelight made his mercury eyes look demonic, which canceled out any friendliness from his expression. “I brought you to the Realm, but I did not bring you to the library. I asked what you are doing in the library.”

  “I was out for a walk and thought I’d drop by.”

  He didn’t respond to her sarcasm, if he even caught it. “But how did you leave Maeve’s court?”

  She struck a dramatic pose. “With style and pizzazz.”

  “How did you find my library?”

  “I just stumbled on it,” she said with a shrug.

  He frowned—that is, his eyebrows moved toward each other, though his brow remained uncreased. “I find that unlikely. Few can find this library. You came from the Borderlands, didn’t you?”

  “If that’s what you call the dark, creepy place with all the tree roots, yeah. I had these things after me, then I saw the light in the windows, and, well, here I am.” Thinking about it made her brush at her shoulders and rake her fingers through her hair to make sure those things were all gone. “That’s where your front door leads?”