by Nalini Singh
Inside was even more kitschy, if that was possible.
Ian and I were arriving first, to be followed by Mike, Steve, and Elana in a few minutes. Ian said we didn’t want to attract attention by arriving in a group. I had news for my partner—in this place, no one would have noticed.
Fairy Tails looked like the set of a low-budget fantasy movie. Really low. The walls had been painted—badly—to look like castle stone. And every few feet were “torches” made of yellow bulbs and those yellow/red/orange strips of parachute fabric cut to look like flames. There was an air source coming from somewhere that made the flames flap around like the arms of those inflatable tube people you see at used car dealerships. What I assumed was the VIP section had thrones for seating. And yes, behind the bar were the expected plastic tankards and goblets. And to top off the themed experience, the bartenders were Little Red Riding Hood and the Big, Bad Wolf. The guy in the wolf suit was plenty big, but there was nothing little about what was about to pop out the top of Red’s red leather corset. Those couldn’t possibly be real.
I had to say it. “Maybe you should bring Yasha here for his birthday. He and Red might hit it off.”
My partner didn’t dignify that with a response.
We were seated by Tinker Bell.
She was made up and dressed just like the Disney version, that is if Tink was about to shoot a porno with Peter Pan and the Lost Boys. I didn’t think Pete and his boys would have been quite so lost if Tink had been flitting around in what the hostess was mostly not wearing.
Moments later, our Disney parade continued when Snow White showed up to take our drink order. Her getup was the familiar Disney version except the bodice was way lower, and the skirt cut so much higher as to be virtually nonexistent. I guarantee Snow would have had a whole different relationship with those seven dwarves if she’d been sashaying around their house in that.
I don’t think Snow even realized I was there. Though it was obvious she had no trouble seeing Ian, and was making it abundantly clear that drinks weren’t all she was offering. I told myself right then and there that if she offered him a lap dance, leprechauns on the lam be damned, I was out of there. Though I really couldn’t blame her; most of the men in this place wouldn’t have been called prized bulls on their best days.
Ian ordered a beer—thankfully without a side order of Snow.
Pursing her red lips in a disappointed pout, she turned to leave.
I cleared my throat loudly. “I’ll have a Coke, please.”
“Will that be diet?” Snow White asked sweetly.
“No.” I forced myself to smile. “Thank you.” Where was an evil queen and poison apple when you needed one?
Snow flounced off, and I closed my eyes and briefly pondered the insides of my eyelids. Maybe the caffeine would help my headache, and keep me from having to prop my eyes open with those little plastic swords Fairy Tails probably used to spear the olives in their martinis, though from the looks of their clientele, they didn’t get many requests for those.
Snow brought our drinks, Ian’s came in a faux pewter stein, and apparently Coke warranted a goblet. Though after baring her teeth in a smile frosty enough to give the Wicked Queen a run for her money, I decided to leave that Coke right where she put it. Caffeine was overrated, and if I needed help staying alert, I’d just pinch myself occasionally.
Mike, Steve, and Elana came in a few minutes later and were seated at the table nearest to ours, but even closer to the back exit. I guess if I saw our quarry, and one or more of them tried to make a break for it, our agents’ job would be to cut off their escape.
While looking around the club for our wayward leprechauns in disguise, I couldn’t help but notice that more than a few of the men in the club were looking at me. Maybe I was being overly sensitive, but it seemed to me like Elana and I were getting more attention wearing clothes than the women on the stage who were one step up from starkers. You’d think they’d never seen women before, at least not any with all of their clothes on. Either that or they liked the idea of women watching other women. Pervs.
I’d put on the super spy gadget sunglasses, so at least I wouldn’t have to make eye contact with them. They’d probably think I was embarrassed that my date had brought me here. While my glare would have been worthless, with or without the shades, my partner’s was in perfect working order. Men looked once, found themselves on the receiving end of Ian Byrne’s I-will-kick-your-ass scowl, and hurriedly looked away to find more interesting things to occupy their attention.
“If you’re concerned about your safety—” Ian began.
A man that bore a disturbing resemblance to a hundred-year-old Danny DeVito scurried back to his table counting out a handful of ones. I felt my lip curl. Either the bartenders made change, or Fairy Tails had its own ATM that spit out small bills.
“I’m more worried about the contents of my stomach,” I told him.
Though what I could use more than a handful of Tums were earplugs. The music was so loud it felt like the fillings were being vibrated out of my teeth, and the flashing disco lights were either going to give me a seizure or the mother of all migraines.
After my first scan of the club came up empty for leprechauns, I made myself at least glance at the dancers. Why not? I was wearing sunglasses that weren’t sunglasses, and could look without anyone, including my partner, seeing me watch. It was kind of daring and dangerous when I thought of it that way.
Cinderella had traded in her glass slippers for Lucite stripper heels, and her shoes weren’t all that see-through. Though after less than a minute of watching her perform moves with a pole that I wouldn’t have thought physically or gravitationally possible, I realized that I was a lot less embarrassed than I thought I’d be. I mean, let’s face it, the dancers had all the same boobs and bits that I had, just more of the former and were more imaginative with the landscaping and decoration of the latter.
But mainly they all looked bored. Sleeping Beauty was dancing like she was still asleep, or wished she was. And Cinderella looked like she was thinking that midnight would never get here. Their lips might have been set on smile, but their eyes said their minds were elsewhere. Maybe sorting laundry—don’t wash silver pasties with that hot pink G-string again. Or the bald guy drooling at the front table made one of them remember to pick up a honeydew melon at the store tomorrow.
They were the ones with their lady bits on display, not me. If they didn’t care, why should I be embarrassed? Stripping was a job, just like any other, except strippers could write off waxing on their taxes. When I thought about it like that, none of this was really that big of a deal. Speaking of taxes, SPI must have a creative accounting department to be able to slip things like strip club cover charges past the IRS as a business expense.
Did Ian think about it in a similar way or was he just that disciplined? He hadn’t gotten all that desk flair from letting anything affect his focus. Or maybe he simply preferred his women with factory-original parts rather than aftermarket enhancements. I took a quick glance down at my girls. As far as I could tell they weren’t anything special to look at, but at least I’d rolled off the line with them.
I glanced back up to find Ian Byrne—the senior agent at my new employment—watching me checking myself out in a strip club.
Oh, sweet Jesus.
Ignoring him—and the shadow of a smile I detected and any thoughts that may have been going on behind it—I resumed doing my job, scanning the club for leprechauns. And rogue goblins.
I saw plenty of hootin’ and hollerin’ men, but what I didn’t see where any horny leprechauns or greedy goblins, and I was frustrated by the former, and quite frankly relieved at the latter.
I leaned toward my partner. “You said we were gonna have goblins.”
“They’re the most likely competition.” Ian’s alertness increased by ten without his moving a muscle, including his lips. Impressive. “You see any?”
“No, but I’ve been wondering what we�
�re gonna do if or when they do show up.”
“Unless they’re standing between us and a leprechaun, we’ll just keep an eye on them. It’s a free country, and unless they break the law, that’s all we’ll do.”
“And if I see a goblin with a leprechaun?”
“We will encourage the goblin to mind his or her own business.”
“And if their business happens to be catching a leprechaun?”
“We’ll do whatever we have to do to stop it.”
Fair enough.
Fairy Tails’ seats left a lot to be desired in terms of comfort. I shifted in my seat to cross my legs—at least I tried.
And I froze in complete revulsion.
The bottoms of my shoes were stuck to the floor.
Ian must have seen my horrified expression even with the sunglasses, and his right hand instinctively moved toward his gun. “What is it?”
“My shoes are stuck to the floor.” Each word was higher, squeakier, and closer to panic than the one before. I couldn’t help it.
“It’s spilled beer,” Ian hurried to assure me.
“Beer is sticky?”
“Beer could be . . . sticky.” Ian reassured me in the same tone he’d use to talk someone off a ledge.
I wasn’t having it. Panic was in the driver’s seat and had taken the wheel. I felt tears welling up in my eyes. “It’s not beer.”
These shoes were going in the garbage as soon as I got home, if not before. Maybe I could convince Ian to add new shoes to his expense report. I loved these shoes. I’d spent more money than I should’ve on these shoes, but no amount of money was enough to pay me to keep them after tonight. And the bottle of hand sanitizer in my purse wasn’t nearly enough to wash this place off the rest of me.
I took a deep breath and tried not to think of my shoes and . . . beer.
Focus on the job, Mac. The nice job. The one you really like.
But Disney porn princesses, ATMs next to the bathrooms, fake fire, plastic goblets, even more plastic riding high in Red’s corset, and sticky floors from God only knows what. This wasn’t worth insurance and a 401k. Nothing was worth this.
Focus, Mac.
I glanced at my watch. It was a little before midnight. We had to find, apprehend, and deliver five leprechauns before dawn. And buy new shoes. This was New York City. There had to be all-night shoe shops. I’ll bet Elana knew.
Talk, Mac. Talking will help.
“You’d think that a leprechaun prince would have more . . .”
“Taste?” Ian finished for me.
“To say the least.”
Ian looked around with a dismal sigh. “Hate to burst your bubble.”
I wiggled my toes in my stuck shoes. “Oh, it’s long gone.”
I wasn’t the only one who was less than comfortable here. Mike and Steve the elves were both staring at Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty in open-mouthed disbelief. Elana had an impressive facepalm going, and her shoulders were shaking with laughter.
At a two-beat lull in the pounding music, I heard Steve say, “Can you say copyright infringement?”
Mike nodded in agreement. “Walt’s doing wheelies in his urn.”
Elana’s shoulders shook harder.
Ian put down his beer. “They’re not going to show. There’s something we’re missing.”
“Besides leprechauns—and new shoes?” I asked hopefully.
“Yes.” He stood. “We’re wasting time. Let’s get out of here.”
That was the best idea I’d heard all night.
I thought the next two clubs had to be better.
I was wrong.
And to make it even worse, I was running out of hand sanitizer.
Three sleazy strip joints. Three strikes. Same shoes.
Unfortunately, three strikes didn’t mean we were out by any stretch of the imagination, or that we could call it a night. Our night didn’t end until we found those leprechauns.
Ian had been talking on his Bluetooth, checking in with the other two teams. Not only were we running out of viable clubs to check, we were running out of night. The prince and his bachelor party were due home by dawn, and we weren’t any closer to getting the job done.
“Anybody else get lucky?” I asked, completely over any and all embarrassment I might have had letting a double entendre slip.
A larger problem for me than the lack of leprechauns in any of the first three clubs was the lack of a usable ladies’ room in any of them. I’d assumed they all had ladies’ rooms; it’s just that Satan would be serving sno-cones in Hell before I would’ve set foot in any of them. Even the time-honored squat ‘n’ hover method wasn’t an option. If the floors in the clubs were sticky, I didn’t even want to think about what the bathrooms looked like. And I really needed a clean bathroom right now. I’d been fairly certain our waitresses in the next two clubs hadn’t been trying to poison me, so I’d had more Coke than my bladder could comfortably hold. Not to mention, if Yasha hit one more pothole, I was liable to let out a burp that’d ring his windshield, right before I’d wet my pants.
“Aren’t leprechauns in the Seelie Court?” I asked Ian, trying to keep my mind off the impending rupture of my bladder. “And isn’t the Seelie Court the good guys?”
“When it comes to the fairy courts, there aren’t good guys and bad guys,” he told me. “There’s just entirely too many what’s-in-it-for-me guys—and gals. All goblins and Unseelie aren’t evil, and all elves and Seelie aren’t good. There’s a whole lot of gray out there, more than black and white combined.”
“If the leprechauns know they’re in danger, why don’t they turn themselves in?”
“Because leprechauns are adrenaline junkies.”
“So they like being in danger?”
“Like it and will seek it out.” Ian stopped and spat a whispered curse.
“What is it?”
“Yasha, take us to Bacchanalia.”
The Russian werewolf shot Ian a sharp look in the rearview mirror. “Daredevil is one thing; suicide is another.”
“That’s where they’ve gone. And if they’ve been there long, we’re too late. Get us there and don’t spare the horses.”
Tires screeched, and I was glad I was wearing my seat belt. As it was, it damned near strangled me as Yasha Kazakov spun the Suburban in a U-turn in the middle of a thankfully empty Seventh Avenue.
Ian keyed his comms. “Steve, we’re going to Bacchanalia.”
Silence.
“Do you read?”
A sigh from one, a “Dammit” from the other, and a heartfelt “Shit” from Elana.
Well, that made it unanimous.
“What’s Bacchanalia?” I asked.
Ian answered me. Yasha was too busy trying to get us killed. “If Prince Finnegan knew he had one night on the town, he’d want to make it count and go to the most dangerous club he knew of—one owned by and crawling with goblins. He’d think that since he and his buddies would be glamoured that they’d be safe.”
“Wouldn’t they? Goblins can’t see through glamours.”
“No, they can’t. So Finn would think he’d be able to live dangerously without paying the consequences.”
“And . . . he would be wrong?”
“He couldn’t be more wrong. Rake Danescu owns that club. He’s a goblin, a dark mage, and while he can’t see through glamours, he’d know when they were being used.”
The depth of the leprechauns’ stupidity started to dawn on me. “And the goblins know that there are five glamoured leprechauns out looking for a good time.”
Ian nodded. “Rake Danescu would know exactly who they were the moment five creatures glamoured as human males set foot in his place.” His mouth set in a hard line. “That little bastard Finn was going there all along. Everything he did tonight was just to throw us off.”
“How’s that?”
“Bacchanalia is on the other side of town from all the clubs on the list he gave us. All the clubs on the list are—”
> “Sticky.”
“To put it mildly. Bacchanalia is not. It’s upscale and very exclusive.”
“If it’s that exclusive, how are we getting in?”
“My undercover alter ego has a membership.”
Of course he does.
I knew how dangerous goblins could be, but that didn’t stop me from giving a little silent cheer. I bet Bacchanalia had fabulous bathrooms.
Ian paused uncomfortably. “I should probably warn you that Bacchanalia isn’t a strip club.”
My inside voice stopped cheering. “That sounds like a good thing, but if you feel the need to warn me, then it’s not.” I frowned. “I thought you said it was upscale.”
“It is. Bacchanalia caters to men and women, and bills itself as a complete adult entertainment experience.”
“Complete?”
“Experience. With an emphasis on experience. People don’t go to Bacchanalia simply to watch—they go to participate.” He hesitated. “And the five of us will go in together. Three men and two women going to Bacchanalia isn’t suspicious at all.”
“Do you mean . . . ?” I made vaguely suggestive hand gestures.
“Oh yeah. It’s a sex club.”
And the allure vanished from my dreams of a clean bathroom.
BACCHANALIA was located in what looked like merely one brick-fronted nightclub in the city. A pair of hobgoblins, glamoured as unnecessarily huge humans, stood guard on either side of a plain door.
Ian’s hand clamped down on my arm, his lips close to my ear. “Mac, this is one of the most dangerous places for humans in the entire city. Don’t let your guard down for one moment. The faster you find those leprechauns, the quicker we can leave. Focus and do your job.”
I swallowed and nodded.
Once inside, we had to pause to allow our eyes to adjust to the dark. My glasses had been sitting on my head. I put them on my eyes where they belonged.