by M. L. Briers
“You’ll sleep better knowing Theseus is dead, will you?” Hawk had his detective hat on, and Doug started to nod as a little smile took his lips and a chuckle escaped him. That was until he saw Hawk’s serious face- the one that he showed to criminals… Doug pulled his head back on his neck and that smile was gone in a heartbeat.
“Hey now- you just wait right there a minute.” Doug growled out as he came to the sudden realisation that he’d just put himself in the frame for the Goblin King’s murder… well, it was murder if someone had let the Banshee out from Marmaduke’s nefarious possessions. Or maybe it wasn’t.
Technically, had a crime really been committed by anyone but the Banshee?
“You seem overly joyed with the outcome.” Hawk said in his serious voice. I liked that voice because it sent a shiver of something good right down to my toes.
“Of course I am…!” Doug growled as he scowled hard. “Not…” He added on an afterthought. “Overly bloody joyed at the death of a dear friend.” Doug was clutching at straws. Boy was he.
Everyone knew that Theseus and Doug hated each other. Well apart from my sister because she’d just got here. But everyone else knew that the Goblins continual raids on Doug’s food stocks had the two of them at loggerheads most days.
“Friend!” Amos scowled up at the bear, and for Amos that was a long way up. “Pah!” He spat out and I think we all got the point. “Are too!” Amos accused and Doug narrowed his eyes on the little man.
“Am not.” Doug took a long step and leaned the top of his body down towards the Goblin.
“Are too.” Amos snapped.
“Am bloody well not.” Doug growled.
“Damn well am too.” Amos was determined to give as good as he was getting.
I felt my eyes roll backwards in my head, and not in the way that those creepy little Goblin’s did it with their second sight. I just wanted this day to be over, and the sun wasn’t even up yet- so why should I be?
“Look!” I snapped out and both men snapped their eyes towards me. “Can we, and by we, I mean you two, not do this?” Doug sighed. Amos grumbled. I just wanted some peace. Sydney sauntered into the centre of the room and both men brightened.
So she was good for something…
“So there’s a Banshee, and a book…” Sydney deduced and I wanted more than anything to reach out and smack her around the back of the head.
“Book, what book are we talking about?” Doug enquired and I think that twitch under my right eye started up again.
“The book of- you’re never laying eyes on it.” Scott offered and Doug did what Doug did best and scowled.
“Have you seen the book?” Doug raised his chin and eyed Scott back with suspicion. I was kind of hoping that for once Scott would behave himself…
“I have the book in my possession.” Scott smirked. Doug scowled harder, and I just wanted to hibernate until two thousand and twenty.
“Why do you have the damn book?” Doug growled.
“Because- and I want you to think long and hard on this one- I’m me.” Scott offered back with a twisted smile that had Doug raising his hand and scratching his head.
“Ok, so…” I wanted to nip this one in the bud. I didn’t want to be here. I didn’t want my sister to be here or anywhere near Scott, and I certainly didn’t want time to stand still while Doug figured that one out or all hell to break loose in the meantime.
Life was too damn short, because we weren’t all vampires.
“You vampires think you are so bloody special…” Doug started again and I sighed. Not just any sigh, but one of those one’s where you know you really just want to head butt something but you don’t want to feel the pain of it. I had enough pain in my life and they were all standing in this damn room…
“Hello, we saw the lights…” The sing song sweet voice echoed through my brain like razor blades.
I was wrong. More pain was on its way in the shapely form of the two faeries. Time to head butt a wall? I think so.
CHAPTER FIVE
“Well, what do we have here?” Anna stood in the doorway and eyed everyone in the room. Then her eyes locked onto Sydney and I felt a groan start somewhere deep within me.
“Oh look, Tracy. Another witch…” Anna offered.
“So it is. In an- costume of sorts.” Tracy stood alongside her sister and eyed Sydney with interest. I saw my sister’s chin go up and her back straighten and I knew we were probably in for some fireworks.
“Shouldn’t you ladies be in bed?” Sydney asked as she pointed her index finger and wiggled it about. “It looks like you girls could do with a few extra hours of beauty sleep.”
Scott bit out a chuckle and Doug smirked. I groaned. I sighed. I liked my sister’s style, but I had to live here when she was gone.
“A bitchy witchy, no less.” Anna offered and Tracy nodded her head on a scowl.
“Well, I’m a firm believer that you get what you give.” Sydney replied in a tone that told me she wasn’t messing with those two.
“Explains your dress sense. I’m guessing it was dark…” Tracy took a step too far and I rounded on her. Syd was my sister after all.
“Do we have a problem with my sister?” Two against two. Faerie magic was good, but witch magic was way better. I didn’t like their odds, and neither did they.
“Your sister?” Anna looked slightly sheepish and Tracy followed suit.
“No problem at all.” Tracy offered quickly. “Welcome to the Cove.”
“Gee- thanks.” Sydney bit out. Always gracious in victory. I sighed. Yep, she would breeze out of town and I would have to put up with the flaming faeries.
“Are we doing this or are we having some sort of gathering?” Scott bit out as he motioned around the obscene amount of crap inside the room.
Damn, but I wanted my bed…
“What are we doing?” Anna asked all bright eyed and bushy tailed again.
“We…” Scott motioned to the select few. “Are looking for clues and you two…” His eyes shot towards Doug. “And the bear, were just leaving.”
“Why don’t you just piss in a corner to mark your perceived territory?” Doug growled.
“That’s what lesser beings do. I prefer to rip out the throats of people who get in my way.” Scott gave him a flash of his fangs and a cheesy smile and I felt my eyes rolling into the back of my head again.
“You little piss ant blood sucking leech…” Doug growled. He was back in one of his rambling, rumbling moods again, and I had the vampire to thank for it.
It surprised me how this town wasn’t rife with carnage on a good day.
“Who is at the top of the food chain? Oh wait, that would be me.” Scott just had to go there. Doug growled some more and the faeries giggled. Not bloody helpful to say the least.
Men and posturing could be a dangerous thing, especially in a town full of alpha male supernatural beings.
“Enough!” I ground out. I was close to breaking point. I just wanted this night to be over, but with a banshee on the loose I couldn’t exactly pretend that everything was coming up roses.
“We need to locate the banshee…” Amos piped up.
“I heard that scream!” Anna offered with a little too much excitement for my liking.
“Perhaps you’ll hear it up close and personal before this night is done.” Scott offered and Anna scowled at him. I didn’t blame her. Scott was being a pain in the arse as usual.
“That’s a horrible thing to say.” She snapped.
“Horrible.” Tracy concurred like an echo.
“What do you expect? He’s a vampire. The man has no soul.” Amos grumbled and Doug nodded his head.
“Hey, I’m just telling it like it is.” Scott expanded his hands and shrugged his broad shoulders. “That banshee has already killed once tonight. She might be on the warpath for more.”
Four people shuffled their feet at that thought. Anna, Tracy, Doug, and Amos all looked worried. So they should. Whoever unle
ashed the banshee had done it for a reason and nobody would be safe until she was caught.
But how did you catch a banshee? That was what Marmaduke’s books would tell us. Hopefully.
“Safety in numbers.” Doug nodded his head thoughtfully and Scott frowned.
“How do you work that out? If the damn banshee walks in that door and screams- we’re all dead.” Scott scoffed. It was nice of him to point that out but I could have done without the dramatics. Every pair of eyes in the room went towards the door and Tracy and Anna did a sort of sidestep away from it. Like that was going to bloody help matters.
“Where did she come from?” Anna asked on a whisper as if she didn’t want the banshee to overhear her.
“That’s the million dollar question.” I’d prefer the conversation took on a more neutral tone. All this male testosterone in the room was getting a bit much.
“It had to have something to do with the break-in.” Doug surmised and I waited for it… and there it was; his accusing eyes came straight up to me and he pointed a finger. “If you had just…”
“Don’t point a finger at my sister unless you intend to use it.” Sydney warned him. Doug stood there opened mouthed for a long moment before he scowled at the offending finger, tossed his hand behind his back, and gave her a sheepish look.
“I was just pointing out…” Doug started, but Syd being Syd; she decided not to listen to Doug’s ramblings.
“Yeah, well, less of the pointing when you’re pointing or you’ll have me to deal with.” Sydney was like me. We may not have been best buddies, but you just don’t mess with family.
“If you’d listened to me when I told you about the break-in…” Doug tried again.
“Yeah, and with hindsight I could win the lottery, but it’s a shame that time has been and gone.” I snapped.
“Besides.” Hawk offered his opinion and I loved him for it. “Even if we had of come right over. The banshee, if in fact she was release via Marmaduke’s possessions, would have been long gone.”
I think Doug was still thinking about my previous comment because he just had this blank, dumb expression on his face that I for one found amusing.
“So, now what?” Tracy asked and Anna nodded in their strange sibling way.
“Damned if I know.” I muttered as I strolled over towards Scott and started to pick through the books that he hadn’t got to yet.
“Done that.” Scott offered as I went to finger a book.
“That too.” He was teasing me now. I know because he had that stupid grin on his face.
“Yep, even been there.” Scott offered as I moved along the line, and I sighed.
“Then what haven’t you looked at?” I finally gave up trying to second guess his movements.
“There’s a pile over on the far table.” Scott beamed me another grin.
“Asshole.” I muttered under my breath and before I could turn away he’d leaned in and was whispering in my ear.
“You really do have a problem with me tonight, don’t you?” He asked. I felt a small pang of guilt, because deep down it wasn’t Scott that I was mad at, but my annoyingly perfect sister.
“Yes.” I had to admit it.
“Want to tell me…?” He asked for it.
“Stay the hell away from my sister. If I wanted a corpse for a brother in law, I’ll go dig one up.” That didn’t come out quite the way I meant it. He narrowed his eyes on me and gave me another teasing grin.
“Would you like to rephrase that?”
“No.” If he was too stupid to get the message then I saw no point in repeating myself.
“Ok. Now what if your sister won’t stay away from me? She is a consenting adult…”
“Oh, go take an upside down nap or something.” I didn’t need the vampire telling me that my sister was old enough to screw half the town if she so chose to do so.
I knew it. She knew it. He knew it. I hated it.
The one thing it would lead to was trouble. Sydney brought trouble everywhere she went. I cleaned it up after she vanished.
I walked away with my fists clenched and my teeth grating together. Scott’s chuckle followed hard on my heels like it was taunting me. How I hated vampires.
“Stop winding up my mate.” Hawk growled. He’d obviously spotted my foul mood and sensed my annoyance.
“Yes. It’s my fault because I’m a vampire.” Scott tried to play the sympathy card but when Sydney chuckled he brightened and wiggled his dark eyebrows on his forehead.
I groaned inwardly. I seethed outwardly. I hated immeasurably.
It wasn’t just one thing, it was everything. I could have killed the banshee with my bare hands had she shown her face. I wanted to kill Doug… just for being Doug, and boy did I want to kill Scott. But most of all I wanted to kill my sister for putting me in this foul mood.
My to-kill list now read; Sydney at the top, closely followed by Scott, and then Doug. There were others. Those were the main culprits of my unrest and the ones that were stopping me from doing what I wanted to be doing. Snuggled up with Hawk, maybe a little mating going on…
“It’s good that you finally recognise that you are the bane of everyone’s existence.” Doug gave him a smug grin and the vampire raised just one eyebrow.
“I wonder if you’ve truly looked in the mirror at yourself, Doug.” Scott tossed back and caused the bear within Doug to growl again.
“Oh shut up. Shut up, shut the bloody hell up.” I ground out. “Now, if we have to catch the damn banshee, and I really don’t want to- how are we going to do it?”
“Before she takes her next victim?” Amos offered quickly and I frowned as I rounded on him.
“Something you’d like to tell me?” I asked. Amos got that worried look.
“What? No.” He snapped out.
“Worried about something?” Hawk hit him with that dark detective look of his and Amos swallowed down a portion of his tongue.
“Absolutely not.” He frowned.
“You look like a man that has a few worrries…” Scott thought he’d add to the drama of the moment as he leaned in over Amos and the man skulked backwards.
“It’s just that if she killed my King I could be next.” Amos declared. A rational conclusion to head towards I suppose, but there seemed more to it than that.
“Why you?” Scott asked.
“Because with Amos gone, I’m next in line to the throne. He had no kin.” Amos stuck out his barrel chest and tilted his chin up regally.
“Oh crap!” Doug growled.
“What?” Amos asked worried.
“I don’t like you any more than I liked Theseus, but at least the man knew when to back off.” Doug rolled his eyes.
“That’s… so helpful to the situation.” Scott had to go there and Doug turned on him and growled.
“You’re starting to piss me off.” Doug growled.
“Just starting to? Then I must have been doing something wrong, but good to know which chain to tug on.” Scott tossed back.
“Oh. Will you two shut the hell up and start being productive?” I snapped.
“Why don’t you tell Mr Fang-go-lightly here to get over himself?” Doug pointed towards Scott and the vampire frowned.
“Fang-go-lightly?” Scott gave a dramatic sigh. “What planet do bear shifters come from?”
Any more of this and I would be curled up in a ball in the corner of the room humming. I don’t know what I’d be humming, just humming. Hopefully oblivious to everyone and everything around me, except Hawk of course.
“Ok, that’s it. I’m leaving.” I announced. “You couldn’t pay me enough to be here with you people anymore.” I grumbled. “Not that I get bloody paid to be harassed day and night by half of the bloody town anyway.”
Hawk’s hand wrapped around my wrist and he yanked me towards those big, strong, warm arms that instantly soothed me. Better. Much, much, better. Now if he would just slay seventy percent of the people in the room…
My wa
rm, safe world didn’t last too much longer with the sound of a scream that could only have come from a banshee… or my sister when I cut off all of her hair when she was eleven.
CHAPTER SIX
“Which direction did it come from?” Sydney asked as she jogged alongside me.
“I have no idea.” I was following the crowd. The ones with the really good hearing and sense of direction.
“Are we running too it or from it?” Sydney demanded as she huffed and puffed. It was good to know that in was in slightly better shape than she was.
“Knowing this lot; we’re running towards it.” I informed her.
“That makes no sense.” Sydney ground out, but she stayed right there at my side. I guess she might have believed that safety in numbers thing. Either that or she didn’t want to let Scott out of her evil clutches.
“Welcome to my world.” I knew when we got to where we were going someone would be dead. I knew that no matter what anyone tried to do for the victim they wouldn’t be coming back from a Banshee’s scream, and I didn’t have a clue as to what we would do with the banshee if she was still there… And yet it seemed important to mark the death of whoever had been killed, murdered.
“So, how long have you known Scott?” Sydney asked as if we were out on a Sunday jog and just passing the time of day. I gawped back at her…
“Seriously? You’re doing this now?”
“Well, in the unlikely event that we get out of this alive I for one don’t plan to waste a minute more of my life…” Sydney waft in my direction and I had to wonder if this was a dream.
“I wasn’t aware that you held back in that department anyway.” I couldn’t help myself. The woman was awe inspiring and not in a good way.
“You’d be surprised at some on the lovers that I’ve had.” Sydney crowed and I’m sure she pushed out her chest like one of those alpha males.
“No, I really wouldn’t, and spare me the gory details of your mating habits.”