by Ann Gimpel
Oops. Need to head this one off at the pass.
I got to my feet. “It was a mistake to raise false hopes last night. I can’t hire you. I don’t trust you. Running a casino is hard enough. Sorry to have wasted your time.”
She knitted her brows together, but never took her eyes from mine. “We didn’t exactly get off on the best foot,” she began.
“Doesn’t matter,” I cut in and reached for my wallet. “I’ll reimburse you twenty bucks for showing up, but you really do need to leave and not come back.”
The whiskey and wildflower scent of her power grew around me. She was setting a sound shield in place. “Now look here,” I sputtered and summoned magic to thwart hers.
“Nay. You look here,” she countered. “Hear me out—and this has nothing to do with a job. If you still want me to leave after I’m done, I shall.”
I wasn’t in a bargaining mood. That she still stood in my office was pissing me off. Yeah, she was a knockout, but Reno was full of showgirls. The reason this woman was so alluring was linked to her magic.
“Leave now.” I pointed at the closed door. “And take your magic with you.”
Her pleasant look departed; in its place, she bared her teeth and snarled. “The power you’re so anxious to rid yourself of shields our conversation from curious ears.”
Breath hissed from between my clenched teeth. “I know that. Who in the fuck would care what you have to say to me? Run back to your coven and—”
“There. Is. No. Coven. Look at me, Fae.” She closed the distance between us. “Look damn good and close, and tell me what you see.”
The temptation to raise power against her and toss her out on her ear was strong, but so was my curiosity. What were another couple of minutes in the grand scheme of things? Deploying my talent, I probed her. Seconds later, my mouth gaped open. I shut it damned quick. How could I have missed something so elemental? She wasn’t a Witch at all, but a forbidden fusion of Fae and Sidhe. Emphasis on forbidden.
“You missed the truth,” she said sweetly, “because you saw what I wanted you to see. And yes, I forged a link to your mind to gauge your reaction. It’s gone now.”
“You did well to hide yourself from me,” I growled. “I should shackle you and haul you back to Faery to face justice, but I’m fresh out of time. I will find you, though, and—”
“Oh really?” She arched her red brows. “I’m exceptionally good at concealing myself. Besides, just what would I be facing justice for? I’m not responsible for my parents’ poor choices. What they did shaped my life, and not in good ways. You try being on the run for centuries with no place to call home.”
“Fine. How about this?” I tried another tack since the court didn’t need any additional matters to rule on with Faery teetering on the brink of disaster. “You walk out of here. I’ll forget I ever saw you.”
“It may come to that,” she said. “The reason I’m here, in Lady Luck, is because Oberon tasked me with keeping tabs on you.”
“What?” I shook my head, certain I hadn’t heard right.
“I hire out my magical talents,” she said, adding, “Now would be a good time to net me in a truth spell.”
I unclamped my jaw, embarrassed to be reminded of such an elemental lapse. The woman nodded as the weave of my casting dropped over her. “Better. Oberon hired me. I’m just the most recent in a long line of spies who have kept eyes on you ever since he left Faery. Most of them didn’t last long, and now I understand why.”
I’d walked around my desk and perched on the edge, facing her. “Since I never knew I was being monitored,” I said stiffly, “I fail to see how any action of mine would have impacted Oberon’s…” I sputtered, at a loss for words. To call them spies made me so angry a red haze descended over my vision.
She waved me to silence. “Not you. Him. Last night, he sent a pack of mages to fire me. If I walked away quietly, he’d pay me half. If I persisted with my contracted activities, I’d get nothing.” She blew out a tense breath. “I figure it’s the same way he treated everyone. To avoid paying us for our services. I’ve been working this job for months and have yet to see so much as a dime.”
“You must know where he is.” The conclusion was so obvious, I should have jumped on it right away.
“That I do.” She nodded. “Or more precisely, I know several possible locations. He moves around.”
I narrowed my eyes. “Why are you telling me?”
A slight shrug. “I’m not certain. I could have vanished into the night. I’m good at that, but I’m sick of running. Beyond that, you got stuck being regent, and I figured you had a right to know Oberon’s been playing hooky ever since he walked out on Faery.”
Balancing my elbow on a knee, I rested my chin in my hand and regarded the Witch, who was really a Fae-Sidhe hybrid. “Ready to tell me your name?”
“Dariyah.” She bowed formally and held out a hand. “Pleased to make your acquaintance Cynwrigg ap Llyr.”
“And yours. It’s not the name I use here, though. So you might want to call me Jed.” I shook her hand, keeping the contact brief. A pleasant ripple of sensation shot up my arm from her touch. Hearing my true name, with all its trills, roll off her tongue in Gaelic was a delight and quite unexpected. No one had ever said my name on Earth before, not within the scope of my hearing. I understood why she’d built the sound shield now. Not because of my name but because of the information she’d imparted.
She licked her full lower lip. “After I left here last night, my temper got the better of me. Before I sent the Witch, wizard, and two shifters packing, I told them I was going to reveal everything to you.”
“Probably not the smartest move. Where’d Oberon get mages to do his bidding?” I sputtered.
She shrugged again. “Same place he found me, probably. There’s a central registry for wizardly types who do contract work.”
First I’d heard of such a thing. “How does that work? Magic-wielders don’t do well if they remain separated from Faery or the other magical realms for long.”
“Most of us have ways of regenerating our talents. To answer your question about Oberon, maybe he’s scrounging through worlds promising work and welching like he did to me.” She closed her teeth over her lip. “I need to get over feeling sorry for myself, but I’m pissed. He not only stiffed me, he spied on me while I was spying for him.”
“How?”
“He implanted a beacon in my cat that gave him a running tally of my activities.”
My mouth twisted into a sour expression. I’d have at least tried to come up with something conciliatory to say, but what she’d described was vintage Oberon. He’d never been the trusting sort. I didn’t see how Titania had stuck it out all those years with him, but I’d never looked too closely, either. They were my liege and his consort. What passed between them was none of my affair.
Dariyah clasped her hands in front of her. “I’ve said what I came to say. I would still like to work with you, but I understand about trust. I’ve not given you any reason to view me as honorable, but I’d like to remedy that.”
The corners of my mouth twitched; I spaded gobs of magic over my thoughts. I wanted her to be a whole lot of things that had nothing to do with honor. Clearing my throat, I said, “You don’t really want to be a dealer or a waitress.”
“No I don’t, but both are good covers. Think about it. I seem to be out of work just now. We could team up. I could do other things that might help you.” The Witch glamour clicked back into place, so opaque I couldn’t drill through it. I was doing a bang-up job overlooking the obvious. Dariyah had a pile of power, so much I wasn’t at all certain how mine would compare if we ever squared off against one another.
I narrowed my eyes and sent a speculative glance her way from beneath hooded lids. All the while, I deepened the sound shield she’d crafted, noticing my power slotted nicely with hers. It made sense. Fae magic was additive. “What exactly did you have in mind?”
“Working
here.” She frowned. “It’s the topic of the hour, right?”
I shook my head. “Not what I meant. You suggested joining forces with me. What were you thinking we’d do?”
She doubled up a fist, but didn’t punch the air. “Take that lofty Fae fucker down a peg or two.”
“Won’t work. Oberon is what he is. He’ll never change.” I blew out a breath. “Faery is in trouble. I need to cajole him into coming back. The land mourns his absence. She knows full well I’m not him.”
Dariyah’s frown deepened. “Faery is self-perpetuating. At least it’s what Mother told me.”
“Who was she?” I recognized my error immediately and followed my question with, “Never mind.”
“I wouldn’t have told you, anyway. Just so you don’t waste your breath, I don’t know who my father was. Back to Faery…”
I nodded. “The land has always taken care of its own needs. Until Oberon and Titania left. Then she became slovenly, slipshod. At some point along the way, a long narrow rift formed in her foundation. It’s growing. The reason I opted for time on Earth was to attempt to locate it from this side. I can’t do anything with it in Faery. No amount of magic makes a dent in the chasm’s size or shape.”
Dariyah snapped her fingers. “That’s how I can help. I could search for it.”
I started to say not without me, but held the words in check. If we located the rift from this side, I wouldn’t need to deal with Oberon. Maybe. Assuming a generous blast of healing power set things right. The specter of sidestepping an unpleasant confrontation was damned appealing. I was plenty angry at him for abdicating his responsibilities to Faery. When I’d believed him missing, I’d been worried. Dariyah’s information lent a whole different slant to everything.
“It’s a good idea.” I held up a hand. “On one condition. If you locate it, do nothing. You must give me your word you’ll run straight back here and tell me where it is.”
A corner of her full mouth twitched downward. “What are you afraid I might do?”
“Make it worse.” Before she could protest, I kept my tone gentle when I said, “You have lived your life on borrowed time. We do not allow those like you to continue. Surely, you know that.”
“Of course I know.” She walked nearer to me, close enough I scented her annoyance. “Revealing myself to you was a huge gamble. You might have had henchmen here. I searched and only found your magic, but others could have been concealed.”
“Go on,” I urged.
“I loathe Oberon. I’ll do anything to get back at him for what he did to me. He left you holding the shitty end of the stick too. Why aren’t you more outraged?”
It was a reasonable question. Too bad I didn’t have much in the way of answers. Telling her all of Faery made excuses for their liege made us sound like a bunch of saps.
When I didn’t say anything, she went on. “Why do you want to find the breach first? Why not Oberon?”
“Because my problems with him will keep. The rift is growing worse. Presumably, Oberon knows about it, if he’s been keeping an eye on everything.” I gritted my teeth; it took effort to release my jaw to continue talking. The old fucker must know, and he’d done nothing. What the hell? Why was he moldering on the sidelines waiting for the land he ruled to implode? No wonder Faery had moaned so piteously.
“I see,” Dariyah kept her tone even, noncommittal. Clearly, my priorities weren’t meshing with hers.
“Back to the rift.” I said. “It will recognize you for what you are and…”
“And what?” She shook her hair behind her shoulders.
“Honestly, I don’t know what impact you would have. Maybe none. Maybe Faery would interpret your presence as one more nail in her coffin and rip herself to shreds.”
Dariyah grimaced. “Nah. I’m not that important. But I will honor your request.” She stuck out a hand. “I’m trying to build credibility, remember?”
I grasped her proffered hand and hung on to it. This time, a palpable shock ran from my fingers and along my arm. Her magic was more than powerful. It was amazing, and it was bleeding all over everything, including me.
“I will pay you, so keep track of the hours you work,” I told her.
“Nope. I don’t need money. What I said last night was a lie. But I welcome useful work. So much of what I do is smarmy. Spying on cheating husbands—and wives. Tracking down embezzlers. Booting escaped magical creatures who are creating havoc into Hell or Purgatory.”
“It’s an open offer.” I was still holding on to her hand. The contact was muddling my brain and ramping up my body.
She took a step, then another, and tilted her head. Her lips were soft, inviting. Where her breasts pushed into my chest, I felt the stiff peaks of her nipples. My breath quickened, but I hesitated before lowering my mouth to hers. What harm could a kiss do? Just one kiss, and then she’d be on her way, and I’d make the rounds and ensure Lady Luck was ready to roll for one more night.
Her whiskey-and-wildflower scent enveloped me, and she threaded her arms around my back, holding me tight. My hands developed a mind of their own and settled over the luscious globes of her nice, tight ass. I tugged her against me and pressed my length against her stomach. My truth net frittered to nothing. I didn’t need it. The weight of her mouth on mine was more potent than any spell.
Her mouth was sweet and alluring, and I licked the seam of her lips before thrusting my tongue inside. We stood like that for a long time, grappling with one another, trading kisses for sucks and bites. I felt her magic slam into my mind; the joining enhanced my arousal, twin to her own.
A staunch knock on my door put an end to my fantasies of turning her over and taking her spread-eagled across my desk. So much for my one-kiss promise. I dragged my mouth from hers long enough to yell, “Be out in a minute.”
“We got a problem, boss,” drifted through the door.
I shook my head. They always had problems, and a seeming inability to solve any of them without me. “We’re out of time,” I told Dariyah.
“It’s all right.” She smiled at me. “I’ve been out of time my whole life. See you later this evening. I’ll hunt every night and check in before closing time.” She unwound her arms and patted the bulge of my cock. “Hang on to that thought.”
“Could get shut of it if I tried.”
A sharp whiff of ozone presaged her departure. No portal, just a shimmery, glistening spot that winked out as she left. A downward glance told me I wasn’t fit to do much of anything in my current state. I ducked into my small bathroom, shut the door, and freed my cock. A few hasty strokes were all it took before jism shot all over the tiny enclosure. Hasty strokes accompanied by graphic imagery of a naked Dariyah bouncing atop my erection.
Whoever was out there knocked again. With an exasperated sigh, I sent magic to clear away the mess I’d made, stuffed myself back into my trousers, and went out to face the world.
The crisis du jour was never as bad as they thought it was. I’d dispatch this one and go check on the room that had taken it up the shorts last night. In a few hours, Dariyah would return. Something to look forward to amidst my sea of unsolved problems.
5
Chapter Five, Dariyah
I shouldn’t have sashayed so close and tipped my head up in obvious invitation for Cyn to kiss me, but I couldn’t help myself. He was tempting with a capital T, alluring as fuck, and I’d been dreaming about ways to seduce him for a long while. My body still tingled from being smushed against his, from the hot, hard length of him jammed into my stomach. I’d been choreographing ways to finesse a quickie when a knock on the door derailed my scheming.
Maybe when I returned early the following morning. I could coordinate things so it was nearly closing time, and— I pushed past my lust-ridden fantasies. They’d get in the way of a productive evening. My first stop was my flat. I wanted to check on Midnight, make certain he knew to run if he smelled anyone like me. I’d meant to do that before my trip to Lady Luck, but I’
d been running late. The in-between place where I go to regenerate my power is captivating. I’ve always suspected if I stayed too long it would be hard to leave.
Mother had said Faery was like that. It got its claws into you until you were never genuinely happy anywhere else. She’d gone into exile to keep me safe, and lost a piece of her soul in the process. She never complained, but sometimes in unguarded moments when she wasn’t aware I was watching her, she looked sad and defeated, shoulders slumped and the tiny lines around her eyes deeper than usual.
I’d asked why she couldn’t go back to Faery without me, and she’d said because mages have long memories. No one had known for certain she was pregnant, but they’d cull through her mind if she returned. Besides, I had nothing to do with her crime, which had been falling for a Sidhe. The whole thing infuriated me. Mother was stuck in a magical grotto cut off from everyone while Father—whoever the hell he was—got off scot-free.
I’d mentioned that once, but Mother became so agitated, I never brought it up again. She’d said my father was a good man, not to judge him by circumstances. Pretty words, but it was impossible not to. When I was little, I’d nurtured secret daydreams about him coming to spirit me to Faery where there’d be a bit of finger-pointing and head-shaking. But in the end, the Fae and Sidhe and unicorns and everyone else welcomed me warmly.
Exile safely over, Mother rejoined Father, and we were a family cavorting through the lush greenery, majestic forests, and magical pools Mother had spun me tales of. Too bad none of it ever played out except in my head. My mother was still where she’d raised me, presumably. Father was in the wind, and I may as well be for all the freedom I’d had in my life.
Always skulking in shadows and glamouring up my true self to avoid detection had been a real barrel of laughs. If that weren’t bad enough, like all those with Fae blood, I longed for Faery. Some nights it escalated to a physical ache that made me so miserable I almost couldn’t function.
I always got over it, but I never moved beyond it happening again. And again. You’d think I’d be used to those episodes by now, except they’d done nothing but grow worse. In my more whimsical moments, I figured Faery was calling her errant daughter home to be slaughtered. That shaped me up damned fast.