“Put your money where your mouth is,” Oliver goaded. “Show me or it didn’t happen.”
Nina lifted her chin defiantly before her beautiful face split into a wide grin. “Whoopee!”
Chapter 4
Nina stood beside him next to his beige sectional with the million and two pillows he hated, but bought anyway just to spite Denise, who’d said that was one of the many reasons she was leaving him—he was inflexible.
He’d shown her, hadn’t he? His couch was a veritable treasure trove of soft-colored pillows in muted sage and fluffy cream.
Hah.
Nina pressed a cool cloth around the horn on his head—which, unfortunately, was still there, if the vibrations rattling his teeth and bones were any indication.
Marty stood over him, her clothes returned to their former places on her body, her hand on Nina’s shoulder, her gaze one of blue-eyed sympathy. “I told you.”
They had. She had. Wanda had, too. He’d chosen to all but dare them to show him what he thought surely was utter nonsense.
But it wasn’t nonsense.
It was real. Yes, Virginia, vampires and werewolves and half-breeds, maybe even gypsies, tramps, and thieves, were real. Real.
Holy frack.
“So are you ready to talk about this shit now, or do you need more time to change your man-panties and take a Xanax, Snowflake?”
Wanda came to stand next to Nina, taking Baloney from her shoulder and giving her an Eskimo kiss before she jabbed Nina in the ribs. “Don’t be awful, Nina. He’s no less a man because he screamed.”
Oliver became a little more defensive than he would’ve liked when he protested, “I did not—”
“Oh,” Marty said with a twinkle in her eye. “But you did. And it’s fine. We’re used to it. Everybody reacts differently. Some cry. Some rock in a corner. Some scream. No big deal. Now we need you to get past the shock, put on your thinking cap, and help us figure this out because you can’t wander around like this—we need to know what it means and how you’ll live with it. If you’ll have to live with it forever.”
Forever? He’d never considered this was permanent.
Pushing his way to a sitting position, Oliver tried to shake the cobwebs from his brain. “Why are you helping me? Why do you care what happens to me?”
Were they going to try to coax him into joining their cult-ish movement? What motivated them if they didn’t take money?
Wanda dropped down beside him on the couch, tucking a pillow behind her back before she patted his knee. “Because we know what it’s like to be alone and have something so crazy happen to you, something so mind-boggling, you’re terrified. You don’t know who to tell or where to turn. You’re horrified by the physical changes in your body. You don’t know how to deal with them. We understand that because it happened to us, too, Oliver. But we had each other. We decided there must be other people out there like us. I mean, we—all three of us—had accidents within the space of a couple of years. Three accidents in as few years? That’s a statistic that needed exploring. So we explored. And here we are, eleven years later and who knows how many accidents since.”
“So it’s true,” he murmured, incredulous. “You really have seen a mermaid and a demon?”
Wanda chuckled. “That’s one of my favorite cases of all time. Her name’s Esther and she’s amazing. I think you’d like her. There isn’t anyone who doesn’t like Esther, right girls?”
“I love that damn fish,” Nina said on a snort. “Hated being wet all the frickin’ time, but love my Little Mermaid.”
He pinched the bridge of his nose, mostly because he wanted to avoid the area where his horn sprouted. “Did she really sniff me out? That was really true?”
“She is standing right the fuck in front of you,” Nina groused. “And I don’t make idle threats, pal. After what you just saw, you still doubt I could sniff you out? Dumbass.”
“Fair,” he muttered. Dumbass was a fair assessment of his person at the moment.
He was having an extremely difficult time trying to clear his brain to make way for all that he’d seen and all he could potentially face, but he had to if he had any hope of figuring out what came next.
Nina nudged him with her knee before taking a seat next to Wanda, summoning Baloney by patting her shoulder. “So, let’s figure this shit out, Ollie. That means going over everything you’ve been up to and everyone you’ve been in contact with for at least the last week.”
Marty nodded as she sat in the chair opposite his sectional and pulled out her phone. “That’s exactly what it means. So buckle up. Also, as a side note, I’ve invited a friend of a friend of ours to join us. She’s a professor of mythology at the local college, understands the paranormal, and will keep this to herself. I’m just waiting on a return text.”
“Which friend of a friend?” Wanda asked with one eyebrow raised.
Marty looked at her phone again. “Khristos’s long-time friend. Her name’s Vincenza Morretti, or Vinnie, as Khristos calls her, and apparently, she’s well-versed in Greek mythology. I mean, she teaches it. So she should have a better understanding than we do, right? Also, she knows people like us exist. That’s a huge relief when we don’t have to explain. Now, I don’t know if it’ll help us, but it’s worth a try because I don’t know anyone else we know of who knows thing one about unicorns. The closest thing to mythological beings we have is Esther or Quinn. Esther’s out of the country and mostly in the water and unreachable. But we can always find Khristos if we can’t find Quinn.”
Oliver gave them all a blank look as they chattered, but Wanda leaned into him and whispered, “Khristos is the husband of our friend Quinn Morris, and she’s the latest incarnation of the Goddess Aphrodite.”
He clenched his fists and tried not to react in stupefied shock. He’d seen what he’d seen and there was no two ways about it. So a reincarnation of Aphrodite shouldn’t be a surprise, but he damn well had to fight not to visibly scoff at the very idea Aphrodite still existed.
He couldn’t help but ask, “The Goddess of love still exists? What are her superpowers? Does she own magic Spanx or something?”
“So you do know a bit about mythology, then?” Wanda asked with a curious gaze.
“I happened to see some stuff while I was researching unicorns, and I read a bit about a magic girdle,” he admitted.
He hadn’t liked what he’d seen, but he’d seen it. It didn’t help in his case anyway. Unicorns were rare. That was the gist of what he’d gotten from his research. So what?
Marty winked at him and chuckled. “Apparently, the girdle thing is a total myth. Quinn told us so. No one ever owned a magical girdle that could make men fall in love with them, and she said if they had, she’d have outlawed them once she took over anyway. But she is a matchmaker extraordinaire. No one understands love, and the pursuit of, better than our Quinn. Think Meghan Markle and Prince Harry, as just one example. You might laugh at the idea that everyone has a mate, but ending up with the wrong person can be deadly. Her matches are forever.”
Nina cackled and slapped him on the back, making a cloud of glitter spatter the air. “Oh, buddy. If you only knew the shit Quinn can do. She knows Cupid, BTW. Like, the real Cupid, golden arrows and all.”
Oliver blanched.
“Why so green around the fucking gills, Unicorn Man?” Nina taunted, but then her face softened. “Listen, dude, you’re gonna hear a lot of shit in the next few days. Things you won’t fucking be able to wrap your pea brain around, but I promise you, if we can find out how to help you, we will. Just prepare for us to take over your life until we figure this out. Okay?”
He swallowed hard, his mouth dry. “Okay,” he agreed.
What choice did he have, short of sawing this thing off his forehead, but to go along with whatever they said? He knew zero about unicorns other than they were among some of his niece’s favorite toys.
The doorbell rang then, the sound more jarring this time around than it had been earlier, likely from
his lack of sleep. As he rose, Nina rose, too, putting him behind her as she crept to the door.
“We don’t know who the fuck’s out there. It’s near five in the morning. Who rings someone’s doorbell at five in the morning? Let me answer the fucking thing. You stay behind me.”
He couldn’t deny that was the right thing to do. She was an ox times ten. I mean, she’d lifted his car to her shoulders right there in the middle of his driveway just to prove her strength in that spectacle of teeth and fur, but the chivalrous side of him, the one that was taught to protect a woman, fought the notion.
However, Nina was all business when she pressed her ear to the door before she sighed. “We have company,” she sang out, swinging open the door to allow a redhead with glasses, holding a black cat, to enter.
“For Christ’s sake,” the cat said as it looked at him from the arms of the curly redhead. “Would ya look at that shit?”
Oliver almost fell on the floor. In fact, he had to press a palm against the wall to hold himself up. “You…”
“Talk,” it said, hopping out of the redhead’s arms and onto the floor to swirl its tail around Nina’s legs. “Go on and let that shit sink in and then we’ll do introductions and all that razzmatazz.”
The. Cat. Talked.
Holy. Shit.
Nina scooped up the cat from the floor, its dark fur blending in with her dark hair, and gave it a quick peck on the head. “Calamity, what are you doing here?”
“I heard unicorn and I came runnin’. So what in all of shiny is this shit? Is it real?” Calamity growled.
“It’s about as real as it gets,” Nina replied, then swung her eyes to the redhead in a bulky jacket, jeans and a pair of glasses that hid her pretty eyes. “So who the fuck is this?”
The cat rubbed its face against Nina’s lean cheek. “I dunno. She was at the door when I got here. She picked me up and scratched my ears and didn’t seem too flipped out that I can talk. So who am I to turn down an ear scratch?”
In fact, Oliver thought, she didn’t seem too flipped out at all. Not by the talking cat or the violent vampire.
The redhead with the chocolate-brown eyes stuck out her hand to Nina, her cheeks pink from the cold October air. Night shrouded her pale face like a dark blanket as she peered at the vampire. “Who are you?”
Nina didn’t offer a hand back. What she did do was loom over her in that defensive stance she’d perfected. The one with her legs wide apart, her face a seething mask of aggravated. “Uh, excuse the shit out of me. I didn’t ring your doorbell. You rang mine. So who the fuck are you?” she sneered.
The woman, her face an ivory landscape of strawberries and cream with gorgeous dark eyes and a pair of softly colored pink lips, shrouded by a mop of unruly hair that easily touched the middle of her back, stared at Nina blankly as though the vampire should know exactly who she was.
“I’m Vincenza Morretti. Or Vinnie, if you’d prefer. You know, the mythology professor? I’m Khristos’s friend. He texted me that you and your friends needed help.”
“So you just dropped by at five in the fucking morning?”
Vinnie shrugged, pulling her bulky red coat off and tucking it under her arm. “I was already up. I got caught up in reading and happened to be awake when I got the text. Khris said it was urgent and you were up, so I figured why not pop over? If it’s inconvenient, and you don’t want to know about unicorns this second, I can go home.”
“No!” Oliver almost tripped over himself to stop her. “If nobody else wants to know about unicorns, I do. Please come in, Miss Morretti.” He held out his hand to her and she took it, curling her fingers into his palm.
They stood that way for a few moments, and he wasn’t sure what the long gaze between them was about, but she pulled away first, tucking her hand under her jacket. And she didn’t seem at all surprised by his horn. Were there others like him?
Nina had said there were tons of other vampires in the world—maybe there were more unicorns and what he’d read was wrong? Maybe he wasn’t so rare after all and in no time flat, he’d have tons of little unicorn friends.
Like on Unicorn Island, Oliver? Where all unicorns gather to skip through fields of gumdrops and ride rainbows? Kewlio!
You, nitwit.
“So this?” she murmured in a hushed, almost reverent tone, pointing to his forehead. “This is it?”
Oliver spread his arms wide, catching a glimpse of himself in the entryway mirror without his hat before quickly looking away in horror.
“This is it.”
Vinnie shoved her coat in Nina’s direction, not even noticing the look on Nina’s face when she behaved as though the vampire were nothing more than a coat check girl. Instead, she took Oliver by the hand, leading him to the living room, where she sat him down on the couch and she took the opposite chair.
She paid no mind to the other women—she didn’t even bother to introduce herself—but she stared down at him intently for a long time, her dark eyes wide with interest before she sat across from him and said, “Interesting.”
Nina glared at her with a scowl. “That’s all you fucking have to say? Interesting? Who the fuck called this nincompoop? We need help, not adjectives, Marty.”
But Vinnie almost didn’t even notice Nina’s ire, because she dared stick a finger to her mouth—and then she hushed her.
Hushed Nina.
Oh. Fuck.
“Shhh,” she said absently, apparently unfazed by the flare of Nina’s nostrils. “I’m working here.”
Oliver leaned in close to her, getting a whiff of her perfume—plumeria, he surmised—and winced. “Just a small warning. She’s very volatile and very, very easily riled.”
Vinnie sighed, her shoulders lifting and falling with the deep breath she took as she folded her hands in her lap. “Oh, I’m not afraid of her. Khristos warned me she was difficult. Just ignore her.”
Wow. This was one brave woman. A true warrior.
“Okay, it’s your life. I hope you weren’t too comfortable here with us folk who like living,” Oliver warned.
Nina growled, but Wanda put a hand up in caution. “Nina,” she whisper-yelled. “Let them…commune, or whatever’s happening here.”
But Vinnie still paid no mind. “So have you noticed anything unusual about your protrusion? I mean, besides the glitter? Khristos said there was glitter. Which, I mean, I can see, because it’s everywhere, but anything else unusual?”
Sure he had, but he wanted to feel this professor out, and that meant not giving away too much. Did she really know something about unicorns or was she just curious? He needed help, not a rubbernecker.
“What do you mean unusual?”
Her eyes never once left his face, but he had the feeling she wasn’t really looking at him, per se. He felt like a science experiment, splayed out on an eighth grader’s desk, awaiting dissection.
“I mean anything out of the ordinary. Don’t you know what ‘unusual’ means?”
Was she purposely being dense? Oliver tried not to sound offended when he said, “Of course I do. I’d just like to know your definition.”
“How can I define what I mean when I don’t know what you’d consider unusual? For instance, you have a horn poking out of your forehead, better known as an alicorn. That’s an obviously unusual anomaly. But less unusual can mean something else entirely. Maybe you have stomach cramps. So do you usually have stomach cramps? Or did they just begin when the alicorn appeared. Do you understand what I mean?”
She peered at him as though he were a complete dolt then she tucked her hair behind her ears and waited for his answer.
“Look,” Wanda said, her soft voice a welcome interference for his stunted speech and whirling thoughts. “Miss Morretti, Oliver’s been up for ages now. He’s tired, he’s had a traumatic experience, and he’s seen more than his fair share of unusual tonight. Let’s take it easy on him. That would be the kindest thing to do at this point. While we appreciate you coming by at a momen
t’s notice to help us, we don’t want to insult our client.”
Vinnie’s face melted almost instantly as she bit at her lower lip and winced. “I came on too strong, didn’t I? Shoot. Sometimes I get way too involved in my own thoughts and I forget to buffer my words, or I’m too anxious to say them at all. My mother used to tell me sometimes honesty isn’t always the best policy. I fear that’s true. Do you want me to leave?”
“Leave?” Oliver asked on a frown. “Of course not. Why would I want you to leave?”
Her face fell, her eyes growing round as dimes. “It wouldn’t be the first time I’ve been too forward and someone’s asked me to leave.”
Nina popped her lips and planted her hands on her lean hips. “Nobody wants you to leave, Curly Sue. We just want you to slow your roll, and that’s coming from an insensitive bitch who always says whatever the fuck she’s thinking. Dude’s all kinds of fucked up. He’s still slogging his way through this shit. Go slow.”
Oliver held up his hands to still everyone. “Let’s start again, okay? I’m Oliver Baldwin, and I have an…alicorn, is it? It sheds pink and purple glitter as you can see, which, as my sister says, really is the herpes of the craft world, in case you were undecided. I don’t know how I got it. I don’t know why, but I have it, and I don’t know what to do to get rid of it. Anyway, under these trying circumstances, it’s nice to meet you.”
Vinnie finally smiled, her eyes lighting up with amusement as she absorbed his words. Her entire face changed with that one smile, making him smile in return.
She held out her hand with a shy gaze. “My name is Vincenza Raphaela Morretti. I’m twenty-eight, and I teach Greek mythology at the local college. I live here in Buffalo, and I have two dogs and a cat. Their names are Frank, Mario, and Brenda. I’m here to try to help, if you’ll let me.” Then she paused and looked at him again, shyer than ever. “Still too much?”
He grinned, her smile warming him from the inside. “Frank, Mario, and Brenda, huh? Are they okay if you leave them alone?”
She nodded, her eyes lighting up. “I have someone who’ll walk and feed them for me. They’ll be fine for now.”
ACCIDENTAL UNICORN, THE Page 4