Midlife Fairy Hunter: The Forty Proof Series, Book 2

by Mayer, Shannon

  I stuck my foot out, tripping his lanky frame as he stumbled toward the stairs. He made a grab for the banister and missed, and I watched with no small amount of satisfaction as my ex-husband fell down the single flight, ass over teakettle, all the way to the bottom.

  16

  I followed him down the stairs at a slower pace as I tucked my knife away. “Alan, you should really watch where you’re going. You could get yourself killed.”

  “What are you doing in here?” he growled, and I took note of the large rectangular bump under his shirt.

  “Are you serious?” My hands went for my knives, but I didn’t pull them out. Just let my hands hover over the handles while I stared at what had to be Gran’s book under his shirt.

  Feish, Eric, and Suzy came running out of the kitchen with all the noise, Gran with them.

  She pointed a finger at him. “He has my book!”

  “I know, Gran,” I said softly. “The question is why. Why would a human like Alan want a book of spells? Hmm?” My mind started rapidly shooting through all the pieces, putting them together as it was wont to do. “Maybe the person who helped you take everything from me, who helped you fool the human court system, wanted a little something in return if you got the house?”

  Holy shit, even as the words left my mouth I knew they were true. Even if Alan hadn’t lost color and clutched at the book he’d tucked under his shirt. He scooted backward on his butt toward the door, but Eric was there, blocking his escape. Feish and Suzy were blocking his way to the kitchen, and I was on the stairs just above him.

  “Alan,” I said his name with as much composure as I could muster. “Who are you working for?”

  He shook his head.

  I couldn’t help laughing at him. “That’s the best you got? I have a siren here who could just make you speak.” I wasn’t entirely sure that Suzy could, but Alan didn’t know that. “I’ve got a river maid”—Feish stepped forward—“who could put you through water torture like you’ve never imagined, and”—I held up a finger and pointed to Eric behind him—“I’ve got a bigfoot who could literally tear you limb from limb. I don’t think you’re in a position to—”

  Alan’s eyes rolled back in his head and he passed out.

  “Well, damn.” Suzy stepped forward and pushed a boot against his squishy middle. “That was rather anti-climatic.”

  Alan lay across from me at the bottom of the stairs, kind of crumpled on top of himself, legs and arms akimbo rather like a giant praying mantis. Of course, in that species the female eats the male after they mate.

  I can see the appeal of that tradition.

  Especially when it comes to Alan or, as I like to call him, Himself. I might have muttered that a little too loudly.

  “Why do you call him that?” Feish asked. “It’s strange, you know that?”

  I stopped a few steps above him. “Because he thinks so highly of himself, he might as well be royalty. And because I fear that if I say his name too many times, he’ll appear. Like Beetlejuice. You remember the movie with Batman and the Stranger Things mom? And look—” I waved my hand over him, “—now here he is.”

  Alan groaned and slowly opened his eyes. “Just a dream, it’s just a dream.”

  He wobbled up to his feet and scooped up his hat from the third step, just under me. He jammed it on his head, whatever fear he’d been feeling before gone, though the dark spot in his crotch said otherwise.

  “If you peed on the floor and wrecked the hardwood, I’m going to be seriously angry.”

  I was going to say pissed, but that seemed a bit much, even for me.

  He adjusted his hat as if that would make us forget he was bald under there. I settled my resting bi-atch face into place and stared him down. Four stairs above him, I could do just that while I waited for him to explain himself.

  Alan glanced over at the kitchen, took one look at Feish and grimaced. This even though he only saw a woman with a harelip. Her shoulders slumped and something in me snapped.

  I rushed down the last steps and jammed two fingers right into Alan’s solar plexus, driving him backward, basically into Eric’s arms. Eric grabbed hold of him, and Alan squeaked like a mouse.

  “You’re trespassing, and it looks to me like you’re trying to steal something.” I growled the words, I was so damn angry. “Maybe more than one something? What else did you come here for?” I knew that Gran had secreted items throughout the house, but I needed to find them still. What if whoever had sent him knew about the things she’d hidden? Would foreknowledge of the items allow a person to find them?

  He gasped for air as I frisked him, first taking the very obvious leather-bound book out from under his shirt. He’d strapped it to his body, but a quick slice of one of my knives through the thin bindings freed it. To be on the safe side, I continued looking him over. I didn’t expect he would actually have taken anything else, so finding my grandmother’s talisman in his left front pocket drew a growl from me. I’d left it in the bathroom after my shower, forgetting it in the . . . heat of the moment, as it were. “Really?”

  He tried to take a step back, but Eric held him steady, a seriously awesome snarl on his normally gentle face. Alan was still fighting to breathe so I jabbed him again in the same spot with my other hand for good measure. “Who sent you, Alan? And you’d better talk before I find a spell to make your dick fall off and your balls shrivel into raisins.”

  His face drained of color, and Suzy grinned. “Oh, I’ve been meaning to try that one out. Is it as good as I think it is?”

  “Better,” Feish said. “I know of one man who lost his dick and his balls. The spell made it so he was horny all the time but couldn’t do a thing about it.”

  Alan’s feet scrambled hard as he tried again to escape. “Men gotta stick together. Let me out, man!”

  “Not a man,” Eric said. “Bigfoot.”

  Alan squeaked again, but his bravado hadn’t faded yet. “Crazy-ass women.”

  I looked at my friends. “Think he can say the name of his boss?”

  It was Gran who slid around Alan, her hands brushing over his body. I watched in fascination as the hair on his arms rose, his eyes locking onto her location. I didn’t know if he could see her or not.

  “You could throw him in the basement,” Gran said, “and let him rot for a bit. But I think he’s been spelled to secrecy. I doubt he’ll be able to speak the person’s name.”

  I grinned, deliberately showing all my teeth even though I was seriously frustrated. “Crazy indeed. I don’t think you should try to do a break and enter again, Alan. Because next time, there’ll be a spell waiting for you, and it will make the rest of your life seriously miserable.”

  Eric let him go and stepped aside as Alan all but threw himself out the door, fell through the opening, and stumbled all the way down the steps to the rock walkway. Feish stood to my left, Gran somewhere beyond her; Suzy was to my right, and Eric stood behind us—the five of us a united front against Himself.

  As he ran down the street, continually looking over his shoulder until he was out of sight, I felt a powerful bond with these people I knew very little.

  “Was he any good in bed?” Feish asked.

  Suzy let out a peal of laughter. “Even I know the answer to that, Feish. No. The answer is no.”

  “He’s rather self-centered. Which left me—” I gave an exaggerated sigh and slumped forward, “—perpetually disappointed.”

  Feish’s grin was as wide as her face as she gave me a wink. “Boss is good in the sack. All the ladies say so. You should try him out!”

  Well, so much for all the good feelings. I cleared my throat. “I’m sure he is.”

  Eric grumbled. “Men like that”—he gestured dismissively in the direction Himself had run—“give the rest of us a bad reputation. I would never treat a woman I cared for so horribly. I’d shower her with affection, and make sure that she knew I cherished her.”

  A chorus of awws slid from four very female throats.
I mean, what woman wouldn’t want a guy like Eric? He was a bit on the nerdy side, but he was tall, super cute and super sweet, and he baked a mean pastry. I cleared my throat to speak, and noted that Suzy had all but locked her eyes on Eric. As if she were seeing him for the first time. Of course, she probably hadn’t noticed him mooning after Kinkly.

  “I’m going to double check my room, see if, Alan”—gah, I had to force myself to say his name—“took anything else.”

  I turned away as Suzy took a step toward Eric. “Do you know anything about sirens?”

  Holy crap, she was really going to make a move on the bigfoot? Was that even allowed, interspecies dating? Not my place, and they were both adults. I hurried up the stairs, forgetting the burn in my body as I moved on nothing but adrenaline and the desire to check my stuff.

  I let myself into my room and looked through my meager belongings. Nothing else was missing, and I set Gran’s book back on the dressing table. The window was open and a sharp gust blew in and flipped the pages open. The particular page that it opened to had a scrawled notation about making sure spelling pots were properly cleaned after each use, and according to Gran, the repairs needed to be done by no one but Crash. There was that name again, written in her handwriting, yet I now knew it was just a pen name of sorts. I sighed and closed the book.

  The image of him—the Boss, Crash, handsome-as-sin blacksmith and probable bad guy—with a beautiful woman on each arm had burrowed into me in a way I didn’t like. In some ways it bothered me more than it had to find out Alan was a cheater—which was crazy. But at the same time, learning the truth about Alan had been a bit of a relief. It had made the divorce clear cut. Because our crappy marriage hadn’t really been terrible in an obvious way. Looking back, I could see the mental and financial abuse for what it was, but in the thick of it I’d told myself I didn’t have enough of a reason to be unhappy. I’d believed it was just crappy. Crap, crap, crap. And it had been difficult to weigh the value of escaping that crappiness at the cost of destroying all we’d created together, of making us both start over, of failing a marriage that from the outside looked fine. All because I’d robbed myself of the ability to see clearly, in more ways than one.

  With him cheating, I’d had an easy out, even if that out had cost me everything. A very small part of me was incredibly grateful he’d done what he’d done.

  I sat down at the dressing table and stared in the dusty mirror. It needed to be cleaned, but even so, I could see myself clearly.

  I was not ugly.

  I was not stunning.

  I was average. I put my hands to the sides of my face and lifted, grimacing at the way my skin moved. I bit my lower lip, thinking. Crash must have known that I was attracted to him before he kissed me. I mean, what woman wouldn’t be?

  I swallowed hard, making myself be logical. “What if he used your attraction for him against you, as if you were a schoolgirl with her first crush? What if there is some fae magic going on here?”

  The ground seemed to move under my feet, and I lowered my head to the table as the truth hit me square between the eyes. Who was I kidding? Corb was out of my league, yes, but Crash was in a class all his own. It was ridiculous to imagine otherwise. He hadn’t needed any fae magic to manipulate me into finding him attractive—he was freaking fae royalty.

  Fantasies, they were both fantasies and they would both remain as such. I gave a sharp nod to myself and nearly banged my head on the mirror.

  Big girl panties were a bitch to put on some days. But I yanked those proverbial panties up and got to work. Because work was something I could control, something I was actually pretty good at.

  I grabbed a piece of paper and rummaged in the desk until I found a pen that worked.

  Forget men and the effect they had on me. I had better things to do, despite what my libido wanted from me.

  I started a list.

  Figure out who/what Douche Canoe is. Assuming an O’Sean? (Ask Feish?)

  Why did Alan want Gran’s book and talisman? (aka, who sent him?)

  Talk to Officer Jonathan. (A connection for us?)

  Weed the garden.

  Find a man in your league, you idiot.

  I smiled at that last one. I might be an idiot when it came to men, but I was going to blame it on my hormones. I looked over the list. We’d worked on the garden, and I wasn’t about to go man hunting.

  I had a few hours before I had to be out at the fairy ring, which meant I had time to take at least one thing off my list.

  I tapped my pen on the third item. A visit to Officer Jonathan was in order. If I was really going to go it on my own, we needed connections.

  Which was how I ended up at the front desk of the Savannah Police Department wearing one of Suzy’s dresses. One of her less scandalous dresses, to be clear. I was shocked that I’d been able to zip it up. Then again, it was tighter in the waist than I’d normally wear, the skirt flaring out over my hips and touching the tops of my knees. That length was the most important part of the ensemble as it was long enough that I was able to wear my knives underneath it.

  “Officer Jonathan?” The very young, ridiculously perky girl with perfectly tamed bright red hair and flawless skin spoke slowly, as if I were hard of hearing. I frowned and drew myself up. If I was going to be the old lady, I might as well be the one she took seriously.

  I leaned over the desk, tapping it with one finger. “I know he might not work here any longer, but I was hoping you might have a forwarding address. If you can find it in your files.”

  She blinked fake lashes at me—not bothered by me in the least—and gave me a smile just as fake as the hair on her eyelids. “Does he have a last name?”

  Oh. Crap.

  I dredged my memory banks and couldn’t come up with one. “That’s all I knew him by. He was a family friend when I was a child. I’ve just moved back into town and wanted to catch up with him.”

  She brightened up. “Oh! Well if he’s been around that long, it can only be Officer Schmitt.”

  “That long?” I tipped my head. “How old do you think—”

  She was already on the phone. “Officer Schmitt, you have a visitor.”

  That stunned me. “So he does still work here?” I remembered him as a man in his fifties, and he had to be closing in on his eighties now.

  “We can’t get rid of him.” She leaned forward. “You know how it is with the old ones, they just won’t let go, even when they’re not needed any longer. They’ve tried giving him retirement packages three times. Keeps turning them down.”

  She might as well have slapped me. I reeled back as a wiry man in uniform with short, bright white hair strode down the hallway. Well, maybe strode is a bit of a stretch. He limped on his left side as if he either needed a hip replacement or had just had one. His dark eyes locked on me like a hawk.

  “Celia?” He breathed my gran’s name, then shook himself. “Wait, no, you’re Breena?”

  I smiled, and he scooped me up into his arms and squeezed me hard enough to make me decide he wasn’t so feeble in spite of that bad leg.

  “Officer Jonathan!” I squeaked out his name and he set me down, a hand on either side of my body. “I thought I’d better come see you.”

  His bushy white eyebrows went up. “You did? Any reason you’re here now and not when Celia passed?”

  More than a little air fled me with that comment. I swallowed hard, once, twice, before I could get the words together. “That is unfair when you have no idea what my life has been like.”

  His dark eyes didn’t leave me. “Is it?”

  Damn it. He wasn’t going to let up, and I doubted this would be a happy reunion after all.

  My jaw ticked. He wasn’t going to send me running. “Perhaps we could speak in your office?”

  His bushy white eyebrows shot way up. “This way.”

  Officer Jonathan led me to the back of the police station, through a door, through what looked like a storage space stacked to the ceiling w
ith boxes, through yet another door, and then into a very small room.

  He motioned for me to take a seat in one of the two chairs. “Relegated to the very back room in a bid to make you leave?” I slid into the chair and crossed one leg over the other.

  Officer Jonathan sighed. “What can I do for you, Breena?”

  I took a slow breath. He was not happy I hadn’t come back for my grandmother’s funeral. I wasn’t happy about that either.

  For the first time, I spoke words I didn’t ever want to have to utter again, the shame accompanying them hot on the back of my neck. “I was in an abusive marriage. That was why I couldn’t come back. He wouldn’t let me leave. But I’m here now, and I am fighting to keep this town safe, the way my gran taught me.” I kept my eyes locked on him, refusing to look away. “I want to know if I have someone here in the department I can turn to for help. For inside information. If not, I do understand.”

  He leaned back in his chair, clasping his hands in front of his chest. My memories of him surged to the forefront of my mind. He’d taught me how to use knives and guns, how to fight and fight dirty. You will always be the smaller opponent, and being a woman, you will be underestimated. When you fight, fight with everything you’ve got and let them think you’re crazy. Let them fear the fact that you’re a woman. That you are unpredictable.

  I smiled at him. “Some of the shadow people out there are afraid of the crazy woman you helped train.”

  He didn’t so much as crack a smile back at me. “I loved your gran. You broke her heart when you left.”

  If he’d slapped me, I couldn’t have been more shocked or hurt. I swallowed hard. “I was young and stupid. I can’t make you believe me, but I don’t regret anything as much as I regret leaving like I did. I am here now, Jon.” Jon, that’s what Gran had called him. How many times had I noticed them smiling at each other, or her touching his arm?