Fae Like Me: A Reverse Harem Urban Fantasy (Selena Pierce Book 1)

by Lucy Auburn

  “Uh-huh.” Shaking her head, Talia ruefully said, “I can smell your hunger, you know. And sense the danger in the air.” She sniffed like she was a bloodhound, and I cringed at the look on her face. “Whatever they’ve been doing to keep those powers of yours inside, it’s not working very well.”

  “You know about that?”

  “I know about everything,” she said, which didn’t even make sense. Stalking towards me, she somehow managed to look down at me despite the fact that I had an inch or two of height on her. “Listen, little baby suck. Eating people is fun and all for your kind, but you don’t get to do it in my town. I’ll be watching you—and the instant you turn darkside, I’ve got a knife with your name on it.”

  “You were way more fun the night we met,” I muttered resentfully. “And I don’t plan on killing anyone. That’s why I was here—I wanted to test things out while I’m still... bound.”

  “Well, it didn’t work,” she pointed out, leaning in even closer. “Because I can smell the hunger on you. You’ve wakened it by giving it a little taste. And you’re going to go mad if you don’t feed it. Dormant sucks like you are the worst, you know. I never would’ve given you that brew or kissed you if I’d known you were this naive.”

  Frustration burst out of me. Raising my voice, I yelled at her, “Well, what the fuck do you think I should do? I have no idea what I’m doing, but at least I’m trying! My life is a mess, my best friend is in prison, and now I have dangerous powers that didn’t come with an instruction manual. I’m out here trying to feed the hunger or whatever, but the only people I can hookup with are humans—and it’s not like you’re giving me any solutions!”

  Panting, I realized that I’d advanced on Naomi and actually gotten her to step back a bit. I felt bad about it and was about to apologize when she said, “You’re right.”

  “Wh-what?”

  “I haven’t given you a proper solution. No one has,” she admitted. “Once your powers are more mature you can go to the Realm of Light and be matched up with a fae powerful enough to take your hunger—but until then, you’re stuck here with the weak humans who will die if you feed off them like you need to.”

  “Right,” I said, all the wind gone from my sails now that she’d given in and admitted I had a point. “So what do I do?”

  “This,” she said, and she surged forward and kissed me.

  I almost resisted—the kiss felt cold and perfunctory somehow, and I got the sense that she didn’t really want to do it. But then I tasted her on my tongue, and sensed the same satisfied feeling I’d gotten the night we met, a feeling I’d been chasing ever sense. Moaning, I sank into the kiss and let myself be uninhibited with her, letting my urges loose and filling myself with her. They were right to call it a hunger. This wasn’t a passing whim that made me want to feed myself. There was something in me that created this need.

  When Naomi pulled back, she didn’t look like Jack had, or Tae Min. Instead she had a smug, almost satisfied look on her face. Staring into my eyes, she murmured, “See? All better now.”

  “Yeah.” I felt dumb, full of warmth and pleasure that sat like sticky honey inside me. “That was great.”

  Pushing away from me, she flipped her hair behind her shoulder and gave me a knowing look. “It’s not going any further than that, though. For one thing I know better than to get involved with a recently awakened dormant suck. And for another, you’re a straight girl. And I don’t do straight.”

  I didn’t know that I was as straight as Naomi thought, but she was right that I’d only ever been with men. I had no idea if I was actually into women enough to start something with her. And if I was into women, someone as intense and overwhelming as Naomi seemed like a bad choice.

  “Thanks for that, at least,” I told her, glancing over towards the door. “I guess I need to figure out what I’m going to do about my powers long-term if they’re going to be this hard for Maggie to bind.” Pausing, I added, “Are you following me?”

  “You betcha.” Her easy candor surprised me. “What, did you think I’d just let you wander around Baton Rouge treating humans like snacks?”

  I sighed, wanting to protest her words but sensing there was no point to it. “I didn’t realize you had time to follow me around.”

  “Well, I don’t.” She raked a frustrated hand through her long silky black hair, which caught my eye. “I’m supposed to be finding whoever is casting spells to make demons possess humans and go all stabby stabby.”

  “Wait a sec!” I stared at her, eyes wide. “So you’re investigating whatever happened to Talia? I thought that fae detective was taking care of that.”

  “Leon?” She scoffed her disapproval. “He’s a good officer, but he’s no dark hunter. Besides, I work with the police—on a freelance case-by-case basis.”

  “Let me help.” Naomi frowned and shook her head, but I wasn’t going to give up easy. “I won’t get in your way. But I know Talia—and I know that school, a lot better than you. If someone wanted to kill Todd using a demon, don’t you think having me around might help?”

  “I doubt it,” she said, entirely unconvinced. “Sucks are powerful, but you’re a baby. As useful as your powers are, you hardly know how to use them.”

  “I don’t need my powers to be useful. I’m studying criminology.” I didn’t mention that I’d only recently changed my major. “And I seduced that guy Salvatore tonight. Maybe I can do the same thing if you give me the chance.”

  “I guess.” She gave me an appraising look. “What the hell, meet me tomorrow to go over the case. At least that way I can work and babysit you at the same time.”

  It wasn’t the enthusiastic reply I was looking for, but it was a yes. “I’ll take it! Where do we meet? Can I get your number?”

  With a sigh, Naomi muttered, “I am so going to regret this, I can already tell.”

  Chapter Twelve

  I knew it wasn’t real.

  I was a teenager again, sitting at the breakfast table opposite my parents. They always made me get up early and eat breakfast with them on Sundays, which I hated more than anything. Everything they did made me feel like a child again. Sulking, I ignored the conversation they were having, shutting them out because I was angry and frustrated at my own life.

  When my breakfast was half done and I was bursting with impatience, I asked to leave. Sighing, my mother glanced over at me, her strawberry blonde hair spilling over her shoulder. She was so patient with me in those days, when I didn’t deserve it at all.

  “You can go, Selena,” she said, and I stood up immediately. Hastily, she added, “Clean your dishes and put them in the dishwasher!”

  I grumbled and stomped as I did it. In the memory I was so twisted up with anger and frustration that I didn’t see what I was doing to my parents, how they gave each other sad, exasperated looks as I pushed them away more and more every day. But I’d reached the age where I started to look at myself and wonder where I came from, and slowly but surely I was figuring something out. Like a worm in the back of my head, the niggling doubt that my parents weren’t really my parents kept growing. And if that was true, then they were lying to me, and had been doing so my entire life.

  So I didn’t even look at them as I huffed and stomped off to my room. When my dad called out, “Love you, Bean!” I didn’t turn to answer.

  A while later they stopped by and knocked on my door, but I was too wrapped up in the video game I was playing to pay attention.

  “We’re going to the market,” my mom said, her voice inquisitive. “Wanna come?”

  “I’m busy!”

  There was a long pause, one that I knew now had to be some kind of sadness. “Okay, Selena. That’s fine. Just... we should talk when you come back.” She sighed, and I almost stopped the video game to get up and open the door, but stopped when I remembered the lie that I suspected they were telling me. Before she left she added, “Love you, Sweet Pea.”

  I didn’t respond; just like with Dad, I said
nothing, my bitterness and frustration with them closing my mouth and keeping loving words inside. To this day it was one of my biggest regrets in my entire life, a little bit of cruelty that I would never forget. Thirty minutes later they were dead, killed in a gruesome car crash that drove their car off a bridge and into a river. I never saw them again.

  When I woke there was dampness on my cheeks; I must’ve somehow been crying in my dream. My heart felt heavy with grief for them, and the new questions that I had, which buzzed around in my mind: why had they never told me the truth? Did they know who my birth parents were? And what was the discussion my mom wanted to have with me when she came home?

  The letters Maggie had might answer some of those questions. My heart was too heavy to think about them, though, and I had a final to study for. Heaving myself out of bed, I headed into the kitchen and poured a cup of coffee. Maggie was sitting at the breakfast table eating scrambled eggs and bacon; she murmured a tired hello to me. She’d never been much of a morning person; neither was I, really. She hadn’t made me breakfast, but that was fine.

  It was a meal I mostly skipped these days.

  “Maggie...” I trailed off, then screwed up my courage. “Have you read the letters my parents wrote me?”

  She blinked at me then admitted, “Yes, I did. Only because I thought they might have written a few things about you that I should know.”

  “Do they mention my birth parents in there?” My heart leapt at the thought.

  Gently, Maggie told me, “No, Silly, I’m sorry. The letters were mostly advice for you about navigating being a fae. They only intended for you to read them once your powers awakened.”

  “Oh.”

  She added, “I don’t think anyone really knows who your birth parents are, though I’m sure they have a few guesses. Whoever gave you away, they wanted your parentage to be a secret, and they hid it well. I’m sorry I don’t know more.”

  “It’s okay. It was a long shot anyway.”

  Gulping down my coffee, I stood up and headed into the living room to study. Talia’s bail hearing was today, along with my calculus final—one of my worst subjects. It would take all my effort to concentrate on what I needed to do.

  So I pushed away thoughts of my parents, both the ones I knew and the ones I might never know, and cracked open my laptop to work on a practice test.

  Hours later I was sitting at my desk in class, staring at words on a page I didn’t understand. Internally, I counted the minutes that passed by, knowing that even now Talia was waiting for her bond hearing.

  I had to go see her.

  But I didn’t even know if I would be let into the courthouse. I had no idea how these things worked—it was the first time I’d been friends with an accused murderer. What I did know, though, was that I wasn’t going to get anywhere on this test, and Talia wouldn’t be proven innocent without hard work. I’d already agreed to help Naomi. Somehow, though, it didn’t feel like enough.

  There had to be more I could do.

  I made a decision. Screw the test; I had places to be. Grabbing my laptop bag, I headed out of class, heads turning to watch me go. The professor raised an eyebrow at me as I walked past his desk but said nothing; no doubt he barely even knew who each of his eighty plus students were.

  Outside, the old campus perched in a grove of moss-covered trees, promising southern splendor and relaxation. The air was humid for November; one of Louisiana’s unseasonably warm weather changes. No doubt it would change back to being terribly cold by the time the sun set.

  The LSU campus was big, so it took me awhile to get out to my car, but the walk cleared my head. The further I got from the classroom, the more I felt like I was making the right choice. This was what I was supposed to do.

  I’d had my priorities wrong to even think I could concentrate on school at a time like this. Being there for Talia was more important than my grades; I didn’t even know what I wanted to do with my life, after all. I’d only gone to college because of the college fund my parents left for me, because it felt like I had to for them.

  Looking back it seemed silly. Enrolling in LSU hadn’t brought them back to life. And choosing what I was going to do after I graduate had turned out to be so impossible that I was now at least a semester behind.

  So I would retake my calculus class. I hadn’t had a chance in hell of passing that final anyway.

  The courthouse was at least fifteen minutes away, but thankfully traffic wasn’t too bad this time of day on a weekday. I texted Talia’s mom as I got into my car, letting her know I was done with my final and on my way—she didn’t need to know I’d skipped out in the middle. She replied when I was almost there, letting me know Talia was coming up next. I parked quickly, got out and jogged up the courthouse steps as fast as I could.

  Inside, a dozen people waited in an old hallway to get into court and see the judge. Talia was there with her mom, dad, and her defense attorney. My heart squeezed to see her wearing old clothes, her hands cuffed together in her lap, two officers standing guard near her. Her hair was messy after a few nights in jail; she’d always told me it took a whole handful of curl cream to keep her thick raven locks in place, even right after a relaxing appointment. All in all she was a mess. But when she looked up and saw me standing there, her face soared.

  “Selena! I told my mom to tell you not to come.”

  “I didn’t listen.” I glanced over at the officers as I approached her; one shifted close and eyed me warily, so I stopped. “Can I, uh, say hi to my friend?”

  He didn’t answer, but the other officer, who seemed more relaxed, did in his place. “No handing her anything. Keep it short.”

  With a smile, I swooped down to hug Talia, and she did her best to reciprocate despite her cuffed hands. I wondered if those were normal; it seemed strange to cuff someone so small and unarmed. The other people in here didn’t seem to have cuffs and two officers watching them. But Talia was suspected of stabbing someone to death, so maybe they were just being careful.

  “I missed you,” I told her. “I’ve barely even been able to study without you here.”

  Ruefully, Talia told me, “I had to push my classes back. Turns out LSU frowns on being arrested in the middle of finals. It doesn’t help that all the news stories had headlines like, ‘LSU student stabs LSU student to death at party.’ The school may not let me back next semester.”

  The officer coughed, and I let go of Talia reluctantly. Her dad seemed to be engrossed in something on his phone; he’d never been a very talkative man, at least not to me. Glancing at her mom, I reached out and squeezed her hand. “I’m sure everything will be okay.”

  “I hope so, Selena.” She squeezed my hand back, and I felt the trembled of fear in her fingers. “We only have so much money to use to bail her out, so we just have to hope the police figure out who did this thing soon.”

  “Yeah.” I was scheduled to see Naomi in just a couple of hours—something I decided not to mention now, since I doubt they would understand why unless I told them about being a fae. And I wasn’t even sure we were allowed to do that in the first place. “When does Talia go before the judge?”

  Her defense attorney, who was a friend of the family, answered me. “She’s going up any minute now. You can wait out here if you’d like—it won’t take long.”

  Right as he spoke, Talia’s name was called and the officers brought her into court. Her mom and dad followed, but I hesitated. My bladder was protesting its fullness; I wasn’t sure if I could hold it through the whole hearing. And her attorney had said I could wait out here. So I decided to sneak off to the bathroom and back before it was all over.

  I shouldn’t have worried; there was no point in me being there other than to comfort Talia. Because not long after I left the bathroom, she came out of the courtroom, tears streaming down her face. Her mother looked similarly devastated, and her father seemed to have shut down.

  Seeing me heading towards them, her defense attorney grimly said, “Th
e judge wanted to make an example of her. No bail. Even if her family and friends are able to get the money to get her out, they won’t be able to.”

  My heart raced for her. I wanted to huge Talia again, but when I tried to one of the officers stopped me. “Keep your distant from the inmate, ma’am.”

  “Inmate?” I spat the word out, and wanted to say something more before I stopped myself. He’d said it like she wasn’t even human—but standing up to him wouldn’t help Talia. “Fine, whatever.”

  As the officers took Talia and ushered her out of the court, the only thing I could do was watch her and try to keep myself together. There were even a few reporters just outside the courtroom doors, waiting for her to come out. Her attorney shooed them away, giving a brief statement as Talia was taken to the prison bus waiting at the bottom of the courthouse steps.

  “I’m sorry, Deena” I said to her mom, reaching out to comfort her as she silently cried. “This can’t be the end of it.”

  “You’re a good friend to her, Selena.” Deena grabbed my hand and squeezed it tight; beside her, her husband Henry was silently crying and holding her other hand. “I thought we’d get more time with her.”

  Her defense attorney told them, “I’ll try to get you visitation as soon as possible. You’ll see her again.

  At the bottom of the steps, they were loading Talia into the bus, her slender form disappearing in an instant. It rolled down the street and took her away from us. Just like that my best friend was taken to a place I couldn’t follow, and we had no way of getting her out.

  There were two people I knew who could get her out, though: Naomi and Leon. And Naomi had agreed to let me in on her independent investigation. I made a vow to myself that I would do everything I could to find whoever did this to Talia, and put a stop to it, once and for all.

  It was time to find a murderer.

  Chapter Thirteen

  “So, where do we start?”