Following Fabian

by Holley Trent

  Shave?

  He rubbed his chin and felt the soft beard. Oh. That. “Maybe I like looking different from my brother.”

  She gave him a long blink and stuffed her hand into her jacket pocket.

  Okay. He got the hint. While he wouldn’t mind being a bit more distinct in appearance from his identical twin, if she wanted him to shave, he’d shave. “You…don’t like?”

  Her nose did the most darling crinkling, and he grinned.

  “No. But, it’s your face. You can do to it what you like. I figured you’d like to clean up.” She smoothed her expression back to its previous blank and shrugged with obviously feigned nonchalance.

  “Then I keep.”

  Her cheek twitched. “Suit yourself.”

  Oh, this was fun. He didn’t catch everything the little dragon was saying, but her sentiment was loud and clear.

  The past half-year had been pretty much non-stop torture, but at least he hadn’t had to shave. He’d never really grown out a mustache and beard before because when he and Felipe performed, they needed to be difficult to tell apart. When Fabian grew his hair out, Felipe had to, too. The shaving part was Fabian’s concession. Hardly seemed an equitable exchange, though, because they’d had to shave damn near everything those fucking spandex costumes didn’t cover. Chests. Legs during the warm-weather months. Armpits.

  Torture.

  He rooted through the bags and plucked out necessary odds and ends for a shower and change of clothes, suitably impressed at her thoroughness, though wondering if what she’d selected was her taste or what she thought he’d like. If she’d spent any time around Felipe at all, she might have assumed their preferences were similar. That was more or less true, given they’d shared a wardrobe most of their lives.

  He wondered what his brother wore now that he didn’t have to share?

  Fabian had been in the shower all of ten minutes and had only managed to shave his face and soap up his hair when Astrid knocked on the door.

  She let herself in without waiting for his invitation.

  He nudged the curtain back a bit and pushed up an eyebrow.

  “Phone for you.” She pointedly put her gaze anywhere but on him, not that she’d be able to see much through that little sliver of an opening.

  “Me?”

  “Mm-hmm.”

  “Who is it?”

  “Dana.”

  Dana didn’t speak Spanish or French. He remembered this all too well. The first time he’d gotten into contact with Shrew & Company’s owner, their conversation hadn’t been an easy one. He’d rehearsed what bit of English he’d introduced himself with, and that opening had gone fine, but things had gone downhill from there. Dana had to send Sarah to talk to him, and Sarah turned out to be a formerly bilingual woman who’d lost her Spanish around the same time as her baby teeth. They’d gotten on well enough, though. Under different circumstances, he might have made a pass at the unusual woman, but the more pressing consideration at the time had been finding Felipe.

  “What does she want?” He closed the curtain and ducked his head under the shower spray. Dana could wait three minutes.

  “To debrief, I guess.”

  “Don’t understand.”

  “Talk to you. Learn what you know about Jacques.”

  He mulled the words over and let the context congeal in his mind as he scrubbed his greasy scalp. “Okay.”

  Judging by the fact the curtain didn’t move and he didn’t hear the door close, he assumed Astrid was still there.

  “Yes?”

  “Phone.”

  “Okay.”

  Impatient little wench.

  He finished rinsing his hair and turned off the water. Nudging the curtain back a bit, he grabbed a couple of towels from the rack and pulled them into the shower cavity.

  She was still standing there. Still waiting. She behaved as if he was going to cut and run, but where would he go with no clothes or shoes on?

  He stepped out, towel-clad, and she held her slick little smartphone out to him.

  “I get dressed.” He didn’t mean for it to sound like a request, but somehow it managed to come out that way.

  “Later.” She nudged the phone up to his ear. “Say hello.”

  He sighed. “Hello?”

  “Mierda, eres realmente vivo.”

  Not Dana. Felipe.

  Fabian slumped against the countertop and blew out a breath. In Spanish, he said, “It’s good to hear your voice.”

  “And me yours. How are you? Are you hurt? This call is being recorded, by the way. Don’t take it personally. The girls need it to take notes. Make plans.”

  “That’s fine, and I’m good. Jacques kept me sedated on and off so I couldn’t phase and slip away.”

  “We figured something like that was going on when Sarah couldn’t get a read on you. None of the psychics could find you.”

  “Yes. I wish I could say I fought and got free, but the truth was, the shit was just less effective the more they used it on me. It’d still knock me out, but for shorter amounts of time. I had a couple of occasions to get up and run, but if I ran, we’d probably never pin him down again.”

  Felipe was quiet for a long while, and then said, “You stayed on purpose? Why? You’ve never been the vengeful sort.”

  It was true. He wasn’t. He’d always been too laidback for revenge, but exhaustion broke people in unexpected ways.

  “I guess a lot of things change when you have nothing to keep you company but your dreams for weeks on end.”

  “If I could leave right now to come help you I would, but I can’t leave Sarah.”

  “Why Sarah? You helping her with something? Did the Shrews put you to work?” Fabian used his palm to clear the mirror fog and studied his clean-shaven chin. Just one nick. He grunted appreciatively at his rusty skill.

  “Put me to work? Yes, I work for Dana now. With Sarah and all the rest. Oh, and Mr. Tolvaj and one of his brothers.”

  “Tolvaj? Really? The old fortuneteller’s favorite?” Fabian chuckled and let the towel at his waist fall to the floor. “Wondered why I hadn’t seen him around with his sadistic brothers.”

  “He and the one brother defected. You were already gone by then. The circus had packed up and left North Carolina with you, so you weren’t around when we had a bit of a shootout with Jacques outside of Asheville. It was utter chaos. We freed those Were-bears the crew abducted—ask Astrid to fill you in about them because it’s important—and Jacques shot at Sarah. He didn’t miss.”

  “Sarah? Astrid didn’t—”

  “Hey, don’t worry. She’s fine. I got in front of her in time to slow the bullet a bit. She’s okay, and…the baby is okay.”

  “What baby?”

  “Mine.”

  Fabian closed his eyes, pulled the phone away from his ear, and shook his head hard. There must have been some water stuck in the canal or something. “I’m sorry, what? Obviously, I’ve missed more than I expected.”

  “Yes. Sarah is pregnant—our daughter is due in a few weeks—and we’re married.”

  “I was only gone, what, six, seven months?”

  “Around seven, I guess. I’ll just say that it only takes one time. Pretty sure she was pregnant before the circus took off. Anyhow, she’ll probably maim me for engaging in this discussion at all, so, to change the subject, where is Jacques?”

  Who gave a shit about Jacques? Fabian was going to be an uncle, and he had a sister-in-law. He wasn’t going to let that drop.

  “You’re seriously married? Like, legal and everything?”

  “Yes.”

  “And you have a job, and I bet you live in a real house and not a trailer.”

  “It’s a pretty nice house. Granted, I had nothing to do with picking it out.”

  Pangs of envy stabbed at Fabian’s heart and stole his breath.

  Hearth, home, family. Most thirty-five-year-olds sought those things, if they didn’t already have them, but Fabian had never really believed
he’d get them. He’d been transient all his life, and didn’t have an education. His travel visa had probably already expired, and he was likely in the country illegally. He certainly didn’t have a driver’s license, or even know where his birth certificate was. And here his older-by-minutes brother was, all cleaned up and respectable.

  He had to ask… “You happy like that, Felipe?”

  Another long silence filled the line, and then his brother said, “Yes. I’m happy. Sarah’s family has been very warm. Belonging to someplace and someone is nice.”

  “Then I’m happy for you.” Envy aside, he really meant it. “Maybe someday I’ll have a landing pad of my own.”

  “Why not live here? With us?”

  “I wouldn’t intrude. I’d be a burden. Best I go back to Spain and—”

  “And what? Chase ghosts? Cry over headstones of people we never really knew? There’s nothing for us there. Trust me, I know. I was there six months ago, Sarah and me. I’m here legally, and not just because of the marriage.”

  “And me?”

  “And you look like your brother, and your brother’s picture is currently on your passport. We had to be careful in regards to you. While we were abroad, we coordinated with Spanish and French law enforcement agencies to give them information about Jacques, but we didn’t mention you were still with them. Otherwise, you would have gotten deported on the spot once you were found. I had to pretend to be you on a couple of occasions, but you’re here for the moment legally, though dishonestly.”

  Fabian groaned and fondled the gold cross pendant he’d been wearing non-stop for seven months. Before Felipe had disappeared, he’d rarely worn it. Now he fondled it as if it were a worry stone.

  “I know how you feel about lying, but let me bear that sin and don’t fret about it,” Felipe said. “We have a list of missing children we suspect may have been abducted by Jacques. Names have obviously been changed, and some may be long dead, but they’re going to e-mail descriptions and age progressed artist renderings of the abductees over for us to look at, see if we recognize any of them.”

  “Okay.” Fabian sat on the commode and threaded his legs into a brand new pair of boxer briefs.

  “Do you know where Jacques is?”

  “I caught snippets of conversations. Rumblings. He’s lying low, hoping people will forget about him. There was some talk about looping up into Canada and moving toward the west coast, but for now, I believe some of his shapeshifters are hiding him in the Black Hills. I’m pretty sure they’re getting some help from local rogue Were-creatures. There were some Cats lingering around the camps, and I heard one of the shifters say they stunk of Jacques.”

  “That helps a lot. If Sarah were mobile, she’d probably get a read on him quickly, but her doctor has prohibited her from traveling right now.”

  “And you have, too, I’m sure.”

  “As if I could tell her what to do.”

  “I know you well enough to know you’d try, and if your first attempt failed, you’d resort to cheap tricks.”

  “You’re right. You do know me well enough, but if it were your wife and your daughter, you’d be unreasonable, too.”

  “Maybe.”

  Fabian had no way of knowing. The closest thing to a father he and Felipe had from the time they were four was Jacques, and that relationship was obviously rife with dysfunction. It was good to know that Felipe preferred to act on instinct than to emulate what he’d personally experienced.

  “Listen, Astrid needs to speak with Sarah, so will you hand her the phone?”

  “Certainly. I’ll see you soon, I hope.”

  “Within a week, come hell or high water.”

  “Why?”

  “Astrid will tell you. Has to do with those Bears I mentioned. Love you.”

  “Yeah. You, too.” He padded out of the steamy bathroom and approached Astrid at the desk where she was furiously pecking her laptop keyboard, forming silent words with her lips as she typed.

  “Phone,” he said, and she looked up, eyes widening as she wrapped her fingers around the phone and took in the sight of him. She did a quick scan from his naked shoulders down to his waistband, lower, then back up to his face.

  He hadn’t taken her for a prude.

  He let the corners of his lips quirk up. Oh, she was going to be fun to play with.

  She swallowed and pushed her chair back as she placed the phone against her ear. “Uh…this, this is Astrid,” she said, and her voice bore a note of strain, as did the corners of her eyes.

  She couldn’t pretend he didn’t affect her. She’d just showed her cards, after all.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Holy shit, he was distracting.

  Astrid tried to focus on putting all the right digits into her phone in the correct sequence, but every time Fabian moved in her periphery, she had to look at him.

  Although he was thinner than his probable usual weight, he had a phenomenal physique. He’d worked hard for it on those trapezes for a lot of years, though. Only a small percentage of what he and Felipe had done for the circus had been smoke and mirrors. Yes, sometimes one or both would phase into their invisible forms to confuse the crowds, but mostly the thrill show was all them, flying from one flimsy swing to the next.

  Felipe had said he was happy to be done with that part of his life, because at thirty-five he was “too old for that shit,” but did Fabian miss it? What would be his livelihood now? Would he be as adaptable as his brother?

  Astrid gave up on dialing Eric’s number, and turned her attention to the semi-clad acrobat perched on the end of the bed.

  His wet hair draped over his shoulders, and he batted a knot out of a section with her comb.

  “Dress, please,” she pled.

  He looked up from his hair and raised an eyebrow. “What?”

  “Dress. Uh…wait. Where’d that book go?” She shuffled through the sheath of papers on the desktop until she found the little dictionary. She turned to the D section. “Uh. Por favor, vestirse.”

  “Why?” His lips quirked up at one corner, and he went back to detangling his long hair. Even Felipe didn’t grow his hair that long, and maybe Fabian didn’t generally either. Perhaps she should offer him her little pair of nail scissors.

  She narrowed her eyes and watched him make frustrated swats at his hair.

  Nah. The hair kind of reminded her of one of those hot Scotsmen on the covers of romance novels set in medieval times. She wouldn’t tell him that, though. That would be admitting she read those things, and that she gave any thought to romance at all.

  “Why? Because you’re really fucking distracting.” No, his cock was really fucking distracting. How had he worn those skimpy costumes for all those years without women pouring into the center ring and swarming him after he climbed down the ladder?

  “I don’t understand.” He wore that grin again.

  “Grr, give me the comb.” She held out her hand, and he dropped her comb into it. Sighing, she stepped into the open V of his legs and he wrapped his arms around her thighs as she combed out his snarls.

  “No need to get too cozy,” she said.

  “Why not? I can understand you this way.”

  “I suspect everything you do and say is calculated to a T, isn’t that right?”

  “More or less.” He skimmed his hands up her thighs, and she gave his hair a hard yank.

  “Dragon.”

  “Been called worse.”

  “It wouldn’t be so tangled if you’d let me finish my shower. Conditioner has its uses.”

  “I’d prefer to not have your brother pissed at me, thank you very much.”

  “That doesn’t sound like Felipe. He’s very laidback.”

  “Less so, lately. His patience is shot, and I can’t say I blame him.”

  “I never imagined us settling down, and he seems to have rooted himself rather quickly.”

  She leaned in a bit closer, so the side of Fabian’s face pressed against her torso, and worked the
back of his head.

  His hands moved to the small of her back, and eased up beneath her shirt, skin-to-skin.

  She let out a breath and struggled to suppress the shudder. When he touched her like that, she had a hard time separating out words from impulses—holding back the things she really should not say.

  “I think roots suit him.”

  “Can’t wait to see it for myself.”

  “What about you? What are you going to do when you’ve got this mess behind you? Given any thought to where you want to be?”

  “I thought about it a little. I always assumed we’d go back to Spain, but Felipe said there’s nothing there for us. I trust his word, so I suppose I’ll have to make alternate plans.”

  “Dana would hire you.”

  “You say that as if it’s a certain thing.”

  “It is. You already know what we are, and you’re already in the loop about all the hinky paranormal stuff going on around us. You’re in good shape, can probably hold your own in a fight, assuming no tranquilizer darts are involved.”

  “Ha ha.” His hands moved a bit higher, and his thumbs spread around her ribcage, both tickling her and arousing her with each tiny stroke of the pads.

  Her sex clenched, and she drew in another breath.

  She couldn’t let him know how he was affecting her. She wasn’t a weak woman easily susceptible by a bit of attention and pretty words aimed her way. She’d always been that tough nut to crack because she knew what she was, and she’d rather be alone than have all of her foibles laid bare and picked apart for someone else’s amusement.

  “Um.” She closed her eyes and concentrated on the task at hand. She felt for snarls and tangles in his thick hair, and finding none, she backed up a pace. “I think I got them all. You can ponytail up now. And you can also let go of me.”

  “What if I don’t want to let go of you?”

  “Everyone has things they desire, but grown-ups know they can’t always act on them.”