“That is true.” He looked crestfallen. The poor guy probably didn’t even own any regular clothes. “I didn’t consider this in my rush to do my lord’s bidding.”
I managed not to roll my eyes, and took a sip of beer. Winston brooded for a moment before his face cleared.
“We will tell everyone that I am your uncle and I am here to visit you.”
Beer sprayed everywhere. Coughing, I snagged a serviette from further down the bar and wiped it up as Winston watched me anxiously. Yes, I was sure people would believe Winston was my uncle. My Chinese uncle.
“Winston, we don’t look anything alike. You’ll have to think of something else.”
But it seemed he was too taken with the idea to let it go. “Perhaps you were adopted! Or I could be.” I shook my head. “An old family friend, then. An honorary uncle.”
I took a deep breath. “Let’s just focus on getting you a house first. I have a friend who can help with that—she’s just started a job as a real estate agent. She should be here soon.”
“Really?” He beamed in satisfaction. “How fortunate! You see, Lexi, if we have faith, the gods will provide.”
“It’s nothing to do with the gods. She agreed to meet me here long before you arrived,” I said, unable to keep a note of irritation from creeping into my voice. “That’s why I’m sitting here. Waiting for her.”
“Trust in the path,” he said, ignoring everything I’d just said.
I drained the last of my beer, seething. If the gods were capable of arranging paths for their supplicants, why the hell couldn’t they predict their own futures? If they were so all-seeing, how come they were getting killed off left, right, and centre?
I wasn’t buying it. If Apollo had the kind of power that Winston was claiming, he would never have spent a year as a prisoner with a collar around his neck. He wouldn’t now be trying to set up a new temple so he could sneak around without being traced. Divine power clearly had its limitations. From what I’d seen, the gods were too busy living their own lives to care about anyone else’s.
2
Rosie arrived a few minutes later, rushing in in a cloud of perfume and breathless apologies. “Sorry I’m late. Got held up with a client who wanted to examine every last cupboard in the house I was showing.” Her eyes slid sideways as she kissed me, checking out my peculiar drinking buddy.
“It’s fine. I wasn’t going anywhere. Rosie, this is my … ah … friend, Winston.” To Winston, I said: “Rosie is the real estate agent I was telling you about.”
“A pleasure to meet you, my dear,” Winston said, with a strange little nod that looked like it wanted to be a bow but thought better of it.
Rosie slid onto the stool on the priest’s other side, her professional curiosity aroused. I hadn’t seen her since she’d taken this job, but she certainly looked the part in a navy business suit, her light brown hair tied back in a neat ponytail. “Are you in the market for a home, Winston?”
“Not a home, precisely.” Winston licked his lips nervously, giving me an uneasy glance. Did he have a problem lying? How quaint! And so strange for a fireshaper. “More of a, um, holiday house.” His expression brightened as inspiration dawned. “Yes! A holiday house for retired priests.”
“Well, I can certainly help with that.” Rosie fished her business card out of her purse and handed it to him. “Come and see me tomorrow and I can show you a few places. What kind of house are you looking for?”
Winston glanced down at the card. “Let’s talk about it tomorrow. I don’t wish to interrupt your time with your friend with business.” He slid off his stool, looking like a man with places to be. Nice exit. Very smooth. He could spend the rest of the evening dreaming up requirements for his imaginary holiday house.
“Do you have somewhere to stay tonight?” I asked.
“My acolyte has booked us into the Goodnite Motel. Hopefully, the comfort there will be better than the spelling.” He smiled at us both. “Good afternoon, ladies.”
“Bye.”
When he was gone, Rosie regarded me with raised eyebrows. “Where on earth did you meet him?”
“We have a mutual friend. In Crosston.”
She shook her head. “You do know some odd people.”
Ha! She didn’t know the half of it. “Can I get you a drink? How are you? How’s the new job working out?”
She signalled to Harry, and ordered a white wine. “Busy. We really need another agent, but Gerard’s too tight to put anyone else on. And I’m the new girl so I can’t really say anything. I’m still learning the ropes.”
Harry delivered her wine, and she took a grateful sip. She looked tired, which wasn’t unusual, but a few wisps of hair had escaped her ponytail and there was a smudge of something—lunch?—on the collar of her jacket, as if she hadn’t had a moment to stop all day. Sunday was a busy day for real estate agents.
“How’s Cody?” I asked. Her face brightened, as it always did when she talked about her son. He was a bright, chatty kid who loved reading, and he’d often visited me in the bookshop after school. He mainly lived with Rosie, but he stayed over with Joe and Holly one night a week, or sometimes two. “What does he think of his new little half-sister?”
“I think he’s looking forward to when she gets a bit older. He says all she does is sleep.”
“Is he okay with the fact that she’s a werewolf and he’s not?”
Rosie grimaced. “I don’t know. He hasn’t mentioned it, and I don’t want to bring it up and make him think about it if it hasn’t occurred to him yet.” Rosie was human, which meant that her son with Joe was human, too, but since Holly was a werewolf herself, Joe’s daughter with his second wife was a full werewolf. “Anyway, there’s nothing anyone can do about it, so he’ll just have to live with it. He’s been too busy keeping on my good side lately to have much time for anything else. He’s been texting me every day at work to tell me when he’s home from school.”
She laughed, and I joined in. Cody had given us all a scare when he’d disappeared with a friend one day after school recently. There’d been a whole search party out combing the bush for him. His mother had been overjoyed to get him back safe and sound, but I could well believe the apron strings had tightened since then. Cody would be working hard to convince Rosie that he was trustworthy again.
That was the night I’d met Jake.
“You look tired,” Rosie said.
“Yeah, it’s been a busy couple of weeks.” She raised her eyebrows again, and I shrugged. “Long story.”
The story had begun that night in the wet bush, when Jake and I had rescued Cody, and it was still going on. I just hoped there was a happy ending in store. I missed Jake more than I would have thought possible, considering the short length of time I’d known him. But the kind of trials we’d been through together had a way of creating an instant intimacy. I’d seen sides of Jake’s personality that I was willing to bet few people knew existed—and I liked what I saw.
“So, you said you wanted to talk to me about something?”
“Yeah. Joe said you were practically the last person to see Alberto before he disappeared.” Sometimes I had trouble remembering to say “Alberto” instead of “Hades”. “I was hoping you might be able to give me a clue as to why he vanished.”
She shook her head. “I’m just as mystified as everyone else. We only chatted for a minute. Nothing seemed unusual.”
“What did you talk about?”
“Just everyday things.”
She took a sip of her wine and I closed my eyes for a moment, trying to control my impatience. This was not just some vampire wandering off. She had no idea what was at stake here. “Like what?”
“He was just asking me how Cody was. He was nice like that, always interested in everyone. I told him Cody was worming his way back into my good books and he laughed. Then I mentioned Cody’s new teacher.” She shrugged. “Nothing, really.”
“That was it?” Damn, I’d been hoping for something
more.
She twirled the end of her ponytail around her finger, thinking. “Pretty sure. He left right after that.”
Was it something she’d said? “What were your exact words, can you remember?” I was clutching at straws, but I didn’t have any other leads. My helplessness galled me. I should be out there fixing this—finding Hades, saving Jake—and instead, I was stuck here, flailing around in the dark.
She shrugged again. “I just said it was a shame that Becky had left so suddenly, because Cody was really happy in her class, but the new teacher seemed to be working out okay.”
“And what did he say?”
“He asked when Becky had left. I thought he knew, because everyone had been talking about it, and you know how he likes to gossip when he’s minding the bar.”
“What was the big deal with Becky leaving?” I’d never really warmed to Becky, though Holly had liked her well enough. She’d always struck me as looking down her nose at the people around her, particularly the shifters, though she acted as sweet as sugar to their faces.
“It was just so sudden. One day, Cody comes home from school and says Miss Campbell never turned up that morning. People were worried at first, frightened that something bad had happened to her. The police even went around to her house looking for her, but she’d packed up all her clothes and personal items and taken off. Just like that. Never said a word to anyone. Old Mr Lee said he’d seen her drive past his place that morning, her car all loaded up like she was going on a holiday. Can you believe that? How could she just walk out on her job like that?”
It was pretty weird. “And when was this?”
“The day after that car accident at the pub, the one that wrecked the doors. Remember?”
Trust me, I wasn’t likely to forget that “car accident” any time soon. I would have died that day, and Jake and Holly, too, if Alberto hadn’t blown the doors off the pub and come to our rescue. He’d blown the lid on his real identity at the same time, though he’d wiped the fact that he was Hades from the memories of everyone who’d seen his true self, except for Jake and me.
But Becky hadn’t been there, so why would the fact that she’d skipped town the day after have bothered Hades?
“What was his reaction when you told him about Becky leaving?”
“Nothing much. You know what he’s like—it’s practically impossible to tell what he’s thinking sometimes.”
“Did he say anything else?”
“Just ‘goodbye, it was nice chatting’, or something like that. Then he left.”
I couldn’t figure it out. Did he think Becky had been working with Erik Anders? That didn’t seem likely, since she’d been living in Berkley’s Bay for at least a couple of years. And why would it matter anyway, if the traitorous councillor was dead?
Perhaps he thought she was a mole. She’d always struck me as a secret One Worlder. Once, I’d thought that that human organisation was the worst threat out there, just because they thought the world would be a better place without shapers or shifters in it. They made plenty of noise about it, but rarely took any action. Of course, that was before I had discovered the shadow shapers existed, with their plans to destroy all the gods by stealing their powers for themselves. If she was a mole for the shadow shapers, it would definitely be a problem, but I just couldn’t see the connection. She hadn’t seen the fight outside the pub, so leaving right after it must be coincidence. Hades must have seen something else significant about her abrupt departure. But what?
My phone buzzed in my pocket, signalling a text coming in. I didn’t recognise the number. It only said “Hes”, as if someone had started typing “He’s”, then realised they had the wrong number and given up. I shrugged and put the phone away.
Rosie patted my hand reassuringly. “I wouldn’t worry about him too much—I’m sure he’ll turn up sooner or later. He’s a vampire. There’s not much that could take him down.”
I smiled, but said nothing. Actually, he was a god, which meant he was vulnerable, since no one knew how the shadow shapers were catching them. Every god they’d captured, whether they survived the experience or not, came away with a hole in their memory where the “who” and “how” should have been. That was why Apollo was so jumpy about people knowing his whereabouts. Since he couldn’t remember how he’d been snared the first time, there was no way to guard against it.
“Hey, there!” said a familiar voice. “Mind if we join you?”
Syl stood there, grinning, her dark hair in its customary long braid over one shoulder, Lucas looming behind her like a gigantic shadow. He was a good head-and-a-half taller than the diminutive cat shifter, and built like a brick shit house.
Rosie finished her wine and slid off her stool. “Lucas! I haven’t seen you in ages.” She stretched up to give her ex-brother-in-law a kiss on his stubbly cheek. “When did you get into town?”
“Last night.” The big werewolf gave her a crushing hug.
“Make sure you drop in for a proper visit before you leave.” She scooped her handbag off the bar. “I’m sorry, I’ve got to run now—I told Cody I’d be home by four. See you later, Lexi.” She smiled politely at Syl and hurried away.
Syl stared after her, a comical expression of surprise on her face. “She didn’t recognise me.”
“No kidding, genius. She’s never see you in human form before.”
“I know, it’s just … weird.” She claimed Rosie’s stool and sighed. “Maybe I have spent too long as a cat.” She shot me a sidelong look, her green eyes stern. “No need to say I told you so.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it.”
Lucas went off to buy a round of drinks and a smile curved the corners of her mouth as she watched him. “There are a few things I’ve missed about being human.”
I followed the direction of her gaze. The hunky werewolf was certainly a tempting package, fit and strong-looking. He was a taller version of Joe, with the same brown eyes, and hair that tried to curl if it wasn’t cut often enough. If I hadn’t been so interested in a certain fireshaper, I might have made Joe’s dreams come true by hooking up with his brother. “Like what? Drinking beer?”
She grinned, a wicked glint in her eye. “That too.”
***
I went home from the pub about nine o’clock. Syl laughed and said I had no stamina, but the truth was, I was still exhausted. I fell into bed and barely had time to pull the blankets up before I fell asleep.
Voices woke me much, much later, speaking in those peculiarly carrying tones that slightly tipsy people always used when they were trying to be quiet. Lucas’s deep rumble sounded just outside my door, then Syl’s unmistakeable giggle. Wow, it had been a long time since I’d heard that. Obviously they’d had a good evening after I’d left. Maybe I’d been wrong about her fancying Apollo. She certainly hadn’t wasted any time hooking up with Lucas. I smiled into the darkness and rolled over.
Syl’s door closed, but I still heard the creak of protest from her bed as they got into it. How on earth were the two of them going to fit into her narrow single bed? There’d be bits of Lucas hanging out all over the place. I heard more giggling, soon followed by some other sounds. Gah. I pulled the pillow over my head to block the noises. These walls were thinner than I’d realised.
Bright daylight glowed around the edges of the blind when I woke again. There were no signs of life from Syl’s room. I grinned to myself as I crept past her closed door. After the night they’d had, they probably wouldn’t be surfacing until late. Later—it was nearly ten already.
I grabbed a juice from the fridge and stood looking out the kitchen window at the street below while I drank it. Maybe I’d treat myself to breakfast at the café opposite, then go check on the bookshop. I had to decide what to do about it—I didn’t really want to leave it closed, but I couldn’t see myself working there again for a while. Maybe not ever, which made me sad. Life had been so much simpler when I was a bookshop employee—filled with the smell of old books, chats with custo
mers, and the satisfaction of keeping everything neat and orderly. Admittedly, I’d had the fear of being found by a fireshaper who wanted to kill me hanging over my head, but otherwise, it had been a pretty good life.
There were only a few other customers in the café, and I took a seat with my back to the wall, looking out at the street. Old habits died hard, though no one was hunting me anymore. I ordered a big breakfast, surprised by how hungry I felt. I guess sleep wasn’t the only thing I’d missed out on lately. There’d been a few skipped meals, too.
By the time I’d worked my way through the heaped plate of bacon, eggs, tomato, and mushrooms that arrived, a small black cat had appeared on my kitchen windowsill across the street.
*I didn’t expect to see you up for hours yet,* I said. *You had a pretty big night.*
*Sooo big.* Her mental voice purred with self-satisfaction.
*Where’s Lucas?*
*Still asleep. I think I broke him.*
I smothered a laugh, and wiped the last of the bacon grease from my mouth with the tiny paper serviette. *Doesn’t he have to get back to Crosston to go to work?* His boss was probably still cranky with him for skipping out on work the other night to drive me to Berkley’s Bay.
*He said he’s going to take special leave.*
*Special leave? What for?*
The little black cat licked a paw delicately, almost languorously. *I’m special, so he’s taking leave.*
*Just be careful you don’t get your heart broken. He’s a bit of a ladies’ man, according to Joe.* That was one reason Joe had been so keen to match me up with his brother—he thought I’d be a steadying influence. Ha! He didn’t know me nearly as well as he thought he did.
*I can handle him. Don’t worry about me—I’m not looking for a ‘happily ever after’ here.*
*Just a ‘sexually sated for now’?*
*Something like that.*
*Sounded like he was meeting your criteria last night.*
*He most certainly was. Who said cats and dogs can’t play nicely together?*
Hidden Goddess (Shadows of the Immortals Book 4) Page 2
