Hey, Universe?” My voice was soft, tentative. “If you’re listening, I need my boyfriend to wake up. If he wakes up, I swear I’ll do anything. I’ll open gates, I’ll help all the paranormals, I’ll never judge people wearing Crocs again. Just let him wake up. Please.
Kiersten White . . . why you are here in the first place,” Lend finished saying. His voice had a distinctly menacing tone.
“Why, to make you the best omelet you’ve ever had, of course.” There was a pause that I could only fill with my imagination. It involved Lend making I’m going to kill you motions with his hands. “Hey-oh,” Jack continued, “I rescued our girl Evie from the Center and helped her get to the Faerie Realms to save you.”
“Our girl is my girl. And that makes everything okay now?”
“It doesn’t,” I yelled. Would we never be able to have a quiet conversation again? “But it’s a start.”
“A start I intend to finish with this omelet,” Jack said, “because after you’ve eaten it, all will be forgiven.”
“I’m not eating anything you make,” Lend answered. I closed my eyes, listening to the sounds of the fridge opening and drawers shutting slightly harder than they needed to.
Can we switch rooms?” Lend called. “I’m king of starving.”
“I’ll make you something!” Jack said, cheerfully skipping into the kitchen.
“Can you even cook?” I asked, a valid question considering he didn’t eat normal food. He could only eat food in the Faerie Realms. Jack could help; he could get me to wherever Raquel was. And he knew the Center better than I did, even.
“Never underestimate what I can do.”
“Oh, believe me I don’t.” I sighed. “Lend, do you want me to go around back so you can come in here?”
“Yeah. Man, this brings whole new levels of suck into my life.
So, we’ve got a problem,” I said.
“What?” Lend yelled.
“We’ve got a problem!” I shouted.
“No, I heard that. I mean, what’s the problem now?”
“I have the solution!” Jack interrupted.
“What?” I sat up, all ears.
“Bells!”
“What?” Lend and I asked at the same time.
“Get her a kitty collar with bells on it. That way you can hear her coming and get someplace where you won’t be hurt by collapsing immediately into sleep.”
There was a thumping noise, followed by an indignant “Ow!” from Jack.
“The problem,” I said, “is that Raquel is going on trial with IPCA and I am not about to let them lock her up forever.” She was my Raquel. How dare they. My fear was quickly shifting to anger. Tasing me was one thing. But if they thought they could get away with persecuting the very best person they’d ever had working for them, they had another think coming.
“Where?” Jack asked.
“At the Center,” David answered, coming down the stairs, but he was cut off by Lend snapping, “You aren’t involved in this, Jack.”
“Oh, I think you want me involved. I believe I’m the only one here who has ever been to a disciplinary hearing. Five, actually. I was shooting for my lucky number seven, but alas, IPCA and I parted ways too soon.”
That settled it. A cheery band we’d make, no doubt. I’d been looking forward to starting some new Christmas traditions this year. Simple things. Reading the Grinch. Decorating a tree. Making cookies. Storming the Center to rescue the closest person I’d ever had to a mom. The usual holiday fare.
Merry freaking Christmas.
I looked at Reth hopefully. “You?”
“Must we really waste more time? Not all of us here are immortal, and I’d think you and Jack would more carefully guard what little you have. We should go immediately to my queen.”
“Can you get us in or not?”
He looked at the ceiling, his features dripping with disdain for the entire operation. “I suppose if you were to stand immediately outside her door I could use my sense of where you are to navigate into her room and open the door from the inside.”
“That’s my pretty faerie boy!”
“If you ever address me like that again, I will make that abomination on your head permanent.”
I put my fingers up to the brunette wig, horrified. “You wouldn’t.”
“I suggest you do not attempt to find out.
I heard a thunk that sounded like Lend’s head against the door. “This is stupid. Let my dad take care of it. He’s been contacting everyone he knows who is still with IPCA, and—”
I walked over and put my own head against the door, pretending there wasn’t anything between us. “And it doesn’t matter. IPCA isn’t the same. There are new people in charge, and they aren’t messing around. I can help her. Raquel would do the same for me. She has done the same for me.”
“I don’t see what good it’s going to do for you to waltz back in there and—”
“Can I tango back in there, instead? So much sexier than the waltz.”
“Evie, I’m serious! You just broke out of IPCA! You’re going to get tased and tagged again.”
“I really doubt it. Faerie backup, remember?” I went to the window and looked down into the yard, where Reth stood in the midst of the dead brown grass, looking like a god of spring and sunshine who had seriously lost his way. He was staring straight up at me, although how he knew I’d look straight down that instant I had no idea. Creeper.
I shivered a little, still not breaking eye contact with Reth. I was in over my head, I knew that, and I knew I’d owe him even more after this. I had no doubt I’d pay in a way I really didn’t want to, and soon.
The door shook as Lend kicked it. “Pretty much the only idea I like less than you walking back into IPCA is you walking back into IPCA with only Jack and Reth for protection.”
“They owe me.”
“True,” Jack said, standing up and swaying slightly as he shook his head to clear it. “Plus, I’m pretty sure Reth’s threat to remove my hands if I don’t help Evie is still under effect. And I’m always up for making hell at IPCA. It’s a favorite pastime of mine.”
Lend kicked the door again, harder. “Along with abandoning people in the Faerie Paths?”
“One time! I do that one time and no one’s going to let me live it down? Just off the top of my head I can name five worse things I’ve done in the last year.”
I put my hand on his shoulder. “Probably not the best way to get back in our good graces.
The doorknob twisted. “I’m coming with you.”
I ran over and held it shut. “No, you are so not. We can’t carry your unconscious body around the Center. Besides, I need you here. If something goes wrong, I can’t handle you getting hurt.”
“Wait, so it’s okay if I get hurt?” Jack asked.
“Yes,” I snapped at the same time as Lend and Arianna.
“As long as you’re sure, then,” Jack muttered.
Lend jiggled the doorknob. “What about you getting hurt?”
“I’ve already broken into the Faerie Realms and stabbed the Dark Queen. After that, a bunch of government suits? Not so intimidating.”
“Please tell me stabbing does not factor into your strategy.”
I laughed. “Of course it doesn’t. I left my knife in her neck, anyway. I think I’m just going to run around and punch people, see if I can’t find a teenage girl to tase me,” I knocked teasingly on the door.
I shuffled my weight from foot to foot, trying to relieve some of the soreness and wondering how long it would take Reth to figure out where I was and get into Raquel’s room.
The door slid open in reply.
Jack and I darted in, letting out twin sighs of relief. Lend, of course, immediately dropped to the floor. Naked, still. I doubted Raquel had anything in his size.
“He was rather upset waking up in the Faerie Paths with me,” Reth said.
“I can’t imagine.” I quickly scanned Raquel’s austere living room area. “There, help me get him into that closet.”
Jack grabbed an arm and we dragged my poor boyfriend across the floor and shoved him into the tiny coat closet next to Raquel’s vacuum. I added watching Lend walk to the things I missed most about him.
We closed the door and after a few moments a loud thunk sounded. “What the—Where am I? Evie?”
“Right here,” I said, tapping on the door. “You’re in a closet in Raquel’s unit.”
“Why?”
“Because I’m going to search the rest of her place and I didn’t want you to risk brain damage by any more unconscious falls.”
He muttered something unintelligible but distinctly grouchy and I turned, quickly scanning the room.
And then, the final line: “Must convince Evie to help Light Queen or all will be lost.”
Well, that was fabulous. Way to be cryptic and a traitor, Raquel. “Looks like Raquel joined Team Force Evie to Do Supernatural Crap.
And the guy with her was Lend’s dad.
Didn’t see that one coming. And, oh bleep, what would Lend think knowing that his dad had been very serious with one of Lend’s least favorite people in the world? Or at least I assumed they were very serious, given the number of photos that they were sucking face in.
“Well, that’s interesting,” I said.
“What’s interesting?” Jack called from the other room.
“Something is interesting?” Lend shouted.
“No! Nothing! I mean, nothing important. Keep looking.”
“I found a vacuum,” Lend said.
“Brilliant!” Jack answered. “Just what we needed!
« first previous
Page 33 of 42.
next last »
Data privacy
Imprint
Contact
Diese Website verwendet Cookies, um Ihnen die bestmögliche Funktionalität bieten zu können.