Pink Princess Fairytini (Fairy Files #2) (32 page)

The goon studied us with a lackadaisical expression, not unlike Jimmy’s resting expression. I wondered if the goon was also a pot head. Finally, he shrugged. “I don’t actually know where he is. He’s with his healer, but I don’t know where she lives.”

“The human?”

The goon nodded. “Yeah. You know her?”

“Sort of. Do you have any idea where the kids are?”

The goon stared out at the street. “I’m down with what Benny wants to do, but I never liked him taking those kids.”

“A little boy died at the mall today,” I said, surprised that the goon was talking to us at all. I was even more surprised when his face paled and his eyes went glassy.

“Which one?”

“A three-year-old boy,” I said. “Herbert Elderwood.”

He dropped his head and cleared his throat. “It’s not right,” he said. “And now that’s how the humans will see him. As a monster that kills children. They’ll want to kill us all.”

“The more children we save,” I said. “The more sympathy we’ll get from the humans.”

The goon nodded. “Yeah. I want to help, but I don’t know where the kids are. I just know that he was hiding them in Rubalia.”

“Through one of the doors in his house?” Brace asked.

“There’s a portal there, yeah,” the goon said. “I’ve seen him take children from there.”

“Can you show us?” I asked.

“Come with me,” the goon said. He spun on his heel and led us inside.

I fell into step next to Hieronymus. “How are things going on your side of the investigation?”

“Like you, we figured out that someone is closing portals, but we didn’t know who or how. Once I heard about the incident here, I stopped at your condo to see what you’d found and Mercury filled me in. I’ve never heard of the kind of magic that Benny uses, and it is especially cruel to use children to perform it. He will have to be shut down.”

“What do you mean ‘shut down’?”

“He is not of our realm in any sense of the word. He is from the nightmare realm and he is living in the Non. In all senses, the laws of Rubalia do not apply to him. His cohorts in Rubalia will be punished by our laws, but the humans in the Non will not be able to punish him or cage him. I’m afraid that job will fall to you.”

“Fall to me? You mean you expect me to put a leash on the big dragon?” I was certain I’d misunderstood him.

He nodded. “Yes, or kill him. He must not be allowed to continue to wreak havoc and give humans a bad impression of the fae.”

The goon was leading us through a maze of hallways and doors, and I hoped he was taking us where he’d said he would, because I didn’t have a clue how to get out of there. I looked behind me at Sandra, Brace, and Frost. “Any of you heard anything about the human response to the dragon in the mall.”

“Magical stunt gone wrong,” Sandra said. “They’re saying Benny’s wanted for kidnapping and child endangerment, possibly murder, but everyone seems to believe he’s a human with a dragon suit. No one is suggesting he’s actually a dragon.”

“Okay,” I said, a tiny bit relieved. “I doubt everyone actually believes that, but okay. Did the humans at the show really see a dragon?”

Sandra shrugged. “He wasn’t glamoured and the humans were there to see something fantastical, so I don’t know how they couldn’t have seen him. Someone took a cell phone video and the eyewitnesses they talked to said they saw a dragon, but—”

“Here it is,” the goon said, swinging a door wide open. As I stepped inside the large, sunny room, I hoped that Sapphire and her boss got a chance to talk to those people who’d been in the audience to find out what they’d actually seen.

“I’ll wait for you outside,” the goon said, holding the door open for all of us. “I’m not permitted to enter Rubalia.” Once everyone was in, I looked around the formal dining room. I stepped to a large, bay window and looked out onto a backyard full of kids, playing tag and swinging, and climbing on the playset.

“Do you recognize them?” I asked, looking between Frost and Hieronymus.

“I recognize Rodney Elder,” Frost said.

Hieronymus nodded. “That’s most of the missing from our side. Three are absent, but perhaps they are playing somewhere else.”

There were no adults around, no half-dragon people, no one to stop us as we collected the kids and took them out of there. Frost, Sandra, Brace and I took Rodney back to the Non, and Hieronymus took the others back to their homes in Rubalia. He claimed he didn’t know who owned the home where they’d been kept and he suspected we’d never know. He was certain that whoever had been helping Benny in Rubalia was long gone, because they’d heard what happened to Benny and they’d fled. Five of the fifteen kids who’d gone missing from Rubalia were not at the house and the other kids said they’d been killed during Benny’s portal-closing spells. We were missing two from our side who hadn’t survived.

We spent the rest of the day returning children to ecstatic parents and breaking the news to other parents that their kids would never be coming home. We made sure the police had been notified of the kids who’d returned home, but since we had no proof that the others were dead, we told them nothing about the kids still unaccounted for. Frost saw me back to Harvey’s house.

I unlocked the door to let myself in and waved at Frost, mentally groaning at the sound of shouting inside. Another game night? Wasn’t Harvey exhausted? I stepped into Harvey’s living room to find him yelling at three men and one woman, all of them dressed in lace and satin, the style of fairies in Rubalia. The man at the center of the shouting match, a tall, lanky man with an aquiline bone structure and a regal bearing, was a cousin I’d met when my mother had killed her father and taken over his throne.

Nobody seemed to notice my arrival and I considered tiptoeing back to my bedroom and avoiding the whole scene, but I figured they’d find me eventually.

“Hi, y’all,” I said, with a wave and a smile. “To what do I owe the pleasure of this visit?”

Everyone froze and stared at me. Harvey could hardly meet my eyes and a stone sunk in my gut. I knew, I just knew that he’d had enough. That he’d found the final straw and whatever we’d had, whatever we might have had was done.

My cousin swallowed hard and returned my smile. “I am your cousin, Oakenwood, and I am here on behalf of your mother. She was quite impressed with how you found the missing children and she would like you to come with me to see her in Rubalia.”

“Why didn’t she send Hieronymus?” I asked. “I just saw him a couple of hours ago.”

“Hieronymus is otherwise disposed and she felt that…in light of the dragon still being at large, she wants you to be accompanied by guards.”

I nodded. “So why were you in the middle of a shouting match with my …?” The look on Harvey’s face stopped me and I knew better than to hold on to him when he had already let me go. “Friend? Why were you two fighting?”

“He broke into my place, Chloe,” Harvey said. “He and his guards were waiting on my couch, like they owned the place. I didn’t know that they were related to you. I almost shot them.”

“I am royalty,” Oakenwood said. “These are my guards. We have the right to enter the princess’s home and make sure it is safe and that she is well-protected. We have found this place and this human lacking. You must return to your condo.”

So that’s what this was about. Oakenwood had said Harvey was incapable of keeping me safe. And Harvey had agreed with him. He’d argued until his face turned red, but I could see from the defeat in his shoulders and the way he wouldn’t meet my eyes that he agreed with my cousin. Maybe he’d come to the same conclusion at the mall, when I’d almost died.

“I’ll meet you outside,” I said. “Give me a few minutes alone to talk to Harvey?”

Oakenwood nodded, and he and his entourage left. They stood outside on the front lawn, looking out of place and uncomfortable. I might have laughed if I didn’t want to cry.

“Chloe,” Harvey said. “I—”

“I wish I had said yes to you the first time you asked me out,” I said, not wanting to hear any speeches about how much he cared about me, blah, blah, blah. “It probably would have ended the same, but at least I could have had a couple of years with you. We could have had a chance to get to know each other.”

He reached for me, but dropped his hand at the last minute. “It’s my fault. You told me you were a princess, but I didn’t really get it. Didn’t understand what it would mean until today. Until I saw you save those kids while I just stood there helpless. I couldn’t even keep those trolls away from you. Brace had to create a shield around you. You almost died and I couldn’t do a damn thing.”

“That’s the moment you understood I was a princess?”

He shook his head. “No. Yes. It was just the moment I realized I’d never do anything but hold you back. You aren’t going to give up helping the fae, putting your life on the line, and just be a club owner are you?”

“No,” I said, a bit sad at the realization that I could never just be a club owner again.

“I hated watching you come so close to dying, and I know that you would do it again, that you
should
do it again. I’ll have to watch that again, while I know I can’t be there for you in any way that matters and you…you have—”

I interpreted his glance out the window and spoke for him. “I have difficult relatives,” I said. “I get it, Harvey. Maybe someday when things are less hectic, when things settle down, we can try again.”

“Maybe,” he said, but I’m pretty sure we both knew that was an empty promise.

I started toward the door and he stopped me with a hand on my shoulder. “The boss wants me to head up a task force specializing in the supernatural.”

I stopped. “I knew not everyone would believe it was a magic trick.”

He snorted. “If anything good comes out of this, it’ll be that the police, at least, believe in the supernatural. I’m going to need your help, though, yours and Frost’s.”

“Of course,” I said. “So you’re not leaving the force?”

“No. They need me. I’m the only cop who didn’t lose my lunch or pass out when they suggested the dragon was a real threat to the city.”

I leaned in and kissed his cheek. “We’ll get him when I get back.”

“About that,” he said. “What portal are they using? In case I have to send someone after you?”

I poked my head out the front door. “Hey, fairy fellas,” I yelled. “Where we headed?”

“To your club,” Oakenwood said. “If we ever get to leave.”

“No, what portal are we leaving from?”

“We built a portal at your club,” Oakenwood said.

“Huh,” I said, looking at Harvey and raising my eyebrows. “Do you think that means I’m getting my club back?”

“I hope so,” he said. “The husbands in this city have been getting complacent since Ephemeral shut its doors.”

I hugged him and left with Oakenwood.

Sometimes, when you think it can’t get any worse, it does
. –Chloe Frangipani

Parents push their children because they love them. They only want their kids to be the best they can be
. –Althea Frangipani

I walked up to Ephemeral and saw Frost leaning against the door. He looked calm and casual, but his eyes were dark amber, and I knew he was ready for a fight. “Harvey?” I said when I was standing in front of him.

“Yeah, he didn’t want you going over alone, and I agreed.”

I nodded, unlocked the door to my club, and let us all in. I wasn’t going to fight with Frost, because I wasn’t stupid enough to want to face my mother alone. Besides, we’d sort of become the Rubalia team, and it would be weird to go there without him. “Okay,” I said. “So we’re at my club, where to now?”

“Your office,” Oakenwood said, glaring at Frost. He didn’t say anything about the werewolf joining us, but then he didn’t have to. His feelings on the matter were clear from his expression.

I led the way up to my office and almost caused everyone behind me to stumble back down the stairs when I froze in the doorway and then took a step back. There was a portal behind my desk, a spinning blue vortex right behind my desk chair. I was definitely going to have to rearrange my office or risk accidently tipping into Rubalia.

Frost put his hands on my shoulder and gave me a small shove. I stepped into the office and moved to make room for everyone else. “There’s a portal in my office,” I said. I know Oakwood had already told me that, but it still blew my synapses a bit to actually see it.

“Your mother is waiting for you,” Oakenwood said. Without another word, he walked to the portal and disappeared. The guards who’d been by his side gestured for me and Frost to step through the portal.

“Any last words?” I asked Frost.

“Don’t agree to anything your mother asks until we’ve had a chance to discuss it.”

I just stared at him. “You mean we have to come back to the Non to discuss it and then go back to my mother to give her my answer?”

“She can wait.”

“I am capable of making decisions on my own,” I said. “I’ve been doing it a long time.”

“And I’m saying you don’t have to do it anymore.” He stepped through the portal before I could argue with him.

I followed him through, glad I’d worn a backless dress and boots until the chilly air of a fall night hit me and pain lanced through my wings. “Ahhh,” I said.

“We should all shift to wolf form to protect our wings,” Oakenwood said, his face drawn, likely from the same pain I was feeling. “It will also prevent Frost from standing out as a werewolf.”

I didn’t have to be asked twice. I wished myself a wolf, and I became a wolf. Immediately, the pain vanished, and I felt comfortable and warm. The two guards shifted as soon as they crossed over, and I finally looked at our surroundings. We were on a dirt path in the middle of a field sprinkled with wildflowers. The portal shimmered, even in the dark of night, just to the side of the path.

The other wolves took off at a run, and I figured it’d be smart to follow. We reached the fairy castle, its dainty towers coming into view over a hill, in what felt like less than an hour. Oakenwood, the guards, and I shifted back to our fairy selves and Frost stayed close to my side as we made our way to a room I’d never visited before. A small, cozy room with delicate, wooden furniture and colorful flower arrangements. My mother stood by a window looking out over the meadowlands and the forest beyond.