I dropped to my belly, the ground under me still damp, though not as bad as where we’d first stopped. Grasses tickled my face as I pushed my way along the path, cursing Kinkly for making me do it and cursing my body for not being in shape despite the last two weeks of hard work. Let’s be honest, don’t we all want to achieve our perfect weight after one workout, and then get offended when it doesn’t happen?

Yeah, me too.

With the dark of the night, it was difficult to see exactly where I was going. Up and over a big root I went, and from there I slid down into a hollow between two trees.

My skin tingled, like buzzing ants were crawling up and down my arms and along my spine. Ahead of me was a cluster of massive oak trees, planted tightly together. Each trunk was pressed against its neighbor, as though they were trying to block out the world. I’d never seen a cluster of oak trees grown like that. Their branches hung low, thick with Spanish moss, and acted like an additional curtain to block them from sight.

I twisted to ask Kinkly a question, but she was gone.

The buzzing sensation against my skin increased, and I crouched down in the hollow, barely breathing as a series of fairies, dressed mostly in black with only a yellow accent on their chests, swept around the grouping of oak trees before landing on the one closest to me. I counted fifteen of the little critters, all male.

They pulled from their backs little tools that flashed bright in the moonlight. Silver was my first thought. Iron was something that bothered the fae, so any tools would be silver.

As a team working three at a time, they began to worry at the tree closest to me, driving their weapons into the oak’s trunk, digging out the wood one sliver at a time. I squinted at the spot they were chopping at and realized this was not the first time they’d been at it. But the tree was healing even as they worked.

Which explained why Karissa thought this would take another ten days before they dug all the way through to the center where the artifact was stowed away. I frowned, tapping my fingers against the tree root I leaned forward against. There were a lot of questions rolling through my mind.

Like why exactly didn’t Karissa just take the artifact herself? She’d evaded the question earlier, but she seemed pretty powerful. Much more so than a bunch of tiny fairies with what amounted to needles. And why exactly didn’t Kinkly want me to be seen by these fairies? I thought back to my conversation with Karissa, going over the words in my head. And then I realized she’d never said her fairies were doing the digging here. Just the fairies.

Duck me, what if these fairies belonged to the Unseelie she’d mentioned? What if I was watching the bad guys, waiting for them to slip up?

I settled down into the hollow, finding a position that was pretty comfortable. I patted the ground beside me and Robert slid down to sit, swaying only a little as he did.

I didn’t say anything as I slid my gran’s book out of my bag and laid it on my lap. Turning the pages slowly, I didn’t dare turn on my flashlight for fear of being noticed, which meant I did a lot of pulling the book right to my nose in order to read in the super dim light.

Nearing dawn, the light shifted enough that I could really get reading between checking in on the workers.

My fingers stilled on a page marked Unseelie.

My gran’s familiar handwriting filled the page beneath it.

Unseelie are not inherently evil, as some would believe, however they are known for their trickster nature—they will not always give the truth when asked, or they may give half-truths in order to manipulate. The division between light and dark fae is not so certain, and there are some who believe there is a third fae power—the Dark Fae, who derive their power from death and destruction. I have not seen this power, but I have encountered Seelie—the fae of the sun—and Unseelie—the fae of the moon—and both carry inherent power and dangers.

Any dealings with them must be made in contract form, their names signed by their own hand, or there is no certainty that they will follow through. (I made a mental note to try and get said paper signed by Karissa.) The power of the Seelie is at its height between noon and sundown, and the Unseelie are most powerful between three in the morning and noon. They can, of course, be awake at other times, just not as strong as when their deity calls to them.

I peeked up over the roots and looked at the fairy men, who were still going strong, working at the tree with great fervor. Watching them, I was willing to bet that they were Unseelie, working while their power was at its strongest.

I held the book tight to me as my mind raced, trying hard to put the pieces together. Karissa wanted to protect the item, but the Unseelie were after it. So why had she hired me to watch their attempts to steal it?

The answer dawned on me. She wanted me here so I could let her know when they were close. This way they’d do all the digging, and she could swoop in and take the item with little effort. Clever, very clever. I found myself smiling. I liked her style, it was crazy smart, and very much using what she had on hand to make it work.

Day fully broke above us and brought with it a fresh wave of heat. It wasn’t long before I found myself wondering how close we were to noon. My belly grumbled hard, reminding me that I had not eaten in a long time. My gran’s book had kept me busy, and between that and the fairy men, I’d not noticed my hunger or my fatigue. A yawn cracked my jaw and I struggled to keep my eyes open for the first time that night.

Moments later, the fifteen small fairy men dispersed, flying away in a V-formation, straight up through the trees and off to wherever it was they slept. Which meant it was time for me to go too.

And maybe that’s where my thoughts would have stayed if not for the person who stepped into my line of sight.

There was no mistaking those broad shoulders, the dark hair touched with silver at the temples, or the blue eyes ringed with gold. Not that I could see the nuances of his eyes from where I sat, but I’d had some up close and personal looks into them. And then there was his body, built from hard work over a forge making knives and whatever else he made.

My temperature rose as he strode around the tree, the small fairies buzzing around him. I couldn’t hear what they were saying, but he was nodding. They were saluting him and then they sped off, leaving the tree and Crash.

He slid his hands over the smooth trunk of the tree, and damn it, the heat burning through me cranked up a notch. He had nice hands. Big hands, probably rough with work. I swiped a hand over my face, fully expecting it to come away soaked with sweat.

Nope, no sweat, just a rush of heat as though I’d spiked a fever.

Crap, what if he looked my way? What if he saw me there? I didn’t know if he was good, bad, or somewhere in between. But I did know he was Karissa’s ex-husband. And he was inspecting the work of what I suspected were Unseelie fae.

Time to go.

I slid backward, pulling myself out of my little hollow, keeping my eyes on Crash’s back. If he turned around, there was no way he’d miss me.

The dark and my hollow hideaway had kept me from the fairies. I doubted Crash would be so easily fooled. Robert had disappeared, as was his habit, but I wasn’t worried—he always resurfaced when I needed him.

Up and over the little ridge I’d first climbed down, I slid down the other side, the crack of a branch breaking under my foot as loud as if I’d shot off a gun.

Crap! Just my ducking luck!

I moved as fast and quietly as I could, driven by the need to put distance between me and the fairy ring that I was pretty sure was being run by the Unseelie. Which probably meant Crash was one of them, something that made my mind stutter. I tried to lock on to the sound of water, to get to the river, but there wasn’t even a whisper of it this far into the forest, which left me running and taking turn after turn without any real idea of where the hell I was going.

I spun and crashed into . . . well, Crash.

“Ooof!” I yelled as his hands locked onto my arms, keeping me from falling flat on my face. Yes, those hands of his were worn, I could feel the calluses on them.

“Are you okay?” His hands were ridiculously gentle, and all I could think was that I’d never been jealous of a tree before that moment.

“Sorry, I’m just totally turned around.” I was breathing hard, which meant my boobs were bobbing up and down as I heaved for air.

He smiled down at me, which made my stomach do some serious flip-flops. “I can see that. What are you doing out here? Not on a job for the Hollows, I hope?”

Double-dipped poop on my shoe, this was bad. Douche Canoe had hired Crash to make a crucible. If Crash told him, even in passing, that I was out here working on something, what do you want to bet Douche Canoe and his son would be back to hurt everyone attached to the Hollows? They’d made it clear they did not want anyone in the Hollows near this job. I found myself shaking my head in denial as I tried to come up with a reason for my presence in the middle of the woods.

“No, no job. I’m . . . just trying to find Eric’s. I told him I’d come visit, but finding his place again is proving . . . difficult.” I smiled back at Crash, hating how my body reacted to him. Because damn it, he was all kinds of bad boy hot.

He slid my hand over his arm, right into the crook of his elbow, and tugged me along. “Come on, I’ll make sure you don’t get turned around again.”

The heat off his skin soaked into my fingers, and I found my hand curling around a bicep that was ridiculously muscular. Like we were on a stroll together. A date.

Nope, that was a ton of nope. I was not going down that path, no matter how hot he was. Crash was not a good guy. And I was done with assholes. And I was working for his ex-wife, who seemed intent on grabbing that artifact out from under him, and it would be all kinds of awkward if that little tidbit got out.

“So, what are you doing out here? Seeing as you left me with Feish because you were going away, right?” I said with all the innocence I could muster.

He didn’t even glance at me as he brushed some exceptionally long Spanish moss out of the way. “Checking on a few things.”

“Well, that’s not suspicious at all,” I said.