“And who are these select few?” I found myself more than passing curious as to what could be more powerful than her.

She shook her head. “I have told you far more than I had thought to as it is. That is enough. The spells will be weakened as the fairies cut through the layers of protection. When the layers are thin, then you must tell me immediately.”

That made little sense, but I supposed the situation would be clearer to me once I saw what was actually going on. “I have one more question.”

“You are full of questions,” she said. “Curiosity killed the cat.”

“But satisfaction brought it back.” I smiled at her. “Satisfy my last question. This sounds like an easy job, easy money. Tell me why Eammon and the others wouldn’t work for you—the truth now—and I’ll consider the job.”

See? Circling back.

Her eyes flashed and above us the sky rumbled. Yeah, lightning was definitely in her toolkit. The hair along my arms and the back of my neck prickled upward with the pull of the electricity in the air.

“They do not like my first husband, that is part of it.” Her eyes kept on flashing as every muscle in her seemed to tense. “To be fair, I don’t like him much either. This one is my preference.” She snapped her fingers, and a slim figure stepped out of the trees to my left, startling me. Pale blond hair braided back from his head, bright blue eyes, a sharp jaw, and soft lips were paired with a body that was still to my mind somewhat underdeveloped. He reminded me of that elf from the Lord of the Rings movie (don’t ask me his name, I can’t remember those wild fantasy names with more vowels than consonants. The cute elf, you know who I mean!).

“Pretty boy.” I spat the two words out before my filter kicked in. Karissa laughed as she smoothed her hands against his bare chest.

“Yes, he is a pretty boy, and so obedient. I don’t like men who can’t be brought to heel. This one is eager to please, never argues, never causes me grief, and does all he can to make me happy.”

I couldn’t resist. “Did you kill the first one?”

Her laughter rang through the trees. “No, he is far too strong, though I would if I could. I cut all ties with him, but he is . . . hard to untangle oneself from. I am still connected to him as all women are connected to their ex-spouses. An offensive thought.” She wasn’t wrong. “My ex . . . he is a blacksmith, of all things.”

I nodded, but my brain was working in overdrive.

Remember what I said about my ability to guess things? About my brain putting pieces together until sudden understanding would hit me like a ton of bricks tossed by a strongman? Yeah. That was usually a good thing.

Except this time I could all too easily see the shadowy character slipping away through the trees right before Karissa stepped out. There’d been something familiar about the figure—or at least its slinking. If I’d looked closer, would I have seen the broad shoulders of a man who’d entangled himself in my life too? I mean, how many supernatural blacksmiths were there?

My mouth hung open, flapping as I tried to find the words. “Crap. Is your ex-husband Crash?”

5

“Get moving!” Eammon yelled. “What the hell, you bunch are the slowest recruits we’ve had in years!”

I tried to pick up speed, I really did. But running a two-mile lap around a graveyard in the remarkably high heat that spring brings in Savannah was no easy thing. Not dressed in work wear, which in my case was leather pants, a tank top, and the waist/thigh strap and sheath system that held my knives.

“Holster,” I muttered to myself as the proper word for what I wore finally came to my oxygen-deprived brain. I had knife holsters on my thighs.

The other part of my brain kept on stuttering over what I’d learned that afternoon. Crash had an ex-wife. I don’t know why that was surprising. I mean, he was gorgeous, and all full of manly alpha vibes that had my panties in a twist, so it wasn’t exactly shocking that someone had wanted to lock that down. But damn it . . . did she have to be a fairy queen? A stunning, powerful, beautiful fairy queen? One that I kind of liked?

My feet slowed as I went over her request again. Watch over a fairy ring, get paid a giant ducking gemstone for every eight-hour shift. The thing was, I wasn’t nineteen anymore, and while I was pretty sure I could pull one all-nighter, could I do ten or more in a row? With like four hours of sleep a day? I wasn’t sure I could do it. Not that I’d agreed to. I’d left Karissa with the promise that I would answer her by the end of the night, before what would be my first shift.

I worried at my lower lip, thinking. I’d never had kids—not for lack of trying—but that meant I’d had little experience with the sleep deprivation camp that children put their mothers through. Sure, sure, dads too, but let’s be real. Whose boob are they latched on to? Not daddy-o’s.

A shake of my head freed me from the whole breastfeeding thought spiral. Crash had an ex-wife and she wanted me to work for her. I was living in a house that he owned. My mentor, Eammon, hated Crash because of a business deal gone sideways. I wiped sweat off my eyes before it could sting.

The job would bring in a heck-a-lot of money.

A job I didn’t have to tell Eammon about, according to my contract. In my paperwork with the Hollows group, it said I was free to take on any additional work so long as it didn’t interfere with the training and the Hollows group had already passed on the job. In fact, the wording was perfect to the point of being suspicious. The hours working for Karissa wouldn’t overlap with my training, so I was technically in the clear.

Temptation called to me, and while I tried to tell myself I hadn’t decided yet, I knew I had. I was going to take the job.

Kinkly was supposed to swing by after training to get my answer, and lead me to the fairy ring if my answer was yes. A grin curled my lips. Hell, yes, I was going to get Gran’s house back one way or another. A couple more jobs like this, and I should have more than enough money to convince Crash to sell.

The other recruits were well ahead of me, hell, they’d lapped me already. To be fair, we weren’t that far into our twelve-week training program. But I was the oldest of the group by nearly twenty years, and it showed when it came to the physical part of the training. At least I knew how to roll with the shadow world. Most of the others still freaked out regularly when exposed to an aspect of their new reality.

Poor Luke was the worst. He passed out from shock on a regular basis. Not good considering he was the resident young werewolf.

“You really are slow, you should go faster. Move your legs more. Like this.” Kinkly’s voice pulled my eyes to one side. She floated above a tombstone that had partially crumbled, her wings fluttering madly as if that would help me run faster.

“What are you doing here? I thought you were supposed to come by at the end of the training?” I’d left her behind at Forsyth Park and hurried back to Corb’s place. He hadn’t been there, which was good because I wasn’t sure I wanted to hear his spluttering explanation about all the lube in the bathroom.

“Came early to watch you in action. Don’t worry, the mentors won’t see me, and if they do, they won’t know about your visit with the queen.”

I flapped a hand at her, rather frantically, to shut her up.

Werewolves had better hearing than most, and I was jogging toward Sarge, who stood next to the tombstone marking the entrance to the Hollows. As I drew closer, I realized his head was hanging low and he just looked . . . sad. Kinkly had ducked around behind the angel tombstone, so I said, or rather huffed, “Hey, Sarge, come run with me. Keep me company.”

He lifted his eyes and slowly broke into a jog next to me. I’d say he was making fun of me, only I really wasn’t moving that fast. Running is not my forte unless I’m running for my life, in which case I’m not half bad at it. I mean, I’d still die, but I’d give whatever was chasing me a good twenty-foot sprint.

“You look blue,” I said as we jogged side by side. “What’s got you down?”

“Unrequited love,” he said with enough seriousness that it made me bite back a kneejerk quip.

I blinked up at him, not sure if he was joking. He was in his mid-thirties, built like a brick house—muscle for days—had lovely amber eyes, a great sense of humor, and was for the most part pretty sweet. “Seriously? Who wouldn’t want you?”

Oops, I’m not sure I was supposed to blurt that out. I’m going to blame it on the lack of blood flowing to my brain as it fought to keep my body moving. He, like Corb, was a hot potato that my raging hormones would love to wrap their greedy little hands around. Sure, he was a werewolf, but I liked dogs just fine.

Woof, woof.

He barked a low laugh. “Thanks, Bree. I think that . . . no, never mind. I’m used to it, and I’ll get over it. How did it go at the auction today?”

Ah, so he knew about that then, did he? “Well, I didn’t get the house.” I didn’t slow to a walk, but my jogging was so slow I might as well have been walking. “They didn’t even let me bid. Himself made sure of it.”

“Himself?”

“Yeah, it’s what I call my ex. He thinks so highly of himself, and I hate saying his name, so it seemed to fit. It just popped out of me one day, and after that it stuck.” I paused and then went through what had happened at the auction, including the parts where I’d kept Missy from bidding so Crash could get the house.

“You should try to separate yourself from Crash,” he said, but it felt like he was saying the words by rote, like maybe he didn’t really believe them. I frowned up at him.

“You know, we might not have known each other all that long, but I can tell when you’re saying something you don’t believe. Why should I stay away from him?” I asked. “I mean, don’t get me wrong, I’m trying to keep my distance, but I want my gran’s house back, and he’s in the way.”

His unusual amber eyes met and held my gaze. “It’s what I’m supposed to say. I’m a mentor, I shouldn’t be encouraging you to be involved with, or hang around, characters who have been deemed shady by the council.”