An Ordinary Fairy (53 page)

“I should have told you I was okay, but I wanted to get the gun away from him.”

“That’s what I guessed. I figured you weren’t hurt, you were clearly too pissed off.”

Willow giggled and turned back to Jones. “We still have to do something with him. Chester, is there any rope in your truck?”

Jones looked back and forth between them before answering. “Yes.”

“Good,” Willow said. “We’re not going to kill you, but we’ll need to keep you prisoner for a few days while we sort things out.”

“Prisoner?” His voice was raspy.

“Yes.” Willow hurled her voice. “Go get the rope.” Jones quickly rose, picked up his flashlight and walked toward the cemetery.

You’re enjoying this, aren’t you?

“Run, Chester.”

The big man grunted and began to trot. He vaulted the low iron fence and ran across the graves. His flashlight flew through air and fell. Something heavy thudded to the ground, and then all was still.

“Chester!” Willow shouted. “What are you doing?”

Silence.

Noah turned his flashlight toward the cemetery. It illuminated the bottoms of Jones’s boots, heels pointing up. “Uh-oh.”

They ran to the fence, vaulted over as Jones had, and cautiously advanced. With a loud bark, Shadow sailed over the fence and then stalked warily beside them.

Jones lay face down in the leaves. The right side of his head lay on the base of a headstone as if he slept, but the dull, lifeless eyes stared straight ahead through twisted and broken glasses. Blood ran down the standing portion of the stone that his face had struck.

Noah felt the neck for a pulse, and wasn’t surprised not to find one.

We didn’t intend this, Chester.

He shook his head at Willow. “He’s dead.”

Shadow sniffed the ground at Jones’s feet.

“Well, that’s the end of the Jones dynasty of terror,” Willow said. “Good riddance.” She paused, watching Shadow’s sniffing with interest. “Noah, come look,” she said. Noah trained the flashlight on the big man’s feet. Deer droppings covered the right boot bottom, and a large smashed pile of dark little pellets lay a few inches away on the leaves.

Noah looked up when Willow giggled. “What’s funny? The guy’s dead.”

Willow grinned. “I hope Daisy left this little pile. Karma at work.” Despite the grim scene, Noah smiled at the thought.

“Let’s go,” Willow said. “We need to take care of your arm. It’s killing me, so you must be miserable.” She rubbed the back of her right forearm.

“Willow, we can’t leave him here for someone to find. We should call the sheriff’s police and report this. It’s an accident, I guess, but there will be questions. The sheriff knows about the issues between you and Chester.”

Willow considered this for a moment. “I don’t want deputies traipsing all over the woods. Forensics is a lot better than it was thirty years ago. What happens if they find the cave, and my parents’ graves? Let him rot.”

“We can’t knowingly leave a dead body. It’s not right. And it’s illegal.”

Willow’s expression went cold. She stepped to the opposite side of Jones’s body. “Noah, I’ve told you fairies live a different existence. We don’t rely on regular law enforcement for help, and we don’t live within the bounds of the law. Your laws don’t always apply to our situations.”

My laws?

A bewildering distance came between them. Despite their love, a deep-seated, ancient difference remained between fairy and human.

The dark stone that stands between us. The thing you won’t discuss.

The fairy mystery.

Perhaps Willow’s warning not to love her was wise; there was much he did not know.

Noah’s mind raced over the last twelve days. The laughing, the crying, the flirting, the fighting, the dangers and the passion. His focus returned to the present and he gazed at Willow, barely visible in the darkness, standing resolutely with her arms folded across her bare chest. Although he could not see, he knew her wings twitched in agitation.

I know you. I want to know you more.

Noah stepped across Jones and stood before Willow. Turning his back on a body for the one he loved, dismissing the law and propriety, evoked the same terrifying feelings as plunging into a chasm. He stood before her, apprehensive, plummeting downward. Willow raised a hand to his cheek and light shone from it: a point of reference in the dark.

A light from the fairy world.

“Willow Brown,” he said. “My fairy friend. My lover. Teach me everything about fairies.” Willow’s face illuminated and a smile came to her beautiful features. He held her close and gently kissed her.

In the end, Willow conceded it wouldn’t be right to leave Jones lying in the leaves. When Noah reminded her she would have to face Janet Jones someday and answer the old woman’s insightful questions, she nodded her agreement.

Noah took a few precautions, hoping it wouldn’t be too obvious. He wiped both knives clean and placed them in their cases on the dead man’s belt. Willow cleaned the rifle of prints, clenched Jones’s hand and fingers around it in firing position, and then laid the weapon next to the body as if dropped. Using his handkerchief, Noah extracted Jones’s cell phone and placed it in his lifeless left hand. Working awkwardly, he dialed 911 using Jones’s thumb. Satisfied, they left for the cottage without further ceremony.

“Ow!”

Willow sat on the toilet stool while Noah applied rudimentary first aid to her injured head. He had insisted on addressing her injury first, hoping to stop his sympathetic headache.

“If you would sit still that wouldn’t happen.”

She
hmph’d
and continued eating the apple Noah had given her when she complained of hunger. “Why didn’t my amulet protect me? Ouch!”

“Sorry.” The bleeding had stopped, so Noah’s main task was cleanup. “Do you have any disinfectant?”

Willow stuck a finger in her mouth and held it up. “Just this.”

“To answer your question, we were at the center of a lot of evil energy. Your amulet was overcome, I guess. That’s probably why the hurling wouldn’t work. Maybe our magic for good wasn’t as strong as Jones’s energy for evil. Plus he had that amulet. I’m anxious to study it and see what’s inside. Might come in handy.”

Willow stared lightning bolts.

Noah continued working until satisfied he had removed all the dried blood and then cleaned the cut. With her hair flipped over the area the injury wasn’t visible except for the swelling, which he figured would be gone by morning.

They traded places and Willow went to work on Noah’s arm, carefully unwrapping and cleaning the injury. She jumped from the pain whenever Noah winced. He declined her offer of stitches, which seemed to disappoint her. She settled for a large butterfly bandage from Noah’s first aid kit and a tight gauze wrapping.

They moved to the kitchen, where Willow busied herself fixing a hummus sandwich. Noah slumped into a seat at the table, overcome with weariness. “Willow, that image you sent me of the stairway at the shed. Was it the same one your mother sent to you the night they died?”

“Yes.” She paused. “She didn’t aim it at me, though. I think it was for my father, and I just caught it, too. Mother was calling him to come help her, showing him where she was. She might have been in the same situation I was in tonight. Father didn’t reach her in time, or he didn’t succeed in fighting Armstrong.”

Willow sat down across from Noah and ate her sandwich in silence.

Exhaustion overcame them and they stripped off their clothes and climbed into bed. Willow rolled Noah onto his back and snuggled close in their favorite position, she on her stomach, half on top of him. She stretched her wings and shook them, then let them slowly settle over both their bodies. Sleep came in seconds.

Noah awoke deep in the night with a warm little hand caressing him to arousal. He opened his eyes to a bright glow all around him. Even Willow’s eyes appeared to glow, in a face of pure lust.

“Fairy lesson number one,” she said, her voice low and raspy. She climbed atop him and straddled his body, leaning forward on the bed to bring her face close to his. “After prolonged periods of extreme stress, fairies need sex.” With a swift motion of her hips, she joined Noah to her. “Lots of sex.” She slid her hands down his torso as she raised herself upright.

“Fairy lesson number two. We like to be on top.”

Twenty-Six

N
oah lit the last candle with satisfaction. The Big House atrium glowed with yellow light. Flames danced around the balcony railings on all the upper levels, including the widow’s walk. Willow had flown up to light the candles before disappearing into her parents’ room. Some big surprise brewed behind its closed door, and Noah was certain sex would be involved.

The last three days leading up to this Halloween night had been a whirlwind of activity, but at every free moment, Willow had led him off to the nearest bed for another fairy lesson, as she called it, though it was really just the best sex Noah had ever experienced. If no bed was near, no problem, since a lover with wings created endless possibilities. Willow told him fairies wrote the book on kama sutra, and he believed it. Noah had never enjoyed education so much.

The sheriff had appeared at the cottage early Sunday morning, as expected. He asked routine questions concerning their whereabouts the night before. The presence of footprints near the scene of Jones’s death was questioned, but he accepted their answer that they had been there earlier in the day to feed the deer. Gator tracks and spilled food confirmed their story. Most of the visit focused on the circumstances of Jones’s death, including the amazing fact that he had dialed 911 before he died. The coroner, he told them, would rule the death accidental, though he was curious what animal Jones had pursued in a cemetery in the middle of the night. Willow had asked about Jones’s mother. The sheriff could only say the coroner was on his way to the nursing home.

The remainder of Noah and Willow’s time, when not making love, was spent replacing the tires on the truck, retrieving the deer from the cornfield, and making preparations for the Ritual for the Dead. Noah had taught Willow the quarter calls, the ritual chants used to invite the spirits of the four elements to attend the ritual. Lighting the atrium with candles was Willow’s idea; Noah’s difficult task had been locating candles and holders.

Several times in the last two days, Noah’s thoughts had returned to their words in the cemetery. Something nagged him that he couldn’t put into words or a coherent thought. Willow often left the impression she concealed things from him, but she was quite open about telling him she couldn’t share everything. Still, something didn’t add up.

Noah checked his watch. Willow had said she would be a few minutes about half an hour ago.

“When are you going to be ready?” Noah said aloud. Willow’s response didn’t come through clearly to him, but he suspected it was meant to be a giggle.

Noah had seen the Ritual for the Dead performed once at a coven meeting he visited. While fascinating and moving, nothing spectacular had taken place, no cold drafts or disembodied voices. Perhaps the addition of some fairy energy would make a difference.

Noah perused the ritual set up. They had laid out a nine-foot circle on the atrium floor composed of leaves, acorns, nuts, small pumpkins and gourds. In addition to the usual ritual tools lying in the center of the circle, Noah had added two tall white pillar candles, the largest he could find. The four colored candles of the elements sat among the circle decorations, each in their proper direction.

A soft buzz overhead attracted Noah’s attention. The most beautiful creature he had ever beheld floated across the fourth floor banister.

A fairy princess, it must be.

She hovered for a few seconds and took in the sights of the atrium, and then gracefully descended to the floor. Her wings slowed to a stop, but remained poised high. She smiled shyly as he gazed at her in awe. Fairy fragrance washed over him like a flood.

She was clad in a gown of dark green velvet that clung to her torso and flared at the waist into a floor-length skirt. Short puffy sleeves and matching forearm coverlets emphasized her athletic body. A low cut back accommodated her wings; the scooped neckline revealed the muscular build of her chest. Around her neck, she wore a chain of flat gold links, and a circlet of autumn leaves graced her golden hair. Her wings sparkled with candlelight and her tiny bare feet peeked from under the dress. She clasped her hands and rested them on her belly.

Wish I’d worn more than jeans and a flannel shirt.

Willow glowed from the neckline of her dress to her hair, not the glow of arousal, but of excitement, for Noah sensed she brimmed with anticipation.

Several seconds passed before Noah could move or speak. He reached a hand to her and she gave him hers. Magic bloomed the instant they touched. He leaned down, brought the hand to his lips, and kissed it as gallantly as he knew how. Without speaking, he led her into the circle. When he released her, she clasped her hands again.