Dirty Little Misery (Miss Misery) (3 page)

“I can’t believe you made me wait ten years.” His voice was low, his breathing heavy.

Neither could I, and I had to fight the longing to go faster. To reclaim our lost time.

Wetting my lips, I undid his button. Then his zipper. He stared down at me, a fierce glow in his eyes that urged me on and heated my blood. My fingers trembled as I resisted the itch to quicken my pace, then I wrapped them around his length, so silky sweet and hard, and eased him free of his jeans. My body clenched in time with his.

His breath hitched as I leaned over to taste him once, a single lick to hear him moan and stoke my hunger. His grip on me tightened. “Jess.”

I teased us both with my lips, letting them brush against his wet tip while my free hand reached lower to cup the rest of him. I wasn’t sure who wanted the next part more, but my body screamed with a throbbing need. To hold his powerful erection in my hands, to watch his naked chest rising and falling, to meet the intensity in his eyes—to know I was the one stirring this reaction in him—pitched my own desires to levels I’d never experienced before.

I couldn’t believe I’d managed to
hold out
ten years.

Twenty minutes later I was on my hands and knees, retrieving my pants from beneath the table and even more in need of a shower. My hair stuck to my neck, but my body was languid with fulfillment and my mind at peace. It didn’t hurt that Lucen hadn’t bothered to put his shirt back on, either. Half-dressed myself, I watched him head into the kitchen, admiring the muscles in his back.

“Ready to shower?” I asked, amused at my own licentiousness. Satyrs could turn anyone into a sex fiend. I’d practically been a nun before this. After all, it was hard to maintain any sort of relationship when you got a high off ruining them, and I’d never been the sort who was comfortable jumping into bed with someone I didn’t know well. Thus my sex life had been almost as nonexistent as my dating life.

Lucen laughed, and I could hear him rummaging around in his cabinets. It was dinnertime for him, but past bedtime for me. “Soon, but first I want to hear what happened today.”

Shit. The Gryphons. My post-sex contentment died a painful death. Groaning, I climbed to my feet and padded over to the stairs in the center of the apartment so I could see him while we talked. I dropped off my jeans on the bottom step. Knowing Lucen, he’d probably wash them while I was sleeping.

I cleared my throat. “Right, the Gryphons.” I dragged out the word, wrapping my arms around the baluster. Lucen glanced my way, his eyebrows raised while he waited. “They offered me a job.”

“A job?” I imagined my expression earlier in the day had been an awful lot like his was now.

“A job.”

His blue-green eyes filled with disbelief. “The kind that comes with a uniform and badge, or the kind that involves cleaning out their salamander cages with your bare hands?”

“The Director made no mention of a uniform or a badge, but given what they offered to pay me, I’m assuming it’s not cage duty.”

“Interesting and unexpected, but I hope you told them where they could stick that job.”

I bit my lip, grasping the baluster for all it was worth. “I’ll only be a consultant, not a real Gryphon.”

Lucen threw the bread he’d been slicing on the counter. “You already said yes?”

“Yeah. As much as I joked about how I’d enjoy owing you for bail money, I really didn’t want to go to prison.” I released the railing and frowned down at myself, thinking how bizarre my life was that I was having this conversation in my underwear. “That was my choice—take their offer or go to prison. Tell me I should have chosen differently.”

“So they threatened you.”

“Basically. You blame me for saying yes?”

He brushed crumbs off his hands and sighed. “No, I don’t. But damn it. Did they tell you what they wanted you to do?”

Gryphons had specializations, just like any law enforcement organization. While the stereotype of a Gryphon was the ass-kicking warrior who could stand up to and fight law-breaking preds, the truth was more complicated. As truth usually was.

Some Gryphons specialized in healing addicts, others in making charms, and still others in jobs I knew less about. I had a feeling none of those specialties were what Olivia Lee had in mind for me though.

“The Director said they’d call me in on cases where they thought I’d be useful.”

Lucen rolled his eyes. “That’s unhelpfully vague.”

I didn’t bother responding. Tiredness was overcoming me again, and my annoyance with the Gryphons killed off any remaining desire I had for Lucen. Instead of sex, I wanted to hit someone.

Lucen must have sensed what I was feeling because his hands appeared on my arms as I started to put on my jeans. Hello, lust, again. That didn’t take much. “I’m not mad at you, Jess. I’m furious at them.”

“So am I, as you can obviously tell. Olivia—Director Lee—said they could charge me with endangering humanity. You think they can?”

“They can charge you with anything. Making it stick is another matter, but I doubt any jury of your peers is going to be too sympathetic. They’ll hear you traded souls, and it won’t matter what the details are.”

A jury of my peers. For the hundredth time, I considered telling Lucen the truth about me. That I was a freak who didn’t have any peers. But something stopped me. While I didn’t believe he’d call me an abomination like the goblin Dom had, I wasn’t eager to find out.

“So I’ll do this,” I said. “How bad can it be? I used to want to be a Gryphon.”

Lucen wrapped his arms around me and kissed my neck, and I was so done thinking about Gryphons. “I was very happy the day you realized they don’t deserve you, little siren. Don’t let them change your mind. I waited ten years for you. I refuse to let them turn you into my enemy.”

“Believe me, I know who my enemies are.” I touched my lips to his. Every nerve from my tongue to my feet came to attention. “Look on the bright side. Isn’t it every satyr’s dream to bed a Gryphon?”

Lucen laughed, though the lines around his eyes made it clear he was not entirely amused by the situation. “I hope you get a uniform. Because you will definitely need to wear it for me if you do.”

Chapter Three

I wasn’t sure what time Lucen joined me in his bed, but it was well after I fell asleep. So when a god-awful noise woke me up, I had a momentary panic attack. His arm was over me, and I couldn’t move.

“Is that your phone?” Lucen murmured into my hair.

Mentally half asleep, I had to think about it. “Shit. Yes.” I slid over to the edge of the bed and nearly tumbled onto the floor in an effort to reach it in time.

The clock on the nightstand told me it was only nine in the morning. In other words, way too early to be awakened when I hadn’t gotten to sleep until almost four.

I swore at the number on my caller ID and picked up right before the phone switched over to voicemail. “Yeah?”

“Jessica, good morning. I hope I didn’t wake you.”

If I’d wanted to punch Olivia Lee yesterday, it was nothing compared to what I wanted to do to her now. I wasn’t supposed to report in to Headquarters for my orientation until this afternoon.

Rubbing my tired eyes, I pulled my bare legs underneath me. “Nope, you didn’t wake me. I always sound this groggy before noon.”

Lucen raised his head from the pillow, cursed silently and flopped back down. I envied him the luxury.

“Good.” I couldn’t sense emotions over the phone, but I swore I could hear her smirking. “Something came up this morning. We’ve been called in to a case by local PD. I’d like you to get to Newton as soon as possible. I already have a team on the way, and I want you on it. You can come by the office afterward to take care of your paperwork. Can you do that?”

I gritted my teeth, considering whether I ought to say no and tell her I had another obligation. Said obligation was watching me from under a set of cool cotton sheets, his hair tousled, his eyes sleepy and his body naked.

On the other hand, I was wide awake and I knew there’d be no falling back asleep.

I yawned. “It might take a while. I don’t have car.” I had a motorcycle, but it was parked at my apartment complex.

“Take a cab. We’ll reimburse you for the expense. When you get there, find Agent Andre Pagan. Do you have something to write with? I’ll give you the address.”

I scrambled for a pen and a piece of paper and wrote down what Olivia said. “I’ll be there.”

I didn’t say how fast. With a second yawn, I hung up and began putting on my clothes, which Lucen had left folded on a chair after I’d gone to bed.

He watched me as I changed. “I thought I had you for five more hours.”

“So did I, but apparently something happened in Newton.”

Lucen buried himself under the sheet. “Great. If this is how it’s going to be…”

I bent over the sheet-covered lump and kissed him through the cloth. “I seriously doubt this is going to be normal. But I’m awake, so I might as well go. Can I make some coffee?”

He lowered the sheet, grabbed my hand and pulled me closer for a real kiss. If he was hoping to make it difficult for me to leave, he was succeeding. “Of course you can make coffee.”

When he didn’t let go right away, I knew he was more than hoping. He was trying quite blatantly to change my mind. The heat of his magic was slipping its way up arm. “Nice trick.”

I yanked my hand away, and he smiled sheepishly. “I had to try.”

“Yeah, yeah. I’ll see you later.”

He muttered something as I left the bedroom, but it was muffled beneath the sheets.

“You know which house?” the cabbie asked me some time later. “Something’s going on over there.”

I pressed my head against the window. Something was indeed going on several houses down on the right. I couldn’t see a street number, but we’d clearly arrived at my destination. “That’s it. You can pull over.”

Stuffing my hands in my jeans pockets, I stood for a moment, taking in the scene as the cab drove off. Three cop cars, plus possibly another unmarked one, and two Gryphon SUVs were parked in front of a huge yellow colonial. As I watched, a van from the coroner’s office squeezed into the driveway alongside a BMW. Given the house had a three-car garage, I assumed the BMW and the other expensive cars in the driveway belonged to guests.

As I headed toward the commotion, I breathed in the smell of exhaust mingled with freshly cut grass and sneezed. Allergies. Just one of the many reasons I preferred living in the city to living in the suburbs.

“Hey!”

Recognizing the sound of authority, I tore my eyes away from what was no doubt at least a million dollars’ worth of house. A uniformed police officer was waving me away. “You can’t come any closer.”

A slight breeze blew my hair in my mouth, and I fought to remove it so I could speak. “I’m supposed to meet Andre Pagan. He’s with the Gryphons.”

The cop gave me a once-over, and I could taste his suspicion. It was a bitter film over the rest of his emotions. Whatever was in that house had freaked the shit out of him.

Peachy. I didn’t really want to find out what that was. Damn the Gryphons. “Look, tell him Jessica Moore is here. Please. I’m new—first day on the job and no badge. But he’s expecting me.”

The cop raised a hand toward me. “Wait here.” He got on his walkie-talkie and wandered away. A minute later, he beckoned me forward.

With a deep breath, I walked up the brick path to the front door. Before I could climb the portico’s stairs, the door opened and a man in a Gryphon uniform smiled warmly at me. “You must be the infamous Jessica Moore.”

Despite my anger at the Gryphons as an organization, I took an instant liking to this particular member of it. Unlike a true pred, sensing positive emotions was beyond my meager abilities, but he had a friendly face. His black hair was only a shadow on his shaved scalp, and there were amber tones in his brown eyes. He was tall too. Close to Lucen’s height if I had to guess.

“I’m infamous? Excellent. But you can call me Jess. Are you Agent Pagan?”

“I am, and you can call me Andre. I’d shake your hand and all that, but as you can see…” He held up hands covered in gloves. “Come on in, and let’s find a pair for you.”

I followed him into a high-ceilinged foyer and wrinkled my nose. Alcohol, stale sweat maybe, and something fouler lurked in this house. “Please tell me that’s not the smell of dead bodies.”

Andre handed me a pair of gloves from a box by the door. “No, decomposing bodies smell much worse. Trust me. I think you’re sniffing the food the owners had sitting out all night. You been briefed on what the cops found?”

I wiggled my fingers around in the gloves. They were way too big. “I’ve been briefed on precisely nothing.”

“Fantastic. And you’ve never done anything like this before?”

“Nope. But I read a lot of mysteries. I suppose that doesn’t count, huh?”

He snorted. “You’re in for some fun then. Come watch, learn, and don’t touch anything. They haven’t taken the bodies away yet because we’re still collecting evidence, so you’ll get to see this insanity for all it’s worth. Just try to stay out of the way.”

I’d have done a much better job of staying out of the way if I could have been brought in later and allowed to sleep, but I kept the thought to myself.

Andre led me through enormous room after enormous room until we reached a door off a blindingly stainless steel kitchen. The source of the house’s odor was plain, and as Andre had indicated. A couple pizza boxes, ripe with garlic and sausage, sat on the center island next to several wine and liquor bottles. The booze was gone, but the pizza was untouched.

Another cop was holding a door open as a photographer came up a set of stairs. The officer gave me a curious glance.

“Basement?” I asked.

“Yes, and what a basement it is.” Andre paused, taking the door from the cop. “You are going to be okay seeing dead bodies, right?”

I swallowed and adopted my best nonchalant expression. Judging by the undercurrent of anxiety I picked up from the more seasoned people here, this was one hell of a group of dead bodies. Then again, I’d experienced some truly awful stuff thanks to Victor Aubrey and the furies, like people whose hearts had been removed. My stomach was tougher than I’d have thought. “I’ll be okay. How many bodies are we talking?”

Andre seemed to consider the truthfulness of my response, then shrugged. “Nine.”

“Damn. Did someone slaughter a party? What was going on here?”

He started down the stairs. “Something like that. Come see for yourself.”

A bit lightheaded from all the diffuse anxiety I was sucking in—and probably a lack of breakfast—I headed downstairs. Something told me I was just as well off not having eaten. Andre might have been right about the smell of decomposing bodies, but the stench down here was nonetheless worse than the kitchen reek. And decidedly different.

He stopped on the landing at the bottom of the stairs and held up a hand. “Whatever jokes you want to make about stiffs? Don’t. I’ve heard them all already from the cops.”

“I think I’m too much of a newb to make jokes about—” My words died on my tongue and my brain seized up. Andre had stepped aside, revealing a scene that was nothing like my imagination would have conjured if given a hundred years.

I’d expected something horrific given the way everyone was feeling—blood everywhere, hacked-up limbs, stab wounds. You know, your typical gruesome murder scene. But that’s not what I found. And while not finding something that could have come from a B-slasher flick was a relief, my brain had a hard time understanding what I did find because it was so not right.

“Tell me I am not looking at some kind of dead people orgy?”

My eyes didn’t know what to take in first. There were nine naked people, and given their positioning, they hadn’t died in some peaceful post-coital state. They’d died right in the middle of having a good time. Either that or some creep had positioned them so it looked like they had.

I asked which of the two it was.

Andre coughed. “Medical examiner’s got to give the final word, but me and the homicide detective are both putting our money on them being alive when the debauchery started. It appears they died the way you’re seeing them.
In flagrante delicto
—or however that phrase goes.”

I put my hand on the stairwell wall for support. If the cops thought that, no wonder they’d called the Gryphons in for a second opinion. We’d clearly entered fucked-up territory. So far as I could see, there was nothing wrong with these people other than them being dead. No blood, no wounds, no weird skin discolorations. They were simply dead. While having sex. “I suppose there’s got to be worse ways to go.”

“Remember—no stiff jokes.”

“Promise.” Cynical as I was, I pitied anyone jaded enough to make jokes about nine dead people. Even if they were naked and in some, uh, interesting positions.

Andre patted my arm. “You all right? You look pale.”

I glanced down at his tan hand contrasting against my pasty skin. No kidding. “I’m fine. I’ve seen worse. What should I do again?”

“Stand back and observe.”

“Got it.”

There were four other—living—people in the room. Two uniformed police officers, a man who I assumed was the police detective, and a second Gryphon. The cops appeared to be searching for clues, and the Gryphon had a portable magic scanner she was using on one of the bodies.

“Have you found traces of magic?” I asked.

Andre cast a glance at the other Gryphon, and she raised a finger in a give-me-another-minute gesture. “No overt signs, but we’re checking. The Newton police called us because the scene seemed off, if you know what I mean. No noticeable causes of death.”

I nodded. “Looks like a lot is off. Um, no pun intended.”

Andre shot me a dirty look and went to consult with the detective.

While he did whatever trained Gryphons did in these situations, I took in the rest of the scene. Dead bodies aside, the basement wasn’t a bad place in a brothel kind of way. The carpet beneath my boots was thick, three of the walls were painted black and red while the fourth was entirely mirrored, and the furniture appeared every bit as expensive as the stuff upstairs. There was also a high-end stereo and set of speakers.

Minus the dead people, the swing and the manacles bolted to one of the walls, this place was in better shape than my apartment.

The superfluousness of my presence was sinking in when Andre returned to my side. “This house belongs to Michael and Shannon Stacy, twenty-eight and twenty-six years old, respectively.”

So the guy was my age. “Nice digs for such a young couple.”

“Yeah, apparently he’s a corporate lawyer in daddy’s firm. That’s all I know so far.” Andre pointed to one of the dead men. His wrists were bound over his head with fluffy red handcuffs. I didn’t think the crime-scene photos were going to help the firm’s PR.

“I suppose the woman on top of him isn’t his wife?”

“Not based on the wedding pictures upstairs.” Andre gestured to a lifeless threesome by the mirrors. “She’s over there.”

Right. Well, that wasn’t a surprise.

“Hey, Andre.” The other Gryphon finished her scanning. “We got something.”

Andre motioned between us. “Anna Scott, meet Jess Moore.”

Anna’s eyes opened wide in way of greeting. “The infamous one? Is it true what they’re saying about you?”

“Depends on what they’re saying.”

“That you can suck on emotions like a pred.”

I winced. “Yeah, sort of.”

Her brown eyes widened farther. “Wicked. Hope I get to test your blood later. Anyway.” She showed her scan to Andre. “There’s strong levels of insoluble magic in all the victims’ blood. I won’t know for sure until I can take it back to the lab, but these markers are a pretty good indication of what we’re dealing with. Just as a guess—I’d say these people were all sky-high on F when they died.”

I tried to hide my reaction, but mentally I swore. It figured that this would be the case the Gryphons were bringing me in on. F was a potent and highly illegal aphrodisiac produced and sold by satyrs. And if satyrs were involved, then my new consulting job with the Gryphons had just gone from being a minor annoyance to a major relationship disaster.

I stood around some more while Andre and Anna related their discovery to the detective then called it in to their supervisor at headquarters. From the sound of it, the Newton police would officially have to turn the case over to the Gryphons later, but unofficially, it was theirs already. All the evidence they’d collected would be passed along, and whatever the autopsies uncovered would be reported to them, as well.