Pink Princess Fairytini (Fairy Files #2) (13 page)

I opened the envelope and found a wad of cash inside. I didn’t make any attempt to count it, before I tossed it back to him. “Take it out of what I owe you for helping me find Buddy.”

Anger fired Frost’s eyes to a molten gold. “Fine. But consider us even, now. I will pay you for any work you do from this point forward.”

“Fine,” I said, wishing I had counted the money to be sure our deal was fair. I didn’t want his charity or his pity. I stood and walked out without looking back. “See you later.”

“You will,” he said, his voice more wolf than human, a sound that made goose bumps rise on my skin.

Most people aren’t bad, they just convince themselves they’re much better than they actually are
. –Chloe Frangipani

If you let a man into your heart, he will destroy you. He might not mean to, but he will all the same
. – Althea Frangipani

I found Harvey outside my door when I got back from the club. I was tired and dirty from cleaning until three in the morning, because I didn’t want to leave until I’d felt like I’d done everything I could to make things right. I’d spent two hours scouring the books for more money, money that the club just didn’t have. Money I didn’t have. I could manage to continue paying my employees while the club was closed, but that’s all I could do, and I could just barely do that. Pierson had insisted on not taking a salary, but he had rent to pay and a gourmand’s love of expensive food, and I couldn’t not pay him. I’d agreed to stop his arguing, but he’d find his usual deposit in his bank account when he looked.

“How long have you been waiting?” I asked. Harvey looked exhausted, dark circles under his eyes, his skin a bit pale.

“An hour,” he said. “I just needed to see you. It’s been a rough day.”

I went to him and wrapped my arms around him, wanting to comfort him in any way I could. I wished I could heal emotional wounds the way I could physical ones. “Why didn’t you call me?”

“I figured you were at the club,” he said, stroking my hair. “I’m just lucky you didn’t decide to go out dancing tonight.”

I had considered it. Dancing was my favorite way to relieve stress, but I’d wanted to get some sleep because flea market Saturday always started early. Not that I could afford to buy anything at the flea market, but I could still go and look, and help Harvey and Sapphire find some fun pieces. “I think I’m the lucky one,” I said. “It’s good to see you.”

I unlocked the door and led him in. He shut and locked the door behind himself and grabbed my waist, lifting and spinning me and pressing me hard against the door. “I’ve missed touching you,” he said. He kissed my jaw and moved his lips down my neck, pressing hot kisses, until he reached my collarbone. He rubbed his soft lips against my flesh and sighed.

“You’ve had a rough day,” I said. “Do you want to talk about it?”

“Talking’s not what I need.” He lifted his head and met my lips with a hard kiss, forcing my mouth open in a way that was rough, but lit me up like a firecracker and sent good feelings sparking through my body. After the stress and the worry of the past couple of days, his rough, primal need was just what I needed. It made me unable to think, all I could do was feel and he made me feel so good.

“Do you want to go to your bed?” He asked, his voice rough.

“No,” I said. “I just want you to keep doing what you’re doing.”

He moaned with satisfaction and helped me out of my clothes without lowering my feet back to the floor.

Later, when we lay in my bed, spent and satisfied, the morning sun peeking in at us, I couldn’t fall asleep. I needed him to confide in me, to share his problems with me, as he’d just shared his body. I couldn’t be the only one to give in this relationship. “What happened today?” I asked.

He pulled me against him, my body spooned inside of his, his arms strong and warm around me. “A young girl, a prostitute was killed. I could have saved her if I’d just looked a little harder, worked a little longer. I’d been so close, and she’s dead because I dropped the ball.”

“Because you took a day off to help me and Frost?”

His body tensed just a bit. “No, it wasn’t about the day off. I missed something I should have seen.”

“You’re only human,” I said. “You can’t save everyone.”

“Maybe. But knowing that doesn’t make it any easier.”

I laced my fingers through his, wishing I could ease his pain and knowing it wasn’t in my power.

Instead, I turned in his arms and wrapped myself as tightly around him as he was wrapped around me. I held on to him, until the sun rose and his breathing evened and deepened.

Harvey smiled at me as he stumbled into the kitchen later that morning, sleepy and gloriously rumpled in his low-slung jeans, his chest bare. “You made me breakfast.”

“No,” I said. “In the cause of total honesty, I have to admit I don’t cook. I don’t like it and I don’t do it. This is from Poinsettia. I just put it in the oven to keep it warm.”

“Looks good to me.” He walked over and gave me a peck on the cheek, before sitting down with a plate of food. “So, I take it you like to get an early start.”

I’d already eaten, but I sat down across from him anyway. “Yep, but since it’s your first day I decided to let you sleep in.”

He looked at the digital display over the stove that read 7:30. “This is sleeping in?”

“I usually arrive with Sapphire right when they open at seven. It’s our thing. She agreed to be more lenient since you’re going with us.”

“How nice,” he said. “I’m not sure I’ll be much good on only a couple hours of sleep. I’ll probably just buy whatever you tell me to.”

“That’s the plan. You about done? We need to get going.” I could feel the tingles in my body already from the excitement of what we might find and the need to find it before anyone else.

He chuckled, stuffed in one more piece of bacon, and stood. “Sure. You think I could take a shower first?”

I nodded, though I didn’t like it. The flea market waited for no man or woman, no matter how clean or unclean.

He must have seen something on my face, because he laughed and swiped my lips with his. “I’ll be quick.”

Sapphire yawned as we approached the gate to the flea market. She’d dragged Knuffington along and he looked wan and weary. “Late night, kids?” I asked. We’d all met at the bus stop closest to the flea market grounds, and I sort of missed having alone time to chat with Sapphire.

Sapphire blushed. “Um, yeah, we stayed up watching a really long movie.”

“Really,” I said, unable to resist calling her out. “What did you see?”

“Would you look at that,” she said after an uncomfortable pause. “There’s a huge long line for the funnel cakes already.”

“Funnel cakes?” Harvey asked.

“Breakfast,” I explained.

“The perfect breakfast,” Sapphire said. “But I’m not waiting in that line. We’ll miss all the best stuff.”

“Want to head to Bea’s booth first?” I asked.

Sapphire nodded and we led the way through the crowds and the dust to our favorite seller’s booth.

“Hi, ladies,” Bea said, her voice scratchy from her three pack a day habit. She was old enough to be a grandma, but hipper than me by a long shot. Not because she could smoke me under the table, but because she dressed like a fifties goddess and always looked more like an aging model than a grandma. “I was beginning to think you weren’t going to show.”

“The fellas here made us late,” Sapphire said with a smirk at Knuffington. “They needed their beauty sleep.”

Knuffington leaned over and whispered something in her ear that made her blush, and Harvey laughed. “It’s handsome sleep, and yeah I need all of it I can get.”

Bea batted her lashes at Harvey and Knuffington. “You two get any more handsome, and we’ll have a riot on our hands.”

“Don’t stroke their egos,” I said. “They think enough of themselves as it is.”

“Oh, it wasn’t their egos I was thinking of stroking,” Bea said. She turned to walk farther into her booth. “Give me a sec, ladies, I’ve got something set aside for you two.”

To my amusement, Harvey paled and Knuffington looked a bit uncomfortable. “She make you two nervous,” I asked in a low voice.

“I’m pretty sure she’s more than I can handle,” Harvey said.

“Oh, sugar, I am more than the two of you together could handle, but you’d love every moment.” She laughed at the shocked looks on the two men’s faces and lugged out the most exquisite chest of drawers I’d ever seen. It was tall and narrow and had a black and white painted silhouette of a woman in a poodle skirt with a cute ponytail. I was speechless.

“Oh, Clarinda,” Sapphire said, her voice breathy. “You have to get that. It would go perfectly in your new place.”

There are no words for how badly I wanted that dresser. No words. But I didn’t have the two-hundred dollars Bea wanted for it and, even if I did, I couldn’t justify spending it with the club closed down. “No, Sapphire, you should have it. I can see how much you love it.” Truly, she had the same look on her face as she’d had the first time she’d seen Knuffington.

“I don’t have any room and I already have a fabulous dresser.”

That’s right, she did, the one with the book covers painted across the drawers. “I just …” I knew if I told her I couldn’t afford it, she’d buy it for me, and I refused to be anyone’s charity case. “It’s great, Bea,” I said. “But it’s just not my taste.”

Sapphire started to protest, but I shot her a glare that shut her up. “Oh, Clarinda,” Sapphire whispered in my ear as we walked away. “You can’t afford it, can you? It’s going to be torture for you to be here. You should let me buy it for you.”

“No,” I said, a bit more harshly than I’d intended. “We’re here to shop for a few pieces to liven up Harvey’s place and, unless you want that dresser …?” I looked at Harvey, a question in my eyes, and he shook his head.

“No,” he said. “It’s not my style either. Don’t they have masculine kitsch anywhere?” So we spent the rest of the morning traipsing around the flea market and eating funnel cakes. We found a clock and a cookie jar for Harvey, both of which I’m pretty sure he bought just to humor me.

We were on our way to the exit when Harvey grabbed my hand and pulled me back toward Bea’s booth. “What are you doing?” I asked.

“I saw how much you wanted that dresser. If it’s still here, I’ll buy it for you.”

The gesture was kind, but I knew Harvey wasn’t so well off that a two hundred dollar dresser wouldn’t make a dent in his finances. I was disappointed that I couldn’t afford it, but at the end of the day, it was just a thing, and I’d find an even better dresser when I was flush. “That’s really sweet,” I said. “But I don’t want you to buy it for me.”

That had come out all wrong, too blunt, and the hurt look that flashed across his face let me know I’d made a misstep.

“I really appreciate the offer, but it’s too much, Harvey. I’d feel terrible about you spending that much money on me.”

“Right,” Harvey said. “But you let Frost buy you a ridiculous clock and pay for your lawyer.”

I stopped and faced him, confused and hurt. “Frost gave me that clock as a housewarming gift. And I don’t have a lawyer, so I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

He studied my face for a long moment. “I saw it in his office when you two went to Rubalia. He had a bill from some lawyer, and the letter attached said it was in regards to your case.”

I didn’t know who to be madder at, all I knew was that I was furious. “I don’t know anything about that, Harvey. Frost gave me the card of a lawyer, but he said the guy would take my case pro bono. If I’d known he’d paid the guy, I wouldn’t have even taken the card.”

He didn’t look convinced. He’d known me for how many years and he thought I was lying to him, that I had something going on with Frost behind his back? Anger warmed me and blocked out the crowded flea market and its happy noises. All I could was the whooshing of my increased blood pressure and all I could see was Harvey.

“Why don’t you just ask me what you really want to know, Harvey? Am I having sex with him in exchange for him paying for my lawyer and buying me kitsch? Maybe if I stop by his office and offer to blow him right now, he’ll buy me that dresser.”

“Chloe, that’s not what I meant. I—”

“You what? Think I’ve got something going on with Frost behind your back. You think I’m a cheater and a liar?”

His jaw tensed, and I saw his own anger rise. “At least give me a chance to explain myself. You’ve been putting me off for two years, and we never discussed being exclusive, so yeah, I wondered if there might be something between you two.”

“Right,” I said, barely hearing anything he was saying. “If that’s the case, why didn’t you just ask me? Why didn’t you have that talk about us being exclusive before you fucked me against the door?”

Sapphire tugged at my elbow, trying to drag me away, and I saw a crowd had gathered around us. I was only too happy to go. I didn’t do drama. I didn’t do emotional scenes. I wasn’t that girl and I wasn’t about to let Harvey make me that girl.

“Chloe—” But before Harvey could say anymore, a security guard stepped in front of him and started asking questions. Sapphire pulled me away.

“Shit,” I said, once we were outside the gates. “I should wait for him.”

“No,” Sapphire said. “You should cool down. Let’s go out for lunch like we usually do on flea market Saturdays, and you can call him once you’re calm.”

What she said made too much sense to ignore. As much as I wanted to have it out with both Harvey and Frost, it would likely end in me saying something I regretted and could never take back. I sent Harvey a quick text to let him know I’d left with Sapphire and would see him later. He didn’t respond and I felt a bit bad. I hoped he hadn’t been pulled in by security or, worse, banned from the flea market. The idea of banishment from my favorite place on earth had me hurrying Sapphire along to the bus stop and downtown to our favorite fifties style diner. I ordered a cheeseburger, fries, and a milk shake, might as well drown my irritation and anger with fattening food, and Sapphire ordered a grilled cheese and a milk shake.