Pink Princess Fairytini (Fairy Files #2) (28 page)

“You’re the one who’ll have to see with him every day. You’ve made it clear you think he’s good for me, but I got the impression you didn’t like him.”

He didn’t meet my eyes. “I like him fine. I think he’d be a good addition to the firm, especially with Howie gone and more jobs landing on my desk every day.”

“Then hire him,” I said. “It’ll be fine.” But all I could think was that now Harvey would be even more firmly in my circle and, when things went bad between us, every aspect of my life would suffer. I told myself things wouldn’t go bad, but in my heart I suspected they would.

“Okay.”

“What did you tell him about me?” I asked.

He headed for the street level, and I followed. “About you? He already knows you help me with cases sometimes.”

“No,” I said. “About me being missing. Wasn’t he worried?”

“Chloe,” he said, his tone gentle. “You were gone for eighteen hours. He didn’t realize there was a problem.”

“But I was gone over night. Didn’t he wonder where I was?”

He shrugged. “You’re a night owl. He probably figured you’d gone out. You both work crazy weird hours, so I doubt he worried about it.”

“Oh,” I said. “Do you know where my phone is? He’s probably going to try to call me any time now.”

“You dropped it on the street when the goons grabbed you. It was totally smashed. We’ll get you a new one after we nab Ward.”

I nodded and climbed on behind him, not even bothering to protest about riding the bike.

“Just one more thing,” he said. “I’m going to make sure you get home safe every single fucking time from now on.”

I really had nothing to say to that. So I kept my mouth shut.

Want to disappear? Act completely ordinary
.—Chloe Frangipani

To be seen is to live
. –Althea Frangipani

I heard the shouts and the groans before I put my key in the lock and let myself into Harvey’s place. I knew exactly what was going on, because I’d heard the same sounds before. At Buddy’s sports bar. It was Sunday night football and Harvey had invited people over. There’s a reason I didn’t open a sports bar and it’s not because I’m a girly girl who hates beer, it’s because sports bore me to tears. To tears. I don’t understand the point of them, though I do think the male obsession with balls is hilarious.

There are plenty of women who love sports just as much as men do, and I fully support my sisters in all of their pursuits, but I also find their obsession with balls hilarious.

“He fumbled the ball,” someone shouted and everyone groaned. I stepped inside, adding an s to the word ball and imagining an entirely different scene. Did that mean I had the mentality of a twelve-year old boy? Probably. Did I care? Nope. It made me smile and gave me a mental image to get me through the night. I stepped inside and saw my living room filled with fifteen people, all focused on Harvey’s obscenely large television. I waved to Frost, and he sped away on his bike as soon as he saw I was safely inside.

Don’t get me wrong, I love people. I love the social scene, every kind of social scene. I don’t love football, but I could work with that. Surely, there would be someone in that group who liked to chat during the game. I looked at all the eyes glued to the T.V., no one making a sound, and thought I might have more trouble than usual finding someone to talk to. Which was actually fine, because I was exhausted and defeated, and I just wanted to soak in the tub, have sex with Harvey, and go to sleep.

After being concussed, kidnapped, and getting my hopes up about finding the ex-rebel who’d kidnapped Buddy’s baby, only to learn that he’d moved and left no forwarding address, I was needing some comfort and some sleep. Especially since I had to meet Frost at six A.M. the next morning. We’d tracked down Ward’s ex-girlfriend and she said he was a health nut, who went running around Fortune’s Lake every morning at the crack of dawn.

A loud shout erupted from the group in the living room and people started jumping up and down and high-fiving. I decided I’d try to catch Harvey later and headed back to his en-suite bathroom.

He knocked on the door just as I was settling into the tub. “Hey, sugar,” he said, his voice going a bit raspy as he took me in, naked in his tub. “Why didn’t you come say hello?”

“I’m just not in much of a party mood,” I said. “I didn’t want to interrupt.”

“You wouldn’t be interrupting,” he said. “I haven’t seen you since yesterday, come out and sit with me.”

A shout from the living room erupted, and he looked back that way, longing in his eyes.

I laughed at his expression. “Go ahead and enjoy your party,” I said. “I’m going to enjoy my bath.”

He looked at me and sighed. “Okay, but I’d really like you to join us. I want you to get to know my friends.”

I fought the urge to roll my eyes. “I’m not an anti-social person, normally, Harvey, you know that. I’m just not a fan of football and I’ve had a really long day. I just want to soak in the tub for an hour, and then I’ll come out and meet everyone.”

“I’m just asking to spend a little time with my girlfriend,” he said, his expression serious. “I’m proud of you and I want to show you off to everyone. In an hour, the game will be over and everyone will have left.” This time, he didn’t take his eyes off me when a loud groan resounded from the living room.

I didn’t want a heavy conversation. I didn’t want to analyze our relationship…again. I just wanted to enjoy my bath and have sex with him after all of his friends left. I didn’t think that made me a bad girlfriend, but what did I know about being a girlfriend. “Okay, give me ten minutes,” I said. “I’ll be out, and I’ll be the life of the party.”

He sighed. “You don’t have to be the life of the party, Chloe. You just have to make an effort.”

I was pretty sure that wanting to deck him right then made me the worst kind of girlfriend. Every impulse in my body was screaming at me to pull back, to run away, but the whole point of this relationship was to prove I could be loyal and stick with him through the good and bad, right? I couldn’t just back down because I’d had a rough day. A relationship was work, right? It was compromise, right? Sure, it would have been nice if he’d asked me how I was or at least pretended to care what I wanted, but maybe he’d had a bad day, and maybe he’d missed me. Nope, I really couldn’t find a reasonable excuse for his pushiness. “This
is
me making an effort, Harvey,” I said, the venom in my tone surprising even me. I’d tried, I really had, but I just couldn’t pretend anymore. I stood up out of my heavenly bath, and grabbed a towel, wrapping it quickly around me. “Let’s go party.”

“Chloe,” he said, a mixture of concern for my sanity and surprise mixing on his face. “It’s okay, you can finish your bath.”

“Oh, no,” I said. “You want the perfect little girlfriend. You want me to be on whenever you want to me to be on. So let’s go do this. I’d hate to disappoint you, Harvey.” I stepped out of the bath, realizing I was behaving irrationally and not able to make myself care. “I bet you would all love some football treats for your little party, right?” I pulled a dress over my head without underwear and without bothering to fix my hair. It probably still had blood in it, since I hadn’t had a chance to wash it, yet. I’d changed clothes before we’d gone after Ward, but I’d just pulled my bloody hair into a ponytail, rather than taking the time for a shower. “I’ll just hop into the kitchen and put on an apron and get started on them right away.”

“Chloe,” he said, anger starting to rise on his face. “I didn’t ask you to cook for us, I just asked you to come sit with us.”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” I said, making my voice robotic. “I will obey your commands to the letter. Right now.” I noticed Harvey’s hands curl into fists and I knew I should stop, but I just kept going. “Can I let my wings out, or does that make you uncomfortable?”

“Chloe,” he said, but his anger faded just a bit to be replaced by a tinge of nervousness at the idea of me parading my wings in front of all of his people. “I just want to be with you. I missed you.”

I ran out of steam right about then and started to feel bad about just how far overboard I’d gone. “I missed you, too, Harvey, but I’m not lying about the bad day I had. I was planning to wait until you’d finished your party to spend time with you. I’m not a football fan.”

He nodded. “You don’t have to stay out there long, just come meet everyone and sit with me for a bit. Then you can come back here and go to bed.”

Was he listening to me at all? “Great,” I said. “But I’ll probably want to wash the blood out of my hair, first.”

“What?” he asked. But I’d already moved past him and out into the living room, riding the dark high of my righteous anger. On some level, I understood that he didn’t know what I’d been through and that he was just asking me to spend some time with him, but I couldn’t help feeling that what I wanted and needed didn’t really matter to him.

“How did you get blood in your hair?” Harvey asked in a low voice, his breath hot on my neck, as he stepped up behind me so close his front touched my back.

“Hi, Harvey’s friends,” I said. “I’m Harvey’s girlfriend, Chloe. It’s so great to meet you all.” I flashed them my widest smile and squeezed in between two of them on the couch.

Harvey still stood at the outside of the group, looking a bit bewildered and worried.

“Hey, I’m Ashley,” the woman next to me said, offering her hand. “I work with Harvey, but he’s never mentioned you. What do you do?”

I took her hand and shook it. “I own Ephemeral.”

“Oh, my god, I love that place,” Ashley said.

“All the ladies love it, all their men hate it,” said the man on my left. He looked older and grumpier than the rest of the crowd.

I smiled at him, ready to charm him, but someone shouted, “Game’s back on,” before I could. I looked to the T.V. to see that half-time had just ended. Of course, Harvey waited until half-time to come find me. The shouts and the boos we’d heard from the bathroom must have been about the half-time show or everyone betting on the outcome of the game.

I tried to watch the game, but after ten minutes, I was ready to gouge out my own eyes, just to have something to do.

“Hey, is that blood in your hair?” Ashley asked, at the next commercial break. Blood dries a lighter brown than my chocolate brown hair, so it probably looked stiff and crunchy.

“Yeah,” I said, trying to act casual. “It was nothing, you know how head wounds bleed.”

“Yeah,” she said, but she looked uncomfortable. “You’re okay now though.”

“Yep,” I said. “I was so excited to see the game that I forgot all about it.” I could feel Harvey’s eyes boring into the side of my face, but I ignored him.

“Oh, I know, this might be the best game of the season. How do you feel about the dolphins’ chances for the season?”

I was not so anti-football that I didn’t know that she was talking about Florida’s football team and not about actual dolphins, but that’s pretty much
all
I knew. “Oh, look,” I said. “The game’s back on.”

“You’re a lot nicer than I’d thought you’d be,” my grumpy couch mate said, as he left. “But you’re still a home wrecker.”

Harvey shut the door behind the grumpy guy, the last to leave after the end of the game. “Huh,” I said. “So your co-workers didn’t know you were dating the owner of Ephemeral? Guess you’re going to get ridden pretty hard at the office about omitting that little detail.”

“Chloe, what the hell was all of that?” he asked, sounding pissy. I got what he was upset about, but I was so not in the mood for another fight.

“I believe the words you’re looking for are, I’m sorry for guilt-tripping you into coming to my party. Please allow me to take you back to the bath where I will bathe you and worship you and fuck you senseless until we both fall into a coma-like sleep.”

I’d expected that to end the conversation. Sex has always been a showstopper for me in the past, but Harvey’s face didn’t lose its grim expression. “What happened to your head?”

“It’s nothing,” I said, because I knew that telling him more would lead to a discussion that would take far longer than I had the energy for. “I’m completely fine.”

The look on his face, the defeat and the sadness, twisted something in my chest. “Please. Tell me what happened,” he said.

So I told him, and his expression grew grimmer and grimmer with each word I spoke. If I didn’t know and trust him, if I was some criminal on the street facing his wrath, I’d be terrified. But I wasn’t terrified, I was just sad, because I felt the divide between us growing.

“Why didn’t Frost call me as soon as he realized you were kidnapped?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “I wasn’t there. But if I had to guess, I’d say he knew you were working and didn’t see any reason to bother you. He had plenty of help and there was nothing you could have done.”

His expression somehow grew darker, and I realized, too late, that I’d said the wrong thing. “I couldn’t help? Because I’m not a werewolf, or a troll, or a magical fairy? I couldn’t help because I’m just human?”

“No, I—”

“I’m trained to protect people, Chloe.” His voice was calm as he took my hands in his. “It’s what I do every fucking day, but because I’m just a human I’d be useless in the attempt to save you?”

“It wasn’t my call to make, Harvey. I don’t know what Frost was thinking.”

He dropped my hands and rubbed his face. “What are
you
thinking? If the situation had been reversed, if you’d had to go in there to save Buddy, would you have called me to help? Or would you have figured I had nothing to offer?”

I wanted to lie, but he deserved an honest answer. I was asking him to accept a lot, about me, about my world, in a very short amount of time. “I don’t know,” I said. “I want this to work between us, and I feel like you need to be eased into the fae and their myriad problems. I’m worried that if you had to go up against a dragon, a literal fucking dragon, you’d either get hurt or decide that I was too much. That dating a fairy faun half breed who makes enemies of dragons is too much for you.”