Worlds Apart (36 page)

“Crazy in what way?” Jonas asked.

Taylor slumped behind his desk. “I remembered him from when I was a kid. We played together in the garden. He disappeared at the same time as Stephanie. I think…” He swallowed hard. “Oh fuck, I don’t know what I think. I sort of accused him of killing her. He told me he was a faery. He said he was dying.” Taylor put his head in his hands.

“What about Roo?” Jonas asked.

Taylor laughed. “No reaction to what Niall told me? And you still haven’t explained why you said that to the police.”

“I’m always careful what I say to the police until I know all the facts. Where are Roo and Niall?”

“No idea. Roo was with me in the garden and now she’s not anywhere. Niall was in the drawing room and he’s vanished. Maybe the two of them are working together.”

“To do what?”

“Drive me crazy? I’m halfway there.” Taylor raised his head and looked straight at Jonas. “Niall said to say something to you and watch your reaction. You’re supposed to be my partner, Jonas.”

“I work part-time for you, I’m not your partner.”

Taylor sighed.

“What did Niall tell you to say?”

“Moon-gold.”

Jonas’s eyes widened and he let out a deep sigh. He leaned his butt on Roo’s desk and his mouth tilted in a half smile. “Niall’s a faery.”

Taylor let his head bang on the desk. Then he looked up at Jonas. “Yeah, and I’m a fucking werewolf.”

“No, that would be me,” Jonas said.

“Not funny.”

Jonas laughed. “How long have you known me?”

“You know how long. We met at university twelve years ago.”

“I’ve been working for Niall for twelve years.”

Taylor’s jaw dropped. “Doing what?”

“Keeping an eye on you.”

Taylor’s mouth lost all moisture. “How did you meet him?”

“That’s not something you need to know. He paid me in moon-gold to keep you safe. Lucky for him I was happy to work as a private investigator. Remember those times when you were in trouble and I turned up unexpectedly? The Greene case. Mrs. Jenkins and her lunatic husband. There were other occasions when I saved your ass and you knew nothing about it. Les Thompson—hospitalized. Dave Teague—confessed to the police. Chris Robbins—broke both legs.”

Taylor could feel his jaw twitching.

“Whose idea was it to come to Leeds?” Jonas asked.

“Mine.”

“Was it?”

Taylor’s head ached so much he could hardly think, but now Jonas had said that, he recalled moaning about London and Jonas bringing up the subject of Yorkshire, saying he’d go with him. Taylor’s shoulders slumped. So Jonas and Niall had plotted together to get him here?

“I’m worried about Roo,” Jonas said.

“Didn’t she turn up to your rendezvous?” Taylor snapped.

Jonas glared. “Roo isn’t part of what’s going on here.”

“Yeah, right.”

“Why would I lie about that?”

If Roo wasn’t part of whatever the fuck this conspiracy was, then where was she? Had she pissed off anyone enough to make them come after her? Apart from him? Did the destruction of the garden have something to do with her?

Think. Think.
Who’d want her shut up?

Patrick Farrant and his wife, the dog-napper. One or both of them. Had Roo done more than she’d confessed to?

Kim and Christopher Singer. The wife-beater. Not such a leap for him to hurt Roo, especially if his wife had run to the refuge. And Roo had told him the guy had come back while she was at the house.

Annette Foster. When her husband confronted her, she’d realize she’d been set up in Pussycats. Would she want to get even with Roo?

They had motives, but how would they know where Roo lived?

“Finished thinking things through?” Jonas asked. “Made sense of any of it?”

“No.” Taylor looked up and did a double take. Jonas had taken off his leather jacket and was unbuttoning his shirt. “What the hell are you doing?”

“Proving a point.”

Christ, he’s ripped.
Taylor gulped. He wasn’t Niall though, and the pain of betrayal clamped around Taylor’s heart like an iron fist.

Jonas took off his boots and unfastened his pants.

“I’m not interested,” Taylor blurted. “And you’re not gay or bi.” He didn’t think.

The leather pants landed on top of the jacket and Jonas peeled down his boxers.

Wow, long cock. Only I’m not looking.

“I’m trisexual. I’ll try anything once. Even you, but that’s not why I’ve stripped. Are you watching? I’ll never do this in front of you again. If anyone discovers I’ve done it, even once, I’ll likely be killed. So pay attention and prepare to be blown away—in the nicest possible way.”

Jonas’s body contorted, arms and legs shortening, his face elongating as he fell to all fours. Taylor pushed himself up and stared down in shocked disbelief as the transformation completed and a wolf stood where Jonas had been.
Can’t breathe, can’t breathe.
Taylor worried his brain was going to explode. This could not be happening.

Told you I was a werewolf.

Taylor sucked air. “Jesus Christ.”

A large black wolf sat between him and the door.

“Jonas?”

Who the fuck do you think it is?

“You’re talking in my head?”

I don’t have the vocal chords to make myself understood. I’m going to see if I can track Roo.

“What about Niall?”

I can already guess where he’s gone. Back to Faeryland.

The wolf bounded out and Taylor slumped back in his seat, his legs refusing to support him. He felt as if the Earth had tilted and he’d slid onto another planet. What else was real? Vampires? Father Christmas? Martians?

Chapter Twenty-Two

Everyone stared at Roo as Oisin, Ardal and Eoin led her through the town on foot. She kept her head high. She’d walked through the streets of Leeds dressed as a chicken, she could cope with this. People came out of shops and houses to watch, their faces curious rather than hostile. In one way, it was as if Roo had stepped back in time into an old-fashioned world of crooked buildings and cobblestone streets, and yet everyone wore modern clothes. And they were all beautiful. Shining hair, perfect teeth, tall and short, but no one too thin or too fat.

Roo hadn’t noticed children until a little girl ran from a doorway and tripped right in front of her. Roo caught her before she hit the ground and set her on her feet. Ardal reached out and knocked Roo’s hands away.

“Don’t touch her,” he snapped. “You have no right.”

Roo bristled. “It isn’t as if I want to be here. You’re the ones who hauled me away from the way to get back.”

“Shut up,” Oisin said.

“No I won’t shut up.”

Ardal dragged her up the road while she struggled to get out of his grasp.

“I should have let her fall on her face, should I? How would that have been the right thing to do?” She dropped her voice. “You fuckwit. I should have kicked you in the nuts instead of that stabilo. In fact, I’d rather take my chances with them.” Roo yanked free, turned and walked back the way they’d come.

The next moment, Ardal slung her over his shoulder and carried her toward the castle. When Roo beat at his back, he slid his hand under the dress onto her bare backside.

“You stop or I won’t,” he snapped.

Roo lay still and he took his hand away.

When he put her down, they were inside the castle, but they could just as easily have been in some modern hotel. No brick walls or suits of armor or displays of weapons, instead smooth white walls, marble floors and flowers everywhere.

“I’ll see you two later,” Oisin said, and Ardal and Eoin peeled away.

Oisin pushed her down the corridor and into a large room. Ahead of her were open windows with views onto a sundrenched sea. Roo tried not to think how this could be possible. It just was and she might as well accept it.

“Mother,” Oisin said and Roo turned.

Several men and women lounged on cream-colored leather couches placed on either side of a platform holding an ornate throne made of silver leaves and flowers. Roo dragged her gaze from the amazing chair to the woman with long golden hair who sat on it. She wore a floaty white dress that brushed her ankles, and looked too young to be Oisin’s mother.

A shove in the middle of Roo’s back sent her tumbling to her knees.

“Show respect to our queen,” Oisin said. “You’ve shown none so far in trespassing in her territory.”

Roo pushed herself to her feet, only to be knocked down again. She gasped as she jarred her hands and knees on the hard marble floor. Instead of feeling scared, Roo was angry. She was quite capable of showing respect, but she’d not been given chance to do so. She swiveled round and launched herself at Oisin, yanking his legs out from under him so he ended up on the floor too. Roo sat on his stomach.

“You were the one who dragged me here. All I wanted was to go home.”

Oisin bucked her off and Roo grabbed his leg and twisted it.

“You little bitch.” He wrapped his arm around her chest.

“I didn’t mean to come here. I fell in by accident. If you don’t want people to come, then you should mend the bloody tear. Ouch.”

He’d pinched her backside. Hard.

“Oisin! Enough,” said the queen.

Oisin glared at Roo but stood and pulled her up, his fingers tight around her arm. Roo straightened her dress and turned to face the woman on the throne. She did a little bob. “Sorry if I trespassed, Your Majesty. I didn’t mean to. If you could spare someone to show me the way back, I’d be very happy to leave. I wouldn’t say anything about this place. I mean, there’d be no point. No one would believe me. Well, Niall would but—”

Not a word was said, but it was as though all the oxygen had been sucked out of the room. The queen rose to her feet and walked over to Roo, her face blank. Roo started to think something not very complimentary and stopped herself. Maybe this woman could read her mind.

“How do you know my son?”

Oh God, Niall is her son?

“I love him and I love Taylor too, and they both love me,” Roo said with as much defiance in her voice as she could muster.

She wasn’t sure why she said what she did, just some inner desperation that made her want to say the words out loud that she’d only whispered to Niall. What she hadn’t expected was for the queen to laugh.

When the wolf padded back into the office, Taylor still sat behind the desk. He swallowed hard as he watched Jonas emerge, fur dissolving back to skin, face reforming, tail shrinking, and wondered if he’d been slipped some hallucinogenic drug. Or he’d gone mad. Or Jonas was a werewolf.
Oh God.

Jonas pulled on his clothes. “I lost her scent at the wall.”

“Meaning?”

“You and Roo walked to it. You came back, she didn’t.”

“What about Niall?”

“I can’t track faeries. They have no scent discernible to werewolves.”

Jesus. I’m going to have a heart attack.
The damn thing pounded so hard in his chest, his whole body hurt.

Jonas leaned on his desk. “Suspend disbelief, Taylor.”

“The world isn’t flat.”

“Well, that’s just being stupid.”

“She might have run away or been taken by someone,” Taylor muttered. “Christopher Singer—”

“Is in hospital and will be for some time. Multiple fractures. He won’t be hitting his wife again anytime soon.”

Taylor stared into Jonas’s face and gulped.

“Annette Foster isn’t yet aware her husband knows about her lesbian tendencies,” Jonas said. “Patrick Farrant and his wife are in police custody. They were arrested at Manchester airport. They have nothing to do with Roo’s disappearance.”

“Right.”

“Niall is a faery. A way into Faeryland lies at the bottom of your garden. I can’t be certain Roo is there, but I suspect she is. I can’t be certain Niall is there, but the word he gave you signals the end of my relationship with him. He no longer requires me to guard you. I no longer need to work for you. And at the moment, I no longer
want
to work for you.”

Taylor straightened. “Why not?”

Jonas stamped away from the desk and then stamped back. “Because I’ve trusted you, shown you something that could at best get me expelled from my pack, at worst get me executed, and you Still. Don’t. Fucking. Believe.”

“If they’re in Faeryland, go and get them back,” Taylor said.

Jonas shook his head. “I can’t invade the territory of another species without permission. I had enough problems changing packs from London to Leeds. My Alpha was not particularly understanding of the fact that I showed more loyalty to my employer than I do to him. Nor can I ask my new Alpha to request permission for me to cross over to Faeryland or he’ll know I’ve been working for a faery. In any case, it’s too late. You’ve blown it, Taylor. You’ve lost them both.”