Gran’s eyes widened. “What?”

I made a sweeping motion with one hand up and down my body. “I’m not tiny enough. I’m not quite pretty enough. I had to rely on my smarts and charm to get anywhere. You don’t understand what it’s like because you just never gave a flying f—”

Her eyes narrowed, stopping me. “Language.”

“Fridge. I was going to say fridge,” I muttered. “What any man or woman thought of you. You were always confident.” I blew out a slow breath, trying to find the right words. “I thought he was more important than anything else. I put him first.”

A wooden floorboard behind us creaked and I turned to see Eric standing there. “But he never put you first.” His voice was quiet and soft.

I shook my head. “No, he didn’t. He told me I embarrassed him, and I believed him. He told me I was a joke. And I believed him. He told me . . .” I swallowed hard. “He told me I was a miserable bitch.” Oh, that last one was tough. I made myself keep talking. “I believed him because it was easier to change than to admit that the man I picked as my partner was a complete and utter selfish asshole.” I sighed.

Gran’s eyes were sad. “Why didn’t you tell me this before?”

“You mean when you were dying? When the cancer was eating you from the inside out?” I spread my hands wide. “Seriously?”

She frowned and touched her head. “When I was dying, I was so sick. But you should have told me then.”

Eric cleared his throat. “We often keep our secrets closer to protect those we love, but then we end up hurting them. It’s a common issue.”

I half-turned toward him. “Listen here, Mr. Therapist—”

He smiled. “Psychologist, actually.”

Well, that was a shock. “Wait. You’re a doctor, a psychologist?”

He nodded. “I do a lot of my work via phone calls, mostly for those in the shadow world who need help walking through a transition.”

I couldn’t help it, my lips twitched. “You help the monsters with the monsters in their closets?”

He gave a shy smile. “Something like that. You can’t understand how hard it is for some of them to accept what they are, especially those who started out human. It’s on par with any major life change. Divorce. Death. Coming out.”

I looked from him to Gran. “Then maybe you can talk to her about why I might have run away from the shadow world. It wasn’t right what I did, but as a young woman, I didn’t think I had any other choice if I wanted a life. I know now I was wrong, but . . . I can’t change what happened in the past.”

“Training,” she said softly. “I was training you to be strong and I failed.”

I brushed past her, a rush of cold running down my side as I strode to the back door. “No, you didn’t fail, Gran. Because at the end of the day, I came back and I’m doing exactly what you taught me to do. To look out for those who couldn’t look out for themselves. And, right now, I have a job to do. Eric’s life is in danger and I—we—are the only ones who believe him. Which I think was on purpose.”

“How do you know that?” Eric asked.

I grinned and managed a wink despite my weary heart. “When it comes to guessing, I’m the best.”

18

My first stop was not 66 Factors Row, despite the urgency of my trip to find the chains and get them back to Gran. Because every person I walked by gave me big eyes and pointed looks at my shirt. A glance down said it all. I had to change if I wanted to go incognito at all. Mud stained my once white T-shirt, and my leather pants were caked in the same mud that flaked off as I walked, leaving a veritable trail behind me.

I ducked into a tourist shop where I bought a cheap T-shirt and changed it out with the grubby, stained, torn shirt I wore, in a makeshift changing room with one of those curtains that doesn’t quite close properly. The white shirt showed every mark of the last few hours, including a few spots of blood that I had no idea where they’d come from. The new shirt was black with the word Savannah etched across it in silver glitter. Not quite as inconspicuous as I’d like it to be, but then again, a tourist would think I was just another tourist, and a local might even skip over me thinking the same thing. I used the dirty shirt to knock the worst of the mud off my pants and boots.

Maybe I needed to rethink my outfits when I was on a job. No more white, that much was for sure.

Hurrying, I caught a glimpse of myself in a shop window. My hair was a disaster, my face had dirt smeared across it, and my eyes had bags under them. Crap.

The closest bathroom was at Vic’s Restaurant on the riverfront. I slipped in with the crush of tourists on the bottom floor getting ice cream, slid by and made it to the bathroom. I splashed water over my face; cleaning it off helped a little. I pulled my long hair up into a high ponytail, smoothing back the flyaways as best I could. For just a moment, I looked younger, but it might have to do with the wide doe-eyed look I had going on. Shock was a funny thing but seemed to be working in my favor.

“Crap. You look like crap,” I whispered to my mirrored reflection as I leaned forward. And I was going to Crash’s and I couldn’t help but want to not look like . . . a mess.

“Oh, here, I can help with that.” The voice was followed by a woman who stepped out of the last stall. “Are you going on a date?” She was dressed nicely, pressed pants and a loose blouse that screamed money. She was about my age, but her life had obviously treated her better if the nails, hair, and makeup were any indication. She moved to the sink beside me and washed up her hands, drying them quickly.

“Uh, no. But I’m going to speak with a guy that—” Oh, crap, I had the hots for Crash.

She smiled and opened her purse, pulled out a compact, and turned me toward her. Her hands moved smoothly over my face, and I stood there and let her. Because this was Savannah. You let people help you here.

“Look, I’m a believer that men should love us no matter what, but you want to know the truth?” she said as she swept a brush across one of my cheekbones and then the other.

I wasn’t sure I did. “Do I have a choice?” I closed my eyes as she quickly brushed something across the bags under them.

“The truth is, sometimes they need to really see us. And they’re too dumb to see us without a little sparkle. After that, well, if they still can’t see you, then they aren’t the right one for you, darling. But without using a two-by-four to hit them upside the head, this is the next best thing.” She stepped back and I opened my eyes. She smiled. “See? You just needed a little highlighting, pretty girl.”

I turned to the mirror and my mouth dropped open. “Are you a fairy godmother?” My pale green eyes, lined with black and various shades of color, looked as though they’d been turned up in volume by at least ten notches. The bags were gone. Gone. My lashes looked longer than normal, dark, sweeping upward and framing my eyes.

And my cheekbones were accented against the rest of my face in a way that made it look completely natural with just a touch of color to my now kissably plump lips. I could never have pulled the makeup off on my own. “Seriously?”

I turned and squinted at her, suddenly suspicious. “Are you fae?”

Her eyes widened and then she smiled. “I see the resemblance now. You’re Celia’s granddaughter, aren’t you?” I noted that she didn’t answer my first question which meant yes, she probably was fae.

I stared at her, not sure what to say. Fae could be . . . difficult at the best of times. “She was a great loss to the community,” the woman said softly. “My name is Karissa.” She pulled a card out and handed it to me. “I’d love to have tea with you. When you aren’t so busy.”

“Breena,” I said my name automatically as I stared at the card. Her name and a phone number on white card stock.

She patted me on the shoulder. “Whoever he is, make sure he notices you. Make sure he sees the real you, Breena, and not the woman you fear yourself to be.”

She left me there in the washroom. Part of me wanted to wash the makeup off. The other part wanted to seal it on forever and ever. “Damn.” I left it on, my vanity getting the better of me.

I tried to remember what I could about the fae in Savannah. Not many of them. None that I knew of went by the name Karissa, so that was probably a knock-off name. They didn’t like giving out their names for a reason—too much power in being able to call them. The fact that she’d given me a card was no small thing when dealing with fae. I didn’t take it lightly.

I shook it off, left the bathroom, and hurried toward Crash’s place. First there, then I’d go to the loft and get Gran’s book. We’d figure this out, one way or another.

Once I arrived at Crash’s, I took note that it was much later than I’d ever visited there before. Okay, I’d only been there two times.

I knocked on the boarded-up door. “Feish, it’s me.”

The door opened right away, and she peered out at me, her face lighting up. “Boss is working. You want tea? We have a good visit; you tell me about that one you protecting.”

I was about to say no, but the truth was, tea sounded amazing. Tea and something to go with it. We had time and I knew Eric was safe with Gran. “Yes, you get the tea. I’m going to get us something to eat.”

Feish gave me a shy smile and I hurried back the way I’d come, not at all suspecting that I might have a problem getting a snack. I had a twenty in my bag somewhere, one of my last twenties. I needed to talk to Eammon about this week’s training stipend. I realized then that he’d forgotten.

Looking down in my purse, I didn’t notice the scuttling sounds in the quiet of the alley—until a long, hairy leg blocked my path.

I stopped so fast I ended up balancing on my toes for half a beat before I rocked back to my heels. “Oh, Jinx. Hi.”

“Who told you my name?” The giant spider’s multiple eyes blinked in succession and her fangs did this stretching thing toward me that made me take a slow step back. Then another. “Look, I was reading Charlotte’s Web last night, and I was thinking—”