Carrie Vaughn - Kitty Steals the Show

When he finished looking at the pieces and skimming the journals, he put them carefully back in the box, which he sealed, then went back to staring out the window. I couldn’t guess what he was thinking.

“You going to be okay?” I asked.

Glancing over, he seemed thoughtful. “Yeah. It’s weird. There’s Amelia, now her family—a lot more family than I ever thought I’d get.”

“Like acquiring in-laws,” Ben said, and feigning offense I said, “Hey!”

He backpedaled. “I didn’t say there’s anything wrong with your family, just that there’s a lot of them. Cormac and I were both only children, and our folks weren’t exactly gregarious. The screaming kids thing takes getting used to.” My sister Cheryl had two kids who were firmly into the running and screaming phase. I actually sympathized.

Cormac added, “That, and you see your father killed in front of you you start to think you don’t deserve a family.”

The train hummed along during the long pause before I ventured, “What do you think now?”

He gave an offhand shrug, glanced at the two of us before looking back out the window. “I think I’m doing okay.”

Ben had tensed beside me, watching his cousin. After his answer, he let out a sigh and relaxed again. I smiled, because I thought he was doing okay, too.

I had a sudden thought. “Hey—you should come to dinner tonight. We’re meeting Luis and his sister. Just a small group thing. It’ll be fun.”

“No, I don’t think so,” he said reflexively.

I looked to Ben, pleading for help in persuading his cousin.

“It’s up to you,” Ben said. “But you have to eat sometime, might as well get a good meal out of it.”

“I just don’t think I’m up for much more togetherness right now.”

“Mr. Badass hunter guy who isn’t scared of anything is scared of dinner ?” I said. He just looked at me sidelong, smirking.

“She’s got a point,” Ben said.

“You’re supposed to be on my side,” Cormac grumbled. “I just don’t see the point in trying to … domesticate me.”

Interesting choice of word. I considered for a minute and realized I would probably never stop worrying about Cormac. “I’m not trying to domesticate you. Just … don’t you think you should get out more?”

“I’m okay. I’ve always been okay.” He almost sounded like he was trying to convince himself.

I said, “Ask Amelia if she’d like to meet a couple of were-jaguars from Brazil.”

The train clacked on the rails as we waited for Cormac’s response. His lips were pursed, like he’d eaten something sour.

Finally he said, “Amelia thinks it would be interesting to meet a pair of were-jaguars.”

“So you’re coming?” I said, bouncing.

He didn’t say yes, he didn’t say no, but he stopped trying to weasel out of the evening.

LUIS PICKED the restaurant. Feeling some trepidation, I wondered what trendy/sexy place he’d chosen, and if he would hire a guitarist or violinist or an entire mariachi band to serenade and embarrass me, or have roses delivered, as if any of his come-ons were more than teasing. He wasn’t so crass to carry it so far. I wasn’t so crass as to let him.

In fact, he’d invited us to a steakhouse, naturally. Simply decorated in a clean modern style, black chairs and white tablecloths, it was filled with the familiar and comforting scents of blood and cooking meat.

“This Luis of yours has class,” Ben said at the restaurant’s entrance.

“You sound surprised,” I said.

“I really didn’t know what to expect.”

“Now are you willing to admit that my taste in men might actually be pretty good?” I looked at him.

“Well, it used to be anyway,” he said, putting his arm around my waist.

Cormac didn’t have commentary to add. He kept looking around like he expected something to jump out at him.

At the bar near the front door sat the two young women from the conference who’d asked for my autograph. The ones who confused Emma and me by their apparent lack of presence. They waved at me, still giggling and excited. I smiled politely, trying to get some kind of sense or feel for them and what they were. The food and alcohol smells of the restaurant might have been interfering with my nose.

“You know them?” Cormac finally asked.

“I ran into them at the conference. It’s just … I couldn’t get a scent off them.” I wrinkled my nose.

“They’re Fae, you know.”

“What?” I said, then lowered my voice. “Like Elijah Smith? Like Underhill and Puck and crap?” I tried not to stare, but the young women were looking right at us, and their grins seemed … conspiratorial. Not at all cute anymore.

Elijah Smith had advertised himself as a faith healer with the ability to cure lycanthropy and vampirism. What he really did was enslave said lycanthropes and vampires and feed on their powers. He’d been a different kind of otherworldly than I’d ever encountered—fairy, according to the experts. Old-school, ancient stories, nothing cute about him.

We were in England, of course there’d be fairies. I should have known.

Cormac handed me an object—one of the charms from Amelia’s box. An iron nail bent in the shape of a cross, with a dried-out spring of something bound to it with twine. A four-leaf clover? When I closed my hand around it, I had to squint and tilt my head, because a haze filtered my vision, like I’d suddenly entered a TV dream sequence. The two women glowed, carrying their own special effects. Also, I could finally smell them—fresh-cut clover, which clashed strangely with the cooking meat smell in the rest of the place.

I might have stared at them all night if Cormac hadn’t taken the charm out of my hand and nudged me. I blinked again, and the haze vanished, noises rushed back, and everything was as it should be.

“You okay?” Ben asked.

I must have looked like I’d gone to another world for a moment. In a sense maybe I had. “It’s just … what are they doing here?”

Cormac shrugged. “For the conference, like everyone else?”

“Kitty!” Luis called, waving from across the restaurant’s main room. He and his sister sat at a table in a prime spot with a view of the room and through the window to the street outside. The kind of spot a lycanthrope would pick, to be able to watch the surroundings.

We went to join them, and I looked over my shoulder at the two women—the two Fae. They had gotten up and were leaving, without a backward glance. Maybe Cormac was right, and they were here to enjoy themselves like everyone else. Their not being human shouldn’t have been anything to get excited about. Plenty of people at the conference weren’t entirely human.

Luis stood and leaned in to kiss my cheek before I could duck, though the gesture seemed cosmopolitan and harmless, even with the dark look Ben gave me. He and Luis didn’t shake hands. Neither did he and Cormac. The two regarded each other warily.

Luis presented his companion. “This is my sister, Esperanza.”

She was short and fiery, with a round face and a spark in her gaze. I recognized the family resemblance in those eyes. She wore jeans and a beaded tunic shirt, and her long dark hair lay braided over one shoulder. She smelled of jaguar, like Luis.

We made all the introductions, shuffled a bit around the table, jockeying for seats as Ben pointedly insinuated himself between me and Luis, which meant I ended up sitting next to Esperanza. Ben may have wanted to make sure I wasn’t sitting next to the charming jaguar, but it meant I was across from him, and he winked at me, dark eyes flashing. Oh dear. I had suddenly forgotten how to flirt. Cormac ended up stuck at the end of the table, probably by design. He could watch us all, and the rest of the restaurant. He’d probably go the whole evening without saying a word.