Jane lifted her eyebrow. “Are you serious?”
“Yes. I will cooperate and answer any questions you have.”
“Right . . . up to the moment you disappear from the back of the transport truck with my wallet and the keys to my office.”
“Use two sets of cuffs if it makes you feel better,” Finn said drily.
“Don’t have to tell me twice,” Jane said. “McElray!”
A stocky SWAT member whipped off his mask, letting his dark curly hair spring free around a round face. “Yes, ma’am?”
“Take Mr. Palmeroy into custody. And put this in level six containment. Protocol: John Carter.”
McElray accepted the book with a grin, his white fangs glistening. “Yes, ma’am!”
With an air of great authority, McElray clapped a pair of titanium-reinforced handcuffs around Finn’s wrists, in a none-too-gentle fashion, murmuring to himself about having the “coolest damn job in the whole damn world.”
“Finn, what are you doing?” I demanded.
“I’m taking responsibility for my part in the plane crash, the book theft, all of it. Because that’s what the kind of man who deserves you would do.”
I thought about protesting. I thought about begging Jane for leniency. I thought about highlighting all the times he’d taken care of me in the woods and how I might not have even survived the crash without him. But honestly, he needed to own up to what he’d done. If I had a pattern of evading conflict and not trying anything remotely new, Finn’s lifelong tendency was to use his charm to get out of consequences. He was like a giant toddler in need of a time-out. So I said nothing.
I would process the part about the kind of man who deserved me when my head wasn’t reeling.
“It’s going to be OK,” Finn promised.
“You don’t know that,” I told him. “They could throw you in jail, give you the Trial.”
“We’ll worry about that bridge when we get to it,” Finn swore.
“If it makes you feel any better, we eliminated the part with the coffin full of bees,” Dick noted in a cheerful tone. “Now we just lock you in a windowless room and play nothing but polka music at top volume for a week.”
I turned to him, a stunned expression on my face.
“Not helpful,” he admitted, stepping back.
Finn’s voice was rough as he said, “Just go home, Anna.”
I turned my face away, anything to avoid seeing the sorrow in Finn’s eyes. I didn’t know if he felt sorry for hurting me or about going to vampire jail. But it hurt me to see it.
“Jane, could you let her know where I end up?” Finn asked without looking at her.
Jane looked none too pleased, but she eventually nodded. McElray yanked on Finn’s cuffs and pulled him away from me. He dragged Finn off while he looked back at me, as if memorizing my face.
“Wait!” I called.
Finn positively beamed as I jogged over to him, a bright, sunny smile that might have had me concerned for his skin if I weren’t so distracted. I pulled his shirt, yanking him closer to give him one last, lingering kiss. Not knowing when I would see him again, I poured every bit of longing and intensity into it, making sure that he felt every last cell of my lips. Because he had done all that he could to keep me safe in the woods. For every hurt he’d dealt me, he’d tried to do something to make up for it. He wasn’t perfect. But nothing in my life was without some complication.
Behind him, I heard Dick coo, “Awww,” until Jane elbowed him in the stomach. “What? They’re cute together.”
Finn smiled, leaning his forehead against mine. “Thank you. That will get me through the next few years.”
I nodded, kissing his nose. “And one more thing.”
“What’s that?”
I brought my knee up so quickly Finn didn’t have time to brace himself for the impact. He yelped and doubled over, and for a moment, I thought he was going to throw up.
“I had that coming.” He wheezed.
“Yes, you did.”
“Well, I feel better,” Jane said, while McElray offered Finn a comforting pat on the back, giving me a scathing look that sprang from male solidarity. “Take him to the transport truck.”
“Come on, buddy,” McElray told him. “I think there’s an ice pack in the first-aid kit.”
“You really have a thing about kicking men in their giblets, Waldo.”
“Keep calling me ‘Waldo’ and see what happens, Dick.”
He shuddered and took a step back.
I took a deep breath and walked to Jane and the head shifter, who was spelling his name for her. “C-K-Y-O-U.”
Jane glared at him. “I’m sorry, I refuse to believe your full name is Eric ‘Eff You’ Kelley.”
Eric shrugged. The other shifters snickered. I rolled my eyes. My patience with monsters and their personality issues had officially come to an end. I stood next to Jane, rolling my shoulders and squaring off against Eric.
“OK, so this whole night has been an example of how terrible supernatural creatures are with communication,” I said. “All of you want the same thing, but you’re so quick to make with the fighting and the weird monster transformations that you don’t bother talking to each other and asking politely.” I turned to the Viking. “You guys want the information in the book to make your lives as shifters easier. Yes?”
Eric glowered at me.
“And what I am hearing from you, Jane, is that you are more than willing to share the information contained in the book with the shifter community.”
“Yes,” Jane said. “But not just with one family. That’s not fair. Though it should be noted that I don’t appreciate the Kelleys trying to kill someone in my employ. I tend to take that pretty seriously.”
“We’ll make it up to you.” Eric sighed.
“Don’t worry about me,” Jane told him. “Make it up to the employee you nearly killed.”
He turned to me.
“I will give you an itemized invoice for my pain and suffering,” I told him. “It will be several pages long.”
“Fair enough,” Eric grumbled.
“And you’ll replace the plane for the airline,” I told him.
“Fine.”
“Where do you even make all of this money?” I asked.
“We’re in the salvage business,” he said. “There’s a lot of money in garbage.”
“Good to know.”
Jane seemed pleased by this turn of events, her shoulders relaxing the more I spoke to Eric “Not Really His Legal Name” Kelley. She cleared her throat. “And I’ll tell you what, the first portion of the book I’ll give you will be the sections Anna said will help you track down the other shifter families. In fact, I have some people in our offices who helped program our human descendant genealogy program, and they’ll help you find the other shifter families. If you idiots put together a panel of major shifter factions who can decide how to proceed, set rules for yourself on public behavior and interactions with other supernatural creatures—translation: create accountability for yourselves—then I will consider trusting you with the entire book,” Jane said.
Eric’s thick yellow brows rose. “You want us to create a shifter Council?”
Jane helped Eric to his feet. “Yes, without coming out to the humans, because we wouldn’t ask you to do that until you’re comfortable. And if it makes you feel any better, we’ve been talking to the werewolves about doing the same thing.”
“Still trying to get used to the fact that werewolves are a thing.” I sighed.
Dick patted my shoulder. “Let it go, sweetheart.”
“Were you serious about the polka music?” I asked.
10
Now that you have endured your first wilderness experience with your vampire companion, your only task is to ask yourself: What challenge will I take on next?
—Where the Wild Things Bite: A Survival Guide for Camping with the Undead
Despite the fact that I had technically only known them for a few days, Jan
e’s friends threw a farewell barbecue for me in Jane’s backyard. Heck, some of them I was just meeting that night. But they all showed up, covered dishes in hands, at Jane’s house, to hang out in her beautiful garden, to give me a send-off.
I met more new people in two hours than I’d met in a year. (Because I didn’t count an outdoor shifter rumble as “socializing.”) Tess, she of the macaroni-and-cheese miracle, brought her vampire boyfriend, Sam, and more important, more macaroni. Jolene the werewolf was there—with her clothes on—and I got to meet her human husband, Zeb, and their two children. Iris, the clever gardener, was there to explain her landscape design, while her husband, Cal, looked on fondly. Iris’s little sister, Gigi, brought her boyfriend, Nik. I even met Dick’s improbable but lovely granddaughter, Nola, who also happened to be Jed’s girlfriend.
Dick insisted that Nola, a registered nurse, give me a full medical checkup after the perils of my trip and getting into multiple scuffles with shifters and former boyfriends. Nola assured me, in her strange Boston-Irish accent, that I was perfectly fine. A little underfed but fine. She prescribed a diet of whatever the hell I wanted to eat and lots of liquids.
It took me a while to adjust to this many people in one place wanting to talk to me. They were friendly and sincere. They were also loud and boisterous and laughed a lot, and did I mention loud? They really seemed to enjoy one another. Not because they were obligated to be there but because they genuinely needed to spend time together.
I didn’t think I would ever reach the sheer scope of relationships that Jane’s group had, but I didn’t think I would mind expanding my circle a little. Maybe I would finally join that book club Rachel had been bugging me about. Mass-market paperbacks only, nothing valuable.
Friar Thomas’s book was safely contained in the Council’s sixth level, wherever that was. Jane had agreed to photocopy everything but the last chapter and distribute the information to whichever shifter clans requested it. Being an insular species, they weren’t exactly clamoring to join Jane’s proposed shifter Council, but members of the Kelley and Trudeau clans were volunteering. And that was a start.
Jane brought me yet another bottle of water while I chatted with Zeb. She’d noticed that I’d taken to carrying a drink with me wherever I went over the last couple of days, a by-product of thinking about dehydration constantly while in the woods. She put the bottle next to me on the garden table. “So is this a humans-only conversation, or can anyone join in?”
“I was just telling Anna here that she should come back when she can spend more time at your shop,” Zeb said.
“And I was telling Zeb that I wasn’t sure if I wanted to hang around your shop if you have more ‘treasures’ like Friar Thomas’s book lurking around,” I said.
“Probably wise,” Jane agreed.
“It was nice talking to you, Zeb,” I said, as he stood up.
“Keep in touch,” Zeb told me. “This group, it’s kind of like the Mafia; once you’re marked as ours, it’s a lifetime commitment.”
“But a friendly Mafia,” Jane assured me. “With Secret Santa exchanges and hugs. I don’t think the Mafia does Secret Santa.”
“Not the East Coast branches, at least,” I said, before I drained my water glass in two gulps. “Can you tell me where Finn ended up?”
“I’m not sure. We questioned him, determined that he eventually did the right thing, and sentenced him to community service and a fine to compensate for his part in endangering you. He also has to write a thousand-page essay on why it doesn’t pay to be an unscrupulous douchebag.”
“You mean a thousand words?”
“No, a thousand pages,” she said again. “He has the time. And I think it will do him good to invest some effort into something that doesn’t come easily to him.”
“Still a lighter sentence than I expected,” I told her.
“I may not like him. But I know you do. And I generally try not to kill people my friends find redeemable.”
“I appreciate that,” I told Jane. I sighed. “I’m really going to miss the people I’ve met here. I mean, I know I just met you and Jed and Dick. It’s probably trauma bonding or something. But really, I wish I could just pack you all up and take you home with me.”
“Well, I’m all for it, but the Council probably wouldn’t appreciate it after taking the time to saddle—I mean, appoint me to this job,” she said, rolling her eyes. “You know, when I was human, my circle was pretty limited, and that’s if you consider the one human friend I’d known since elementary school a ‘circle.’ But after I was turned, it was like my whole world opened up, and I just collected people along the way. I’m much happier now.”
“That point sounds awfully pointy, Jane.”
Jane put her arm around me, a gesture that only last week would have made me tense up if it came from anyone but Rachel. “I know what it’s like to limit yourself because you’re afraid of being rejected or hurt. And thinking that way can only hurt you in other ways—other less healthy, more sad ways.”
“I will try to keep that in mind,” I promised. “Besides, after the week I’ve had, going to the grocery store for myself, meeting new people, joining a gym—they all seem a lot less scary.”
“You don’t have to rush off, you know. You’re welcome to stick around for a few more weeks. The public relations division of the Council is still spinning your ‘miracle survival’ with the assistance of an upstanding undead citizen pretty hard. You might want to wait until the reporters lose interest before you head home.”
“Well, I would, but news of my not being dead has gotten around to my clients, and they are asking Rachel why I’m not meeting their deadlines,” I said. “And I have consultations scheduled with about twenty new clients in the next month. Somehow word got around in the supernatural community that Michael’s appraisals may not be up to snuff, because his PhD is under review. It turns out he might not have written the original research he used for his dissertation. You don’t know who might have placed an anonymous call to the administration tipping them off, do you?”
“The Council donates a lot of money to a lot of colleges,” Jane said, smirking. “It’s not my fault if that carries some weight. I’m just glad I can swing that weight around for good instead of evil.”
“Well, thank you. I appreciate it. Someone from the American Historical Review called me for an article she’s writing about ‘Shameless Academic Fraud,’ and from what she says, Michael’s already lost his tenure-track position and most of his freelance contracts. All of the journals that published his articles over the years are reviewing every word he’s ever written, preparing official apologies, just in case.” I told her. “Do you really not know where that swingy weight might have landed Finn?”
“I’m not going to try to talk you out of having contact with him, even though I think it’s a terrible, terrible idea. Because I know that will only drive you toward him. I’m seriously considering telling you that he’s the most datable, wonderful person ever to grace the planet.”
Ignoring the obvious segue, I said, “It’s really beautiful here.”
“Thank you. And you’re always welcome here if you want to come visit.” She hugged me tight. “We book nerds need to stick together.”
I enjoyed the hug for a moment. “Maybe you should come visit me next time.”
She nodded, her chin bumping against my shoulder. “Yeah, probably.”
A few days later, I was boarding a plane at the tiny, one-gate Half-Moon Hollow Municipal Airport to prove that air travel hadn’t beaten me. My trip through security was remarkably fast, seeing as I had no luggage and my new purse contained only a Council-issued phone, a replacement photo ID, my check from Specialty Books, and several hundred dollars in cash.
I was not at all worried about boarding this plane. For one thing, Ernie the pilot had been taken into Council custody until they could figure out what to do with him. While Ernie had committed several crimes in the employ of the Kelleys, no one had b
een (permanently) injured. And the Kelleys weren’t being charged with anything, beyond service on the shifter Council—the not fun, not powerful, spend-a-lot-of-hours-doing-thankless-tasks kind of service. But Ernie did have some extremely sketchy ideas on acceptable ways to make extra cash, not to mention violent tendencies. Jane thought maybe they could make Ernie do something similar, using his piloting skills to do community service hours for one of the vampire Council’s new charitable efforts, just so they could keep an eye on him.
But it did make me feel better that there were already other passengers aboard and a flight attendant who didn’t look at all shifty. And there were two pilots. I knew what was possible and that I could get through it. I wasn’t afraid anymore.
I settled into my seat, still careful to take the one I’d been assigned, because of manners, thank you. I leaned forward, imagining the vacation I would give myself after I got caught up with my work. No texts, no phones, no e-mails for a week, just silence and a bed and a refrigerator full of food I didn’t have to scavenge.
Before my backwoods adventure, that would have sounded like heaven. But suddenly, a week of solitude seemed sort of lonely. Maybe it would be better to travel somewhere? Maybe somewhere tropical? Then again, I’d had enough heat and humidity to last me for a while. Canada? England? Alaska, maybe? The sun would set earlier in that time zone, wouldn’t it? Because Finn—
I shook my head. I didn’t have to worry about the sun anymore.
A happy thrill zipped up my spine. I’d had a passport for years, but I’d never used it, fearing the chaos of long-distance travel. And now I was thinking about a last-minute trip to Anchorage? The world was opening up in a way that was terrifying and exciting all at the same time.
The only drawback was that I would be doing it alone. I wasn’t worried about the safety aspects of it, but it would be lonely. Maybe Rachel would be willing to tag along? If we visited a few bookshops along the way, we might even be able to write it off as a work trip.
My replacement phone beeped, reminding me that I needed to put it in airplane mode. I pulled it from my purse and checked the screen. Jane had texted me.