Page 97 of Welcome to Fae Cafe

Connor rolled his eyes. “I knew you were lying.” But his face changed when he noticed Cress there. “You,” he said.

Lily glanced at Kate, and their eyes locked for a moment.

“Are you okay?” Kate asked first.

“Areyouokay?” Lily folded her arms, hugging them to herself.

“You shouldn’t be working today. You should take a few days off until the funeral. Or at least work here with us,” Kate said.

“I’ve been searching everywhere for you,” Connor interrupted to say to Cress. “Just so you know, I informed the department about that stunt you pulled on the docks. You’re in big trouble.”

Cress tilted his head. “Shall I inform the department of what you were trying to do to Kate that night?” he asked, and Lily’s eyes widened. She pushed Connor—his back slammed against the door.

“I’m going to beat the idiocy out of you, Connor! You can report me for threatening you, I don’t care!” she shouted at him. “I’ve warned you to stay away from Kate too many times!”

Connor pointed at Cress. “He threw me off a dock!”

A wicked smile found Cress’s face. “I did.”

“What is your deal, anyway?” Connor shoved off the door and took a hostile step toward Cress. “You don’t show up for work, and then you mess around in my personal life? Who do you think you are?”

Cress blinked down at the policeman. He took Kate’s hand. “I’m Kate’s boyfriend,” he announced. “We go on dates.”

Kate tried to tug her hand away, but Cress’s grip turned to stone around hers. “Cress… You’re not—”

The bell rang through the café again. A sunburnt, hazel-eyed teenager in a hoodie came in, and everything Kate had just been thinking evaporated. “Wow!” he said, looking around.

“Greyson!” she said.

Cress dropped her hand when she rushed for her brother.

Greyson caught Kate into a hug. He patted her back and rubbed back and forth across her shoulders. It said enough about the loss they both felt. “The police called yesterday. I took the first redeye flight home,” he said. “I didn’t even know I was Grandma’s emergency contact. It makes no sense when Lil is a cop, but whatever. I tried calling you.”

“Watch your human hands,” Cress mumbled as he eyed Greyson’s gestures on Kate’s back.

Lily rolled her eyes. “This is Kate’sbrother, Greyson,” she explained, still glaring at Connor as she marched to the counter and dragged over the coffee maker.

The coldness dropped from Cress’s stare. He still looked Greyson over as though recognizing him from somewhere.

Greyson let Kate go and smirked. “Who the heck is this whack job?” He jutted his thumb at Cress.

Kate opened her mouth to explain but,“He’s an assassin who came to kill me,”didn’t quite have a nice ring to it. She sighed and took Cress’s hand against every warning in her body. She patted his knuckles. “This is my boyfriend,” she said.

Cress’s smile widened. He looked right at Connor.

Without missing a beat, Greyson nodded. “Oh, that makes sense then,” he said. He grabbed Cress’s free hand, shook it, then headed over to the counter where Lily was. “One Americano, please. And one Canadian police officer bestie to go with it.” He winked, and Lily shot Kate an odd smirk.

“We’re not finished,” Connor promised Cress. His hand rested on the hilt of his gun. “I’m friends with all the captains on the force. You don’t want to mess with someone like me.”

Mor’s chuckle lifted from behind the newspaper, and cold malice filled Cress’s smile. “I can’t wait to mess with someone like you,” Cress assured.

Lily reached for a paper to-go cup, seeming determined to ignore the tension in the air. She shook her head as she poured a coffee, slid it over to Greyson, and said, “Welcome to Fae Café.”

It wasn’t easy to sneak out without Lily noticing. Thankfully, Lily was so tired from being overworked and emotionally spent that she was sleeping like a log by midnight.

Kate waited until she was outside breathing in the cool night air to zip her coat, not risking the noise. She trudged through the crunchy snow, shivering as flakes left the black sky and turned to glittering confetti beneath the streetlamps. Her last conversation with Lily rang through her mind:

“I’ve fallen in love with them, Lil. I’ve gotten too attached to four fairy-beings who came here to kill me. I’m crazy, right?”

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