Page 25 of Pixie Problems
It could happen to anyone.
Truly.
I nodded. “I stuck around for a while. Took care of my parents. We were all devastated.” I ran my fingers over Zian’s ribcage. He was a really healthy weight now, and no longer super skinny. And his black and white coat was smooth and glossy. Mia was taking really good care of him.
“But after a few years, I felt like I couldn’t turn a corner without seeing her ghost. And my parents felt the same way. They moved to a city in Italy with warmer climates, and I traveled the world, moving from place to place, restless. Finally, I moved here and settled in.” I shrugged. “The rest is history.”
Draven took a sip from his teacup, then set it down in the saucer. “The attacks on Mia, are they bringing these memories closer to the surface?”
“Yeah,” I whispered. “I don’t really want to lose my best friend.”
“Rhys?”
I looked at him.
“We’ll find them. IpromiseI’ll protect her.”
I nodded. I believed him. Not only was Draven insanely powerful, but his heart was now also on the line. He wouldn’t want to lose the person who was coming to mean the world to him.
He walked me out, insisting I take one of his long, thousand dollar coats because I was dumb enough to go outside without one. In my defense, Doom had rattled me with his little beady eyes.
I turned at the door. “Thanks Draven.” I shook his hand, and he pulled me in, slapping my back in a bro hug that he managed, with his aged vampiness, not to make awkward. Also, he was Italian, so there was that. The Italians were very affectionate. Not quite as affectionate as star elves, but close.
I arrived home to find Doom purring on my pillow, fast asleep. I checked high and low for anything evil he’d done in my absence, but all of my shoes and clothes were intact, and none of my electronics were missing cords or buttons. Thank the stars.
I picked him up gently as I sat on my bed, and he opened his blue eyes and looked at me. There was no deviousness in them. There was just understanding, happiness and contentment. It made me ponder all of the devious things he’d done the last few days. I wonder . . .
“Did you just want me to talk to someone about what was bothering me?” I asked the swix.
Doom purred in reply while nuzzling my face lovingly and I felt my eyes suddenly go hot and tight. I swallowed. “You could have just said so, fuzz-ball. You didn’t need to sacrifice my favorite shoes and my remote.”
He gave me a look that clearly said it had been the only way to get through to me, and I laughed as I cuddled him to my chest.
What do you know?
I reallywascuddly.
Chapter8
Dice
For the first several weeks that I was in Moonhaven Cove, I was hyper aware of my every surrounding. I saw shadows in inanimate objects. I jumped at cars backfiring on the streets outside of my home. I viewed each and every shift at The Laughing Elf as a potential time for Hux and his pack to come harass and stalk me. But weeks passed and Hux hadn’t showed. He no longer called my cell phone at all hours of the night and day. He didn’t haunt my every footstep with his smarmy smile and his predatory pack.
It was enough to give a pixie a little relief. I was notstupid enough to believe he’d given up on me, but whatever the reason for his prolonged absence, I was extremely grateful.
Hey, maybe the town intimidated him and he’d changed his mind. I wasn’t discounting anything, including the deterrent that Moonhaven Cove was or was not giving my stalker. Personally, I’d be very afraid of Finn. Just because he was a good alpha didn’t mean he didn’t have sharp claws.
Rhys nudged my shoulder as he passed, handing someone the Bacardi he’d just poured for a dryad at the end of the bar. I eyed her, making sure none of the guys were hassling her. She looked sad, and I figured, if you were sad and drinking, you needed to be left alone. This dryad was on the youngish side—their mint green skin bleached to white as they aged—and she looked like a heroine from a romance book. She had long, amber-blonde hair that was down and perfectly windblown. It draped over her shoulders and fell down her back to her waist. Her aquamarine eyes studied her drink with a frown, as if she were trying to find answers in the bottom of her glass, but the glass wasn’t giving up its secrets.
A sorcerer sat beside her—his power levels were too high to be a wizard—and kept an eye on the dryad from the corner of one eye as he placed his order with Rhys. It made alarm bells go off in my mind, but I restrained my natural impulse to jettison the man out the door and let the scene play out instead. I couldn’t just throw someone out because I was being weirdly protective of a dryad warrior, now could I? I grumbled under my breath as I restocked the ice and kept an ear toward the pair so I was able to hear if they started conversing.
“Lass, aren’t you far from your tree and forest?”
I interrupted before she could respond, abruptly deciding to butt my nose in her business anyway, and slid her a seltzer water with ice on the house. “You don’t want him. He’s revolting, and all kinds of shifty. He probably just wants to get a hold of your golden armor and sell it in the black market.” My Insight was streaming a miasma of dark things about this sorcerer, which was never a good sign.
The dryad pursed her lips, eying the sorcerer with repugnance. “No black marketeer would give you anything for it. They wouldn’t want to get on the wrong side of one of the dryad’s blades or our fierce magic. Run along now. There’s a good lad.” She scoffed into her seltzer as the sorcerer beat a hasty retreat.
“Nicely done,” I praised.
