Pirate's Alley

Unlike Alex, who I spotted as soon as I slipped through the double doors. He wore a suck-up black tailored suit that highlighted his broad shoulders and narrow waist, and a cream-colored shirt that looked suspiciously like silk, open at the collar. Deep in conversation with an older man who sported a wild Einstein-ish shock of white hair, Alex looked healthy, wealthy, and sexy enough to make me forgive almost any boorish behavior.

 

 

I caught his eye and waved, and got a hot little smile in return, complete with that sexy crease on the left side of his mouth that was almost, but not quite, a dimple. Maybe our relationship was going to make it after all. I’d had my doubts in the last month, but we’d both been working at it, trying to keep the external stuff from blowing us apart.

 

I reined in my appreciation and looked around the room, trying to figure out where to sit.

 

According to Alex, the room had been patterned after the Supreme Court chambers. A long table stretched across a carpeted platform in front, with chairs that faced the room. Before each chair was a placard inscribed with the council member’s name. I made note of where Capt. Jn. Lafitte would be seated and scanned the rest of the room. A small wooden table sat in front of the dais, with two chairs facing the council, probably for whoever was giving testimony. And rows of seats behind.

 

I was prime peanut-gallery fodder, so I plopped myself at the end of the row of seats nearest the front and counted the chairs behind the long table. Fifteen, each with a microphone stand before it.

 

Despite my terror at having to testify and dread of seeing Adrian Hoffman and the Axeman again, my adrenaline pumped enough to make the room seem brighter and louder. I’d done a good grounding before leaving Eugenie’s to keep my empathy in check. I didn’t know which species I could read and which ones I couldn’t, so better to be safe.

 

“Hey, sunshine. Care if I sit with you?”

 

I looked up and smiled. It was the first time I’d seen Jake Warin in weeks, not since I’d fled to Old Barataria to escape the elves and the Axeman.

 

I scooted over and Jake took the aisle seat.

 

“What are you doing here?” I whispered. “You don’t have to testify.” Being here could be dangerous for him; he’d accidentally infected me with the loup-garou virus last month, which in some ways had set the whole ugly elven conspiracy in motion. The Elders still didn’t know about his involvement, and I hoped it didn’t come out today.

 

“I’m security for the boss.” Jake’s dimples made an appearance, and his amber eyes twinkled like they had before all this loup-garou mess started. Maybe he was finding his way back to being Jake, and that made me happy. “You know, your pirate BFF.”

 

I looked around but didn’t see Jean. “How’s he doing?”

 

Jake shook his head. “His body’s healing, but you knew that. His head? Well, let’s just say he is one pissed-off Frenchman.”

 

Great, and I had to babysit him. “Throwing tantrums? Making it hard on his people?”

 

“Oh no.” Jake looked around to see if anyone was nearby, then lowered his voice. “If Jean’s noisy and carryin’ on, he’s mostly putting on a show. It’s like theater for him, you know? He likes an audience. When he’s really pissed off, he gets quiet. And he’s been like a damned church mouse ever since Thanksgiving.”

 

Better and better. “I hear my next assignment will be keeping Jean under control,” I said. “Any idea how I can accomplish such a thing?”

 

Jake laughed. “Good luck, sunshine.”

 

Yeah, seems like I’d heard those words before.

 

Alex joined us, and for the next half hour, we watched as members of the Interspecies Council arrived with varying amounts of fanfare. The people with charges against them were being held in a room behind the dais, which left me free of worrying about seeing Adrian Hoffman again and able to gawk at the pretes.

 

The Einstein talking to Alex turned out to be Toussaint Delachaise, my merman friend Rene’s father and council representative for the water species. A sour-faced gremlin represented the group I liked to call “gods and monsters,” sort of a catchall prete class, none of whose components were big enough to have their own representatives. The head of the enforcers, a werewolf who’d been Alex’s boss before he’d begun answering to Zrakovi, filled the were-shifter council seat.

 

“Where’s Lafitte?” Alex whispered, then slid his gaze past me. “What the holy hell is that?”

 

I didn’t feel self-conscious turning to openly gawk at the newcomers, because a silence had fallen over the room. Everyone else gawked, too. A tall, razor-thin woman with a cascade of silvery-blue hair glided down the room’s center aisle. She wore a heavy blue floor-length coat trimmed in white fur with a long fur tail that slid along the floor behind her like a snake. Trailing her were two men also dressed in long, fur-trimmed coats.

 

“Faeries,” I whispered to Alex. “Has to be. They have three council seats.”

 

He nodded. “The queen is really … old.”

 

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