“You know what Idohate? When a fae such as yourself thinks the law doesn’t apply to them and takes advantage of hapless humans.” He opens the file again. “I did a little research while they were cleaning you up. Soho Lane has cheated humans out of hundreds of thousands of dollars over the past decade.”
More like 2.4 million over the past sixteen years.I keep that thought to myself.
“Poker is eighty percent skill,” I say. “I might have used luck occasionally to gain an advantage, but most of those games I won fair and square.”
He snorts. “Sure you did.” He pulls a pack of gum out of his desk drawer and folds a stick into his mouth. He doesn’t offer me any. “Answer me this. If you weren’t intentionally preying on human vulnerabilities, why did you leave Dragonfly Hollow? It’s not like you don’t have a casino there.”
I roll my lips together. I don’t like to talk about why I ran away. It’s humiliating, and I was only seventeen at the time. A lifetime ago. “Domestic issue,” I say vaguely. Not a complete lie. Gambling is prohibited for fae in Dragonfly, but I keep that information to myself. I doubt it would help my case.
“Hmm.” Donovan chews his gum. “Well then, you’ll be happy to know I’ve decided not to send you back there.”
“I’m not being deported?” I can’t believe the luck. But I also can’t believe Donovan would let me go. There isn’t a sliver of kindness or compassion behind those eyes.
He gives me a long, hard look, his gaze wandering the length of my jumpsuit. When he speaks again, his voice is menacingly soft, and his smile matches his crocodile eyes. “Nope, I’ve decided to keep you.”
His tone sends a chill through me. It’s like he’s picked out a puppy at a pet store—a puppy he plans to permanently chain in his yard. “Wh-why?” I hate the way my voice breaks, but I’m losing my battle to remain strong. If he finds out my real secret… If he finds Arden…Come on, Sophia. Be brave.Stay sharp.
Again his gaze rakes down my body. I keep my arms folded protectively across my chest. When he reaches my knees, he turns the folder around to face me. “Look at these pictures.”
Huh? I furrow my brow. He shoves the folder closer, and I look down at the contents. It’s an eight-by-ten photo of a bloody, twisted corpse, limbs splayed at odd angles in the middle of a crime scene. I have no idea how the person died except that it was obviously a violent death. Blood stains the pavement, splattered everywhere. “Why do you think I can help with this?”
“Because the murderer is fae.”
I scoff. “Why would you think a fae did this?” Seelie fae are rarely violent. Even under extreme conditions, most seelie would avoid hurting humans outside Devashire for the simple fact of not wanting to get caught being outside Devashire.
Donovan studies me for a moment. “All his teeth are missing.”
Hmm. That is strange but not necessarily fae. “Your Tooth Fairy is mythology,” I say. “I’d guess this is a human-on-human crime, and the murderer didn’t want his victim to be identified.”
“That’s what we thought too until we found his wallet in his pocket and his wife confirmed his identity. Why would a human pull the guy’s teeth but then leave a big fat wallet in his pocket?”
“I have no idea.”
Donovan rubs his chin. “The answer is a human wouldn’t.” He shuffles the picture to the bottom of the stack, revealing another. A footprint, definitely not human. “Can you tell me what creature made this?”
I study the print, wickedly uncomfortable. It looks like it was made by an eight-foot-tall skeleton. Each bone of the foot is clearly visible and is set deep in the mud. “I don’t think that’s a footprint, Donovan. It’s much too large.” The secret to a good lie is to tell a partial truth and concentrate on the true part. The footprint isn’t human, but it also isn’t seelie, which means that if it is fae at all, the human world has bigger problems than one dead man.
“Sophia… what made this?” he asks again through his teeth.
“I told you I don’t know. Pixies and leprechauns have the same feet as humans.” I stick my foot out to show him. “Satyrs also have human-looking feet most of the time. They can shift, but in their natural form, they have hooves. That’s definitely not a hoofprint. Which means, whatever made that, it wasn’t one of us.”
“You know something more. I saw it on your face when you first looked at this picture. Tell me.” He has that psycho look in his eye, the same one as in the torture room. If I’m not careful, I’m going to end up strapped to that table again. Only I can’t share what trotted through my mind when I saw that footprint. There are things humans don’t know about Devashire, things they can never know.
What I need is a distraction. I lean forward, allowing the vee neck of my orange jumpsuit to reveal some skin. I’m not blond or voluptuous in my natural form, but I look young and cute by human standards. My sable shoulder-length hair and large chocolate-brown eyes give me the coloring of someone who could fit in among multiple cultures under the right conditions. I’m often mistaken as Asian, although in an indistinct way. People assume my ethnicity is mixed, maybe Japanese/Italian or Korean/Irish. I’ve heard it all. No way can I flirt my way out of answering his questions, but I hope I can accentuate that part of me that’s approachable and sweet, that thing that made human men in my past tell me I was the type of girl they wanted to take home to mama.
“What made this print?” Donovan asks again, chewing his gum more vigorously.
“I don’t know,” I answer sweetly, genuinely. Even I believe me, and I know I’m lying.
“Is it true that pixies can make their boobs bigger anytime they want to?” he asks abruptly.
What the fuck? Maybe I could flirt my way out of this. “If you’ve been to the Dragonfly Club, you know the answer to that.”
He nods slowly, that crocodile smile making an appearance again. “When you’re rested, you can look any way you want. You can be Megan Fox or Kim Kardashian.”
Is that why he’s keeping me? To make me his personal, shape-shifting sex doll? I shudder.
“I bet you can even become the monster who made this footprint.” He waves the folder, and I swallow as I understand that it isn’t sex he’s interested in but pinning a murder on a fae.Fuck.
