The steam thickens. Pack yanks and pulls at the beast, her body jerking as she tries to get rid of it on her own. The creature swings its bat?—
Icicle daggers slice and stab the troll’s body.
Hundreds of them.
A thick green ooze seems from every wound. Blaze reaches me and grabs Pack, wrestling her from the troll that’s trying to rally. It staggers and folds, limping back and away from us. I prepare more stakes to finish it off, but it finally collapses into a steaming pile of ooze.
God, thesmell.
I grimace and pull the apron up over my nose.
Ugh. I need to get rid of this before the fucking sprites find it.
“—brave girl. Let me look at you,” I hear Blaze saying to Pack. He’s crouched in front of her, scratching her ears and trying to clean the green substance off her mouth.
“Don’t tell your mother,” I say to her.
Pack’s ears perk when she looks at me, and she whines in response. I almost smile.
“She looks very proud of herself,” I note.
“She should be.” Blaze straightens and sighs as he looks the dead troll over with me. Just when I open my mouth to speak, he pulls an envelope out of his jacket.
I curse under my breath at the black paper.
“It was on her screen door,” he says.
“Fuck.” My stomach drops as I open the envelope and read it aloud.
Don’t be stupid, boys. Leave her and come home.
I scoff and shake my head. “Why? So she can punish us anyway? Gouge out our eyes so we can never look at another human again? That bitch. I can’t wait to see what she tries on Sunday.”
The corner of Blaze’s lips lift when he looks sideways at me.
I squint at him. “What?” I ask.
He shrugs. “Nothing.” He glances back at the trailer, gaze softening. “Is she awake?”
I nod and pull the frozen coffees out of my apron pockets. “In the shower,” I reply as I give him his. “Do you mind? Since you seem to have figured out how to boil things again.”
It’s a taunt, and Blaze looks like he’s going to smile. He presses his hand to the bottom of our cups, warming them quickly. It steams in the chilled air, and we cheers them against one another.
“Is she okay?” he asks.
I sip my drink. “She didn’t realize we brought her home. Did you figure it out on your long walk?”
“Which part?”
“How we’re going to tell her—More importantly, how we’re going to get her to agree,” I reply.
“Not yet. I was thinking more about keeping her happy today, before the fall out.”
“You know tomorrow is her birthday,” I remind him.
Blaze exhales heavily and hangs his head. “Let’s get this cleaned up. We can figure out everything after she goes into work. Hopefully there are no more surprises.”
I stare at the pile of steaming shit in front of us for another beat, mind reeling with all that the next two days might hold.
