“Checking out your friends’ handiwork?” Annette pushed up her sleeves to display more of her burns.
“What? No, I...I don’t have many friends. What happened to you?” He sounded genuinely horrified.
I caught Annette’s eye. She shrugged one shoulder. Ronnie could be telling the truth, or he could just be a good liar.
“I looked up the deed to Second Life Books and Gifts,” he continued. “I didn’t make the connection before. You’re really her, aren’t you?TheAnnette Thorne? The one who stopped a level six demonic incursion in San Francisco in ’89? Who tracked down Jack the Ripper’s ghost in Paris? Is it true you were married to Baptiste Davoust?”
I looked sideways at Annette. She rarely spoke of her prior relationships, and the details of her first marriage weren’t common knowledge.
“My first husband,” said Annette. “The Earl of Arundel before he got turned into a vampire. Good kisser. Lousy temper. The marriage didn’t last. A five-hundred-year age difference is tough to overcome.” Annette folded her arms, but I could tell she was pleased by Ronnie’s obvious awe. “How do you know all that?”
“It was part of my training. I studied the history of all the great battles that have been hidden from the world, along with the heroes and soldiers who fought the darkness. I have to know the warriors who came before me if I’m to join them.” His voice shook like he was working up the nerve to ask Annette for her autograph. Instead, he swallowed and said, “The deed also listed Temple Finn.”
“Protector of the eastern continent,” I said. “Enforcer of the Unseelie Treaty of 1981. Maker of the best cheesecakes in the northern hemisphere.”
“Holy shit,” he whispered. Then he blinked at me. “And what was your name?”
“Jenny Winter.”
He repeated the name to himself. “Are you their assistant?”
Oh, no. He didnotjust say that. “I’m—Iwas—a Hunter.”
He looked me over. “Like, deer and quail and that sort of thing?”
Annette snorted and covered her mouth.
“I’m ritually bound to Artemis,” I snapped. “I was a Champion of the Guardians Council. Wasn’t any of that in your training?”
He shook his head. “Sorry.”
“You never learned about the goblin incursion at Disney World?” I asked. “I was sixteen. I snuck away from my school’s band trip and killed the goblin king with my oboe. It was a mess. They had to shut down the Haunted Mansion for three months.”
“Never heard of it,” he said.
“Tell us why you were watching the shop, Ronnie,” Annette cut in.
He looked down at himself. “Can I get dressed first?”
“Be my guest,” said Annette.
Neither of us moved.
Ronnie flushed and pulled the blanket around himself like a cloak, then grabbed the nearest clothes from the floor.
“My name is Ronald Kensington the Sixth.” He tugged on a pair of jeans with one hand while clutching the blanket with the other. “My family has fought the forces of evil since fifteen twelve, when Sir John Kensington helped track down five escaped creatures after the fire at the Norwich Exhibition of the Unnatural. I’ve come here to carry on that noble mission.”
“How many times have you practiced that introduction in the mirror?” I asked.
His blush deepened.
“I take it you thought we were the forces of evil?” asked Annette.
“Well, you did help that harvester. And also...” He pulled on a black T-shirt. “Never mind. I’ve screwed everything up, haven’t I? Ma tried to warn me. She doesn’t think I’m ready.”
“Ready for what?” I asked. “What aren’t you telling us?”
“You’ll think I’m stupid.”
