All the cabinet doors were open. Glasses were pushed around. Plates askew. Tupperware on the verge of toppling onto the counters. Pots and pans in the lower cabinets turned so their handles were jutting out.
“Well, you see, it’s kind of a long story.” Tink sat on the edge of the island, his legs swinging and his wings twitching while the scent of fried meat mingled with the peach-scented candle that was burning behind him. Dixon was lying beside him, his long tail swishing idly.
I turned to him and opened my mouth, but I was at a loss.
“Dixon and I were playing hide and go seek.”
That explanation didn’t help either. “How do you play hide and go seek with a cat?”
Dixon’s ears flattened as Tink gasped dramatically. “Are you suggesting that Dixon doesn’t have the brain capacity to play hide and go seek?”
“Dixon is a cat—a very smart cat, but a cat.” I shook my head as I walked over to the small kitchen table. “You are so cleaning this up.”
“I was planning to.” Tink took flight, following me over to the table. He landed on the back of the white chair. “What are you doing? And don’t lie and say you have a date.”
“I’m actually going to walk the Quarter,” I said, deciding not to lie. “There’s some younglings that have gone missing and I’m going to see if I can find any of them.”
His brows knitted together. “Fabian mentioned something about that, but he didn’t seem too concerned.”
“Well, Tanner and Faye are. They contacted the Order.”
“Oh, and I bet the Order cares sooo much about a few missing Summer fae.” He walked along the narrow back of the chair like it was a balance beam. “They were basically ‘not my problem’?”
“Pretty much. That’s why I was going to head out. The chance that I see any of them is pretty nil, but it can’t hurt to try.” Glancing back to the island after I heard the soft thump of Dixon dropping to the floor, I made another quick decision. “Do you want to come with me?”
Tink halted, one little leg up in the air. His forehead wrinkled as he looked up at me and then glanced down to where Dixon was weaving himself around my ankles. “Nah, I need to clean up the kitchen.”
“You sure?”
He nodded as he flew up so he was eye level with me. His wings moved quietly through the air. “Yeah, and I discovered this new show that I’m only a few episodes into.”
Tink gave me a lot of crap about going out hunting without him, but Tink didn’t go out often. Sometimes I wondered if he had some kind of phobia surrounding the outside human world and that was why he didn’t travel to Florida with Fabian. Then again, he had traveled with Ivy and team to San Diego when they were searching down leads to stop the Queen.
“What show?” I asked.
“Santa Clarita Diet. It’s about this woman who becomes a zombie, but she’s not like a Walking Dead zombie. She’s basically trying to live her best life with her husband and daughter as a flesh-eating zombie.”
“Okay.” I drew the word out. “Sounds like you have a fun evening planned.”
“I do.” Tink flew with me as I went into the small mudroom that exited onto the porch and picked up my Saints cap. “Will you keep in contact with me?”
Grinning, I pulled the cap on and shoved my ponytail up under it. “Of course.” Watching Tink when he was this size use a cellphone was quite amusing. “I won’t be out too late.”
“Coolio,” he murmured, zooming back into the kitchen. A second later, I heard him yell, “Giddy-up Dixon, we must conquer the kitchen and then it’s Netflix time!”
Shaking my head, I picked up my keys and shoved them into the back pocket of my jeans. I pulled my peacoat from a hook and shoved my arms through it. The last thing I put on was the iron cuff. That was a just-in-case thing. I started for the door and then stopped, pulling out a gray basket. I snatched up an iron stake and placed it into the pocket of my jacket. That was another just in case.
I slipped out the side door and, after making sure it was locked behind me, I turned around and halted.
An odd feeling crept along the nape of my neck as I stared at the narrow pathway that connected the front yard to the courtyard out back. Tiny bumps rose all along my body as I shivered, not from the cold but from… from the feeling of being watched.
I walked to the end of the porch and saw no one in the courtyard or anywhere near the house. My gaze flicked to the house next door. All the curtains were in place. Coming back to the side door, I checked yet again that it was locked and then made my way to the front of the house.
As I stepped off the porch and walked toward the front yard, I told myself it was just my imagination, but I couldn’t shake the eerie sensation.
Couldn’t shake it at all.
* * * *
Emerald green beads whizzed through the air as the drunken college-aged guy in a one-piece hot pink bathing suit twirled in the middle of Bourbon Street, his white sneakers pounding off the pavement. The suit was cut high along the hips and the front was nothing more than two panels of cloth held together by a jeweled clasp. It was not the kind of bathing suit made to wear when someone actually planned on swimming.
Or made to wear on a chilly March evening.
The man spun, winging another strand of beads into the night as the crowd cheered him on. The back of the suit showed more of the man’s ass than it covered, but I had to say, it was a nice ass.
Mardi Gras had ended over a month ago, so I really had no idea what this dude was doing with the beads and the bathing suit. But it was Friday night in the French Quarter, so I knew I was going to see far weirder crap before the night was over.
Leaning against the brick wall of The Swamp, I sipped my ginger ale as someone shrieked happily from the courtyard behind me. Raucous laughter followed, and I figured someone had gotten thrown from the mechanical bull.
One of these days I imagined that bull was going to snap and pitch a person head first through a window.
Grinning at that because I was a terrible person, I took another sip of the carbonated goodness as I scanned the packed streets, looking for people that weren’t quite… people. I reached into the pocket of my lightly lined cotton peacoat, feeling a sharp trill curl down my spine as my fingers brushed over the warm, slim piece of metal.
There was an eight-inch iron stake in my pocket and I was so not afraid to use it.
I couldn’t help but wonder what I would be thinking if I had been out here two years ago. I wanted to be doing this, but I didn’t have the lady balls. Not only would the Order members have laughed like deranged hyenas, I would’ve laughed… and had a minor panic attack simultaneously, because I’m a good multitasker like that.
Now I was more than capable of patrolling for the Order, but they didn’t know that and if they did, it wouldn’t matter. Just look at how they’d treated me today. Even if they saw me in action, it wouldn’t change their views.
In their eyes, I wasn’t the same as them and I’d never be ready to take to the streets. Not at my age. It was so ridiculous, considering the Order had been nearly decimated.
I drew in a shaky breath and it got hung up on the knot that had formed in my throat as my gaze swiveled back to the mayhem in the middle of the street.