Merry Gentry 03 - Seduced by Moonlight (30 page)

"It looks like a problem," the major said.

I wondered what I'd done to deserve someone with the rank of major being in charge of my police security. Was the queen keeping as many secrets from us as we were from her? Looking up into the major's serious face, I thought,
Maybe.

Madeline smiled and tried to win him over, even putting a hand on his forearm. His eyes didn't thaw; in fact, he stared at her hand until she took it away. "Do you know the old saying about the duck?" he asked in a voice that was still utterly serious.

She looked puzzled for a second, regained her smile, and shook her head. "Sorry, can't say that I do."

"If it looks like a duck, quacks like a duck, and walks like a duck, it's a duck," he said.

Madeline looked puzzled again, which didn't mean she was. She capitalized on being small and cute, and only at odd moments did you realize just how shrewd and business-like she really was.

I'd never had much patience with women who hid their intelligence. I thought it set a bad precedent for the rest of us. "He means if it looks like a problem, sounds like a problem, and acts like a problem, then it's a problem," I said.

The major, whose nameplate said WALTERS, turned his cold grey eyes on me. It wasn't just the normal unreadable cop eyes, either; he was mad about something. But what? His eyes thawed a little, as if he liked that I'd stopped playing games, or as if he wasn't mad at me. "Princess Meredith, I'm Major Walters, and I'm in charge of this detail until we cross over onto sidhe territory."

"Now, Major," Madeline said, "you and Captain Barinthus are both in charge, that's what the queen agreed to."

"You can't have two leaders," the major said, "not and get anything done." He glanced at Abloec, then at Barinthus, and the look said he didn't like the way Barinthus was running his men. What Major Walters couldn't know, and none of us would ever admit outside the sidhe, was that if things weren't running smoothly, it was almost always Queen Andais's fault, or her son's. But since Prince Cel was still locked safely away, it had to be something that the queen had done.

For the life of me I couldn't think why she'd have allowed Abloec to be seen in front of as much media presence as was likely to be in the press conference. He was addicted to everything, drink, cigarettes, drugs. You name it, Abe liked it. Once he'd been the greatest libertine of the Seelie Court, a lover and seducer par excellence. He was cast out of the Seelie Court for seducing the wrong woman, and Andais would only allow him into the Unseelie Court on one condition. He had to join her guard, which meant that Abe went from being one of the busiest lovers of the sidhe to being celibate. He'd taken to drink, and when stronger drugs were invented he took those. Unfortunately for him it was almost impossible for a sidhe to become completely impaired by alcohol or drugs. You could get drunk, but never to the point where you passed out. Never to the point where true oblivion could ease your pain. The best Abe could do was take the edge off and become addicted to damn near everything. My father had kept him far from me, and my aunt despised him, thought him weak. So he'd been hidden away on small duties for centuries, an embarrassment to us all. So why was he here, now, in such a public forum? It made no sense. Not that everything Andais did made sense, but in public she always came off as the perfect queen. A drunken guard was not good press. A drunken guard entrusted with the life of a princess and heir to a throne was worse than simply bad press, it was careless. Andais was many things, but careless was not one of them.

"I earned the right to be here, Darkness, trust me on that," Abe said. His smile was gone, and there was something very sober in his charcoal-grey eyes.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Walters asked.

Neither the guards nor I had to ask. If he'd earned it, then he'd done something that he'd hated but had pleased the queen. It usually involved sex, or sadism, or both. The guards kept their secrets about what humiliations the queen demanded of them. There's an old saying that you'd crawl over broken glass for someone, or something. Apparently that wasn't just a saying with the queen. What would a person do to end hundreds of years of celibacy? What wouldn't he do?

It must have shown on at least some of our faces, because Walters looked even grumpier and said, "What aren't you telling me?"

Barinthus and Doyle gave him their empty faces, honed to unreadability by centuries of court politics. I turned in against Frost's body so that my face was hidden from the major. I just didn't give good blank face anymore.

Frost slid one arm across my shoulders, but opened his coat so that I was snuggled inside it. Most people would have thought that he was trying to get me closer to his body, but I knew better: He was opening his coat so he could go for his gun, or knives if he needed to. Hugging was fine, but for the guards, duty had to come first.

Since it was my life they were protecting, I never got my feelings hurt about it.

"To my knowledge, Major," Barinthus said, "we are not concealing anything from you that will impact your ability to perform your job."

Walters almost smiled. "You're not going to deny that you're withholding information from me, from the police?"

"Why should I deny it? You would have to be a fool to believe that we have shared all we know with you, and I don't think you a fool, Major Walters."

He looked at Barinthus, and it wasn't an entirely unfriendly look. "Well, that's good to know. You don't want Abe here, do you?"

"Obviously not," Barinthus said.

"Then why is he here?"

Madeline tried to intervene. "Major, we really must get them all ready for the press conference."

He ignored her. "Why is he here?"

Barinthus blinked at him, and his second eyelid flicked down and up. The clear membrane allowed him to see underwater. When it showed on dry land, it meant he was nervous.

"You heard me say that Abloec was not my choice, but the queen's."

"Why would she send a drunk?"

"I resent that," Abloec said, leaning in toward the major.

Walters wrinkled his nose. "Your breath smells lethal."

"Just good scotch," Abloec said.

Barinthus grabbed him by both shoulders. "We need some privacy, Major Walters, to discuss things."

Walters gave Barinthus a sharp nod and called his men out. He tried to leave two, but Barinthus asked him not to. "You are welcome to put officers at both doors, as long as they are outside and do not try to eavesdrop."

"Unless you yell, they won't hear you."

Barinthus smiled. "We will try not to yell."

Walters herded his men out, and Doyle called, "Please, hold the door for Ms. Phelps."

The publicist looked at him, her eyes wide, mouth in a little O of surprise. It was an act, because she recovered too quickly. "Now, Doyle." She put her well-manicured hand on his arm in its black leather jacket. "I have to get you all presentable for the press conference."

He looked at her much the way Walters had, except meaner. She let go of his arm and took a step back. For a moment the real Madeline stared out; ruthless, determined. She played her trump card with a face that was harsh with her anger. "The queen's orders are for me to make sure you are all lovely for the press conference. When she asks why I didn't do that, do you want me to tell her that you contradicted her orders?" She, more than most of the humans who dealt with the court, knew what the queen was capable of, and she used that knowledge well.

I turned in Frost's arms so that my face was framed by the fur of his coat. "None of us is contradicting my aunt's orders," I said.

The look she gave me was just this side of insolence. Madeline had enjoyed the queen's favor for seven years now. Seven years of basking in the absolute power the queen had over beings who could have snapped Madeline in half with their bare hands. She felt safe behind the shield of Andais's power. Up to a point, she was right. Beyond that point—well, I was about to remind her of what that point was.

"We have a major press conference, Meredith." She didn't even bother to use my title now that no other humans were around to listen. Her glance flicked from Galen's much loved, old brown leather jacket to Doyle's short black one, and finally to Kitto's Day-Glo parka. Her lip curled just a bit. "Some of the coats, some of the hair, and you are seriously not wearing enough makeup for this kind of photo opportunity. I have makeup and wardrobe outside." She turned toward the door as if she'd fetch them.

I said, "No."

She turned back, and the arrogance on her face would make any sidhe proud. "I can call the queen on my cell, but I promise you, Meredith, that I am following her orders." She actually slipped a small phone out of the inner pocket of her blazer. A phone so tiny it hadn't disturbed the line of her jacket.

"You are not following her orders, not to the letter," I said. I knew I looked small, near child-like, peeking from amid the ticklish fur of Frost's coat. And for the first time it didn't matter, not to people like Madeline. I could hide my power until we needed it. I didn't have to be forceful to win this one.

She hesitated with the phone open in her hand. "Of course I am."

"Did my aunt tell you to dress us, and primp us, as soon as we came in out of the cold? Were those her express orders?"

She narrowed her carefully lined and shaded eyes. "Not in so many words, no." She sounded uncertain, then gained her businessy tone as she continued, "But we have the press conference, and then you'll have to change again before the big party. We have a timetable here, and the queen doesn't like to be kept waiting." She hit a button on her phone, put it to her ear.

I stepped out from the warmth of Frost's body and whispered in her other ear, "I am heir to the throne, Madeline, and you've always been nasty to me. I'd start trying to make nice if I were you and I liked my job."

I was leaning so close that I heard my aunt's secretary answer the phone, but not what he said. Madeline said, "Sorry, hit the wrong button. Yes, they're here. We've got some challenges, but nothing we can't handle. Okay, okay, great." She hung up and stepped back from me the way I'd seen people step back from Andais and Cel over the years, as if she was afraid.

"I'll wait out in the hall." She licked her lips, glanced at me, but couldn't completely meet my eyes. She wasn't as good at court politics as some. There were those who had tried to kill me before, who would smile and nod to my face, acting as if we'd always been best friends. Madeline wasn't up to that level of duplicity. It made me think better of her.

She hesitated at the door. "But please, hurry. We really do have a rather tight schedule, and the queen did say, exactly, that she had outfits for everyone for the party tonight. She'll want everyone changed before the festivities begin." She didn't look at me as she left, as if she didn't want me to see what was in her eyes.

When the door clicked firmly behind her, Galen asked, "What did you say to her?"

I shrugged and cuddled back against Frost. "I reminded her that as heir to the throne, I might have some say in who gets hired or fired."

Galen shook his head. "She went pale. That wasn't just from the threat of being unemployed."

I looked at him. "Exiled from faerie, Galen, not just unemployed."

He frowned. "She's not elf-struck."

"She's not addicted to us, no, but her reaction tells me that she doesn't want to lose her special place among us. She doesn't want to lose the chance of touching sidhe flesh even if it's only in passing."

"Why does knowing that matter?" he asked.

"It means that we have leverage with Madeline that we didn't before, simple as that."

"That's not simple," he said.

I looked into his so-honest face, and the near pain it caused him to watch me outthink him, outmaneuver him. I might never need the knowledge that Madeline valued her job enough to be nice to me; but then again, I might. Every bit of knowledge, every bit of weakness and strength, pettiness, cruelty, or kindness, of everyone, could be the very piece of information you needed to survive. I had learned not to undervalue anyone's allegiance, even if it was allegiance simply from the need to cover all bets. It wasn't that Madeline would be cruel to Cel when he was freed, but she'd be nice to both of us now, and that was a start.

"Well handled," Barinthus said, with a smile, "but the publicist is right about one thing. Time grows short." He motioned another guard forward.

He was tall, slender, and looked tanned to a lovely brown, but it wasn't a tan. Carrow always looked like a summer-browned hunter with his brown hair streaked with summer gold like any human who'd been outdoors day after day. His hair was cut short and simply. He looked very human until you reached his eyes. They were both brown and green, but not hazel, no. They were green like a forest stirred by the wind, so that one breeze turned the world to sparkling green and another deep and dark.

With most of the sidhe I'd had to ask what kind of deity they'd been, but like Barinthus, Carrow screamed what he had been. I looked up into the face of one of the great hunters.

Carrow's smile brought one of my own. He had been the guard whom my father entrusted to teach me the ways of bird and beast. When I'd entered college for my biology degree, Carrow had actually visited me and sat in on some of my classes. He'd wanted to know if they'd learned anything new since last he checked. In most classes, no, but he'd been fascinated by microbiology, parasitology, and Introduction to Genetics. He was also the only sidhe to ask me what I'd do with my degree if I hadn't been Princess Meredith.

No one else had cared, or rather they couldn't conceive of anything but court politics. When you can be a princess, why would you want to do anything else?

Carrow started to drop to one knee, but I caught his arm and drew him into a hug.

He gave his easy laugh and hugged me tight.

"I was surprised to hear you were a detective in a big city." He drew back enough to see my face. "I thought you'd run away to the wilderness and play with the animals, or at the very least a zoo."