“You can’t sit here with me or every fairy that sees us together will know I can see you. I get to choose who to reveal myself to,” she gritted. “When I see the ones I want, I’ll wave you over.”
“As you wish, Gabrielle.”
11
It was late in the day before Gabby spotted a pair of Fae she was willing to approach. The ball-game-goers had long since swept back through downtown, retrieving their cars (the Reds won; she’d heard the fireworks), and the sun had ducked low behind the skyscrapers that hemmed Fountain Square, gilding the silvery-windowed walls fiery rose and slanting tall early-evening shadows across the square.
During the interminable wait she’d realized the Fae were, indeed, watching him. Many appeared throughout the course of the day. But since he was just sitting there doing nothing, most of them went away after only a short time. She supposed he wasn’t being very entertaining.
Finally, she spotted her two. She chose them because they weren’t as blindingly beautiful as the rest, and she hoped, rather like people, the less attractive ones weren’t quite so . . . well, were more approachable.
A male and a female, both blond and shimmery-eyed, were standing near the bench Adam was sitting on, deep in conversation. Rather than waving him over, she decided to join him and get it over with.
“What? Haven’t you seen any?” Adam asked, as she approached.
Did that husky, Celtic-accented voice sound almost . . . cheery? She shook her head at the idiotic notion, deciding the sun must have baked her brains during the long, tedious afternoon.
“They’re right there,” she told him, pointing.
“Where?” He looked where she was pointing and muttered a string of curses. “Christ, I can’t believe I can’t even see them. Are they looking at me?”
“Not at the moment. And they’re there,” she said, trying to correct his gaze, “standing about ten feet to your left, less than a foot from the trash can.” She drew a deep breath, bracing herself to approach them, when suddenly the male fairy turned and looked at her.
“Hello,” she said politely. “I’d like to speak with you a moment. I need to—”
“I do believe it sees us, Aine,” the male fairy spoke over her, with a haughty lift of a brow.
It? Gabby thought, nostrils flaring. It was calling her an it? The nerve. The unmitigated gall. She was human. She had a soul. It wasn’t and didn’t. If anyone was an it, it was it not her.
“Oh, get over yourselves already. I’m just here to pass on a message. Adam Black wants me to tell you . . .” Gabby blinked and trailed off. They’d turned their backs to her and were paying her no attention whatsoever, carrying on a hushed conversation that she couldn’t overhear.
Then the male fairy nodded, and suddenly both fairies vanished. There one moment, then gone.
Exhaling gustily, Gabby clenched her hands into little fists and turned to Adam. “Are all of you so damned arrogant?”
“What do you mean? What are they saying?”
“They’re not saying anything. They’re gone. They called me an ‘it,’ said something to each other, and vanished.”
His eyes narrowed. “If this is some kind of trick . . .”
“It’s not,” she said impatiently. “I swear, they were here. I was trying to talk to them, and they just vanished.”
“What did they look like?” he demanded.
She described them, adding that the male had called the female “Aine.”
Rolling his eyes, he groaned. “I know her.”
“And?”
“She’s a princess from Aoibheal’s line, the First House of the D’Anu, and the only thing royal about her is how much of a pain in the ass she is. But she’ll help me. She’ll be back.”
“Are you sure?”
He nodded. “Yes, Aine has always had a bit of a thing for me. Perhaps more than a bit. Actually,” he said with a long-suffering sigh, “she’s obsessed with me.”
Figured, Gabby thought irritably. Even other fairies weren’t immune to his seduction. What did that say about a human woman’s chances? There should be a vaccine against Adam Black. And all women should be given it at birth.
“Sit,” he said, gesturing to the bench beside him. “It won’t be long. She’ll be back. Aine will refuse me nothing.”
Gabby began to sit, then stopped. Another fairy had suddenly appeared over by the fountain, alone. A solitary one. Just what she’d been hoping for all afternoon. Just what Adam had said she’d never find. “Well, you were wrong,” she grumbled, feeling inexplicably irked about Aine-who-would-refuse-him-nothing, “because there’s a fairy over there, all by himself.”