Skin Deep

Terryn wrapped his arms around Cress and kissed her forehead, a rare show of public affection. “Go upstairs then. I’ll take care of the body.”

Cress held him. Laura felt a surge of essence and watched without comment as Terryn allowed Cress to siphon some of his body essence. She wondered what Terryn would have done if he had fallen in love with Cress and wasn’t an Inverni. With the powerful reserves of essence i

Body. Terryn said he would take care of a body. Laura spun toward the SUV. Through the open door, she saw a dark shape in the back. She sensed the essence of an Inverni fairy. It should have been stronger that close to her.

“Dammit,” she muttered.

She popped the hatch of the SUV. A shirtless Inverni fairy lay on his back, pale skin bearing ancient blue tribal tattoos across the chest and shoulders, faded with time. In life, Inverni wings flicker with light and color, notably whites and deep blues. In death, they were dim and gray, their diaphanous nature hardening to a fragile membrane that crumbled at the slightest touch. The translucent wings twisted around his arms and legs, a nauseating tangle that would never happen in life. A deep burn mark marred the left half of the fairy’s face. It wasn’t Alfrey.

On top of messing up, she’d put Terryn in a position of having to kill someone. He went for a head shot. Laura spoke a prayer of departing to herself. She didn’t want the Inverni to leave an echo of anger behind for her as he made his afterlife journey to TirNaNog.

“I’m sorry you had to do that, Terryn.”

He shrugged. “The Wheel of the World turns as it will, Laura. It chose me to be at the end of his path.”

Laura didn’t respond as he lifted out the body. She believed in the Wheel of the World, the grand turning of events large and small that determined the course of one’s life. She accepted that things happened for a reason and for no reason at the same time. That didn’t mean she wasn’t responsible for her role in events. It didn’t mean she had to like it. It didn’t mean she knew what her future held. What it meant, to her, was that actions begot reactions and mistakes had ramifications. A dead body was never a good thing to leave in one’s path.

CHAPTER 29

LAURA LET TERRYN unlock the door to the Mariel Tate apartment. She rarely used the place. Mariel had to appear to live somewhere, and the nondescript building where the Guildhouse kept corporate residence suites fit the bill. She turned on the lights as she entered behind him, illuminating the large open studio. If her apartment in Alexandria lacked personality, the Mariel apartment had the bland style of a hotel room.

She dropped her bags on the floor. “Really, Terryn, you had someone do a sweep of all my places yesterday.”

He circled the room with a small obelisk of granite that glowed a steady blue. It was keyed to change color if it encountered other essences. “I’ll remind you that someone managed to get a bomb through security at the FBI building.”

He had a point. She went to the kitchenette in the corner and pulled two bottles of fruit juice out of the refrigerator. She opened one and left the other on the counter. “Whose orders do you think Gia

He hovered off the floor to check along the top of the wall of curtained windows. “Alfrey’s.”

She pursed her lips. “That was a quick answer.”

Terryn settled to the floor and placed the obelisk on the coffee table. “It’s clear.” He pointed at the juice on the counter. “Is that for me?”

She tossed him the bottle. “Are you changing the subject?”

He drank the entire bottle in one smooth motion. “Blume’s not a fool. He wouldn’t poison you on his own property. I think Gia

She showed him a slight smile. “Terryn, my friend, you forget whom you’re talking to. I’m sensing a subtle evasion in your voice modulations.”

He nodded, staring down at the floor. “Simon Alfrey and his father Skene manipulate the lesser Inverni clans to no good end. Simon’s involvement makes me uncomfortable.”

“Yeah, well, uncomfortable doesn’t quite cover how I feel about someone who’s tried to kill me,” Laura sent.

Terryn sighed and looked up. “It would not be an exaggeration to say I blame the Alfreys for the death of my father.”

Laura’s eyebrows shot up. “You know I want to hear why.”

He shrugged. “The Alfreys stirred the Invernis to challenge the Dana

Laura crossed her arms as she leaned against the counter. She knew Terryn was heir to the rule of the Inverni clan but that he refused to take the underKing title to which he was entitled. For years, she had thought it was because he wanted to keep peace with Maeve. Without an invested Inverni leader, the Dana

Terryn nodded. “I ca

She pushed away from the counter and placed a hand on his shoulder. “Simon Alfrey screwed up, Terryn. I can identify him at the scene. Let me do that, and you’ll have one less Alfrey to deal with.”

He placed his hand on hers. “You were glamoured, Laura. The only confirmation you have of that is the macCullen heir and a leanansidhe. That presents a credibility problem.”

She dropped her hand. “And Sinclair.”

Terryn walked to the door. “A second-generation fire giant masquerading as a human also has little weight in a fairy court, even if he were willing. No, we will have to catch Alfrey with stronger evidence.”

“We’ll think of something,” she said.

He bowed as he left. “I appreciate that. Now get the rest that Cress ordered. We have much to do in the days ahead.”

Tired didn’t cover how she felt. Whenever she heard that someone had been admitted to a hospital for exhaustion, the concept baffled her. She tried to imagine feeling more exhausted than she did at that moment and couldn’t. Laura put water on to boil as she pulled down the Murphy bed. She steeped some tea and curled into the corner of the couch.

Staring at her hand, she thought about the raid. She tried to force lines on her palm into a pattern that might trigger a memory. From one angle, the three lines radiating across the palm could be the Celtic ogham rune gort or the German ansuz. A single rune could mean anything, though, never mind the question of why Sanchez-who wasn’t fey-would use a rune to convey a message. Maybe an “F,” she thought. Foyle?

She let her hand fall to her lap. Aaron Foyle was right about one thing: Last words were important. She remembered the look in Sanchez’s face. He’d known he was dying. He didn’t pray or speak a lover’s name. He used his last breath to tell her something-something important enough to use his final moments of life. And she couldn’t remember.

She left the tea on the counter and turned the shower on in the bathroom. She watched herself undress in the full-length mirror. Humans would kill for the body she had at her age, but not the rest. Her hair hung lank. Darkness shadowed the skin under her eyes. Her lips, wiped clean of lipstick, looked thin and colorless. Her eyes unsettled her. She saw the small signs-the faint traces of crystallization forming, the slight recession into the skull, the unca