“Shit. I need a drink.”

Luc cocked one eyebrow and tried not to look too smug, but he was glad to see someone else react to his mission the same way he had. “I brought a flask of Faerie wine, if you’d like a belt of that.”

His companion scowled at him and opened a cabinet door to retrieve a graceful glass decanter of amber fluid. “Thank you, my friend, but as much as I would like to pass out and forget what you told me, I don’t think it would help your cause. The Council and I had hoped that we could resolve this issue before we reached this point. We had not yet confirmed that Seoc had begun to mingle with the humans.” He poured two glasses of brandy, the red-gold color less exotic than the crimson of Faerie wine, but also less likely to knock a grown Other on his ass.

Luc’s host, and his first stop on his trip through Ithir, happened to be one of the few inhabitants of the mortal world who would neither attack, nor be particularly surprised when a Faerie portal opened up in the middle of his office. As the head of the Council of Others, Rafael De Santos had grown used to unusual occurrences.

“I think that’s what we all would have preferred,” Luc said, accepting the snifter Rafe handed him. “As it is, I’m beginning to think getting seriously drunk might be the only thing that can help. At least if we’re shit-faced, we won’t realize how much this sucks.”

The Feline shifter looked at him over the rim of his glass. “Even dead, this would suck, my friend.”

“True. Speaking of dead and sucking, though, how’s Dmitri doing? I heard he got married. And I think someone said his bride was mortal.”

Rafe grinned and nodded. “He did indeed marry, earlier this spring. And wasremains the operative word. He wed a charming young woman, who can now discard any worries over encroaching crow’s-feet and age spots. They had a lovely ceremony. Great caterer. Even better scenery.”

“Scenery?”

The grin widened. “The bride has some remarkably attractive friends. One of whom is currently expecting the Silverback Alpha’s first cub.”

Luc felt his eyes widen. “Graham bit it, too? With another mortal?” He shook his head and downed a gulp of his brandy. “What is this human world coming to?”

“Mating season, apparently.”

“Does that mean you’re feeling the call of the wild yourself?”

Rafe shrugged. “We cats are more solitary than the Lupines, and the jaguar is more solitary than most cats. The wild only calls us for short stays, not permanent ones.”

Luc stifled a chuckle. “Yeah, so I’ve noticed. But I admit that’s a relief for me. I know you want Seoc returned to Faerie with all possible haste. Which means I can use all the help I can get finding the bastard. The last thing I need is for you to go off after some cute little furry thing and leave me to do this on my own. Or worse yet, some cute little mortal thing.”

“Be careful, my friend. Your arrogance and Faecentrism are showing.”

Luc shifted in his seat. It wasn’t that he disliked humans, precisely, but he couldn’t understand how an Other like Dmitri or Graham could possibly have a lasting relationship with such a…such a mundane creature as a human. What could they possibly have in common?

“But you needn’t worry,” Rafe continued, twirling his snifter. “The Council will, of course, completely support your mission. We want nothing to happen to the Queen’s nephew, especially not while he is on our turf, as they say. Now that Mab has sent you after him, I’m certain he will be easily found.”

“You obviously don’t know the Queen’s nephew.”

“I have not had that pleasure, no. But if he is moving among the humans now, as you say, I have a feeling an introduction will be inevitable.” His eyes firmed, even as his mouth remained in its customary subtle curve. “Rest assured that if you have trouble with your mission, I will step in on behalf of the Council and see to his removal myself. The situation appears to be reaching a flash point. Since we had not yet heard of Seoc moving among the humans, we can still hope his presence has gone unremarked. If they begin to take note of him, our secret will be in jeopardy. No matter how many among the Council talk of the necessity of Unveiling ourselves to the humans, Luc, I shouldn’t have to tell you that the Council would look very unfavorably on having such a monumental decision forced upon it prematurely.”

Luc could hardly miss the underlying message there. “If you were all so anxious to have him back in our hands, why didn’t you do something about it?”

Rafe’s shoulders lifted in a lazy, boneless shrug. “We discussed the problem at length, but we believed we still had time to deliberate. Plus, we agreed that things would go much more smoothly if we didn’t try to handle this ourselves. The last thing we want is to have an interdimensional incident on our hands.”

Luc frowned.

“Like the kind we’d get if reports reached Mab that her nephew was being returned in a bucket,” Rafe explained with a pointed look. “Some of our people have difficulty remembering their manners during a good game of chase, Luc. Even a Fae prince can look like prey if he’s running fast enough.”

“Great.” Luc drained his brandy and set the glass aside. “So because you can’t manage to keep your fangs to yourselves, I’m on my own until I fail miserably?”

“Of course not. As I said, we will assist gladly in whatever way we can. The Council simply feels we should not be handling such a potentially delicate matter on our own. Dmitri, damn his pale, chilly hide, has also volunteered his assistance. Which is the least he could do, considering he left his position as head of the Council to me when he married.” Rafe rose, crossed to a heavy, mahogany desk, and rifled through a drawer. “Of course, his idea of ‘assistance’ and mine do not exactly match. Now that he has the distraction of a new bride, he often takes a kind of hands-off approach to assisting.”

“That doesn’t sound very helpful.”

Rafe’s teeth flashed, white and sharp, as he handed over a small, white card. “Feel free to point that out to him. His number is on the back.”

“Thanks. I’m overwhelmed.”

Luc was spared a response to his sarcasm by a throat being carefully cleared in the doorway of the large office. Rafe turned to acknowledge the intrusion.

“Forgive me, Mr. De Santos,” one of the uniformed club staff said quietly. “I was unaware you had company, but I’m afraid there is someone else here asking to see you.”

The Felix frowned. “I had no appointments this evening. In fact, I told no one I would be spending any time here at all. Did this person give you a name?”

“She did not, sir, but she seemed insistent. She did inform me that it was Council business.”

Luc sipped his brandy and watched his host’s face. The other man’s expression remained impassive, but Luc could see impatience turn to curiosity in his cat-like yellow eyes.

“Forgive me,” Rafe said, nodding to Luc. “The head of the Council’s time is rarely his own. Please enjoy your drink while I step out and deal with my unexpected visitor. I’m certain I won’t be long.”

Luc grinned. “And I’m certain how long will depend entirely on how attractive this ‘she’ turns out to be.”

“Actually, it won’t,” a decidedly female voice retorted from over the footman’s shoulder. “Because she isn’t here for a game of touchy-feely. She is doing her good deed for the century, and then she is going to go the hell home before she catches anything in this…ridiculous place.”

Luc stood even as Rafe turned to face the newcomer. The footman spent a split second looking mortified before he spun and made a grab for the intruder. The woman stepped sideways and knocked his hands away with a clenched fist.

“Watch it, grabby,” she growled. “I don’t know where you’ve been lately.”

“At the front door, I expect. You may return to your post, Jameson,” Rafe said smoothly, nodding at the still-mortified and now disgruntled servant. He stepped forward with an outstretched hand and smiled at the latest visitor. “Corinne, what a pleasant surprise. I hardly expected to see you here at Vircolac tonight. What could have brought you to our little club?”

“Nothing short of a loaded handgun or a conscience full of misplaced loyalty,” the woman said. Or, more accurately, grumbled. She shot Rafe a suspicious look, then spared a glare for Luc. “I didn’t know you’d be in some kind of meeting, like a normal person.”

Luc raised a brow and indulged himself with a quick study of the bad-tempered female. That she was human was obvious, almost as obvious as the crushing weight of discomfort that radiated from her. She looked less than pleased by her surroundings, and equally un-enamored of her present company. Behind the scowls, though, Luc saw something that caught him off guard.

He knew Rafe had said that Regina’s friends all seemed to be remarkably attractive for humans, but for Lady’s sake, Luc was Fae. He lived among the most beautiful females in creation, served as elite guardsman to one who probably reigned as themost beautiful, so he certainly shouldn’t be feeling this surge of lust for a human.

Besides which, humans were just so…human. They had nothing special, not compared with an Other or a Fae or any of the other legions of creatures living in the worlds. No powers, no gifts, not even any real talent to speak of. Like many in Faerie, Luc had always thought of them as being a bit primitive and undeveloped. So why the hell did the sight of this woman to go directly to his groin?

She didn’t so much surpass the normal notions of human female beauty as expand them. She had warm, slightly olive skin and thick, dark hair the color of the onyx Mab wove into her crown every Samhain. She was taller than the average human woman, too, though still a good foot shorter than he, and she had the sort of solid, human figure many Fae thought of as coarse and common. Luc found it tempting. Her curves made his hands itch to trace them, and her very substantiality seemed to call to him, made him ache to feel her press against him, heavy and warm and real. He wanted to hold her, to taste the curves and angles of her clear, classical features, to learn the earthy truth of her scent and the richness of her flavor.

What in the Lady’s name was wrong with him?

Luc tore his eyes from temptation and struggled to regain the distant amusement he’d felt when he’d first heard her voice, before her appearance had distracted him. He glanced at his host. “So, Rafe, is this a friend of yours?”

The woman stiffened, but Rafe merely smiled and drew her carefully into the office. “Come,” he told her, in a soothing, faintly cajoling tone Luc guessed was lost on her. “You must allow me to introduce you, and then you will sit comfortably and tell me what troubles you.”

Luc watched her step forward, her reluctance obvious. He half expected to see her look over her shoulder to be sure nothing intended to jump out at her and begin tearing her to pieces. Briefly, he considered being insulted on his host’s behalf. It appeared their guest clung to some unflattering suspicions about the Others. But, he concluded, he was neither Other nor her host, so he decided not to muster up the energy. Especially since he could barely stand to look at her without his palms itching.

“Luc, this is Corinne D’Alessandro. She is a very dear friend of Graham’s and Dmitri’s wives, which, of course, makes her a very dear friend of mine,” Rafe continued, ignoring the look of surprise his guest gave him at hearing his introductory words. “Corinne, please meet Lucifer. Luc, as we call him, is here…on business, but we’ve known each other for a number of years. He’s perfectly harmless.”

Luc tried to decide if that assessment amused or insulted him. No man liked to be thought of as harmless, especially not when he made his living with a sword in his hand. He didn’t think this woman was buying it anyway. Her gaze sized him up suspiciously, and she made no move to shake his hand. Maybe her attitude would do something to cool his ardor.

“Lucifer?” she repeated, still looking quite uncomfortable.

“Luc,” he corrected brusquely, barely softening the syllable with a small nod. “Luc Macanaw. It’s a—” He broke off. “It is interesting to meet you.”

Her brows flew up and a wry sort of amusement joined the unease in her expression. “Yeah, the, uh, interest is all mine,” she said. She turned back to Rafe, giving Luc her shoulder and a vague sense of annoyance at being so easily dismissed.

“Look, I’m sorry to just barge in like this, in the middle of your meeting or whatever, but I thought you might want a heads-up about this, so you could…” She guestured vaguely, then let her hand fall back to her side. “Anyway, I just thought you should know, since it’s got to be one of you guys, right?”

“Think nothing of it,” Rafe dismissed, easing her smoothly toward a large armchair. “What has to be, er, one of us?”

“The elf everyone is talking about.”

Luc, who had just begun contemplating how best to remove both himself and his unfinished brandy from the room for the duration of this conversation, tuned right back in. “Elf?” he repeated, glancing at the Felix.

Rafe seated himself across from the woman and leaned forward. “I’m afraid you’ve caught us off guard, Corinne. I’m not sure I follow. Who, exactly, has been talking? And about what?”

“The elf,” Corinne repeated impatiently. She searched their faces for a moment, then seemed to read in their carefully controlled expressions that she needed to give them more. Luc watched her take a deep breath, then start again. “Look, I definitely don’t want to get involved in any kind of…issue you people have among yourselves, but Reggie and Missy made it pretty clear when they spilled the truth about this whole Others business to me that you guys consider it pretty damned important that no one knows about you. So when my boss handed me this assignment today, I thought it was weird. And I thought someone should let you guys know.”

She paused and made a face. “Unfortunately, I was the only someone I could think of.”

Luc struggled to follow the woman’s garbled explanation and discovered she might as well have been speaking a foreign language for all the sense he could make of it. Hell, she might as well have been waving semaphore flags; and normally, he wouldn’t have cared, but her mention of an “elf” when he was here in Ithirlooking for a missing Fae had definitely piqued his interest. So he could admit later that he may have been a bit brusque when he snapped, “For the stars’ sake, woman, you’re making no sense. At all. Do you need smelling salts or something, or can you maybe pull yourself together and let us know what the hell you’re babbling about?”

Rafe shot him a speaking glance, but the woman seemed to have no need for anyone else to defend her. She swept him an utterly dismissive look, then turned fully away from him to face Rafe alone.

“I know from meeting you guys that the Others don’t want humans to know you really exist,” she continued, speaking directly to the Felix. It didn’t take a genius, though, to realize the frigid tone of her voice was aimed at someone else entirely. “Aside from people like Reggie and Missy. And the rest of our little circle now, I guess. But I know it’s not supposed to be common knowledge. Reggie made us all swear an oath when we first found out. And I know that an occasional article in the tabloids about Dracula attacking a hiker in Romania or a werewolf impregnating a housewife in Arkansas doesn’t concern you. Which it shouldn’t, because people can make fun of those, and when they make fun of them, that means they don’t suspect anything. But this isn’t like that. This is bigger.”

She paused for another deep breath, blew it out slowly. “Today my boss asked me to look into half a dozen reported elf sightings here in Manhattan. None of the witnesses was an obvious crackpot, all of them are willing to swear on a Bible about what they saw, and all of them apparently have pretty big mouths. Now, if it were just my boss looking into it, I wouldn’t have freaked, and I probably wouldn’t be talking to you. Well, I definitely wouldn’t be talking to you, but the word is that we’re not the only ones on the story, and that’s…unusual.”

“Your boss asked you to look into it?” Luc demanded. “Are you with the police?”

Rafe looked up. “Corinne is a reporter.”

Luc felt himself blanch. “A reporter. Wait, does that mean these sightings will be announced on your television sets? That the entire human world will hear of it?”

Corinne deigned to reply frostily over her shoulder. “Not yet. Maybe. I’m a print reporter. I work for a small local newspaper. But like I said, I’m not the only one on the story. There are other papers snooping around, and my boss thinks the TV stations might be getting curious.”

The curses Luc let fly stretched the bounds of legality and creativity, but fortunately he retained enough presence of mind to utter them in his native tongue. This wasn’t good news.

“While I may not understand the sentiment, I’m afraid I likely agree with it,” Rafe said grimly, standing to thrust his hands in the pockets of his tailored trousers. “This is…distressing.”

“I’m guessing from your reactions that you haven’t heard about this before. Which means I was probably right to come here and warn you. Yay for me.” Corinne stood as well and shouldered the battered leather backpack she’d carried with her. “Anyway, I’m sorry if this is trouble for you guys, but at least you know. So, you know, good luck and everything. I hope you…do whatever you need to do with the…whatever it is.”

She turned toward the door but didn’t manage a single step. Instinctively, Luc reached out to stop her. She’d just given him his first lead in discovering Seoc’s whereabouts. Right now he needed her, and he didn’t intend to let her go until she gave him everything she had.

He just didn’t expect that to include a punch straight to his chest.

Not literally, of course. She didn’t raise a hand to him. She just arched one dark, curving eyebrow and let her gaze trail slowly from his face to the hand he had wrapped around her upper arm. She stared at it as if it were covered in leprous black spots.

“Excuse me?” Her voice sliced into him with excruciating politeness.

He made no move to release her. He doubted he’d be able to if he tried. Grabbing her arm had been like grabbing on to a live electrical cable; his entire body had clenched with the strange and powerful current that coursed through him. The hair on his arms and legs stood up and vibrated to an unheard frequency. He wouldn’t have been surprised if the hair on his head did the same. He was frozen, paralyzed by some force greater than himself, something he had never seen coming, and he couldn’t have chosen a less appropriate time for it if he’d charted the stars and consulted a damned oracle beforehand.

Shit, just when he’d thought her attitude had dampened that initial burst of attraction, he’d had to go and touch her. What the hell had he been thinking?

Corinne did not appear similarly moved. If she had been, he doubted she would have yanked her arm out of his grasp with such obvious ease. Not to mention relish.

“I’m going to pretend that didn’t happen, because if I didn’t, I’d feel obliged to deck you for it,” she said tightly, “and frankly, I’d rather just be on my way. So, toodles.”

Rafe stepped forward, holding his hands up near his shoulders, palms out, when she turned her snarl on him. Luc seized the opportunity to try to get control of himself.

“Please, Corinne. Don’t leave yet. We could use your help,” the head of the Council admitted. “I— we—certainly appreciate the favor you’ve done us by alerting us to this issue. Clearly, you were under no obligation to do so.”

She crossed her arms over her chest, but she stopped heading for the door. “Have you actually met Reggie and Missy?” she grumbled.

The Felix offered a wry smile. “You did it out of loyalty to your friends. I understand that, and I still owe you thanks, no matter your motivation. We knew that there was a…visitor to the city at present, but we were not aware before now that he’d been spotted by the human media. The information you’ve given us is not what one would call welcome news, but it isvaluable to us.”

“Valuable? Look, I’m definitely not asking anyone for some kind of reward—”

“I never thought you might be. I only mention it because we would find it equally valuable if you could stay a few more minutes and answer one or two questions for us.”

In other circumstances, Luc might have laughed at the expression of horror that suggestion evoked. Unfortunately, in the present circumstances, he couldn’t afford to be amused. Nor could he afford to be feeling the gut-deep, elemental attraction that had flared between them the moment he touched the bare skin beneath the arm of her short-sleeved top. Too bad no one had asked him about it first.

He cleared his throat and hoped he’d tamped down his reaction to her sufficiently for his words not to spew out like liquid idiocy before he spoke. “Rafe, I think we need to explain to her what’s going on before we ask her for any more help. It’s the least she deserves.”

She looked a bit surprised that he’d suggested such a thing, but she nodded at Rafe anyway. “I think that might be a good idea. Especially since my editor is determined to get this story. I suppose if I know what’s really going on, I can make sure the article I turn in is far enough from the actual truth to be safe.”

“You’re right.” Rafe nodded and waved her back to her seat. “It is senseless not to fill you in when you already know almost as much as we do.” He waited for her to sit, then settled himself back into his lazy pose, but his fingers beat restlessly against the arms of his chair. “The problem you’ve brought to us this evening is the very reason for Luc’s visit to our city.”

Corinne glanced at him. “You’re not from around here?”

Luc shook his head.

“Luc is Fae,” Rafe informed her.

Corinne just stared at him. Then she turned her head and stared at Luc. She looked back and forth between them at least half a dozen times, but her blank expression never changed.

“I’m Fae,” Luc repeated, then sighed. “As in Faerie.”

The blankness dissolved beneath a surprised laugh. “You’re a fairy? Sure, Tinker Bell. Pull the other leg while you’re at it.”

Luc scowled at Rafe. “You see? That’s the problem with mortals. We leave your world for a couple of thousand years and everyone either forgets all about us, or they reduce us to little glowing balls of tutu-clad good cheer.”

Corinne continued to chuckle. Even Rafe had caught the bug. He met Luc’s glare and shrugged. “You have to admit, the mental image of you in such a costume is amusing.”

“Fuck you.”

Corinne watched the interchange and managed to stifle her laughter, but she couldn’t quite wipe the grin off her face. Luc tried not to notice how it made her mouth look wide and mobile and wholly inviting.

“You’re serious?” she said, shaking her head. “You two honestly want me to believe Luc’s a fairy?”

“No, I want you to believe I’m Fae,” he said firmly. “Faerie is where I come from, but it was the most convenient word I could use to make you understand. Faerieis a place. Faemeans a being from Faerie. Calling someone a Faerie is like calling someone a France.”

Corinne nodded, then shook her head, then nodded again. Then she just sat there and looked confused. “So you’re trying to tell me that fairies are real. Does that make the elf a fairy?”

Rafe must have seen the irritation in Luc’s face, because he cleared his throat and jumped into the fray. “ Fairyis considered a bit of a derogatory term by the people of, erm, Faerie,” he explained. “They really prefer being called Fae.”

Her shock faded enough for her to roll her eyes. “Okay, so is this elf a Fae?”

“Seoc is not an elf, but yes”—Luc nodded—“he’s Fae, and he’s the reason why I’m here. I was sent to return him to Faerie.”

“Sent? By whom?”

“By the Queen of Faerie.”