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“Yeah. In fact, I’ll take a few more in this size.” While he took the lingerie in back to wrap for the wedding, Camille showed me the garnet and black bustier she’d found for herself. She added it to my pile, along with four pair of black cotton panties. By the time Tim returned, I’d found four more bras and a jungle green chemise. I didn’t normally like sleeping in anything but sleep shirts, but it was too pretty to pass up.
“Are you and Jason coming to the wedding?”
Tim laughed as Camille pulled out her wallet to pay for everything. “We wouldn’t miss it for the world. We’ll be there with bells on. Or something equally appropriate.”
“During the reception, let’s try to carve out a few minutes to talk about when to hold the Supe Community meeting. I guess we’d better do so as soon as possible.”
“I was thinking about the evening of the seventeenth? And Vampires Anonymous has volunteered their meeting hall, with protection included. We can use the phone tree to let people know. What do you say about eight p.m.? I can start the wheels going this afternoon.”
Camille gave me a long look. I inclined my head. “The vampires to the rescue. Sounds good. Go ahead. Meanwhile, we have a couple more stops to make, so we’d better get going.”
As we left the shop, Tim was already deep into calling the leaders of our phone tree. There would be a lot of buzzing lines this afternoon.
Second stop: a little out-of-the-way boutique that sold the most gorgeous crystal I’d ever seen. We’d ordered a set of cut cobalt crystal dinnerware, for when Bruce and Iris had their own house. Once we were sure it was all intact, we waited while the shopkeeper wrapped the boxes in gorgeous linen paper with an elegant ribbon. After we carried them out to our car, we were off to pick up Iris’s wedding cake.
As we pulled into a corner parking spot three shops down from the Ambrosia Bakery, I had a sixth sense—an uneasy feeling. I paused, getting out of the car, to look around.
A glance up and down the street showed nothing out of the ordinary. Groups of passersby shopping, huddling against the chill of the rain and damp as they hurried by. A cluster of guys in tight jeans and thick jackets loitered on the corner against one of the poles that stretched over the road, holding the streetlights. But the looks they gave us were the same we got anywhere. We had quit masking our glamour most of the time, now that people were used to us, and Camille’s outfits and my height always drew notice.
Camille looked at me, questioningly. I shook my head. “Must just be my nerves.” I motioned to her and we hustled past the Thai restaurant on the corner, then past a small consignment shop to the bakery next door.
As we pushed through the door, a bell rang and the clerk waved. We’d come in with Iris when she put in the order, after she and Bruce had discussed what they wanted.
They had opted for a three-tiered wonder in white, with elegant roses of blue and silver cascading down the sides. The bottom and top layers were chocolate, with the middle layer vanilla. The frosting was a smooth fondant over vanilla butter cream, and the filling between layers was a chocolate framboise ganache. The smell that filled the bakery set my stomach to rumbling.
“We’re parked three spots down; I’m not sure I trust myself with carrying that to the car,” I said.
“No problem,” Mariah said. “Let me get Jorge to help you—we’ve got a cart and can make certain you get it to your car intact.”
Jorge came out. He was about twenty, muscled and buff, and looked altogether adorable in his Ambrosia Bakery apron. He grinned at us as Mariah loaded the cake onto the wheeled cart.
“Hold on,” I said. “Give us six of those cupcakes, please.” I glanced at Camille. “Chocolate?”
“Yeah, with the thick frosting.” Her gaze was glued to the window of the case. “They should last us till we get home.”
As Mariah boxed up the cupcakes—each with a thick topping of icing and multicolored sprinkles—Camille handed her the credit card. Once she signed the receipt, Jorge followed us out the door, back to the car, cautiously pushing the cart with the boxed cake inside.
As we neared my Jeep, I slowed. The guys on the street corner were staring at us, as if they were waiting. They made no move, though, so I tried to shake off the feeling that something was about to go down. But as we neared the side of the car, I stopped, a sick sense of shame sweeping over me. Camille let out a little gasp.
Across the passenger’s door, bright red graffiti spelled out Go Home, Faerie Sluts! A wash of embarrassment swept over me—the same shame I’d felt when I was a child and we’d been tormented because of our half-human heritage—but then I slammed it down. I wasn’t that little girl anymore. And I wasn’t taking this lying down.
The smell of the paint was fresh. I glanced at the men on the corner again. One of them gave me a snide grin, and I knew—I knew sure as I knew my own name—that he and his posse were responsible.
Camille followed my gaze. “What should we do? Kick a little ass?” She stood ready to take my lead.
“No, but I am calling Chase. I’m not going to wait here, though. I don’t want a confrontation. Not today. Just avoid brushing against the paint. Jorge, can you please transfer the cake into the back of my Jeep?”
“Those motherfuckers do this to your car?” Jorge sputtered, his expression angry as he loaded the cake and cupcakes into the back of the car.
“Leave it alone, Jorge. I don’t want you hurt.” I didn’t want him involved—didn’t want the Ambrosia Bakery to be a target—so keeping an eye on the men, I pulled out my cell phone and dialed Chase’s number.
“It’s not right, miss. Not right at all.”
“No, it isn’t, but right now, the most important thing to me is getting Iris’s cake home safe and sound. So please, Jorge, go back in the bakery. The cops may come to talk to you, but I don’t want you out here. Please?”
“I don’t want to leave you two out here alone.” He scuffed the ground. “You girls going to be okay?”
“We’ll be fine. I’m calling the cops. Now go.” As he headed back toward the store, cart in hand, Chase answered the phone.
