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Claire glanced at him. “Why?”
“You got company.”
I took the damned plates to the window, and spotted a parade coming at us from across the road. “What company?” Claire asked. She was blind as a bat without her glasses, which as usual she’d misplaced.
“It’s just the guys from next door.”
There was a similar Victorian monstrosity wilting across the road, only it was even larger than ours, a relic from when people around here could afford servants’ quarters. That made it a hard sell these days, with too much to air-condition and too much to heat—not that the house appeared to have either. But the artists who had taken it over didn’t seem to care, and the many little rooms were perfect for communal living.
“Just the guys?” Claire asked sharply.
“No, some of the girls are with them.” A couple blondes, a redhead and two brunettes were bearing casseroles and covered plates that looked like they might contain cookies—or, if I was lucky, some medicinal brownies.
But Claire didn’t seem so enthused. “Crap!” she said, searching around in her clothes for the missing glasses.
“What’s the problem? Throw another bag of rice in the pot, maybe a few more peas—”
“It’s not the food I’m worried about, Dory!”
“What then?”
“They’re…women of questionable morals.”
I laughed out loud at that one. “What?”
“You heard me.”
“Claire. You do realize what century it is, don’t you?”
“And you do realize what we have in the backyard, don’t you?” she snapped back.
“What? You mean your bodyguards?” The fey had pitched tents back there rather than stay in the house, because there wasn’t enough room inside for everyone and it was some kind of no-no in their culture to not treat people of the same rank equally. Luckily, they seemed to enjoy outdoor living. No reason not to. Retrieving my underwear had been the most work they’d done in two weeks.
“No,” she said, finally locating the glasses in a pocket of her apron. “I mean a bunch of young male fey who are currently without supervision.”
“Where’s Heidar?” I asked, talking about Claire’s fiancé, who was supposed to be in charge of the motley crew.
“He went back this morning. Something his father wanted—I don’t know. But that leaves us—damn it!” She’d gone to the kitchen door in time to see the group being greeted warmly by what looked like the Norwegian male swim team. A dozen tall, well-built guys with long blond hair were hanging over the back fence, grinning like Christmas had come early.
The artists were grinning back. “We keep hearing this crazy music,” Jacob said, holding up a guitar. He was the tall one with the Jewfro and the Grizzly Adams beard. “Do you guys play?”
“Yes. We will play with you,” one of the fey told him, his eyes on the pretty Hispanic girl at Jacob’s side.
“Oh, I love your accent,” one of the other girls told the nearest noble of the Royal House Blarestri of the High Court of the Fey. “Are you Swedish?”
“Yes,” he assured her solemnly. “I am of the Swedish.”
“Oh, cool.”
Claire rolled her eyes.
“They’re not children,” I reminded her, grinning.
“That’s what I’m worried about.”
“Don’t you think you’re overreacting just a—”
“Why do you think there are all those legends about the fey kidnapping human women?” she demanded, whirling on me. “What do you think they did with them?”
