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Liliana cocked her head to one side as she walked briskly, trying to ignore her tender feet. The sergeant did not seem to know Peter Teague was an Other himself, despite their friendship.
As Liliana followed the footpath into a larger patch of woods, she thought about leaving town, disappearing, and creating a new identity. She hadn’t moved in five decades, not since her second mother died at the turn of the millennium. She liked Fayetteville. The weather was pleasant, and business was good. A constant stream of soldiers and soldiers’ families, mostly Others, paid her to check on their loved ones as they fought far away. She even helped some Normal human civilians keep an eye out for whatever life might bring.
My clients.
Her steps faltered.
Moving would mean leaving her clients on their own. They would have no one to watch over them, no one to guide them away from danger and toward happiness.
She loved her job. It let her positively affect so many in Fayetteville, without forcing her into social interaction.
What would she do if she left? Join a circus again?
Her lip curled in an automatic sneer of distaste.
She had grown up in the circus, but she hated the chaos—always moving, always traveling. She liked the comfort of routine and stability. She liked her cozy little house in her cozy little neighborhood with her books and her pretty things.
A lot of circuses had gone virtual in the last few decades, traveling holographically rather than literally. That might not be quite as bad.
Liliana sighed and pulled the thin silk of her homemade blouse around her shoulders against the cold and drizzle. She was barefoot, her tights wet and torn, and she had no coat.
Before she could go someplace warm and dry and decide what to do with the rest of her life, she had to figure out what to do about the red wolf hunting her.
She tightened her fists.
Regardless of what her life would become, she would not die beneath red wolf fangs like so many of her kind.
The Fae colonel who paid the mercenary to hunt her needed to call him off.
Chapter 3
Fae Colonel
With her fourth eyes, Liliana searched for the man who held the red wolf’s leash. A Celtic wolf mercenary, once paid, would not leave the hunt unless his employer rescinded the order. She saw several images of the handsome colonel, but they were all on base. He lived in a house in Fort Liberty. He worked there. He ate there.
Liliana had lived for decades on the doorstep of America’s oldest Army base. The huge base housed the third Army special forces group, Delta Force, some rumored special ops teams that no one was allowed to talk about, and a whole lot of regular soldiers.
Liliana had not received a Social Security number when she snuck into the country in 1943, stowed away in a cage full of lions, two of whom were her brothers. She had no driver’s license and no chip ID embedded in her skin like many Americans born since the turn of the millennium. She did all her business in cash, or the modern equivalent, pay cards. She had a rule against her clients taking her picture. She did not appear on social media sites. Her business all came from word of mouth and a few who saw her sign. She avoided camera drones and CCTV cameras whenever possible. As far as the United States government was concerned, Liliana did not exist. The spider seer preferred for that to remain the case.
That made getting onto the military base very problematic.
Just when she’d begun to despair, and consider other options, she saw the Fae colonel leave base, today, just a few hours in the future, according to his wrist phone. He only drove a few blocks off base, on her street, to Emerald Arms custom weapons shop. He would park in the small lot behind the shop and go in to say something to Siobhan and come back out. After speaking to her, he would drive right back to base. Liliana had a narrow window to catch him.
While she could speak to him before he went in, she would have to be very careful. The colonel might be more dangerous than his mercenary.
She retraced some of her steps, keeping a close fourth eye on the Celtic werewolf and his companions to make certain they didn’t return to the area. They went to the police station to research anything they could find out about Liliana on the computer.
Liliana chuckled to herself. Good luck.
When the colonel’s car pulled into the parking lot behind Emerald Arms, Liliana would be standing in it. She sealed the back door shut with a spot of webbing so Siobhan would not interrupt them.
Under her skirt, she tied the equivalent of a climbing harness like the safety harness she used to wear in the circus. A line of her silk under tension led from just above the waistband of her skirt up to the roof of the building. In seconds, she could use that tension to propel herself onto the roof and get away.
She simultaneously needed to be close enough to the colonel to have a conversation and maintain enough distance to escape if he attacked. She should appear to him to be simply standing casually in the lot.
Plus, she knew better than to touch anything living when facing a dangerous Sidhe. Gravel and asphalt were the only things near her, unless she counted the stubborn dandelion growing in a crack a short distance from her foot.
She looked at it critically. The Fae probably couldn’t use it against her. It was pretty, and she admired its determination. She left it alone.
