Smoke and Mirrors (Fortune Favors the Fae)

Chapter 1

Chapter

One

“ I mean, as long as you don’t mind a little competition,” I said, smirking because I needed him to understand who the competition was. It was me. I was his competition.

Tyler leaned back, just slightly, just enough that my mind went into overdrive because this was one of the make-or-break moments my mom used to mention after a con was done. She’d always say we needed to know what to do when someone leaned away and said no as clearly as though they’d rented a bullhorn and interrupted your wedding when the poor priest said speak now or forever hold your peace .

Every person in the back room tensed, from the guy counting cash in the back to the guy at the door with the semiautomatic weapon in his hand. My mind flipped, rearranging everything I’d read on his features, every clue he’d given me, every hint I’d seen in his narrowed eyes.

I could work with this.

I laughed. Loud, leaning back and throwing up my head, exposing my neck, a somewhat primal way to show him not only was I no threat, but I was giving him every clue that I was his pack like I was the last, desperate wolf on the tundra begging not to be left to starve in the arctic. Tyler stared at me until I shook my head, leaning forward, catching his eyes.

“I’m just messing with you. Of course I wouldn’t do that.” I shook my head. “No way.”

There were three kinds of bosses in this line of business. The type that liked a little competition because it got their blood up, the kind that hated competition and crushed it into nothing, and the kind that liked a little competition from me . Just me. Because they wanted to crush me personally under their heel, and the only way to do that was if I was close enough to fit my head between their boot and the ground.

I liked to call it the Damian Reyes effect. Something about my face just screamed shove me onto the pavement and step on me . Like, only in a little bit of a kinky way because most criminals limited their homoerotic tendencies to business.

Tyler narrowed his eyes, and oh yeah, he was one hundred percent imagining what it would look like when he strung me up and whaled on me. Again, in a business sense. And maybe a murder sense.

Either way, I could work with that.

I leaned back, smirking, and he leaned forward, and as my mother would say, he was hooked now and if I lost this fish it was on me and I should starve in the streets.

Mamá Reyes believed in tough love and no fish for kids who lost their marks due to carelessness. Granted, when I lost one of my mother’s marks, it meant no dinner; if I lost Tyler, it meant that the nice man at the door with the very powerful gun would shoot me down.

So, in this situation, I took my mother’s advice to heart.

I waited. Tyler stared me down.

I lowered my eyes, just a flick, just the slightest hint that he might be able to win if it came down to me and him. Then, I lifted my eyes, a silent but you haven’t won yet . And he bit.

“All right.” He stood up. “Show me what you’ve got.”

I was in, I was golden, I was glowing, and this was when I knew I had to be my most careful. There was nothing to be done if you’d gone through all the trouble to con someone and then lost them when the exact thing you wanted was there for the taking.

There were fishermen who’d hooked the biggest fish in the pond and still went hungry, as my mother said. In the desert, we didn’t fish, but in her metaphors, my mother could stand up against anyone on Deadliest Catch .

I picked up my briefcase and walked over to the table, Tyler a few steps behind me. He watched closely as I put in a code, opening the latches with a sharp snap.

The man counting money paused, and everyone in the room seemed to lean forward, lingering on the anticipation. I drew it out, using the two seconds to observe how long Tyler would go without being satisfied before he started to lose it.

He frowned, and I put the briefcase flat and opened it. Two seconds. That didn’t bode well; I’d need to teach him to stretch that.

Inside, packed in careful compartments, were two magical artifacts and a knife. I took out the first artifact. I felt a slight hum, like water running through a pipe.

“This is just to see the quality of the goods,” I said. “These aren’t on retail.”

“Sure.” Tyler’s lip pulled to the side, and I took note like I was a sniper trying to find just the right angle for a shot. No, not a sniper, a hunter setting a rope trap in the forest. The lion was going to walk into it, and either I’d get killed or he would.

The tension between us had to be just right. Too tight and he’d get suspicious; too loose and I could hang myself with the extra rope.

I handed him a glazed ball just barely larger than my fist. In my hands, it looked ceramic, a child’s art project that couldn’t even be used as a paperweight because it would roll off the table.

As soon as Tyler touched it, it lit up like a firecracker, lights bouncing off the walls, sparkles of spinning magic flying off into nothingness.

Tyler’s eyes went wide, and there it was, my golden ticket, my ride to the high life. Greed.

Tyler said, “This is just a sample?”

“Non-retail.” I held out my palm.

He glared at me and handed it over. “Show me the rest.”

I took out the other ball. This one was larger and looked onyx until he touched it, and then it lit from within, clouds spiraling under the surface. My mom had one like it at her shop. Only hers worked by hidden lights and mirrors.

“Future?” Tyler asked.

“Present,” I corrected. “But I’ve checked, and it’s universal. If you want to see what the weather is like on Mars, go ahead and ask.”

“Show me Céline,” Tyler said, and unless that was the name of a Martian he knew, Céline was about to have all her business exposed to Tyler and his associates.

The clouds spun but then settled, and Tyler drew the ball closer to himself, glaring at what it showed. I glanced at it and didn’t let anything show on my face.

Background told me that Céline wasn’t the name of his wife, who lived stateside and called him once a day. That meant Tyler’s very French girlfriend was having lunch right now with an attractive man in a suit. I slid some more puzzle pieces together, adding up Tyler’s second rental in the city and this woman and coming up with the fact that she and lunch guy were sitting very close for a woman whose boyfriend rented her a penthouse apartment.

Tyler swore and tossed the ball back to me. I caught it easily, carefully tucking it back into the padded compartment.

“You want to see the knife too, or are we good?” I asked.

“Show me,” he snapped.

Crap. I needed to sweeten him up because now he was cranky and distracted, and neither one of those things would get me the in I needed.

Tyler glanced significantly at the guard by the door, and he nodded back. Double crap. Poor Céline was going to find out what a bad idea it was to two-time a lieutenant of the Green Scales.

“Here,” I said, offering over the blade.

“It can cut anything?” Tyler guessed.

“No,” I said immediately because Mamá Reyes had raised a con artist, not a fool. “It tells you if someone is lying.”

With some exceptions, because only an actual moron would hand the man they were lying to a magical lie detector, and see above for Mamá Reyes and fools she didn’t suffer.

Tyler wasn’t a fool either and eyed me suspiciously. Still, with his whole girlfriend-cheating-on-him thing, he was honestly more focused on that rather than on whether I was trying to trick him (lucky for both of us, and luck was one thing I had plenty of).

He swung the knife toward the man with the gun and said, “Did you know she was cheating on me?”

The man with the gun had one moment to look surprised, and then he cleared his throat and said, “No, no, Tyler, of course not.”

And the knife stayed completely dormant, almost like my grubby magic-draining hands were still holding it. Tyler’s shoulders slumped, and then he turned to the man counting the money.

Before he even asked the question the man was talking. “Tyler, Tyler, you have to believe me, I didn’t know.”

Which was the wrong answer, as clearly as if Alex Trebek’s face was falling and the game show host was saying, “I’m sorry, money-counter guy. The correct answer was hell yes, I knew , and it needed to be in the form of a question.”

At money-counter guy’s blatant lie, the knife lit up in shiny lights that sparkled off his terrified eyes. The very-relieved-that-he-hadn’t-known gun guy lifted his weapon in threat as money guy searched the room for anyone to help him.

His scared eyes fell on me, and I hesitated. Not very sporting of me, but if Tyler got rid of someone on his team, that left a nice opening in the starting lineup for the confidence man trying to get on the field. Meaning me. I could easily slide in and count money.

Still, there was a big difference between taking someone’s place and actually watching Tyler kill them in cold blood.

I winced because the same goddamned conscience that always got me into trouble was acting up. “Tyler, if that’s all, I’ll take my samples, and we can arrange a second meeting?”

It was the wrong time, I was pushing him too hard, and we’d expected what he was going to say next, but this way, I was taking the focus off money guy, who would hopefully come up with a better way back into Tyler’s good graces while he had the break.

“You aren’t taking these back,” Tyler said, twisting the knife between his fingers.

“Uh, yeah, well, I told you it wasn’t on retail.” I searched around the room, making sure that I appeared just confused and helpless enough that the rest of Tyler’s guys looked uncomfortable. There we go. Get everyone thinking about what happened when Tyler got pissed.

“I didn’t ask for retail.” Tyler gestured at the briefcase with the blade. “This is a gift.”

“See, the thing is, this belongs to someone else. This was just a sample to let you know what I can get my hands on if you hire me.” I twitched, making my nervousness as clear as Tyler made the danger he was putting me in.

“I’m going to take this. And I’ll let you know if we decide to make use of your services.” Tyler smirked.

I glanced around the room again, pretending desperation. The gun guy looked pleased that his boss got to save face by putting me in my place. The guys playing cards in the back looked equally reassured by the return of the expected pecking order.

The money guy looked… well, I’d expected him to be terrified, but something was up because he looked like he’d just won something. He looked like he was staring at his get-out-of-jail-free card, his full house at a poker game.

I narrowed my eyes, suspicious, and he looked away. With his eyes cast downward, there was something familiar about him, but I couldn’t place it. Maybe it was just the expression I recognized, the I’m going to survive this expression.

“Okay, well. You’re putting me in a spot, Tyler,” I said softly. He’d defeated me; I needed to sell it to the hilt. “Please, you gotta call me because once they find out it’s gone, I’m dead. Please, Tyler.”

Tyler waved his hand magnanimously, but god if he didn’t show exactly how much he liked having me beg. Maybe this one was kinky because he certainly seemed to forget about his girlfriend as he gleefully packed everything back in the briefcase.

He closed it without setting the lock, and I let my shoulders slump, let myself appear just enough defeated before I straightened up.

I glared him in the eye, and he smirked. Oh, he liked winning over me, and that was the play in big, flashing Las Vegas neon lights.

“I’ll call you,” Tyler said. “So you better have another score for me.”

Tightly, I nodded and headed out, the guy with a gun opening the door for me and shutting it behind me.

Outside, the streets of Paris were overly bright, the sun gleaming off glass windows. I slid a pair of aviators out of my suit jacket and put them on. My shoulders slumped as I walked, my whole body tense, anxiety in every step.

I kept up the ruse for a block before I let myself walk normally, my confidence taking over.

My mental map of the city skewed toward areas I knew Tyler and the other members of Green Scales congregated. So, when I strode out onto a side street, I was lost, and my stomach started to turn over with hunger.

My phone rang. I picked it up. “Hey, sweetheart.”

“Damian,” the chilly voice on the other end greeted. “Are you clear?”

“Yeah,” I said.

“Line is secure.” I didn’t hear anything in the background, but the slight hesitation was the only indication that Analyst Twenty-one was typing on her computer. “I don’t see any obvious tails.”

I’d been running countersurveillance myself and hadn’t seen anyone. It looked like Tyler had ended up too focused on the girlfriend to focus on me. Hopefully, money guy was smart enough to come up with a new excuse that got him off of Tyler’s this-guy-is-dead list.

“Did the dry cleaning get picked up?” I passed a woman behind a table of small, fake gemstone rings. She eyed me with interest, but I shook my head, and her face fell.

“It looks like the package is on the move.” Twenty-one paused again. “The team will confirm before moving in.”

“Tell them that he might be on his way to his girlfriend’s place. Big shock to everyone that she was cheating on him. Real Jerry Springer stuff about to go down there.” Nearby, a small bridge overlooked a garden, and I passed over it, leaning my arms against the railing. It gave me a second to observe my surroundings, and I knew on the other end, the analyst was using every camera at her disposal—CCTV, drone, probably satellite—to make sure I was safe.

If she thought I was clear, and I thought I was clear, I was probably good, no matter that my gut said something was up. My gut also said things like, “Hey, that street food looks like it won’t give you two days of food poisoning” and “That guy who wants to hook up with you is a keeper and not going to steal your stereo.”

“Noted.” On the other end, there was a pause, and then she said, “What is it?”

“I thought one of his guys might have recognized me,” I said.

“I’m requesting immediate exfil.” This time, I could hear the typing, which meant she was upset and expressing her emotions like a healthy person and requesting vast amounts of violence because I’d had a feeling.

“No, no, not like that.” I looked around, but the only people lingering were couples and very obvious tourists. No one I recognized from my walk earlier. “Trust me, if he thought he could throw me to Tyler and have him shred my cover in exchange for surviving, he would have.”

On the other end, the analyst made a noncommittal noise because not immediately pulling me was a break in protocol. Twenty-one was cold as ice, and she believed in three things: protocol, 5:00 a.m. was the only appropriate wake-up time, and late library books should be punishable by death.

“No, really, Twenty-one,” I chided. “Trust me to do my job.”

Analyst Twenty-one snapped, “Trust me to do mine. If someone recognized you, you need immediate extraction.”

“Twenty-one,” I said her name as a singsong.

There was no reply.

“Come on, I put in all this work, and you have to admit I look good in this suit.” I wasn’t sure where she was looking at me from, so I threw a generous look to the surrounding buildings and flicked open my suit jacket, putting myself on display, turning so that the expensive fabric displayed my form to its best advantage.

“Stop that. You look like a prostitute,” Twenty-one said. “Hourly check-ins.”

“Yeah, yeah.” I went back to leaning against the railing.

“Now, can you use your magic internet box to find me something good to eat around here? I’m starving.”

Twenty-one’s directions put me right at a small outdoor marketplace, where a falafel vendor sold me the most delicious pita-bread sandwich creation I’d had outside of the Middle East. Phone in pocket, free of any surveillance, enjoying a good meal, everything was great until someone crashed right into me.