8. I hate the stupid.
EIGHT
I hate the stupid.
Life never went to plan.
The shower revitalized my husband, and I admired him while he strutted around the house, waiting for the rental company to pick him up so he could finalize the rental and bring the vehicle back so we could hit the road. I made his coffee, chuckling at his restless energy. “Be careful driving.”
“I will,” he promised, accepting his travel mug and giving me a kiss.
The doorbell rang, and he grabbed his wallet from our coffee table.
“This could take up to an hour, but hopefully not that long. If the assholes come back, remember you are a meat-eating, fire-breathing unicorn and act appropriately.”
I translated that to mean I should put on my fur coat for a while and play guard unicorn. “Okay.”
Quinn left, and I went upstairs to grab the stash of grade-A transformatives I kept taped to the bottom of my nightstand.
I’d have to order a new stash from the CDC, but the grade-A was easier for me to transform through, and I struggled less reversing back to human.
I stripped, folded my clothes and put them in a bag, and swallowed the pill.
Ten minutes later, I carried my bag downstairs in my mouth, set it with the rest of the bags for the trip, and stretched.
As there was no reason to not enjoy myself, I sliced open the box of long-burning logs with a claw, picked one up, tossed it into the fireplace, and used my horn to open the flue so I wouldn’t fill the house with smoke.
While I liked it, my husband adamantly did not enjoy my adventures with the fireplace and a closed flue.
I snorted to light the log, settled on my favorite rug, and admired the flames, keeping an eye out the window for anyone suspicious.
Within twenty minutes, most of the cops left, leaving one unmarked car parked across the street with a pair inside, keeping watch on those coming and going.
As I’d made a large travel Thermos of coffee, I got up from my spot and grabbed the handle in my mouth, which was positioned on the top specifically so I could carry it while a unicorn, and eased through the house to a window, hitching a lift on a sunbeam to get outside without having to bother with the door.
Snorting fire over the chill, I trotted across the street, making use of my claws on the ice to keep from slipping.
The cop on the passenger side rolled down his window when I approached, and I thrust the Thermos at him, which he accepted.
“No dust but good coffee,” I told them, giving a swish of my tail. I stomped my hooves to keep warm, and as that worked, I pranced in place and bucked, giving my mane a good shake, too. “Idiot par-rents no un-der-stand I un-nee-corn.”
“Seriously? I’m Troy, and my partner is Lucas, ma’am.” Troy handed the Thermos over to Lucas. “We were asked to stick around until you leave, as our chief seems to think the perps might come back to finish what they started.”
“They are that stupid.” I pricked my ears forward over how well I’d managed to talk despite the cold stabbing away at my fur.
“Keep Thermos. It old one. Have new one inside.” We’d just gotten it before I’d gone on my road trip adventure, and it was still in its box.
“Give good excuse to get out new one. Odds idiot par-rents coming back to house?”
“Pretty high. They made their attempt in broad daylight, which smacks of general desperation.”
“But why? Makes no sense. I leave them alone? They go away, I happy. Very happy.”
“It’s not uncommon with abusers. They seek revenge when the gig is up, and people like them value their reputation. We’ve been doing groundwork on them as part of the investigation. According to the briefing, they’re part of a somewhat influential vanilla family.”
“Yes. Hate magic, hate magic users. Hate any-thing diff-er-ent from them. Me diff-er-ent.”
“Well, yes. You’re in a class of your own. You need a high rating to qualify for your job.”
“I hate the stupid,” I complained, hanging my head.
Troy reached out of the unmarked car and gave my shoulder a pat. “We all do. It’s so annoying.”
I raised my head, and as Quinn kept telling me the cops liked when meat-eating, fire-breathing unicorns nuzzled them, I bumped his fingers with my nose.
He scratched my forehead below my horn, and I settled in to enjoy the attention.
“That silver car matches the witness description,” Lucas announced.
I cracked open an eye to regard the vehicle coming down the street. Sure enough, my idiot, asshole parents were in the vehicle. “So damned dumb,” I complained. “At least no can burn roses now. Or house. Fire-proof house. So stupid.”
Both cops reached for their firearms, and I got out of their way, stepping back and flattening my ears.
Smart people would have noticed the irritated black and red unicorn snorting smoke standing beside a suspicious looking vehicle most would believe to be an unmarked cop car, given even half a second to examine it and its occupants.
Rather than utilize one of their limited brain cells, my parents pulled up alongside my house.
Rather than go the gasoline and a match route, they’d gotten a Molotov cocktail, which they flung in the direction of the big picture window.
Had my father had a stronger arm or better aim, I might’ve been worried, but he hit wide and low. The bottle shattered on the brick, and the sticky substance caught aflame.
My poor house.
I pivoted and trotted along, eyeballing their vehicle. My mother, who was driving the vehicle, continued down the street as though nothing happened, and after she passed Valorie’s house, she sped up.
Did the assholes really think I would just let them try to light my house on fire again without doing anything about it?
I bucked, kicked my heels, whinnied, and charged down the street.
Within a few strides, I hit top speed, making use of my claws to maintain traction on the slick roads.
When I caught up with the vehicle, I calculated the distance to the hood of their car, jumped, and landed hard, slamming all six hundred plus pounds of my weight on the plastic and metal.
The car came to a rather abrupt halt, and I yelped, crashing to the icy asphalt. Scrambling to my hooves so they wouldn’t run me over, I blew flames at the vehicle.
Troy and Lucas joined the party, their firearms out and ready, trained on my idiot parents.
My mother seemed to believe she would be able to get her car on the move after having an angry unicorn bash the hood in. On closer investigation, not only had I bashed the entire front end of the car into the ground, I’d broken the axle, as both front tires pointed in separate directions.
Wow. I regarded the destruction with interest.
“I broke it,” I informed the cops.
Rather than pay any attention to me, the cops began barking orders, directing my asshole parents to get out of the vehicle with their hands up.
Amused neither seemed to care I’d trashed my parents’ car, I amused myself circling them, snorting smoke and fire to keep my body temperature up. Sometime after the cops had read my parents their rights, a black SUV with a rental car sticker came down the street.
I bolted for the house, dug at one of the holes left from moving my roses, and tried to hide in the frozen ground. “Not here!”
Down the street, the cops laughed at me.
I didn’t blame them.
My husband parked the rental in our driveway, and I hunkered down, attempting to escape his wrath.
“I can see you, Bailey. You don’t fit.”
Damn it. “Not my fault!”
“The unicorn-shaped dent in the hood of that car is definitely your fault, unless there is another unicorn hiding around?”
“May-be?” I turned my ears back and showed him my teeth. “They start it!”
“Now that I can believe, especially as it seems the side of the house has been lit on fire. Did they use a Molotov cocktail?”
“May-be. Okay. Yes. Do you think Mol-o-tov cock-tail tast-ee?”
“Go lick it and find out.”
I scrambled out of the hole, scrambled to the side of the house, and gave the fire on the brick a lick.
Whatever they’d used tasted peppery with a solid punch of diesel and some other accelerant.
“Die-sel! Tast-ee!” I enjoyed the flames tickling over my fur, and I went to work licking everything off our house.
“Just try to leave the broken glass alone. Don’t step on it or cut your tongue. I’ll give Barfield a call.”
Within twenty minutes, the cops were all back along with a single fire engine. The fire fighters stood around and did nothing while I handled the cleanup, and when I finished my treat, I burped. With a claw extended, I tapped on the broken glass. “This part no tast-ee, Queeny.”
My husband joined me on the front steps of our house, shaking his head at the damaged bricks. “A few inches to the left, and we would have had a charred interior, and even then, it wouldn’t have done much damage.”
“Not much damage because Queeny the best husband and fireproof house.”
He rewarded me with a stroke of my nose. “A wise man adapts to his wife’s special needs, and my wife’s favorite treat is napalm. Did you enjoy your snack?”
“Very tast-ee. Not as good as nay-palm, but good. Peppery. Die-sel plus some-thing else.” I considered the taste. “Blue gel stuff for hot plate things.”
“Methanol blue,” my husband replied. “Easy to get, a good enough gel, and would help keep the fire concentrated enough to light the house up—if I hadn’t fireproofed it.”
“Par-rents very stupid.”
“Yes, they are. Did you really have to total their car, though?”
“Cops would have put bullets in car and may have shot idiot par-rents. May-be earn, but my way bet-ter. No par-rents shot, only car damaged. No tell nice father or mother about this? They be upset. Very upset. Might smite.”
“Smote, my beautiful.”
“Might smite,” I replied in my most solemn tone.
“You’re incredible.”
I nuzzled his chest before using his shoulder as a headrest. “Think they get bail?”
My husband wrapped his arms around my neck and held me. “I don’t know. Are you all right?”