Accidentally Accurate: The Fake Psychics Guide to Solving Shifter Murders

1. Paul

Paul

The VanMarches go Marching One by One, Oh No!

“Wake up, Jackie,” I said before tossing a bucketful of lukewarm water on my youngest brother’s face.

He jerked up, sputtering as if I had just accosted him with water filled with chunks of the iceberg that had taken out the Titanic.

Reality was far from that, of course, considering I’d used the leftover water in his empty champagne bottle holder.

“What the hell, Paul?”

“Rise and shine. You’re going to be late.”

“Late for what? We’re not in school anymore, goddamn!”

“No, we aren’t, but if you want to be treated like a grown-up, perhaps you should act like one.

” Some would think it harsh, but they weren’t thirty-three years old and having to wake up their twenty-five-year-old youngest brother because the baby of the family couldn’t be trusted to be responsible for anything outside of throwing a decadent rager.

Normally, those words wouldn’t fit together, but Jackson VanMarche had made an artform out of it.

“Dude, this is ridiculous, even for you. I’m going back to bed.”

If I was Luther, my eldest brother, I might have given him a soft but firm lecture about the responsibilities that came with our rather cushy lifestyle.

If I was Chris, my second eldest brother, I might have just flipped his bed.

But I wasn’t either of them. I was Paul VanMarche the Third, so I figured a middle ground was the best way to go.

I picked up the next closest champagne bucket and emptied it on him too.

“DUDE!”

“I think, brother, that perhaps you are forgetting something.”

“What could I possibly be— the charity! ”

“That’s right, the charity. The function you insisted on, saying no one else had a way with the people like you do. And now, all those disadvantaged children are waiting on you to make their toy drive shine at this rather huge event, which—and I cannot stress this enough— you scheduled.”

“Paul, Paulino, Paulski-dono?—”

God, I hated when my brother went on one of his bouts of verbal diarrhea.

He thought he was hilarious or particularly blessed with the gift of gab, but to me, it came off as him trying too hard to entertain instead of being himself.

Although, sometimes it was tempting to believe that he was pure brain rot —one of the few and yet very useful internet phrases I bothered to learn.

“I know you’re, like, all intense about everything, and constantly trying to prove yourself, but you gotta chill. That event is tomorrow. I’ll spend the whole day sobering up to make sure each one of those kids gets the best birthday or Christmas or whatever that they could ever dream of.”

Normally, I would have let out a long-suffering sigh, but we didn’t have the time for it.

“While I would never question your wolf’s ability to heal you from all the no doubt healthy things you ingested, you are mistaken.

The charity event is today. Monday. A weekday was chosen because the donation boxes are at multiple schools, especially in the more advantaged areas of the city. ”

“Today isn’t Monday.”

“Today is Monday. Name originating from the Old English word mōnandaeg , meaning Moon Day, and coincidentally, just so happens to be the exact day that you organized this charity drive.”

My brother blinked at me. It was a bit uncanny to have my mother’s green eyes make that expression at me.

I always thought it was a tad unfair that the one VanMarche child who had never gotten to meet our mother had so many of her features.

Really, all of us had a piece of her. Luther had her reddish hair, as did Penelope, although hers was more auburn. Christopher had green eyes as well.

Really, the only one that didn’t have any of her traits was me .

I’d inherited my father’s dark hair and eyes, the same strong chin and jaw, accompanied by the strong VanMarche nose.

Sometimes it made me feel a bit alien among my siblings.

They all could see our mother in their reflections, but I resembled the man I could never quite fully please.

At least I didn’t displease him. No, that was Jackson’s habit, and sometimes his delight.

“ Shit, ” my brother murmured, and for a moment, I felt bad for him. I didn’t hate Jack; I didn’t even dislike him. But sometimes I resented the amount of work he often made for me. Apparently, being the middle child meant it was my job to babysit or wrangle any siblings younger than me.

Yee-fucking-haw.

“Shit is right. Now, on your feet. You’re going to take the quickest shower you can while still managing to make sure you don’t smell like the backside of a bar, you’re going to get dressed in the clothes I laid out for you, and then you’re going to go make this the best toy drive this side of the equator in a decade.

“I dunno?—”

But I was already pulling him to his feet and frog-marching him across his penthouse to his bedroom. Then, with a (very loving) kick to his rear, I sent him into his ensuite.

In truth, I could have never woken him up, never bothered to show up to his place.

It was no skin off my nose. But I knew he’d be incredibly disappointed with himself.

Although my baby brother was, for all intents and purposes, a fuckboi , he was really passionate about helping kids.

Maybe it was because he never got to meet Mom; maybe it was because he and Father were like oil and water.

Whatever the reason, I couldn’t stand by and let his impetuousness and inability to look at a calendar ruin things for him. Maybe I was enabling him.

Or maybe I was just his big brother.

“Don’t forget to clean behind your ears!” I called as my brother stumbled toward his shower.

“Yes, mother, ” he retorted.

I couldn’t figure out if I hated that or not.

While our father wasn’t a terrible man, not like some alphas could be, he wasn’t very…

whimsical. He was matter-of-fact to a fault and had to put a great deal of pressure on all of us.

We were, after all, at the top of the wolf hierarchy of the entire East Coast.

Our mother had been the artist, the fun one, the song in the morning, and the gentle kiss on the forehead at night.

Losing her had been a blow none of us had anticipated.

She’d barely entered her thirty-second year when she died giving birth to Jackson, something almost unheard of among wolf shifters.

But even with all the medical and magical care that money could buy twenty-five years ago, nothing was able to save her.

Honestly, probably not the best time to think about that.

Instead, I busied myself spritzing my brother’s clothes with the right amount of cologne. A measured hand was required, considering the mix of humans and magical folks with sensitive noses at this event and the schools involved.

“All fresh?” I asked once my brother emerged from the shower, looking like a relatively sober member of society.

Although I wasn’t exactly fond of Jack’s overconsumption of all sorts of illicit things, our wolf shifter nature prevented it from being permanently damaging—physically, at least. Socially? That was an entirely different matter.

“Yeah, yeah,” he said dismissively, throwing his wet towel at me.

I caught it and went to hang it up.

“Paul?”

“Yes?”

“Thank you. And I’m sorry. You shouldn’t have to nanny me like this. I promise I’m going to get my shit together.”

My brother had been making that promise since he’d turned twenty-one and moved off the VanMarche estate into his own place. Even though he hadn’t really managed to keep it so far, I still chose to treat him as if this time, he would.

“I believe you, Jack. And you know you have my support for anything you need in that goal.”

His voice was much softer when he responded, so soft that if I wasn’t a wolf as well, I wouldn’t have been able to hear him. “Thank you.”

I chose not to respond, because honestly, the moment didn’t need it. My youngest sibling knew I would be there for him no matter what, no matter how many times he messed up. I wouldn’t lie to his face and coddle him, but I wouldn’t shut him out like our father did either.

It wasn’t in my nature to turn my back on family.

I checked my emails while he got dressed, but as soon as he was in appropriate attire, I handed him his shoes and escorted him to the door.

Now, some might argue that my grown brother could handle calling an Uber by himself, but when we were halfway to our exit, he stopped and looked longingly at the kitchen.

“I don’t suppose there’s time to stop and tuck in for a little brekkie, is there?”

“Not a chance. If you wanted to fill your belly, then perhaps you shouldn’t have partied until four in the morning.” Again, supporting not coddling.

“I think it was more like six, actually.”

I rolled my eyes and shoved my brother forward. He went along with it, because in his heart, I think he liked knowing someone would help him stay within the lines when he needed. A few minutes later, he was sliding into the family car I’d ordered.

“And don’t forget to sign up for the Christmas Cookie list that was sent out. I’m not letting you mooch off me this year. You know Alexandria’s stuff is more popular than ever, and she bakes for all three families, not just ours.”

“Yeah, yeah, I’ll answer the email.”

“See that you do. As for you, sir, do not stop until you have reached your destination,” I said to the driver as I shut the rear passenger door.

“No matter how much he begs, no matter how much he bribes, and no matter how much his stomach rumbles, he is getting to this event on time. If he wants to stop for food, that can happen between the second and third school.”

“Understood, Mr. VanMarche.”

Nodding, I stepped back as the car pulled away.