Robots vs. Fairies(45)

“I knew I could count on your help,” she said.

I grinned.

“Maybe take a cab tonight, though. There was another disappearance today.”

“Another?” I asked. “Who this time?”

“The púca that lives in Central Park.”

“Seriously?”

Sarah nodded.

“Still no hint as to what’s going on?”

“Not that I’ve seen.” The Fae were good at gossip—you get that way if you have a hide in plain sight sort of lifestyle—and Sarah was a wiz at social media. “Mostly, people are worried.”

The walk to the club was short, not even a mile. And it was supposed to be a nice evening. But the púca was bigger and fiercer than I was by a long shot. Plus, he could turn into a horse. If someone could kidnap him, I doubted I’d be a challenge. I was worried too. “Okay. I’ll take a cab.”

*

Purple Reign was a Fae club. Not that we banned humans from coming in or anything like that; it was just really hard to find if you didn’t know about it. You might, if you hadn’t been invited, walk past and think that it was actually a run-down diner that looked like it had failed its last health inspection and smelled like it had just had a garbage fire.

Which is why I was surprised to walk in and see Trent up onstage. He was as smarmy and good-looking as ever. Also, as apparently alive as ever. Singing, in fact. Alone in the spotlight, solo guitar. Surrounded by seriously adoring fans—a wide variety of Fae crowding the stage, bodies in various stages of what might best be described as “swoon.”

Not swoon like the reaction when you think someone is hot, not even like the reaction when you want to get in someone’s pants so bad that your brain sort of short-circuits. More like when you see people literally lose their powers of speech, where their eyes go unfocused and yearning, when you suspect that the walls could be burning down around them and they wouldn’t even notice. That sort of swoon.

And that explained why he was here. He was Fae. A gancanagh—a love talker. Able to use his voice as a tool of seduction. And when I say tool, I mean basically a hammer. If you heard it, if he spoke his words to you, you’d fall in love with him. Well, not “love” so much as “significant sexual infatuation.” Whether he was your normal type or not, if he told you that you wanted him, it would be very, very hard—maybe even impossible—for you to resist. You would do whatever he wanted to make him happy.

The gancanagh was not a type of Fae I was fond of.

I watched through narrowed eyes as he sang. His voice was pleasant enough, the songs covers, all sugary-sweet pop. Love songs of one variety or another, surprise, surprise. He wasn’t, as far as I could tell, directing his singing to one person in particular, but rather blasting the room with the force of his voice, dispersing the lust generally. I still wasn’t a fan, but feeding off the love of the audience I could let slide.

Still, I had no desire to hear the rest of his set, so I slipped back out the door to wait, to make sure he went home alone. As I waited, that fog-feeling rose up in my throat again like a doom. When I saw him step outside, I wailed. Even though I was certain there’d be no effect, I felt like I’d drown if I didn’t let the cry shriek from my throat.

Once again, nothing happened. Shit, maybe I really was broken. This was possibly ungood.

“You,” he said, still all charm in tight T-shirt and worn denim. “Decided to get that cup of coffee after all?”

“Not even a little bit,” I said.

“I’d ask if you came by to hear me play, but I didn’t see you at the show.”

“I was there. Briefly. Long enough to see you,” I said. “You’ve got some . . . interesting arrangements to your songs. The crowd seemed to really love them.” I kept my eyes on his face, trying to see if he’d react. We’re not forbidden from using our powers on each other or anything like that, but something about what he’d been doing struck me as sort of tacky. I wanted him to know that I knew.

But there was no change in his expression. Just that smile. “You should come back. Do a song with me tomorrow—I’m here one more night. I’ll even have a full band, one I’m really excited about, and I’d love to hear how you sound with them. I bet the audience would just die to hear you sing.”

He knew what I was too, then. I kept my face blank. “Sounds interesting. Maybe I will.”

A cab slowed, and I raised my arm to flag the driver.

“It’s still early. Do you have to leave now?” Trent asked.

“Yes.” I opened the car door.

Then he sang a line from one of his earlier songs—something about longing and staying together. He looked at me intensely as he did, and paused at the end, as if he was waiting for something else to happen. Like he was hoping it would make me change my mind. It didn’t. I got into the cab and went home.

*

“So he knows what I am, obviously,” I said, through a mouthful of a cake made out of layers of chocolate crepes, with some sort of glorious pistachio filling between them. “This is maybe the best thing you’ve ever made, by the way.”

“Thanks,” Sarah said. “And if he knows, then you should definitely stay home. Don’t sing.”

“Why?” I asked.

“He won’t have asked for any good reason. Think about it. If he knows what you are, then it’s because he knows you’ve been trying to use your wail to kill him. Why would he ever invite you to sing after that?”