Greg Vasilescu, PI + A Good Guy

Three generations of werewolf women sat opposite Isla and me in the train car.

Denise D'Onofrio was a stern looking matriarch, white but well-tanned for this time of year, appearing to be somewhere in her mid-sixties. Her gray hair was shorn short with bangs swept over one side of her face. Zebra-striped glasses were perched at the tip of her nose; a beaded lanyard looped behind her ears to keep the spectacles from wandering off. She wore acid-washed jeans, beat up running shoes, and down jacket.

Bouncing on her knee was a toddler in a tutu. Arabella, I presumed. The girl's perfect, auburn ringlets hung to her elbows. An oversized bow secured a bushel of them on the crown of her head, out of her eyes. She seemed intently occupied by the picture book in her lap.

Beside her mother and daughter, was Mrs. Cabroni, dressed in another one of her tracksuits. Her long hair was styled to match the child's strand for strand. She had a thick ring of badges braced around her neck. Dang. Was more than a bit gob smacked to see her up and out of the hospital so soon. But gee whiz, guess the Pack had at least a couple of family doctors on call.

She glared daggers at me.

Stuffed my hands in my blazer pockets to protect my fragile fingers.

"Uh, Mrs. Cabroni," said Isla. "You're... looking... fab."

"Call me Vesper," she croaked. "D'Onofrio. Going back to my maiden name."

"Your family name," grumbled Denise in her ear.

"Ma, they get it."

"Shhh," the Alpha wolf patted her daughter on the knee. "Save your voice."

I cleared my throat. Just as Isla was about to open her mouth and probably say something silly and more than likely Traumatic Brain Injury induced. "Ms. D'Onofrio, I, firstly, would like to apologize for how I mishandled our communications—"

Denise raised a hand. "You the vamp that shot—"

"Ma! My kid!"

"Earmuffs, Ari."

The child smacked her hands over her tiny ears, smiling up at me in an unsettling, borderline demonic way. Made me shiver.

"Are you the vamp," Denise continued, "that shot my son-in-law in the face?"

Oh fangs.

Beside me, Isla stiffened. Her pulse spiked in my own veins. Blood rushed through us both at identical, breakneck paces. Felt like a donkey tap dancing on my chest. Oh, this was going to be problem, wasn't it?

As subtly as I could, I slipped a hand from my pocket and into Isla's. Gave her swollen knuckles and scabbed palm a little squeeze. An effort to try and calm her pulse before it got us both into trouble. Not out of affection. Course not. I was still mad at her. Seemed to work though, a small bit. She threaded her fingers through mine, and her heartbeat calmed by a fraction.

Behind us, Sloane whistled. Not sure if werewolves had the same hearing and ability to read a pulse as vamps did, but for the sake of Isla's blushing cheeks (and chest and ears) I hoped they didn't.

But I was getting away from the question, wasn't I?

Here it goes, old boy. You were bound to have to answer for your actions sooner or later.

"Yeah," I said. "I put the dog down."

Isla sniggered, "nice," then, quickly added: "It wasn't in the face though."

Vesper nodded along with her. "Yeah, you mentioned."

She mentioned? When!

"He was a bastard to your daughter, Mrs. D'Onofrio," I continued, doing my darndest not to squirm under the scrutinizing gaze of four Otherworldly women and an eerily vacant-eyed child. "She hired me because she suspected him of being a cheat, and she was right. Good instincts on her."

"I bet she gets those from you," said Isla.

Denise affectionately stroked her granddaughter's hair, beaming with pride.

"Naturally," I continued, fighting (and losing) against the urge to watch the way Isla played the room with that Hollywood smile of hers. Dame was good at flattery, alright. Good at reading the room for that sort of thing. Better than was I. "And while I'm sorry for robbing you of a loved one, I don't regret having to do it."

"Good. He was a scumbag. You did us favor!" Denise laughed, loud and boisterous. "While I thank the Lord in Heaven every day for the blessing—" I hissed as a sting raced up my spine (heard Sloane do the same over my shoulder), "that is my granddaughter, my precious Arabella, I never felt no love for that mutt and the way he disrespected my family."

"Never trust a man you have to turn yourself, yeah?" I recited Vesper's complaint from memory.

Which, wouldn't you know it, earned me a snarl from the former Mrs. Cabroni.

Her mother at least seemed to appreciate the quote, as she chuckled and toyed with Arabella's hair.

"I like a man who protects what's dear to him," Denise's eyes shifted, briefly, to Isla sat beside me, hip to hip, her warmth radiating into my side. "If you wasn't a bloodsucker I'd fix youse two up, yeah? Like you fixed up my baby girl's neck," she elbowed her daughter.

"Ma," growled Vesper.

"He'd treat you nice, yeah? Like you deserve!"

"Flattered," I said. I wasn't. Frankly, I was still trying to determine if I should be offended by her tone when she spewed that 'bloodsucker.' That, and, I was still mighty confused as to why this dame dragged me and my girl into a rattling train car in the first place. And what the sweet hell Sloane was doing here, breathing down our throats. "But the fixing was all Isla."

Her heart skipped a beat. She looked at me, brows furrowed, and lip twisted in confusion. Oh that's a cute look. I gave her hand a little pulse.

"I really miffed your case, Vesper. I was unprofessional," (Isla snickered), "and it put you in danger. Almost took a mother from her daughter."

Vesper, eyes watering, stroked her child's hair.

"Isla, she's a smart woman, and compassionate, and has got balls the size of a minotaur on steroids," (Isla's snicker evolved into full-fledged hysterics) "She's the one who saved you. Saved us both."

Her eyes twinkled when she laughed. Black and shining up at me full of life and warmth and—

"Sure," Denise shrugged, "whatever."

That snapped my attention back to the were-women. Good. I was grateful to her, sure, but I couldn't afford to get lured deeper in the sea of Isla's charms (I ignored the way her face fell when I tore my gaze away).

"Ma'am, not to be disrespectful of your time," I said, "but if we're not here to be fitted for cement shoes, what are we doing?"

"This is a fucking thank you, fucko—ah, sorry, my language, I know."

Sloane draped her arms over the backrests of two rows of seats and hung between them in the aisle, effectively boxing Isla and me into our little nook with the werewolves.

Denise harrumphed at Sloane's swearing, peeking down at her granddaughter to make sure the 'earmuffs' were still in place. Arabella hummed—an ominous, foreboding tune—and remained focused staring, unblinking, into the depths of her book. Her mother turned pages with forced enthusiasm.

"A thank you?" I asked.

"You're welcome," said Isla.

Sloane clicked her teeth. "Yeah. If it weren't for you two horn balls coming in and literally wrecking months of fine-tuned fuc—plans, the Magistrate would never have been all up in my fangs about the club's more exclusive donors."

"Sweeping their brooms all through my property!" Denise chimed in.

"Got us to talking," Sloane gestured between herself the Pack matriarch, and then, if I wasn't mistaken, she winked at Isla. "You know, regular girl talk. And we got to thinking, hey now, my cockwa—my dearest husband's name is still on the club's papers. Wouldn't this be an opportune time to rid myself of the ugly, crotchety, rusty ass mother—"

Denise cleared her throat.

Sloane shrugged it off. "Any who, good timing on this whole Rosemond jawn—excuse me, on Dmitri's fraying mental health that led to not only his mismanaging the club, but to his wholly misguided kidnapping of this fine babe," she blew a kiss at Vesper, who appeared to blanche. "Is all I got to fucking say. Sorry."

Isla and I exchanged a look.

"Buildings too hot to sell right now," grunted Denise. "It draw too much attention, yeah? So, weez get to talking and decided—"

Sloane jumped in with an expressive set of jazz hands.

"We're business partners now!"

...

"O-oh," said Isla, stealing back her hand and giving a gentle clap. "Good for you?"

"Congratulations," I said.

Out the window, the passing brown and dirty walls of the underground seemed to slow. Train's breaks rattled beneath us. Some mumbled static and chimes drifted through the speaker, alerting us that we were approaching a station. It wasn't anywhere near mine or Isla's joints.

I stood, offering Isla my hand. "It's been lovely to catch up ladies, but this is our stop. Best of luck on your business endeavors."

Listen, see, it wasn't that I wasn't appreciative of all the little strings they pulled, but hell, I hadn't been aware said strings led to Dmitri's arrest. Guess once she recovered, Sloane found time to have a chat with my pal Octavius about that domestic dispute.

I'd been so focused on Isla, on getting her out of custody, I didn't care much on how the whole real estate kerfuffle resolved. Stayed up all day—cowering in my house with the shades drawn, sunglasses planted firmly in front of my aching eyes—working on fudging those papers with Phoebe. Even though the occasional prickle of exhaustion and wooziness struck me throughout the afternoon, I didn't rest a wink. Couldn't, till all this was settled.

Kind of wished I had at least popped out to watch the sunset, cause hey, that sure wasn't something a vamp saw every night, but, eh, the weather'd been overcast all day anyway.

Regardless, mad or not at Isla, she didn't deserve to go down like that. Not after she saved my skinny neck with that spooky magic of hers.

Phoebe, lousy secretary she was, still hadn't quite managed the wording on that letter exactly right in the final draft, but it pleased Isla's probation officer well enough.

Her charges, and bail, were set significantly lower than I anticipated. Seems despite her Contraband Curse blazing like the dickens this morning, inspectors on the scene couldn't sniff out a single tampered with corpse. I think that charge got chalked up to trespassing on a burial ground, or some similar hooey.

Isla slipped her warm hand into mine and stood. "Love the glasses," she said to Denise, "Kyle was an ass, you're a catch, get well soon," to Vesper, and finally, "glad to see you recovered," to Sloane.

The train car slowed and jostled us as we rolled into the station.

"Of course," Denise waved. "Enjoy your evening."

Sloane eased out of our way, fangs glinting in the flickering light. "See you on the flip side, fuckos."

As we scooted out of our seats and down the aisle toward freedom, Vesper clutched Arabella's teeny hand in her own and puppeteered the girl to wave goodbye. I shuddered.

The doors slid open.

"Hey, uh," Isla stopped, hand still clutched around mine. Fang it, woman, don't stop now. "Can we also maybe get, I don't know, some compensation?"

All heads snapped to the necromancer. She gulped.

"For, you know, my Emergency Room bills? The money Kyle stole from me when he jumped us in the street and beat us half to death? All my stolen, and ruined, stuff?"

Denise squinted, seeming to consider this. "I'll knock fifteen percent off next month's rent, how's that sound?"

Isla's shoulders sagged. "Peachy."