“Handsome and good with the magic." I slid closer to him and waggled my brows.
"Yeah." He shrugged, hands in his pockets. "I'm a keeper."
Peter slid an arm around my shoulders, and we walked on together, Daisy bounding ahead. I could just make out the shimmer of magic enclosing some of the outdoor cages. Every now and then a hot huff of breath or a heavy footstep reminded me that the dark grounds were teeming with magical animals and monsters.
We cleared a small hill and spotted Daisy, bushy tail wagging excitedly. She tapped her paws in front of a couple of silhouetted cops who stood against a tall wall. Peter squeezed my shoulder, then let his arm drop to his side, and we picked up the pace until we joined them.
A tall, thin young officer bent forward and scratched Daisy behind her ears, while the other cop leaned against the vine-covered stone wall, his eyes glued to the middle-aged woman sitting on the ground.
I arched a brow as the young cop cooed over Daisy, scratching her head and telling her what a good girl she was. So this guy could get away with it, but Daisy would barely deign to let me bring her a treat? I saw how it was.
Peter greeted the other cops, then nodded at the woman on the ground. "Miss Brown."
"Ah, so this is the Libbie Brown I've been hearing so much about." I lifted my hand in a little wave, and the woman glanced up and shot me a quizzical look, her knees hugged to her chest. The grasses blew all around her, the wind tossing her long dark curls across her face. She glanced behind her toward the cop leaning against the wall. A zipped leather backpack sat beside his feet.
"You here to take my Cassie away from me?" She glared up at me.
I held up my palms in surrender. "Nope. Just your run-of-the-mill, everyday pet psychic. I leave the Cassie stealing to the pros." I thumbed at the officer playing with Daisy, then frowned. “Who’s Cassie?”
The cop against the wall lowered the booted foot he’d been pressing against the stones and scoffed. "More like what is Cassie."
I threw my head back to the sky. "Ah." I tipped my chin back down and leveled Libby with a grin. "The wombat."
As if on cue, the backpack rustled and squeaked.
“See?” Libby let out a growl of frustration and lifted a dark, tattooed palm that told me she was from the Fire Kingdom. "She's hungry, and she misses me."
I squeezed an eye shut and raised a finger. "Actually, her leg’s falling asleep." I remembered a moment later, as four sets of wide eyes landed on me, that I was supposed to be a pet psychic, not a pet translator. I pressed my fingers to my temples and squeezed my eyes shut, as if concentrating. "At least that's what the ether is telling me." I peeled them open and glanced at Peter to see if I'd covered adequately. He was biting back a grin.
"No way!" Libbie’s face lit up, her white teeth bright against her dark skin. "You really are a pet psychic?" She threw an arm toward the backpack. "That's great! You can just ask Cassie who she’d rather live with, and we’ll get this whole thing sorted out."
I squeezed an eye shut and tipped my head side to side. "Not sure that's quite how the law works…."
"Actually, we're here to ask you a few questions." Peter stepped closer.
Libby let out an exaggerated groan and rolled her eyes. "You lot have already asked me a thousand questions! Ugh.”
I arched a brow and leaned into one hip. "Maybe you'd rather answer the questions up at the station?" It was hard not to grin. I’d been dying to use that line since I’d become a consultant for the police. I caught Peter's lips twitching toward a smile out of the corner of my eye.
Libbie sighed through her nose, but sobered and shoved to her feet. She dusted off her jeans, then stuffed her hands in the front pocket of her black hoodie. "Fine. What do you want to know?"
"We may have asked you questions before, but you didn't give us many answers." Peter’s tone was serious but kind. "If you'd like this to be over, you're going to need to cooperate with us. So for starters, how did you break in?"
Libbie scoffed. "I didn't break in. I'm the head zookeeper, like I said, and this animal needs medical attention. I was just getting her to a vet—"
Daisy, still getting rubs from the tall officer, cut her off with a growl. Lies.
I shot Daisy a flat look as she plunked her haunches onto the grassy ground and her leg twitched as if wanting to scratch the same spot the cop was. I rolled my eyes. So intimidating.
Peter's tone grew harder. "As I mentioned when we caught you, my canine partner, Daisy, can smell lies."
I raised my eyebrows. "And she just called you out."
It was hard to tell in the dim light—the cop leaning against the wall had lit his wand for us to see by—but I thought some color rose to Libbie’s cheeks. She let out a sigh. "Fine. I don't work here anymore, but I did up until a week ago. I still have a key—so I didn’t technically break in.”
I nodded. “And this, technically, isn’t your wombat.”
The cop who’d be leaning against the wall stomped forward and held his palm out. Libbie rolled her eyes but dug around in her jeans pocket, then slapped her hand into the cop’s, leaving behind a small gold key.
I frowned. "Why did you break in and steal a wombat, of all things?”
Libby's expression darkened, and she stomped her foot. "I didn't steal her! She's mine!"
Daisy whined, her leg still twitching as the cop worked that
