He grinned as he decided to spy on the cute little fairies. He knew he should be careful. The fae in any form were dangerous, so he had to stay out of sight. But they were pixies, all shaped like cheeses. And wasn’t that the most adorable sight ever?
He needed to take pictures. No way could he explain this to Nero without evidence. He silently pulled out his cell phone as he tried to make sense of what they were doing.
Simply put, they were playing Angry Birds. The pixies were loading a slingshot full of cheddar cheese bombs and launching it at a knee-high structure made of rocks and sticks. In the game, there would be a pig in the makeshift structure, and he could see something inside it, but he couldn’t tell what. And now he knew what those puffs of orange were. They came from little cheddar cheese bombs exploding against the stick structure.
Totally precious! He was so captivated that he forgot that the air smelled incredibly foul, especially after one of those cheese bombs exploded. He made the mistake of inhaling.
Oh hell. There was no way to stop the sneeze. He tried, but everything he did just made more noise before a truly loud, from-the-gut sneeze ripped through his nostrils.
When his watering eyes finally cleared, he saw that every single cheese was staring at him. And pointing. And screaming one word in unison.
“Attack!”
Chapter 8
BRUCE DISCOVERS FAIRY CHEESE
BRUCE FELT safe, which was weird because nothing in his life was safe. Not his job, not his parents, not even his little brother. The only one he felt reasonably confident about was his little sister, Ivy, but that was because she’d finished her deployment and was home. No suicide bombers likely to get her in Indiana.
And yet life had never felt more relaxed than it did when he stretched out on a bench with Laddin. Normally hyperactive guys like Laddin drove him nuts. Squirrels were less animated than his trainer. And yet the man made him laugh. Even better, he respected Laddin’s intelligence, which made him feel like he wasn’t alone against a whole lot of crazy. Apparently that relaxed him enough to fall asleep right there on the bench when he really ought to be finding out what it meant to be a werewolf.
He knew he should force himself to wake up, but every firefighter knew the value of a good nap. He’d doze for five more minutes, then start asking questions.
It went exactly as he planned. Five minutes into sleep, he started asking questions. Only he just wasn’t talking to Laddin. No, Mr. Salad Elf appeared right in front of him, his tomato hat slipping to the left so that a tomato seed dangled from his ear like an earring.
“Really?” Bitterroot said, gesturing at his outfit. “Can’t you think of something else? My clothing comes from your memoires.”
“Nope,” Bruce answered, happy to torture the fairy any way possible, if only in this dream.
The dream prince snorted in disgust, then spent a long minute studying him. Finally Bruce gave up waiting.
“What do you want?”
“It’s not about me, Bruce. What do you want?”
“I don’t want anything from you.”
“Are you sure?” He held up the glowing apple, his expression making him look like the snake in the Garden of Eden. Bruce didn’t have to look twice to recognize it as the same apple he’d been offered before. The one that would give him more, whatever that meant. As far as he was concerned, it was all bullshit.
Bruce waved his hand, knocking the thing aside. But of course, this was a dream—that was the only way to explain the fact that he was sitting on a bench made of celery—so the apple stayed right where it was, pulsing with temptation.
“Things didn’t go so well with Josh, did they?”
“What do you care?”
“Well, think about it. You want to protect your baby brother, right?”
Bruce grunted his agreement. He didn’t mean to, but the sound reverberated through the dreamscape anyway.
“That cherry you ate made you his equal,” Bitterroot continued. “He’s got just as much magic as you do. So you can’t protect him from anything he can’t handle himself. What kind of a big brother is that?”
“It’s the kind he’s got. Besides,” Bruce drawled, “it’s not the size of the wand that matters—”
“But the magic within it,” Bitterroot finished for him. “And you have a cherry’s worth of magic. I’d say that’s small potatoes, but what you ate was tinier than even that.”
Bruce winced but didn’t push. Yeah, the apple was all bright and beautiful. He knew it would taste like the best apple ever made. Hell, his taste buds were still yearning for another cherry, but he knew this apple would be even better.
But he didn’t move. His issues with Josh wouldn’t be solved by a bigger magical dick, so he looked away. Except… he couldn’t look away, so he forced his eyes shut. Only they were already shut, because this was a dream.
In the end, he fuzzed out his thoughts. “If that’s all you’ve got,” he murmured, “I was taking a nap.”
“Are you so sure about that?” the fairy taunted. “I think your partner might prefer you to be awake.”
At first his mind flashed to his partner at the firehouse, but Joey was doing fine. Last he’d heard, the fireman was on a Disney vacation with his sister’s kids and probably rocking it out with Mickey. Meanwhile, Mr. Salad Elf huffed out a crouton and threw it at Bruce’s head.
“Not that partner, idiot. That one.” The landscape around them zeroed in on Laddin screaming as he flailed at… at… flying Cheetos? Bruce couldn’t see clearly, and the more he blinked and focused, the less he could make out.
Then he saw Laddin’s face. He’d gone pale, and his skin showed sweat. He was flailing at something and maybe screaming. Bruce couldn’t hear, but the panic was clear—Laddin’s
