Mad, Bad & Dangerous

holding a youth who’d just pissed himself.

“Ain’t ever dull with you around,” Tyrnan called down, and she scowled at him as Willifus looked up and recognized his host.

“Sir!” he cried, and Kett rolled her eyes. Was it inbreeding, she wondered, or was the kid just destined to be thick? “My lord, this…harpy assaulted me!”

“No she didn’t,” Bael said. “She kicked your ass.”

“And that harpy,” Tyrnan said, hands in his pockets, “happens to be my daughter.”

This time Kett swore the wolf laughed.

“Where the hell is Tanner?” Tyrnan said, looking around. “I swear to gods, why the hell do I bother to invite the captain of the guard?”

“He got called back to the ngardai,” said a young man with a garda badge, muscling his way through the crowd. Kett figured he was Eithne’s boyfriend Verrick. “I’ll take them.”

Tyrnan wavered. On the one hand, he didn’t approve of Eithne having a boyfriend, even if he was a garda. On the other, he clearly didn’t approve of Willifus being present at his party.

He pulled a set of handcuffs from his pocket and handed them to the young garda, who took them wordlessly and leapt down to cuff Willifus’ wrists, ignoring his protests that it was inhumane to cuff an injured man.

“Should have thought about that before you ripped her dress,” Kett said. “Your mate with the sword, he got a permit for it?”

“He doesn’t need one,” Willifus said. “His father is Lord-”

“Don’t give a fuck who his father is,” Kett said. “He still needs a permit.”

“I’m going to need a coach or a cart, and some rope, unless anyone has any more handcuffs on them,” said Verrick.

“Sure,” Bael said, taking a set out of his pocket, and Kett tried not to stare. “I guess we’ll have to improvise later, sweetheart.”

Kett was glad it was dark, because she didn’t think she’d ever live it down if she blushed.

She pinched the bridge of her nose, her headache back again, and thought wistfully about the screaming hot sex she should have been having. Catching Bael’s eye, she wished, just for a split second, that she could fold herself into his arms and be held, like Tane had held Giselle, but that was stupid because no one had ever held Kett like that in her life. And anyway, it was pathetic, needing to be rescued like that. She could take care of herself.

And besides. She didn’t want Bael to hold her. She was supposed to be distancing herself from him.

“Oh now, this just isn’t fair,” came Chance’s voice from the terrace. She appeared with the light behind her, lending her lovely features an angelic glow, and withdrew from her bag a set of handcuffs. “Nobody told me the real party was out here.”

Kett caught the handcuffs and stared at them. “Am I the only person here who doesn’t carry these around with me?”

Wisely, no one responded. Kett cuffed the last of the boys and handed him into the carriage that had been brought ’round as Verrick climbed up into the driver’s seat.

Chance, her pretty nose wrinkling as she regarded the boys who’d attacked Giselle, glided to Kett’s side and murmured, “Can I have a word, darling? In the house. Private business.”

Kett nodded wearily and started toward the house, then stopped, swore and turned back to Bael. “Private business” was probably going to involve talking about Koskwim, and she couldn’t let him in on that. There were heads of state who didn’t know about the Order-she couldn’t tell one feckless Nasc about it.

“Bael,” she said, and he turned to her, handsome in the darkness. “Will you go with Verrick to the Free Hospital and keep an eye on these three until he gets someone else in to chaperone them?”

Bael narrowed his eyes and she was sure he was going to protest, but then he surprised her by nodding easily. “Sure, sweetheart. I’ll see you later. Are you okay?”

“Five by five,” she said automatically.

He kissed her cheek, which stunned her into silence, and hopped up onto the seat beside Verrick. Var leapt into the coach, Bael reached back and shut the door, and a whimper came from inside.

“Don’t, you know, kill anyone,” Kett said, and he just laughed.

Feeling suddenly very tired, Kett trekked back up to the terrace, cutting ’round past the ballroom and entering one of the salons flanking it. Chance caught up to her, Dark padding along beside her with his tail swishing.

“Tane’s girlfriend’s very pretty,” she said, and Kett tried to remind herself that this was no reason to hate the girl. “Pity she doesn’t seem to have a clue about defending herself. Perhaps you and I can give her a few lessons?”

Kett shrugged and led them into what Nuala was probably calling the Slightly Purple Drawing Room. As she was closing the door behind herself, it swung open again and she spun to see Striker, striding into the room and sneering at everyone.

“Oh good,” she said flatly. Nothing like a psychopath to make a party go with a swing.

“Kett!” Chalia cried, wandering into the room. “Look at you!”

“Yes, I’m wearing a dress, I have breasts, get over it,” Kett said, slamming the door and debating whether to lock it. Her parents and siblings knew about Koskwim, and several of the guests were members of the Order, but she couldn’t risk an innocent member of Elvyrn society wandering in.

Assuming there was such a thing as an innocent member of society.

“What?” asked Chalia. “No, not the dress. You got laid.”

“Recently,” Striker said, looking her over.

“In the minstrel’s gallery,” Chance added, and when Kett stared, she clarified. “I swear to gods, I just happened to glance up.”

“Great,” Kett said. “Now that we’ve discussed my sex life-”

“Sweetheart, I’m just glad you’ve finally got a sex life,” Chalia said.

“You wanted to talk about-”

“I know, three years,” Chance said, appalled. “Which reminds me.” She turned her beautiful eyes on Striker.

“No,” he said warily.

“I haven’t even asked you yet!”

“Still no.”

“Striker,” Chance said, pleadingly. “Dad, please.”

Kett and Chalia gaped at her. Even Dark, still in his lion form, looked stunned.

“You never call me that,” Striker said, staring at his daughter.

“It’s true,” Chalia said, seating herself prettily on a chaise. “Since she was a baby, she called him Striker.” She grinned. “Except she couldn’t pronounce her T’s or R’s very well, so it sounded more like psycho.”

“Always said she was smart,” Kett muttered.

“Striker,” Chance said, scowling beautifully and burying her fingers in Dark’s long mane. “Have you seen the enchantment on Kett?”

All eyes turned toward Kett, who squared her shoulders and glared back at them all. Striker sauntered over, ran his fingers half an inch above her skin and frowned.

“Like a net,” he said. “Dense. Tough. Interesting.”

Kett waited for someone to say that sounded just like her, but no one did.

“It’s been on her since Nihon,” Chance said.

“What’s it do?”

“You can’t tell?” Kett asked, surprised as much as anything.

Striker gave her a narrow-eyed look and closed the distance between his hand and her shoulder.

Then he jerked it away as if he’d been burned and stared at her.

“What?” Kett asked.

“That-” He touched her again, shook his head. “Bad mojo, pet. And you’ve had it on you before.”

“No I haven’t,” said Kett, pretty sure she’d remember.

“Yes, you have. For eight years.”

His pale eyes were steady on hers as she tried to figure out what the hell he meant. Eight years of being unable to change her shape? Ever since she could remember, she’d been able to-