Page 24 of The Minotaur's Valentine

“Twenty, please.”

“Do you know where I could find a metalworker named Milo?” I ask as I count out fives and some ones.

“He’s in the back row.”

I nod and take the tissue-paper-wrapped pendant.

The wind howls suddenly and I shiver. The hot rush of energy I felt when Ricky smiled has been replaced with a need to lay down and have hot, wet, dirty fantasies involving my fingers and that man’s tongue.

But I’m so tired. By the time I make it to the line to get my fudge, I feel like I might faint. Even my libido has buggered off.

“Libby, my dear. You look pale.”

“Oh, hey. Mr. Minegold. How are you? Any more concussed cardinals?” I ask, hoping I don’t slur my words. I also want to point out that he has no business calling me pale. He looks like an ad for White-Out.

“Not recently, no. May I help you home?”

“I... okay.” I want to say no. I should say no. If this were any other town on the planet, I would totally say no. But Pine Ridge is so nice and safe. I’m sure Mr. Minegold will take me straight home in his car.

Except he doesn’t have a car with him. He takes me under the elbow and we walk. While we’re walking, he’s talking to me in a very soothing voice about the weather. I think it’s the weather.

And then we’re at my door. He tips his fedora and bows, then leaves.

He’s fast for an old guy.

I fall asleep without taking off my coat.

Chapter Twenty-Two: Milo

Isee it happen. Everyone in a ten-stall radius sees it happen.

Ricky is sucking energy out of Libby with an incubus kiss. (That means his tongue is in her mouth. I finally understand the phrase “seeing red.”) He’s doing this in public. In public. A public, human-friendly, human-active place!

I guess I should be grateful it’s just a kiss! He can’t really feed on her, or even worse, remove her soul (which I’m sure Ricky wouldn’t do) without doing something more than kissing.

I’m glad he isn’t trying to go that far, but still! That’s such bad manners. I hear Minegold bark, but I don’t turn my head. I’m snorting and pawing, my tail lashing, and I slam my expensive wireless headphones down on my cooler in case I have to go pull him off.

But I don’t. Ricky stops, and then he and Libby smile, laugh, and wave goodbye like sweethearts.

“Hey, I checked. She’s into it,” Ricky tells Minegold loud enough for me to overhear with my big ears swiveling. “She’s into us. People like us. When I’m done with her, want to try her out? You know what they say about vam—”

Minegold says something in Polish, and Ricky shuts up. I don’t think Ricky speaks Polish, but when Minegold speaks in his native tongue, he is royally pissed.

I don’t speak Polish, either, but I speak angry parental lecture and hand gestures, and it's not hard to guess what Minegold is saying. He is telling Ricky to straighten up and fly right and not to fool around with humans who are living amongst us. He’s reminding him that they don’t deserve to be exploited any more than we do.And then Libby goes home under Minegold’s arm. He’s walking at vampire speeds, holding her just off the ground. She looks dazed. I don’t think she even knows she’s not actually walking.

And Ricky comes to me.

“Make this into one of those things like you made for Charlotte,” he demands without preamble, his hands shaking as he counts out ten crisp tens. “I need it by Friday at six.”

“I can make the container. I don’t do the spell work. You need someone as powerful as Tessa to do that part. I’ll make the pendant, but I can’t use glass. It’ll shatter. It has to be metal.”

Ricky snarls and snatches back the money before stomping away.

It takes everything I have not to bellow, put my horns down, and charge his stupid, handsome, irresistible-to-women ass.

But the real guy I want to trample is me. This proves it. Ricky says Libby is okay with supernatural species. Well, incubi and maybe vampires. They look human and handsome.

Would she have been okay with me?

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