Page 16 of Hot Vampire Next Door: Season Four

“Be nice, Mouse? Be nice? This is a blatant display of something and until we know what it is, I will not be nice.”

With a grumble, I turn back to the fae. “Can you help us out? He’s a man that likes to know what he’s dealing with.”

The fae turns his bright blue eyes on Bran. “Not quite a man, is he?”

“Vampire. Close enough. Why are you kneeling outside of a diner?”

He cants his head and his tunic glimmers again with the movement. “It is our duty to show respect. But beyond that, you used your power, which means everything is about to change.”

I said it, didn’t I?

The fae looks back toward the diner where Stanley and Judy are now standing outside.

“You kept this from us, brownie.”

Stanley doesn’t balk. “There was a reason she was hidden and bound, and it wasn’t my place to decide to undo it. Nor was it yours.”

“Stanley, do you know this man?” I ask him.

“The name is Arion,” the fae answers. “And I am a Lord of the Summer Court.”

Though I’m trying my hardest not to appear overwhelmed, hearing his title makes my eyes pop open with awe.

“I didn’t know any of the high born were on this side,” Bran says.

“You wouldn’t.” Arion narrows his eyes when he looks over at Bran. “As I said, it’s none of your concern.”

Oh, well, shit. This isn’t going well.

Bran practically vibrates with rage.

I take a step, inserting myself between them before Bran has a fae heart dripping blood from his hand.

“It’s really nice to meet you, Arion,” I say, trying for diplomacy and kindness. After all, if I’m regarded as the villain, I need to do everything in my power to prove to them that I’m not.

“Can you at least tell us if you’re friend or foe?”

Arion shrugs, but it’s a calculated shrug with no ounce of casualness to it. “I think the answer to that question is entirely up to you.” He unclasps his hands from behind his back and offers up a thick card captured between his middle and pointer finger.

Before Bran can tell me otherwise, I snatch the card from the fae.

It’s thick, the paper creamy, but textured like linen. The text on the front is an elegant, looping handwriting and the note says: Moonlit side of Bramwell Pond. Tomorrow night at midnight.

I look up at Arion.

“Come if you wish. Or don’t. I don’t care.” He turns away and the fae crowd parts for him. He clearly rules what few fae remain on this side and my fear and anxiety turn into a knot.

I don’t like that I’ve literally never met this man, and I definitely don’t like that he immediately knew how and where to find me. It means he knows more about being fae than I do, which isn’t much at all.

He has the upper hand no matter how powerful I’m supposed to be.

I take a step to follow him when Bran hooks me by the elbow and whirls me around. “Where the hell do you think you’re going?”

I lean into him and lower my voice. “We need to find out what’s going on here.”

He takes the card from me and reads it over, then curses beneath his breath. “Waiting will be better, little mouse. Trust me.” He yanks me down the street away from the fae where they’re dispersing fast and following after Arion, the darkness of the night swallowing them up.

“Aren’t you curious about him? I hate waiting and I don’t want to run away,” I argue.

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