Page 23 of Blood and Bonbons

“Don’t worry. Miles has us. We’ll figure this out.”

She hugged me back and nodded against my shoulder before straightening.

“If he’s researching something, we need to follow the breadcrumbs to him,” she said, digging her hand into her pocket.

I retreated a few steps as she pulled that nasty relic out of the bag.

She shook the shriveled schlong out onto the counter. A few fragments broke off, dusting the laminate surface.

“It’s not a dick. It’s a sheep’s scrotum.”

I gagged and turned away. “That doesn’t make it better.”

“The fae used to use scrotums for things that they wanted to withstand time’s decay. My grandparents told me about them. This looks to be centuries old.”

“You’re touching it, aren’t you?” I took deep breaths.

“The fae don’t usually let these get out into the world. I think this is it, Ev. You said it was in the cake? Hidden?”

“Yeah.” I finally looked over at her and witnessed her sniffing it. “I’m going to be sick.”

“Don’t be a baby. It’s still too dry to unroll it without cracking it, but it feels like he oiled it. He probably stashed it in the cake to hide it while it softened. Whatever is written inside could point to whoever might want it.”

“So Miles was kidnapped because he had a thing for oiling shriveled scrotum?”

Vena cracked a smile. “You were right about it being Shadow Trade related, then. But how did they get his necklace off if they were non-human? Or if they were human, how did they break in?”

“Maybe they knocked, and he answered the door.”

She shook her head. “No. He would have looked through the peephole first. If it were someone he didn’t know, he wouldn’t have answered. And even if he did, he would have put his research away first.”

“Unless it was someone he knew from the trade.”

She picked up his phone and unlocked it. “Maybe it’s one of his contacts. We can probably whittle down the list quickly.” She scrolled through his phone. “It’s mostly family and research contacts. I don’t see any names that jump out at me. But I bet spineless Spawn knows something.”

Any small amount of optimism I was shooting for crumbled at Spawn’s name. The goblin was currently Miles’ best customer at the Shadow Trade market…the last place I wanted Vena to go.

“We need to call your parents and tell them--”

She was already shaking her head. “No way. I’m not having them come back from their research trip early. They’ll end up panicking like they did with my grandparents’ disappearance. We’re going to be smart about this and quietly find out who borrowed my brother to persuade him to share his information. If he’s not safely back by the time they get home, I’ll tell them everything.”

She glanced at the scrotum then pulled the vampire’s ring from her pocket. “That gives us seven days to solve our two problems, and I know our first step.”

The nervousness that had my stomach tighter than the nutless sheep’s sphincter had a lot to do with Miles’ disappearance and the fact that, tonight, a pissed-off vampire was going to come for me. But it was also because I knew Vena. Without Miles’ calm reasoning and guidance, Vena was going to go rogue.

When she held up her first finger, I cringed.

“First, we have to lay a trap for the vampire tonight. Second, we have to find who wants the nut scroll. There’s only one place we can go for the information and weapons we need.”

“We arenotgoing to—”

“The Shadow Trade market. We’re going,” Vena said with a nod.

Shit.

CHAPTERFIVE

“Nothing good comesfrom the shadow world,” I said. “How many times have I said this?”

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