The woman vanished into the feverish din of the Bloomingdale’s crowd without so much as an apology. Mercedes touched my elbow, angling me away from the cashmere scarves as she pocketed her badge.
“Every year I need to use it at least twice. ” She shook her head and chuckled. “Christmas in this city should come with riot gear. ”
We negotiated our way through the seething mass of bodies until we reached the watch counter. The rows of Rolex and TAG Heuer timepieces were dazzling under the cleverly positioned lights. The price tags were what had my heart beating faster, though.
“Thirty-five-hundred dollars?” I stared at a silver and black TAG Heuer Aquaracer. It seemed to be chanting I belong on Lucas’s wrist. I couldn’t argue with it. The watch definitely suited the werewolf king of the East Coast and his sleek billionaire style. I, however, didn’t have the disposable income available to a Fortune 500 real-estate mogul.
I ran my fingertips over the cool glass and gave the watch a forlorn final glance.
“What do you buy a billionaire for Christmas?” I grumbled. Eight words I never thought I’d fit together in a sentence.
Mercedes smirked but checked her phone for the seven-hundredth time since we’d gotten here.
“Okay, Cedes, seriously. Either you’re having a scandalous affair via your cell phone, or something is up. ”
“Sorry, sorry. We’ve got an insane workload right now. With all these dead bodies popping up around the city lately, I’ve been working overtime every night. I’m exhausted and there’s no end in sight. ”
“What bodies?” I stood up straight and focused on her face. Corpses weren’t exactly unheard of in a city this size, but enough of them to raise police attention was worth hearing about.
“Still full of blood,” she added, forcing a weak smile. Well, at least we knew it wasn’t vampires. “Some of them do have small, ragged holes in the back of their heads, though. Frigging gross. ”
“Anything I can help with?” I was getting antsy without work to do for the council, and at this point I’d gladly take on a human case if it meant getting my hands dirty in the real world again. Sparring with Holden was great and all, but I needed the thrill of the hunt back in my life.
She pocketed her phone and placed one hand on each of my shoulders, staring in my eyes. “Secret, if I need you, I will ask. As of right now, just tell me if you see some nutcase running around with an ice pick, okay?”
“Sharon Stone: public-enemy number one. Understood. ” I nodded, proud of myself for not flinching when she’d reached for me. My natural inclination was to go on the defensive when someone touched me unexpectedly.
“Can we get back to this present hunt? I’d like us to get out of here without me drawing my weapon. ”
I grimaced. It wasn’t like I wanted to be shopping the week before Christmas either. It just so happened that this year I finally had people to buy for.
In previous years I would ship a box of Magnolia cupcakes and the finest dried herbs from Dean & DeLuca to my grandmere. She loved the red velvet cupcakes with their mile-high icing, and claimed the overpriced herbs worked best for her spell casting. I knew better than to argue with an aging witch.
My partner, Francis Keats, always disappeared for a month around Christmas, so I never had to get him anything. Mercedes had a more traditional religious take on the holiday and didn’t do gifts.
Now the game had changed. Not only did I need to get Grandmere’s usual gift, but I had a whole slew of people in my life I wanted to acknowledge. First there was Lucas Rain, my royal wolfie boyfriend. Then there was Desmond Alvarez, my other werewolf lover and current live-in boyfriend. I also wanted to get something for Desmond’s brother, Dominick, who had become a surrogate sibling to me over the past year.
Then I had the vampires to contend with. Brigit Stewart, my ward in the eyes of the vampire council, would be spending her first Christmas away from her family, thanks to her now being dead. And though Holden had never been on my gift list before, since I’d saved his life over the summer I thought I should get him a little something.
Last, but not least, was Nolan Tate. I’d come to his rescue too, and since summer he’d become a presence in my life.
Over the course of a year, I’d gone from no family save one, and few enough friends to count on one hand (with fingers left to spare), to now having an overburdened shopping list. But that list represented a beloved handful of people who had chosen to share my insane life with me.
“Secret. ” Cedes sighed and tapped out a message on her BlackBerry. “Do I really need to tell you what to buy Lucas for Christmas?”
I gnawed on my lower lip and toyed with my purse strap. The only shopping I knew how to do was for shoes.
“An iPod?” I queried.
The detective slipped her phone into her back pocket and gave me a knowing wink. “Lingerie,” she said, as though it should be obvious.
“Why would Luc…oh. ” When it comes to the finer points of typical feminine seduction techniques, I’m not always the swiftest, and sometimes I drop the ball completely. But today I caught on quick enough. “Wouldn’t an iPod be easier?”
“But is an iPod going to make him want to ravish you on the spot?”
“An iPod with Barry White on it might. ”
She smacked my arm, and I had to restrain my natural impulse to break her wrist. I didn’t want to hurt Mercedes, but when someone hit me it was second nature to fight back.