Down & Dirty: Supernatural Cleaning Services (Book 5)

I finally came face to face with the serial killer who's been stalking me...and it didn't end well.

I'm Paige Harper and I'm now afraid to leave my own house. But a girl can only hide from reality for so long. So when my ex-husband needs my help finalizing our divorce so he can get remarried—it just feels like another bump in the pot-hole road that is my life.

There’s a minor wrinkle, though. We gotta go to Fairieland and petition Oberon—the King of the Fae himself—to make our split official. As usual, Jax has everything figured out—for himself. Nico will come along as my fake boyfriend to convince the Faerieland King that I've moved on.

Sounds like hell.

But when my former flame suddenly becomes an online sensation and my connection to the serial killer goes public—jetting off to Faerieland with my ex-husband and the werewolf fake boyfriend (I might have real feelings for) sounds like a vacation.

What could possible go wrong? We just gotta remember the Faerieland rules: Don't eat anything. Don't make any bargains. And just like everywhere else—sometimes it's kill or be killed.

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Excerpt:

Chapter One

Kidnapped and tied up in the back of a van, I have time to evaluate my poor life choices.

I just saved my dirtbag ex who definitely didn’t deserve it. Which means that I did a good thing, and I did it just because it was the right thing to do, not because I expected a great karmic payoff in the future.

I guess it’s true. No good deed goes unpunished.

I just wanted to find Nico, collect Shauna and go home. My weekend at the sex cult was really draining, even though I managed to not have any sex. There was, however, plenty of drama and I needed some serious couch and TV time to recover from everything that went down.

But no, instead I came face to face with the Vampire Serial Killer.

I didn’t know it then. I was just confronted with a man in a ski mask and when I opened my mouth to scream, he pressed a Taser to my chest, dropping me like a rock.

Now I’m bound and gagged in a moving vehicle, being driven God knows where by a man who hates vampires and has been fixated on me for longer than I care to think about. I don’t know what VSK has in mind for me, but if the gruesome “gifts” he’d been leaving on my front doorstep—like the body of my neighbor’s cat—are any indication, I’m worried my insides might be on the outside if I don’t come up with something clever—fast.

I worry at my gag and manage to get it out of my mouth. Spitting out the rag I start screaming as loud as is humanly possible. I also kick at the side of the van, but I’m not even making a dent. I don’t care. If VSK thought I would go out quietly he is very much mistaken.

I’m tired and hoarse by the time the van pulls over. I try to sit up, but I’m solidly stuck on my back. Working out has always been more of an aspiration than an actual event. The van door opens and I’m hauled out unceremoniously and put on my feet.

It’s dark and I can’t see much but I still try to make a run for it. All I can manage is an awkward lope. My legs are still shaky from being tased and I only get about five feet before I fall on my face.

VSK—the fucker—chuckles.

He hoists me up, and I whip my head around, looking frantically for any sign of where I am. A road, a house number, a landmark. But VSK grabs the back of my neck and forces me to look straight ahead as he marches me to a door buried in the ground, opens it, and pushes me inside.

I hit every step on the way down and land hard on my shoulder. The door slams shut, the noise echoing through the basement room. With all the light completely cut off—even the dim haze of twilight from outside—I have a very bad feeling that my tan is not going to be improving any time soon. Although I should probably be more worried about my skin staying attached to my body, or at the very least not rotting off my bones. I’ve just been tossed into an underground bunker—I’ve got to prioritize my problems.

Number one—get the hell outta here. If Shit, my Dalmanther, had been with me at the Humans First rally, none of this would have ever happened. Shit would’ve dismembered VSK right there in the alley. But no, Nico insisted that Shit stay behind at the Together We Come compound, and I didn’t put up much of a fight.

I let out a cry of frustration. And then something touches my arm.

“Who’s there?” I shout, trying to squirm away.

“It’s just me,” answers a soft, male voice.

“Get away from me or I’ll cut off your balls and wear them as earrings,” I say. “I’ll make gloves out of your dick and choke you with them.” This threat is from my friend, Shauna—a pixie/vampire hybrid who likes to get creative with her violence. I don’t have her supernatural abilities, but I’m hoping I can borrow her words and a little of her insane swagger might come along with it.

“Huh,” comes the voice and he sounds legitimately confused. “How would you do that with your hands tied? Are you magic? Father wouldn’t let a supe in here.”

I’m not about to admit that I can’t do anything to him, I’m bound and can’t move. Still I’m hoping the anger in my voice might be enough to keep him away. “You’ll have to piss through your belly button when I’m through with you!”

“I would really prefer you leave my genitals and belly button alone. Those are very sensitive body parts,” comes the answer. “I was going to untie you...is it too dark in here for you? I can turn on a light.”

“Light,” I agree. And suddenly it’s very bright. I blink, trying to focus. There’s a man, slight of build, kind of like one of those men who still looks like a boy. He’s holding a pair of shears, the light gleaming off the metallic blades.

“Get away from me,” I shout.

He looks from the scissors in his hand. “I was going to cut your binds. May I?”

As it is right now, I can’t defend myself. I can’t even move. If he wants to stab me I can’t prevent him. “Do it,” I order. Immediately, he leans forward and obliges.

As soon as I have my arms free, I push myself up, grab the scissors and shuffle backwards until I hit a wall. My arms are shaky and full of pins and needles from the lack of blood flow, but I hold the scissors in front of me like they’re a knife.

“Who the fuck are you?” I ask.

The man tilts his head. “I’m…” he looks pained, rubs his temples. “I don’t know actually. I was in an accident, I think. I can’t always remember things.”

“Are you VSK?” I ask. Maybe he’s messing with me. Threw me down the stairs then snuck in a different entrance just to play mind games. I try to stand, but I can’t and slide back down the wall to the floor.

“VSK?” he asks. “I don’t know what that is.”

“Have you been living under a rock? VSK is all the news. The serial killer that hunts vampires? He’s been terrorizing the supes of New Jersey for over a year.”

The man shakes his head again. “Oh, I’ve been here longer than a year, I think,” he informs me. He doesn’t seem to be a threat, really, he’s so calm. But I can’t let my guard down. I still hold the shears in front of me as I look around the room.

The stairs that I was thrown down lead up to a door with a keypad lock. The room we’re in is cozy, almost like a studio apartment, with a little kitchenette off to the side. There’s a neatly made bed and an area rug, a bookshelf, and what I assume is a bathroom area, discreetly hidden behind a curtain. Unless, of course, there’s actually an operating table back there, and bloody, rusted tools hanging on the walls.

But the man standing in front of me seems about as scary as Darron after an opening-night flop. And a drag queen crying into his martini is not intimidating.

“How long have you been here?” I ask. “Were you kidnapped too?”

“Kidnapped?” he chuckles in a goofy sort of hee-haw type of way. “I haven’t been kidnapped. I like it down here. There’s too much noise up there.” He waves vaguely. “I don’t really know how long I’ve lived here, though. Time doesn’t pass properly anymore, not since my accident.”

I manage to get to my feet and use the wall to support me, and try to get a better feel for my surroundings. I always assess people by how clean their homes are, and this one is downright squeaky. I don’t even see any dust bunnies under the fridge. But I do spot something that might be way more sinister.

On the fridge are some kid’s drawings.

“Is there a child here?” I ask.

Again, the man gives me that look, like he has to really think hard. “No. I think those are mine from when I was a kid.”

“Have you been here that long?” I ask, finally letting my scissor-wielding arm drop to my side. The man crosses over to the fridge, running a finger over the crayon lines on the drawing. He traces the house and the sun and the happy little family. Then he traces the signature, written in the big blocky letters of a child.

Zach.

“Are you...Zach?” I ask.

He nods. “That sounds right.” He smiles at me and once again I’m struck by how boyish he seems.

“I’m Paige,” I tell him.

“Paige. Yes, I know.”

I take another step back. “And how do you know that, Zach?” I ask.

“Because you’re my new sister. Do you want to see your room?!”