Crimes of Cupidity (Heart Hassle Book 3)

I’m crying in a smoke tree.

Like, a literal smoke tree. As in, it’s smoking. Instead of leaves, the branches just have wisps of curling, thick smoke that constantly change color. I’m not sure why I decided to land on one of its branches, enter my physical body, and start crying. It just seemed like if I was going to have a total breakdown, it was a good idea to do it with a bunch of rainbow smoke around.

I have snot and tears on my face and my hair smells like smoke, but at least it’s hiding me from any prying eyes. The colored smoke curls around me like it’s giving me a little hug. Yeah, I know. That’s weird, right? Right. But I’m wallowing right now, and I could really use a hug, so if that means that I have to pretend to get it from a weird magic smoking tree, then dammit, that’s what I’ll do.

I sit on the branch and have an emotional breakdown until I can’t cry anymore, while Lex sits on a branch beside me in stoic silence. When my tears finally dry up, my eyes are painfully puffy and I feel perfectly miserable, but the flood that escaped me helped unleash the torrent inside, so I feel a little steadier. I still have a job to do.

I have to shove all thoughts of Okot out of my mind for now, otherwise, I’ll just want to crawl into a ball and sleep for a hundred years so that I don’t have to deal with the pain that I’m feeling. But I can’t do that. The princess needs me. My genfins need me. I have to get Princess Soora out of the prison and find my mates.

After that…then I’ll deal with the pain of Okot’s betrayal. But not now. I had my cry, and that’s all I’ll allow myself for now.

“Better?”

I look over at Lex where she’s perched on a branch, looking at me expectantly. She looks so prim and proper with her sleek pink hair and wrinkle-free clothes, while I…I have rainbow smoke stains on my dress and my face is splotchy from my sob fest.

I’m also not positive that I don’t have snot in my hair. What? I just had my heart broken. A girl is entitled to ugly cry.

Lex’s question hangs between us. Am I better? No. Not at all. But I wipe my nose on my arm and nod at her anyway. “Yeah.”

Lex does some crazy limber move and swings from her branch to mine, landing gracefully beside me. If I’d have tried that move, I would’ve for sure lost my balance and fallen to the ground in a clumsy heap.

“I’ve fixed over nine hundred thousand broken hearts,” she tells me matter-of-factly. “My method is tried and true. You choose one or more acceptable replacements, and I will hit them with two Love Arrows in rapid succession and then add precisely three Flirt Touches upon first glance. It’s a guaranteed love-at-first-sight outcome that has a success rate of eighty-two percent.”

I blink at her. “Umm…wow. That’s really something.”

“I take great pride in doing my job well.”

I sniff. “Thanks for the offer, but no thanks.”

She cocks her head and reaches behind her to her quiver full of arrows. “I could go to the mate in question and hit him with Love Arrows? Granted, it might not work on him. He seemed quite enraged.”

“No thanks to that, either, Lex.”

The last thing I want is for any of my guys to have their feelings pushed into love territory by force. Especially Okot. He betrayed me. Lied to me. Faked everything. I want to get love on my own without cupid intervention.

A thought occurs to me. “Wait. How are you here? I thought only I was able to cross in and out of the Veil.”

She shakes her head. “As your assistant, I come automatically whenever you need aid. I suppose that goes for when you are in the physical realm as well.”

I run a hand down my face. “You won’t start malfunctioning, right?”

“No, I have travelled for Seedy to the physical realms in the past. The Veil understands it’s part of my duties.”

“Oh, okay. Good.”

“Forgive me, but…are your hands dirty?” she says, staring at my palms.

I look down at them, and realize that they do look dirty. Filthy, even. I rub them together, and brown particles fall to the ground.

“Is that dust?” she asks.

I glower at the pile that lands on my feet. “Nope. Not dust. Sand,” I tell her. “Sandman powers. Sandwoman? Sandlady? Sandperson? Whatever, you know what I mean.”

Her brows shoot up in surprise. “Oh.”

I try to dust off the…dust, but the movement just makes my cupid boss mark start glowing pink again. I sigh and give up.

“At least the pink glow can give off light whenever you’re in the dark,” she says hopefully. She’s really a glass half-full of a fruity cocktail kind of girl. “And I’ll bet you can find a way to use all your new powers in a way that will help all of lovekind.”

I peer over at her curiously. “You really like being a cupid, don’t you?”

She nods enthusiastically. “I do. Making Love Matches, watching people get so filled up with love that they nearly burst…it’s fulfilling.”

“No wonder you’re always Cupid Of The Month.”

“Thank you,” she beams.

I take a deep breath and get my bearings. “Okay, why don’t you go back to Cupidville for now? It’s not exactly safe where I’m going, and I know you’re excited about getting in that Love surplus you were talking about.”

She looks me up and down, no doubt noting that I look like I’m barely holding myself together, and shakes her head. “No, Madame Cupid Emelle. I’ll stay with you.”

“Lex…”

“Don’t worry,” she rushes in to say. “At the first sign of trouble, you can push me back into the Veil.”

I can see by the look on her face that I’m not going to talk her out of it. Short of ordering her away, she’s going to stick with me. And honestly? I’m glad for the company.

“Okay, then. From this moment on, we’re in super spy mode. Let’s go invisible. I need to fly to an island and see about a thief, and believe me, we don’t wanna get caught.”

She practically bubbles over with excitement. “Do you think we can shoot some Love Arrows on the way?”

“Have at it.”

“Yay!” she claps.

We both go into the Veil and fly through the kingdom. It’s clear that Okot alerted the soldiers of my presence, because guards are scouring the city, even more so than before. Lex shoots at least a dozen fae with arrows before I make her stop and we take to the sky. She follows beside me as I head straight for Arachno’s banishment island. It’s easy to find, since my genfins’ banishment island is below the kingdom’s, and then Arachno’s isn’t far off from that.

It doesn’t take long for us to get there. Neither of us have to worry about the protective barrier, so we pass through it without a hitch. Following Princess Soora’s directions, I start scouring for Belren’s secret hideout. Luckily, it’s on the other side of the creepy, rocky island where Arachno’s cave is located.

I find the mountain at the edge of the island, and we float all the way to the top. “What are we looking for?” Lex asks.

“There should be a door,” I say, looking around the rocks. I know we’re in the right place. I just need to find…

“This door?”

I whip my head around and see Lex pointing to a flat slab of rock propped up against the mountainside. I fly over and immediately find an H carved into the side. It’s tiny—barely an inch across.

I give her an impressed look. “You are super good at this assisting stuff.”

She practically gleams. “Thank you!”

We float through the stone door and then pop into our physical bodies.

“Come on,” I say, grabbing her arm and pulling her forward.

We make our way down the winding stone tunnel that was carved into the mountain. There are some sconces hanging on the wall every few feet that magically burst with light as we pass.

“What’s that noise?”

I stop to listen, and my ears perk up. “I think it’s…music? Go invisible, Lex. Just in case.”

She nods and pops out of view, and I hurry toward the sound. When I get to the end of the tunnel, I find a fae slumped over, snoring soundly against the wall. Edging past him, I push open a crooked wooden door and walk into the huge room.

Sure enough, the music is coming from a quartet of fae collected on a makeshift stage, playing flute-like instruments. There are a dozen more fae gyrating to the music while in various stages of undress. The room is smoky and reeks of fairy wine.

In one corner, there’s a group of fae getting it on while another group sits by to watch. Belren is right in the thick of it.

“That damned Horny Hooker,” I mutter through clenched teeth. He’s lying on his back, his gray horns curled over his silver mask as he sucks on a fairy pipe and blows smoke into the air in the shape of butterflies. Female and male fae alike are tittering around him, acting perfectly impressed.

I march over and stand over him with my arms crossed. “What the hell are you doing?”

His gray eyes snap up to mine in surprise. He takes a moment to look at me, his eyes calculating through the slits in the mask. “I thought I made you promise never to come back to this island,” he murmurs.

He takes a long, slow drag from the pipe before pursing his lips and blowing a stream of smoke up at me. A smoke butterfly forms and starts flapping its wings in front of my face.

“Yeah, well, that was before I had to track your thieving ass down.” I wave my hand to dissipate it, which makes several of the other fae boo me. I frown at them. “You shouldn’t boo people. It’s not nice.”

A slow smile spreads over his face. I can just barely see his flashing white teeth beneath the mask. “It really is you. You’re back,” he says, more to himself than to me, as the smoke curls around him. From the smell, I know that he’s not just smoking bay leaves. This stuff seems…potent.

In one fluid movement, he rolls up to a standing position, grabs my arm, and then starts pulling me out of the room toward a wooden door at the back. When we’re inside, he closes the door behind him, plunging the room into darkness. Total darkness.

You know, except for my glowing cupid boss mark.