Right Kind of Wrong(95)

“Routine check on the fire alarms,” I say, my eyes fixed on Daren, who is still ogling her. “Got it.”

“Can I help you with something?” Ellen smiles sharply at him. “Looks like your eyes are lost.”

He readjusts his gaze. “Uh, no, ma’am. I was just wondering where Sarah was.”

“Sarah is working. And so are you.” Her hazel eyes drop to the case of water. “Why don’t you take that to the dining room? I think Angelo is stocking the bar this morning.”

He gives a single nod and walks off.

Ellen turns back to me and looks over my face. “Nice beard,” she says. “Pixie?”

I rub a hand down the smooth side of my jaw. “Yeah.”

She lets out an exasperated sigh. “Levi—”

“I’ll check out the fire alarms after I finish shaving,” I say, quickly cutting her off. Because I don’t have the time, or the balls, to undergo the conversation she wants to have with me. “Later.” I don’t give her a chance to respond as I turn and head for the stairs.

Back in the bathroom, I stare at my reflection in the mirror and shake my head. Pixie timed it perfectly, I’ll give her that. My facial hair is literally half-gone. I look like a before and after razor ad.

I think back to the irritated expression on her face and a small smile tugs at my lips. She was so frustrated, waiting outside the bathroom door with her flushed cheeks and full lips and indignant green eyes…

Why does she have to be so goddamn pretty?

I turn on the razor and run the blades down my jaw, thinking back to the first time I saw those indignant eyes cut into mine. My smile fades.

Pixie was six. I was seven. And my Transformers were missing.

I remember running around the house, completely panicked that I had lost my favorite toys, until I came upon Pixie sitting cross-legged in the front room with my very manly robots set up alongside her very dumb dolls.

I immediately called in the authorities—“Mom! Pixie took my Transformers!”—and wasted no time rescuing my toys from the clutches of the pink vomit that was Barbie.

“Hey!” She tried to pry them from my hands. “Those are the protectors. They kill all the bad guys. My dolls need them!”

“Your dolls are stupid. Stop taking my things. Mom! Mom!”

Haunted eyes stare back at me in the mirror as I slowly finish shaving.

I wish I would have known back then how significant Pixie was going to be.

I wish I would have known a lot of things.





Turn the page for an excerpt of the second book in Chelsea Fine’s Finding Fate series,

Perfect Kind of Trouble


Available now





1


Kayla


On the other side of the casket, a middle-aged woman wearing a navy blue dress glares at me.

The man in the wooden box has only been dead for three days and this woman already has me pegged as the slutty mistress he kept on the side. I’m probably an ex-stripper with a coke problem as well, based on the way she’s sizing me up. But this isn’t my first rodeo—or my first funeral—and deadly looks like the one Navy Nancy is angling at me are nothing new, unfortunately.

Now feeling a little self-conscious, I slowly slide my black sunglasses on and tip my head down, concentrating on the casket in front of me as the preacher/priest/certified-online minister drones on about peace and eternity.

It’s a nice casket, made of polished cherrywood with decorative iron handles and rounded edges. I should care more than I do about the deceased man within, but all I can think about is how that casket probably cost more than any car I’ve ever been in, and how the man inside is probably tucked against velvet walls lined with Egyptian cotton.

And now I’m angry. Great.

I promised myself I wouldn’t be angry today. Bitter? Sure. That was a given. But not angry.

Taking a deep breath, I raise my head and try to avert my attention. Behind my dark shades, I glance around the cemetery. More people showed up than I had expected, most of them looking like they’re sweet and respectable. I wonder how well they knew James Turner. Were they friends of his? Coworkers? Lovers? Folks around here probably show up at funerals regardless of their relationship with the deceased. That’s the thing about small towns; everyone cares about everyone else—or at least acts like they do.

“James was a good man,” the minister says, “who lived a solid life and has now gone on to a better place…”

A roll of thunder sounds in the distance and I turn my eyes to the heavy gray clouds above. The weatherman said it’s supposed to rain tonight. They’ll bury James, cover his casket with dirt, and rain will fall and seal him into the earth. What an ideal passing.