In-Between Work and Play (The Jocelyn Frost Series Book 1) (14 page)

Jocelyn

Client files
were updated, check.  Office straightened out, check.  Job secured, no check. 
Explanation for Lucinda’s murder, no check.  Proper contraceptives for demigods
and goddesses, no check.  Meeting with my regulars, no check.  Two didn’t show.

I closed Gwen’s
folder, praying that she had just lost track of time, or was busy with Hamish. 
Making a mental note, I decided to ask him if he’d seen her if I happened to
run into him while I was out with Dex.

My mind kept
drifting back to that newspaper article.  I didn’t know why it bothered me, but
it did.  I wasn’t even friends with any vampires, nor did I want to be. 

I know I should
have kept an open mind, but something inside me told me to stay as far away
from them as possible.  If only they were more like the sparkly vampires that a
good portion of the preteens and teens loved back on Earth.  But they were
not.  They were pretty much selfish pricks that cared about only two things:
blood and sex. 

Depending on the
species of their origin, their different allergies normally made them go boom! 
Those allergies came from their blood types.  Vampires that were originally
human had a greater intolerance to light than any other species.

My mind drifted
as I thought about all the different ways those vampires could have died. 
Several bizarre scenarios ran through my mind, but were quickly discarded.

I internally
winced when my thoughts were interrupted by a light knock on the door.  I
glanced at my phone.  Of course, someone would knock with only five minutes
left before I could leave for the weekend.

“Hey, Jocelyn?” 
Zack’s boyishly handsome face popped into the doorway. 

For the love of
Odin, I so did not want to deal with him. “Hi Zack, how can I help you?”

“I just wanted
to say thanks for giving me those files.  I’ve been studying them all day.”

I knitted my
brows together. “I didn’t send you any files.”

“Sure you did.
Inez hand delivered them herself.” So my initial instincts were correct!  The
pile she took out of my office was for Zack.  That, however, did not explain
what happened to the rest of them.  He grinned. “She’s really great.  I’ve
learned so much from her.”

“I’m sure you
have,” I dryly stated.  A voice in the back of my mind reminded me to file a
complaint about her when I returned from Erda.  Then again, she was my
supervisor, so it would be my word against hers, and I didn’t want any time
tacked onto my seemingly never-ending contract if I were accused of slander. 
It was worth the risk.  Who knew? Maybe they had an empath on the Board of Department
Supervisors?  Perhaps, that could have worked in my favor.

He looked a
little lost by my inability to throw sunshine up his butt.  I almost felt bad
until he said, “I know I’m not supposed to say anything, but congratulations on
the baby.”

I rolled my head
in defeat. “Zack, come in here and close the door.”

His brows
knitted together, but he did as he was told.  I knew he couldn’t keep a secret
to save his life, but I also didn’t want him to believe a lie. 

“Is something
wrong?”  Zack plopped himself down on one of the accent chairs.  He actually
looked worried.  Maybe he thought I miscarried? I almost felt guilty
contradicting Inez’s lies. 

Doubt kept
poking the back of my brain like a thumbtack holding up a pro and con list on a
cork board.  This conversation could have gone down one of two ways.  One
result was denial.  Being that he worked closely with her, Zack may not have
wanted to believe she was lying to him.   The other result was acceptance.  He
might have noticed her insincere behavior and our conversation may have been
the only opportunity to confirm what his gut already knew.

It was now or
never.  The words were ready to fly free from my mouth, but I chickened out.
“Zack, I’m not pregnant.  I’m not even planning on starting a family any time
soon.  I would actually like to finish my contract with the BCW before I even
consider having kids.  I really love my job and if, for some strange reason, I
got pregnant before that happened, I would like to find a way to keep working
here.”

He sat there in
silence, processing everything I told him.  When the silence became awkward, I
got up from my desk.  I chewed on my lip and retrieved a bottle of water from
the fridge, which I handed to him.

After taking a
long sip of water, he stood up and headed toward the door.  I wasn’t sure if he
believed me or not.  For all I knew, he could have been running straight to
Inez to confront her. 

I felt bad for
him, but I also didn’t know him very well.  I just wanted to make sure that he
knew where I stood without directly throwing our boss under the bus. 

I don’t know.
Maybe if I weren’t so overwhelmed, I might have thought his lack of response
was weird.  But then again, I react weirdly on a daily basis. Did any little,
red flags wave inside my head?  I wasn’t sure.  If anything, they were iffy at
best.

Surprisingly,
when I saw it was already ten after four, I knew I had rush out of there  to
meet Dex at the Archive. 

I logged off my
computer.  I half expected Inez to pop in, but she didn’t.  Instead, I found an
envelope on the floor in front of my door.  I could have sworn it wasn’t there
ten minutes before, when Zack was still in the office.

Thinking back, I
didn’t recall seeing him holding it at any time.  But there it was, staring
right up at me.  There was no writing on it.  Hoping to avoid further
distractions, I picked up the envelope and shoved it into my desk before I
locked up.

Walking across
the Department Mall’s lawn at this time of day was pretty uneventful. 
Intramural teams played tag football.  Tour guides stopped in front of the
various departments while reassuring new recruits from Earth that they were
perfectly safe. 

I refused to
think about work.  If I lost my job,
I lost
my job
.  Rolling my ring between my finger and thumb, I stopped to
take a deep breath.  Maybe I should have filed a complaint before I left for
Erda. 

“Is that a
wedding band?” Finley’s voice caught me off guard.  Dressed in a long-sleeved
Henley with overalls and work boots, he lazily lounged on the steps leading up
into the Archive. 

It took me a
minute, but it was probably only about ten seconds before I realized that
something was missing.  “Holy Helheim! Where’s Bill and Ted?”

“Those maggots? 
They already went to Erda. Turns out, they were more than willing to locate
your brothel on such short notice.”  He gave me a killer smirk that spoke
volumes about the type of activities those two were-gorillas participated in on
their one-day-a-month of freedom. 

“Wait a second;
that’s way too much information to process.”  I dropped my ring in order to rub
the bridge of my nose. “Aren’t you boiling hot?  It’s like eighty degrees out
here.”

“Aren’t you the
observant one?  Well, Frost, temperature fluctuations don’t really bother me. 
Besides, I consider my arms my best asset for attracting the ladies. I wouldn’t
want to get them all cut or burnt up, you know.”  He rolled up a sleeve and
flexed his bicep as a nymph and a fairy clad in string bikinis heading toward
the Sex Department walked by. 

They stopped and
giggled. “Are you going to the orgy, Fin baby?”  The nymph swung her hips as
she sashayed over to his side.  She latched onto his arm while tracing her
fingertips down his chest.

I personally
wanted to puke at the totally inappropriate public display of flirting, but
that was just me. 

Finley slid one
hand around her waist. “As much as I would like to make some magic with you,
ummm, baby, I have other plans tonight.”

The nymph pouted
her glossed-up green lips.  “I’ll miss you.”

“Yeah, Fin. It
won’t be the same without you!” The fairy added with a flutter of her neon pink
wings.

“Maybe next
Friday, ladies.”  He gave the nymph a quick smack on the rear.

The fairy blew
him a kiss and linked arms with her friend.  Shaking my head, I watched them
stroll down the sidewalk.  “You couldn’t even remember her name?” 

“Eh, once you’ve
dipped your wick in one nymph, they all tend to feel and sound the same.”  He
linked his arm with mine.  “Come on now, we best be going before your boy gets
his tighty-whities into a twist.”

“We’re not
meeting Dex here?”  I looked over my shoulder at the empty steps leading up to
the Archive. 

“Nah, change of
plans. He’ll explain once we get back to the house.”  He slid his arm free,
then tapped my ring with his index finger.

“Hey,” I swatted
his hand, “personal space, buddy.”  I put a little distance between us. I liked
Finley, don’t get me wrong, but my ring was located snugly between my breasts,
and I did not like him crossing that line.

“Sorry, Frost,
but you never answered my question.” His ears actually turned a shade of red.

“Which was?”

“Is that a
wedding band?”

I rolled the
ring between my fingers again.  “Oh. No, it’s not.  It belonged to my father,
Baldur.  He left it on the pillow after his one-night-stand with my mother.”

“Huh?  Does it
do anything, like make you invisible or turn you into something?”  He reached
for it again. 

“For the love of
Odin!” I gave him a glare. “I’ll let you look at it back at the house.  The
last thing I need is for it to accidentally fall into a gutter.”

“No need to get
hostile with me. I just was curious, that’s all.”  He shrugged right before he
decided to check out another pair of fae heading toward the Sex Department. 

I dropped the
subject.  Discussing the lack of male role models in my life always dampened my
mood.  “What about you?  What’s your claim to this crazy dimension? Or are you
one of those poor humans that were drafted after college?”

His eyes shifted
away from the faes’ display of ripe goods. “I’m like you, my dear, half-human
and half-godling.  My pop’s Luchtaine of the Tuatha De Danann.  And just so you
know, there is no one better at carpentry than a child of Luchtaine.”

“Huh?  The
Tuatha De Danann were French. I mean, gods of Gaul?”  I hadn’t heard anyone
talk about them too much before, so I wasn’t entirely sure if they were the
ones originally responsible for watching over the region that covers modern day
France.

“Cut your tongue
out and serve it for supper.  No.”  He gave me a look suggesting that I just
insulted him.  “Gaelic mythology is filled with their stories.  They once
inhabited what you call Great Britain.  Eventually, they were ‘driven out’ of
that region and forced to live ‘underground.’”

“Where did they
go?”

“Why, to a
perpendicular dimension and Erda, of course.”

I guessed as
mankind became more independent, they relied less and less on the gods.  No
longer needed, they eventually disappeared from history.

“Wow, so you’re
a demigod.  What about your sister?”  I wondered if I were being too personal. 
But then again, he froze my panties—you can’t get any more personal than that.

“We’re
triplets.  What about you?  I find it hard to believe that you’re an only
child.” 

Crap, maybe I
shouldn’t have asked him that question.  “I had a sibling, but there was a car
accident when my mom was pregnant with us, and well…  I survived, but my
sibling didn’t.”  I picked up my pace. 

The accident
wasn’t something I liked to talk about, but every once in a while, I have a
recurring nightmare.  I’m nice and comfortable, tucked into a bed.  There is
someone else cuddling with me, but I never look at him, or her.  In the
distance, there is a doorway where I can see my mom.  She’s talking to someone,
but I can see that she is smiling.  Then, all of a sudden, everything starts to
shake.  My mother screams as our bed flips over.  Through the doorway, a
beautiful woman with steel-grey hair and beady black eyes rushes towards us
with a knife in her hand.

I wake up,
feeling shaken and scared.  I know who that woman was even if no one actually
ever told me her name.

Hel paid us a
visit that day.  She took my sibling away just like she took away my father
long ago, before his resurrection.