Shadowglass: The Shadowfae Chronicles - By Erica Hayes Page 0,1

forte. My nose looks a bit less pointy, my hair more blond than orange, my garish yellow skin fades to human tones. That’s about it. Glamour or not, I’m still the same geeky old me.

Blaze slid his arm over my shoulder to offer his fingertip, slick and adorned with a shimmering purple pill.

Naughty boy. I giggled, licked the pill off, and swallowed. It stung bitter, but his finger tasted of sherbet, sparkly and nice.

He rubbed his sharp nose in my hair, and I laughed, my blood hot and urgent, my head awhirl with fizzy-sweet vodka and the thrill of our night’s work. Forget the Valentis. Forget the world. Just me and my diamonds, jumping, twirling, dancing until I dropped. Yes.

Next to me a blue-haired vampire kid in leather and his girl kissed, bloody spit trickling on her chin as she swayed to the music, his fingers sliding beneath her skirt. A pair of shirtless trolls scoped for girls, sweat glistening on bulging green muscles and bell-pierced nipples. One winked at me, flicking ragged black hair from his eyes, and I pretended not to see him.

“Spice for Ice!” Blaze yelled, sparks showering. He’s allowed to make fun of my unfortunate name. He sizzled my pointed ear with his tongue. Shivers. Mmm. More tongue, slower and wetter than strictly necessary. Bet he’s got a hard-on.

I arched my butt backwards and giggled again. Oh, yeah. He’s wearing suction-tight leather pants—how he gets those on, I’ll never know—and they don’t leave much to the imagination.

I grinned, magical warmth already glowing in my guts. Blaze feels as good as he looks, and when he’s sparkled to the eyeballs and high from housebreaking and too much broken glass, he always tries something. But we’re just friends. We’ve got rules, and they don’t include dragging each other out the back for a hot dirty shag.

Blaze is my lucky charm. Other guys will laugh at me or hit me or play tricks on me just to watch me cry. Fairy girls get that. It’s a harsh fae-taunting world out there. Every week you hear about a new fairyslasher, a sadist, a murderer on the loose. Fairies aren’t people, see. We’re whispers, shadows, irrelevancies sheathed in desperate glamour so we won’t stand out or offend anyone or make anyone feel uncomfortable. We’re just flotsam, bobbing on the surface of real people’s lives. We just hang out and party. It’s what we’re here for. No one cares if we die or hurt or bleed.

But I know I’m safe with Blaze, even if he is a horny little rat.

That hunky troll bumped my hip, his beady black gaze slithering down over my ass, and Blaze snarled wet sparks at him and spun me away.

I snickered, and wriggled to face him, static shifting. He tossed bloodred hair and threw me that dazzling Blaze grin. He cuts his hair short in the back and scrunches it wildly too long at the front so he can shake it back like that and skewer you with his dirty black come-taste-me stare.

But I know he doesn’t mean it, not with me. He’s just having fun. I tickled his pointy teeth with my claw. “Go rub that thing on someone else, ya dirty whore.”

He slid bony fingers over my hip, keeping me just an inch or two away. His scent zinged my nose, fresh like a newly struck match. Rakish golden rings glinted in his pointy ears, and his studded black velvet jacket was cropped at his smooth hip with nothing underneath. Sweat caressed his narrow muscles in all the right places. He flicked his smoldering gaze to the bar for a second, ruby sparks jumping from his lips. “I can taste green. Azure’s watching us. Wanna tease her a bit?”

Azure’s our other best friend, as pretty and awesome as Blaze. I looked. She was watching us, with that glinting glaze over her eyes that meant trouble. “You’re cruel.”

“You’re scared.” He edged closer, sweat-slick skin sliding on my bare midriff. My breasts pressed against his chest, burning.

Already the purple pill flowered deep and hot inside me. It couldn’t be desire. I was far too sensible to want Blaze. Indignation lifted my eyebrows. “Am not. I’m sensible.”

“To hell with sensible. Let’s be reckless. I’m good at reckless.” He wetted his plum-red lips, and the smell of that moisture tripped warm dizzy waves in my skull. Hot fae boy. Lips. Diamonds.

I couldn’t keep the giggles in any longer, and I shoved him in the chest, tipping him backwards. “What