Page 5 of Colby (Tucker’s Pride #5)

“Oh, I thought that she was in jail. Didn’t you tell me that she was in jail?

” Crumble explained again, he thought it was the fourth time, that while the woman was at the jail, she hadn’t been arrested.

Just a witness to a murdered human. Thinking he’d finally gotten it figured out, he drove them both to the police station and asked for Officer Colrain, who had been in charge when Crumble had been there.

“Is she your master?” While he hated that word, he knew that it was the only one that the little faerie would understand when talking about the person he was supposed to be looking after.

“Nay, she is my friend’s master. Darling was off tonight, and I was with her.

I didn’t see anything. She kindly kept me away from the murderer.

But she asked me to get one of the Tuckers, and you were the closest one that I knew to her.

” He was there because he was a Tucker and close.

Better, he supposed, than being the one dead, he shivered.

“I don’t usually go out on trips like this one, but Darling’s wife just had them a baby, and he wanted to be there with her.

Emma, the master, understood and said it was fine by her to have another in his place.

She’s very nice, Ms. Emma. The others, your family, has taken her under their armpits and want her to keep safe. ”

“It’s wing, not armpits.” Crumble looked confused and said that humans didn’t have wings. Letting it go, Colby changed the subject. “So why am I here if she’s not in trouble? I’m assuming that she had some kind of part in the accident?”

“Nay, she had nothing to do with it. Because of her magical truck, she stopped in time to not do more damage. She is very lucky, the officer said, in that she didn’t muck up—I don’t know what that means—any more than it already is. It was three cars that slammed into one another.”

Colby was getting more and more information and understanding less and less.

He didn’t have a faerie around all that often, but when he did, he knew them to be confusing and a little aggravating.

It was why he had opted not to have one around him when he came here.

He didn’t want to have to spend all his time trying to figure out what was being said.

Finding the girl was easier than he thought it might be.

She wasn’t in a cell but in one of the offices of the large stationhouse.

There was a blanket over her head, and he could see water stains on the back of the towel.

Entering the room with her, Crumble said her name lightly so as to get her attention.

~*~

Emma looked at the man after asking Crumble if he was all right. She might well have done that several times over the last few hours, but she couldn’t remember. She remembered a lot that had happened, but talking about the little person who might well have saved her life, she didn’t remember.

“Crumble said that you were near an accident.” She nodded and told him that it had happened right in front of her. “I’m sorry to hear that. He said that several people were killed when the crash happened.”

“I didn’t hit the car by an inch. By an inch.

” She tried to calm her voice down. “We were coming up on the light when this man in a red SUV leaned out of his car and shot the man in the car beside him. Just pulled out his gun and shot the man. I’m assuming in the head because the windshield splattered with blood the moment I heard the sound of the gunshot. ”

The man nodded, but she thought that he was humoring her.

Looking at Crumble, he still had spots of blood on his…

tunic? Dress? She didn’t know, but it was on him.

Pointing it out to him, he did a little body shake, and not only was he cleaned up, but he had on different colored clothing as well.

Emma put her head down and closed her eyes.

“The police said that it was nothing more than road rage. When one of the cars tried to pass the one with the shot victim, he was shot, too. Like the man wanted to be first in the race, and he was going to kill anyone who got in his way.” Someone asked, she didn’t know if it was Crumble or the man if she’d been shot at, and she nodded before speaking.

“He turned the gun my way even though I’m at least six feet above him.

All the bullet did was ricochet off the front of the rig and hit his car.

That must have pissed him off more because he was coming at me to my door to, I guess, kill me too. ”

The door opened behind her, and she didn’t bother looking.

Someone had been coming into the room since she was brought in a few hours ago.

When someone put their hand on her back, it was all she could do not to scream and cringe from the warmth.

Every part of her was freaking out, and she didn’t much care for it. Sitting up, she looked at the woman.

“I’m Bailee. We talked the other day.” Nodding, she sat up higher in the chair she was in. “You’re just fine, you know that, don’t you? No harm came to you as I promised you and your mother.”

“I should be dead.” Nodding once, she sat down across from her, and that was when she realized that they were alone in the room.

There was also a cup of what looked like tea in front of her with a few cookies on the plate.

“That little guy. He snatched me back and did something to me to make sure I didn’t die, didn’t he? ”

“Yes. Crumble is very good at his job of protecting people. You wouldn’t have died, not from the shooting, but had the man been able to get you out of the truck before he was killed, he would have surely murdered you.

He would have run over you with your truck and killed—” She put up her hand, and Bailee stopped talking.

“You’re all right, as I have said to you. ”

“It scared me. The way he looked, he was just going to do what he did without anyone stopping him.” Emma looked at Bailee. “My mom, does she know that I was…whatever I was?”

“She is aware only that there was an accident that you were no part of, but only as a witness. Nothing more. I didn’t think that it would do either of you any good for her to know everything right now.

” Emma thanked her. “I had no idea when you left yesterday that this would have happened. I only wanted to see how long it would be before you were to get to each of the stores along Taylor’s routes. For returns, you see.”

“I know that shit happens, but this was about as close as I’ve ever come to hitting anyone or even causing damage to anything since I’ve been driving.

” Bailee told her that was why they hired her.

“Thank you. I’m assuming that I still have a job?

I mean, why would you come all this way if I didn’t…

how did you get here so fast? Is it that magic stuff again? ”

“Yes, the magic stuff.” She knew that they had magic.

Not that she wanted to believe it, but if she were to be in her rig right now, she could go to her bedroom and lie down on a nice king-sized bed.

Get her things out of dressers or her closet and take a shower in her full-sized bathroom that was tucked into the little spaces that were there for her.

There was even a fully operating kitchen with a table and two chairs she could sit at should she want to have lunch while not driving.

“You’ve decided to believe me when I tell you that we’re magical? ”

“Honestly? I have no idea what I want to believe. The living room in my rig begs me to say I believe you, but in my head, there are just too many things that tell me that there is no such thing as magic.” She eyed her hard.

“No one has to shift to make sure I understand that there are lion shifters, either. I got that, too.”

Bailee laughed, and she didn’t find any humor in her.

Not any of them. If not for the contract, she might well not have worked for them had she not already signed it.

There was something extremely strange about all the Tuckers, and she wasn’t entirely sure that any of them wasn’t a little off their meds.

“Drink your tea, Emma. It’ll make you feel better.” She eyed the tea and then looked at Bailee when she laughed again. “I promise you there is nothing in it other than a bit of sugar. The cookies are just that. Cookies. Just have a few sips, and you’ll see, you’ll feel much better.”

“The police are going to send me to the hospital. They’re afraid that I’ve had a bit of trauma.

They don’t know that half of it. I feel like I’ve been put into a large rabbit hole and can’t find my way out.

You’re not helping.” She told her that she was trying her best. “Yeah? Well, it’s not working.

I don’t even know…I’m freaked the fuck out right now. ”

“No, you’re just still wondering how you can be alive when he shot you.

He did, you know. Shot you twice in the head.

But as you said, Crumble saved you, and you’re going to be just fine.

Nothing happened that you can explain to the police.

You understand that, don’t you?” She said that they’d lock her away.

“More than likely just put you in the hospital for a few weeks, but we can’t have that, now can we?

You have a good job, and it keeps you from getting hurt.

I told you several times that we take care of those that we love. ”

She was, in the end, taken to the hospital.

The man who had come in with Crumble when she was at the police station was hanging around a lot.

Twice, the nurse had to ask him to move so that she could do something for her, but other than that, he didn’t say much.

He did look like he was pissed off, but she had enough on her mind right now not to be fucking with a stranger.