Page 6 of The Ferryman’s Rest Inn & Grogshop

She followed my gaze and smiled. “Dragon artist. He paints what we see when we fly.”

“They’re amazing.”

She nodded her appreciation and then turned her attention to the dogs. Fergus and Alice were sniffing and bumping into each other, two huge dogs happy to see one another. Fergus pounced on Alice’s toy and brought it to her bed, where he flopped on his back and rolled around, claiming it as his own, the big jerk.

Coco laughed and gestured to her couch. “Can I get you anything?”

“I’m good. Thank you.” I pointed at Fergus. “Should I get him off her bed?”

Shaking her head, Coco sat on the chair beside the couch. “This is what he always does. If she has a problem with it, she’ll let him know. Don’t worry about them.” Her smile faded. “What did you want to talk to me about?”

I watched Alice try to tug her toy from Fergus for a moment and then turned back to Coco. “This is probably going to sound crazy but—wait. Do you know who Meg is?”

Coco thought a moment and then nodded. “She was at your wedding. Grandmother said she was a Fury.”

“Right. Megaera. She’s one of the Furies.”

Coco shook her head. “You have some crazy people in that bar of yours.”

She wasn’t wrong. “Meg is a friend and a couple of days ago, she sent Clive and me a text asking for help. Ordinarily, we’d just go, but she’s asking us to come to the Underworld.”

Coco flinched. “As in the actual Underworld? Hades? Are you serious?”

“Unfortunately. The issue—well, one of the issues—is that Clive can’t go with me. Stheno—have you met Stheno?”

Coco nodded. “That one’s hard to forget. Grandmother said she’s a gorgon.” She ran her hand over her forehead, muttering, “Insane.”

Even Fergus and Alice had stopped wrestling to watch me flounder.

“Right. Well, as Stheno is, like Meg, an ancient Greek being, she knows more about this than we do. She says that vampires are dead enough to qualify for the Underworld, so if Clive goes with me, he’ll never get back out.”

Coco’s eyebrows went up. “You said Meg was your friend. Would she ask you to come someplace that would steal your husband?”

“And that was my point,” I told her, “but everyone keeps reminding me than when my aunt was trapping me in those visions, Meg knew who was doing it and didn’t tell me.”

Coco’s eyebrows, if possible, went even higher. “She knew? Like that vision you had in the park about the rats? She knew who was spelling you, trying to kill you, and didn’t help? How is that a friend and why are you going to her aid?”

I took a deep breath and blew it out. “And that’s Stheno’s point.” Fergus padded over and dropped his big head in my lap. He always knew when I needed him. “I asked Meg that question at the time, and she told me she’d been ordered not to interfere.”

“Ordered by whom?” Coco demanded.

I scratched behind my baby’s ears. “As far as we know, Meg only has one boss.”

Coco stood, moving to the other side of her small living room. “Hades?” she whispered.

I nodded. “That’s our current theory.”

“Wait. Why are you telling me this?” She ran her hand over her short-cropped hair before walking back and dropping into her chair. “Am I supposed to talk to Grandmother for you? I honestly don’t know how she could help with any of this.”

“I doubt this conversation has inspired a lot of confidence in me and this quest, but I’m here to see if you’ll accompany me into the Underworld to help Meg.”

Her face went completely blank. “Me? I don’t understand. Why me?”

Fergus slowly got up on the couch to more fully lie on me. As Coco didn’t say anything about it, hopefully that was okay. “I’ll admit, we don’t really know each other well enough for you to have been my first thought in a crisis. It was actually Fyr who suggested I ask you.”

She blinked slowly, taking it all in. “Fyr? Fyr thinks I should go across the world to break into the Underworld?”

I grimaced. That did sound bad. “I’m not sure that specifically. It felt more like he knew you were strong and capable and thought you’d benefit from getting out of here, away from your normal life, to do something stupid and scary and all your own.”