I raised my eyebrows. "Are you sure you got the right guy, Meryl? No one ever apologizes to me for anything."
She pushed at her hair with one hand. It fell right back over her face. "I'm sorry. I was scared earlier, and I acted without thinking."
I traded a glance with Billy. "Uh, okay. I'm pretty sure lurking in a dark alley to mug me with your apology isn't the usual way to go about saying you're sorry. But I didn't read that Mars-Venus book, so who knows."
Her mouth twitched, and she relaxed her stance by a tiny degree. "I didn't know how else to find you, so I was just waiting near your car."
"Okay," I said. My neck still throbbed where her fingers had clamped on. Five to one I would have wonderful stripy bruises the next day. I nodded and turned away. "Apology accepted. Now if you'll excuse me, I have things I need to do."
A note of panic crept into her voice. "Wait. Please."
I stopped and looked back at her.
"I need to talk to you. Just for a minute." She took a deep breath. "I need your help."
Of course she did.
"It's very important."
Of course it was.
The headache started coming back. "Look, Meryl, I've got a lot on my plate already."
"I know," she said. "Investigating Ron's death. I think I can help you."
I pursed my lips. "You were close to Reuel?"
She nodded. "Me. Fix. Ace. And Lily."
I flashed back on the photo of Reuel and the four young people. "Green-haired girl? Very cute?"
"Yes."
"Where's Ace?"
"He had to go to work right after the funeral. But Lily's why I need to talk to you. She's missing. I think she's in trouble."
I started filling in context on the conversation I'd overheard between them. "Who are you?"
"I told you. My name is Meryl."
"Okay, fine. What are you, Meryl?"
She flinched at the question. "Oh. I'm sorry, I didn't know what you meant." She raked at her hair again. "I'm a changeling. We all are."
"A what?" Billy asked.
I nodded, getting it. "Changeling," I said to Billy. "She's half mortal and half fae."
"Aha," Billy said. "Which means what?"
I shrugged. "It means that she has to choose whether to remain a mortal or become wholly fae."
"Yes," she said. "And until then I'm under the rule of the Court of my fae father. Winter. The others too. That's why the four of us stuck together. It was safer."
Billy nodded. "Oh."
"Meryl," I said, "what makes you think your friend is in trouble?"
"She's not very independent, Mister Dresden. We share an apartment. She doesn't have a very good idea of how to take care of herself, and she gets nervous if she's out of the apartment for too long."
"And what do you think happened to her?"
"The Winter Knight."
Billy frowned. "Why would he hurt people in his own Court?"
Meryl let out a brief, hard laugh. "Because he can. He had a thing for Lily. He would hurt her, frighten her. He got off on it. He was furious when Maeve told him to back off. And once Ron was gone ..." Her voice trailed off and she turned her head to one side.
"How does Reuel fit into this?" I asked.
"He was protecting us. Maeve had been torturing us for fun, and we didn't know where to turn. Ron took us in. He put us under his protection, and no one in Winter was willing to cross him."
"What about your fae dad?" Billy asked. "Didn't he do anything to look out for you?"
Meryl gave Billy a flat look. "My mother was raped by a troll. Even if he'd been strong enough to do anything about Maeve hurting us, he wouldn't have. He thinks he's already done enough by not devouring my mom on the spot."
"Oh," Billy said. "Sorry."
I frowned. "And with the Summer Knight gone, you think Slate grabbed the girl."
Meryl said, "Someone broke into the apartment. It looked like there had been a struggle."
I let out a sigh. "Have you contacted the police?"
She eyed me. "Oh, yeah, of course. I called them and told them that a mortal champion of the fae came and spirited away a half-mortal, half-nixie professional nude model to Faerieland. They were all over it."
I had to admire the well-placed sarcasm. "It doesn't take a supernatural studmuffin to cause something very bad to happen to a cute girl in this town. Your plain old mortal kidnappers and murderers can manage just fine."
She shook her head. "Either way, she's still in trouble."
I lifted a hand. "What do you want from me?"
"Help me find her. Please, Mister Dresden."
I closed my eyes. I didn't have time, energy, or brainpower to spare for this. The smart thing would be to blow her off entirely, or to promise her I'd do it and promptly forget about it. "This just isn't a good time." I felt like crap the second I said it. I didn't look at the changeling's face. I couldn't. "There's too much trouble already, and I don't even know if I can help myself, much less your friend. I'm sorry."
I turned to go, but Meryl stepped in front of me. "Wait."
"I told you," I said. "There's nothing I can - "
"I'll pay you," Meryl said.
Oh, right. Money.
I was about to lose the office and the apartment, and this faerie work only paid in misery. I needed to pay some bills. Go to the grocery store. My mouth didn't actually water, but it was close.
I shook my head again. "Look, Meryl, I wish I could - "
"Double your fee," she said, her voice urgent.
Double. My. Fee. I hesitated some more.
"Triple," she said. She reached for her back pocket and produced an envelope. "Plus one thousand cash, up front, right now."
I looked back at Fix, still trembling and leaning against the alley wall, a handkerchief pressed to his mouth. Meryl continued to rock from one foot to the other, her eyes on the ground, waiting.
I tried to look at things objectively. A thousand bucks wouldn't spend if I got myself killed while distracted by the additional workload. On the other hand, if I lived through this thing the money would be necessary. My stomach growled, and a sharp pang of hunger made me clench the muscles of my belly.
I needed the work - but more to the point, I needed to be able to live with myself. I wasn't sure I was comfortable with the idea of looking back on this particular patch of memory and seeing myself leave some helpless girl, changeling or not, to the metaphoric wolves. People don't ask me for help if they're anything less than desperate. The changelings had been terrified of me only a few hours before. If they had turned to me for help now, it was because they were out of options.