Read My Big Fat Supernatural Honeymoon for Free Online Page B

cold and a little clammy. I wasn't sure what was going on here, but Braddock was genuinely afraid. "Abducted her? Did you see it happen?"
    "Well," he said, "no. Not really. No one did. But she
wouldn't
just walk out. Not today. We got married this morning, and we're leaving on our honeymoon tonight, soon as the festival is over."
    I arched an eyebrow. "You put your honeymoon on hold to go to a beer festival."
    "I'm opening my own place," Braddock said. "Mr. McAnally has been giving me advice. Sort of mentoring me. This was… I mean, I've been here every year, and it's only once a year, and the prestige from a win is… the networking and…" His voice trailed off as he looked around him.
    Yeah. The looming specter of sudden loss has a way of making you reevaluate things. Sometimes it's tough to know what's really important until you realize it might be gone.
    "You two were at this booth?" I prompted.
    "Yes," he said. He licked his lips. "She went to pick up some napkins from the bar, right over there. She wasn't twenty feet away and somehow she just vanished."
    Personally, I was more inclined to go with the cop's line of reasoning than the kid's. People in general tend to be selfish, greedy, and unreliable. There are individual exceptions, of course, but no one ever wants to believe that the petty portions of human nature might have come between themselves and someone they care about.
    The kid seemed awfully sincere. While endearing, awfully sincere people whose decisions are driven mostly by their emotions are capable of being mistaken on an epic scale. The worse the situation looks, the harder they'll search for reasons not to believe it. It seemed more likely that his girl left him than that someone took her away.
    On the other hand, likely isn't the same as true—and Mac isn't the kind to cry wolf.
    "How long you two been together?" I asked Braddock.
    "Since we were fifteen," he replied. An anemic smile fluttered around his mouth. "Almost ten years."
    "Making it official, eh?"
    "We both knew when it was right," he replied. He lost the smile. "Just like I know that she didn't walk away. Not unless someone made her do it."
    I stepped around Braddock and studied the high-backed booth for a moment. A keg sat on the table, next to a little card-stock sign that had a cartoon bee decked out with a Viking-style helmet, a baldric, and a greatsword. Words beneath the bee proclaimed BRADDOCK'S MIDNIGHT SUN CINNAMON.
    I grunted and reached down and pulled a simple black leather ladies' purse from beneath the bench seating. Not an expensive purse, either. "Not much chance she'd walk without taking her bag," I said. "That's for damned sure."
    Braddock bit his lip, closed his eyes, and said, "Elizabeth."
    I sighed.
    Well, dammit.
    Now she had a name.
    Elizabeth Braddock, newlywed. Maybe she'd just run off. But maybe she hadn't, and I didn't think I would like myself very much if I walked and it turned out that she really was in danger, and really did get hurt.
    What the hell. No harm in looking around.
    "I guess the game's afoot," I said. I gestured vaguely with the purse. "May I?"
    "Sure," Braddock said. "Sure, sure."
    I dumped Elizabeth's purse out on the booth's table, behind the beer keg, and began rummaging through it. The usual. Wallet, some makeup, a cell phone, Kleenex, some feminine sanitary sundries, one of those plastic birth control pill holders with a folded piece of paper taped to it.
    And there was a hairbrush, an antique-looking thing with a long, pointy silver handle.
    I plucked several strands of dark wavy hair from the brush. "Is this your wife's hair?"
    Braddock blinked at me for a second, then nodded. "Yes. Of course."
    "Mind if I borrow this?"
    He didn't. I pocketed the brush for the moment, and glanced at the birth control pill case. I opened it. Only the first several slots were empty. I untaped the folded paper and opened it, finding instructions for the medicine's use.
    Who keeps the instructions sheet, for