“Momma’s boy.”

Universe, grant me patience.

• • •

I WALKED INTO Beau’s office carrying six bottles of root beer and a bucket of fried chicken. Beau raised his head from the paperwork he was reading behind his desk, sniffed the air, and sat up straighter.

Beau Clayton, the sheriff of Milton County, was a man who made his own legend. A few months ago Hugh d’Ambray had come to collect me and take me to meet my father. He went about it in a complicated way, and one of the Pack’s members ended up murdering one of the People’s Masters of the Dead. The People demanded that the Pack turn over the accused. We refused. They would’ve murdered her. She was entitled to a trial.

The People emptied the stables under the Casino and brought a vampire horde to attack the Keep. I was the Consort back then and most of our people were out of town. It was me and some regular Pack members, mostly parents with small children.

I had contacted the Atlanta PAD offering to surrender the guilty woman to their custody, but they didn’t want to risk it. Nobody wanted to risk it, so as a last resort I called Beau Clayton, because one hundred twelve square yards of the Pack’s land lay within Milton County. It had to be the flimsiest excuse ever used to establish jurisdiction.

The People besieged us, bringing hundreds of vampires. The field before the Keep was about to become a bloodbath. Beau Clayton chose that moment to ride between the two lines of fighters. He didn’t bring an army. He brought two deputies, put himself between the Keep and the horde of undead, and told them that he had been lawfully elected sheriff by the people of Milton County. He was the law and he had arrived to take the suspect into his custody. And then he told them to disperse.

I didn’t get to see the end of it all, but war didn’t break out on that field. The People took their vampires and went home. Beau took his suspect into custody and proceeded unmolested to the Milton County jail. People started calling him Beau the Brave.

Looking at Beau, it was easy to see why he would inspire legends. Huge, six foot six, with massive shoulders and powerful arms, he made his big wooden desk look small, but it wasn’t his size alone. There was something unflappable about Beau. A kind of measured steady calm. He knew exactly what his mission in life was: he was the voice of reason and when reason failed, he enforced the law.

“Is that fried chicken?”

“Yes.”

“Virginia’s fried chicken?”

Virginia made the best fried chicken in North Atlanta and never tried to pass rat meat off as chicken tenders. I managed to look offended. “Of course it is. Who do you take me for?”

Beau leaned back. “Might you be trying to bribe a law enforcement official, Ms. Daniels?”

“You bet.”

Beau glanced at Derek. “Gaunt.”

Derek nodded. “Sheriff.”

Beau turned to Ascanio. “And who would you be?”

I almost opened my mouth to tell him he was our intern and stopped myself. He was willing to take adult risks, he would get an adult introduction. “He’s Ascanio Ferara of Clan Bouda. He works with me.”

Ascanio blinked.

Beau took a long look at Ascanio, probably committing the name and face combination to the extensive files in his sheriff memory. “So how’s business?”

“Fair to middling. How’s yours?”

“About the same. Things quieted down a bit in the last six months.”

“It’s because of your name recognition.” I opened my root beer and took a swig. “‘Beau the Brave’ has a certain menacing ring to it.”

Beau grunted.

“Imagine, in about three hundred years, they will tell legends about you,” I said.

“They will,” Derek added. “Beau the Brave, nine feet tall, able to behead ten vampires in a single swing.”

“Never thought about it much,” Beau said. “But if it keeps the ne’er-do-wells from causing mischief, I can live with it.”

“Ne’er-do-wells?” Derek asked.

“I read.” Beau looked slightly offended.

“Ancient literature?” Ascanio inquired. “Did it have words like ‘dame’ and ‘stool pigeon’ in it?”

“Do you make your deputies call you ‘copper’?” Derek asked.

“Have you two ever thought of taking your show on the road?” Beau asked them.

If Beau’s legend grew big enough and enough people believed in it, he would live for a long time and he might even grow taller. I didn’t have the heart to tell him that. He didn’t look comfortable with the whole thing as it was.

“So what can I do for you?” he asked.

I took out the scrap of the article and pushed it across the table toward him.

He glanced at the clipping. “What’s your interest in the Eakle brothers?”

“I don’t have any.”

“Ahh. You’re in the market for a gold winged horse.”

Gold? Julie’s notes said golden in color. “Something like that. Can you tell me more?”

Beau sipped his root beer. “Chad and Jeremy Eakle are Caleb and Mary Eakle’s sons. Nice enough fellows, but not a lot of brains between the two of them. Never been in serious trouble. My deputies had a few run-ins with them some years back, when they were in high school. Nothing too bad, typical petty things bored kids do: throwing beer bottles at stop signs, making bonfires, mooning people off the Cassidy Bridge. The usual. Both have jobs and families now. Both go to church.”