0449474001339292671 4 fighting faer by Unknown

do.” She disappeared through the door behind the counter without another word but with one last, lingering glance at the fly of Luc’s jeans. She just missed the new nickname Corinne invented especially for her, but that was likely a good thing.
    Grumbling under her breath, Corinne gave Luc a sour glare and slung around the miniature backpack she used in place of a purse. If he kept up that sort of behavior, she wouldn’t have to convince herself he was scum. He’d take care of it for her.
    She flipped open the clasp and pulled out her small notebook. Might as well make use of the delay to scope out the store. If this sorry excuse for a lead ever panned out into an actual story, her observations of the nut of a witness’s nutty place of business might prove useful. She certainly didn’t intend to speak a word to Lothario Luc.
    Rummaging for a pen and wishing she could put her sunglasses back on without feeling like a moron, she looked around the shop, this time tuning out the horrendous décor and the presence of the Fae warrior beside her. She didn’t need to notice it again to know it would play a prominent role in describing the place. Some things a girl could never forget.
    In a city full of sex shops, they tended to boil down into three categories. On one end you had the kind of place that flourished in the heyday of Times Square, before Giuliani and Disney got hold of it and cleaned it up nice for the tourists. Those were the sleaze museums, the places where anyone in their right mind wore rubber gloves, a biohazard suit, a good disguise and still thought twice about touching anything. They catered to the lowest sort of hustlers and vagrants and anyone with a quarter and a strong stomach who wanted a couple of minutes alone in a dirty viewing booth. Come to think of it, no one in their right minds would step foot in one of those to begin with, biohazard suit or not.
    Then you had the upscale shops, the ones that made the papers for reasons other than arrests and crimes committed there. They had well lit, tastefully decorated retail spaces, with polite, well-educated and well-informed staff that took care to be both helpful and non-intimidating. They carried quality products and catered to couples looking to add spice to their relationship, or to women who were too intimidated or embarrassed to step foot into a less welcoming environment.
    Then you had places like the Pink Pillow. Somewhere between trash and good taste, it sold a huge selection of goods at reasonable prices in a neighborhood you wouldn’t be afraid to walk through under normal circumstances. The staff was iffy—clearly—but they probably didn’t have any serious criminal history and they could ring up a sale easily enough, even if they couldn’t discuss the chemical components in lube like a Nobel scholar. These shops retained just enough of the sleaze factor to give the average conservative a thrill, but not enough to scare him or her away from stopping by to stock up. In fact, if she hadn’t been so grumpy, Corinne might have had some fun browsing. While she appreciated the Religious Sexes of the world, her pocketbook appreciated the Pink Pillows.
    In reality, aside from all the…pink…there really wasn’t anything wrong with the shop, or its merchandise. Looking around, Corinne spotted half a dozen brands she recognized, from the maker of flavored massage oils on a small multi-tiered shelving unit to the silicone dildo manufacturer occupying a prominent place against the wall. She wondered briefly if that much familiarity with the world of sex toys said something about her character, but shrugged it off. Everybody had to have a hobby.
    “Are you going to ignore me for the rest of the day?” Luc spoke from right behind her, apparently bent on following her through her tour.
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    “I’m thinking about it.”
    “Because it’s not my fault that woman