Ferally Funny Freakshow Read online

  Contents

  Start Reading

  Book Summary

  Acknowledgments

  Other Works

  About Ann Charles

  CHAPTERS

  1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10

  To Clint the Clown.

  You keep me smiling!

  It’s all fun and games at the circus ... until everyone’s favorite clown winds up dead.

  Someone killed Clint the Clown.

  Madam Electra’s crystal ball could help find the murderer, but she risks exposing her own secrets in the process. Secrets that could land her on the endangered species list.

  Head security officer Bruno Maska has been ordered to enlist the help of the one person he suspects is hiding something—Electra. The same woman who’s been haunting his thoughts since their drunken night together.

  With the killer still on the prowl, can Bruno and Electra get their act together before the Freakiest Show on Earth loses another clown? Or worse, its beloved psychic?

  From the AC Silly Circus Co. comes the first story in a new series of paranormal romantic mystery novellas chock-full of oddball shapeshifters, dangerous secrets, and loads of laughs.

  Step right up and enjoy the Feral-LY Funny Freakshow!

  Acknowledgements

  Thank you to Robyn Peterman for asking me to play in your sandbox. You motivated me to start this fun series.

  Thank you to my husband for helping me brainstorm in this crazy new world.

  Thanks to my two kids who had fun daydreaming along with me about were-characters.

  Many thanks to my editing crew—first draft folks and beta readers. I appreciate you helping on such short notice.

  Thank you to my brother, CS Kunkle, for sharing your freaky ideas and great cover art.

  Thank you to all of my readers for coming along to enjoy the ride in this new world.

  And thank you to Clint, my brother, for being such a clown growing up. You’re immortalized now. Sorry I had to kill you first though.

  Chapter One

  Tinkerville, Mississippi

  My life was one, big, fun freakshow until someone killed my favorite clown. Now, not even watching a grizzly bear eat a flaming torch made me crack a smile.

  “Okay, Eugene,” I said to the big bear of a man across the crystal ball from me. “What would you like to know?”

  His thick brown eyebrows pinched together over the bridge of his long nose. “I have a really bad feeling about tonight’s show.”

  My hands hovered over the ball in a holding pattern. “That’s not really a question.”

  “I know, but I have this burning sensation in my chest about it.” He pounded his barrel-like torso, thumping hard enough to make me wince.

  “That’s probably indigestion from those six chili dogs I saw you eating at lunch. You know those crazy monkey brothers brag about using real diced habaneros in their chili, right?” Eugene’s esophagus had to be lined with glowing embers after all that heat.

  “I’m telling you, it’s not the chili dogs.” He burped, grimacing as he held his stomach. “Well, not only the chili dogs.”

  As bear shapeshifters went, Eugene was the largest I’d ever seen. His freakshow act had two parts. He started out as “The Human Giant,” aka the man sitting across from me at the moment. After wowing his audience with his sheer size and physique, he shifted into a werebear, risking life and fur to swallow fiery torches whole.

  The act was always a crowd pleaser, reeling in folks night after night. After seeing it, nobody would ever suspect that due to an incident months ago involving a candle, an erotic romance novel, and some singed chest hair, Eugene now suffered from pyrophobia.

  “I’m telling you, Electra,” he said, his baritone voice hitching. “Something bad is going to happen tonight.” He chewed on his large thumbnail, the hair on his knuckle a thick tuft like his eyebrows.

  I slid my hands over the cool, smooth crystal ball, my fingertips sparking a blue light within the orb. “Eugene, you have had a bad feeling about your flame-eating act every day since the candle accident.” His cheeks darkened, his gaze lowering to his hands. “That’s why we consult Ol’ Blue before each performance, remember?”

  Passed down through my family line for too many generations to count, the crystal eye had been called Chosposi by the ancient ones, which translated into “bluebird eye.” However, I preferred to use “Ol’ Blue,” the nickname my grandmother had given the all-seeing ball before passing it down to me after my mother opted out of using her power of sight.

  Eugene sighed. “But tonight feels worse than before.”

  I didn’t bother reminding him that he also said that every evening before his show. “Why does it feel worse?”

  “Because Clint the Clown is dead.”

  Hmmm. That was a different reason than usual. “Honey, Clint has been gone for over a week now.”

  “I know, but I keep thinking about the last thing he said to me.”

  “What was that?”

  “He wanted me to hold onto the key to his roller skates because he kept misplacing it.”

  I frowned. “They still use keys on those things?”

  “Clint’s skates were old school. They were the metal slip-on kind that expanded to fit over his clown shoes.” Eugene smiled wistfully. “Good old Clint could sure put on one hell of a show on those skates.”

  As tragic as the death of a clown was, life had to keep rolling on for Eugene … and for me. I had shed plenty of tears over the last week. Fat, clown-sized tears. Clint had been the light that kept the rest of us tumbling along night after night. His was the last act each evening, sending the crowd to their cars with wide smiles. The world had lost some of its sparkle when Clint died.

  “We have to move on,” I told Eugene. “Clint would want it that way.”

  Actually, we had moved on—literally. We’d loaded up our circus train and chugged along the tracks to the next stop here in Tinkerville, where we were booked for a week solid.

  Come one, come all to see the Feral Freakshow, our marketing department advertised, churning up crowds full of shapeshifting spectators both young and old. We had were-freaks and were-clowns aplenty to entertain the masses, along with a few plain old animals that were treated like royalty among the circus were-folks.

  “I think Clint’s death was a sign,” Eugene said.

  “What sort of sign?” To never take life for granted?

  I rubbed my fingertips over the cool crystal ball, remembering the big clown smile Clint always painted on his face. The blue light inside the glass swirled like smoke, following my touch. Unlike Eugene, myself, and many others here at the circus, Clint had stayed in costume whenever leaving his tent. His rainbow hair always stuck out in a crowd, just like his upbeat personality.

  Why on earth would someone want to kill a damned clown? A guy whose main goal was to make people laugh? I still couldn’t wrap my mind around it.

  “A sign that I’m supposed to stop eating fire,” Eugene said, pulling me out of my reverie.

  We’d gone over this before, only not using Clint’s death as a reason. Eugene kept grasping at straws for excuses to put down his torches. Not that I could blame him. Shoving oversized lighted matchsticks down my throat didn’t appeal to me either. I was glad my act involved a cushy chair, a bit of showmanship, a few tricks of the crystal ball trade, and that was it.

  “That wasn’t the only sign, either,” he told me, his brown, teddy bear eyes round with worry.

  “What other signs have you seen?”

  “Someone spray painted graffiti on a bunch of our poster boards again, messing with our name.”

  Actually, I’d foreseen this several nights ago in Ol’ Bl
ue and warned Runash, the circus’s new head of security, to keep a look out for three teenage raccoons trying to sneak into the circus with spray cans. Runash had rolled her eyes at my prediction and told me to stick to entertaining the paying customers.

  Same shit, different security jerk.

  “What did they paint on the poster boards this time?” I asked Eugene. I’d seen the raccoons at work in the crystal ball, but not the finished product. Ol’ Blue was a tease most nights, giving me sporadic glimpses of possible futures and murky peeks of set pasts.

  “Our name. It now reads: FeralLY Funny Freakshow.”

  Playing Polly Positive, I said, “In my line of work, I’d see that as a prophecy. Maybe it’s time to mix up our acts, add humor instead of getting our freak on every night.”

  “What’s funny about a fire eater?”

  “Think outside the box, Eugene.”

  He scratched behind one of his small ears, his face scrunched. “Ming says she’s going to write something new about Clint’s death.”

  That blogger bitch needed to cap her damned pen before someone did it for her. “That nose of hers is going to get her into trouble some day, mark my words.”

  “Is that what your crystal ball says?”

  “No, that’s just the word from my lips to your ears.”

  Ming had been sniffing around again, trying to scrounge up some juicy dirt on Clint so she could broadcast about his tragic ending to the world. She claimed it would be an epitaph, but I had a feeling it had a lot more to do with gaining her new readers and potential sponsors.

  When it came to Ming, she had one goal in mind … well, two. The first being plastic surgery to fix her hairless problem when she shifted to her weredoggy self. The other was to be called up to the journalism “majors” and land a career in the big leagues, aka television. Ming told me once she’d do whatever it took to succeed. Apparently, “whatever” included having repeated office couch sex with the circus’s master of ceremonies and exploiting the death of everyone’s favorite clown.

  Ming’s selfishness was an exception among the rest of the “hybrid” shapeshifters here at the freakshow circus, who were trying to make it in a world full of purebred shifters. Shunned outside of the red and white striped tent, the circus folks had formed a tight-knit pack of their own. It had taken me several long, lonely months to overcome their distrust of my purebred pedigree and fit in amongst their ranks.

  “Listen, Eugene,” I started, but then paused at the sound of a footfall on the other side of the red velvet curtains that divided my reading parlor from the waiting area. “Who’s there?”

  Nobody answered.

  Eugene looked around. “I don’t hear anyone.”

  That’s because he was a fire-eating bear who shifted into a giant with small ears and a long nose. I, on the other hand, had the hearing of a long line of werecoyotes, no matter if my fur was showing or not.

  Eugene sniffed. “Hey, I know that smell, but …”

  “Whoever is on the other side of the curtains, I can hear you huffing,” I said. “If you’re looking for the three little pigs, Eugene ate them for dinner last night.”

  “I’m not eating pork anymore. The doctor says too much fat in my diet could make me more flammable.”

  The curtains parted. “I wasn’t huffing, Electra,” Bruno Maska said in his low growly voice. His broad shoulders filled the entryway into my fortune-telling parlor.

  My heart staggered at the sight of the ex-head of security. His dark, wavy hair was combed back and his beard trimmed short around his square jaw. Bruno was all brawn and plenty of brains, which equaled one helluva batch of trouble for me and my bag of tricks.

  I tried to act cool and calm, lifting my chin when I met his brown eyes. The anger smoldering in their depths sent a quiver of nervous energy zipping through my limbs. Bruno was taking no prisoners this evening, and it appeared I was standing in his way.

  Breaking eye contact, I looked down at my empty crystal ball. What was Bruno doing back here? I thought he’d moved on to lead the owner’s entourage of bodyguards and secret service. When he’d left a month ago, I’d not expected to see him again, offering prayers to the moon goddess that he’d be gone from my life for good. How come I hadn’t seen him when I looked into Ol’ Blue earlier to check for any signs of danger tonight?

  “Bruno! I thought that was your scent.” Eugene lumbered to his feet, his smile wide on his large, hairy head. He wrapped Bruno in a bear hug for several seconds before stepping back. “Boy howdy, am I happy to see you again. I was just telling Electra how things don’t feel as safe around here ever since Clint got killed.”

  “Really?” Bruno stuck his hands in his jeans pockets, taking a wide stance that blocked off any chance of my slipping past him and running for my life. His gaze narrowed when it centered on my crystal ball. “Why don’t they feel safe?”

  “I don’t know exactly,” Eugene said, wringing his thick fingers together. “But my hair keeps bristling at the base of my neck for no reason.”

  “It’s almost full moon,” I reminded him.

  Eugene continued without pause. “Two nights ago, I almost lit my face on fire.”

  I sighed. “You singed one long hair on your muzzle.”

  “And now my jaw clicks every time I close it.”

  “That’s your teeth clacking together.” I grabbed my velvet shroud and draped it over Ol’ Blue, my skin tingling under Bruno’s watchful stare. “Eugene,” I said, lacing my fingers together, trying to pretend the scent of Bruno in my tent wasn’t throwing me off my game. “I want you to sing ‘Jingle Bells’ three times tonight before you go on stage.”

  A wrinkle formed on Eugene’s wide brow. “But it’s almost Halloween, not Christmas.”

  “Ol’ Blue did not show me anything for you to worry about tonight. After you sing the song for the third time, you’ll eat the flames, wow the crowd, and walk away once more burn-free.”

  “Was I wearing my new gear in your crystal ball?”

  Eugene had recently purchased fireman headgear, but his ears kept getting crushed inside of the helmet, so he’d had to cut holes in it. On top of that, he couldn’t figure out how to maneuver a flaming torch into his gaping jaws through the face shield, which kept fogging up from his snout pushing against it.

  “No, just your fireproof face balm.” I gave him my best everything-will-be-okay smile. “Trust me, your fur will still be singe-free in the morning.”

  He scratched his big jaw, frowning, and then turned to Bruno. “You here to see the show tonight?”

  Bruno shook his head. “I’m here to bring Clint’s killer to justice.”

  “Good. If anyone can figure out who’s behind this, it’s you. I always said nobody can sniff out trouble better than Bruno.” Eugene gave him another bear hug, only from the side this time. Something made a popping sound and Bruno grimaced. After a wave in my direction, Eugene took his worries and left my tent.

  For several silent seconds, I stared at Bruno, reminding myself of the reasons I could not let him sniff out that he was my fated mate. For starters, it could be the death of him. For enders, it could be the death of me, too.

  “So, you’re back,” I said, cutting our standoff short.

  One dark eyebrow lifted. “Surprised?”

  “Not really,” I lied.

  “Let me guess,” he said with a smirk. “Your magical crystal ball showed you that I was coming.” Bruno had never been a believer in my abilities. Once a trickster, always a trickster, he’d said to me more than once.

  “You still have that chip on your shoulder, I see.” Bruno didn’t trust purebred shapeshifters. According to circus gossip, his father had knocked up his mother with a half-breed child and then left, never to return.

  “Only when it comes to you, Electra.” He glanced around my tent, his frown growing as he took in my roadrunner incense holders, decks of tarot cards, and veil-covered lamps. “Where were you the night Clint was killed?”

/>   I scowled. “You think I’m a suspect in his murder?”

  “I know you’re a suspect. Answer the question.”

  “Fuck you.” I stood, grabbing Ol’ Blue, shoving it in the lock box where I stored it.

  “We tried that already. It only made this thing between us worse.”

  By “this thing,” I assumed he meant the constant underlying attraction turned frustration thanks to the mental buffer I used to disguise my natural scent from him. It was a trick I’d learned from my grandmother long ago, a way to hide in plain sight when needed. It worked for Bruno the same as any possible bounty hunters looking for my hide since I joined the Gone Were witness protection program for shifters.

  Without that buffer, not only would Bruno have figured out the real reason for the tension always hovering between us, but I couldn’t have kept him at bay. According to everything I’d read since first meeting the maddeningly sexy brute, short of death, there was no resisting a fated mate.

  I was toast already, itching for Bruno every night since I’d met him. However, I had one hell of a reason to keep my paws off of him, and I’d managed to do just that until a month ago at his going-away party.

  I’d been drinking to forget him that night, and he’d been drinking to forget all of us. Thanks to the monkey brothers’ homemade really hard cider, we’d both ended up sloshed. When Bruno leaned in close to accuse me yet again of turning up my nose at half-breeds, I had grabbed him by the shirt and planted my lips on his to show how I felt about the exasperating half-breed in front of me. One thing led to another and before I could lasso my emotions, I was already naked inside his tent, and then he was already naked inside of me.

  I’d left him passed out on his bed, tiptoeing back to my own tent before anyone found out about us. Come morning, I’d made sure I wasn’t around when Bruno said his final good-byes.

  His leaving for a higher rung on the career ladder had been my saving grace, even if I had ached from missing him almost every day since. But now that he was back, I’d have to resort to my old tricks—cold showers, sniffing pepper, and, as a last resort, taming-the-shrew with my own devices when the need grew too strong.