Magic Kingdom (Dragon Born Alexandria Book 3) by Ella Summers Page A

me.”
    She snickered.
    “Besides,” he added with a sly smile. “It wouldn’t do any good. They’re scared of you too.”
    “Of me? Why?”
    “They were with the Disposal team that cleaned up after the first mission we did for Monster Cleanup.”
    First mission, first mission… Alex tried to jolt her memory. There had been so many missions.
    “The one with all the manticores.”
    “Oh. I see. Yeah, that would do it.”
    Alex and Logan had been sent out to subdue one manticore. That one manticore had turned out to have five buddies. Taking out one manticore was difficult. Taking out six was…well, Alex was usually more than ready to spit in the face of any opponent, but she had no desire to repeat that particular challenge. The Disposal team had arrived to find them standing in a field strewn with debris and hacked manticore. Half of the Disposal agents had lost their lunch promptly upon exiting the van.
    “Hey, Stan. Miss me?” Alex called out as they stopped in front of his desk.
    The head of Disposal looked up from the dead vampire bat he was studying. He grimaced when he saw Alex.
    “Back so soon?” he asked, setting down his knife to pick up his tablet.
    “We were gone for hours.”
    “You’ve had a busy few hours.” His eyes scanned the tablet’s screen. “How can one person create so much chaos in so short of a timespan?”
    “Well, technically I was with Logan, so that’s two people.”
    The hard gleam in his eyes told her he was not appeased.
    “Hey, this isn’t my fault. I wasn’t the one to let out all those monsters. And I didn’t melt those buildings either.”
    “And the barn?”
    “Some crazy supernatural-hating extremists blew it up while we were inside.”
    “How about the bees? You didn’t even get me an intact sample.”
    “Yeah, I was too busy fighting for my life to worry about samples I didn’t even know you wanted.”
    “You know me, Alex,” Stan said. “I always want samples.”
    “All right, so that was impossible in this case. There were over fifty bees. I didn’t ask them all to attack me at once.”
    “Actually, you did,” Logan told her. “When we arrived on the scene to find the swarm of bugs, you shot magic at them, swung your sword around, and shouted, ‘come and get me, you overgrown bumblebees!’.”
    “Oh, right. That does sound like me.”
    Stan expelled a martyred sigh. “You can create more messes in one night than others can in a month.”
    “It’s a rare talent.”
    Stan grumbled something under his breath. Alex thought she caught the words ‘mercenary’ and ‘liability’ muddled in there somewhere.
    “Believe it or not, I’m not here to reminisce about old jobs,” she told him.
    “I’m all out of cookies.”
    Damn. “I actually need to pick your brain.”
    His eyes darted to her sword. “Not literally, I hope.”
    “Only if you require motivation.” She flashed her teeth at him.
    Stan paled and scooted backwards.
    “I was just kidding. Geez.” She frowned. “Is this about the manticores?”
    “Alex,” Stan said, his voice strained. “This is about every job you have ever done for Monster Cleanup. You are the best monster hunter I’ve ever known, but I have to tell you that you scare the hell out of me.”
    “But not him?” She glanced at Logan.
    “He’s not half as scary as you are,” said Stan. “He glowers and stalks around with that stone-cold expression of his. He doesn’t act like a normal person. Not like you.”
    “So you’re telling me that you’re scared of me because I act normal?”
    “Yes. You smile and joke and laugh with people just like any normal person. Then a battle begins, and it’s like a switch flips inside of your head. You have no mercy, no humanity, no anything left. There’s only the killer.”
    “That’s not true.”
    “Isn’t it? Alex, I’ve cleaned up after your messes. I’ve seen the bodies, the perfect cuts made without thought or hesitation.”
    “They’re monsters,”