“Yeah,” I said. “Faeries aren’t wholly beings of the spirit world. They leave corpses behind.”

Michael grunted. “Other than that there were footprints, but that’s about it. No sign that these goat-things were still around.” He glanced into the dining room, where the Carpenter children were gathered at the table, talking excitedly and munching the pizza their father had been out picking up when the attack occurred. “The neighbors think the light show must have come from a blown transformer.”

“That’s as good an excuse as any,” I said.

“I thank God no one was hurt,” he said. For him it wasn’t just an expression. He meant it literally. It came of being a devout Catholic, and maybe from toting around a holy sword with one of the nails from the Crucifixion wrought into the blade. He shook himself and gave me a short smile. “And you, of course, Harry.”

“Thank Daniel, Molly, and Charity,” I said. “I just kept our visitors busy. Your family’s who got the little ones to safety. And Charity did all the actual smiting.”

Michael’s eyebrows went up, and he turned his gaze on his wife. “Did she now?”

Charity’s cheeks turned pink. She briskly swept up the various tissues and cloths I’d bloodied, and carried them out of the room to be burned in the lit fireplace in the living room. In my business, you don’t ever want samples of your blood, your hair, or your fingernail clippings lying around for someone else to find. I gave Michael the rundown of the fight while she was gone.

“My nail gun?” he asked, grinning, as Charity came back into the kitchen. “How did you know it was a faerie?”

“I didn’t,” she said. “I just grabbed what was at hand.”

“We got lucky,” I said.

Michael arched an eyebrow at me.

I scowled at him. “Not every good thing that happens is divine intervention, Michael.”