Blondie stepped around the others and over to the robber, pulling a set of keys out of her pants pocket and holding them out to him at arm’s length, her hands shaking. The dwarf grabbed the keys and used one of them to open the lock on the jewelry case, instead of just smashing the glass and setting off the alarms. He threw the keys down on the floor and started shoving bracelets, rings, and necklaces into his jeans pockets.

I looked at the knives I’d piled on the bench inside the fitting room alongside my clothes. Normally, I carried five silverstone knives on me—one up either sleeve, one against the small of my back, and two in the sides of my boots—but I’d removed them when I’d started trying on the dresses. I couldn’t exactly go outside with a knife in my hand, since that would ruin whatever element of surprise I had, and there was no time to change back into my regular clothes. Cursing Finn under my breath, I hiked up the long skirt of the dress I was wearing and opened the fitting-room door.

“Darling!” I squealed, rushing into the front of the store. “Isn’t this dress just the most divine thing you’ve ever seen?”

I twirled around and managed to put myself in between Finn and the robber. With the yellow dress, I might as well have been a mother duck, watching over her little ones.

“‘Darling’? I thought you said she was your sister!” Red hissed.

A dwarf had threatened to shoot her and was now robbing the store, and Red was still more worried about Finn’s marital status than all that. Someone’s priorities were a little skewed.

Finn winced and gave her an apologetic shrug, but he never took his eyes off the dwarf.

The robber’s head snapped up at the sound of my voice, and the gun followed a second later. He stepped to the end of the counter and grabbed hold of my bare arm, his fingers digging into my skin as he pulled me next to him. His hot breath wafted up my nose, reeking of onions and garlic. I hoped he’d enjoyed whatever he’d had for lunch today, because he was going to be eating through a straw soon enough.

“Who the hell are you?” he growled, shoving the gun in my face. “Where did you come from?”

“I was . . . I was . . . I was in the back, trying on some evening gowns,” I said in the breathiest, most terrified and helpless voice I could muster. “I don’t want any trouble. Please, please, please, don’t shoot me!”

The dwarf stared at me for several seconds before he lowered his gun and let go of my arm.

“Just so you know, that’s the ugliest damn dress I’ve ever seen,” he said. “You look like a daffodil.”