Chapter Two

NASH

The waiter thumped a glass on the bar. “One water. You sure you don’t want a whiskey with that?”

I shook my head. Water was fine. Unlike other drinks, it was easy to know when to stop.

Still, he stood there, grinning at me. “You’re either crazy, stupid, or gay.”

I cocked my head, waiting for the punch line.

“A man’s gotta be one of those three things to turn down a woman as fine as Pippa.” He chuckled.

I shrugged. Burned out — by work, by women, by life — was more like it, but let the guy think what he wanted.

“Oh, I get it,” he went on. “Bad breakup and you’re not ready.”

Close, but no cigar. Still, I kept my mouth shut.

“Or maybe her sister is more your type.” He motioned to one of the two women Pippa had joined. “Erin.”

I barely glanced over, then jutted my jaw. “I just came for a drink.”

My eyes must have flared, because he stuck up his hands and hurried away.

I turned my glass, adding wet circles to the bar. Heading to an out-of-the-way bar on my first night in town had not been my plan. But something had kept my blood stirring, and I’d had the same itchy feeling I’d been getting lately — the one that insisted I had to be someplace in particular at a certain time, even if I didn’t know why.

And, hell. That feeling had brought me to Sedona. It had made me pull over to a strip mall and wander toward a supermarket exactly as an older guy was posting a Help Needed sign. Five minutes later, he took the sign back down, and I had a job — starting tomorrow — and a place to stay.

So I’d figured I ought to go with that feeling one more time, and here I was.

Old habits died hard, so I studied the place, counting entrances and exits and sweeping my eyes over the crowd. All were human, from what I could tell — except three grizzled old shifters engrossed in a hand of poker across the room. Two wolves and a cougar, if my nose was right. It took a while for them to spot me, and when they did, their nostrils twitched. One huffed and the scruff on his chin thickened, but the others elbowed him.

I raised my glass in a subtle motion that said, Live and let live, right? After all, I was no longer in my previous job.

They held up their beers in a silent toast and went back to their cards.

I sipped my drink, relieved to have encountered shifters old enough not to give a damn about a dragon minding his own business.

I checked the rest of the crowd, finding nothing else of note — except the three women by the fireplace.

Just relax and watch the game, I ordered myself.

I tried to, but my eyes kept dropping to the mirror under the screen — a long one that ran the length of the bar, reflecting all the bottles on display — and among them, glimpses of the tables behind me. Lots and lots of tables, though my eyes landed on Pippa’s every time. Not for Pippa, but the woman next to her.

Erin, my dragon whispered, if what the bartender said was right.

One of those tough, brunette cowgirl types with intriguing, kaleidoscope eyes and something on her mind. Something I doubted she would find a solution to in the fire, but she kept staring there.

I towed my focus to the TV, but it wandered back to her again and again and noticing tiny, unimportant details. How she munched her burger, deep in thought. The way she dabbed her lips before reaching for her drink. Her eyes swept through the place, then over to the—

I jerked my gaze down to my drink a split second before her eyes met mine in the mirror.

Minutes later, I peeked again. She was in animated conversation with the third woman — the one with the tattoos.

Which made me think. Did Erin have a tattoo? She didn’t seem like the type, unless it was one she hid.

And, zoom — my imagination took off on that thought. A four-leaf clover on her ankle. A dolphin in the small of her back. A yin-yang symbol around her belly button…

I gulped and stared back at the game. Who was playing? Miami and…some other team.

Then I cussed, catching myself spying on that woman again. What was it about her?

She stood, heading to the restroom. As she did, my eye caught on a detail, and I froze.

The flame of the candle on her table tilted as she moved, following her. It tilted…tilted…went sideways, then gave up and snapped upright.

Which could have been anything, but the candlelight on the next table also bent when she passed. And the next one, and the next, like so many wobbly toys tipping, tipping, tipping. When Erin disappeared down the hallway, the candles went back to flickering normally.

I squinted into the mirror. Just an optical effect?

When she returned, I swiveled to watch. And, bing! Bing! Bing! Like a row of lights in Las Vegas, each candle flared as she passed. The fire in the stone fireplace sparked too.

And it wasn’t just her. When Pippa wandered over to chat to someone else, every flame in the place wandered with her.

All barely noticeable, except for someone trained to spot such clues.

My mouth went dry as I thought through the possibilities.

Pyromancer jumped to mind, but no. They tended to exude hot, pulsing energy that could be felt a mile away.

Dragon shifter, my beast side suggested hopefully.

Another no. Erin had neither the fidgety temperament nor the scent.

Witch was my second guess, but she didn’t seem aware of her effect on the candles.

Relic, my dragon finally rumbled.

I went still, trying to get my head around that. A relic?

All three, maybe, if they’re sisters, my dragon said.

“I know, I know.” The guy beside me chuckled. “The game’s that bad.”

I snapped my mouth shut. It wasn’t the game that astounded me. It was coming across a relic in a place like this.

Then again, Sedona had a reputation for attracting supernaturals — shifters, vampires, witches, and the like. That meant it would attract relics too — descendants of supernaturals who’d interbred with enough humans over the years to dilute or erase their powers.

Some relics were aware of their faint power and could manipulate it at will. Others had no clue. Most were harmless, party-trick types. People who could hold their breath for crazy-long periods of time, for example, often descended from mermaids. People whose fingers could fly over musical instruments to produce heavenly tunes usually had magic in a distant branch of the family tree. Most top athletes were relics too, possessing extraordinary speed, strength, or agility. Olympic gymnasts were a prime example of watered-down shifter blood — usually feline. Who else could string together four backflips on a beam just a few inches wide?

Only a tiny portion of relics caused trouble — and that’s when guys like me came in. The minute I’d left the military, I’d been recruited by the government agency responsible for such things.

All the usual protocols ran through my head…until I remembered I wasn’t in that line of work any more.

I stared into my drink for a while, then peeked back at Erin. Was she really a relic?

I decided to focus on Pippa instead. As the most outgoing sister, she was more likely to reveal hints of her hidden nature than the other two. Erin was more guarded, while the third sister was way beyond guarded. More like locked in a turret with the key thrown away.

So, Pippa it was. I focused on her reflection in the mirror, just visible between a bottle of Jim Beam and Jack Daniel’s…

Pippa, I hissed to my dragon side when my eyes strayed back to Erin.

The beast grumbled, then stopped, suddenly on alert.

A motorcycle pulled into the no-parking zone in front of the bar. Then another…and another, all revving so loudly, they were impossible to ignore.

“What the…?” A guy at the bar stood for a look.

The bottom two-thirds of the front window was covered in black foil, but the top was clear. My stool was high enough for me to peer out if I sat tall. I counted as a fifth and sixth motorcycle rolled into the no-parking zone in front of the bar. Then a seventh and eighth, all revving away like they were about to zoom off instead of coming to a halt.

I lost count after a dozen.

They kept up the racket until the top dog pulled into the lot and gave his own ride a commanding rev. When they finally cut the engines, they cracked jokes and hollered to one another.

“Now would you look at that,” someone murmured, though everyone already was. “Those guys sure know how to make an entrance.”

My dragon snorted. They think they’re so big and bad.

“Trouble?” someone muttered to the bartender.

My whole body tensed, sensing at least one supernatural among them.

My dragon growled. Trouble, for sure.