Firestorm Forever: A Dragonfire Novel (16 page)

She’d felt an awareness of him, even then, one unlike anything she’d experienced before. It had only heightened when he’d given her a small smile, his eyes glowing. She’d felt beautiful when he’d looked at her like that, with his appreciation clear. His grip was strong and his hand warm, and she’d seen that his eyes were a deep hazel, with green and gold lights in them. Beneath his perusal, Sam had felt something awaken deep inside her that she’d thought was dead forever.

He had her at hello, both her curiosity and her lust aroused.

That powerful impression had been reinforced with every exchange between them.

And her whimsical cover story, about being a tarot card reader and spell caster, had been put into immediate action. She feared that maybe he already had seen through her story. Sam had thrown herself into researching spells that used herbs, partly so that she had excuses to go to Sloane’s greenhouse and seek his advice. She’d even planted a number of them, making a start of a garden around the house. She’d studied the cards that her sister read so easily and had been devouring books on their interpretation. Contrary to being something easily mastered, she found the detail almost bewildering.

Even with so much to do, Sam hadn’t been able to stop thinking about Sloane. She hadn’t been able to stay out of his shop. She’d been sure that seducing him would be the easiest way to cure her of the attraction.

Instead, she was even more intrigued by him.

It was those secrets.

She was on his porch, with a pathetic excuse at conversation in her hand, an apology composed in her thoughts, her heart skipping as she knocked on his door. He’d see right through the pretense, Sam knew it, but strangely enough, she didn’t mind. She just wanted to see him again.

She wanted to make things right.

Sam couldn’t deny that the house seemed empty. It was silent and dark. She knocked and called and rang the bell, but there was no reply. There was no one near the pool, either. She tried to peer into one window, but it was either tinted or the shades were drawn on the inside. She couldn’t see anything but her own reflection.

The night they’d made love, she’d noticed that it had been impossible to look into his house, even from the pool area. Either the windows were tinted or blinds were closed, because the windows looked like dark mirrors. In earlier days, she might have dismissed his need for privacy as a quirk, but she thought again about that tattoo, and Sloane’s insistence that there be no strangers in his house.

What
did
he do, really?

Why was he so private?

Mercury was guide of the dead and protector of gamblers, liars and thieves.

Sam shivered, despite the warmth of the afternoon. She’d always found mysteries enticing. Her ability to shake the truth free, no matter how improbable it was, had been the basis of her entire career. The funny thing was that she hadn’t felt much like solving riddles since her colossal failure.

But Sloane’s tattoo rekindled Sam’s almost-forgotten need to know.

She realized a bit late that a man so enamored of his privacy had to have an alarm system. She hadn’t heard an alarm, though, and the police hadn’t responded.

There was no crisis.

Sam walked home, more disappointed by Sloane’s continued absence than she knew she should be. She tossed the branch of the rose into the field, well away from Sloane’s meticulously tended gardens.

Her mother had always insisted that everything happened for a reason. If one night was to be the sum of her time with Sloane, what had been the point?

The mystery was the point, Sam decided. She was going to unravel Sloane’s secret, no matter what it was, no matter how deeply buried it was, just to prove that she hadn’t lost her mojo. There might be one riddle she couldn’t solve, but there wouldn’t be two.

Maybe that would push Sloane out of her thoughts for good.

Chapter Six

“That’s Erik!” Cassie was astonished to see the leader of the
Pyr
on the news in his dragon form. Erik was battling a red and gold dragon in the night sky.

“Our latest dragon sighting comes from Chicago, where these two dragons battled over the city, showing no care for the human residents sleeping in the vicinity,” declared Maeve O’Neill. She was in a studio somewhere other than the battle itself, providing a voice-over, her image in a box at the bottom of the screen. Although she was a beautiful woman, with dark hair and blue eyes, Cassie found her perspectives irritating. “A flurry of dragon sightings coinciding with the blood moon and eclipse, as well as natural disasters in China, the Ukraine and Indonesia—never mind the unchecked progress of the Seattle virus—have this reporter wondering whether the end of the world really is near. Are the
Pyr
friend or foe? Call in now to share your views, as we watch this brutal attack unfold…”

Cassie turned off the sound so she could avoid another tirade by Maeve and watched Erik’s fight. He was winning, and had torn the wings off the dragon who had to be
Slayer
, when another one popped out of nowhere to fight against Erik. It was strange how much he resembled the wounded
Slayer
. To Cassie’s relief, Donovan showed up, and then Delaney, and the
Slayers
vanished into thin air.

She was in the large room of the Venetian palace she shared with Lorenzo di Fiore, her
Pyr
and the former Las Vegas illusionist. It was one of those rare moments when they were alone together and both of their sons were asleep. Antonio would be three in March. Bartholomew—Bart to all who adored him—had only been born the previous May. Cassie had been thinking that she was too tired to do anything about their moment of privacy when the fight had been televised. She was fully alert now.

Lorenzo was staring out over the canal, hands on his hips, apparently lost in thought.

Cassie knew better.

“You don’t fool me,” she said, turning off the television with the remote. “You have to be interested. It looks like Erik’s wounded, and you know how he feels about being seen by humans.”

“I watched the video online earlier,” Lorenzo said quietly.

“And?”

“And?” He turned to face her, his smile no less enigmatic than his manner.

“And what have you concluded, planned or otherwise schemed without telling me about it?” Cassie softened her words with a smile. It was Lorenzo’s nature to plan, but she couldn’t resist teasing him about it sometimes.

Lorenzo came to sit beside her on the couch, his gaze intent. “I would never make a decision without consulting you.”

Cassie rolled her eyes. “No, you just move all the pieces into place and ask me when it’s too late to do anything different.”

He was immediately contrite. “I thought it would be easier for you if I took care of details. You’ve been tired during your pregnancies and I wanted you to have every opportunity to work on your photographs.”

“While you’ve had very little on your talons.” She poked him in the chest and he sighed.

“I’m not used to retirement,” he admitted ruefully.

“Regrets?”

His shrug was non-committal but his gaze was bright. “You?”

“The boys are so great,” Cassie said, watching Lorenzo nod. “I wouldn’t be without them.”

“No.” He arched a brow. “But?”

Cassie decided to be the one to voice her doubts first. “I miss living in the States. I worry about their schooling here, where there are so few other kids. I’m not sure I like seeing you prowl around the house, either, trying to find something to do.”

Lorenzo took her hand in his. “We’ve been thinking the same way.”

Cassie was glad to hear it. She gestured to the dark screen. “Talk to me.”

He frowned, then nodded. “You’re right that Erik doesn’t like humans to see him in dragon form. That he was filmed and the video survived means that he was unable to beguile the person who shot the video.”

“Because he was injured?”

Lorenzo winced. “I think Erik would defy death to beguile humans in defense of the
Pyr
and their privacy. I’m sure he, and the others, tried.”

“Then what could be the reason?”

“Change.” Lorenzo got up to pace the room. “You know that beguiling works best, like most kinds of hypnosis, when the person being beguiled wants to be convinced. Historically, people didn’t want to see dragons. We were terrifying. We could destroy them, readily. And seeing a man change into a dragon was even more frightening. It challenged everything they believed to be true.”

“Right.” Cassie hugged her knees. “So it was easy to beguile someone into believing that he or she hadn’t seen a dragon at all.”

“It’s
never
easy, Cassie,” Lorenzo chided gently and she smiled, knowing she’d pricked his pride.

“Of course not. And you’re the best at it because you’ve worked hard to be so.”

He gave her a simmering glance, probably because she was teasing him. Cassie smiled at him, unrepentant, and patted the couch beside her. “You need to perform again. It keeps you more even-tempered.”

He snorted and she practically saw a puff of smoke come out of his nostrils. “I wish you weren’t so right.”

“Come on. Tell me what’s changed.”

Lorenzo perched on the edge of the couch again, his restless energy tangible. His gaze collided suddenly with hers. “They
want
to see us now. Taking a video like that one of Erik, Donovan and Delaney is a ticket to fame, of a kind. Humans aren’t afraid of us, and they don’t want to be beguiled that their dream didn’t come true.”

“Could you have beguiled the person who shot this video?”

Lorenzo frowned. “I don’t know. It would have been a challenge.”

His uncertainty was unexpected. “You would have liked to have tried.”

“Yes.”

“Do you agree with Erik? Do you think the
Pyr
are in danger? This Maeve seems to want us to take up our pitchforks and battle you to extinction.”

He turned a glittering glance upon her, one that could still make her simmer with desire. “We’re all prey, Cassie, but the real hunters aren’t humans. The real hunters are those other dragons.”

“
Slayers
?”

“Not just any
Slayers
. The two in the video look just like Boris Vassily, who has been dead for several years. And they were indistinguishable from each other.” He drummed his fingers on the couch. “I have to wonder what Jorge learned from Chen at the end, or what he’s done.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means that it’s time for the illusion to end.” Lorenzo eyed her, his manner regal. “I won’t hide when I’m being hunted.” He took her hand in his again. “And to my relief, that meshes quite well with what we’ve both been thinking.”

Cassie smiled, knowing her dragon well enough to guess his choice. “You’ll taunt.”

He leaned closer, smiling with anticipation. “I’ll taunt and I’ll provoke and I’ll find out the truth, so it can be used against them. This is the end of the Dragon’s Tail Wars, Cassie. I didn’t want to be involved, but our firestorm changed everything. I mean to survive this reckoning, and that means I need to fight in the only way I can.”

“We’re going back to the States,” Cassie guessed, her excitement rising.

“The master illusionist Lorenzo is going to rise from the dead,” her
Pyr
agreed with a nod. “And it will be the greatest show of all time.” He smiled as he held her gaze with that familiar confidence. “The only way past the fire is through it.” She could almost see him making lists and planning. “We’ll start with a press conference to announce my return. You’ll be there.”

“Just another photographer in the crowd,” Cassie guessed.

Lorenzo shook his head. “No, no. There will be no crowd.”

“But don’t you want as many reporters there as possible?”

Lorenzo’s eyes danced. “I’m going to give Maeve O’Neill an exclusive.” He sat back on the couch, lounging with a satisfaction that Cassie didn’t understand.

“Why would she be interested in your illusion show starting up again, or even in your return from the dead?”

Lorenzo smiled. “Because you’re going to tell her that I’m the
Pyr
you photographed shifting shape in the desert.”

Cassie gasped. “I can’t! Erik will be furious! It’s a violation of the Covenant…”

“This is war,” Lorenzo interrupted with resolve. His eyes glittered coldly. “I’ll do whatever I need to do to win and secure the future of my sons.”

Cassie still didn’t understand. “But she’ll broadcast the story and once everyone knows, you’ll be in danger…”

“No, she won’t.” He leaned closer to her, his smile bright with anticipation. “Not after she’s been beguiled into changing her views about the
Pyr
, and begins arguing in our favor.”

Instead of condemning the
Pyr
with every broadcast. “Can you do it? Doesn’t she want to believe you’re evil?”

Lorenzo pursed his lips. “I think she’s more interested in her own fame than any convictions about our nature. I think she wants a story, and the bigger the better. I just need to offer her a tempting one for the beguiling to work.”

“Like what?”