Fire Brand (City of Dragons Book 6)

by Val St. Crowe

  “Well, I would,” I said. “It’s only that every time I go someplace, you usually come with me. But I don’t have issues leaving him. I leave him with Vivica.”

  “Who’s a dragon shifter,” said Lachlan.

  “And Connor.”

  “Who’s an impressively strong gargoyle,” said Lachlan.

  I furrowed my brow. “What are you going on about? You’re a vampire.”

  “I…” He sighed. “Well, I might not have needed the gun if I’d had magic, you know. But it’s been awhile since you and I… you know…”

  I blushed. “It hasn’t been that long.” When Lachlan drank my blood, it tended to be part of other, more amorous activities. And we were just so busy with the baby these days.

  “Well, it’s been long enough that all the magic’s out of my system.”

  I bit my lip. “You’re mad. You’re all frustrated and lonely, aren’t you?”

  “No,” he said, shaking his head. “Trust me, I get it. We are tired, all of the time. Both of us. So, I’m not saying that I wish we were doing more blood sharing, or having more sex, or anything like that, because I’m just as exhausted as you are.”

  I folded my arms over my chest. “Seriously? You’re not just saying that because you’re trying to make me feel better?”

  He took me by the shoulders. “Penny, with you and our son right now, I am the happiest I have ever been in my life. Everything is great. Trust me. Great.”

  “Okay,” I said. “But…?”

  “But nothing.” He turned and stared out over the dragon corpse at the ocean.

  “There’s a ‘but’ in there,” I insisted.

  “It did suck being powerless today,” he said.

  “Well, it happens to me too,” I said. “There have been times I’ve gone over three weeks between shifts. Lost my magic.” I was a dragon, and dragons were inherently magical, but if we didn’t shift every two weeks or so, our magic wore off.

  “Not the same,” he said. “You could have dove into the water, shifted and then taken the dragon head on. And anyway, even if I could have had some of your blood then, I’ll still never be as powerful as you. You’re always going to be stronger and more magical than I am.”

  I narrowed my eyes. “And you’re threatened by that,” I said flatly. Because he always claimed that he wasn’t threatened by it, but I never quite believed him. He brought it up too much not to be bothered.

  “No,” he said. “That’s not what I’m saying.”

  “What are you saying, then?”

  “I want to be able to protect my son,” he said. “If I’m alone with him, I want to be able to keep him safe. I want to be strong enough, powerful enough to do that.”

  “And you are,” I said. I gestured to the dead dragon. “Look. This thing is very, very dead.”

  “I know,” he said. He ran a hand through his hair. “Maybe I’m making a big thing out of nothing.”

  I didn’t say anything.

  “I mean, if you feel comfortable leaving me alone with Wyatt, then there’s no problem.” He shrugged. “I should suck it up. Stop whining.”

  “You’re not whining,” I said. But I had to admit that I did feel a little nervous about leaving him alone with Wyatt now. And I didn’t want to feel that way. He was Wyatt’s father. When I had been a little girl, I had seen my own father as larger than life, the strongest person in the universe. I was sure Wyatt would see Lachlan the same way when he was a little older.

  Unless… unless I treated Lachlan like he was weak.

  I shook my head. “We need to find some way to keep that talisman on his body. Maybe if we use that elastic thing again.”

  “It dug into his skin, Penny. Left marks.” Lachlan shook his head.

  I sighed. “There’s got to be a way to keep it on him.” We had used clips, like the ones for pacifiers, for a while, but Wyatt had somehow figured out how to remove them. He loved to take that talisman off, no matter how crazy it made me when he did it.

  “There is,” Lachlan said. “We’ll figure it out.”

  I turned back to the dragon corpse. “I guess I better call someone to come and get rid of this.”

  “Those people Clarke put you in touch with?” he asked.

  “Yeah,” I said. Clarke was a dragon slayer who dealt with killing and disposing of rogue dragons. We would have called her directly, but she was never around anymore. She was supposedly jet-setting across the country with one of the Spencer boys. I had grown up with the Spencer family. Most dragon shifters knew each other. Small social circle and all of that.

  “Sounds good,” said Lachlan, turning and walking up the beach toward the hotel.

  I stole a glance out at the ocean. The sun was setting over the hotel, and the sky over the water was turning dark. The water was already dark, lapping up at the land.

  I headed after Lachlan.

  “So, did you buy some new clothes?” he said.

  “I did,” I said. “Do you care about that?”

  “I care about you, and if you care, then I care.”

  What the heck did that mean?

  “It was kind of depressing, actually,” I said. “I still haven’t lost all the baby weight.”

  He put an arm around me. “You’re beautiful.”

  I grinned at him. “You’re biased.”

  He shook his head. “Not in the least.”

  * * *

  Christy Dirk set down two coffees in front of Lachlan and me. “Good morning. Hope you haven’t caffeinated yet.”

  “For us?” I said, smiling at her. Lachlan and I had just arrived at the office, and—as luck would have it—hadn’t made time for coffee that morning. In pre-Wyatt days, such a thing would never happen, but these days, trying to get out of the house on time was a Herculean feat.

  “For you,” she said.

  “Thanks,” said Lachlan. “What’s the occasion?”

  She shrugged. “No reason. Just thought you guys might want some coffee. Although, I must say, you two always seem remarkably well rested for a couple with an infant.”

  “We do have a night nanny,” said Lachlan.

  “Sometimes, Connor helps out at night,” I said. “But Wyatt won’t always go back down for him. Connor does wake me up if Wyatt needs to nurse.”

  “Yes, well, that’s you,” said Lachlan, picking up one of the coffees.

  Christy glared at him. “Sometimes, you are such an ass, Flint.”

  “I’m just joking,” he said. “I obviously get awakened as well. It’s not as if a gargoyle coming into your bedroom with a screaming child is something that’s easy to sleep through.”

  “Oh, poor you,” I muttered.

  “I wasn’t complaining.” He took a drink of the coffee. “I think the whole thing’s great, frankly. I would be happy to be awakened eight more times a night as long as we still had our little man.”

  “Me too,” I said, picking up a coffee.

  And Lachlan and I grinned at each other.

  Christy made a gagging noise in the back of her throat. “You two disgust me. You are way too happy. No one should be as happy as you.”

  “Do you want kids, Christy?” I asked her.

  “I don’t know,” she said. “But I do know that if I met someone and we decided to start a family, either she’d have to get pregnant or we’d have to adopt, because I could never do the pregnancy thing. No way. And, I mean, that’s not something you really lead with on a first date. Or, apparently, you shouldn’t, as I have learned from experience.”

  Lachlan and I laughed.

  “Besides,” she said. “I have kids.” She gestured to the photos of her dogs Lala and Booboo, which she kept on her desk.

  We laughed again.

  I took a drink of coffee. Ah. I could feel myself waking up. Warm, wonderful stuff. “Is this pumpkin spice?”

  “Yup,” said Christy. “That okay? You like that?”

  “Heck yes,” I said. “Love it. I go pumpkin-flavored crazy the
minute it’s fall.”

  “Oh, me too,” said Christy. “It’s my favorite seasonal flavor.”

  Lachlan made a face. “I don’t get it. I like coffee to taste like coffee.”

  “That’s because you’re a man,” I said.

  Christy laughed.

  “Seriously, though,” said Lachlan. “Why’d you bring us coffee? You’re going to ask us a favor, aren’t you?”

  “No, I was just being nice,” she said.

  He raised his eyebrows at her.

  “Okay, well… I mean, it’s not a favor or anything.”

  “I knew there was something,” said Lachlan.

  “It’s only that you’ve been having me handle all the murders and big cases ever since Wyatt was born,” she said. “And there are two murder cases right now. I could try to work them both, but I really don’t know if I’d be able to handle that kind of workload…”

  I perked up. “We have to solve a murder?”

  Lachlan eyed me. “You sound excited.”

  “Well, yeah,” I said. “I mean, it’s been a while, and we haven’t really had a case to sink our teeth into, and this could be kind of fun. Like old times.”

  Lachlan nodded slowly. “Right. Except while we’re kicking ideas around, we’ll also be changing diapers.”

  “Yeah,” I said, not fazed.

  “So, you guys think you can handle it?” said Christy.

  “Definitely,” I said. “What’s the case?”

  “Well,” she said, “like I said, there are two. There’s one that’s probably something to do with a vampire gang—”

  “We’ll take the other one,” I said. Lachlan and I had had enough vampire-gang-related nonsense to last us a lifetime.

  “I was going to suggest that anyway,” said Christy. “It’s a gargoyle. Beckett James Stanley.”

  “What?” I said. “He’s dead?”

  “Oh, you’ve heard of him, then,” said Christy.

  “Sure,” I said. “He was a big civil rights leader for the gargoyles back in the sixties, when they were fighting to get their freedom from mages.” Gargoyles had been created by mages to be protection against dragons. They were created from a deep, dark magic—human and dragon sacrifice—and they had been considered property of mages for hundreds of years. Finally, however, they had won their freedom and could no longer be owned.

  “Right,” said Lachlan. “Sounds familiar. That guy was murdered?”

  “Well,” said Christy, “at first they didn’t realize it. He was ill and in the hospital, and it looked as though he’d had a heart attack and died. But his niece insisted there be an autopsy. She was sure that there was foul play. And sure enough, they found that he had a drug in his system, um… can’t remember the name, but it’s in the file.”

  “So, the drug killed him?” said Lachlan.

  “When did he get injected with the drug?” I said.

  “I’m… not sure,” said Christy. “You should probably pull the file up.”

  “All right,” said Lachlan, scooting over to his computer and logging in to his computer.

  Though I had my own login to the network, I didn’t have my own desk or computer. There were a few floater desks at the back of the room that I used when I needed to.

  Lachlan’s desk used to resemble one of the floater desks. It was utterly bare. He didn’t keep anything in the drawers either. Said that he didn’t need to, since everything’s digital. He even took notes on his phone. Now, though, he had a couple pictures of Wyatt on the desk, sitting together in a little frame. There was also a framed picture of the three of us, taken only a few hours after Wyatt was born at the hospital. It was actually one of my favorite pictures of myself, even though I was still huge with baby weight. The expression on my face was pure, unadulterated happiness, and it made me look radiant and pretty. Of course, Lachlan always looked good. And Wyatt was perfect and tiny. I smiled at the picture, feeling a sweetness settle over me. I loved my family.

  “Okay,” said Lachlan. “So, get this. The drug is called Periklur. It’s readily available at the hospital. In fact, it’s kept in a storage closet that’s very close to the room where Mr. Stanley was staying.”

  “It was taken from the hospital?” I said.

  “Looks like.”

  “Don’t they keep those storage closets locked?”

  Lachlan shrugged. “If they didn’t before, they should now.”

  I shrugged too. He was right. “So, someone picked it up on the way to his room.”

  “Yeah,” said Lachlan. “Now, unfortunately, the syringe used to inject him wasn’t recovered, so we can’t test that for prints, but I wonder if it’s worth it to dust inside the closet.”

  “Something that so many people use?” said Dirk. “You’d never find anything usable.”

  “Well, we’ll ask,” said Lachlan. “If it’s been wiped down in there since, we won’t push it. Otherwise, what’s it going to hurt, right?”

  “I guess,” I said.

  Lachlan mused over the computer screen. “So, it had to happen during night, because you can’t inject a stone statue.”

  “Oh, I guess not,” I said.

  “But it doesn’t seem he struggled,” said Lachlan. He turned to me. “Do gargoyles sleep?”

  “They turn to stone,” I said. “In the summer, that’s for up to fifteen hours a day. They don’t need sleep.”

  “He knew his killer,” said Lachlan. “Trusted that person. That’s why he didn’t struggle. Didn’t question why the person was coming in close. Probably didn’t even see the syringe. Hit him out of nowhere.”

  “That’s awful,” I said.

  Lachlan grimaced. “Hell of a way for a man like that to go out.”

  CHAPTER THREE

  “He was a really wonderful man,” said Sierra Johnson, shaking her head. She was a nurse who worked at the hospital where Beckett had been murdered. “It’s really horrible what happened to him. I hope you two find whoever’s responsible and make sure they face the consequences.”

  “Well, that’s our job,” said Lachlan. “Were you working the day that Mr. Stanley was killed?”

  “I was,” said Sierra. “I usually work night shift, so I’d see him nearly every night.”

  “What was he in the hospital for?” said Lachlan. “My understanding is that gargoyles don’t tend to get ill very often.”

  “Well, his diagnosis kept changing,” said Sierra. “The doctors here are good, but they aren’t used to dealing with gargoyles, and they weren’t able to be sure what was causing his symptoms. I was of the opinion that he had liver damage, personally. He apparently had a drinking problem, and there’s only so much being a magical creature can do to help your physiology along at a certain point.”

  Lachlan looked at me. “That true?”

  “Um…” I wasn’t really an expert in gargoyle health.

  “Well, that’s a personal opinion,” said Sierra. “I have to admit that my own study of magical creatures was limited to drakes when I was becoming a nurse. But I do know that magic can’t fix everything.”

  “That’s true,” I said.

  “So, it’s not likely that his symptoms were, um, inflicted before being admitted?” said Lachlan. “Maybe by the same person who killed him?”

  “I don’t think so,” said Sierra. “Whoever killed him got the Periklur from our storage locker, didn’t they? That’s my understanding. There’s concern at the hospital about the risk of a lawsuit.”

  “That’s the way it appears,” said Lachlan.

  “So,” said Sierra, “to use a drug to give him the symptoms that got him admitted, the person would have had to have access to that, and this seems much more opportunistic.”

  “That’s true,” said Lachlan, furrowing his brow at her.

  I eyed her as well. She’d really thought this through, huh? Or was it possible that she’d twisted the evidence to make it look a certain way? Maybe she had killed Beckett Stanley.

  Sierra
looked at us expectantly.

  Lachlan shifted gears. “Did he have visitors that day?”

  “There’s actually a security camera right outside of the room where he was staying,” said Sierra. “It caught an image of everyone that entered Beckett’s room that day.”

  “We’re going to need those tapes,” said Lachlan. “Would that be possible?”

  “I think so,” said Sierra. “I was instructed to cooperate with the police completely. But let me check with my supervisor first.”

  * * *

  “And who’s that?” said Lachlan, pausing the video. We were inside an office in the hospital, reviewing the security video with Sierra.

  “That’s Rowan Lynch,” said Sierra. “I don’t entirely know who she is, but I think she’s an ex-girlfriend of his.”

  Rowan Lynch was human. So, Beckett James Stanley had dated humans. I didn’t think that meant anything, per se, but there might be some blow back from Lynch’s family if they were prejudiced…

  Still, they hadn’t appeared on the tape.

  “Great,” said Lachlan, who had returned to the video and was watching it at high speed. “And, um, you again.” He stopped the video. On the screen, we watched an image of Sierra enter the room.

  “That’s when I discovered that he was dead,” said Sierra.

  “Got it,” said Lachlan. “So, then that’s everyone.”

  She nodded.

  “No one else entered the room,” said Lachlan.

  “No one else that night,” she said.

  “Great,” said Lachlan. “That’s all we need from you, then, I think. We’d like a copy of this video, though.”

  “You can take that one,” said Sierra.

  “Excellent,” said Lachlan. He stood up. “Thank you for your time, Ms. Johnson.”

  “Sure thing,” she said.

  Lachlan handed her a card. “Anything else you think of, you let us know. Call the number on there.”

  “I’ll do that.” She accepted the card.

  * * *

  Back at the station, Lachlan went through the footage again.

  “Okay,” he said. “So, we’ve got the niece going in. She’s the one who demanded the autopsy.”

  “Paloma Stanley. And Sierra said she was always there,” I said. “Spent lots of time with her uncle. They were very close.”