by TJ Nichols
His gaze slid over. “I have more honor than that.”
“But I don’t?”
“You would be the first human I’ve met who does.” Edra shook his head and turned away from the window to face him. “I’m still working this out.”
David walked by and peered in the window. “Why do you have one of the goats in here?”
Edra stiffened and glared at David.
“He’s looking at some pictures,” Jordan said.
“You aren’t still pursuing those cases? Just shelve it and move on.” David stepped back. “Dirty animal. Just because it can talk, it thinks it has rights.”
Jordan saw the tightness in Edra’s jaw. He was biting his tongue because this was where Jordan worked and it was his case.
“I have leads, and people are dead,” Jordan said, keeping his voice level.
“You should be arresting that thing for drugging humans.” David pointed at Cassius.
“I’m going to see how Cassius is doing.” Edra stepped into the room and closed the door.
“Who was he? Feds? DEA?”
Cassius was pointing at a picture and talking to Edra.
Jordan didn’t bother to answer David. “I need to go.”
Chapter 20
EDRA SAT at his desk in the Mytho Servo building. If he’d been able to breathe fire, his nostrils would’ve been smoking. While the case was making progress, he was still turning in circles—Jordan was spinning him in circles. Last night had been easy, but today had been prickly. He should stop trying and see Jordan only professionally, but even then, all he wanted to do was needle him to get a response. But Jordan was good at slipping on armor and drawing down the visor so no one could see past and no one could hurt him.
Then that toad had so confidently claimed that satyrs were animals. Annoyance flickered through Edra afresh. He’d been tempted to hiss or reveal the truth, but the man would’ve just sneered and seen him as less than human.
Edra forced himself to pick through Howard’s article again. This one was about the influx of drugs and sex on the streets. He went on about how the den was luring in innocents. From the comments beneath the article, he had supporters. He was also lying through his teeth, playing to the fears that some still held about mythos and the way they lived. Howard had even gotten quotes from a priest who was worried about children growing up surrounded by creatures with no morals.
Creatures.
With no morals.
Mythos weren’t stealing from humans or killing humans. Humans were doing the damage. Humans lacked the morals the church claimed to love.
Edra hissed. He wanted to shift and show Howard exactly what became of liars and troublemakers in Tariko, but he was sure someone would then claim that mythos were vigilantes.
Howard needed to be shut down. Or fed to the dragons….
The latter would be easier to accomplish.
He considered it seriously for several moments, mostly because he would enjoy listening to Howard’s bones crunch before the dragon swallowed him whole and screaming. No one in the mytho community would argue that the punishment was inappropriate. Telling lies to incite violence and hatred was serious, and it had gone far beyond splitting the tongue.
He sighed. Humans, especially anti-mytho humans, would notice Howard was missing and correctly point the finger at the mythos. Edra would have to be smarter. He pulled out his collection of articles and skimmed through them again and then read what he knew about Howard.
He needed to feed Howard something false that could also be proven false by the cops. The cops should be giving a statement about the recent murders of the university students, but Jordan had told him that it was too political. And he was getting heat about being overly concerned with Darian’s death.
All Jordan could do was keep a watch on the places where mytho trophies were sold, even though they both agreed that trophy hunting wasn’t a likely motive. The murder had a personal feel to it.
Where had Darian gone for those few missing hours? He wasn’t with his friends or at any of the bars that were mytho friendly, and there was no record of him catching a taxi or a train.
There was nothing until a white truck dumped the body. That was hardly a hot lead—every second vehicle in the city was white or silver.
He’d seldom spoken with Darian, and he regretted that now. If Edra had known more about him, he might have had a better idea where he’d gone between ten at night and four in the morning—the kind of hours he kept when visiting Jordan because he didn’t want to stay the night.
Edra rang Helena and apologized for bothering her again. She was terribly polite about it, which was good, because the only thing more terrifying than a male satyr with bloodlust was a female. They would take all your teeth and your skin and turn them into home decor. Given it was mating season, it was a really bad time to piss off a satyr woman.
It wasn’t a conversation he wanted to be having with Darian’s mother, but it had to be done. “I’m following up, and I can’t remember if Darian ever mentioned having a lover?”
“No. He had his fill at the den and wasn’t interested in settling down.” Helena made that sound like a bad thing, but Darian had still been young.
“Nothing casual?”
“Only at the den.”
There had to have been more to his life than the den. “What did he do when he wasn’t at the den?” Edra should’ve known. “He didn’t work every night.”
“Some nights he went to school. He was studying bookkeeping to help with the business and eventually help other mythos. We have a terrible time hiring humans to do anything. They are so untrustworthy. Did you know Kataline found out that her human bookkeeper was stealing from the business?”
Yes, he had known that, because Kataline had come to Mytho Servo for help when the cops hadn’t pressed charges—too hard to prove, apparently. That was before he’d been the liaison officer.
Edra picked up a pen. “Do you know where Darian studied?”
“Yes.” She gave the name of one of the few night schools that regularly accepted mytho students.
“Thank you.”
“I know it’s your job, but thank you… and that inspector. He cares.”
Edra wasn’t sure he did. But Jordan wanted to do the right thing, and that should be enough. “I’ll let him know.”
For a heartbeat he was tempted to ask her if the Strega had seen anything about him or Jordan, but he didn’t want to know. And even though the Strega no longer had much magic, they were still deadly crones who could brew a potion that could kill or cure. Asking them the wrong question could be ruinous. Helena must have been desperate to go to one, and it wouldn’t have been cheap.
The Strega didn’t deal with money.
He shouldn’t go to the night school on his own—couldn’t really, because he wasn’t qualified to investigate anything more complicated than what he should get for dinner. But he wasn’t sure he was ready to even talk to Jordan again.
He’d spent too much time thinking about exactly what he’d like to do with Jordan, and last night had been far too tempting. Today had been the reminder that, no matter how well they seemed to be working together, there were far too many things to get stuck in the wheels.
He typed up a text so he didn’t have to speak to him.
Darian went to night school. Need to get down there ASAP.
Jordan didn’t reply until Edra was almost home.
At San Francisco State. Will follow up tomorrow. Thanks.
If he couldn’t do anything to help with the murders, he could at least think of a way to stick the knife in Howard. Instead he stripped and shifted, with the excuse that he needed to fly more. That he was invisible and taking a path to San Francisco State was a side issue.
He didn’t know what he was looking for or what he was doing, only that sitting in his pathetic excuse for an apartment wasn’t how he wanted to spend the night. If things were different, he might’ve gone to the den to waste money
he didn’t have.
He closed his eyes and coasted on the currents, but he couldn’t even imagine he was home. The air smelled wrong, but he couldn’t remember exactly how it had smelled in Tariko. While the bay had been the same, the town had been smaller and the forest bigger and with far taller trees.
And he hadn’t been the only lesser dragon in the region.
There was another in Portland and a couple to the south. He could find another like him if he tried. But he didn’t want to replace what he’d lost. That would be a disservice to Lyo and the life they’d had. He’d wasted ten years trying to find a way to exist here, and now that he had a place… a life… he was missing something… someone….
He plunged toward the ground and refused to think that he needed a cop in his life. He skimmed over the surface of the road and over a vehicle and stopped in the parking lot. He had no idea where on campus Jordan was, and it didn’t matter. He wasn’t there to see Jordan—not at all, not even a little bit.
Instead he paced the parking lot, claws tapping—invisible but not silent. Like any predator, the scent of blood drew him. A chipmunk scurried up a tree, and he thought about going after it, but the blood was more important. The white truck was unattended, and while Edra couldn’t see anything, it reeked of old blood. Could’ve been from a hunt. Could’ve been from a wounded satyr.
Not wanting to contaminate whatever was there, he stepped away, memorized the license plate, and went back to the blue car that smelled like jasmine and sweat. Then he perched on the hood like a large and rather pretty gargoyle. It was an effect ruined by the fact no one could see him.
About half an hour later, he heard Jordan approach. He was talking to someone, so Edra waited until the woman got in her car and Jordan was three feet away. Then Jordan paused as though he knew something was wrong. He brushed his hip with his hand, revealing the butt of his gun.
Edra shimmered into view.
“Jesus. Fucking. Christ.” Jordan took several steps back. His gun was instantly in his hand and then holstered just as fast. “What the fuck?”
Edra smirked. He could shift back to human form, but he enjoyed seeing Jordan look completely unraveled.
Jordan stared at him and raked his fingers through his hair. “How the fuck do I get a dragon off my car?” He walked two paces away and then returned with his eyes narrowed. The game was up. “Silver lesser dragon. If that’s you, Edra, I’m going to kill you.”
Edra shifted and hoped Jordan wouldn’t arrest him for being naked in public. “You can try, but dragons, even lesser ones, are hard to kill.”
“One bullet.” Jordan tapped his forehead.
“That good, are you?”
“I grew up in Texas. I could fire a gun before I could ride a bike.” Jordan took off his jacket and offered it to him.
Edra draped it on his lap so Jordan would feel more comfortable. Though Edra covered himself slowly.
He dragged his gaze to Edra’s face and tried to sound calm, but his scent gave him away. Lust was on his skin, and his heartbeat was fast as the shock worked its way through his body. “Do you want to explain why you are sitting on my car? I’m guessing this is work and not some stalking-mating behavior?”
“Could be both, but there’s a white truck around the other side that smells of blood. I thought if you were here chatting to people, Darian’s killer might be here. So I thought I’d do a flyover.” And hope that maybe he’d see Jordan, because the need was an itch in his blood, and he couldn’t shake it. He wasn’t sure Jordan was doing everything he could to find Darian’s killer, so it was his job to make sure he made progress.
“And scare me to death.”
“That was a bonus.” Edra grinned. “You jumped so nicely, but you knew something wasn’t right. You knew I was there.” He was going to savor that for a while.
“I was being watched. That was all I knew. And that’s only because a year of being undercover gave me a very healthy sense of paranoia. Did you get the license number?”
“Do you think I’m stupid?” He gave Jordan the plate number, and he typed it into his phone.
“I’ll check it out and see if it’s one of the men Cassius recognized.”
“Were any of them there tonight?”
Jordan didn’t answer. Instead he rocked on his heels. Their partnership only went so far.
“You have to trust me with this. I appreciate you stepping in and helping, but—”
“But I’m not a cop.” He slid off the hood, the jacket held in front of him. “I wanted to be, but you have to be a citizen.” Even if he were a citizen, he was sure they’d find another reason to exclude mythos from the police force.
“If you were a cop, you wouldn’t be as effective at looking out for your people. You’d have limits, rules, politics.”
“I have all of those now.”
Jordan stared at him and nodded. “Maybe, but not the same. You don’t level with me about everything you do, and I’m not willing to ask more because if I know and someone asks me, then there’ll be trouble.”
Edra lifted his eyebrows. If Jordan had realized something else was going on, had others? Or was it just that Jordan had taken the time to get to know him and other mythos? He handed back the jacket. “I should go. Leave you to it.”
The night air was cold on his skin, but his blood was hot. Jordan’s car was just behind him, and Jordan was within touching distance. They could both be naked and in the car in under a minute. It was so damn tempting.
But it was also impossible. Jordan dropped his gaze and then glanced at the car as though having the same thought.
“There are security cameras.”
Of course there were. “Going to arrest me for being naked?”
A smile flickered across Jordan’s face. “Didn’t know you liked handcuffs.”
Edra smiled. “Not even a challenge. I can snap them.” He stepped back. “Going to watch?”
Jordan didn’t answer, and Edra didn’t give him a second chance. He drew the cold up and shifted. He heard Jordan’s sharp intake of breath, but Jordan didn’t look away. That was a good sign—even some mythos couldn’t handle watching the body distort and twist into a new shape, but Jordan didn’t even step back. His gaze skimmed over Edra’s dragon shape and assessed every change.
“Your eyes don’t change.”
Well, of course they didn’t. Neither did his brain. He was still him.
“But you have no hands.”
Edra opened his wings. They were his hands. His finger bones were just extremely long in this body.
“And you have no voice.” Jordan smiled.
Edra hissed. He had a voice, just not words that a human would understand. He snaked his head forward until he was looking Jordan in the eye, and then he snorted.
Jordan flinched, but lifted his hand. “Can I?”
That almost made Edra step back. He wasn’t a pet. No one had touched him with affection in his dragon form since the collapse. He hesitated, but then he nodded.
Jordan reached out and barely brushed his fingers over the fine silvery scales on Edra’s chest. “I thought you’d be bigger… even though I looked up what lesser dragons were. But you’re more delicate than I expected.” His touch became more confident.
I am not going to purr. But the rumble was building, and he was accidentally leaning into the touch and turning his head so Jordan could rub that spot just below his earhole.
“You feel kind of like a snake or a lizard—smooth.”
Jordan wasn’t getting the right spot, so Edra eased back. He wasn’t a reptile, but he wasn’t a mammal either.
He snapped his head up at the approaching footsteps. It the next heartbeat, he vanished. That made Jordan step back, and he turned toward the sound.
Edra got out of the way, and with a claw, he nudged Jordan toward his car. Jordan muttered a curse, but he unlocked the door and paused to scan the parking lot.
Two men stepped out of the shadows, laughing about some
thing.
The tension left Jordan, but he watched them as they made their way to the bus stop. Edra did too. Had they been there for the meeting?
There was probably not enough evidence for the police to talk to the anti-mytho group. While Edra was tempted to create some, he wanted to believe that Jordan could manage on his own. If Jordan knew exactly what he’d already done, he’d probably arrest Edra.
Chapter 21
SOMEONE HAD left a cheap black eyeliner on Jordan’s desk. At first glance it could’ve been a pencil, but he didn’t need two glances to know what it was. His heart beat a little quicker, but there was no one watching and laughing. He was tempted to throw it in the garbage, but instead he dropped it into the broken cup that served as a penholder on his desk.
The cup had been a hand-painted gift from his youngest sister when he moved out. Even though the handle had dropped off, he didn’t want to throw it away. At eight, her artwork had been a little shaky, but the intent was there. They messaged a couple of times a week, but his older siblings wanted nothing to do with him—unless it was to tell him they still prayed for him, to which he had nothing to say.
When he first realized he liked boys and not girls, he tried to pray it away and fit in, but then he woke up to the fact that most people didn’t care. So he shed expectations and religion, and he was a whole lot happier. Now his youngest sister wasn’t having a good time at home. He would call her, but that would only make it worse.
If he reacted the wrong way to the warnings left on his desk, things could get messy. He could either panic or ignore it until they tired of their game. The latter was the better strategy, but he still documented it on his phone—date, time, item. He should’ve photographed it on his desk too. If there was a next time, he would. He also made note of the news article, so he would have a record if he ever needed HR to step in.
He’d been so careful… but he shouldn’t have to be that careful. What did it matter what he wore when he went out? He was allowed to have a life. That no one knew he’d visited the den was pure luck, and it made him queasy. It was much safer to use at home.