Breaking the Nexus (Mythrian Realm)

by Avalon, Lindsay

  Puzzled, she shook her head. “I don’t understand.”

  “It could have been a trap to lure you out into the open to give him a shot at you.”

  Her mouth opened to protest, but then she thought about what he’d said. “You may have a point. I may or may not have been called impulsive a time or two.”

  The words had the desired effect, coaxing a small chuckle from him. “I can believe that.”

  Ian cleared his throat and Sha realized she’d forgotten he was even in the room. “The captain wanted to know if you could tell us anything about this victim.”

  She studied the pictures carefully. “I’m not sure what he’s hoping I’ll see. I don’t recognize the girl…” Sha’s voice trailed off.

  “What is it?” Connor demanded.

  “See here on her right shoulder? These lines radiating outward almost in a starburst pattern? That’s mage fire.”

  “Okay…” He lifted a brow, motioning for her to continue.

  “Oh, right. You wouldn’t know what that is, would you? Suffice it to say, mage fire is one of the most painful weapons you could ever feel. It’s near impossible for most to harness its power effectively, and even when you can wield it, you run the risk of it doubling back upon you. When it strikes, the magic explodes for lack of a better word, racing along the skin and prolonging the agony as it dissipates. The size of the wound depends on the location where it first makes contact with skin, the closer to major veins or arteries, the larger the pattern. If you survive the blast, you’ll always bear the distinctive scarring.”

  “You sound like you speak from experience,” Ian said.

  The ghost of remembered pain spread through her back. Without a word, she turned and lifted her shirt to bare her back, revealing the evidence of her misfortunate encounter with the excruciating magic. Gentle fingers traced the faint blue lines of the scar, drawing a shiver from her. She didn’t have to see his face to know it was Connor’s hands on her body and she leaned back into his touch.

  Disappointment shot through her when he dropped his hands. Already she’d grown accustomed to his touch and she wanted more. She wasn’t sure what to think of that.

  “So what does that mean for the case?”

  “I don’t know how it’s possible, but I’m almost positive it means your killer is…Mythrian.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Knowing Sha had suffered such excruciating pain, seeing the permanent evidence of it, ripped at Connor. How and why this woman had gotten under his skin, he wasn’t sure, but the thought of her hurting brought out a visceral urge to protect. Granted, she didn’t need protecting as she’d pointed out. This woman was an enigma and he’d always loved puzzles.

  He felt Ian’s eyes boring into the back of his head, scrutinizing his reaction to Sha. His partner was like a brother to him, especially since he’d grown up with only sisters, and there was no chance the other man was blind to his attraction to their witness. Connor tried to hold back his sigh. There was going to be no end to the ribbing he’d get for this.

  “There’s a definite consistency between our victim’s wound and yours,” Ian said, his words prompting Sha to cover herself. “Would there be any way for you to identify who made the wound?”

  Connor’s hands began to ache, making him realize they were fisted at his sides. Loosening them, he considered the action carefully. He was a possessive man, but it had never before bothered him when Ian would check out women. Why was Sha so damn different?

  She shook her head. “If I got really close to the body, perhaps. I’m able to track magical signatures sometimes, but it doesn’t always reliably work. It may be even harder since it’s a dead person.”

  An idea started to formulate. “It’d be hard to get you into the autopsy, the captain frowns upon civilians interacting with the body while it’s in the morgue unless they’re next of kin. Does this tracking only work with people or could you do it with an inanimate object.”

  Nodding slowly, she pursed her lips, considering his suggestion. “You’re wondering if I could track our killer from some of the evidence he left behind. I can’t make you any guarantees, but if you get me some samples, I’ll give it my best shot.”

  “I’m going to need to head back to the scene anyway, so I’ll swing by the precinct and see what I can sign out for you,” Ian offered.

  “Thank you. The more variety of objects, the better the chance I’ll be able to work with them. If you could also get pieces from each murder, that may help.”

  “Will do. Connor, can I have a word with you outside?”

  “Yeah, sure. Sha, why don’t you have a look through the file on the latest crime, see if anything jumps out at you.”

  She cocked her head to the side, skepticism in her eyes. “Alright. I’ll just read this in the other room and give you boys a chance to talk about me.”

  Ian opened his mouth then shut it again. Hot damn, it was rare for anyone to render his partner speechless, much less a woman. Served him right. Not giving them a chance to respond, she turned on her heel and headed back to the couch, the subtle sway of her hips captivating him.

  When she was out of earshot, he glanced at his partner. “Well, spit it out.”

  “Have you screwed her yet?” Ian asked bluntly.

  Connor restrained himself from punching the man, but it was a close call. “Watch it,” he warned.

  “You’re risking your career over a piece of ass, man. Is she worth it?”

  He knew Ian was worried about the consequences if their captain discovered the feelings he was developing, and rightfully so. At the least, Connor would be pulled from her protective detail, and at worse he could be brought up for disciplinary actions on the grounds of professional misconduct. Once that would have been enough to stop him from so much as thinking about kissing a witness, much less kissing her and wanting much more.

  His voice was quiet, measured when he answered. “You know she’s not just a piece of ass. Is she worth it? I don’t know, but my gut says yes.”

  “You’ve known her less than twenty four hours, how can you be sure?”

  “I’m not, but shouldn’t the fact that she’s affecting me this way when I’ve never let a woman get to me like this in all the years you’ve known me tell you something?”

  “Oh it tells me something, whether it’s that my best friend has lost his mind remains to be seen. Be careful, that’s all I ask. Now the shit is still hitting the fan downtown. I keep getting text messages from the uniforms securing the scene that there are reports of other bizarre things going down so I need to head off. You’re lucky; the captain has a thousand other things to worry about at the moment than your state of mind.”

  Connor released the breath he’d been holding. “Good to know. About Captain Morrison, I mean, not about the rest. Do you need backup?”

  “Nah, your orders are to protect the witness until I can relieve you. After the stunt earlier with the banshee, her face is officially plastered all over on TV, YouTube, blogs, you name it. Plus, the story’s going national now.”

  He cursed. “Goddamn vultures.”

  “Tell me about it. I’ll keep you updated so leave your phone on. Claire should be meeting me downtown.”

  Claire Michaels was a newly promoted detective assigned to their division, and Connor knew Ian had the hots for her. “Here you are warning me off, and you’re working with Claire? Pot meet kettle.”

  Ian snorted. “Not the same and you know it. Stay out of trouble and try not to get yourself killed if anything else comes out to play. I’d hate to have to break in a new partner.”

  “Same goes. Catch you later.” He opened the door and watched as Ian walked out to his unmarked car, got in, and drove off. As he shut and locked the heavy oak door, Connor wondered how long they’d have to wait for the next catastrophe to strike. He’d be a fool to think the situation wouldn’t continue escalating. Whatever happened next though, he doubted there was anyone better to have at his back than the pin
t-sized woman in his home.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  The poor woman didn’t deserve to die like this. No one did. Pity for the victim churned in her stomach, making her feel a little nauseous. Sha felt sympathy for all of the dead, but this latest was different. In a way, she felt to blame for this death.

  She didn’t kid herself; there was a maniac out there delighting in brutally murdering people and that wasn’t her fault. But perhaps this latest one wouldn’t have died if she hadn’t tumbled into the crime scene. Then again, the killer would have undoubtedly picked another victim, so why didn’t that make her feel any better?

  Luca would tell her to stop being a fool and look for clues to stop this guy before he could go after the next target. Sentinels didn’t investigate every crime, there weren’t enough of them to do that, but they were called in if the situation was unusual or the perpetrator was suspected of being powerful. She’d worked a few cases with Luca and he’d berated her more than once for taking it too personally whenever there was another death before they could identify the killer.

  When it’s your job to bring evil to justice, and you fail that job, how are you not supposed to feel guilty?

  Turning her mind from the path her thoughts were taking, it wouldn’t do any good to continue beating herself up for something she couldn’t change, she wondered what the men were talking about. She only heard hushed tones, not their actual words, and she’d been fighting the temptation to cast an amplifier spell. Water was an excellent conductor of sound, so it was one of the simpler spells for an Aquarum to use. But it would be wrong to eavesdrop. Even if the curiosity threatened to eat her alive. Those two needed to hurry up so she could press Connor for details.

  Ian intrigued her. Oh, not in the same way as Connor. Nowhere near the same way, she thought, a lazy smile spreading over her face as she remembered their kiss. No, he reminded her a bit of Luca. In appearance, they couldn’t look more different. Ian had hair as red as fire, skin as pale as her own, and he was lanky. Her partner, on the other hand, had the darker coloring of his Elven brethren and he was a bit more muscular. Plus there were the distinctive features of the Elven races: sharper lines on the face, ears pointed a touch more pronounced than the average individual…

  Mother Night, she was blind. Scanning the room, her eyes locked on the folders from the previous murders spread out on a long table where Connor must’ve been reviewing them. How had it not clicked in her brain sooner? Rummaging through the endless sea of papers, she found a close up view of the third victim.

  “We’re still trying to ID him, all of them actually. None are in the system and facial recognition hasn’t popped a match. It’s like they’re ghosts,” Connor said from behind her, standing so close she could feel the heat of his skin warming her back. She resisted the urge to lean back, bringing her into contact with him. Focus on the present, Sha.

  “I don’t know what your systems are or how you search them, but I doubt you’re going to find their identities in them.”

  “I assume you found something?”

  There it was, subtle but there. “Look at this man’s face. Notice anything strange about him?”

  He scrutinized the photograph for a minute then shrugged. “There’s something a little off, but I can’t put my finger on it.”

  “Doesn’t surprise me because I almost missed it myself. I think he’s Elven.”

  Connor made a small choking sound. “I’m sorry, did you say Elven? Like Legolas in The Lord of the Rings?”

  “Yes I did and who is this Legolas?”

  “A character from a book. Remind me to dig out the movies for you, I’m pretty sure I have them somewhere. You’d probably love them. So he’s an Elf?”

  “Apparently, but this isn’t good news.” No, this was very, very bad. She bit her lip, turning over the implications in her mind. “The Nexus should be impenetrable unless you go through one of the Gates. If all of these men are Elven, it lessens the likelihood it’s all a coincidence and that these men were holdovers from when the ancients raised the barrier. Plus, the features are too prominent, after this much time you’d expect the Mythrian blood to be much more diluted.”

  He touched her arm, halting the rapid flow of words. “Sha, you’re rambling. Spell it out for me. Couldn’t they have come through one of those Gates?”

  “You don’t understand. We erected the Nexus to keep the realms separate, specifically to keep Mythrians out of the Human Realm. The portals exist, but there are so many layers of safeguards preventing one from opening that your average person shouldn’t be able to do it. Any attempts set off alarms to the Sentinels. Except for the occasional creature who slips through small fissures before it can be repaired, it’s impossible for these men to be here.”

  Raising her eyes to meet his, she saw confusion cloud the shifting steel gaze. “The Gateway collapsing and pulling me through, the creature attacks, these murders. Connor, I think the Nexus is…I think it’s breaking down.”

  “How can that happen? Didn’t you say it has stood for thousands of years? Has it degraded?”

  “No, that’s what Sentinels are for, to monitor it for areas that need to be shored up. Someone is trying to take it down.”

  “What happens if it falls?”

  A shaft of fear lanced through her, turning her blood to ice. By the flame, let that not happen. “The realms have been separated for so long, your kind doesn’t believe in us and my kind believes you’re weak. Take down the barrier that has allowed them to coexist independently…” she broke off, unsure how to explain the inevitable, disastrous outcome.

  “All hell will be unleashed,” he finished, the color draining from his face.

  Well, at least they were on the same page about it.

  *******

  A headache was building at the base of his skull, throbbing in time with his pulse. Fleetingly he wished he could go back to blissful ignorance, to when he hadn’t know any of this was real. Enough of that, he admonished himself, it did no good to bury your head in the sand. On the bright side, they had an idea of what was coming meaning they could prepare for it.

  “What are the odds of the Nexus falling within the next day or so?” Connor asked, moving to the kitchen sink to get water so he could take something for his head.

  “This is pure speculation, but judging by what happened when the Gate imploded, I’d feel enormous surges of power as it grew more unstable. I haven’t picked up on anything like that, so I’d say it’s unlikely to happen within the next few days.”

  “Let’s go over what we know. You were in Mythria, found a Gateway on the verge of collapse and sensed some sort of magic had been at work, correct?”

  “Blood rites, yes.”

  “You were sucked in through the portal and landed in my murder scene where the victim may have been Elven and there were definite ritualistic elements at work. We get attacked by a banshee, reports are coming in of other creatures terrorizing citizens, and a woman was found killed in the same ritualistic manner, but this time made to send you a message.”

  “That about sums it up. All in a day’s work, right?”

  He couldn’t help it, she’d said that in such a flat voice, so matter-of-fact, he couldn’t stop the chuckle. Damn he liked her attitude. “Right. Now for the $64,000 question…is it just me or is all this connected?”

  “You mean what happened in Mythria could be related to what’s happening here? I suppose it’s possible.”

  “Then let’s focus on what we can control for now. I have a feeling the key will be tracking down our murderer, so we’ll start there. Maybe having a new set of eyes on the case will uncover more we’ve missed, especially with the mythical angle.”

  She nodded then yawned, stretching her arms above her head, her shirt lifting just enough to reveal her midriff. That glimpse of skin set his blood on fire. “Sorry, I must be more tired than I thought.”

  Struggling to stop his mind from imagining what the rest of her body would look like
bared to him, he jumped at the opening she offered. “It’s late and we may as well grab a few hours of sleep so we can start fresh.”

  Her hands slowly fell and her lips curved as she took a step toward him, her hips swaying. She was temptation personified, somehow persuading him to forget everything, the case, the threat to her safety, the imminent demise of the world. Another step closer, an arm’s reach away. He should move, say something to discourage her, but his feet were rooted to the floor.

  “You’ve felt it too, haven’t you, Detective?” Sha asked, her voice husky, causing his groin to tighten. Rational thought was getting harder and harder to hold onto.

  He could’ve denied it, should have denied it, but he didn’t. Inches separated them now and he could feel the heat of her, smell the soft lilac lotion one of his sisters had left blending with the scent that was unique to this woman. “We shouldn’t, it’s the worst possible timing.”

  Her mouth parted, begging to be kissed. Every ounce of restraint he possessed kept him from leaning forward, from nipping her full lower lip.

  “It’s never been like this before, with anyone. If I didn’t know better, I’d say you cast a spell on me,” she said, voice trembling with desire.

  “You’re the one with the power, I’m only human. And it’s the same for me. You’re decimating my self-control, Sha, so you’d be smart to tread carefully.”

  “Something tells me there’s more to you than you think.” One more step and she pressed against him, standing on her toes to bring her mouth a breath away from his. “As for treading carefully? People always say I’m too impulsive for my own good.”

  “Be sure,” he warned, feeling his good intentions giving way to the lust beating to be set free. “There’s no one waiting for you in Mythria? Not even Luca?” The mere mention of her partner unleashed a wave of jealousy. Please don’t let there be anyone.

  Laughter shook her and she tossed her head back, exposing the gentle curve of her neck. “By the flame, Luca’s like my brother. That’d be wrong on so many levels. No, there’s nobody back in Mythria. And you?”