“This morning,” the redhead muttered.
“Doesn’t look like the sprinkler system turned on,” Dave commented, dragging a toe through the black ash on the floor. “Either a fault—or someone prevented it.”
Melissa nodded. “The system was disabled. I had to use a dampening spell. I’m lucky the fire was only contained to this room.”
Ryder’s eyes narrowed. “Tell me exactly what happened.”
Melissa put her hands on her hips. “Some guy turned up asking about wolfsbane, wanted to check out my stock, maybe order some. So I brought him down here,” she said, gesturing to the room. “This is where I keep my store.” She eyed Ryder. “I sell ingredients for potions, some tools for spells, that sort of thing. At least, I did.”
“Like an apothecary?”
“Precisely. It’s going to take me some time to clean up and build up my stock again.” She pursed her lips.
“What about my black thorn, rue and willow order? And my ink?” Dave asked, frowning harshly.
She made a face. “It arrived this morning, up in smoke a few minutes later.”
Dave swore and kicked something that clattered against the wall.
“He wasn’t a miscreant, they’re not welcome, so I thought he was safe.” Melissa sighed as she stared at the destruction in the room. “If I ever see that bastard again, I’m going to set him on fire.”
Dave nodded. “I’ll bring the beer.”
She high-fived him, then put her hands on her hips, her green eyes curious. “So why all the interest in wolfsbane?”
“Did you hear about Jared Gray’s death?” Ryder asked, his attention again on the burn patterns along the wall.
Melissa snapped her fingers. “The Alpha Killer. I was trying to figure out why you looked so familiar. Personally, I think they should give you a medal for what you did, not a prison term.”
He grimaced. “One, I didn’t kill him, at least, not intentionally, and two—he was still a person.”
She snorted. “You keep telling yourself that. The only good werewolf is a dead one.”
He raised an eyebrow and glanced over at Dave. The big man shrugged. “She doesn’t like miscreants.”
He’d figured. Vassi was still standing outside the bookstore. He really wanted to get back to her. Thoughts of her, waiting for him—braless—were completely distracting. He turned back to the redhead. “Jared was poisoned in my clinic with wolfsbane. Personally, I don’t touch the stuff, so I’m trying to figure out who is behind this whole mess.”
She shook her head. “I don’t take down every customer’s name. I don’t know who this guy was.”
“What did he do, exactly?” Dave asked, leaning his hand against a wall.
“I showed him my stock, he made a selection, then I opened my ledger to record it,” she said. “I’d turned my back for just a second, and then there was an explosion.”
“An explosion?” Ryder stared around the room, then at the woman in front of him. “How the hell did you survive?”
“I’m a witch,” she said simply. “It takes more than fire and brimstone to kill me.”
Dave cleared his throat, and she rolled her eyes. “Fine, if you need to hear it. It worked.”
“You’re welcome,” Dave said meaningfully.
“What worked?” Ryder asked.
Melissa wagged her finger. “Uh-uh. You don’t need to know. I’ve learned my lesson. I’m not about to divulge my secrets to any more strangers.”
“Yeah, because you were such a trusting soul before all this happened,” Dave remarked dryly.
Ryder leaned over to look at the scorch marks that scrolled up the wall. There was a flourish to it, a weaving of marks that looked familiar. Suspicion, ugly and toxic, curled inside him. “Can you remember any orders for wolfsbane before the guy this morning?”
Melissa snorted. “I deal in herbs. There are a lot of folks out there who would like a little protection against the wolves. I sell plenty of wolfsbane—and verbena, along with lilies, oleander, nightshade, foxglove, hemlock, and all the silver and iron mineral compounds you could poke a stick at, just to name a few. There have been a lot of wolfsbane orders over the last few weeks. That Woodland Pack is determined to start a tribal war, and my human customers are stocking up for insurance.”
“The guy who—” Ryder winced, “—firebombed your store. What did he look like?”
“Dark hair, brown eyes, tall—about your height,” she said, eyeing Ryder. Her hand rose to toy with her braid. “Strong cheekbones, and the tiniest of little grooves in the corners of his mouth …” she stopped, then frowned. “Er, or so I think. I didn’t really pay that much attention to him.”
“Liar.” Dave looked at his hand, then grimaced, wiping the blackened soot onto his jeans.
Ryder’s eyebrows rose. “That’s actually quite … detailed.”
She shrugged. “If you think so. Does he sound like someone you know? I’d really like to get my hands on him,” she muttered.
Dave made a choking sound and held up his filthy hand. “Please don’t say anything more.”
Melissa frowned. “I want to hurt the bastard. Look what he did to my store, damn it!” she turned to Ryder. “Do you know who he is?”
Ryder shook his head. “No,” he lied. He looked over at her brother. “I guess this was a bust. Any evidence I had of clearing my name went up in smoke in the fire.”
Dave sighed. “Sorry, mate. Wish it could have been otherwise.”
Ryder gave them a half-hearted smile. “Thanks. Well, let’s get back to Vassi.”
Melissa made a face, but Ryder turned away before she could make another snide remark about his mate. He smiled briefly. Just the mention of her name had his body tightening in anticipation, his power rising like a lazy tide.
Then his smile died. But he had some business to attend to first. He started to climb the stairs.
* * *
Dave gestured to the stairs. “Perhaps Little Miss Horny Pants would like to go first?”
“I’m not horny,” Melissa stated primly as she walked past him.
“Please, you’re practically drooling over your flamethrower friend,” he muttered. “You really need to start dating again.”
She whirled on him, her green eyes flashing, and he knew he’d struck a nerve. “Look around you, Dave. Look what he did to my store. It took me years to build this. I can’t find some of those herbs, anymore. This arsehole might just ruin me. I swear, if I get my hands on him …”
Dave grasped her wrist, raising it and sliding back the sleeve. “Then I’ll have to add to this,” he said, pointing to the intricate tattoo on the inside of her wrist. It was delicate, the dark flourish so visible against his sister’s pale skin. He covered the mark and closed his eyes, sighing. “Thank God it worked.”
“Uh, the fact that you’re so relieved doesn’t boost my confidence in your work, brother dear,” Melissa said.
He laughed, opening his eyes to look into her clear green gaze. “Bitch.” He let go of her.
“Prick.” She turned back to the stairs, and hesitated. She glanced quickly over her shoulder. “Thank you.”
He nodded, and they trotted up the stairs.
* * *
Vassi straightened from her position by the door as Ryder strode out of the bookstore. He grimaced and shook his head. “She couldn’t help,” he told her. “She’s got no records, no information that might lead to an arrest.”
Her shoulders sagged. “Darn. I’m so sorry. I actually thought for a moment that she might be of some help.” She gave a half-hearted shrug. “Should have known better. We are talking about Melissa.”
He looked up and down the street. “I think you should go stay with Dave for a couple of days,” he told her. She frowned.
“Why?”
“I think he’s more than capable of keeping you safe from any lycans.”
“I see.” She focused on her gift, letting it drift out and over the man in front of
her.
“We have no other clues, nothing else to go on,” he told her. The coolness of his prevarication snaked around her.
“I’m sure if we sit down and put our heads together, we’ll be able to figure something out,” she told him quietly.
He shook his head. “No, I don’t want you involved in this, not anymore.”
Her eyelids fluttered. There was no coolness there, just an honest warmth that chilled her heart. He didn’t want her to help him.
“I’m your lawyer, Ryder. I’m here to help, that’s my job.” She glanced up as Dave and Melissa stepped out of the store. Ryder shifted to block her view, to return her focus to him.
Those dark brows were pulled together in a frown, his blue eyes sombre. “Not anymore. You’re fired, Vassi.” Implacable, resolute, encompassing, his brutal honesty surrounded her.
“Don’t do this, Ryder. Not again.” He was pushing her away. Again.
He touched her cheek, regret in his gaze. “I’m sorry.”
He turned and strode away, quickly disappearing into the night.
Chapter Fifteen
“Whoa. Burned,” Melissa commented with a mock grimace.
Dave arched an eyebrow at his sister. “Really? After what happened downstairs?” He shook his head, then turned back to Vassi, his sunglasses catching and reflecting the street lights. “Again? He’s fired you before?”
Vassi’s nodded as she folded her arms, hugging herself in the cool evening air. “Yeah, I think that was the third time.”
“Three times since—” Dave cocked his head to the side as he made a mental calculation, “Friday morning?” He nodded. “Impressive work, Vass.”
She rounded on her friend. “What happened down there?” Before he’d gone down there, everything had been fine. Hell, they’d been better than fine, especially after their ‘nap’. He’d looked at her as though—as though she was important, damn it. Now, after spending ten minutes with a green-eyed witch, he couldn’t wait to get away from her. She glared at Melissa. “What did you say to him?”
“Who, me?” Melissa fluttered her eyelashes innocently. “Perhaps he’s just not that in to you?”
Vassi reached out, her movements a blur as she caught the witch by the throat and had her backed up against the building before Dave could stop her. The woman was taller than her, but Vassi still held her high enough off the ground that the witch’s feet kicked ineffectually at nothing. Vassi let her eyes glow, and lengthened her fangs intentionally. “You’re outside, Melissa. You don’t have the protection of your damn store anymore. Don’t try to piss me off unless you want to pay the consequences.” She dropped the woman to the ground, and Melissa coughed, clutching her throat as she tried to force air back into her lungs.
“And you wonder why she doesn’t like you,” Dave said to Vassi, shaking his head.
“What happened in there?” She kept her tone calm, but her anger still showed in her eyes. Dave held out his hands.
“Calm down, Vass.” He leaned over and helped his sister to her feet, then tightened his grasp when his sister tried to launch herself at his friend.
“It appears we weren’t the first party interested in Melissa’s sales records,” he told her, and Vassi frowned as he set Melissa behind him with a warning look.
“Who else?”
“That, we don’t know. Some guy pretended to be a potential customer and set fire to Melissa’s apothecary.”
Vassi closed her eyes in frustration. “And destroyed any record of who may have bought the poison,” she said. Damn.
She glanced back down the street in the direction Ryder had walked. He’d come out, but hadn’t quite seemed as defeated or lost as she would have thought. He’d just told her to back off, effectively.
“Look, you tried to help your client, and now he’s fired you. Let’s go back to my place and crack some beers.”
She chewed the inside of her lip. “He only fires me when he wants to protect me,” she said, then remembered the second time he’d fired her was in the bedroom in Dave’s cave. “Or when he—” she stopped when she realised what she was about to disclose.
Melissa’s eyebrows rose in question, but Dave screwed his face up and clapped his hands over his ears. “Don’t want to know, Vass. Don’t care. La la la.”
She blushed. “Well, you get my drift.”
Dave dropped his hands. “I so wish I didn’t.”
Vassi put her hands on her hips and walked a few steps. “So someone definitely ordered the wolfsbane from Melissa, and burned her store so that nobody could trace who was responsible.” She frowned again. “The werewolves, covering their tracks?”
Dave shook his head, and lifted his chin at the sign inside the store. “No miscreants allowed, remember? They can’t enter without Melissa’s permission.”
She shot his sister a dark look. “How could I forget?” She turned and walked back toward him. “So, if it wasn’t a lycan, who burned the store?”
“Woodland want to expand their territory. They could have any number of unknown allies,” Dave suggested.
Vassi bit her lip. “Maybe we’re looking at this from the wrong angle?” she lifted her gaze to meet Dave’s. “We’ve looked at this as a murder, and focused on the victim—who had the most to gain, who had a grudge, etc.”
Dave arched an eyebrow. “Isn’t that how you normally look at a murder?”
She lifted a hand. “Well, there could be another victim, here.” She stepped closer to her friend, her earnest reflection staring back at her from his sunglasses. “Who suffers if Ryder is convicted of murder?”
Dave frowned. “Well, Ryder, I guess.”
“Exactly. We’ve been looking at this case from the perspective of Ryder being used to kill Jared. What if we looked at it from the perspective of Jared being killed to strike at Ryder?” Her eyes widened. “We’re looking at this whole thing wrong. Jared was the weapon to get at Ryder.”
Melissa pressed her palm to her forehead. “You’re making my head ache.”
Vassi pulled her phone out and noticed she only had one bar left on charge. She quickly dialled her assistant, putting the phone on speaker and holding it between her and Dave, her heart thumping.
“You called, oh sexually stunted one?” Seraphina answered, and Vassi closed her eyes as Melissa laughed.
“You’re on speaker, Sera,” Vassi informed her. “I need you to do me a favour. I need you to do a background check on Ryder.”
“Uh, I already did. Sent it to you Friday, with all the case notes. How is our hunky client going? Let him into your volcanic snatch yet?”
Dave raised both eyebrows and looked at her, and she frowned. “Uh, not really the time, Sera. I mean a check on who benefits from Ryder going to prison.”
“You know it’s Sunday night, right? That some of us have a smoking hot social life and don’t sit around waiting for your call?”
“Seraphina,” Vassi growled.
“Fine, fine,” her assistant muttered. “But I want you to know that you are interrupting something magical.”
“Delayed gratification can be character building,” Dave commented in a low drawl, and Vassi’s eyes widened. Was he flirting with her assistant?
“Oh, baby, I’m great at building character,” Seraphina cooed back, and Dave chuckled.
Vassi shuddered. “Uh, back to work,” she said. “I need to find out what happens to Ryder’s assets if he goes to jail.” Another thought occurred to her. “Or if he’s killed by the lycans in a tribal law act.”
“Okay, give me a second,” Seraphina said, then giggled and whispered something to someone in the background. In a moment Vassi could hear the tapping of fingers on a keyboard. “Okay, so I’m in the public trustee’s database, just let me pass these security gateways …”
Vassi grimaced. “You shouldn’t tell me you’re hacking into a government site,” she told her assistant.
“Did I mention anything about hacking? Besides, that’s a crude and
violent term. I like to think my work is much more delicate and skilful.”
“She’s really hacking into a government database?” Dave enquired, and Vassi winced. “That’s so sexy.”
“Oh, honey, you ain’t seen nothing yet,” Seraphina purred. “Okay, so looking up—oh, wow.”
“Wow? What’s wow?”
“Did you know Ryder had a mother?”
Vassi arched an eyebrow. “I assumed he came into the world much like we did.”
“No, I mean his mother was loaded. She left him and his brother a tidy little sum of money and some real estate. If Ryder was to die, it reverts back to his family. That is, to his father and brother.”
The family he’d walked away from.
“Can you send me photos of them, and their addresses?”
“Sure. I can send you one of me, too, if you like.”
“Yep,” Dave responded instantly.
“Just the Armstrongs, please Sera. Thanks.” Vassi disconnected the call and shot Dave an exasperated look.
He grinned. “She sounds cute. Fix me up with her.”
“No.”
“Come on, you owe me one.”
She smiled sweetly. “Actually, Ryder owes you two. I don’t owe you anything.” Her phone beeped, and she quickly pulled up the messages from Seraphina. The images came through of Ryder’s family. She easily recognised Arthur Armstrong. She flicked through until Ryder’s brother’s image popped up. Hunter Armstrong was a good-looking man. Dark hair, dark eyes, she could see the family resemblance. Though Hunter was handsome, he didn’t arrest her attention like his brother did, with his stunning blue eyes and a protective streak a mile wide.
“Let me see that,” Melissa breathed, grabbing Vassi’s wrist. Her eyes narrowed. “That’s him. That’s the guy who blew up my store.”
And now Vassi knew why Ryder had fired her—again. He was going up against another light warrior.
The next message from Seraphina showed an address. “I’m going,” she told Dave.
He stared at her for a moment. “I’ll help.”
She tilted her head back. “I didn’t ask for it.”
“I’m offering,” he told her. She looked at him, his features hidden by his sunglasses. Offers for help required no payment. He couldn’t demand anything in return.
Tribal Law Page 14