The Detective's Dragon

by Karilyn Bentley

  A growl erupted from his lips.

  A male never let his female come to harm.

  Wait, wait, wait. She wasn’t his female. He didn’t even know who she was.

  But he knew how to find her.

  Just as with everyone else he needed to find, the knowledge of how to find her appeared in his mind as if thrust there by her soul’s dying breath.

  “Jamie? You all right?” Erik touched his arm. “You get a reading on that missing Halfling?”

  “No, not him, my female.” Who was not his female. Not yet anyway.

  “What?” Erik’s eyes flared. “You’ve been hiding a female from me?”

  Jamie rubbed the bridge of his nose. “No. I’ve been dreaming about her for the past week, and she’s in trouble. I have to rescue her.”

  “Who is she?”

  Did he dare tell his friend the female was human? Should he lie? Since when did he lie? “I don’t know, but she’s human. She comes to me in my dreams. She’s dying.”

  Erik blinked. “A human?”

  “Why not? I’m half human. You staying here or helping me find her?”

  “Oh, I’m helping. This I’ve got to see. Where do we go?”

  “The caves to the west of the border.”

  “What’s a human doing that close to Draconia?”

  “She’s not there. That’s just how I find her.”

  “All right, then.” Erik grabbed Jamie’s arm. “Ready?”

  Power seeped from Erik’s arm into Jamie, boosting his ability to transport. Yet another thing he lacked, the ability to transport others. He barely managed to transport himself. But over the years as Erik’s partner, the two discovered a way to keep Jamie from depleting his magical stores. Rather than Jamie transporting to the find, then returning to tell Erik where to go, Erik’s touch simplified things.

  Jamie pictured the caves in his mind. Several caves dotted the landscape, one of which had a waterfall running in front of it, obscuring the entrance from view. His internal beacon homed in on that cave. Jamie threw them into a transport, using Erik’s magic to pass through the Draconian ward lines and appear inside the cave.

  Water pounded a rhythm into the river below the cave, a relaxing, rolling thunder. The damp from the cave mixed with the piney scent of wood from the trees dotting the hillside.

  “All right, scout, you sure the way to this female is here?”

  “Yes.” Clear as if she stood beside him, he heard the female scream, her cry coming from deep inside the inky blackness.

  “Where is she?”

  Jamie closed his eyes, and the female popped into his mind, this time with the aura of death enclosing her in its grasp. His muscles tightened as he straightened his shoulders. “This way.”

  The light dimmed the further they walked into the damp darkness of the cave. Erik formed a blue flame in his palm, and they continued forward, their elongated shadows dancing across the stone walls.

  Until the blue flame disappeared.

  “Goddess’s toes, what just happened? I can’t form a flame.”

  Jamie took a deep breath, hoping to calm his racing heart. A male should not react to sudden darkness with an involuntary squeak. Not male-like at all.

  “Try again.” Good for him. No squeaking voice.

  “I. Can’t. Form. A. Bloody. Flame. Nothing. It’s like my magic stopped working. I can’t do anything. Can you?”

  Definitely a panic moment for Erik. Otherwise his friend wouldn’t have asked the obvious.

  But it wouldn’t hurt him to try.

  Jamie focused on his palm, willing a blue flame to appear, the same exercise he’d tried, to no avail, since a youngster in magic training classes. Only this time a flame danced in his palm. He sucked down a sharp breath.

  “I did it! I formed a flame!”

  “Goddess’s toes, scout, how’d you do that when I can’t?”

  “No idea. Back up and try again.”

  Shoes scraped against pebbled stone as Erik took a step backward. Blue light exploded from his hand, illuminated his wide-eyed expression. He took a step forward, and the flame died. Back and it appeared. Forward and it died. His eyes narrowed.

  “You led us to a titanium vein? Are you bloody crazy?”

  Jamie swallowed. Titanium was the bane of Draconi, rendering their magic useless, allowing their enemies to overcome them.

  So why, for the first time in his life, could he perform magic?

  “It couldn’t be titanium. I can form a flame.”

  “I can’t. And there is only one thing that stops my magic, and it starts with a T. So what are you? Some sort of titanium neutralizer?”

  The dancing flame tickled his palm, creating a corresponding echo in his heart. “I don’t know. We can figure it out later. I need to find the female.”

  “In a cave? Where I have no magic? Did I mention the lack of magic?”

  “Only several times. It won’t kill you. That’s how I live.”

  “You have more than I do at the moment. Maybe I should wait here for you.”

  “And if I get into trouble?”

  Erik sighed. “Fine. But you owe me.”

  “I’ll buy you a pound of jaba-jaba beans.”

  “Lead the way, scout.”

  Using his palm-tickling blue flame, Jamie marched through the cave, leading them into a small room off a winding tunnel.

  “She’s in here.”

  “I don’t see her.”

  “The way to her is in here. Somewhere.”

  But where? He closed his eyes, picturing the female, seeing her face laced with fear and pain. Forward. He needed to walk forward. He took several steps to the wall.

  “She’s in the wall?” Erik placed a hand on his shoulder, and Jamie started.

  “Maybe it’s a door?”

  “Touch it and see.”

  Jamie reached his hand toward the wall, holding his other palm with the flame close to the stone. Cool stone rasped against his fingers.

  “It’s just a—” wall died in his mouth as the stone gave way, collapsing around him like crumbling mortar, casting him and a screaming Erik into a swirling darkness.

  Chapter Two

  Detective Ruby Parker sat at the bar, eyes fixated on the ice cubes melting in her whiskey. Alcohol got her into this mess, and with any luck, it would help get her out.

  “You look a little down, hon.”

  Parker raised her gaze and stared at the gray-haired, handlebar-mustached bartender. How did she miss him earlier? Sure, she’d had one watered down whiskey drink, but one shouldn’t interfere with noticing the human equivalent of Big Foot. “Damn,” slipped out before she could stop it. “Your momma give you steroids instead of milk?”

  The skin around his pale blue eyes tightened, and she gave herself a mental smack. Rude, rude, rude. But that’s what happens after being put on administrative leave and forced to surrender her badge and gun to her captain, instead of being commended for doing the right thing. She released a breath as he chuckled.

  “Yeah, hon, that’s exactly what happened to me. So what happened to you?” Two large palms rested against the bar on either side of her drink as he leaned forward.

  Parker leaned back, one hand slipping to her waist for her gun before she remembered it wasn’t there. Besides, he was just the bartender, who’d come on shift sometime after her drink was poured. So what if he was the size of a freaking grizzly.

  Nothing to fear. Nothing at all to fear.

  She swallowed, trying to coat her suddenly dry throat. “Bad day at work.”

  Grizzly Bartender leaned back, out of her personal space. “Looks like you need another one.”

  Not really. But as she had no place to go tomorrow, why not? “Another whiskey.”

  “Good girl. Finish that one while I pour you the other.”

  He walked off, and Parker pressed the glass against her lips, swallowing away the sting of hard liquor, relaxing as the whiskey pooled warm in her stomach, firing heat
through her veins. Much like a lover. No wonder her partner—make that ex-partner—refused to divorce his bottle.

  Country music pounded a beat beneath her feet as if the floor danced a rhythm. Or maybe the pounding was all the dancers. She glanced toward where the happy couples twisted and hopped to the music. Her chest clenched like too-tight handcuffs, ached like a bullet through her heart. She’d had that once. That happy carefree, life-is-grand look. Once. Before her fiancé decided she spent too much time on the job and not enough time on him.

  She could still see the smooth tanned legs of his lover wrapped around his waist, hear the headboard slapping rhythmically against the wall. In their bed. The bed she shared with him. The lying, cheating jackwagon.

  So hell, yeah, happy freaking couples brought out the green-eyed monster she kept stuffed deep inside.

  “Here’s your drink.”

  Parker turned around, grabbed the fresh whiskey and raised it to the bartender. “Thanks, man. Where did the other bartender go? He was here just a minute ago.”

  Wrinkles twitched at the corners of his eyes. “He needed a break.”

  A prickling slid along her scalp, a warning buzzer firing her intuition. As a detective, she learned to rely on that sixth sense of intuition. But she was no longer a detective, now was she? At least not until she got her badge back.

  Which might very well be never.

  As she sipped her drink, she stared into the large man’s ice blue eyes. He didn’t blink, countering her stare with a soulless gaze. How could she have missed those killer’s eyes earlier?

  Drink much, Parker?

  Clearly the alcohol affected her intuition buzzer. She doubted Dave, the owner of the bar, would hire a known killer. Since cops made up a good deal of his clientele, setting Big Foot the Killer behind the bar would be a rather stupid move, and Dave didn’t strike her as stupid.

  But she knew a killer’s gaze when she saw one.

  Stop being ridiculous, Parker. Get a grip.

  Maybe she should grab her drink and move to a table. One of the many open tables. She stared at the three couples swaying to the beat on the floor. Where did everyone go? When she first arrived, the bar was filled, all the tables full. Parker glanced at her watch. Nine o’clock. People should still be hanging out drinking at nine on a Friday night.

  A quick glance showed she sat alone at the bar. Her heart rate quickened as she took another sip. Just as well no other cops hung out here tonight. After the way they accused her of previously concealing the truth when she did what needed to be done—when she reported her partner for coming to work drunk—she didn’t want to see any of them anytime soon.

  She never thought her captain would take the side of her accusers, would be persuaded to believe she’d allowed her partner to work drunk before and only now reported his behavior to cover her ass.

  What kind of a cop allowed another to work drunk? How dare they accuse her of concealing the truth? How dare her captain take those assholes’ side?

  She’d clear her name and get her job back if it was the last thing she did.

  She up-ended her glass, pouring the whiskey straight down her throat. Liquid courage worked better inside her than filling a glass. Her glass slipped on the wooden bar when she set it down, toppling onto its side, an overturned turtle spinning on its back. Parker giggled.

  Definitely drunk. Mission completed.

  “What do I owe?” At least that’s what she tried to say, her words slurred into the land of incomprehensible. She swallowed. Tried again. Grizzly Bartender waved a hand.

  “That one’s on me. You needed it.”

  “Thanksh.” She stood and grabbed onto the bar for support as the room swayed a dance. How much had she drunk? She only remembered two whiskeys, but two shouldn’t make her a stumbling fool.

  Getting home just got harder.

  “What’s the matter, hon? You need me to call a cab?” Grizzly’s face loomed close, then retreated, close again, now away. What the hell?

  Cold seeped into her fingers where she white-knuckled the wooden bar. A cab sounded great. “Pleash.”

  He turned, paused, faced her. “Let me walk you outside for it.”

  “Didn’t call.”

  “Yeah, I did. You watched me. I’ll walk you outside.”

  His arm grasped her elbow, tugging her staggering body toward the door. How did he move so fast? Wasn’t he behind the counter, not beside her? She glanced back to her barstool. Bad idea. The entire room swam like a fish in a hurricane.

  A wave of nausea punched her stomach and she doubled over. Only to be yanked upright by Grizzly, who shoved the door open and pulled her onto the sidewalk.

  Where she promptly stumbled to her knees.

  “Fuck,” Grizzly muttered.

  Her stomach rolled, its contents threatening to escape. Okay. Definitely one too many. Although the last time she drank whiskey, it had been much more than two mostly watered down glasses. And no embarrassing stumbling sessions on the sidewalk. She hadn’t felt drunk until that last glass. It was almost like Grizzly gave her something extra in her drink.

  But why would he do that?

  She tried to yank her arm out of his grasp, but his fingers tightened in a bone-crunching grip. Agony exploded in her arm from where she'd been shot years ago. An embarrassing squeak slipped past her lips.

  “You ain’t going nowhere, honey. We have something special planned for you.”

  Parker tried to move. To run. To get away from this crazy bastard with his killer gaze and steel grip. But her body didn’t want to obey her mind’s commands and refused to move.

  Her knees buckled as if her skeletal system exited her skin, leaving her a limp human rag. To hell with this. She was not going down this way. A surge of electromagnetic energy she normally worked hard to tamp down, but lost control of when scared, exploded from her body, wreaking havoc on anything electrical in its way. The streetlight above them shattered into white-hot shards of glass.

  Parker tried to open her mouth, tried to use her vocal cords, but neither worked. Definitely a drug. A drug that left her alert but paralyzed. Unable to move. Unable to call for help. Panic flooded her uncooperative limbs as she stared into Grizzly’s killer-cold eyes. No one heard her mental scream.

  ****

  Jamie stumbled, pitching to his knees as the dancing lights slowed their frantic twirl. What just happened? And then he fell forward, palms smacking on smooth stone in a successful attempt to stop his nose from cracking against the ground. A heavy weight landed on his back, slamming the air out of his lungs. Erik. Ouch. Who knew his friend weighed the approximate amount of a dragon?

  Erik rolled to the side and Jamie drew in a deep breath to prove his lungs remembered their function.

  “You all right?”

  “Would be better if you were shaped more like a pillow.” Erik pushed to his feet, offered Jamie a hand and pulled him upright. “What about you?”

  “Would be better if you weighed a bit less.”

  Erik returned Jamie’s grin. “Where are we?”

  “I don’t know.” Jamie’s voice echoed as if he stood in a large cave. But what cave had a stone floor as smooth as marble and just as hard?

  A small hiss and a blue flame appeared in Erik’s palm. Jamie blinked in the sudden light. Erik held his hand up, turning in place. Shadows bounced off strange equipment sitting on shiny metal tables. Erik raised a brow and Jamie shrugged. High windows looked down upon the cavernous room. He poked the gray floor with the tip of his boot. Not marble. Jamie raised a brow. Erik shrugged.

  “You landed us in a strange place, scout. You sure the female is here?”

  Prickles exploded along his nerve endings, a warning buzzer of the female’s proximity and the cloak of death surrounding her. “She’s close.”

  “Great. Get us out of here.”

  Jamie spotted a door hidden in the shadows on the opposite side of the room. A tugging sensation drew him that direction as if invisible st
rings connected him to the female. “Come on. She’s this way.”

  He jogged toward the door, Erik running beside him. Then the blue flame disappeared, plunging them into darkness.

  “Goddess’s toes! What happened?” Erik stopped, staring at his palm as a thunderous rhythmic noise slammed through the building.

  Jamie looked up at the ceiling. What was that noise? Did it affect Erik’s magic? If so, how?

  “Form a flame.”

  “What?” Jamie dropped his gaze to Erik.

  “Go on. Try.”

  Jamie held his hand out, palm up and remembered the way the blue flame tickled his palm. Light burst from his hand, illuminating a wide-eyed Erik. “I don’t understand.”

  “Titanium. Just don’t know where. Maybe we should stay here.”

  “You jest. We came all this way to rescue a female—a female who is nearby—and you are too scared to leave the building?” Jamie shot Erik his best are-you-jesting glare. While Erik’s lack of magic was a bit worrisome, this place was new and, therefore, an adventure. Jamie loved a new adventure. Especially when it came with a female.

  “Me? Scared?” Erik’s eyes narrowed, and Jamie grinned. “Just giving you an opportunity to change your mind. Which you aren’t taking. So lead on, scout. Find this mysterious female. I’ll suffer my loss of magic. The lack of magic hasn’t hurt you all these years.”

  “Being able to use my Goddess-given magic is rather enjoyable.” Unusual, but enjoyable.

  “Don’t let it go to your head.”

  “Don’t worry.”

  “Well, don’t just stand there. Lead us to this female.” Erik gestured to the door several feet away and Jamie closed the distance and yanked on the handle.

  Nothing.

  The flame flickered, casting inky shadows across the metal door. Maybe he could use his suddenly apparent magic to open the thing.

  But how?

  “Goddess’s toes, scout. Open the door already.”

  “It’s locked.”

  “You are a Draconi. A defective one, I must admit.” Erik’s teeth gleamed white in the shadows. “But a Draconi nonetheless. And you seem to be less defective the longer we’re here.”