But Brandon stared in astonishment at his parents. They were not only here and smiling, but together. Before he could make sense of it, his mom smiled and waved. Brandon opened his arms to her on instinct. She started to cry as she hurried toward him, then caught him in a fierce embrace.
“I had to meet this Liz of yours,” she said when she’d kissed him a hundred times. She turned to Liz expectantly. Brandon introduced them, looking for his dad.
Brandt Merrick hung back, as if uncertain of his greeting. Erik stood behind him, one hand on the other Pyr’s shoulder. Brandon nodded, then strode to his father, offering his hand. “Hey, Dad. It’s good to see you,” he said, meaning every word of it. “I’d like to talk to you, if you have time.”
“All the time in the world,” Brandt said with a smile as he seized his son’s hand. He looked into Brandon’s eyes. “I’m sorry.”
“Me, too.” Brandon caught his dad in a tight hug, feeling his tears rise when he felt his father catch his breath. He looked up and met Erik’s knowing gaze, then saw the leader of the Pyr smile with approval before he turned away.
He led his dad back to Liz and his mom, marveling as he did so that just a week before, he’d thought that his dragon would ruin his life. Now he had everything, everything he’d always wanted and a love he’d never dreamed of finding.
And he would defend it, both as man and as dragon, for all the days and nights of his life.
This was the gift of the firestorm.
Don’t miss the bad boy of the Pyr!
Turn the page for a preview of Lorenzo’s
story in Deborah Cooke’s
FLASHFIRE
Available now.
Cassie had to hand it to this Lorenzo guy. The custom-built theater for his stage show, The Trial by Fire, was incredible even by Vegas standards. He hadn’t skimped at all. There was nothing tawdry or tacky about it. The interior was gorgeous and elegant, far more luxurious than any of the other venues they’d visited or glimpsed.
The seats were cushy and upholstered in black velvet. They were scrupulously clean, as if they’d been upholstered just that day. The carpet was black and thick underfoot, unstained as far as she could see. There wasn’t so much as a stray kernel of popcorn. The curtains on the stage looked like real velvet, black with a line of metallic orange along the hem. That line etched the glittering outline of flames.
Trial by fire. She got it.
There were sconces spaced along the walls, each looking like a brass bowl that held a flame. Of course, they couldn’t have been real flames, not with fire codes, but they looked real. The temperature in the theater was cool but not cold. It felt like a refuge, both from commercialism and the noisy bustle of Vegas.
She listened to the audience as they took their seats and murmured to each other. She felt their wonder and knew that Lorenzo had them believing in him even before he began his show.
Cassie folded her arms across her chest, less willing to be persuaded. All of this magic stuff relied on trickery, on making people look left when things happened on the right, for example. She was determined to see the truth of whatever this guy did.
Her BlackBerry vibrated again and she glanced at it. Again they had doubled the price they’d pay for shots of those shape-shifting dragons. Melissa Smith’s television show about the Pyr must have really good ratings. Cassie scrolled through the message, eyeing the specifications for what they wanted.
A suite of shots, documenting the change from man to dragon.
That would be tough to fake.
Of course, if the Pyr were real, the shots wouldn’t be fake.
Cassie dismissed that possibility. She wondered what the editor would pay for proof that the Pyr were a hoax. Well aware of Stacy’s disapproval, Cassie sent a message to ask.
Her BlackBerry received a reply almost instantly. This story was hot. She wasn’t totally surprised that the editor would pay the same price for proof of a hoax, but was surprised that the price had increased again.
But where would a person find one of these supposed dragon shifters?
“Off,” Stacy muttered. “You promised.”
Cassie turned off the device and put it away. It would be enough money to retire. To leave the business of illusion for good.
She was surprised by how appealing that idea sounded.
Cassie was still thinking about that money as the lights began to dim and music started from all sides. The flames in the sconces leapt higher, and that line across the bottom of the stage curtains began to glitter.
As if it were burning.
A trick, but a good one.
If she were pretending to be a dragon shifter, where would she hide?
Maybe, just maybe, in a place where nothing was what it seemed to be.
A place like Las Vegas.
Hmm.
Lorenzo nodded at his staff and strode to his place at center stage, where he would await the rising of the curtains. He fought his awareness of the slow burn of the eclipse, teasing at the edge of his thoughts. He felt the firestorm light for some poor Pyr and ignored it, just as he had a hundred times before.
Even though it was close.
It was not his problem.
Lorenzo was in the act of donning his top hat when the music swelled. One pair of curtains swept back and the other curtain rose skyward.
Right on cue.
Perfect.
The audience stared at him in expectant awe. Lorenzo had a moment to think that everything would be just fine.
Then he raised his hand in a welcoming gesture, and the light of his own firestorm sparked from his fingertips.
Lorenzo was astounded.
His firestorm launched an arc of fire that illuminated the space between him and a woman in the front row. She was lit suddenly with radiant golden light.
The audience gasped.
Lorenzo wanted to swear.
The woman had been sitting with her arms folded across her chest, reluctant to be impressed. Her skepticism would have made his eye skip over her under other circumstances. The blonde beside her was more typical of the women Lorenzo took as lovers.
But the bright glimmer of the spark startled her.
And it compelled Lorenzo to look. Her bones were good. She could have been attractive if she’d chosen to do anything other than tug her hair back into a sloppy ponytail. She wore no makeup and was dressed in jeans, a cotton shirt, and hideous red cowboy boots.
Lorenzo couldn’t stand cowboy boots.
Even on cowboys.
Women certainly shouldn’t dress like cowboys, not if they wanted to show their glory to advantage. Women should wear skirts and high heels, lacy little bits of nothing, and lipstick. They had serious assets and they should use them.
This woman apparently didn’t bother. Her hair was reddish blond, her skin fair. She jumped when the spark struck her shoulder, and the golden light revealed that she was young and pretty. There was intelligence in her expression, wariness and interest mingled together.
Despite that, there couldn’t be a woman on the face of the earth whom he was less likely to find intriguing. She seemed to feel the same way about him. Lorenzo didn’t find it promising that they had that one thing in common.
Meanwhile, he smiled at the crowd and bowed, as though everything were going according to plan.
Far from it! Curse the firestorm, its timing, and its choices. Curse his Pyr nature and everything that came with it.
Lorenzo was just going to have to work with the firestorm.
Somehow.
Cassie jumped when the spark struck her shoulder. She’d assumed it was an illusion, but the collision of that flame with her skin gave her the strangest sensation.
She was hot.
She was simmering.
No, she was aroused. The electric heat of desire slid through her body, turning her mind in earthy directions, making her fidget in her chair. She was consumed with lust, which was about as far from her usual frame of mind a
s possible.
She stared at Lorenzo, wondering what the hell he was pumping into the air in this place. He smiled at her as slowly as she’d anticipated. Like he knew what she was thinking. He was suave and confident, and she wondered whether he made love slowly, too.
In fact, she tingled at the very idea.
He was manipulating her, but she couldn’t figure out how.
Lorenzo was gorgeous, but Cassie saw lots of hot guys up close and personal in her line of work. Genuine or augmented. She talked to them, she cajoled them, sometimes she even shared a joke with them. Not a one of them had ever made her feel like this. Not a one of them had ever made her mouth go dry or made her panties wet with a single glance.
She wasn’t sure there had ever been anybody who had made her feel like this.
And she didn’t like it one bit.
“Welcome, ladies and gentlemen, girls and boys.” Lorenzo’s voice was low and rich, the kind of voice a woman could listen to all day long.
Or all night long.
Cassie stifled a shiver and folded her arms more tightly across her chest. Charisma. He had charisma. Buckets of it. That was all. And he knew how to work a crowd. He had each and every one of them in his pocket already.
Maybe there were vibrators in these chairs.
Or just in hers.
“I hope you are prepared to be amazed!”
A flick of his wrist, and the stage erupted in flames. They were brilliant orange and waist-high, surrounding Lorenzo. He stood, smiling, in his tux, untouched by the fire. Maybe he was Faust, completely at ease with the heat of hellfire. Certainly there was something wicked in his smile.
With a gesture from him, the flames were all extinguished, the stage still looking like wooden boards.
Unburned.
The audience applauded wildly, but Lorenzo was already on the move.
“Yum!” Stacy whispered, and Cassie nodded agreement.
Okay, she wasn’t just burned-out. She was going insane. Cassie felt like a besotted teenager, but she couldn’t take her eyes off Lorenzo.
This was not good.
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