by Chant, Zoe
“THANK YOU FOR PLAYING last night,” Scarlet said to Conall sincerely, gravely accepting his offer of a glass of water. “Performing has never been a part of your contract and I don’t want to take advantage of your kindness.”
Conall poured them each a glass of water from the icy pitcher at the small kitchenette. “I don’t feel taken advantage of,” he assured Scarlet as he turned back and gave her the glass. “It’s a pleasure to be able to play again.” He gave the young woman in the living room a quick, amused smile, but she didn’t notice.
Gizelle was lying on her belly on the couch, engrossed in something on her tablet. Her bare legs were up in the air behind her, ankles crossed, and there were headphones over her ears. The cord, Scarlet noticed, had been chewed on, probably by Gizelle’s kitten, Sweet One. The young gray cat was on the back of the sofa just above Gizelle, curled up asleep.
Scarlet smiled as they sat across from each other at the dining room table. “They were extremely excited to have played with you.” Conall, as a young musician, had been on a skyrocket to success. He produced several bestselling albums and garnered several awards before a car accident stole his hearing.
He had come to Shifting Sands a bitter, angry man, resentful of his loss and disenchanted with the fast-paced, highly successful business life he had tried to use to replace music.
Gizelle had changed everything for him.
Shy and frightened, his mate had lived all of her life imprisoned by a madman, trapped in her gazelle form. She had no memory of the time before her rescue and few social skills. Neal Byrne, one of her fellow prisoners who had been key in releasing the inmates of the zoo, had helped coax her back to human shape, but it was Conall’s love that had made her truly bloom.
Her greatest gift to him in return was arguably the ability to hear again; when she touched him, particularly skin to skin, he could hear again, using her ears.
But Scarlet was fairly sure that his ability to smile again was actually the most precious thing that Gizelle had given him.
He was smiling now and he put his hand across the table to take the paperwork that Scarlet had put down. He had to scoot the papers around a curious centerpiece: a heavy lump of unattractive metal that had once been a lock on one of the cages of the zoo where Gizelle had been imprisoned. It had been a gift from her, the most precious item of her possession. Conall sometimes carried it with him, despite its awkwardness, and it had been fitted with a carabiner to hang off his belt.
“These are the revisions to the lease, provisional to the purchase of the island.” Scarlet let herself feel a moment of grateful wonder and anticipation. The idea that she would own the island and never have to worry about it being taken from her again was still fresh and new.
“Beehag hasn’t accepted the offer yet?” Conall said, glancing through the paperwork.
“He has thirty days to accept per the contract,” Scarlet said as serenely as she could manage, remembering the feeling of Mal’s hand at her waist as they danced instead of how he had tried to weasel the resort away from her. “Jenny says there’s no reason they shouldn’t simply accept, but I suspect Beehag’s lawyer will wait the full window just to be a jerk about it.” An unexpectedly hot jerk, it turned out.
“How is she?” Scarlet asked, lowering her voice. She didn’t have to worry about Conall hearing her; without Gizelle’s touch he couldn’t hear her at all and was relying on his ability to read her lips.
“She’s nervous about something,” Conall said honestly in return.
“Neal...?” Gizelle had been anxious about Neal’s return to the resort to marry his mate Mary; she had changed so much since he had left and come so far from the gazelle who wouldn’t shift to human.
Conall shook his head firmly. “She talked with him before their wedding and as far as I can tell, that’s all fine now. No, this is...” he shrugged, looking over at the couch where Gizelle’s bare feet suggested she couldn’t hear anything outside of her earphones. “It’s getting hard to hear,” he said thoughtfully. “The background noises she hears are getting worse. It’s like being surrounded by a hundred radios playing different stations that are mostly tuned to static, and they’ve all gone up a notch lately.”
“The voices of more shifter animals,” Scarlet suggested. It had been a surprise to the staff when Conall revealed that Gizelle could hear their animals. Conall had been quick to explain that it wasn’t anything that could be considered eavesdropping—only when she touched a shifter did their animal’s voice come into focus.
“Sometimes I think it’s more than that,” he said reluctantly. “It’s been getting... louder? Clearer? There are more voices, even though there are no more guests? It’s hard to pinpoint. And...” Conall looked uncomfortable. “She’s been talking about the end.”
“Death?” Scarlet glanced at Gizelle’s feet, her fragile toes flexing. “It’s a concept she may only be starting to understand. There are so many things that she’s never faced before.” She had a pang of empathy. “It’s a big world and there’s so much I wish she could be sheltered from.”
Conall frowned at her mouth and Scarlet wondered if she would need to repeat herself until Conall shook his head. “She doesn’t seem to be fixated on death, she seems very matter-of-fact that the end—her end—is coming, and she talks about things that are her fault, and how she’s got to figure out how to fix things. Her fugue states are happening more often lately, like they’re getting harder for her to ignore.”
Scarlet frowned in sympathy. “There’s so much we don’t understand about her.” She finished her water. “Is there anything I can do to help?”
Conall shook his head and stood to gather their glasses. “I will read over the revisions and let you know if I have any changes after I’ve conferred with my lawyer,” he promised.
Theirs was an efficient friendship, Scarlet thought with amusement as she stood. They didn’t tend to waste words, but their mutual affection for Gizelle gave them a broad common ground that they had built a sturdy companionship upon. She was grateful for that friendship, even as it left her craving for something deeper.
Her thoughts returned without bidding to Mal—Mr. Moore.
She stood, dismissing her thoughts fiercely. Mal Moore was a thorn in her side, a problem to be dealt with, not danced with. “Thank you. Let me know if you have any concerns.”
As she walked past the couch, Gizelle suddenly slipped off her headphones and fixed her with a wide-eyed look as she righted herself. “Do you know about sonic booms?” There was a physics lesson paused on her tablet.
“A little,” Scarlet said. Physics had never been a topic of particular interest, but she had slogged through a few years of study. “It was a long time ago.”
Gizelle was happy to explain, bouncing to her feet. “All the sounds want to go fast but they can only go one speed, the speed of sound, and they get all backed up in one wave that hits you at once and it’s like a great big explosion.”
“It really is fascinating,” Scarlet agreed. Gizelle’s enthusiasm was contagious.
“Can people make sonic booms? They’re all trying to go so fast, but can only go the one speed through time. Will they get all backed up and explode, too?”
Scarlet looked at Conall helplessly, but Gizelle was speaking obliquely and he couldn’t read her lips.
“I have no idea,” Scarlet said. “But it certainly paints a vivid picture.”
“No,” Gizelle said thoughtfully. “Not a picture, a song.” Then she scolded, “Oh, Sweet One, no!” because the kitten, startled out of sleep, had slipped down onto the couch and was extending a paw at the headphone cable. “Conall has already bought me three of those!”
Scarlet chuckled as she slipped out of the door; she had already gone through at least a half dozen of her own various cables thanks to Sweet One’s sister, Tyrant. It had amused everyone when the cream-colored cat had attached herself to Scarlet instead of Gizelle, and Scarlet was grateful for the companionship, even
while she sometimes found herself frustrated by the creature’s destructiveness.
Outside of Conall and Gizelle’s cottage, Scarlet turned her feet to the central path running up the resort and she allowed herself a moment of pride looking up over the resort. White columns and glossy tiles graced the gorgeous central buildings of the resort and everywhere, verdant green trees and flowering bushes cast cooling shadows and provided pockets of privacy.
She’d done well, she thought.
The resort was finally thriving, and—her heart squeezed—it was finally almost hers, outright. It was a safe place, the haven for shifters that she’d always imagined it could be. It was just the right touch of luxury and practicality, beauty and durability.
Mal’s presence here... surely that was just some final bluster before the sale was finalized. He couldn’t stop her, he didn’t have any legal leg left. And if he was hoping to come win her with his admittedly considerable masculine charms, he was about to find out exactly how practiced she was in ignoring the desires of her body.
Chapter 5
Mal pivoted on a wingtip and flew over the crescent of golden sand beach, then followed the edge of the sea on the west coast of the island.
He extended his senses, the runes etched into his scales momentarily flaring with light.
The flow of power was as bad as he’d feared coming in the night before. It was like looking at a bad light ballast in a dark room, dim and flickering. The spell he had come to renew—a spell that should be steady for decades more—was failing.
Another little white beach opened up, a tiny half-circle bisected by a river that snaked from a beautiful waterfall. Cliffs on all sides isolated it. Under other circumstances, Mal might have been tempted to stop and bask in the warm sunlight.
But worry drew him on, the island rising to his right, the ocean stretching to his left, as he flew north. The dock for Beehag’s compound appeared and Mal swung inland and rose into the air with powerful wingbeats, following the steep, winding road.
The compound was half-destroyed; the Phoenix had done his work well, and the zoo had been scorched to the earth in many places; no full cages remained. The arboretum was crumbling. The lawns that had been so tidy and well-groomed when Mal had last been here, many years ago, were overgrown.
There was a beaten-down area in the center of the zoo, the grass trampled to brown.
Mal circled it curiously, then reconciled it with the Civil Guard report he’d intercepted the week before; this would be where the fighting ring had operated, pitting Grant Lyons in a handicapped revenge match.
With wingbeats that raised dust, Mal found the sturdiest of the remaining walls and perched.
He shifted back to human.
From his vantage point, he could see the encroaching rainforest. The rain must not be as frequent here; it seemed less vividly green than the jungle that ringed the resort.
He gave a casual murmur and gestured. Energy overlaid his sight once again.
This was a passive spell; he didn’t wish to further muddy the evidence, or cause more damage inadvertently. He paced to one end of the wall and stared down at the burned zoo. Traces of the Phoenix’s magic teased at the edges of his vision, and Corbin’s contaminated power was like a distasteful oily smear over the entire area, rainbow hued with the flavors of the mythic shifters he and his followers had been draining.
Corbin, Mal thought in disgust. Corbin could be the cause of this disruption. With his ham-handed, stolen magic, he might have disturbed the carefully laid spell.
Mal could tell, just from the evidence left, that Corbin had been loud, unconstrained, unrefined. But it didn’t feel... focused. He’d been a child with a canon, so self-absorbed and noisy that he probably hadn’t even realized there was anything beneath the island.
Beneath him, the ground suddenly rumbled, and the trees shuddered. The wall he was on even swayed for a moment. Then, as quickly as it had come, the earthquake was over, leaving Mal coursing with adrenaline.
He centered himself, once the earth stopped moving and he was sure the danger had passed.
Curious, his dragon said as an understatement. His voice had a current of worry, which was itself worrisome. Mal’s dragon was a well of confidence and apprehension rarely intruded from that quarter.
Mal gathered himself and shifted as he leaped from the wall, a strong downbeat of his wings bringing him into the air over the compound.
He flew back to the resort following the east coast, over the primitive airstrip, along the winding road to the resort.
After the abandoned and destroyed Beehag property, the resort was like a gleaming jewel, beautiful and perfect. But Mal’s dragon, for once, was not interested in beauty; he was focused on the low building at the top of the resort with the open courtyard.
Our mate, he insisted. We have to get her away from here.
With effort, Mal kept him from landing at Scarlet’s office and trying to force her into fleeing with them. We have some time, he reminded his dragon. And he already knew that trying to force Scarlet to do anything was a losing game.
Not much time, his dragon countered unhappily. She is our treasure. We must get her off this island.
Chapter 6
Scarlet glared out over the resort through her office window after she righted the pots that had toppled in the brief earthquake. Tyrant jumped up on the pillow she kept there and Scarlet petted her absently.
She couldn’t feel Mal, which meant he wasn’t at the resort, or anywhere on her half of the island.
That should be a good thing, she reminded herself. Maybe he’d packed his bags and flown home, knowing a losing battle when he faced it.
But she’d seen the amusement in his eyes, and the determination. She already knew he wasn’t going to give up that easily.
Her traitor body still remembered the feeling of his hand at her waist and her fingers remembered the muscles under his dress coat.
Mal...
That was her problem. She was thinking of Mal, when she should be thinking of Mr. Moore. Mr. Moore was a voice on the phone that never came with good news. Mr. Moore was the lawyer who tried to buy the resort out from under her with drug dealers and mercenaries. Mr. Moore was the one making offers too good to be true for whatever nefarious purpose he clearly needed the resort for.
Mal was a different kind of problem altogether.
Tyrant reached a paw up for Scarlet’s hand and extended her claws just enough to prick skin.
Scarlet obediently resumed petting her.
“I’m an idiot,” Scarlet told her fiercely, then turned away. If Mal—Mr. Moore—wasn’t at the resort right now, she could conduct her usual business without fear of—
Scarlet stopped herself furiously. She wasn’t afraid.
What on earth was there to be afraid of? Mal—Mr. Moore—had no power over her. That he was here at all was an admission that all of his usual ways had failed him. The island would be hers, the resort would be hers, all of her dreams were on the brink of happening.
All of her dreams except...
Scarlet scowled and went at once to the back entrance of the kitchen, startling Darla with her approach.
The once-heiress was emptying trash into the bin, sorting out reusables, recyclables and compost from what little would actually have to be taken to the mainland for disposal. She had a handkerchief around her strawberry-blond hair and she looked up in surprise. “I didn’t hear you coming,” she said, visibly alarmed and a little afraid.
Scarlet tempered her furious expression. She wasn’t angry with Darla and the young woman already felt responsible for the lawsuit hanging over the resort. “I’m sorry to alarm you,” she said politely. “Is Chef still in?”
“He is. They’re doing some prep work for dinner.” Darla looked like she was resisting the urge to curtsy, despite being covered in trash, and Scarlet strode past to go inside.
The kitchen was relatively empty; it was always busy for the catered breakfast and dinner
, but midday was often quiet, with minimal wait staff attending the buffet.
Breck and Chef were merrily discussing the dinner menu.
“I don’t suppose he’s allergic to anything,” Breck was proposing. “I wouldn’t mind watching him get all puffy-faced and choke a little.”
Scarlet didn’t have to ask who they were talking about. “I am quite certain you are not discussing how best to poison a guest,” she said in utterly icy tones.
They both turned and looked at her. From the way they blanched, she realized she was glowering again and she forced herself resume a serene expression.
“I’m sure I don’t need to remind you that we are here to accommodate our guests, and that we will uniformly treat them with respect and cater to their various needs.” She kept her voice level and reasonable.
Breck, who was never terribly good at hiding his feelings, looked like she’d just kicked him and she knew that she’d struck a nerve. She smothered the satisfaction it gave her to think of Mal—Mr. Moore—getting Breck’s cold shoulder.
“I expect to receive no complaints about our level of service or the quality of our product,” Scarlet said firmly, including Chef in her statement.
Even he looked chagrined.
“I assure you—” he began.
“Don’t mind me,” Tex sang out from the door. “I’m just going to be up here ‘getting ingredients’ for about an hour while Mr. Asshole Lawyer cools his heels by the—” He spotted Scarlet at that moment, and Scarlet realized that she could sense Mal—Mr. Moore, dammit—on the bar deck.
That he’d gotten there without her noticing bothered her almost as much noticing him now did. Scarlet slammed a fist onto the counter hard enough to make the plates rattle, but not hard enough to dent it. “You are not to harass the man!” she snarled. “I should not have to remind any of you how to be professionals!”
The kitchen, which had been quiet, went utterly silent.
Tex finally cleared his throat and someone began noisily washing dishes near the back of the kitchen. “Yes, Ma’am,” the bartender said sheepishly.
