Kindling The Darkness

“Hello?” She leaned over the counter, peering into the back through a beaded-glass curtain. “Anyone back there?”

Nothing.

She was running out of time, and she really needed that coffee. She’d been awake for almost thirty hours at this point. “Hey, hello? You’ve got a customer out here.”

In frustration, she tossed a five-dollar bill on the counter and grabbed a lemon poppy seed muffin, stuffing a bite into her mouth while she went around the counter and helped herself to a cup of coffee. There were no paper cups. She’d have to bring back the cappuccino cup after her meeting.

Lucy sipped her coffee as she headed back around the counter and nearly dumped it on herself as she looked up. At the bottom of the staircase that led from the book stacks to the second floor of what she assumed were more book stacks, a ruggedly handsome middle-aged man stood watching her, arms folded—and they were seriously impressive arms packed tight into a white T-shirt—a scowl on his tanned face. It was her G.I. Joe vigilante.

“Find the cash register all right? I hope that pesky drawer didn’t give you any trouble. It sticks sometimes.”

“Cash register? No, I—just needed a coffee. There was nobody here. I left money on the counter.”

“Jerome isn’t your personal hunting ground. You might want to learn some manners before someone mistakes you for a thief and treats you accordingly.”

Heat rushed to Lucy’s face. “Yeah? Well, you might want to be a little more responsive when a customer is waiting. In the real world, baristas don’t get tips when they ignore people. Maybe you shouldn’t be taking bathroom breaks when you’re supposed to be working.”

“Maybe you should learn to read.” His head tilted toward the words printed in large gold lettering on the outside of the glass panel on the door. “We open at noon.”

Lucy tried to maintain some dignity, the stupid muffin crumbling in her hand as she set down the coffee cup. “Why the hell is the door unlocked if you’re not open?”

Barista G.I. Joe studied her for a moment, his expression giving away nothing. “We generally trust our neighbors around here. This is the first time I’ve ever been robbed.”

“Robbed?” Lucy picked up the five-dollar bill and waved it at him. “I paid you. But you know what? Forget it. Keep the coffee and the muffin. And the damn change. Maybe you can buy yourself a functioning lock.”

She tossed the muffin and the money on the counter and stalked to the door, willing down the prickly heat in her skin threatening to top off her humiliation with a furious blush. She made it all the way to the door—and then pushed instead of pulled.

His soft laughter as she adjusted her grip on the handle followed her out.

Lucy wasn’t easily flustered. Years of practice being the “good” daughter under Edgar’s strict rules and dealing with supernatural rogues, paranormal entities and therianthropes—or shape-shifters, in layman’s terms—of every description had made her preternaturally calm under pressure. Everything was to be kept inside. A Smok wasn’t supposed to react with emotion but with a cool head to defuse the most unpredictable situations. And she certainly didn’t get embarrassed. What was it to her if some petty wannabe-vigilante barista chose to call her a thief just because he couldn’t be bothered to man the counter at his day job?

Normally, she’d have already forgotten the encounter. Maybe it was the lack of sleep—and caffeine—affecting her, but her blood was boiling, and she couldn’t shake it off. She wanted to go back and punch the guy in the mouth.

Lucy gritted her teeth and entered the landscape-dominating Civic Center building on Clark Street that housed the town hall, an odd mix of classical architecture and Mission Revival that defied the small-town-Victorian aesthetic.

With a few minutes to spare, she stepped into the bathroom to make sure she was presentable. Charcoal-gray pin-striped suit immaculate, white shirt crisp, nothing out of place. After tucking a few stray hairs into the loose braid that hung down her back, she touched up her Blood Moon lip stain—the dark, dramatic hue was the one concession she made to traditional femininity; the over-the-top color went beyond sexual appeal, making an aggressive statement that made her feel in control—and headed upstairs to her meeting.

The door to the meeting room opened outward—like a respectable door. Lucy pulled it open and stopped on the threshold in disbelief. Among the three council members sitting at the table was Barista G.I. Joe.

His dark brows drew together into a disbelieving scowl that matched the one she was no doubt displaying as he met her eyes. “You have got to be kidding.”

The elderly woman who’d risen from the seat next to him at Lucy’s entrance glanced from him to Lucy and back. “Do you two know each other?”

“No, we don’t,” said Lucy before he could answer. “We just had a misunderstanding about coffee.”

“I see.” The woman reached a hand across the table. “I’m Nora Peterson.”

Lucy stepped forward with a nod and shook Nora’s hand, trying to ignore the unfriendly glare emanating from beside her. “Lucy Smok.”

Nora indicated the chair opposite her. “Please have a seat.”

As Lucy sat, she reevaluated her initial assessment of G.I Joe’s age. Prematurely graying hair had made him seem older at first glance. He was definitely on the nearer side of forty.

She smiled politely at Nora and the other council member, avoiding the glowering eyes. Even though they were compelling. And an intense deep cinnamon, just a shade darker than amber. Not that she noticed.

“I didn’t realize the town council would be here. Generally, people like to keep these matters hushed up.”

Nora tilted her head. “The choice of meeting place may have been unintentionally misleading. We’re not exactly the town council. We’re more like...the paracouncil.” She gave Lucy a slight smile. “We’re a volunteer group. But we’ve taken it upon ourselves to manage incidents that fall outside the normal operations of the town. With the council’s blessing. Unofficially.”

Lucy took out her phone to take notes. “So they do know about these paranormal occurrences.”

“Everyone knows.” The man on Nora’s other side shrugged. “Jerome is a small town. It’s hard not to know things. We just don’t talk about them. Except for the ghosts, of course.” He smiled. “They’re sort of our livelihood.”

Lucy nodded, uncertain whether he was being facetious. “I see. Thank you, Mr...”

Nora clucked her tongue. “So sorry, Ms. Smok. This is Wes Mason.”

Wes reached over the table to shake Lucy’s hand, his dark skin weathered and rough. “How do you do?”

“And Oliver Connery.” Nora indicated Barista G.I. Joe.

Lucy turned to him with a bland, polite expression. “Mr. Connery.”

He rose to shake her hand, maintaining a similar expression in return. “Pleased to meet you, Ms. Smok.” The handshake was firm but not too firm.

Lucy sat back in her chair. “So you said there’s been werewolf activity?”

“We assume it’s a werewolf,” said Nora. “We haven’t personally gotten a good look at it.”

“You’re sure it’s not coyotes or stray dogs? And you’re certain it’s only one?”

“I think we all know the difference between a dog and a werewolf.” Oliver Connery wasn’t quite as unflappable as he’d pretended. The other two members of the council glanced at him, as if the defensive tone was out of character. He seemed to realize it and dialed it back. “We’ve spotted tracks matching the profile of wolves that disappear into human footprints. Normally, this wouldn’t be cause for alarm. Most shape-shifters just want to be left alone, and we believe in a live-and-let-live philosophy.”

“That’s not consistent with my experience, Mr. Connery.” Lucy calmly met his eyes. Now she was in her element. “Rogue shape-shifters are never benign. Every one I’ve dealt with has caused chaos and destruction.”

“Your experience? Forgive me, but you can’t really have much experience. I’m a little surprised, honestly, to find that someone so young is the CFO of Smok International. Or that the CFO herself would take this job.”

Lucy fixed her gaze on him. “I’ve been deeply involved with the company operations—both the biotech side and the paranormal-consulting side—since I was fifteen, and I started working as a consulting agent when I turned eighteen. I spent the last five years traveling Europe and the eastern states as Smok Consulting’s premier field agent before my father turned the business over to me prior to his death. And I am telling you—from experience—that shifters who aren’t actively managing their conditions and integrating with normal society are dangerous.”

Oliver opened his mouth, but Wes spoke first. “Ordinarily, I’d agree with Oliver, but this is a different breed. We’ve never encountered any so malevolent. It’s been responsible for at least three vicious attacks in the area—official reports are attributing the deaths to a rabid mountain lion, but we have eyewitnesses who claim to have seen a large, misshapen wolf. That’s why we’ve called you in. This is bigger than we can handle. We took a vote.” He glanced at Oliver a bit apologetically. “It was two to one in favor of bringing in professional help.”

“Well, you’ve made the right decision.” Lucy spared a cool glance at Oliver. “This is my area of expertise.”

Oliver’s strong jaw was tight. “I’m not sure I care for your use of the word normal, but despite my reluctance to bring in an outsider—whose motives are purely mercenary—I concurred with Nora and Wes’s assessment that this isn’t ordinary. If it’s a wolf, it’s like no wolf I’ve ever encountered.”

“You can’t have encountered many, Mr. Connery. Smok Consulting tracks this kind of activity closely, and we have no previous evidence of any werewolves in Jerome, Arizona.”

“You assume every werewolf in existence announces itself to you.”

Now, that was an odd thing to say. Perhaps Oliver Connery had experience after all. Personal experience.

“You assume all the unnatural creatures in our database are aware that they’re in it.”

One dark brow, in stark contrast to the silver in his hair, twitched.

Nora made an effort to regain control of the meeting. “So how do you usually approach these matters? Despite the fact that people are aware of certain odd goings-on in Jerome, we do want to maintain some discretion.”

Lucy nodded. “Absolutely. I’d like to start with a list of all reported sightings, including times and dates and any physical contact. And then I’ll survey each of the sites, interview any eyewitnesses who are willing to come forward and get to work tracking the creature or creatures down.”

“I’m not sure how many eyewitnesses will be willing to talk to you.” Nora and Wes shared a look. “But I’ll give you what I can.” She rose and shook Lucy’s hand again. “We’re very grateful for your help. In the meantime, Oliver will take you to the location of the most recent sighting so you can examine the physical evidence.”

Lucy paused as she rose with the others. “Oh... I wouldn’t want to put you out, Mr. Connery. I’m sure I can find it on my own.”

“Please, call me Oliver. And I’m sure you can’t.”

“You doubt my abilities?”

“I don’t have any idea what your abilities are. It’s not about your abilities. It’s just that it’s not something we can simply write down and give you directions to.”

One of her abilities was being able to kick the asses of men twice her size. She supposed she could put that ability to use if she had to. Again.

Lucy shrugged. “Well, if it won’t inconvenience you.” She nodded to Nora and Wes as they headed out into the hallway before she turned to give Oliver a pointed look as he came around the table. “I suppose you have someone to cover your shift?”

“My shift?” He stopped in front of her, forcing her to look up.

“Aren’t you working at the coffee shop?” She smiled darkly. “You did say it opened at noon.”

Oliver chuckled, hooking his thumbs into the back pockets of his jeans. “I don’t work there.”

Lucy frowned, the usual potency of her practiced icy stare diluted by having to look up. “Then what were you doing there?”

“I live upstairs.” He smiled back at her as if they were having a perfectly friendly conversation. “I own the place.”

“Oh.”

“So that coffee and muffin you stole come directly out of my profits.”

She didn’t normally lose her temper, but there was something about this guy that totally pushed her buttons. “I paid for the food!” Her fists were clenched at her sides as she resisted the urge to punch him in the face. The urge was strong.

His eyes were laughing at her, crinkled at the corners. “A large coffee is two fifty, and the muffin was four seventy-five.”

“Four seventy-five for a muffin?” Lucy yanked her wallet from her inside pocket and pulled out another five and shoved it at him. “That’s two seventy-five you owe me, then. I’m not leaving a tip for such poor service.”

Oliver stared down at the bill as if he wasn’t quite sure what to do with it or how to respond to her, thumbs still firmly in his pockets. When she continued to hold out the money, he took it at last and tucked it into the pocket of the flannel shirt he’d put on over the T-shirt since she’d seen him in the shop. It gave her the impression she must have caught him getting dressed.

Lucy cleared her throat deliberately. “My change?”

That dark eyebrow twitched again. “I don’t keep a cash register on me. I’ll just consider this an advance on your next muffin.” He rolled up his sleeves and reached to open the door, and Lucy took a broad step past him to get it herself.

As she pushed it open and went through, he chuckled once more behind her. “I see you figured out how doors work.”

Chapter 3

Oliver studied Lucy Smok’s profile as she followed his directions and drove toward the Gold King Mine & Ghost Town attraction just outside the town proper. When he’d clashed with her the night before, he was focused on her militant intrusion into his world, her unwarranted attack on poor Crystal Harney, an “undergrounder” who was just trying to get by.

Crystal belonged to a certain class of the not-quite-human who were shunned by those who ran in elite circles like the world of Smok International. Oliver had seen his fill of vulnerable undergrounders being victimized and demonized among the paranormal-aware community, and he’d vowed to watch out for them when he could, since no one else would. Lucy’s arrogant insistence that Crystal was a killer rubbed him the wrong way, the sort of attitude he’d seen from law enforcement types all his life.

Then, today, when Lucy had appeared in his shop after raiding his kitchen, Oliver took her for a spoiled brat. In the dark and the rain the night before, he hadn’t noticed how young and slight she was, and it was hard to reconcile the two versions of her. But discovering she was Lucy Smok, the high-powered twenty-five-year-old CFO of Smok International the council had brought in to deal with their problem, had thrown him for a loop. How all three things could exist simultaneously in one compact—and highly opinionated—person was difficult to process.

She was also one of the most visually striking women he’d ever seen.

Pale aquamarine eyes and porcelain skin contrasted sharply with almost-ebony hair, and the deep red lipstick she wore—like the stain from a beet—enhanced the effect. The paleness of her eyes made her seem like a dangerous wolf. He might have suspected her of being a shifter herself if she hadn’t been so adamantly bigoted against them. She also possessed a sharp cockiness he didn’t see in most women, the kind of confidence a woman would need, he supposed, to run a multimillion-dollar corporation—especially at such a young age.

He kept coming back to that. Because, beyond her puzzling contradictions, he was having trouble reconciling his own powerful attraction for a woman almost ten years his junior. It wasn’t the image he had of himself. Later in life, ten years wouldn’t matter so much. But a man in his midthirties chasing after a woman in her twenties was just embarrassing. Not that he was chasing after her. He didn’t chase. And he wasn’t interested in any kind of intimate involvement. He was done with that. But the attraction was undeniable.

It was almost visceral, like he’d been waiting for her, his senses pricking up in anticipation as if his body recognized her. And not in a sexual way—though he couldn’t deny there was that, too—but with a sense of familiarity, of knowing, that he couldn’t explain and didn’t particularly care for. Her scent seemed made for him, a blend of cardamom and amber, something both earthy and exotic at once. And he didn’t think she was wearing perfume.

“Now where?”

Oliver blinked. “What?”

She glanced over at him, annoyance drawing her ebony brows together. “Where do I turn?”

They were at the crossroad where Jerome-Perkinsville Road split off in two different directions, one toward the rustic museum of antique mining machinery and the other up into the hills.

“Oh, sorry. To the right. You can pull over by the gate.”

Lucy turned a bit too swiftly, tires kicking up dirt and gravel, and drew up in front of the rusted barrier chaining off the private road. “It says No Trespassing.”

“We’re not going in. We’re just heading up the forest road a bit. We could drive in farther, but I don’t think your car is made for dirt-road driving.” Her expensive convertible two-seater looked like it was designed more for show than for sport.

He noticed the dress boots with a two-inch block heel under her tailored suit as she stepped out of the car. She was even shorter than she seemed. He could probably pick her up and carry her under one arm like a caveman claiming his mate. Not that he approved of cavemen scooping up and claiming women. Or that he considered her a potential mate.

Oliver swallowed and reined in his idiotic thoughts. Sometimes it seemed like his brain took pleasure in going off on tangents that would make him uncomfortable. At any rate, how such a slight-looking woman could possibly be one of Smok Consulting’s premier field agents was beyond him. Going after someone small and defenseless like Crystal was one thing. And Lucy obviously had some kind of martial arts training. She’d briefly overpowered him with the element of surprise on her side. But what was she going to do when she tracked one of these things down? Call animal control?

Lucy was eyeing him with a mixture of impatience and annoyance. “Well?”

“This way.” Oliver strode past her, hands in his pockets, up the dirt and gravel road, not waiting to see if she’d followed. Her expensive, unscuffed boots crunched on the gravel behind him. They weren’t going to be unscuffed for long. He led her around the bend, where he veered off the road and headed downhill over the remains of old mining spoil, only to realize she was no longer behind him.

He turned to find her standing at the top of the hill with her arms folded, watching him. “Too steep for you?” he called up to her.

Lucy uncrossed her arms and rested her fists on her hips. “Mr. Connery, is there a point to this little trek?” Her ability to project was impressive. She must have had stage experience.

“It’s Oliver,” he yelled back. “And yes.”

After regarding him with suspicion for a moment longer, she finally headed down the side of the hill with a sigh—extremely sure-footed on the damp earth despite the boots that didn’t look like they were made for hiking. It occurred to him as she came closer that perhaps it looked like he was leading her out into an isolated area for nefarious purposes. He’d forgotten to put himself in her shoes—not that he’d fit them—which was a large part of his meditative practice.

“Sorry about that,” he said when she reached him. “I should have told you what we were doing. This is where we tracked the creature after it was spotted lurking around the Ghost Town. The lupine tracks disappear here, to be replaced with human footprints.”

She looked where he was pointing, and Oliver stepped aside and moved off a few paces to let her examine the area without him hovering behind her. Lucy sank into a crouch, perfectly balanced on those thick-heeled boots, and took out her phone to snap some pictures before straightening and walking around the prints to get some shots from another angle. After walking farther down the hill to follow the now-human prints for a ways, she turned and headed back up.

“I see what you mean. The animal tracks aren’t standard wolves. I’ve never seen any quite like that. Certainly not that size. But those are definitely human prints leading away from them, with no sign that anyone else was out here until they appeared.” She glanced at Oliver’s footwear—a much more utilitarian pair of old brown work boots. “Except you, evidently. And now me, of course.”

Oliver tilted his head and studied her, amused. “You think I’m the werewolf?”

“Are you?”

“Would I tell you if I were?”

Lucy shrugged and headed back up the hill. Oliver followed, and they walked in silence until they reached her car and got in.

“I’m not,” he said as she started the engine.

“Not...?”

“The werewolf. For whatever my word is worth to you.”

“Exactly as much as any man’s is worth.”

He had the distinct impression that meant “zilch.”

She turned the car around and pulled back out onto the paved road. “Besides, I don’t think we’re dealing with a werewolf.”

“Oh?”

“Lycanthropic transformation isn’t instantaneous and smooth. The creature would have struggled and fallen, and the human shape would have been on all fours before the footprints began. There’s no sign of any transition at all with these tracks. It’s as if the creature simply chose to be human at that moment.”

“What kind of shifter could do that?”

Lucy was quiet for a moment before she answered. “None that I know of. So where to now?”

“Haunted Hamburger.”

She looked over at him. “Haunted...what?”

“Best burgers in town.” He smiled. “I think I owe you a meal.”

* * *

The outdoor seating overlooked the entire Verde Valley—the hundred-mile views the restaurant boasted of along with burgers, brews and “boos.” The distinctive red-rock formations that defined the Sedona landscape, made blue and soft by distance, marked the horizon like the rim of another world. Lucy gazed out across the panorama while they waited for their food, wondering how much of this territory might “belong” to the creatures she was hunting.

“It’s a pretty great view, huh? The ghosts seem to like it here, anyway.”

She turned toward Oliver, who was sipping his porter. “Hmm?” Lucy glanced at the valley once more. “Oh. Yeah, it’s nice. I was just thinking about the direction this thing might have gone. The tracks we looked at must have been made within the last few hours since the rain stopped.”

“That’s right. We got the report of the sighting about an hour after I caught you harassing one of our citizens.”

Lucy ignored the bait. “And what makes you think the tracks were made by the same creature responsible for the ‘mountain lion’ attacks?”

“Because similar tracks were seen at the sites of those attacks. And a kid was found close to that spot yesterday with his throat torn open and his intestines missing.”

The same MO as the beast she’d been tracking from Flagstaff.

Oliver grimaced as the burgers arrived. “Sorry. I wasn’t planning to talk about that while we ate.”

“Why not? Isn’t that why you brought me to Jerome? I didn’t come for a social visit.”

“No, of course. And to be clear, I did not bring you here. I was outvoted, if you recall. But don’t you ever take a break?”

Lucy shrugged. “I’ll take a break when they do.” Which seemed like it was going to be never. She dug in to her burger, having forgotten how hungry she was until now. “So, where were the other attacks?”