Chapter 1
There was bad trouble coming—Flynn could smell it. It had been following him for months, like a monster in the shadows, raising the hair on the back of his neck and making that spot between his shoulder blades prickle in warning.
Like an unseen knife was about to come out of the dark and stab his entire life through its heart, destroying his shifter crew and everything they’d built together.
He’d keep that from happening if it was the last thing he ever did.
It probably would be.
The nightclub was filled with writhing bodies and dark shadows cut by flashing neon lights. Flynn leaned against the wall near the bar, the vibration of the too-damn-loud music rattling his back teeth, making his head pound and jangling his nerves.
Whoever had invented clubbing should be stuffed into a glass VIP booth with eighty-six other people and forced to listen to a never-ending loop of techno party music until their head exploded. Or until someone vomited appletinis all over their gelled-up hair and skinny jeans.
Flynn hated crowds, and nightclubs, and people. And the stupid shit they said to each other when they were trying to get laid. And…people.
To his lion shifter senses, the whole place stank: the chemical artificial fog, the perfume and fancy cocktails, and the overheated bodies pressed too close together, oozing with lust and anxiety and the brittle desperation of too many people trying too hard to convince each other they were having a good time.
But his contact liked meeting in clubs. He liked the anonymity. As a twenty-something who could pass as a hipster, the asshole could blend in. Flynn, not so much—considering that he was a fucking six-foot-six lion shifter the size of a linebacker, with a crap-ton of shaggy black dreadlocks.
People noticed. And got out of the way, usually, which was how he liked it.
But to someone with his military training, a club was a nightmare. A huge room packed with bodies, where people were constantly touching and bumping into each other, where anyone could come up behind you and slip a stiletto between your ribs, and melt into the crowd before your body hit the floor.
Or drop poison in your drink. Hell, he could think of about sixteen ways to kill someone in this room without getting caught.
He subtly shifted his body, feeling the comforting weight of his weapons. The gun in his shoulder holster under his oh-so-unfashionable leather vest. The backup strapped to his right thigh under his equally unfashionable cargo pants, where he’d ripped the backing out of the side pocket so he could reach right through to the weapon if he needed it.
Some people dressed for style; some for comfort. When Flynn went out in a crowd, he dressed for battle.
He scanned the club for his contact. Again. His body language deliberately said casual—maybe even bored. Slouched against the cinder blocks, one knee bent so the sole of his boot pressed flat against the wall.
But he was paying attention to everything. Because…paranoid. Always had been, always would be.
Fletcher was late. Flynn glanced at his phone. No messages. Fuck.
He tried to tell himself it didn’t mean anything. The guy could have hit traffic. Changed his mind.
Or he could have found out too much, and be lying in a pool of blood somewhere.
That place between Flynn’s shoulder blades was prickling again. A few months ago, he’d used ancient magical dragon artifacts to rescue one of his crew from a life-threatening situation. He’d known that would draw some attention—both from people who wanted the artifacts’ power, and from the original owners. He’d been waiting ever since to find out who would find him first—and what they’d want from him.
Because fucking dragons always wanted something.
And the other people who wanted the artifacts would kill him to get them.
He absently rubbed one of the cuff bracelets that encircled both his wrists. He’d wrapped them in leather because they were pure gold, which tended to draw attention. He used to keep them in his safe, but lately, when he was in a crowd, he felt better with them on.
If there was a price to be paid for using them, he just had to make sure that he was the one who paid it. Not his crew, who’d fucking been through enough.
As if on cue, his phone vibrated with a text alert.
Shit. Not his contact.
It was Xander. Again. Black panther, recent dad, and by far the most annoying member of his crew.
Did your date show up yet?
He’d made the mistake of telling the crew he was going out to a club. Implying that he was going to meet a woman, because they didn’t know about his contact or his intel operation, and he planned to keep it that way.
A woman. That was a laugh. As if he could possibly meet anyone here who had any clue who he was or what he needed.
The phone buzzed again.
Have you gotten laid yet? Or did she see your tiny dick and run away?
Fucking Xander. He typed back:
How the fuck can I get laid if you won’t stop texting me? Go away and boink your mate.
He hit ‘send’, then added:
PS I’ll always be the biggest prick. Me 8===========> you 8--> so sad
His phone buzzed again. Nothing but a middle finger emoji. He wondered where Xander had found that—Flynn definitely needed it for his phone.
He copied it and sent it back double. The alpha always should have the last word.
He flicked back to his Home screen, shaking his head, smiling a little in spite of himself. His crew might be a bunch of idiots, but they were pretty damn funny when they weren’t bleeding each other. And in their own fucked-up dysfunctional way, they wanted him to be happy.
The problem was, Flynn didn’t do happy.
Flynn was one of the people who kept watch, all the time. Who fought and bled so that other people could be happy and oblivious.
He’d been raised with the ingrained knowledge that if he ever let his guard down, people would die. Hell, he’d seen it happen. A whole clan wiped out, because their watchers and protectors had failed.
That hard lesson had shaped the rest of his life.
His crew, all mated up and drunk on sex hormones, thought that’s what Flynn needed too. A mate to get all sappy over—someone who he could trip over his paws to please and make happy.
Good luck with that. Flynn was…what was that shit women called it? Complicated.
Which was basically code for ‘a fucking bastard.’
He was dominant. Irritating. Uncompromising. Paranoid. Fuck it, he liked shit his way. People who did things his way tended to stay alive longer than people who didn’t.
Flynn was a fan of the people he cared about staying alive.
Mates needed gentleness, and there weren’t any soft places left in Flynn.
And anyway, his chance was gone. He’d had a destined mate, once. Supposedly. According to the dragon seers, they were going to grow up and fuck happily ever after while saving the world in their spare time. Right.
That had turned out to be bullshit. His promised mate had been killed before she ever had the chance to grow up. Which just showed that prophecies didn’t mean fuck-all.
As Flynn checked his phone yet again, he suddenly felt goosebumps ripple up his arms, every tiny hair standing on end. All his senses went on the alert. His lion woke up and growled.
There was danger in this room. Danger, and power. He scanned the club, keeping his gaze casual. A guy looking for a hookup.
He’d already pegged the few shifters in the room. None of them were paying attention to him; they were mostly workers from the Nashville wolf pack’s downtown offices, and Nashville wolves had learned the hard way not to fuck with Flynn or his crew.
None of them were the source of the power—or the danger.
He let his gaze drift upward. There was a balcony around three sides of the room, with spiral staircases at the two corners. The center portion bowed outward in a curve, packed with more gyrating bodies, the neon lights of a small auxiliary bar blinking behind them.
The two sides were almost empty, with fewer lights and deeper shadows.
There.
She stood at the railing alone, on the left side of the balcony. He raked his gaze over her body, assessing. Slim, taut, with the graceful lines of a dancer and the poised wariness of a trained martial artist.
She wore a leather bustier, laced up the front. Leather jacket over it, all buckles and chains and rivets, and too hot for a late August night in Tennessee.
You could hide a gun and several knives under that.
Her dark hair was swept up in a deceptively casual knot, speared with two long sticks with silver filigreed knobs on the ends. They looked like fancy chopsticks, but Flynn knew the tips were probably filed to lethal sharpness.
She looked beautiful—and deadly.
Then he looked in her eyes.
Dark, deep pools, full of mystery and promise.
Even from across the room, they pierced right through him. Everything seemed to stop, like the music and the noise of conversation had suddenly been hit with a mute button.
There was only her, gazing down at him. Gazing into him.
A faint smile curved the corner of her mouth. A taunt. A challenge.
She raised her hand…to beckon him? Or to warn him?
A voice broke the spell. “Hey, do you want to dance?”
Flynn started and jerked his gaze away from the balcony, flicking the handle of one of his knives automatically into his palm before he remembered where he was. How the hell had anyone gotten so close without him realizing?
A pretty blond woman stood in front of him. Her emerald green dress clung to her curves, and her bronzy hair cascaded in artful waves down past her shoulders. Her two friends stood behind her, giggling.
Fuck. Flynn slipped the knife back up into its sleeve sheath before they could see it. They were all barely old enough to drink, soft and silly and breakable. Looking for adventure—a hookup with a bad boy to tell their friends about. Probably drank fruity girly drinks and didn’t know an AK47 from a revolver.
“Sure,” he said. He held out his hand as if for a handshake. “My name’s Xander. I live with my mom. In the basement, with my collection of Star Wars action figures. Want to see them?” He tried to look hopeful. Epic fail. “You can bring your friends.” He went for the creepy leer instead. Score. “I love it when girls dress up like Storm Troopers and tell me what a very bad boy I am.”
She stepped back. “Ew. That’s lame.”
“You sure? You can be Princess Leia if you want. I always wanted to do the nasty with Princess Leia. You’d look bitchin’ hot with your hair in those side buns.”
“No thanks. Perv.” Rolling their eyes, the three of them sashayed off on their too-high heels, swinging their asses to make sure he knew what he was missing.
Flynn snorted. That was too easy. He returned his attention to the woman on the balcony.
She wasn’t there.
Before he had a chance to think or ask himself what the hell he was doing, he was moving for the spiral staircase. The metal treads hummed under the soles of his boots; he could feel the vibration in the handrail. He skirted the press of people on the central balcony and headed towards the shadows where he’d seen her last.
No one was there. Putting his hands on the handrail, he surveyed the club below.
Even in the frantic press of bodies, somehow he knew she’d stand out.
He couldn’t see her anywhere.
He was surprised at how disappointed he was. Flynn never let himself get disappointed. He’d trained himself to always expect the worst.
He glanced around. He’d cased out this club before the meeting; he’d never meet a contact without knowing where the exits were. There was a locked door behind him leading to the offices—he’d lifted a key card from one of the staff, just in case.
She might have done the same, and slipped out that way.
But somehow he knew she hadn’t. She was here for a reason. One of Fletcher’s people, maybe? Or one of his enemies. Whoever she was, she wanted something from him. He could feel it.
The desire to know what it was—the desire to know her—flooded through him like a compulsion.
He couldn’t leave until he found her.
That now-familiar lifting of the hairs on the backs of his arms brought him back to reality.
She was there. Behind him. Not close enough to kill him, unless she had a gun. But he could feel the heat of her body, the heat of her power.
The throbbing music changed to something soft. Soulful. All around the club, couples melted into each other’s arms.
He heard her voice, low and sultry, as she came up beside him. “Do you want to dance?”