Mercy Burns

“I don’t know—”

“You asked me to prove myself,” I cut in. “And I’m offering you a lot of money. It’s only fair that you prove the truth behind your words.”

“My scars are my proof.”

“Your scars could have been caused by anything. You’re the one who said you know where the bodies lie. I want you to show me.”

He picked up his beer and drained the glass in one gulp. He wiped the froth from his beard with the back of his hand, then said, “I just have to show you? I don’t have to do any more than that?”

“No more. I just want proof.” What I’d do with it once I had it, I wasn’t entirely sure.

Nor was I sure how finding bodies from a cleansing that had happened over thirty years ago would help my quest or find Rainey’s sister, but I had to try. Hell, merely having some evidence might just get the council to take me more seriously. Reporting the empty, gutted towns had caused little more than uninterested disdain.

Angus studied me, blue eyes still holding that cold determination. “Why do you want proof? It’s not like you can go to the cops, and if you think the council will care, you’re not exactly living in reality. And you’re not going to threaten these people, especially considering you’re just one lone draman.”

“I never said I was alone.” Although to all intents and purposes, I was. Leith was ready, willing, and able to help, but I’d already lost one good friend to this quest. I had no intention of losing another. “I just want to stop what is going on. Finding the bodies is one more step along that road.”

“But why? That’s what I don’t get. Especially after what they tried to do to you.” He studied me for a moment then added, “Was someone you loved killed in one of the cleansings?”

“No.” I hesitated, then added, “But Rainey lost a sister in one.”

“That wasn’t mentioned when we arranged the original meet.”

“No,” I said, and wondered why the hell he even thought it should have been. It wasn’t something you mentioned on a phone to a complete stranger.

I gulped down the rest of the Coke and wished it were something stronger. I’d never been one for alcohol, but a little something to help push the memories back into their box would have been handy right now.

Angus—who was watching me like a hawk—said, “You want another drink? Perhaps something with a little bite?”

I grimaced. “Not at this hour. But another Coke would be good. Thanks.”

He snapped his fingers at the bartender, who gave a nod. Obviously, Angus was pretty well known here. I couldn’t imagine the gruff-looking bartender playing waiter for any old stranger.

Angus looked at me and said, “Okay, it’s a deal.”

I took my wallet from my pocket and dragged out the cash, but I didn’t hand it over yet. “Tell me how a sea dragon came to be in a town of outcast draman.”

He smiled. Again, it was a bitter thing. “It was bad timing, nothing more. My parents and I were swimming to Australia to spend the winter, but a bad storm caught us. I was small for my age, so Mom decided to make for shore.” He hesitated, and the ghosts of the past seemed to crowd the room for just a moment. I shivered and rubbed my arms. “The little seaside town seemed ideal.”

“Seaside?” That surprised me. Both Stillwater and Desert Springs were situated in the semiarid wastes of Nevada. There were rogue towns outside Nevada, of course, but as far as I was aware, none of those had been hit as yet.

Of course, I couldn’t actually be one hundred percent certain, because no one really knew just how many rogue draman towns there were. As Angus had said—and I’d discovered—the council didn’t give two hoots about them. Their main concern was keeping the thirteen main cliques in line.

The bartender arrived with our drinks and a strange, forced smile. Obviously, he wasn’t that happy about being treated like a waiter. Angus paid the man, then waited until he’d gone before saying, “Aye, and a pretty spot it is, too.”

“You’ve been back there, then?”

Again, sadness briefly clouded his eyes. “I lost my parents in that town. I go back there every year, on the anniversary of their deaths.”

“So is the town still vacant? Or has civilization encroached?”

“Only ghosts reside there, even now.” He shrugged. “I’m told the kin of the people who owned the land are keeping it as some sort of memorial.”

“So is the land draman-owned?”

“Dragon-owned. At least it is now.”

“Who by?”

He smiled, but there was nothing warm about it. “Jamieson.”

My clique. Great.

And while that didn’t mean they were in on this whole cleansing business, I wouldn’t put it past them. The bastard we called king certainly wouldn’t be above a little outlawed cleansing if it suited his purposes—and if he thought he could get away with it.

“But you’ve never seen anyone else there?”

“No.” He shrugged again. “I just lay my flowers and leave, lass. That’s enough for me.”

It would probably be enough for anyone. I dragged the Coke toward me and took a sip. The chill of it sent a shiver down my spine. “Has this town got a name?”

He hesitated. “Whale Point.”

I took another drink of Coke, then said, “Never heard of the place.”

“Well, yeah, because the town and the road into it are all but destroyed.”

It was a reasonable-sounding statement, and yet there was an edge to his voice. My gaze flickered to his arms. If not for those scars—which fit every scrap of information I knew about the destruction of the draman towns—I might have been tempted to believe that this was some odd con. “Meaning the town isn’t on the Cabrillo Highway?”

“No. The highway bypasses Whale Point and most of the surrounding area is state park. The track running into the town has been left to ruin, and it’s easy to miss if you don’t know what to look for.”

His voice held a tiredness that made me want to believe him. And yet, part of me didn’t. I wasn’t sure if it was my long history of distrusting the motives of just about everyone, or whether it was simply disbelief that answers might finally be at hand after months of Rainey and I finding nothing but ruins and dead ends.

And now I had only five days to find my answers and solve this crime.

Panic swirled, briefly making it hard to breathe. I pushed it away fiercely. I could do this.

I had to do this.

He took a long swig of beer, then added, “Whale Point’s down by Limekiln Beach State Park, a good two and a half hours’ drive from here. When do you want to go?”

I glanced at my watch. It was nearing four now, and I didn’t fancy walking around an abandoned town at dusk, let alone at night. I might not be bereft of fire come darkness—an oddity no one could explain given most dragons and draman were—but I still wasn’t about to be caught at night in a place I didn’t know and with a man I didn’t trust.

“Given the time, perhaps it would be better to start tomorrow.”

He nodded. “You got a truck or a car?”

“Car. Why?”

“Because as I said, the track was in pretty bad shape last year, and it has probably degenerated since. You’ll need a four-wheel drive.”

“Then I’ll meet you at the beginning of the road into Whale Point, and you can drive from there.”

There was no way I was getting caught out in the middle of nowhere without transport, either. Not when I couldn’t fly. He wasn’t to know that, of course, and that’s just the way I intended to keep it. The more he thought I was one of those draman who’d inherited full skills, the less chance there’d be of him pulling something funny when we were out there alone.

Or was that just my suspicious nature rearing its ugly head again?

“It’d be easier if I simply drove all the way there, but we’ll play it your way. You’re the gal with the money, after all.”