Wild Cat

hunters did by breaking the law and shooting him. You’re not responsible for absolutely every damned thing that goes on in other people’s lives.”

“I’m Eric’s second. Yes, I am.”

“Yeah? Then maybe Donovan was right. You’re too tied to being second to Eric and not enough to being first to yourself.”

Her anger was palpable. “And this is how you plan to convince me that a relationship between us will work?”

“I’m trying to convince you to give me time to convince you. Later. We’re here.”

The dirt road had narrowed. Xavier stopped his truck ahead of them, and Diego pulled in behind. Cassidy didn’t say anything or even look at him as they got out of the car.

Diego’s heart beat faster as Reid found the path and started leading them to the rock outcropping. Cassidy was pretty stubborn, but like hell Diego was going to let her win. He’d convince her they should be together if he had to argue with her until they were both too hoarse and too tired to talk. Then he’d teach her exactly how he felt about her, in all ways.

Court her, his mother would call it. Chase her ass was Xavier’s term.

Diego watched Cassidy walking a little ahead of him, her legs slim in jeans, her loose sweatshirt in no way disguising the delectable body beneath. He thought of the way she’d slid onto him in his backseat last night, wearing nothing under her tight dress.

If Cassidy thought this human would run away with his tail between his legs, she didn’t know humans. Or at least Latino cops who didn’t take shit from anyone.

After twenty minutes of climbing, they came to the clearing and the buildup of rocks within it.

“This is a magical place,” Peigi said as she looked around. Cassidy looked around as well, her arms folded hard across her chest.

“How do you know that?” Xav asked.

Peigi touched one of the boulders. “I was raised on the Scottish west coast, where the Fae presence is strong. I learned the feel of it. It’s faint here, but Fae magic has touched it.”

Diego knew it only as a place where he’d been shot at, and where he’d found Cassidy ready to be butchered by Reid.

Eric walked through the cave with his flashlight, examining walls, floor, ceiling. Shane came behind him, the big bear man sniffing. Diego trained his own light on them but found nothing unusual, only gray and darker gray limestone of the mountains and a coating of dust.

“The gate won’t open for me,” Reid said. “I’ve tried.”

“What is the ritual?” Peigi asked.

“It involves candles and a big, long knife,” Cassidy said.

“And Tasers, apparently,” Shane said. “Though I’m thinking they weren’t in the original spell.”

“A spell I won’t try to work again,” Reid said. “I don’t fit in here, but I won’t kill to get back home.” Diego heard the dead note in Reid’s voice.

Eric pressed his hands on the wall at the end of the shallow cave. “According to my Fae source, the gates on the ley lines go to different places in Faerie. You can walk through two gates right next to each other in the human world and end up thousands of miles apart in Faerie. So this gate might not lead to anywhere near Fionn’s territory.”

“It might not lead to mine either,” Reid said. “But once I knew where I was, I could get home.” He touched the wall next to Eric’s hand. “I don’t know what I’d find, though. My entire clan destroyed by the hoch alfar? Or my people restored, and at peace?”

“Moot point if you can’t get through,” Xavier said.

“He’ll get through.” Peigi also touched the rock wall. “Maybe only a little Shifter blood will open it enough to assess where it comes out, and what is on the other side. Isn’t it worth a try?”

“The spell needs the lifeblood of a Shifter, sacrificed,” Reid said. “You’re not doing that.”

“How about freely given? I sacrifice it for you?”

Reid’s face was dark with anger. “Why the hell would you do that?”

Peigi took Reid’s hand and wrapped her own around it. “Let’s just say I want to see someone get their heart’s desire.”

Cassidy went to them. “Let her try. It might work.”

Reid didn’t want to. Peigi jerked her hand from Reid’s, turned it palm up, and let her claws come out. As Cassidy had at the club when she’d vouched for Diego, Peigi slashed her own claws across her human hand.

Blood welled up on her palm, and she pressed her hand against the rock wall.

Nothing happened.

Diego kept his eye on Reid as he approached Peigi. Peigi lifted her hand, leaving blood smeared on the rock. Shane tapped the wall. Solid.

“It won’t work,” Reid said. “It needs more blood. Forget it.”

“Spells are tricky,” Eric said. “Especially Fae spells. It’s not the ingredients that matter, but what they represent. Does the blood stand for life essence? Or a Shifter death?”

His words gave Diego an idea. “If these Fae seriously want to keep you from finding your way back, they won’t make the solution one you would like. You hated Shifters, and you were perfectly willing to kill one to open the gate. So maybe spilling Shifter blood really won’t work, because you were so eager, even happy, to do it.”

“I wasn’t eager,” Reid growled. “Or happy. I don’t like killing anything. Except hoch alfar.”

Diego continued. “What I’m saying is, when you talked to me about Shifters, you despised them. You were ready to make yourself sacrifice one. So do the Fae think it would be harder for you to kill a Shifter? Or to save one?”

Diego drew his Sig and trained it on Peigi.

Reid snarled in pure rage. He threw himself at Diego, slamming them both into the wall, right over the smear of Peigi’s blood. Reid knocked Diego’s hand into the rock until the gun fell from Diego’s grip.

Diego felt the rocks behind him give. He grabbed Reid and hauled him out of the way, turning to see a gray mist forming where the rock wall had been.

The misty patch expanded until it was about ten feet high and three feet wide. A doorway.

Peigi stared, openmouthed. “What happened?”

Eric gave Diego a thoughtful look. “The sacrifice was Reid saving a hated Shifter. Not killing one. Good perception, Diego.”

“Yeah,” Shane said. “But what’s that stink?”

Wind swirled through the doorway, bringing with it cold and a stench of something rotting.

“Goddess,” Cassidy said, waving her hand in front of her nose.

“This isn’t right,” Reid said. He started forward, but Xavier and Diego grabbed his shoulders and pulled him back.

“Wait,” Diego said.

Picking up his gun, Diego moved slowly toward the misty air. As he neared the door, its outline grew more and more clear. The mists rolled back in a sudden burst of cold, to show them a man-shaped figure silhouetted in the doorframe.

The figure turned and brought up a weapon.

“Down!” Diego shouted.

Shifters and cops hit the ground. A bolt pinged a rock in the cave and fell to the dirt, and at the same time, the man fell through the opening.

Not a man. He was tall and strangely lean, like a human who’d been stretched, and he had white blond hair and pointed ears.

He was also dead.