Hour of the Dragon - Heather Killough-Walden Page 0,51

be a pain in the ass.

When he hadn’t had any luck getting his fair-haired past out of his head, he’d downed those few more beers, switched them out for shots, gone back to beer, and then headed back out onto the Austin street in the middle of the night. He’d been in awe of the crowd that hadn’t thinned out one iota over the last few hours. All his years of existence, and this was his first time on this particular street at this particular time of year. Was that normal for Austin during Christmas? He genuinely didn’t know. Three a.m., and they were still partying like it was the end of the world.

And of course the Monsters MC leader was there too.

Somewhere between Ares leaning against his bike and scanning the crowd, Cain had apparently snuck right up behind him. Cain could sneak up on the devil. Hell, most people thought he was the devil.

Antares slowly lowered his beer, opened his eyes, and looked over his left shoulder. A few feet away, Cain leisurely leaned on the saddle of his own motorcycle, his thick arms crossed over his chest, his boots crossed at the ankle. He watched Antares with very blue, very keen eyes.

Ares glanced from Cain to the motorcycles. All thirteen of the chrome beasts were lined up along the street here, and the sight was attention-grabbing not only because the bikes were gorgeous, but because of what the symbols on their gas tanks proclaimed them to be. However, other than Ares, Cain was the only Monsters member outside with the admittedly priceless vehicles. Everyone else in the warden clan was either asleep because they were genuinely tired, at the bar getting drunk because they couldn’t sleep, pretending to get drunk because they actually couldn’t, or off somewhere getting laid because they could.

“We?” Ares repeated flatly, returning his gaze to Cain. “We’re not looking for anyone.”

Cain shrugged his broad shoulders and smiled a predator’s white smile, crossing his arms over the expanse of his chest. “Suit yourself, Mace. But I’ve got nothing better to do.”

Antares knew that sure as hell wasn’t true. Cain was an enigma of a man. He may have appeared to be the leader of a motorcycle club, but in deeply influential circles within both the mortal and immortal worlds, Cain was known as one of the most powerful men in existence. Power came with TTD lists.

“You aren’t out here because you can’t sleep, are you?” Mace asked him.

“Nope,” Cain simply replied.

“And you really do have a thousand things to do right now, don’t you?”

“Yep.”

“And you know who it is I’m looking for.” The last one wasn’t a question. And it also wasn’t necessary.

“I might,” Cain answered anyway. “But I want to hear you say it. Who are we hunting, Mace?” he asked softly before taking a drink of some beer that Antares knew for sure had absolutely zero inebriating effect on the man.

Antares went still at the question. The thought of Cain hunting anyone at all gave the black dragon a chill, but the thought of him hunting this particular person was downright unsettling. “We’re searching for… a ghost,” he finally said. That’s what it felt like, anyway.

Cain watched him in silence a second before he looked away again to peruse the people milling on the street. “Ghosts,” he repeated softly. He seemed to contemplate things as he peered down the block. Everyone he looked at no doubt felt Cain’s eyes on them. It would feel like a touch of something both cold and hot like dry ice, but heavy like the sudden condensed and collapsing mass of a neutron star becoming a black hole, and it would be there for a mere split moment before it at once lifted away – poof. And life was a little different.

That was what it felt like to be noticed by Cain.

“Well, I’m no ghost whisperer,” Cain said, turning back to pin Ares once more with his blue search lights. “But it’s been my experience that ghosts are a hell of a lot less solid than the girl you’re…” he smiled rakishly, “searching for.”

Ares tore his gaze away and paid attention to his drink. “Who said it was a girl?” But Cain was slower in answering this time, and that made Antares look back up.

The clan leader was still studying him with that acute perception that made his stark eyes look so sharp that diamonds would slice themselves up before him just to save themselves the pain