The Vow (Black Arrowhead #1) - Dannika Dark Page 0,13

It was as if I’d stepped into a time machine and transported myself to 1952, and not in a good way.

I patted my hand against the bar to summon the bartender. “Exactly what are the rules in here?”

He popped open a bottle of beer before answering. “No fighting, no shifting, and no skipping out on the tab.”

“That’s it?”

When he pointed behind me, I glanced up at the wall over the jukebox to a sign I’d failed to notice. It was wooden, and the red paint had faded. An arrow pointed to the right, and the lettering read TRIBES.

Which meant the place segregated patrons. Two black men were doing shots at a booth behind me, so it had nothing to do with skin color and everything to do with the local tribes. I’d never seen anything like it in Austin. Some Shifters resented Natives because they owned good land passed down from their ancestors—land that neither the white settlers nor the higher authority had gotten their hands on. Usually I’d seen the animosity in the form of a few grumbles between packs, but nothing like this.

I swung my gaze to Lakota as he swaggered toward me, his eyes slicing across the room. As he closed the distance between us, my heart quickened. Will he recognize me? What is he doing here?

The moment his eyes slanted in my direction, my stomach tightened into a knot.

“Better keep those eyes in your head,” a man at the bar spat. “Don’t look at our women.”

Now these rednecks are coming to my defense?

I could almost hear my heart beating with each step he took. Thump. Thump. Thump.

Recognition flickered in his eyes, and they widened just a fraction. When he averted his gaze and moved past me without a word, I realized I wasn’t supposed to know him, and he wasn’t supposed to know me. I sized up his two friends, each wearing a single braid down their back. They kept their eyes trained on the wall, uninterested in the dripping-wet woman who was gaping at them. I could smell rainwater on their clothes as they walked by and disappeared around the divider wall.

I faced forward and frowned at the bartender. “If you don’t like them, why not ban them?”

The bartender laughed and shook his head. “I got nothing against the tribes. They’re half my income. We got a bunch of old-timers living around here, though. The wall keeps everyone happy, and I don’t have to break up as many fights. Ain’t one of them complained about it.”

I lifted my root beer and gave him a mirthless smile. “That’s really progressive of you.”

The black-haired man on my right turned toward me and drummed his fingers on the bar. “Where you from?” he asked, his voice threaded with suspicion. He didn’t have the same twang as everyone else. His accent was a slow Southern drawl that told me he wasn’t local.

“Texas.”

He narrowed his eyes and smiled. “And your pack?”

“It’s rude to ask what my animal is.”

He scratched his five o’clock shadow. “I wasn’t asking. I was… making an assumption. Bitches are so easy to spot.”

Bitch wasn’t a word in my former pack’s vocabulary, but it was a common, innocuous term among Shifters. Despite his friendly banter, my head was still reeling from seeing Lakota. What are the odds?

It made sense that he was taking jobs where there were more tribes. He could easily blend into the fold. Having been raised in both cultures, Lakota would have no trouble relating to the nontribal outlaws as well.

But here, in the middle of nowhere? What kind of insidious crimes are happening at the corner of the white tree and the big rock?

Staring back at that sign was making my stomach roil. I’d always considered Hope’s family an extension of mine. Their culture was steeped in tradition, and it had never been an “us and them” situation. Racism existed among Breed, but it was between different animals or Breed types, not because of color or heritage. No one trusted Vampires, Mages and Chitahs were mortal enemies, Shifters were looked down upon because of our past as slaves, and Sensors weren’t taken seriously since their business practices were seen as perverse.

It made me ashamed to be sitting on the side I was, but something told me the resentment flowed both ways. The place had a history all its own that my brief visit and a few enlightening speeches weren’t going to change.

Jimmy returned to his seat and tossed his camo hat on the