Page 12 of Shifter's Dream

Sage kissed him on the cheek and tried to flutter him away from the door again, but he brought his hands out from behind his back and-

Flowers.Reed startled and backed away.

Sage grabbed at them and looked over her shoulder, catching Reed’s eye, a look of apology on her face. “Thank you, thank you, that’s so sweet, you’re really very sweet, but you’re going to get me in trouble if you don’tgo now.” Sage pushed him out and watched him go for a second. She looked over her shoulder again at Reed and Reed tried to tell her it was ok. But it wasn’t ok. The flowers drew her attention like a bloody knife would have. She couldn’t help it. The ghost of her headache flashed bright pain behind her eyes and she closed them. She heard the screen door to the back open and close and when she opened her eyes, Sage was gone.

Reed loaded more and more silverware on her tray, her mind a still lake before a storm in which no rational thought could exist. Silverware. Tray. Silverware. Tray.

Sage rushed back inside, hands empty. “I took care of them,” she said. “I’m so sorry.”

Reed shrugged, the storm beginning to blow inside her while she prepared to weather it, to pretend it wasn’t happening at all. All at once she was aware of her racing heart and the moisture in her palms. Her headache was back, too. The flowers had brought the storm, and Reed resented the hell out of it. These… attacks she had? They weren’t getting better, and the tools she’d learned from those books she’d read, they weren’t working anymore.Get ahold of yourself, ReRe, she whispered inside the swirl of her mind, trying to be her own still, calm voice.

Anthophobia, it was called, the fear of flowers, and she’d had it as long as she could remember. Except that wasn’t exactly what she had because what Reed had was fear of onlycutflowers. There was a big difference, there was ahugedifference!

Reed shouted the last few words inside her head, forgetting where she was for a moment, forgetting what she was doing, forgetting everything but those damn flowers screaming from the crystal vase.

A hand on her arm. A cool, soft hand that calmed her at once, that made the noise in her head fall away. “Are you ok?” a soft voice said. Familiar. Sweet. Sage.

Reed pulled herself together with effort, thick fear settling in the place where the noise had been. She was losing her hold on herself, on reality, and it was getting worse every hour. How many days away from a public episode was she? Did she have two days? Three days? A week? And once she blanked out or worse, did something that made no sense or ruined her reputation, then what? She’d have to move back home and live with her mother.

Reed grabbed at Sage’s retreating fingers like a life jacket. She squeezed Sage’s hand before letting it go, waiting for what came next. Nothing. She was tired, a little cranky, but she felt mostly normal. Thank goodness.

She smiled at Sage and nodded. “I am, thanks.”

Out in the bar, the music was turned up. The evening was getting started.

“He a cop?” Reed asked, lifting her chin at the door where the big guy had been. Normally she could tell with a look, but that guy hadn’t been obvious.

“Nah, he’s a hose man,” Sage said, her smile widening for just a moment.

Reed laughed, not asking if that meant firefighter. She would just assume it did. She pulled herself back into work mode, with effort, and told Sage what she’d meant to before she’d seen the “hose man.”

“You have seven in booth two, they look like they want food and lots of it. I’ve never seen any of them before, but the four guys are definitely cops, one of the women is probably a cop, and the other two women are possibles.” It was always good to know who were cops and who weren’t, because then they knew which fighting to stop, and which to ignore. Fighting between cops, they always ignored. They let them fight, they let boys be boys or assholes be assholes, whatever, but if it was cops fighting with bikers, or cops fighting with people who didn’t know any better, they didn’t ignore it, she’d learned that lesson early. A big fight had broken out between cops and firefighters, and the next day the bar had been empty. Not one cop or firefighter had come in for days, while their rank actively chewed them out and punishments were doled out, she’d learned later. Reed had been eating ramen with a side of ice water for all her meals. She relied on her tip money for rent and groceries, it wasn’t extra money. Anything that hurt tips, hurt Reed’s bottom line. In her new job, herrealjob, she would have asalary.

Sage stood on tiptoe to see out the window to booth two, where the party of seven had sat down. “Thanks,” she said, hurrying out the out-door.

Reed circled the back once, got food that belonged to her tables, and made a round through the floor, feeling eyes on her the entire time.

Someone was watching her.

8 – Fresh, Windy, Sweet

Troy slid into the oversized booth at Mugshots next to Beckett, Cerise and Dahlia. In the other seat, Crew was all the way on the inside, already playing footsie with Dahlia, then Rogue and Mac were next, both relaxed, lounging, and sizing up the place.

Troy caught a thread of a scent and his eyes dropped closed as he savored it. It was like peppermint, spearmint, and wintermint all rolled together, blowing in his face. Sweet, windy, fresh, like what he’d scented the night before. Thoughts of sex steamrolled him, sex and something more, something so far-reaching and forever that he could not quite name it.

The sounds of the bar fell away and he took a deep breath in. There it was, the mint scent, so cool and refreshing and in need of a thaw. Troy opened his eyes, searching the inside of the bar for her, the source of the delicious scent. His wolf leaned in close. He didn’t translate what his wolf was saying, only agreed.

The minted thread of scent reached him again, new and fresh, and Troy searched the interior of the bar. She was close. The bar and grill itself was a square, with two seating sections along two outside walls, separated by an archway over the entrance. The archway was lined with pictures, “mugshots” of customers half an hour after they’d drank a drink called the “Spread ‘Em.” Troy had seen the sign explaining the images as he’d walked inside, but did not know what a Spread ‘Em was, nor care. He wasn’t drinking, he was hunting. Troy saw no female who fit the scent in the section he was sitting in, so he peered through the archway to the other side, also running his eyes over all the women at the bar. The door that divided the bar from the kitchen was to his right. A waitress with long dark braids came through it, but she was not the source.

Mac whispered something to Rogue, then stood, and left the table, heading further into the bar. A door to the right of the bar swung open, and a female walked through it, balancing trays expertly on each forearm. She was beautiful and poised and perfect, with curves that wouldn’t quit, wearing jeans, a simple dark shirt, and comfortable shoes. Black, curly, shoulder-length hair framed fine-boned features set in a controlled expression that perfectly matched her cool mint scent and made Troy’s stomach flop around in the strangest way. Four realizations struck him all at once.

She was the source of the delicious minty scent he couldn’t get enough of. She worked at Mugshots. She had a cool, ice princess vibe that he must thaw or die. She belonged with him.

Troy growled soft enough that only he could hear it, a slow idle that revved up his desire to get close to her, to see her eyes and her face, and her mouth and her body up close, to hear her voice, maybe catch her eye, to carry her on his back like she was royalty.

Mac came back to the table, but Troy didn’t even look at him. He watched the female and waited for a clear course of action to come to him.

Mac got in his line of sight, and when Troy moved over, his future wife was gone, maybe around the back of the dance floor, maybe through the door behind the bar. Troy snarled once at Mac, but let it go. She would be back.

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