It wasn’t a shifter caught mid-shift, but something else entirely. Something Emory had never seen before.
“That is so wrong,” Emory said, keeping his voice low.
“It must be a mutation of some sort.” Bain shifted fully back to his human form.
The deer’s ragged ears suddenly twitched, and it ran, rushing through the clearing where Alaric waited.
Emory and Bain hurried back, and Alaric turned to them with wide eyes, his jaw tight with concern. “This is not good. I’m guessing that the intensity of the ley lines has made the magic unstable. The tremors in the earth we’ve been feeling are because of that as well. But now that it’s affecting the flora and fauna, it’s turned into a serious problem.” He pulled out his cellphone. “I’ll fill Xavier in and get a clean-up crew out here.”
Emory nodded and leaned against a tree trunk. Alaric was right. This was serious. That thing was something out of a nightmare, and if there was one, there were probably more mutated creatures. Plus, something had been off about the rougarou pack.
His gut clenched when he felt the rumbling tremor of yet another earthquake. He looked at his coworkers, seeing the concern in both their eyes.
Something needed to be done about the ley lines.
Chapter Two
Julien
“Planning to burn the midnight oil again, Julien?”
Julien Davenport glanced up from his monitor to see his CFO, William Cummings, leaning against the door jamb. His tie was loosened, his normally crisp dress shirt wrinkled, and faint circles darkened his eyes.
“You’re here, too.” Julien narrowed his eyes. “And you look like you need to go home. Maybe take a day off. Something I need to know about?”
William shook his head. “No. I was just going over some numbers. What are you working on?”
“The same.” What Julien didn’t say was something was off in those numbers and he had stayed late to investigate. But then he’d gotten distracted by a report about suspicious data one of his employees had discovered. Julien owned and operated a cloud storage service company, and though he had a feeling this information came from a backdoor that shouldn’t have been there, it still had his gut tightening. “I’m also looking into some people who have been using our service to communicate.”
William straightened. “Why? Lots of people use the service for that.”
He shouldn’t have said anything since he couldn’t very well tell William his suspicions—though he was well aware that William wasn’t quite who he pretended to be. He looked at his computer screen. “I don’t have enough details yet. Have to dig in some more.” He looked back up when William cleared his throat.
“I wouldn’t worry about whatever you found. I’m sure it’s nothing.”
Julien frowned because William wasn’t quite meeting his eyes. But then, the man looked exhausted—probably wasn’t seeing straight.
“Go ahead and take tomorrow off, William.”
But William’s features tightened. “I’ve got too much to do. Don’t worry, I plan to do nothing but catch up on sleep this weekend. See you tomorrow.”
He left, and Julien went back to the data. The whole time, his gut churned. Something was going on in his city of Seattle. Earthquakes, the incredibly high heat—and now, according to what he was reading, powerful magical beings were gathering here. There were cryptic discussions through shared documents, but believing their words private, they’d let a few hints through. It was easy to decipher that there was some big plan in place. He couldn’t figure out what, though.
He spent another three hours looking through it and by the time he was ready to leave, he still didn’t have any solid answers.
He rode the elevator down to the underground parking garage. A blast of heat hit him when he stepped out onto the concrete, but that fled his mind when every hair on his body suddenly stood on end.
Magic.
Only one person knew this about him, but he was well aware of the hidden world of preternatural beings living among them. He employed quite a few, and they were the reason he’d named his company Spectral Enterprises. They used magic to disguise themselves, but for some reason that magic didn’t work on him. He’d long grown used to them and no longer gave himself away when he saw them. And feeling actual magic in the air was a part of whatever weird gift he’d been given.
Only this magic felt wrong. Dark. Whatever was in this garage with him didn’t have a pleasant greeting in mind.
He stopped and cocked his head to listen for anything moving, but it was eerily silent. There was a strange smell to the hot air, something he couldn’t place, but made him crinkle his nose because it was certainly unpleasant. He took two steps before a whispering sigh wafted past his face.
There was a dark, low laugh right behind him that prickled over the back of his neck.
He spun around, gaze searching nothing but empty air.
