Page 15 of Red Dragon’s Flame

Michelangela scowled at him.

“Give her a break, Thorne,” Mikah said. “She’s helping me out.”

Thorne’s snort showed what he thought of Michelangela’s potential usefulness. Then he heard what Mikah wanted.

“You seriously came all this way to ask me to pull a random human’s real-life name and address from a role-playing game? So you can stalk her?”

“I’m not stalking her.” He glared at Michelangela, who had been the first to introduce that word into the conversation. She shrugged, looking innocent.

“She’s a friend,” Mikah went on. “And I’m afraid she might be in trouble.”

“Based on one missed appointment that she told you she might miss? And a cryptic message that could mean anything—including that she found her husband cheating or her in-laws showed up unexpectedly?”

Michelangela and Mikah exchanged glances. Thorne looked from one of them to the other, and folded his arms. “And you didn’t funnel this request through Emon. What’s really going on here?”

Mikah sighed. “I have a bad feeling.”

Thorne raised his eyebrows. “You did? Or your teenage mutant ninja turtle did?” He nodded at Michelangela.

Damn. He’d forgotten how quick Thorne was, and how little got past him. But Mikah still wasn’t sure he wanted Michelangela to out her powers over this, no matter what she said.

“I’m babysitting her. I have to watch her every minute.”

He expected Mikey to make a rude noise or give him the finger, but she just played with a strand of her hair, eyes downcast. Finally she said, “Go ahead, tell him.”

“You sure?”

“Fine, I’ll tell him. I get… feelings, okay? I can connect to people sometimes, through things they’ve touched, or even photos or emails. Something that came from them, with intention. I tapped into the connection between Shadow and Mikah by touching her message on the screen, and I almost couldn’t breathe. There’s something wrong. Bad wrong.”

Thorne was just opening his mouth to say something when his brother Zane walked in—golden-blond hair, sky-blue eyes, jeans and t-shirt, bare feet. His mate Blaze was with him—a copper-haired witch with startling blue-green eyes. Zane carried a half-eaten plate of red velvet cake, and was still munching. Behind him and Blaze, the rest of the cake was floating in mid-air, about waist height. The lair was staffed with invisible servants called zefir, and they seemed to love supplying Zane’s cake habit.

“Did somebody call us?” Zane asked, looking curiously around. “Hey, Mikah. Michelangela.”

“I didn’t call you,” Thorne said.

Mikah hadn’t either. He glanced at Michelangela, who was looking totally innocent. Was it possible that she could speak to dragons, without being spoken to first? What all could this girl do?

All Michelangela said was, “Lucky for me. I’ve been wanting to talk to Blaze about something.” She looked around the room at everyone staring at her, and frowned. “Girl stuff,” she added pointedly.

Blaze looked surprised, but she nodded. “Come on over here.” She led Michelangela to the other side of the cavern, where there were a couple of couches and a table. “Want some cake?”

The cake followed them, followed by plates and forks that rose up off a side table. Michelangela called to Mikah, “How come you don’t have zefir at Al-Maddeiri? They are so cool.”

“You got me,” Mikah said. “Although, when that evil fucker Ragnor built the place, he warded it against all other Draken and their magic. That probably included zefir.”

“Too bad I’m not a dragon,” Michelangela said. “Then maybe one of them would follow me home. That would be so cool.”

She sat on the couch with Blaze and they went into a cake-fueled huddle. Mikah went back to persuading Thorne to track down Shadowfire. The more time that went by since her last message, the more uneasy he got about her.

“Look, Thorne, what harm could it do? It’s not like I’m going to storm in there and burn down her white picket fence. I just want to know she’s okay.”

“And if she’s single.”

He didn’t answer.

Zane snickered through a mouthful of cream cheese frosting. “You fell in love with a game character, didn’t you?”

“Shut the fuck up,” Mikah said, but without any heat behind it.