Another reason—one more sinister and less altruistic—existed. A reason that landed closer to home…and his own heart.
Having Magickind around was dangerous. Not to the Scottish pack, but for him. His secret was a fragile one, a carefully constructed mirage that would disappear if one of the elder races came to stay at The White Hare. He or she might recognize him, seek him out to pay homage, reveal what he tried so hard to keep hidden—force him to face his packmates and the consequences of concealing his true origins.
The instant Cyprus and the others learned the truth, he’d be exiled. Mayhap even killed for hiding his bloodline.
Kruger clenched his teeth. His fucking father. The male’s stink followed him everywhere he went.
It didn’t matter that he’d never met the irresponsible arsehole. The damage Silfer had done to Dragonkind couldn’t be undone. The fallout would never stop. After centuries of suffering, his race’s struggle went on ad infinitum. Each generation passed the curse on to the next, siring males who lacked the ability to connect to the Meridian and draw nourishment from the electrostatic bands ringing the planet, providing what a warrior needed to stay healthy and strong.
His sire had done that—betraying the Goddess of All Things along with those he represented in the Heavenly Realm by impregnating a wood nymph…and siring him.
Kruger’s chest tightened. So much fucking pain. All that upheaval. Goddess, what his mother must’ve suffered bringing him into the world. He could hardly wrap his brain around it—or his sire’s selfishness. The hubris floored him. The continued struggle of Dragonkind made his heart hurt. Nothing he did would repair the damage.
The connection lay shattered, beyond help or repair. So aye…
No way around it.
He would never tell anyone where he came from—or who’d sired him. Heartache along with certain death lay in that direction, which left him one option—no more playing nice with humans.
He would wait for the new innkeeper to show up and do what must be done: eliminate her fast, take what he wanted instead of negotiating for what he needed. The White Hare wouldn’t be under new management long. He’d make sure of it.
2
CHICAGO, ILLINOIS
Every once in a while, life threw you a bone.
Ferguson McGilvery remembered those days, when everything was golden, shiny, and bright. Before the wounds deepened and pain crept in from the edges, making things turn from good to bad. She longed for the days when life set its thumb on the scales, landing on her side instead of throwing curveballs—ones she never managed to hit.
It was the damnedest thing, those strikeouts. Her batting average had always been solid. Never one thousand, mind you, but a respectable eighty percent at least.
Strange the things one took for granted while sailing on good vibes through a smooth patch—like stable relationships and financial security.
Despite her skill at playing the odds (statistics had always been her jam), she hadn’t seen it coming. She’d been too trusting, an idiot each and every way she sliced it. The facts weren’t in dispute. The worst-case scenario had arrived with a thunderclap, knocking her off her cozy perch.
An elaborate illusion, conjured by a master of deception.
Her husband had created the bubble, then wrapped her inside it. And she’d stayed oblivious, wasting seven years of her life with a man she believed loved her.
Seven years.
Seven freaking years.
Ferguson couldn’t believe she’d fallen for the ruse, or that she still struggled to let go of the dream. Everything was upside down and backward, twisted in a way she couldn’t straighten out, and most days didn’t want to, though sometimes…
Swiveling away from her computer screen, she tipped her chair back. Hinges creaked. Stained ceiling tiles looked down on her. She stared back at the messy collection, then frowned. Seemed like a metaphor for her life right now. Hanging on by a thread, about to come down around her, ratty beyond repair.
Concentrating on a yellow stain above her head, Ferguson scowled, not wanting to admit she longed for the good old days. A foolish reaction. Doing what her ex wanted, returning to the dysfunction, sounded as crazy as it was, but…
All that golden, shiny, and bright was seductive in the midst of upheaval. Human nature, maybe—longing for the familiar. To return to the known, no matter how screwed up, instead of forging new paths into the wilderness that had become her life.
Going back, however, wasn’t an option. Four months changed a lot. Not much time in the grand scheme of things, but plenty enough for everything to slide downhill. No way of slowing down, never mind bring the careening calamity to a halt.
She’d face-planted. Spectacularly, in public, losing her mind when she found out…and everything else shortly thereafter. Which landed her here, in the last place she wanted to be—the family business (the one her mother married into), working alongside her stepbrothers.
Pressing the balls of her feet into the floor, Ferguson rolled her chair farther away from her cubicle. Rubber wheels rasped over carpet. A clunk sounded behind her.
The surfer-dude voice came next. “Feeling sorry for yourself again?”
With a sigh, she closed her eyes. Why her? Why now? Why couldn’t everyone just leave her the hell alone?
She glanced over her shoulder. “You’re early.”
Bleach-blond hair in a messy halo around his head, Jethro stepped on the edge of his skateboard. The wheels flipped up into his hand. Dark brows popped over ocean-blue eyes, heading toward his forehead. “Dude, I’m fucking vapor. You expect me to keep track of time?”
She sighed again. So much for common courtesy. Jethro—next-level surfer, pothead bohemian—never cared what she thought. Or that she didn’t want him around during office hours.
For good reason, too.
He was dead, as in—no longer among the living, breathing normal human beings she interacted with every day.
No one else but her could see him, which put her in a whole other category. One her mother had called special, and Ferguson called screwed up. Being the go-between, communing with the spirit world, sucked. Not that anyone wanted to hear her opinion.
Keeping with Jethro’s ongoing theme, none of her visitors cared she wanted nothing to do with them. Ghosts came and went, showing up in her space, scaring the shit out of her on a regular basis. Though since what she liked to call the catastrophe, and the subsequent dismantling of her life, only Jethro and Cuthbert (the English butler who drowned in a pond trying to save a cat during the Victorian Age) popped in to chat.
Or rather, checked up on her. Their way of describing the crazy-ass visits, not hers.
“People already think I’m nuts, Jethro.” Ignoring the mountain of file folders growing like fungus on her desktop, she swung around in her chair. “You trying to give them more ammunition?”
“Who cares what these assholes think?” He treated her to a pointed look, then flipped a joint into his mouth. A cheap plastic lighter flamed, and the pungent scent of weed hit her, ramping her irritation into double digits, given no one but her could smell it. “Partake of the green goddess and chill the fuck out, Fergie.”
His answer for everything.
He blew out a stream of smoke.