The brunet settled back in his seat, eyelids drooping over whiskey-colored eyes, handsome face as pleasantly blank as it had been all night. It went with the rest of the package: a well-muscled body done up in good-old-boy denim, cowboy boots, and a sleepy expression. Almost as if playing for a pot that rivaled my yearly salary bored him. He threw in a sizable chunk of his chips. “Call.”
The blond’s confident expression faltered as he turned over his hand: three jacks. It was good, but not great—not with a pot like that. He’d been bluffing, and I had a feeling his opponent knew it. The brunet let the tension draw out for a few long seconds, then casually flipped over a full house. “Better luck next time, kid,” he said. It didn’t sound much like he meant it.
He cashed out, probably afraid that winning any more would put his name on the casino’s suspect list, and headed out the front door. I let him get a small head start, then followed. I needed help to crack this case, and odd as it seemed, he was my best chance to get it.
Fremont Street is where the locals go to drink and gamble, in that order. But despite living in Vegas for six months, I’d never been among them. There was too much temptation to do a spell to skew the odds in my favor, and thereby violate the ban on magical interference in human games of chance. Rigging the games risked letting the human authorities, who monitored them closer than terrorism, discover the existence of the supernatural community. As a result, it was a serious no-no. The kind that carried a possible death penalty.
It was the coercive potential of that little fact that had me following a werewolf through the holiday crowds, while huge, goggle-eyed faces stared down at us like neon gods from the psychedelic arch overhead. Despite everything, he’d never lost the loose-hipped saunter of the upper clans, the one that said the whole world was there for him to walk on. The stride looked casual, but it ate up a lot of ground. I lost him in the crowd around an aging busker belting out “Silver Bells” from the bed of a rusty pickup.
I dodged the cops converging on the illegally parked vehicle and stared around, grimacing. My quarry was nowhere in sight, meaning he’d probably ducked into one of the clubs. But which one? The buxom redheads or the fetish-clad blondes? I mentally flipped a coin and decided on the blondes. A pert version with black eyebrows and a twenties-era bob gave me an odd look, but let me in.
The lights were down in preparation for the next act, and there was enough smoke in the air to count as a screen, but I thought I saw him lolling at the bar. I was sure of it when he suddenly stood up as I approached, the scowl on his face visible even in the bad light. I decided not to take chances. The guy could move like quicksilver; it had been hard enough tailing him when he wasn’t trying to evade me.
He slowly sat back down, eyeing his left hand, which was glued to the bar top by the remains of his whiskey glass. It had been a thick, substantial piece that made a nice puddle when it liquefied and then grew solid again almost immediately, serving as a makeshift handcuff. Along with his fingers, the spell had trapped a little Santa-on-a-stick that had decorated the now evaporated booze. It grinned cheerfully out at the world, like a bug caught in amber.
“Hello, Cyrus.” I appropriated an empty stool on his right. “Miss me?”
“You owe me a drink,” he said, trying to flex his fingers and failing. “I’ll tell my lawyers to add it to the bill when I sue you for assault.”
“Two bourbons, straight up.” I slid a twenty over the sticky counter to the bartender, who thanks to the dim light, had yet to notice the mess. “It’s on me. You’ll need your money for bail.”
Cyrus slammed his free hand down, shattering the glass and making several nearby patrons jump. He began digging chunks out of his palm. “I’m being arrested? On what charge?”
“You’re a lone wolf, without clan protection. Do I need one?”
“The last time I checked, yes!”
“Hmm.” I sucked on a pretzel while the bartender poured our drinks. “Then I guess I’ll have to go with endangering the Secrecy Act.”
“I don’t know what you’re—”
“Your little gambling problem?”
There was a slight pause. “It’s only a problem when I’m losing.”
“Or cheating. By the way, how’d you do it? Can you tell how much a person is sweating? Or does their scent change when they’re bluffing?”
“If you don’t know, you can’t prove a damn thing,” he said firmly, abruptly standing up. “I’ve had a wonderful evening, Lia. Too bad this wasn’t it.”
“If you’re going to quote Groucho, at least get him right. And lone wolf, remember?” Where he was concerned, I wouldn’t need much proof. What little I did, his unusual lucky streak would provide.
Cyrus’ eyes were glittering, but his voice stayed level. “If you were at the game, why not arrest me there?”
“Too many norms.”
“And there aren’t any here?”
I glanced about the murky room. “I think we’re safe,” I said wryly, “unless you plan to make a—”
I turned back around to find my quarry gone and the bartender peering at the mess on the bar with a puzzled frown. I threw another twenty on the counter and headed for the back door. It led into a side street, where Cyrus was already disappearing around a corner. Damn it!
I sent a doppelgänger spell after him, hoping the low light would make the misty double believable, and headed around the opposite corner to cut him off. And found myself slammed against a hard concrete wall for my trouble. “Nice try,” Cyrus breathed, “but you forget your roots. Spells don’t have a scent, Lia.”
Having Cyrus’ full attention was like being the only rabbit in the world in front of a pack of starving wolves. If I hadn’t had the wall behind me, I might even have taken a step back. Only Weres ever did this, walked right past arm’s length and set up camp inches away from my chest. I’d never gotten used to it, and it didn’t help that his knuckles were pressing against my throat.
But showing fear is the absolute worst way to negotiate with a Were. And since he hadn’t yet snapped my neck, that’s exactly what we were doing. “Would you cut it out? I’m not really planning to arrest you!”
“Why not?” The darkness had made his eyes liquid black, but I could still see the suspicion in them. “Surely not some leftover sentiment?”
“I have to find some missing girls,” I said curtly. “And I’m new here. I don’t have the contacts I did back East—”
“And you think I do?”
“You always have contacts. If you help me, I’ll forget what I saw tonight.”
Violet-blue light filtered down from a neon sign, bathing him in strange shadows. It leeched away the good-old-boy vibe, leaving the harsh planes of his face clearly visible. For a moment, I almost thought I could see the wolf staring out at me. “And if I say no?”
I flexed my shields a little, slamming him back into a nearby Dumpster. I wasn’t the only one who’d forgotten who he was dealing with. “You haven’t heard what I want yet. You might even like it.”
Cyrus pried himself loose from the Dumpster’s metal embrace. “If you’re involved, I doubt it.”
“Even if it could put you back in the king’s good graces?”
He scowled as I stepped out into the street to hail a cab. “What king?”
“My boss is convinced that Sebastian is the werewolf king.”
“You know damn well—”
“Yeah, but I kind of like it. I think I’ll call him ‘your majesty’ if we ever meet. See how well that goes over.”
“I can already tell you that,” he said dryly. “And what, pray tell, is a lowly grifter and a disgraced war mage supposed to do for the almighty Sebastian?”
We got in the cab and I tossed the file onto his lap. “Save his daughter.”
“You don’t get it! If I don’t find these girls, they could end up dead!”
We were back at his place, a seedy motel room considerably off the Strip, with the buzz of traffic clearly audible from outside. It mingled with the sound of the ice machine at the end of the hall, a couple of parents screaming at their kids, and a guy with a four-pack-a-day habit coughing up his lungs somewhere nearby. Merry Christmas.