Page 3 of Kidnapped By The Messy Dragon

I grin.

“And no funny business.” He points at me on his way out of the kitchen. “Or I will shut that little show of yours down myself.”

“Noted,” I say.

He’d do it. An Alpha’s word is law in a clan, and my brother doesn’t bluff. But he’s driving me straight into Millbrook, and he thinks the biggest story in that town is a land deal.

I glare at Dorian on my way out of the kitchen. “Fucking snitch.”

Dorian laughs into his pancakes and keeps eating.

I jog back up to my room and raid my reading chair. I come out with a white button-up, gray slacks, and my good watch. I dress fast and grab my Millbrook notebook off the floor.

Every page in that notebook circles the same witch. She sent ghouls into my town, humans who traded themselves to her for gifts. They broke into Shadow Suds, our local cleaning service, and stole cases of a discontinued solution. Then they broke into Treasure’s apartment. She’s my good friend’s mate, and the witch meant to use her as bait against the gargoyles.

And I know exactly who I’m hunting. Delilah has worked my valley before. She’s told fortunes in my town wearing a borrowed face, and she’s cut deals with wolves on our mountain. Now she’s gone to ground. Where does a witch hide? And why isshe sending ghouls to do her handiwork when she could level a building with a snap of her fingers? A witch like her doesn’t borrow hands unless she’s scared of something. I want to know what.

All she left behind was that solution, and it can fool a shifter’s nose. The company that made it sits in Millbrook.

I dig my ear cuffs out of my dresser and drop them in my pocket. They pin my points down, and in a town like Millbrook, flat ears keep a dragon alive.

I sneeze again on my way out the door, and smoke curls down the hall behind me.

Neither of my brothers has ever heard the name Stillwater Solutions. I plan to keep it that way.

For now.

2

ZURI

Whitney is still talking when I reach the corner across from the Stillwater building, and I’ve quit hoping she’ll take a breath. Four coffees ride in the cardboard carrier in my left hand. My phone is pinned between my cheek and my shoulder, and the sidewalk is full of Millbrook people who don’t move for anyone.

“Conference room B gets set up first,” Whitney says in my ear. “Ms. Hale’s dry cleaning arrives before lunch, and you will intercept it. She wants the vendor folder waiting on her desk when she walks in. The blue folder. If you bring her teal again, don’t bother coming up.”

There’s no writing any of it down with both hands full, and Whitney doesn’t repeat herself. So the list goes where everything goes: in my head, in order.

I cross with the light, because getting hit by a car would make me later. The heels are the newest problem. They’re front-office dress code, per Whitney’s memo, and whoever designed them should do time. I take the crosswalk in short steps. Breaking my neck is not on Whitney’s list.

Stillwater hired me to file compliance records. I’ve been fetching coffee and dry cleaning ever since. My landlord already has every dollar I brought to this town, so I don’t get to be picky.

Two men in gray suits hold the door for each other and let it swing back on me. I catch it with my elbow and keep every coffee level. My bun is still holding.

The lobby smells like lemon polish. STILLWATER SOLUTIONS spans the wall behind the front desk, with A QUIETER CLEAN printed underneath.

“Tell me you have all of that,” Whitney says, and hangs up.

I have it.

No one at Stillwater has figured out yet that I remember everything. I plan to keep it that way.

The elevator gives me one floor’s worth of privacy, and I spend it breathing and getting my face right.

Whitney is posted at the desk outside Ms. Hale’s office, slender and spotless in cream silk. Her blonde hair is ironed straight to her shoulders, and she takes me in from heels to bun before I’ve cleared the elevator doors.

“You’re late,” she says.

“The line at—” I get out, still short on air.