Instead she went to the sink and filled up a glass of water. Las Vegas tap water tasted terrible, but who cared? She needed the water, needed the cool wetness inside her parched mouth.

“This book.” Reid held it up. “Where did you get it?”

Misty explained about the flea market. “I had it valued, but even though it’s a first edition, it’s in too bad a shape to be worth much. I kept it for the interest.”

“Whoever wrote it knows much about the Fae.” He flipped to the title page. A nice frontispiece with an etching of an heirloom rose faced it, the plate guarded by a thin piece of vellum. The title page itself didn’t have much information.

“The author didn’t put her name on it,” Misty said. “Or his. They didn’t always back then. This book has a date but no publisher or author.”

“Maybe a Shifter wrote it,” Xav suggested.

“Doubt it,” Reid answered. “The spells in here against Fae are subtle but show a good understanding of Fae magic. Shifters are cruder when dealing with Fae.”

“He means we just rip their heads off and spill out their insides.” Graham strode to the back door and yanked it open. “Kyle! Get out of that damned tree! You’re not a cat.”

Kyle stopped squirming in the branches of the fruitless mulberry that overhung Misty’s yard from her neighbor’s, and dropped to the ground. He yipped once when he landed, then he trotted off, none the worse for wear.

Misty tried to memorize what he looked like, so she could try to tell them apart, but once he joined Matt, she gave up. The two, as wolves, were identical.

“Are you babysitting them?” Misty asked when Graham came back inside.

“Their foster mother dumped them on my doorstep,” Graham said. “I was on my way to hand them to Nell and her bears when the dream hit.” He regarded Reid speculatively. “You and Peigi have a bunch of foster cubs at your house. Kyle and Matt like them.”

“No,” Reid said quickly. For the first time since Misty had met him, Reid looked less like a mysterious being and more like an ordinary human. A worried human. “Peigi’s got too much to deal with—the cubs, the other Shifter women from Mexico . . . You weren’t here when we rescued them. They went through hell, and Peigi as their alpha feels the worst of it. Leave her alone.”

Graham scowled at him a moment longer before he relaxed into a grin. “Why don’t you just make the mate-claim on Peigi and get it over with?”

Reid looked embarrassed. “Dokk alfar don’t do mate-claims.”

“You’d better start. Shifters need females, and she’s fair game. Even my wolves are eyeing her. They’re going to start to Challenge for her, and they won’t care if you’re dokk alfar or tree bark. They’ll use the Challenge as an excuse to kill a Fae, and won’t care you’re one of the good ones.”

“I’ll keep it in mind,” Reid said, recovering his calm. Graham didn’t seem to frighten Reid, and neither did other Shifters, Misty had noticed. Most humans, even Xavier sometimes, could grow nervous around Shifters, but never Reid.

“So we wait until moonlight?” Xav broke in.

Misty shrugged. “I guess.”

“I guess we do.” Graham moved back to the door, opening it again to watch the cubs. He wasn’t about to leave, she saw. Misty would have to sit here with him for the next few hours, her nerves making her crazy, the sensation of his hard kiss lingering on her mouth. “Got any beer?” Graham asked over his shoulder.

“I told my guys to bring some,” Xav said. “And we’ll get pizza.”

At the word pizza, high-pitched yips sounded in the backyard. One cub popped up from the riverbed, an eager look on his face. There was no sign of the other cub.

“Matt!” Graham shouted. “Get out of there.”

The second wolf scrambled out from under the bridge. He gave Graham and Misty an innocent look, or as innocent as he could with a clump of Angelita daisies drooping from his mouth, their yellow heads bobbing in the sunshine.

 • • •

Moonlight. The clear skies of southern Nevada ensured plenty of light once the three-quarter moon rose into the black night.

The moonlight poured down into Misty’s backyard, rendering her colorful flowers pale ghosts of themselves. The neighbor’s tree cast sharp shadows on the patches of grass, and the dry river’s dark rocks took on a dull glow.

The cubs, unbelievably, were asleep. They’d dropped off fearlessly on top of Misty’s bed after consuming more than their bodyweight in meat-lovers’ pizza.

Misty’s aching body begged for rest, but she was afraid to sleep, afraid to dream. What if she found herself facing the hiker again, the wave of ice? The cubs didn’t worry, but then they hadn’t drunk the Fae water. How the cubs had entered the dream, and whether they’d truly been there, neither she nor Graham knew.

When the moon had risen high, Misty and Graham went out to Misty’s backyard. Graham had told Xav and Reid not to join them. He didn’t know what the spell in the little book would do, if anything, and he didn’t want it messed up by unspelled humans or a Fae—especially not a Fae.

Reid agreed without argument. Xavier didn’t like it, but he stayed inside, saying he’d keep an eye on the cubs.

Xav’s men had not only brought the pizza, but water—glorious water. A case of it, which Misty had drunk almost half of.

Graham had drunk nothing. She knew he was feeling the thirst, because he kept wetting his mouth, or swallowing and turning away as Misty had guzzled water. Why he wouldn’t drink, she had no idea, and he wouldn’t tell her.

Graham helped her carry the accoutrements for the spell outside. Misty had harvested petals from two of the roses she’d brought home from her shop, washing them thoroughly and rolling them dry in a towel.

“You eat flowers?” Graham asked when she told him imbibing the petals would be safe. “Humans are weird.”

“Lots of flowers are edible,” Misty had answered. “Cake bakers paint them with sugar water and use them for edible decoration. Roses, pansies, carnations, squash blossoms. I went to a restaurant where they made sweet corn tamales in squash blossoms. They were awesome. You have to be careful to choose the right kind of flowers, though. Oleanders, for instance will kill you quickly.” She waved her hand at the thick, dark green bushes along her fence.