“Wh-what? Why?”
They shrugged. “Tan’s pissed about the ward.”
Before I could respond to that, Jed asked, “Are you okay, Dain?”
I nodded. “Uh, yeah. I’m fine. Um… do you just want to… go inside?”
After setting Keryth on his feet, Anton walked straight over to me and put his hands on my shoulders, holding me at arm’s length. “Are you injured?”
I shook my head. “I’m fine.”
“Are you sure? No bruises? I don’t smell blood on you. No—”
“Anton, I’m fine. The burglar wasn’t even here when I got home. I’m fine.”
He pulled me in and tucked me into a hug, holding me like a parent would. It made my heart do funny things as I patted his back. Anton whispered, “I’m so glad you’re okay.”
“Me too.”
When he released me, Jed sent me a small smile and gestured toward the door. “Want me to go in and check?”
“Yes, please.”
Anton finally released me, so I opened the front door.
Jed walked inside, breathing deeply. He only stepped in a few feet before he stopped, taking in everything. After a few seconds, he said, “I don’t recognize the scent, but… it almost smells… artificial.”
Katja, Jed’s sister, strolled past me and up to Jed’s side. “You’re right. I think they’re using a masking spell to confuse their scent.”
Jed nodded. “Agreed.”
“Well, great. How the hell will we find them, then?” I asked, stepping in behind them and taking a deep breath. They were right. It did smell artificial, and not like a person was wearing cologne or perfume, either.
“We can track the artificial scent as far as it’ll lead us, but if they went that far to cover it up, there’s a good chance they had a way to disappear from our tracking,” Jed said, looking around my place before he faced me. “Why don’t you stay here and see if there’s anything missing. I don’t sense any other magic lying about, so it should be safe—”
Oakley cut him off, saying, “There’s no other magic in the apartment except for a few spelled items in the front closet—those are yours, though, right?”
That was directed at me, so I answered, “Yeah. I have a few shield sticks and things like that.”
They nodded. “Right. That’s the only magic I can sense, but Rome and I will walk around and double-check.” Dragons were probably good at sensing that sort of thing, so I figured that made sense.
“Thank you.”
Oakley sent me a small smile and a nod before they and Roman, who also nodded at me, walked inside.
Jed cleared his throat. “My siblings and I will follow the trail.”
Before I could respond, Anton said, “Good plan. I’ll stay with Dain as backup.”
Oakley added, “Rome and I don’t sense anything, but we’ll stay here too. The more backup, the better.” Oak shot me a wink.
I truly didn’t think I needed all of that, but if they were offering, I supposed I should take them up on it. After all, all thevampires were thousands of years old, and Oak and Rome were dragon shifters. As far as backup went, I couldn’t do better than that.
Jed and his siblings headed out, so I walked farther into my apartment, taking everything in and trying not to let the scent of a stranger bother me… even though it did. I hated the fact that I had a stranger’s scent filling my own private space.
I walked around the living room, but didn’t notice anything missing.
“Hey,” a voice said from the doorway, making me whip around, my heart racing.
