For a moment we watched the waitress and waited until she headed back to a swinging door with a tray of empty glasses.
We reached her just before she disappeared into the back, and I realized the woman looked familiar. Very familiar.
“Ariel?” I asked.
Ariel Shaw was a necromancer, or the daughter of one, at any rate. I’d never seen her practice. But I could feel the magic, cold and heavy as a tomb, that surrounded her. Her mother, Annabelle, had helped my parents with issues now and again, and Ariel and Lulu had been friends as teenagers. I’d been a fan of rules and order growing up; Ariel hadn’t, and had tried to steer Lulu down the same rebellious path. They’d eventually grown apart, which was fine by me.
Ariel looked at me, brow knit, when something flashed in her eyes. It was gone in an instant, but not before I registered concern.
“The prince and princess come to visit the commoners?” Her tone was derisive, as was the expression she donned. “Vampires slumming with shifters these days?”
“Since you’re working in a shifter bar,” Connor said easily, “you might want to lose the attitude.”
“Working,” she said, “and I need to get back to it.”
“Tell us about this man,” Connor said, and showed Bryce’s photograph.
“He was a shitty tipper,” she said, tone edged with irritation, but I saw that hitch in her eyes again.
“What else?” Connor asked, putting his screen away.
Ariel gave a haggard sigh and rebalanced her tray. As she moved, I caught the edge of a black tattoo on her arm—a thin line with short hash marks, at the edge of her sleeve. When she saw the direction of my gaze, she shifted her body to block my view of it.
Totally not suspicious behavior.
“He was a customer,” she finally answered. “I served him.”
I bet that wasn’t the entire story, so I took a chance. “And what happened when you went outside with him?”
She jerked, and the glasses rattled. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“You clearly do,” Connor said. “Would you rather talk to us or the CPD?”
She met his gaze. “I’m not one of your subjects, and you don’t own me,prince.” There was teenage petulance in her tone.
“He’s dead,” Connor said. “He was killed with dark magic, or because of it. You have magic, witch. Did you kill him?”
“My coven is good. We don’t practice dark magic.” She started to move away again, but Connor took her arm, stared down at her with the threat in his eyes plain and clear.
Before he could speak, my screen buzzed. I found a message from Theo—an address only a block away, and a message:think we found his clothes.
I showed it to Connor, who nodded, then looked at Ariel again.
“A shifter is dead,” he said, fingers still wrapped around her arm. “If you were involved in that, it won’t matter that you’re a witch, or if your mother was good, or if we were friends once upon a time. I’ll find out. And you won’t like how that conversation ends.”
He lifted his hand, and she pushed through the door, where glass rattled again.
Connor took my hand, and we walked back through the bar together. This time, the gazes weren’t just on the prince, but on both of us, and our linked hands.
We found Theo in McKinley Park proper. He stood beneath a tree, flashlight aimed on the ground—and a pile of clothes tossed there.
He nodded in greeting when we reached him. “You get coffee?”
“Not enough,” I said.
Connor kneeled, looked over the pile of clothes. The shift between man and animal—whatever form that took—was magical and physiological; it didn’t affect clothing. So a shifter either sacrificed their clothes, which would be shredded in the transition, or took them off before shifting and dressed again afterward.
“These are from Bryce,” Connor confirmed. “They have the same scent as the wolf.”
