Kiss of Fire by Deborah Cooke Page A

linen.
    Sara left the back room with a certain caution. She looked into the back corners of the store, then down the adjacent aisles. “Hello?” she called, feeling stupid when no one answered her.
    She was alone. Of course. She eased toward the book, looked down at it for a minute, and then realized what had happened.
    Someone had just left it on the edge of the shelf. Gravity had won. There was nothing spooky about that. She picked up the book and put it back into the gap at eye level where it must have been.
    Then she returned to the front to eat her lunch.
    She only made it to the end of the aisle before a book fell behind her again. Sara glanced back, her heart skipping a beat when she saw that it was the same book.
    Impossible was starting to sound like a relative term.
    She strode down the aisle, picked up the book, and shoved it back on the shelf. This time, she stayed and waited. She had just long enough to feel dumb before the book started to move toward her.
    It was as if a finger was pushing it off the shelf.
    An invisible finger.
    The book was apparently shoved the last increment and Sara jumped back as it fell to the floor in front of her. She peered into the gap but there was no one there.
    The hair on her neck stood up and saluted.
    â€œAunt Magda? Are you messing with my mind?”
    Was it Sara’s imagination that the air conditioner began to run even more smoothly?
    She picked up the book and looked at the spine. She hadn’t gotten to this section in her reading yet.
    Awakening the Psychic Within.
    Sara laughed. She knew when to take a hint.

    Quinn marched back to his booth. Prepared to brood, he threw himself into his lawn chair. He thanked the volunteer, who scurried away from his dark mood with obvious relief. Maybe Sara hadn’t run when he’d shifted shape, but things couldn’t be said to be going well. He had to respect her choice, but he didn’t have to like it.
    He had three days left in Ann Arbor.
    He didn’t want to think about how long it would take the Slayer s to make another attempt on Sara’s life.
    But he didn’t want her to think she had a stalker named Quinn Tyrrell, either. He buttressed the protective smoke that he had exhaled to surround her store and worked on the cocoon around her house for good measure. Maybe he could ensure that he was with her when she moved between the two locations.
    A guy could only hope.
    â€œIt’s enough to make a Pyr yearn for the good old days,” a voice murmured in old-speak.
    Ambrose?
    Quinn blinked in shock. No, it couldn’t be Ambrose. Ambrose was dead. It would be too good to be true to have Ambrose beside him again, offering him advice and knowledge, but Erik had killed him. Ambrose was dead, and Quinn regretted that fact for the umpteenth time.
    The old-speak had to be coming from Erik. Only a Slayer would mess with another Pyr ’s mind like this. Quinn should have anticipated the game.
    The voice continued, low and persuasive. “Ah yes, there was a time when a princess could be captured and seduced at leisure, well away from the assistance of well-intentioned, if somewhat misguided, suitors.”
    The voice could have been Quinn’s own thoughts. It was in his head, but not from his head. The old-speak was heavily threaded with guile. There was an intruder, thinking in Quinn’s head, meshing his ideas with Quinn’s own. The voice sounded like Ambrose, who had been dead a good seven centuries. Quinn felt a reluctant surge of admiration.
    Erik was good.
    Quinn couldn’t detect any recent sign of Erik’s scent and doubted that the other Pyr was close by. There was no one else who looked Pyr , although it was difficult to tell with human forms. No one was even looking directly at him.
    The mermaid, he knew, was stone cold, so Sara wasn’t in danger.
    Quinn decided to lure the speaker. He might learn something. He sent out the whisper of old-speak, broadcasting it