Page 68 of Golden Eagle

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Colette was open for business. The little neon OPEN sign in the front window was lit, bright blue against the deep purple curtains behind it, and inside, bell jangling at the sound of their entrance, they found a full waiting room.

Nikita had always found it curious the number of mortals who looked to the occult for life’s answers. Searchers of love potions, protection spells, and hex bags. Those who wanted voodoo dolls – Colette didn’t make the real thing, and was offended whenever they were mentioned, her eye twitching in a telltale way. She’d once ranted for fifteen minutes about the difference between voodoo and hoodoo, and Sasha had sworn to never mistake the two again. Then there were those who wanted to have their palms read, their fortunes told. Who stared into Colette’s big crystal ball and believed the mist swirling inside it was real, and that the psychic’s predictions came from beyond…rather than from the scents she picked up on their skin, and the auras her sight enabled her to see around them.

Colettewasa psychic, and a powerful one. But not in the way her human customers thought.

Today, Nik stepped into the rich, perfumed entryway and spotted two middle-aged women and one young man in the tufted velvet chairs. All three looked cagey and nervous; all of them stared a bit at Nikita and Sasha, their heavy black combat boots, and doubtless Sasha’s biker jacket.

Nik dropped into a chair as far from the mortals as he could get, and Sasha settled in beside him, between him and the others. Nikita touched his knee, briefly, wishing now that he’d chosen to be the buffer; to guard his mate from possible threats.

There were no threats here, but it was an instinct all the same.

Sasha turned a quick, warm smile on him, like he understood.

Colette emerged a moment later, patting a customer reassuringly on the back of her hand. “You must be patient,” she was telling her, long earrings chiming, voice musical and lilting in that put-upon way she used for work. Her skirt, thick emerald velvet, dragged across the floor behind her. “Your husband is a good man, but he can’t read your thoughts. It’s up to you to educate him, my friend.”

The customer, who clutched a tissue in her other hand and looked like she’d had a nice cathartic cry, nodded emphatically. “I will, I will. Oh, thank you Madame Colette. You’ve been wonderful.”

“You’re welcome, dear.” Colette gave her a serene smile and propelled her toward the door with a little wave. She linked her hands together, after, and looked at her other three customers. “If you’ll excuse me, I’ll be with you all shortly. Please help yourselves to tea and cakes.” She motioned to the table in the center of the foyer, laden with electric kettle and several covered plates.

Then she turned to Nik and Sasha. Her smile turned wry, and she motioned back toward her reading room with a sharp tilt of her head.

“Good afternoon, Colette,” Sasha said, beaming, when they were behind the thick curtain that blocked the room off. He produced the flowers they’d brought: a tiny potted African violet. “We brought you this.”

She took it with a sigh and an unimpressed look. The pot itself was a tiny ceramic teapot, with painted violets on its sides. It was cute, if you liked that sort of thing. Her gaze lifted to Nikita. “Nothing good happens when you two come around. What trouble have you brought me this time?”

Sasha’s brows knitted. “We just wanted to–”

“We need information,” Nikita said. “About a vampire named Gustav.”

Her gaze narrowed right away, tension stealing through her. “Now why would you expect me to know anything about him?”

Nikita met her stare with a level one of his own. “Because you know everything.”

“I’m flattered.” Her voice was no longer musical, just straight-up New York, completely done with them and their bullshit. “But I don’t need the drama, Captain Baskin.”

“No drama. Just information.”

She glared at him a long moment, then sighed and turned away, retreating toward her table. “Fine. You have ten minutes. No more.”

“We don’t need more,” Nikita assured, sitting down across from her, the glowing crystal ball between them.

Sasha sat next to him. “We’re sorry.”

“No, you’re not,” she said without heat. She propped her elbows on the table, her chin on her linked hands, and swapped a look between them. “How have you gotten involved with Gustav?”

“We haven’t, Nikita said. “But he’s murdering civilians, and that’s not tolerable.” He gave her the brief rundown of the situation.

She listened without comment, expression carefully guarded. “So you have no proof,” she said, at last, when he was done.

“I have his scent. I have bodies on tables in the morgue. That’s all the proof I need.”

She sighed. “He runs a bar for immortals. He is well-known and popular among wolves and vamps in this city. If you kill him with your human evidence, that will be a step too far, Nikita. The immortals of New York won’t ignore that.”

“Let them come,” he said, chest puffing up. “I’ll kill whoever challenges me.”

She groaned and massaged the place between her brows. Then she looked at Sasha, smiled at him sweetly. “Sasha, hon, will you be a dear and run go get the whiskey? It’s upstairs in the kitchen. Bring glasses, too.”

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