Firefighter Phoenix (Fire & Rescue Shifters 7)

That unnerved him. It wasn’t like Corbin to pass up what he called a ‘teaching opportunity’. The High Magus was preoccupied.

“Given what you say, I believe that she is a shifter as well,” Corbin said, sounding thoughtful. “A lesser kind of animal, if she was unable to shift with her clothes.”

“A shifter?” Blaze said, startled. “But she had no binding. And she spoke to me. She shouted at me to stop the fire. How could she maintain her human mind, with no warlock to help her?”

“Some feral shifters, particularly those with weak beasts, can do surprisingly well at maintaining the pretense of humanity.” Corbin’s shrouded shoulders were set in a tense, straight line. “But do not be misled. Underneath the veneer of civilized behavior she is driven by base animal desires. No better than a bitch in heat. And that was what drew your own beast.”

Blaze stared at the back of the warlock’s head. “My animal is in some kind of…mating frenzy?”

“It is a sickness that can strike some shifters. An urge to rut, which drives out all other thought. When it occurs, madness is the inevitable result.” Corbin sighed. “We have sometimes had problems with it h

ere, with other familiars. But I never thought it would affect you, given your singular nature.”

She certainly couldn’t be the same species as him. There was only one Phoenix, thankfully. Blaze would not have wished his own inner monster on anyone else. Yet he couldn’t deny that his body had responded powerfully to the mysterious woman.

Not just his body, though.

She’d run toward the wildfire. Toward him. He’d been nearly lost to the inferno, more elemental force than man, and yet she’d faced him without flinching. In the defense of innocent lives, she’d defied the fire, standing bare and unafraid. Her courage and compassion had arrested him as much as her feminine curves.

“You truly think that it was only my beast?” he asked, uncertain. “She was very…striking. Not to mention very naked. Surely any man would have responded to her as I did.”

Corbin made a slight, impatient sound. “Becoming instantly infatuated? To the point of throwing away all training, all discipline, all ethics and morals? Think, Blaze. How long were you in her presence? How many words did you exchange? And you have the idiocy to think that this sudden passion you feel can possibly be real?”

Blaze dropped his gaze to the hem of the warlock’s robe, stung by his scorn. Corbin was right, of course. Even as isolated as he was, he knew enough of regular humans to understand that love—true love, the kind that lasted—didn’t work that way. You didn’t lock eyes with a woman and instantly know that she was the one and only for you, always and forever.

But it had felt so real.

It still felt so real.

“You said this drove shifters mad,” he said, quietly.

Corbin stopped, turning. His mouth was set in a thin line, eyes as hard as steel.

“I will not allow that to happen,” the warlock said. “But you must fight this as well, Blaze. No matter how much your beast rages, you must keep control. The Phoenix must be contained. You cannot let it rise.”

His binding throbbed, an ever-present ache ebbing and falling in time with his own pulse. He was used to constant pain.

But there was a new hurt in his heart now. And ache of the binding was as nothing compared to it.

He took a deep breath, closing his eyes. As a child, he’d adjusted to the cage of pain that contained the ravenous force consuming his soul. He was a man now, stronger, more disciplined. He could adjust to this new torment.

He would have to.

“Will you do one thing for me?” he asked, opening his eyes again to meet Corbin’s impassive ones. “Can you find her? To explain things to her. And to help her. If she has been struck with this sickness as well, if she feels this pain, she will need your aid as much as I do.”

“Oh, I shall find her,” the warlock said, his jaw tightening. “But I cannot bring her here, Blaze. You know why.”

“Yes.” Blaze bowed his head. He forced himself to say the words out loud, no matter how the inferno within him raged and howled. “I must never see her again.”

Chapter 5

Ash knew that he shouldn’t be here.

He sat in the high-backed restaurant booth, pretending to study a menu. In reality, most of his concentration was focused on very lightly singeing the minds of the people around him.

It was an art he’d perfected decades ago, during the darkest years. Just the barest brush of his flame, carefully sending a single thread of short-term memory up in smoke, and people’s eyes skipped straight over him. He wasn’t invisible; they still saw him. They just instantly forgot that they had.

There was only one person’s mind he didn’t touch. He’d sworn that he never would.