Silver Dragon (Silver Shifters 1)

“None of those,” Bird said, pointing to a little black dress and a slinky green thing, both of them low cut. “No one will want to accidentally look down the neck of my dress to see my stomach sticking out.”

“You’ve got a cute figure,” Doris said.

Bird laughed. “I like my body, but sexy it is not, nor has it ever been.”

Doris sniffed, but put the slinky dresses away. “Well, you’re right that low cut is probably not you. How about this?” She held up a pretty butter yellow dress with ruffles slanting down from one shoulder to the cocktail length hem.

Bird sighed. “It’s gorgeous. But I can’t wear it. Yellow makes me look sallow. And that length requires heels.”

Doris frowned at the dress, then thrust it back into the closet. “Not your best color,” she admitted. “Ah! I know you look good in sky blue.” She pulled out a silky, chiffony dress that was absolutely simple in line, hanging from two pretty golden clasps at the shoulder. “Your arms are good from all that biking and gardening you do. Try it on.”

“You have a lot of gorgeous gowns,” Bird said admiringly.

“Three of those are from one niece’s weddings. She trades in husbands faster than some guys trade in cars. One is my high school graduation standby, the black one is for fancy funerals. This pink one,” she said with an uncharacteristic wistful look, “I bought the last time I dated. We were supposed to go to Cancun together—remember that?”

“I thought it was Jen and Robert who went to Cancun.”

“Jen and Robert were the ones who ended up going. But I was given the tickets after my senior high school drama class won an award. I was going to take Phil, a guy I’d been dating, until I happened to stop up at The Hideaway B&B to pick up a donation for the temple, and I saw his car in the lot.” Doris scowled at the memory. “So I sat there and waited, and pretty soon out he comes from one of those little rooms with a very good-looking redhead hanging on his arm.”

“No,” Bird exclaimed, horrified. “I never knew any of this.”

“I never told anyone—except Jen and Robert. You know she’s as silent as the tomb, and Robert . . . turned out he had six months left on his ticket, unknown to us all. I’ve always been glad they got to go on that trip, which I could have done alone, but I would have been miserable,” Doris muttered trenchantly. “Anyway, to finish up my sob story, I called that fancy hotel in Cancun, and changed the reservation to their names. Blocked Phil’s number on my phone. I was too embarrassed to take the pink dress back, after I’d been boring on about Cancun to the shop people, and so I added it to the rotation for events at the temple. Here, try this blue one on.”

Bird took the dress and went into the bathroom to change, hurting for her friend. You thought you knew someone well—and then you find out that they have layers you never expected. Bird had always thought Doris was satisfied being single, as she’d never talked about dating.

Neither had I, she thought as she stared at herself in the bathroom mirror. But that was because she’d believed that part of her life over for good, once forty had come and gone, then fifty.

She stared at herself in the mirror, seeing the lines time had carved, the softening of her skin under her jaw and cheeks, and (despite Doris’s comment) under her arms. Not sexy, no . . . the bathroom mirror image was overlaid with Mikhail’s image. His smile. That smile he’d given just to her.

Bird came out, the hem dragging softly over her feet.

“That looks lovely!” Doris exclaimed. “But it really needs heels.”

“I really can’t wear them,” Bird protested. “My arthritic knee won’t let me get away with heels—I gave away my last pair years ago. All I’ve got are my gold sandals.”

“Then let’s hem it up,” Doris said briskly. “And you can have it.”

Bird began to protest. Doris waved her off. “You can see I have a closet full of nice dresses that just hang there. Take it. Think of me when you’re dancing with your mysterious professor.” She added as led the way to her sewing room, “I want details, mind. I want to enjoy it vicariously, and you know who will be expecting a military sitrep! See that you call first thing tomorrow.”

Bird promised, and shortly after that rode home, the dress carefully folded and laid in her bike basket. And for the rest of the day, she enjoyed tidying, whipping up a dessert, and readying things, always imagining Mikhail in her space, his smile as he turned to her. His silvery eyes . . .

Yep, I’m sixteen again, she thought as she took a last look around. Might as well embrace it!

EIGHT

MIKHAIL

Mikhail flew into the cave, all his senses alert. Nothing living was lurking in there. He didn’t expect to find anything. What he sought was what lurked on the mythic plane.

Bird’s backpack lay discarded on the floor. He shifted entirely to his human form and bent to touch it, relishing this small part of Bird. Remembering her bravery when she offered to go immediately back inside, though he could see her frantic heartbeat pulsing in her delicate throat.

She was safe. And now he had a job to do, and he needed to focus on that. But he could not resist running his hands over the backpack, loving the thought of touching where her warm fingers touched, before straightening up.

He scanned quickly. The quake had caused a rock fall, not catastrophic, but entirely blocking the opposite side of the cavern from the murals. Mikhail labored for several hours moving great boulders and clearing rubble, first to make it easier for Bird to return, and then to begin his search. But the crystalline note still seemed to come from everywhere. After all his work, the sense on the mythic plane grew no stronger.

Something was blocking it.

When the hour had advanced, he gave up. He needed more time—but that must come later. The frustration of his unfinished hunt gave way to anticipation. It was time