Drip, drip, drip.

Just a leaky pipe, he told himself, shrugging it off. Ben glanced at his watch. He’d told Marcie he’d run late tonight, so when he got home, he anticipated finding her on the small nook balcony of the second floor of their Garden District home. She’d be curled up in the wrought iron garden chair she’d repainted a cheerful blue and placed amid the forest of blooming potted plants there. She’d have a glass of wine at her elbow, her sneakered feet propped on the rail. Her lovely face would be creased in concentration, strands of her silky blond hair framing her delicate features as she studied for the police academy exams.

He tried to curb his demanding appetites while she was in study mode, which was part of why he’d chosen to work late, but pinning her to the wall and taking her hard before he fixed them a late dinner qualified as restraint for him.

He’d probably want her once more when they finally went to bed, but she wouldn’t be studying then. Or when he woke at the 3am witching hour, which he often did. His beautiful submissive would murmur in her sleep, open to him, give him all of herself, as she took all of him, and then slip back into dreams, drawing him with her. His good witch, with her own special magic to counter the darkness of the bad ones that disturbed his sleep in the middle of the night. He—

Drip, drip, drip.

Damn it. Ben paused, his brow furrowing. He tracked every foot of the parking deck, looking for the source. It was one thing to hear dripping from the eaves in the aftermath of a rain shower. They hadn’t had rain in three days, and this drip was like the leak from a rusty pipe, something heard underground. He didn’t like it.

Two vehicles were on the top covered level of their parking deck, the McLaren and Lucas’s Outback, since he’d biked home this afternoon, the maniac.

Only two cars, but the parking deck wasn’t empty.

Ben didn’t carry a gun. He was glad as hell his wife carried and knew how to use the concealed Glock she favored. But he’d learned to fight and survive without one. Had killed without one. The ability to handle a situation with wits and whatever weapons were close to hand was a skillset he’d never abandon. Never wanted to get out of the habit.

It came in handy when a couple of assholes were trying to corner him on his own parking deck at work.

“If you don’t come out of the shadows, the security cams can’t capture me kicking your asses to post on YouTube. I’ve had a long day, I’ve got a beautiful woman waiting on me at home, and a good Portofino. So show yourselves, let’s get this done, or fuck off.”

The shadows to the right moved. Ben set down the briefcase and put his car at his back. As soon as the cameras did show whoever was approaching him, the alert security team K&A employed would be on their way to clean up what he left in a crumpled mess on the concrete. The cameras should have already tracked what he was dealing with, but apparently the bastards had knocked out a couple lights on that side.

The big son of a bitch who emerged from the shadows wasn’t what he was expecting. He wore a cowboy hat, for fuck’s sake. He also carried a white ash staff, very Gandalf-like, that didn’t blend with the worn jeans and dark blue button down he wore. But it did work with his boots, which might have been snake or alligator skin but was neither, at least no species that Ben had ever seen. The scales were bronze and silver, with tinges of iridescent color. The guy wasn’t wearing them as a fashion accessory. They were scuffed, well-used.

His face was lined and rugged. Maybe forty-something, until you reached the steel-blue eyes, and then Ben thought he was looking at someone—or something—way beyond room for candles on his birthday cake. Unless the expanse of buttercream frosting was the size of a football field.

The set of the guy’s mouth and jaw said cop to Ben, no matter the odd get-up. Too often in his youth, Ben had been on the opposite side of the law, so being alert to that cop-vibe was another instinct that never went away. Yeah, he got the irony. Leland Keller, a Baton Rouge police sergeant, was a close friend, and Ben’s own wife was studying to join the blue line. God help him.

Asshole number two stepped into the light a few feet away from Cowboy Gandalf. This one had the same cop vibe, was also tall and broad-shouldered, though he presented himself quite differently. His black suit was a Brioni bespoke, Ben was certain of it, a four or five figure investment. No Lord of the Rings staff for this one, but there was an odd energy vibrating around him.

His gaze was so dark Ben almost couldn’t detect pupil from iris, as if that wasn’t eerie as fuck. The guy’s hair was dark, thick and silky, enough to make Jon, their resident Kensington & Associates pretty boy, trade hair product recommendations with him. But there was nothing pretty boy about the eyes. That darkness ranked up there with vampire movie effects, not so easy to laugh off in the middle of the night.

But he’d faced a lot scarier things.

“Getting bored,” he said sharply. “I do have office hours. What do you want?”

“A voodoo priestess named Elagra Bluebird Jones,” said Cowboy Gandalf.

Okay, that was one of the scarier things.

It was perhaps the last thing Ben would expect someone to say to him. Yet it wasn’t a surprise to hear it, because somewhere way deep down in his gut, he’d always known he’d have to deal with her again.

Out of all the disturbing things that woke him at 3am, one of them actually was a witch.

“She’s no voodoo priestess,” he said sharply. He knew voodoo practitioners. They’d want nothing to do with something like Elagra. But it was New Orleans, and the bitch had always known how to market herself.

To pull in the unsuspecting.

Drip, drip, drip. If that fucking noise didn’t stop…

Just water, he reminded himself. But when he’d been younger, the rust had turned it red. When he woke with the drops staining his skin, she would say it was blood. And smile.

“It comes through the pipes. It is all the blood shed on a New Orleans night. In the dark places, where hope has never been allowed. It all flows to me, for there is a power in despair, the power to turn and twist a man’s heart, any way I wish. I can make him abandon his soul, so he can never find it again. Even if the the world, with its unseeing eyes, thinks him the strongest of men, he is a naked, shivering thing. Always.”

When she’d told him that, they’d been in a section of tunnels that picked up New Orleans nuances through the sewer drains. The bump of traffic, call of vendors and tourists, the salty humid smell of the nearby waterfront. They hadn’t been far from the warehouse district, Mardi Gras World.

Thanks to an unexpected friendship with the nighttime security guard, he’d become a regular late evening visitor when he was a kid. He’d slip in, wander amid the floats. Occasionally, a couple of designers would be working late at their drafting tables or computer screens. They knew him there, would lift their heads when they saw him, nod, and go back to what they were doing. All of them silent ghosts haunting the Carnival world.

He remembered coming face-to-face with the Grim Reaper float. The towering figure had looked down at him with staring eyes that never left him. He’d been glad when they’d torn that one down, to build something new. Its eyes reminded him too damn much of Elagra Jones.

Memory had sucked him in, and he’d lost time and place.

“Fuck.” The hair on the back of his neck was a prickling, charged field, and his muscles were tense and ready for the fight.

The two men hadn’t moved any closer, but that didn’t make Ben less annoyed with his distraction. Way to get yourself killed, O’Callahan.

“Sometimes my presence resurrects old demons,” Brioni Asshole said. Those dark eyes held Ben’s. “It is one way I get to the truth of things, sooner rather than later. More efficient.”

His tone was resonant, in an oddly contained way. Cowboy Gandalf’s had been the same. In the mostly empty parking deck, their voices should have echoed, rather than sounding like the notes were filling all the hollow space and drawing decisive lines around it.

For just a moment, the clustered shadows around the dark-eyed male looked like a pair of large, sinister wings. The lights Ben thought had been knocked out weren’t, and caused the talons at the joints of the wings to gleam.

Ben blinked again, and the wings were gone.

“You are right. She is not a voodoo priestess.” Cowboy-Gandalf brought his attention to him again. His expression was grim. “It’s good you already know she’s not what she presents herself to be.”

Ben’s gut was as tight as an overwound spring, his heart cold and still. He didn’t tolerate fear or anxiety, especially not from the specters of his past. He usually countered any resurrection of them with deadly force.

“You need to fuck off now,” he said. “Give that staff back to the pimply geek you stole it from at DragonCon.”

“But the tears of surly teenagers give him such joy.”

At the first note of the purring voice, Ben was hit by a wave of far different energy. Whereas the two males heightened his warrior instincts, driving him to evaluate what kind of fight he was facing, this one took him to an entirely different kind of arena, though no less physical.

He had a stronger than average sex drive. His wife would declare that an absurd understatement, with fervent gratitude, loving amusement and the right kind of sensual trepidation. Yet he was also a grown man who had iron discipline over when he opened the flood gates on that formidable carnality.

This voice wrapped around that lever—pun impossible to avoid—and pulled it into the On position with the ease of glossy feminine fingernails flicking a light switch.

The woman who came out of the shadows behind Brioni guy had the kind of shiny black hair that had shimmers of blue in certain lights. Her exotic green-gold eyes made Ben think of dragons. She had a dusky complexion, lush lips and an even lusher body, clad in a velvet green scoop-necked top with flared sleeves that draped over ring-bedecked fingers. Which yes, were tipped with glossy nails, painted dark green and sparkling with a diamond chip on the middle finger and thumb. Her black jeans fit her every bit as well as expected, showing off an ass that would fit a man’s hands just fine. The pentagram around her neck gleamed silver.

She laid her hand lightly on the arm of Brioni guy. The glance he sent her was ten percent exasperation and ninety percent possession.

“We need his mind clear,” he said. “Perhaps dial it down.”

“That was our thought,” said another female voice. “You and Derek are broadcasting ‘tell us what you know or we’ll fuck you up.’ She was just balancing it, so this didn’t turn into a fight. Which you already know won’t work with him.”

Her voice had a Lauren Bacall sound to it, raspy but direct. The woman to whom it belonged stepped into Ben’s field of vision, at the elbow of “Derek,” the blue-eyed staff wielder. She was far more functionally dressed than the other woman. Form-fitting but well-worn jeans and tank top outlined a feminine but toned body. Based on the way she carried herself, her obvious situational awareness, and the light shirt she wore open over the tank, Ben guessed she was carrying, and likely not just one weapon.

With her hair pulled back in a ponytail, she’d have looked totally in her element standing next to Lara Croft with matching Desert Eagles at the ready. Though he expected what she had concealed would be something like his wife’s compact Glock, easy to hide but just as lethal when needed.

“We were being direct,” the dark-haired male said, tossing her a slightly annoyed look. “And exceedingly polite. For us.”

“Could everybody attending this fucking rave step out into the light?” Ben said, with more than a tinge of annoyance in his voice.

“This is all of us,” she told him. “And don’t worry. Your cameras will see nothing but you getting into your car and driving home.”

“I’m not worried. But how is that supposed to reassure me, exactly?”

“Would you rather have your security people seeing you standing around, talking to the air?” she said, with a practical air that made Derek’s lips twitch. The male sent her a fond look.

Unlike the two men, her manner of speaking was far less formal. The way the other woman spoke was something unclassifiable, but definitely not casual English.

A crazy thought crossed Ben’s mind. He and the Lara Croft woman might be the only fully human things on this deck.

“Look,” she said, “we don’t mean to spring out at you. We just really need to find her, fast. Some bad shit is going to go down in New Orleans, and she’s got info about it we need. I’m Ruby. This is Derek.” She nodded to the man in the cowboy hat. Mikhael,” she indicated the Brioni, “and Raina.”

The sultry woman who emitted pheromones like her personal oxygen supply swept him with a glittering look that trailed heat from the back of his neck to the soles of his feet. No lie, it felt as if her fingertips trailed along that same path. Another minute, and he’d pull Marcie’s picture out of his wallet and hold it up, like priest wielding a cross.

“Derek and Mikhael are Guardians, Light and Dark, respectively,” Ruby said. “Their job is to defend the world from the big, really bad stuff.”

“Of course,” Ben said. “Like auto-tuning and rising interest rates. What do you two do in this circus act?”

“We’re witches. Another class of magic user.” Despite her down-to-earth practicality, Ruby didn’t smile at his humor.

However, as his glance went to Raina, Ruby offered a tight chuckle. “Yeah, she’s got something extra thrown in. She’s half succubus. She’s not trying to lead you around by your cock, believe me. This is her on her lowest setting.”

“Almost,” Mikhael said, tossing the dark-haired witch a reproving look before he brought his attention back to Ben. “It does not matter if you believe we are a cadre of lunatics. Tell us what we need to know, and we will be on our way.”

“Lunatics aren’t usually this well-organized,” Ben said. He sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Fuck, I really wanted to get home to my wife and have that damn steak.”

“I’m not seeing how we will interfere with that,” Mikhael said.

“Because finding Elagra isn’t the same as giving tourists directions to Jackson Square,” Ben said irritably. “On top of that, this is our town. If shit’s going down, you’re going to tell us what it is, and how we can fucking help.” Ben pulled out his phone and hit a programmed button.

“Us?” Mikhael exchanged a look with Derek while a smile crossed Raina’s moist red lips. Ben made the mistake of looking at her when she did it, which brought on a surge of lightheadedness. Christ.

“I told you,” Derek said to Mikhael. “They’re warrior class.”

“Do much gaming, do we?” Ben said, as he waited for the signal to find the phone. The deck could be a spotty area, but it should go through on the top deck. He’d called Matt from here before.

Derek frowned at him. Good. Ben preferred to get on the nerves of those who annoyed him. But Ruby answered the question. “Warriors are those among the normal masses who will heed the call if needed, no matter how things change, how modern and separate from magic their society seems.”

Apparently, they preferred her to do the talking, probably because she came off the most normal of the bunch, and they assumed that would put him more at ease. Or make all this sound more yeah, okay, of course.

Well, he wasn’t the type of person who let himself be fucking handled. However, from the knowing light in Ruby’s eyes, he expected she understood that, and was playing it straight with him. Another reason he was pissed.

It would be far easier if they were lunatics.

“Yeah?” Matt’s Texas drawl on the other end of the phone had that clipped, no-nonsense, head-of-the-pack authority that Ben always appreciated. “We’ve talked about you working too many late hours. You have a wife now.”

“She needed study time. But work’s not why I’m calling. I need you and the others back at the office. We’ve got a situation.”

Matt’s tone became even more crisp. “What kind of situation?”

“Not a topic for the phone, but I just want the team. No one else. Understood?”

A pause, and then Matt spoke. “Give me about thirty minutes. Lucas a few minutes longer, since he’s further out of the city.”

“Tell him to borrow Cassie’s Harley. We can’t wait on him to pedal it in the middle of the damn night.”

Ben cut the connection. Abruptly, because Mikhael had advanced as the conversation concluded. While he pocketed the phone to free up his hands again, Ben narrowed his eyes as the Dark Guardian—whatever the fuck that was, though he was still guessing some form of cop—circled the McLaren Roadster. His initial concern that the guy was executing some kind of flanking maneuver disappeared. Ben recognized the light in the male’s eyes, the first real show of emotion he’d had.

Pure gearhead appreciation.

"Nice car,” Mikhael said.

"It's my wife's," Ben said, deadpan. "She's letting me borrow it while my mini-van's in the shop."

The first part was a true statement. His Mercedes S 560 Cabriolet had been due for a tune-up and Marcie had graciously, with mischief dancing in her gaze, offered to let him “borrow” the car that had originally been his.

Before he’d worked some of his personal shit out, he’d been drinking too much, being too self-destructive, and it had spilled out over her on one terrible night. Part of his amends for that night had been to give up the McLaren for a charity auction. A year later, the team had bought it back from Richard Lewis, the business rival who’d bought it at the auction, and gifted it to Marcie as a wedding gift. His own damn car.

“What’s your ride?” Ben asked pleasantly. He nodded toward Raina, standing closest to the Dark Guardian. “Or do you straddle the back of her broom and wear matching helmets?”

Raina chuckled, a total grip-a-cock-just-right-and-stroke-it sound. Ben made a mental note to stay away from the jokes if he didn’t want to embarrass himself.

Mikhael’s face had resumed the statue look. “Ferrari 458 Italia.”

Nice.But Ben scoffed. “The McLaren will run it into the ground.”

"Maybe we shall test that later.” Mikhael straightened from his study of the McLaren’s body and showed his teeth. "Or your wife will. Since it’s her car."

Ben held that dark gaze. "Can't get to my wife except through me. And I'm the fucking chasm to Hell."

"I've been there," Mikhael replied. "You look nothing like it."

“And he tells me to dial it down,” Raina muttered to Ruby.

Ben heard the comment, but kept his eyes on Mikhael. Yeah, he and this guy were going to have a problem. He could already tell that. Might as well bring it to a head. He preferred that to thinking about Elagra Jones.

“As much as this rabid display of male plumage is making my panties wet, can I interrupt?” Raina drew close to Mikhael’s side. She rested her long-nailed hand on the thin cloth of the suit, caressing his bicep through the fabric. With her back to Ben, he was given a good view of her temptingly curvy ass while she looked up into Mikhael’s face. “His dick is longer, yours is bigger around, and both of them will scare fish when you’re naked,” she said. “All right? So can we move on?”

She tossed that last part over her shoulder to Ben, including him in the sensual reproof.

Ben pinched the bridge of his nose again. Fuck, fuck and double fuck. “Let’s head back up to our boardroom,” he said. “We’ll wait for the rest of the team there.”