Betting on Bear (Charmed in Vegas Book 6)

  From New York Times and USA Today Bestselling Authors Tabitha Conall and Michelle Fox, a new bear shifter romance in the exciting Charmed in Vegas series…

  One surly bear shifter plus one stubborn mate-to-be minus one escaped prisoner equals trouble.

  Sheriff’s deputy and naiad Naya Krena wakes with no memory of the last night, only to discover she’s lost the prisoner she was supposed to deliver to Vegas detective and bear shifter Brick Hardiman—and Hardiman is knocking on her door.

  Hardiman’s got a big secret—Naya’s his fated mate. But his surly, bearish personality makes it hard to tell her. Meanwhile, Hardiman did her wrong her in the past and Naya hasn’t forgotten. If they can’t learn how to get over their differences, their future looks bleak.

  Betting on Bear

  Tabitha Conall

  Michelle Fox

  Chapter 1

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  And don’t forget to read the other books in the Charmed in Vegas Series.

  ***

  If there was one thing Naya Krena despised, it was stupid criminals. As a cop in the tiny town of Dusty Valley, just a hop, skip and a jump from Vegas on the other side of the California border, she saw her share of stupid criminals. That was strike one against Vegas.

  Naya sat in a beat-up Ford across the street from the current abode of Sneezy McGee, a man who forged checks and didn’t know enough not to get caught. She had every reason to believe Sneezy would be coming home soon, and she intended to nab him.

  Of course, that would mean she’d have to transport him to Vegas, because while he might be hiding out in Dusty Valley, he was wanted in the city that never sleeps. And that would mean she’d have to interact with Brick Hardiman, a Las Vegas detective with a stick up his butt. Strike two against Vegas.

  A tiny Kia pulled up in front of the ramshackle apartment building where she’d been told Sneezy was living. Sure enough, the failed forger got out of the car and headed for the door of the building. Naya followed him, trying to catch up while not giving him any reason to run.

  Naya hated it when she watched a cop show and the cops stood a block away from the guy they were after and shouted his name, then said, “Stop! Police!” as though he wasn’t going to run. Why on earth wouldn’t they get closer before identifying themselves? She sure wasn’t going to make the same mistake.

  The lobby of the building was small and squalid. Floor tiles were missing or sitting cockeyed in the place where they were supposed to be lying, and the paint on the wall was pockmarked and peeling. Sneezy was out of sight, but she could hear his shoes squeaking against the stairs so she headed up after him, trying to keep from making any noise as she sprinted up the steps.

  She reached the second floor just in time to see Sneezy struggling with a door a few feet in front of her. If at all possible, she needed to keep him from entering the apartment. If he got in there, things could get dicey, fast.

  “Sneezy McGee?” she said, using her most authoritative tone of voice.

  His body jerked. “Who’s asking?”

  “DVPD. You’re under arrest for passing forged checks.” She grabbed his right arm and pulled it behind his back while reading him his rights.

  “It wasn’t me. I didn’t do it.”

  She hooked a cuff around his wrist then grabbed his other arm. “That so? Why don’t we go down to the station and straighten all this out?” Not him, right. She didn’t believe that for a second.

  Five minutes later, she had Sneezy in the back of her car and was headed for the station. Sneezy leaned forward in his seat and spoke in a rush. “You can’t take me in. They’ll kill me.”

  “I can assure you, the cops will not kill you.” She took a left turn then got stopped behind a line of traffic waiting for a light.

  “Not the cops, you stupid bitch. That bitch from Vegas and her goons. They’ll kill me.” He spat as he spoke, little droplets of spittle flying into the front seat beside Naya.

  “If you’re looking for my help, calling me a ‘stupid bitch’ isn’t the way to get it.” Jerk.

  “Sorry, sorry. Look. You just put me out on the side of the road and I promise I’ll leave your little podunk town before sunset.”

  What was he smoking? “I’ve got you dead to rights, and you think I’m going to let you go? Think again.”

  He leaned his chest against the back of her seat, his mouth close to her ear. “Please.”

  She shied away, to avoid getting spat on.

  “She’ll kill me. I’ve got something she wants. Why else would I leave Vegas?”

  Because it had two strikes against it, and pending? “What did you steal?”

  “Who says I stole anything? All I said was I have something she wants.”

  Right. Like his sticky fingers hadn’t gotten him into trouble. “Fine. What is it you have that she wants?”

  He leaned back against the seat. “What’s it worth to you to know?”

  Oh, sweet Poseidon. If he didn’t stop jerking her around, she’d be tempted to make his blood boil. And as a half-naiad, she could do it, too. Human beings were seventy percent water, and naiads could do amazing things to water. “You’re the one who thinks he’s in danger. If you want my help, you need to tell me what’s going on. Otherwise, I’m booking you and transferring you to Vegas as per normal protocol.”

  “Normal protocol?” His tone twisted the words. “Lady, my life’s on the line.”

  “Says you. I have no proof that this is anything more than an effort to escape custody.” The police station came into sight down the road. Naya couldn’t wait to unload this guy and call Hardiman. Maybe then she could forget about her past mistakes.

  Sure she would. And Icarus would fly again.

  “I’m telling you, they’re coming after me. If you don’t let me go, my blood’s going to be on your hands.”

  Naya continued to try to pry information out of Sneezy, but he wouldn’t say anything more than that his life was in danger. By the time she hauled him into the police station, she felt ready to drown something. Lucky for him, they were in a desert, and good water sources were hard to come by.

  Naya sat Sneezy down in the chair next to her desk, still handcuffed, and started on the paperwork. She needed to call Hardiman, but she wanted to get all her ducks in a row first. That way he couldn’t catch her out.

  From the first time they’d met, Hardiman had taken pleasure in tormenting her. She didn’t know what it was about her that got him going, but she wanted it to stop. Needed it to stop. Hell, the last time they’d met, he nearly got her fired. That’s why showing up with Sneezy—a fugitive Hardiman hadn’t been able to catch, but she had—would be so sweet.

  Once she’d finished getting Sneezy’s basic information and filling out all the forms she had to, she took him to the holding cell. As she closed the door, Sneezy reached through the bars to grab her arm. “If you take me to Vegas, I’m dead. Dead, I’m telling you.”

  She pried his hand off her arm and wiped her face where his spittle had hit her. “If you want to amend your statement and tell me exactly who you’re afraid of and what they think you did, maybe we can work something out. Otherwise, we’re heading for Vegas tonight.”

  When Naya got back to her desk, she took a deep breath before picking up the phone and dialing Hardiman. The worst part about her whole feud with him was that as much as she wanted to be cold and hard around him, what she really felt was a cacophony of emotions. Not just angry and frustrated, but also confused and hurt. And attracted. Damn him. She
shouldn’t feel attracted to someone bent on taking her down.

  “Hardiman here.” His deep voice rumbled through the line, reminding her yet again that he was a bear shifter—a big, stubborn, lumbering bear.

  “It’s Naya Krena.” Her voice sounded too breathy. She swallowed. She’d better get ahold of herself. “I heard you’ve been looking for someone.”

  There was a pause, just long enough to make Naya think he didn’t understand what she was saying.

  She rushed to clarify herself. “I picked up Sneezy McGee in Dusty Valley. I can bring him down to Vegas for you.”

  She heard papers rustling. “It’s too late to arraign him tonight. We’ll do the transfer in the morning.”

  “Fine by me. I’ll drive Sneezy down tonight, give him to you first thing, and be back to Dusty Valley by noon.”

  She heard a faint noise, almost like a growl, then it was gone. “Where will you stay? I’ll come to the hotel to pick him up.”

  She bristled. She was sure there was an insult in there, though she wasn’t sure exactly what it was. But what the hell—if Hardiman wanted Sneezy bad enough to come to the hotel, he could have him. “Same as usual. Beckford Plaza.” The Beckford was an old, falling-down hotel on the outskirts of city life, which also meant it was the cheapest place in town.

  “You should stay someplace better. That place is a dump.”

  Now her hackles rose for sure. “You know damn well the department won’t spring for anything nicer. What’s it to you, anyway?”

  “You should make them treat you better.”

  The hell with him. “I’ll be at the Beckford tomorrow morning. That’s all you need to know.” She gritted her teeth but couldn’t bring herself to hang up on him. He’d already proven he could get her in trouble if he wanted to. “Goodbye.”

  It took her another hour to get approval to travel to Vegas and to arrange for a room at the Beckford, then to fill out additional paperwork for transferring Sneezy to Hardiman. As soon as she was done, she bundled Sneezy into her car and started for Vegas.

  She wasn’t going to get to swim tonight. At the thought, she took a long drink of water from one of the bottles she’d brought with her. An entire case of water bottles sat on the floor of her car.

  Her family thought she was stupid for living in a desert. They were probably right. Naiads—even half-naiads like her—needed water. They needed to drink it, touch it, be around it. She didn’t have it as bad as a full naiad would, but just to stay even, she had to drink several bottles of water every day and spend a good half hour or more in the pool every night. And when she didn’t…

  Well, when she didn’t, she was a screw-up. Which was exactly why Brick Hardiman hated her so much. He thought she was weak, too dependent on water and unable to function like a cop should.

  She took another drink. If she knew what was good for her, she’d move someplace wet. If she were able to get more moisture from the air, she’d be better off. But there were naiads in wet places, and she wanted nothing to do with them. Her parents had made it clear she was a mistake—and not just because she’d been conceived on the wrong side of the bed.

  “You’re killing me,” Sneezy moaned.

  So he was back to his whole song and dance? “Give me something or I can’t help you.”

  “You’re killing me.”

  He wasn’t the only one dying. “If you’re not going to tell me something I can use, then shut up.”

  “Bitch.”

  Fine. Whatever.

  It was a long hour from Dusty Valley to Las Vegas, punctuated by non-specific belly-aching by Sneezy. By the time Naya pulled into the parking lot of the Beckford Plaza, she was ready to believe he was in danger, simply because of his constant complaints. But that didn’t change anything. He still wasn’t giving her anything she could use to help him. They’d both have to hope that being in police custody would be enough to protect him from whatever thugs might be after him.

  She’d have to remember to double-lock the door that night.

  They checked in, then Naya faced her first problem. She needed to get some dinner for them, but the crappy hotel didn’t have room service and they weren’t close enough to any restaurants that would deliver. She couldn’t leave Sneezy alone in the room, so her only option was to drag him to the little diner that she knew was only a few blocks away. That or starve, but starving wasn’t an option, especially since she wouldn’t get her dip in the pool tonight. The last thing she needed was to have her blood sugar drop at the same time she wasn’t getting enough water. Sometimes being a naiad was no fun at all.

  She re-cuffed Sneezy so his cuffs were in the front then they walked to the restaurant. She pulled up the most direct route on the GPS on her phone but wasn’t happy when it led them down busy streets full of tourists who looked askance at the cuffs on Sneezy’s wrists. She didn’t even have a sweater or jacket to throw over them to hide them.

  The diner proudly proclaimed it had the “best burgers in Las Vegas” but the food didn’t bear that out. She choked down her food because she had to, but Sneezy barely touched his. She was tempted to ask when he thought he’d get his next meal, because she sure wasn’t going to go hunting down food for him, but decided not to bother. If he wanted to go hungry, that was on him.

  To avoid the tourists, she pulled up a different route to take them back to the hotel. Everything was going fine until they passed by an old casino with a big fountain in front. Clearly, the place was trying to rival the fountain at the Bellagio, but it fell short. Far from looking like a spectacle of light and water, this had a sickly feel to it. There might not have been any algae on the surface but the fountain felt diseased nonetheless.

  Naya stopped at the edge of the fountain, her hand on Sneezy’s arm to keep him from going anywhere. There was something so wrong about the fountain, she couldn’t help but try to figure it out.

  Naiads were nymphs from the Greek mythos and were tied to fresh water sources—fountains, springs, streams, lakes. Naya was a Krenaia which meant she had a particular affinity for fountains. If she were full-blooded, she’d be tied to a fountain of her own, but since she was half-human, she had no fountain—which meant she had her freedom. Still, she had a closer relationship to fountains than to any other sort of water source, and that was probably why the wrongness of this fountain was hitting her so hard.

  As she stood staring at the water, the surface began to shimmer. A blonde head broke through. A naiad. By what kind of naiad would allow her fountain to be so…wrong?

  Then a dark head emerged from the water, and another, and another. Five naiads. Naya’s stomach rolled.

  That wasn’t right—there should never be more than one naiad to a fountain. Five. Five.

  The naiads spotted Naya. The blonde began to swim closer to her, and that’s when Naya saw the gold shimmering around the blonde’s waist.

  “A binding cord,” she said. Her fingers dug into Sneezy’s arm hard enough that he yelped. Binding cords were magical ropes that made slaves of naiads.

  “Help us,” the naiad said. “Free us.”

  “How did this happen?” Naya said. “Who’s holding you prisoner?” Her voice sounded rough. A fucking binding cord. It was inhumane.

  All five naiads turned their heads. When Naya looked in that direction, she saw a tall, heavyset man walking down the path along the side of the fountain. He held a shining binding cord in his hands and he stared at Naya.

  She would save the naiads, but first she had to save herself. “Run!” And she ran, pulling Sneezy along with her.

  Chapter 2

  If that phone didn’t stop ringing, Naya Krena swore she’d pull out her damned gun and shoot it.

  Her head pounded. Worse, when she opened her eyes, the ceiling above her head was white. White, off-white, the kind of white you’d see in a lot of bedrooms—but not hers. Her bedroom ceiling was a swirl of blues, waves of color that made her feel like she could dive right in.

  This was not her
home.

  She sat straight up, the pain in her head spiking. The room around her looked stale—tan walls, tan carpeting, two double beds and a picture of something abstract on the wall. A hotel room, no question.

  Her phone started ringing again. This time, she grabbed it. Not even looking at caller id, she held it to her ear and snapped, “Krena.”

  “Where the hell have you been?”

  The growl on the other end of the phone could only belong to one person. “Hardiman. What do you want?”

  “What I want—” he bit off the word, “is for you to tell me your room number so I can come up and get the prisoner.”

  In a flash, everything came back to her. Well, not everything. But enough so she knew she was up the Styx without a paddle. “We’re just waking up,” she said in a rush. “We’re not ready for you yet. Call back later.” She hung up.

  She’d hear about that later. No one hung up on Brick Hardiman. Hades, if she listened, she’d probably hear him snarling from the lobby.

  She and Hardiman were supposed to do a prisoner exchange. She remembered that much. The night before, Naya had driven Sneezy to Vegas and checked into this hotel. She remembered hauling him to a little diner for dinner, and then—nothing.

  Maybe he was in the bathroom. She prayed to every god and goddess she could think of, trying to ignore that the second bed was still neatly made. He had to be in the bathroom. If not, then her career was over. Hardiman had it in for her. If he found out she’d lost a prisoner, he’d bring her down himself.

  Yet she knew without looking that the water was off. As a naiad, she had a special relationship with water, and she could tell there wasn’t any running in the bathroom—not the sink, not the shower, not the toilet.

  She looked anyway, but wasn’t surprised to find the room dark. When she flicked on the lights, any hope that Sneezy might be hiding in the corner fled. The bathroom looked as stale and tan as the bedroom, and just as empty.