Master of Smoke

Master of Smoke
    by Angela Knight

    Mageverse #11
    Comic book shop owner Eva Roman discovers a real-life superman battling a werewolf. After she spirits the handsome hunk to safety, she discovers he has no memory of who he was or why the werewolf wants him dead. Beth takes him in – and promptly becomes a target of the werewolf hit team that’s been sent to kill David. Luckily Eva, too, is a werewolf, so she’s up to the job of playing bodyguard.
    And David’s body is a lot of fun to guard. He’s handsome and seductive, with a feral sexuality Beth finds impossible to resist.
    Now if only they can stay alive long enough to find out why all these monsters want David dead…

    ONE
    Boom!
    The psychic rumble seemed to vibrate Eva Roman’s skull. She jumped. “What the heck was that?”
    Her father glanced over at her. “What? I didn’t hear anything.” Bill Roman was a bear of a man with a broad, handsome face and a gray-shot black beard that blended with the salt-and-pepper bristle of his hair.
    The customer he was talking to shook his head and slid his hands into the pockets of his jeans. “I didn’t hear anything either.”
    Eva hadn’t either, but she still felt as though she were sitting next to the amps at a rock concert. Her chest vibrated as if from a deep bass note, and ripples of ice crawled along her spine.
    What was that?
    Something that isn’t making you any money. Unpack the boxes, Eva. Dragging her attention back to the job at hand, she used a box cutter to slice open the cardboard box at her feet, pulled out a stack of books, and started counting. It was Wednesday, and the week’s shipment had arrived, so she needed to check the contents.
    Yep, fifty copies of Amazing Spider-Man, just like the shipping manifest said. She put a check on the list and propped the books up at their assigned spot on the New Releases display rack.
    Ruuuumble. Despite her instinctive jolt, Eva tried to ignore the vibration as she started pulling copies of X-Men out of the box.
    “It was completely out of character.” Her father leaned an elbow on the counter, settling in for his favorite pastime: debating his beloved comics. “Deathrage would never torture anybody, not after what Psicopath did to her in issue 28. It’s like Batman using a gun or Superman beating somebody to death.”
    “The writer’s just trying to take the book in a darker direction.” A tall, handsome blond, Joel Harmon had intense opinions and a love of comics almost as deep as her father’s, which was why Bill loved to argue with him.
    Eva had fallen in love with him for basically the same reasons. At least until she realized what she was doing to him. Or worse, going to do.
    “Darker? Her name’s Deathrage, for God’s sake. How much darker can she get?”
    Rummmmmmmble. Something about that sound gnawed at Eva, gave her the nagging feeling that something was deeply wrong. Something she had to do something about. Stop. Fix. Fight. Something.
    And she had to do it now.
    Dropping the stack of books back into the box, Eva looked over at her father. “Mind if I take off, Dad?”
    He turned around and examined her face. Whatever he saw carved sudden lines of worry around his hazel eyes. “Hey, are you all right?”
    Eva rolled her shoulders uneasily. “I just don’t feel well.” She had to find out what the hell was causing her Spidey sense to tingle.
    She hadn’t even known she had a Spidey sense.
    “Go. I’ve got this.” Bill took the box cutter out of her hand and went to work on the next box of books.
    “Thanks.” She gathered up her purse and headed for the door, striding past massive wooden display racks stacked with comics. “See you tomorrow, Dad.”
    “Bye.” He pulled out a stack of books. “I’m telling you, Deathrage wouldn’t have laid a finger on that guy ...”
    The bell attached to the door jangled merrily as Eva stepped out of the Comix Cave. It was dark, the moon riding the stand of pines that bordered the strip mall’s parking lot. In the distance, dogs barked in a hysterical chorus. Probably at the same thing that was making her crazy.
    She could head into those trees, transform, and go investigate. Might be better to take the car, though. Especially if she needed a quick getaway from whatever was doing ... whatever the hell it was doing. Eva dug her keys out of her purse and clicked the fob to unlock her dark blue Ford Focus.
    Curiosity might have killed the cat, but she hoped it didn’t do