"Tell me you're not going to any of them," Jim demanded as I walked him out to the side lawn, which I'd been told was the area reserved for dogs to do their thing.

"Oh I don't know. I think they sound interesting. I might pick up some techniques to keep you in line."

"Yeah, like you need to learn any more ways to make my life a living Abaddon?"

He stopped next to a large laurel bush. I moved over to a small wooden bench almost obscured by a rowdy group of azaleas and breathed deeply of the night air. It was scented with the perfume of midsummer flowers—tall gladiolas, delicately colored roses, early-blooming mums, and beautifully waving beds of poppies in almost every color. The dog walk was a long, narrow stretch of grass that was bordered on three sides by a woodland copse, the tall fir trees casting long shadows that sent inky fingers across the grass.

"This really is a gorgeous city—it has exquisite gardens," I said, allowing myself to drink in the beauty of the surroundings. Despite the big hotel and conference complex a few hundred yards behind us, it felt as if we were totally alone in a little piece of paradise.

"'Hello, remember me?" Jim asked, a pointed look on its face. "You can still see me!"

"What? Oh. Sorry."

I turned around, giving the demon my back so it could do what it had to do without a witness. Jim didn't mind that I had to clean up after it performed its outdoor activities, but experience had proven that privacy was necessary to the act. Since I didn't want to spend all night out here waiting for the demon to take care of business, I strolled down the lawn toward the firs. The sun was a burnt orange ball half disappeared behind the distant hills, but it didn't seem to lessen the heat of the day very much. The shade of the dense clutch of trees looked cool and inviting.

From behind the nearest tree, a shadow separated from the copse. Before I could suck in a startled breath, a familiar figure lunged toward me. The street thief who had tried to rip me off at the train station slammed his fist into my shoulder, sending me flying backward into another tree. He jerked at my belt, half pulling me forward onto him.

"Hey!" I yelled, suddenly realizing what was happening. I had tied the amulet in its soft leather pouch to my belt in order to keep it safe with me, in case anyone had thoughts of searching my hotel room while I was out. (It had happened in the past.) "Stop it! Help! Jim!"

The young man snarled something as he pulled at the amulet, but I had tied it with a couple of sailor's knots, guaranteed to withstand even the most nimble pickpocket's fingers.

"I'm busy here, Aisling!" Jim's voice drifted down the lawn as I struggled with my assailant. The man grunted when I stomped his foot, retaliating by slamming his elbow into my jaw so that I reeled backwards.

"Effrijim, I command thee to stop thy pooping and help thy master right this frigging second!" I yelled, my fingers clawing the man's hands as he fought to release my belt.

"Fires of Abaddon, Aisling, don't ever do that to me again. It's bad for my prostate or something—hey, who's that?"

"Get him," I snarled as the man spat an oath at me in Hungarian. Before I could clarify to Jim just how I wanted the demon to attack—one of the trials of being in command of a demon was that you had to give it very specific orders—a glint of silver flashed in the man's hands.

He had a knife. One that would laugh scornfully at my intricate sailor's knots, damn him. I tried to remember everything I'd learned in my self-defense classes about disarming a man with a knife, but before I could put it into practice the man slammed his forearm against my neck, pinning me to the tree. I reached up to poke my fingers in his eyes just as his knife swung forward in an arc intended to sever the leather straps binding the pouch to my belt.

I screamed as the knife slashed through the thin gauze and reached my tender flesh.

Jim yelled something in Latin and lunged at the man, but even as I struggled to disarm him, he cut the thongs to the pouch and bounded away, a quicksilver shadow in the woods.

I slumped to the ground, cradling my arm.

"Are you all right?" Jim asked "How bad are you hurt? Should I go after him?"

"Yes," I answered, rocking with the sharp, burning pain that snaked up my arm.

"Really?" Jim looked into the dark woods. "You want me to chase him? Uh . . . he's got a knife, Aisling."

A voice shouted behind Jim.

"Yeah? He also has my amulet, and Uncle Damian isn't going to forgive and forget if I lose another priceless object. Demon, I order thee to—"

A man loomed up behind him, immediately crouching down next to me. "You are injured? I smell blood. Allow me to see. I am a healer."

"You can smell blood?" I asked, momentarily disoriented by the man who bent over my arm. All thoughts of the amulet evaporated as he lifted his head and his silver eyes laughed into mine.

"Yes, I can. It is not a bad injury. I believe no muscles or tendons were severed—"

"You're a dragon," I interrupted, noticing the slightly elongated pupils. His skin was a warm caramel color, his long hair pulled back in a pony tail, but it was his eyes that held my attention. Bright silver, like illuminated mercury, they glinted through the darkening shadows, exotically tilted, full of secrets and mysteries.

"Yes, I am. How perspicacious of you. I am Gabriel Tauhou. I have the honor of being the wyvern of the silver dragons. And you"—he brushed aside a ruffle of my blouse, exposing the brand on my collarbone that Drake had left the month before—"you are a wyvern's mate."

"Just what we need—another wyvern," Jim drawled, sitting down next to me, giving Gabriel a piercing glare, "Look, she's been hurt, OK? Why don't you get on with the healer thing and stop flirting with her? She's got enough to deal with without you, too."

As much pain as I was in, I had to admit Jim's protective stance warmed my heart a little bit.

Gabriel's finger traced the circle pattern of Drake's brand. "This is the symbol of the wyvern of the green dragons. You are Drake Vireo's mate?"

"Not necessarily," I started to say, wanting to refute anything to do with the handsome, arrogant man who had the tendency to literally haunt my dreams when he was so inclined.

Gabriel's blinding smile stopped me. "Ah, good. You are versed in dragon lore. Then you know that a wyvern's mate is subject to the laws of lusus naturae."