“I mean, it’s not like we have a sex life or anything. I don’t know what Graham finds wrong about me, but he’s not interested.”

“Not interested?” Xavier looked Misty up and down with flattering interest. “Is he insane?”

“You know what it is to be a human around Shifters. I liked Graham as soon as I saw him, but he drives me crazy. What is wrong with me? I’m pretty sure he backs off me because I’m not Shifter. I bet that’s why Lindsay keeps it cool with you too.”

Xavier started to shake his head, and ended up shrugging. “Yeah, I figured that.”

“Look at us. We’re both two perfectly nice people. Why are we hanging around waiting on Shifters instead of finding other perfectly nice humans to be with? We’re no better than the Shifter groupies.”

Xav let out another laugh. “Are you sure you’ve only been drinking water?”

“Very sure. But I’m still thirsty. I must have gotten seriously dehydrated. I’ll start on the booze as soon as I feel better.”

“Why don’t you drink some more water and lie down or something?” Xav said. “I’ll be here, standing guard, so you don’t have to worry about anything. You had an ordeal.”

Misty sighed. “See? I’m right—you are sweet. Lindsay doesn’t know what she’s missing.”

Xav actually started to blush. Misty went around him and back to the fridge to grab a bottle of water with electrolytes. On the way out of the kitchen, she paused next to Xavier, rose on her tiptoes, and kissed his cheek.

“That’s dangerous,” Xav said in a low voice.

Misty walked away from him, opened the bottle, and gulped down a third of the water on her way to the bedroom.

She fell asleep very quickly. She tried to think about Xav’s handsome face, but it was instantly blotted out by Graham’s hard, intense stare, and then she was asleep and dreaming.

 • • •

Misty thought she was back in the huge cave she’d found. Water burbled in the middle of it, this time in an ornate, gigantic fountain that flowed into a river of water. Flowers and vines snaked around the fountain, up the rock walls, across the floor. These flowers shouldn’t be thriving, not out here. Desert flowers could be gorgeous, but these were from a hothouse garden—large puffs of white hyacinths, climbing yellow roses, and red and pink dots of sweet william, mixed with tropical flowers like bird-of-paradise. Everything was beautiful in a bizarre kind of way.

Misty’s mouth went drier than ever as she gazed at the fountain. She needed that water.

Come. Drink.

The hiker stood near the fountain. He was no longer the scruffy, dirt-stained, sweaty man who’d talked to her in the desert and the convenience store. His face was clean, sharp, and his hair, white blond, flowed to his waist in a long, straight wave. Some women would kill for hair like that.

Misty couldn’t see what the hiker wore now, but whatever it was shimmered and caught the light.

“Come,” the hiker said again. His voice was deeper than when she’d first heard it, the vowels long, consonants soft. “Rest. Slake your thirst.”

Misty licked her lips, finding them dry and cracked, her mouth parched.

“Drink,” the hiker whispered.

Misty took a step forward. Then she stopped. Everything inside her screamed at her not to go near that fountain, as enticing as it was.

The hiker spoke again, his voice smooth and coaxing. “The Shifter is dying. Take him the water. It is the only thing that will save him.”

What Shifter? Then Misty saw Graham lying on the ground, flowering vines encircling him. His face was wan, blood coated his bare torso, and his breathing was rapid and shallow. He opened wolf gray eyes and stared right at her.

“Misty.” The word was faint, scratchy, Graham’s voice nowhere near as rich as the hiker’s. “Help me.”

“Only the water will cure him,” the hiker said. “Take it.”

He reached into the fountain then lifted his hand and let droplets trickle back into the river with a silvery sound. Misty’s thirst jumped higher.

No, something inside her pleaded. Don’t.

But this was only a dream. It didn’t matter what she did in a dream, did it?

“Misty,” Graham said again. “Please help me, love. I’m so sorry I hurt you.”

Misty froze again, staring at Graham. He looked back at her, sorrow in his eyes.

Now she knew it was a dream. Because no way in hell would Graham ever say in a cultured tone, Please help me, love. I’m so sorry I hurt you.

The dream Graham blinked, scowled, and took a deep breath. “Don’t listen to the bastard. He’s tricking you. He thinks humans are easy.” He sounded much more like himself—gruff, gravelly, impatient.

The hiker’s voice rose to drown out Graham’s. “He needs the water. He will die. Would you let him die to assuage your pride? Save him, Misty.”

No, she wouldn’t let Graham die. All she had to do, at least in the dream, was take him a drink of that water.

Misty started forward. One little scoop, and Graham would feel better. Then the dream would go away, and she could sleep in peace.

A growl made her halt. The growl wasn’t huge and fierce, like Graham’s, but small, childish, and insistent. And at her feet.

Misty looked down. Two wolf cubs stared back up at her. Their muzzles were fuzzy, their eyes big, their ears perked. Both bared little wolf teeth in full snarls. When they grew up, those snarls would be frightening; right now, they were tiny but unceasing.

Misty had met these two before, Matt and Kyle, orphaned twins who lived in Shiftertown. They could shift into twin three-year-old boys, but they liked to stay in wolf form, better for running around and playing, they’d once explained.

“Where’d you two come from?” Misty asked.

Both cubs wagged their tails, but when Misty tried to step past them, they got in front of her again, little bodies vibrating with their growls.

“Leave them,” the hiker said. “They don’t understand.”

One of the cubs, Kyle or Matt—she could never tell them apart—turned to the hiker, planted his little feet, and howled at him. The hiker hissed and pointed his finger at Kyle . . . or Matt.

Misty didn’t like the pointing finger. She expected lightning or something to come out of it, and since this was a dream, it probably could.