Free Nightwalker by Allyson James

don’t know that at all,” I said hotly.
    “She never called Ansel by name,” Fremont pointed out. “She could have meant another Nightwalker. Ansel’s a decent guy. You know, when he’s not under a hex.”
    Paige’s voice was thick with anger. “He killed her. I want him to pay.”
    “Now, hang on,” Fremont said, getting to his feet. “What do you mean, pay ? You have to prove it was him first.”
    “You heard her,” Paige said. “Laura told me to avenge her.” She jammed her sister’s belongings into her big purse. “Thank you, Heather. This was worth it.”
    Without saying good night, she slung her purse over her shoulder and stalked out of the room. We heard the shop’s front door bang a few moments after that.
    “Great,” I said, getting up. Following the dictates I’d learned as a kid, I pushed in my chair. “She’ll have every slayer in the country running out here for the bounty. Mick and I can’t fight all of them.”
    “Nightwalkers are dangerous, Janet,” Heather said, walking past me in a whiff of patchouli. “I’ve never been easy with you letting him live in your hotel.”
    “I’m more dangerous than any Nightwalker, Heather. Trust me.”
    I walked out into the cool night with Naomi, Julie, and Fremont in time to see Paige peel out of the dirt lot in a small sedan. Bear had already disappeared, but this didn’t surprise me. Like Coyote, she came and went as she pleased.
    “I’d give you a lift home, Janet,” Fremont said, starting for his truck. “But I have a date.” He winked.
    “With who?” I asked in alarm. Fremont had the propensity for going out with entirely the wrong women—magical femme fatales—to dire consequences. I’ve had to extract him from disastrous relationships more than once.
    Fremont’s grin flashed in the darkness. “It’s Olivia Medina.”
    “Oh.” One of Maya’s cousins, who was a harmless human being. Hmm. A Medina going out with a Hansen. The world might cease revolving.
    Fremont drove away south, and Naomi offered to give me a lift home. I accepted and climbed with Julie into the big truck in which Naomi hauled around nursery plants for her business. As Naomi pulled around the strand of big cottonwoods that lined the parking lot, I saw to the north an orange light, the definite flicker of flame, and black smoke rise to blot out the stars.
    Only two things lay in that direction—Barry’s bar and the Crossroads hotel. One of them was on fire.
    “Shit!”
    Two fire trucks rushed past us, and Naomi turned onto the highway to follow them. I couldn’t help pressing my feet to the floorboard as Naomi drove the twisting road north out of town.
    “If the slayers are trying to burn Ansel out,” I said, “I’m slaying them .”
    Naomi shot me a glance. “You said something about slayers inside. What do you mean by slayers?”
    Julie watched my mouth, reading my lips interestedly as I explained. “Bounty hunters who kill Nightwalkers. The bounty on Nightwalkers is temptingly high.”
    “Who puts a bounty on something no one believes in?”
    “Lots of people. Pissed off mages, families of Nightwalker victims, families of the Nightwalkers themselves. Who wants a vampire in the family?”
    Naomi shook her head. “Poor Ansel.”
    “Some Nightwalkers do deserve to be staked,” I said. “But why the fuck are they burning down my hotel?”
    “Almost there.” Naomi didn’t admonish me for swearing in front of her daughter, not that I’d have noticed at the moment.
    Naomi’s truck flew through the parking lot of Barry’s bar—the bar intact—and pulled up behind the fire trucks. The bar had emptied, bikers standing outside in the motorcycle-filled lot to watch the flames eat into my hotel. Red lights flashed from the north on the highway, Flat Mesa responding to the call as well.
    I leapt from the pickup before it stopped moving and sprinted toward the commotion.
    My saloon was on fire. The high-ceilinged saloon had been an add-on to