Eternal Flame (Night Watch #3)(46)
Author: Cynthia Eden

“Where to, Miss?” the driver called out.

She didn’t speak, but Zane heard her thoughts so clearly, heard her-I don’t have anywhere to go.

The images whirled through his mind. Jana, a few years older, with dark red hair now. She was in a diner, and a guy was yelling at the waitress. No one said anything when he started cursing at her. But when the waitress ended her shift, Jana followed the woman.

Jana watched through an open window, and she saw the waitress and her two kids … and the man who’d come to the diner, drunk, to make trouble for her. The woman’s husband.

Only the guy wasn’t just yelling now. He was hitting the wife and the kids.

Anger fueled Jana’s blood. Hot, thick fury and the charge she’d swore never to feel again coursed through her.

“The charge can come from anger, from rage…. It’s so easy to stir the power. You just need the right stimulant.” Her voice echoed in his ears as her fingers trailed down his chest.

When the wife ran out of her house, holding the kids, bleeding, she found Jana in her yard. “I can make sure he never hurts you again,” Jana said.

The woman stared back at her with terrified eyes and a broken jaw. Then she nodded. She didn’t question Jana, didn’t say so much as a word. But then, maybe she couldn’t speak. Her jaw had doubled in size and the skin had already started to darken.

“Take the kids away,” Jana ordered. “They don’t need to see …”

Then she walked into the house. The man came at her, swinging hamlike fists.

She trapped him in fire. Fire that she stirred, and he screamed and said she was a monster.

“If you ever go near her or the kids again, I’ll burn the flesh right off your body. You won’t even know I’m there watching you until you smell the smoke. Smoke that will be coming from inside of you.”

“You should have killed him,” Zane said, the memory of his mother fighting with Jana’s images.

“He killed himself a week later. The drunk bastard drove straight off a bridge.”

And he could see it. Because Jana had seen it.

More images tumbled through his mind. More fires, more threats. Not death, though. Her fires hadn’t killed anyone until …

A vampire grabbed her in a dark alley. She screamed, but no one came running to help her. The vampire shoved her against the side of a building, and he opened his mouth wide. “Ready to die, bitch?”

The fire charged through her once more. “Don’t! You don’t want to—”

His teeth drove into her neck.

Jana let the fire free.

“I found out later that the folks from Perseus had seen everything that night. They’d had the vamp under surveillance. In another few minutes, they were going to move in and save me.” Her finger pressed against his chest. “But I saved myself first, and they saw what I could do. I was taken to the hospital right after that attack. Jesus, a vampire-I didn’t even realize those guys existed until that night. I thought I was the only freak out there.”

But she wasn’t a freak. Beautiful. Sexy. Dangerous.

“I told good old Nurse Nancy too much, but it wouldn’t have mattered, really. Perseus already had me in their sights.”

The image in his mind changed. He saw …

Jana, sitting in a small chair. Beth sat on the other side of a dark, wooden desk. “You didn’t know about the monsters, did you?” Beth asked quietly.

Jana shook her head.

“They’re evil, Jana. They’re strong and they’re evil and someone has to save all the innocent people in their path.” A pause. “You’ve saved people before, haven’t you? You’ve let your flames burn, and you’ve saved lives.”

Jana didn’t speak.

“We need someone like you, Jana. Someone who is strong enough to fight back against them. Someone strong enough to kill them.”

She flinched at that. “I haven’t—”

“You killed the vampire.” Beth’s lips pursed. “Vampires burn so easily.”

“Look, I don’t know what’s going on here, I don’t know what’s happening—” An edge of hysteria entered her voice.

Beth rose and walked to Jana’s side. Her eyes were glass hard. “Let me sum things up for you. Monsters are real. They’re evil, and if we don’t stop them, they will destroy everything good in this world.”

“She showed me then. Took me on stakeouts with Perseus guards to see the monsters she wanted me to target. She wanted to point me and aim me and let my fire burn a path through every supernatural she wanted eliminated.” Her breath shuddered out. “When I didn’t play ball, she just reorganized her game. She made me the bait, and the paranormals started coming after me. I had two choices then. Fight back or let them kill me.”

“Whore, you think I’m gonna let you burn me?” A demon walked from the mouth of a dark alley. His black gaze locked on Jana. “I heard about you. An Ignitor who thinks she can hunt the demons here. Think-fuckin’-again. We’re huntin’ you!” Three more demons sprang from the shadows, and they attacked her.

And the fire had burned.

“I think she wanted to test my fire. To see if it was strong enough to use against demons.” Flat. She shrugged. “Since demons can conjure the flames, too, maybe she had to know just what her guinea pig could do.”

What could she do? One hell of a lot. She’d burned her way through the demons.

“I’ve never gone up against a demon stronger than a level seven before.” She gazed up at him. Waiting. “But I suspect a level seven or higher could easily beat back my flames.”

Easily.

“Perseus told me the demons I’d taken out were killers. They showed me the photos of their victims. They told me I had a damn gift.” Her lips twisted. “I’d always thought God cursed me, and here these people were telling me I had a gift.”

More fires flashed through his mind. But Jana wasn’t killing. Burning. Warning. But not killing. Demons ran. Shifters fled. No, she hadn’t killed. She didn’t kill… unless she caught the paranormals preying on humans.

A vampire caged a girl up against a tree. The girl-hell, she looked like she was about twelve. Her head was twisted, her neck bared, and the vamp’s teeth were buried deep in her throat.

“Let her go!”

But he didn’t stop drinking. Didn’t stop slurping down the girl’s blood with deep, greedy gulps.