Chapter 5
FIVE
WYATT
Deputy Rena Marsh looked up from the front desk as he walked in, her wolf-sharp senses immediately cataloguing everything wrong with him.
“You look like hell, boss.”
“Good morning to you too.”
“Late night at the festival?” Her tone was casual, but her nostrils flared. Wolves and their damn sense of smell. “Heard there was some magical incident near the candle booth. Flames going crazy, that sort of thing.”
Wyatt didn’t break stride. “Surge energy. Nothing serious.”
“Uh-huh.” Rena’s gaze followed him across the bullpen. “You know, people have been talking. About the candles. Apparently they’re doing strange effects now. Showing—”
“I have reports to file.” He cut her off, his tone making it clear the conversation was over.
His office waited at the back of the station, glass walls offering the illusion of transparency while letting him observe everything. He’d fought for this office when he made sheriff. The previous occupant had preferred solid walls, privacy. Wyatt preferred sight lines.
He dropped into his chair, turned on his computer, and stared at the blank screen.
His desk was immaculate. Files in precise stacks, a single coffee mug positioned exactly where it belonged, no personal items to distract or reveal. The only anomaly was the hidden drawer on the right side. The one he wasn’t going to open.
He opened it anyway.
Six years of notes stared back at him. Observation logs. Background research. Questions he couldn’t answer.
Narla Wright arrived in Haven Shores on March 15th. Previous residence: Mountain View, CO. Claimed widowhood—husband Niccolas Chen, bear shifter, died in house fire. No children. No close family in the area.
He flipped through the pages.
April 3rd: Subject visited the library. Checked out books on protective wards and concealment magic. Stayed for three hours.
June 17th: Subject declined invitation to Junie Reed’s birthday party. Claimed prior commitment. No evidence of alternate plans.
September 22nd: Subject’s candles exhibited unusual flame behavior during autumn equinox. Colors unidentifiable. Magic appears to be fluctuating.
Page after page after page. Documentation he’d told himself was professional vigilance. Month after month, tracking a woman he’d claimed to suspect while his panther howled for her with every breath.
What kind of lawman kept files like this on an innocent resident?
What kind of man watched a woman like this and told himself it wasn’t obsession?
Wyatt slammed the drawer shut.
His hands shook. His panther paced. And somewhere across town, Narla Wright was probably waking up and trying to forget last night ever happened.
The same way he was trying to forget.
The same way neither of them would succeed.
Two hours into his shift, his computer glitched.
The screen flickered, pixelated, went dark for three full seconds before rebooting.
Wyatt stared at it with grim recognition.
This was the fourth computer he’d gone through since Narla arrived in Haven Shores.
The first one had died the day they met.
The second had lasted eight months before an “unexplained electrical surge” fried the motherboard.
The third had developed a persistent glitch that only manifested when she walked past the station.
He’d told himself it was coincidence.
He’d told himself a lot of things.
The door to his office banged open without warning.
Cassia Gale stood in the doorway—storm witch, newly mated to Aero, and currently looking like she’d witnessed something that had rattled her unshakeable composure. Her dark hair crackled with residual electricity, and her eyes were too wide, too bright.
In her hands, she held one of Narla’s candles.
Wyatt’s panther went rigid.
“We have a problem.” Cassia crossed to his desk without waiting for an invitation, setting the candle down on the polished surface. It was a simple beeswax taper, indistinguishable from dozens of others Narla sold at her shop. “A big one.”
“Good morning to you too.” Wyatt leaned back in his chair, forcing calm into his voice. “Is there a reason you’re bringing me candles?”
“Watch.” Cassia pulled a lighter from her pocket—not matches, he noticed, which meant she didn’t trust her own magic for this—and touched the flame to the wick.
The candle ignited.
For a moment, it burned normally. Just fire. Just light.
Then the flame flared—not violet this time, but a deep, rich gold—and in its depths, a face took shape. Sharp features. Ancient eyes. The unmistakable silhouette of a dragon in human form.
Aero.
Wyatt’s blood ran cold.
“Every candle she’s made recently does this.” Cassia’s voice had gone tight, controlled in a way that meant she was barely keeping it contained. “I’ve tested five of them. Different scents, different sizes, bought at different times. They all work.”
“Work how?”
“They show you your fated mate.” Cassia met his gaze, and there was knowing awareness in her expression that made his panther snarl. “Light the candle, look into the flame, and you see their face. Clear as a photograph. Unmistakable.”
The flame on his desk still showed Aero’s features, wavering but distinct. Wyatt couldn’t look away. His mind was racing, cataloguing implications, calculating consequences.
If Narla’s candles showed fated mates…
If she’d lit one after last night…
Did she see you?
His panther’s certainty crashed through him. The beast had no doubts. Had never had doubts. It had known from the first moment, the first glance, the first arc of lightning between them.
She’s our mate.
“How long has this been happening?” His voice came out rougher than intended.
“I noticed it this morning.” Cassia blew out the candle, and Aero’s image dissolved into smoke.
“I bought a candle at the festival last night. Lit it when I got home, and—” She gestured at the extinguished wick.
“Aero’s face. Right there. I thought it was a fluke, so I tested more. Every single one shows the same thing.”
“The surge.” Wyatt forced himself to think like a sheriff, not like a panther whose mate had developed terrifying new magic. “The equinox surge has been affecting magic all over town. This is probably—”
“This isn’t just surge fluctuation.” Cassia cut him off. “I talked to Junie on the way here. She tested one too. Saw Leo. Crystal clear, no ambiguity.” She paused. “And Avine found one in her bedroom. Theo’s face in the flame.”
Three witches. Three confirmed mate visions. Three of Narla’s candles taking action that should be impossible.
“Has anyone talked to Narla about this?”
“Not yet.” Cassia’s gaze sharpened on his face. “I came to you first because this warrants the sheriff’s attention. Magical items revealing private information about residents’ mate bonds—that’s going to cause problems.”
Problems. That was an understatement.
Wyatt could already see the chaos unfolding.
Couples terrified to light candles in case they saw someone other than their partner.
Singles desperate to find their fated mate.
People who didn’t want to know, forced to confront truths they’d buried.
The gossip network would go into overdrive.
Relationships would fracture. The entire town would be thrown into—
She might have seen you.
His panther’s focus cut through all the professional concerns, zeroing in on the only thing that mattered.
She lit a candle. She looked into the flame. She saw your face.
She knows.
“Sheriff?” Cassia was watching him with an expression he didn’t like. Too knowing. Too perceptive. Storm witches read atmospheric pressure; apparently, they also read emotional tension. “You went silent just now.”
“Processing.” He stood, needing to move, needing an outlet for the restless energy coiling through his muscles. “This is going to require careful handling. If word gets out before we understand what’s happening—”
“Word is already getting out.” Cassia stood too, gathering the candle back into her bag. “I passed three people on Main Street arguing about whether to buy Narla’s candles or burn their existing ones. The festival sales from last night are spreading through town. By noon, everyone’s going to know.”
By noon. He had hours at most before Haven Shores descended into mate-revelation chaos.
And somewhere in that chaos, Narla Wright was sitting on the same secret he was. The same knowledge. The same impossible truth.
“I need to talk to her.” The words came out before he could stop them. “Narla. I need to understand what her magic is doing.”
“I can come with you. This affects me too, and—”
“No.” Too fast. Too sharp. He forced himself to moderate his tone. “I’ll handle the initial inquiry. Standard procedure. Once I have more information, we can coordinate a community response.”
Something flickered in Cassia’s expression. Skepticism, maybe. Or recognition.
“Standard procedure.” She repeated the words flatly. “Right. Because there’s nothing unusual about your interest in Narla Wright.”
Wyatt went motionless.
“Six years you’ve been watching her.” Cassia’s voice was quiet, almost gentle. “The whole town has noticed. Even before I mated Aero, before I understood what it felt like to have a beast inside you that sensed a truth your human brain refused to accept—I noticed.”
“I don’t know what you’re implying.”
“I’m not implying anything.” She moved toward the door, pausing with her hand on the frame. “I’m saying that denial only works for so long. And when it breaks—” Her gaze flickered to the scratches on his neck, visible above his collar. “—it breaks hard.”
She left before he could respond.
Wyatt stood alone in his glass-walled office, his panther prowling restlessly, his carefully constructed control lying in ruins around him.
The mate bond was forming. He could feel it—a new awareness, something terrifying, a thread stretching across town toward a woman who smelled like warm honey and candlelight and tasted like everything he’d been denying himself for twenty-three years.
It was forming whether he wanted it or not.
And there wasn’t a damn thing he could do to stop it.