Reluctant Psychic

What happened in Reluctant Psychic?

Life as a seer is not all it’s cracked up to be. Especially when you’re unemployed, and your former boss blacklists you everywhere. Or when a legendary Russian witch calls in a favor owed, demanding the unthinkable. When danger threatens everyone around me, there’s only one man I can turn to—and he may not be what he seems.

What tropes are in Reluctant Psychic?

• Mystery
• Psychic
• Urban Fantasy

Where does Reluctant Psychic fall in Sasha Urban?

Book 3 of Sasha Urban. Reading order

What should I read next?

Sleight of Fantasy by Dima Zales.

Chapters

2. Chapter 2

   Sasha wakes to an intrusive call on the first morning of unemployment, sharing potato pancakes with roommate Felix and their domovoi familiar, Fluffster. The mood shifts when Ariel returns home glowing and manic, wearing last night’s clothes, and the group recounts how the succubus Harper infiltrated their apartment and nearly killed them before Fluffster intervened. Ariel dissolves into tears and guilt for abandoning them, while they debate why Harper fell outside the Mandate’s protection—possibly fleeing prejudice in the Otherlands or tied to a necromancer lover. As Ariel rushes off to work looking pale and secretive, Sasha senses a wave of dread reminiscent of Nero’s previous attacks, ending the chapter on a private phone call that promises new danger.

4. Chapter 4

   The narrator, a young illusionist with hidden seer abilities, performs an elaborate card trick for her vampire friend Vlad and witch companion Rose, only to have Vlad dismantle every method with supernatural precision. When Rose asks to walk arm-in-arm with Vlad, the narrator escapes their romantic moment to run errands. In a public restroom, she comes face-to-face with Roxy and another werewolf from her Orientation bully clique—enemies who previously tried to harm her. Trapped with no weapon and surrounded by literal monsters about to shift into wolf form, she bolts for the exit, leaving the confrontation unresolved as the chapter ends on a knife-edge of violence.

5. Chapter 5

   The narrator flees through Battery Park, pursued by the b-hive—specifically the dual-identity Ashley/Maddie and the predatory Roxy. Racing toward a secluded gazebo, Rose’s favorite spot, she hopes to find allies Vlad and Rose, but the structure is empty. Cornered between the two pursuers who have shed their heels and stripped bare, she attempts a bluff with a phantom weapon, only to watch both women transform into wolves. With Roxy lunging and her heart hammering, the chase ends in a snarling cliffhanger as the beasts close in. The chapter ratchets from desperate flight to primal confrontation, establishing the hunters’ shapeshifting nature and the narrator’s resourcefulness under pressure.

6. Chapter 6

   Sasha narrowly escapes a pack attack by Roxy and Ashley/Maddie in their werewolf forms when Vlad and Rose intervene, capturing the girls and revealing Roxy's paternity to Chester, a probability-manipulating former Councilor embroiled in a deadly feud with Darian. Rose threatens to lock Roxy's shifting for weeks while Vlad dismisses Sasha, who retreats home to decompress with her pet Fluffster. Seeking calm, she replays Darian's meditation tape, but the practice escalates dangerously when lightning manifests on her palms—nearly arcing toward her eyes before her panic extinguishes it, leaving her shaken by the near-lethal intensity and realizing the next step could kill her.

7. Chapter 7

   Sasha grapples with an involuntary awake vision—lightning flooding her eyes as she witnesses Nero choking Darian in a luxury elevator. Driven by suspicion about Darian's motives, she tracks his real address from a shipping label and ascends to his Upper East Side building, only to intercept Nero mid-threat. After a tense staring contest that ends with the doors slamming shut, Sasha chases Darian downstairs but loses him to a departing cab. Alone, she spirals into paranoia, wondering if Nero surveils her apartment and saw her private moments. When Felix reveals an unknown caller is Baba Yaga's restaurant, Izbushka Na Kurih Nojkah, the witch phones to collect the favor Sasha owes her. The chapter closes with Sasha retreating to Battery Park with Felix for a fragile moment of normalcy, haunted by unanswered questions about loyalty, desire, and who is truly watching whom.

8. Chapter 8

   The narrator ignores a call from Baba Yaga and meets Felix near New York Harbor to discuss their fears that their former boss Nero is surveilling their apartment. Felix reveals he designed Nero's security system without a backdoor but possesses a custom hacking device called FELLATIO that could penetrate it if placed near Nero's workstation for hours. They agree to plant the device in Nero's pocket using the narrator's card magic, despite the lethal risk if discovered. Returning home, the narrator discovers Nero has blacklisted her from every job she applied to, filling her inbox with false rejections. Filled with rage, she abandons her meditation practice and resolves to confront Nero directly the next day while hiding the FELLATIO in her deck of cards.

9. Chapter 9

   Sasha Urban infiltrates her former office building to confront her ex-boss Nero, only to discover her security ID remains active—suggesting Nero may be in denial about her resignation. In the elevator, she confides in Lucretia, the firm’s empathic psychologist, but the conversation veers into uncomfortable territory when Lucretia senses conflicting emotions and defends Nero’s character, leaving Sasha defensive and eager to escape. After brushing past Venessa, Nero’s hostile assistant, Sasha enters his office concealing a compact device in her palm. Nero, dressed in an expensive bespoke suit, greets her with smug familiarity, unaware of her hostile intent. As she strides toward him with mounting rage and a hidden plan, the chapter ends on a knife-edge of confrontation, with Sasha determined to force Nero to acknowledge her departure.

11. Chapter 11

    The narrator frantically orders Felix to destroy the FELLATIO device on Nero’s screens, but Nero produces a pen instead, foiling the plan and forcing a new strategy—perhaps planting the device in his pants. Shaken, the narrator burns off nerves at an executive gym, tries yoga, then meditates at home, only to plunge into Headspace: a bodyless, non-dimensional realm where consciousness perceives fractal shapes as taste, temperature, and music. Exploring this impossible geometry, the narrator touches a warm shape and is swallowed into oblivion as awareness short-circuits. The chapter closes on this unresolved cliffhanger, with the surveillance mission still pending and the narrator lost in the abstract void.

Editions

Nothing has been published here yet.