by A. C. Arthur
“But we’re talking about an Egyptian dagger and a few mummies,” Aiken said. “Not the freakin’ Royal Blood that’s at least eight hundred deep in Burgess alone.”
“It was more like a few dozen mummies and they were steadily coming, from where I don’t know, but there didn’t seem to be a pause button to their intro,” Steele told them. “What I’m trying to tell you is that I don’t think Robles having that dagger was a mistake. Isla’s doing deeper background checks on the guy and I’m certain she’s going to find something to help piece this together.” He was also hoping whatever she turned up didn’t somehow link to Ravyn.
“Okay, and say that she does find something and it connects to a bigger preternatural problem? We’ll come together and we’ll deal with that. But in the meantime, you need to deal with that human, who knows way too much right now,” Theo said.
Steele looked at him, wanting to say that Theo hadn’t been thinking along those lines when he’d let Shola stay here and then revealed not just himself but every one of them to her. He didn’t say it because he knew those were different circumstances and as it turned out, Shola was a demigoddess. That meant she wasn’t a normal human like Ravyn.
“I’ll handle it,” Steele said and stood, pushing the chair back. “But this is big. Those mummies were being controlled by someone or something.”
Bleu shook his head. “That’s ridiculous. Mummies have free will.”
“Right, but ancient Egyptians believed so much in life after death that they began mummifying just about everybody, especially soldiers to protect the tombs of the pharaohs,” Steele said.
“You’re thinking they’re being controlled by the curse?” Magnum asked. “Coming after whoever has that dagger.”
He nodded. “Coming after Ravyn.” The words stung the back of his throat and Steele’s hands fisted at his sides. “It’s our job to protect the humans. I won’t let her die.”
Magnum’s look was full of more sorrow than understanding, but Steele ignored it. He didn’t want to rehash the past with his brother, not when he had a chance to make a better decision now.
“I want to hear Isla’s report as soon as possible,” Theo said. “Bleu, you find out about every being that’s strong enough to control an army of mummies. Magnum and Reese, head back to the hotel to see what you can find.”
“Ziva and I will stay here,” Shola said, her gaze settling on Steele. “For Ravyn.”
He didn’t like how Shola was looking at him. Like she knew the turmoil going on between him and his beast, the battle between that damned Drakon Selection process and his will to remain in the emotion-free/hurt-free zone.
“I’ll take care of Ravyn,” he said through clenched teeth. “She’s my responsibility.”
He walked out of the room at that point, not looking back and not giving a damn what anyone was thinking or saying about him. This was his job, he’d been born to do it and none of them could stop him.
Chapter Ten
“Dammit!” Ravyn screamed as she sent the lamp flying into one of the three side-by-side windows in the room. It only bounced back, the base going in one direction and the plaid-print shade going in another. The light bulb stayed intact, which didn’t really matter because the woman named Shola had flipped on a set of switches when they’d walked into the room, draping the space in a soft gold light.
Ravyn paced across the room for what felt like the billionth time, dragging her hand through the one side of her hair.
“I gotta get out of here,” she spat and turned to pace in the other direction.
Pausing, she looked at the door again. It was locked, the knob, a small black iron one, wouldn’t even move when she tried to turn it. There were no bolts that she could see and no keyholes, so how had they locked it? Probably some sort of electric mechanism. That was just great.
The windows were a no-go too. She had no idea what they were made of, some super Plexiglas, maybe, but they were unbreakable. She’d tossed a chair, used a coat stand from the corner and then the lamp that was now in two pieces, with no luck at all. There was no other way out. No vent that she could fool herself into thinking she could shimmy through, no window in the bathroom, no way to maybe use the dagger to pick the door open.
With a heavy sigh she looked down at the dagger.
“Why aren’t you glowing now? Or floating over to break through that window?” Stopping her movement to drop down on the bed, she shook her head. “Because you’re an idiot, that’s why.”
The feeling she’d felt back at that hotel, and the glow from the dagger, the way she’d floated through the air and the dagger had done the same thing. For those few moments Ravyn had started to believe. She’d begun to think that maybe there was something to otherworldly powers or things that weren’t easily explained. Because she’d never felt as powerful as she had in those minutes. Not even that night when she’d leapt from that roof. Even though, now that she was thinking about it, maybe that was connected to the dagger, as well.
“Nonsense. That dirty old dagger isn’t cursed, nor is it giving you any powers. It’s just a relic, and one that’s brought us a lot of money.”
That thought made her smile. There was so much she wanted to buy for Safeside, so many things she wanted to do for the people there. If she could get out of this mountain jail first.
“Who are these people? And what was that thing?”
Her questions—which by the way were just as odd as every day had been since she’d stolen that dagger—halted when she heard the clicking sound at the door.
She jumped off the bed, grabbing the dagger she’d tossed on it when she realized it wasn’t going to work, then lifted her shirt to stuff it into the waistband of her jeans. The door opened seconds after the click and Steele walked in slowly. Ravyn was across the room, jumping into his arms before he had a chance to close the door all the way.
“Whoa,” he said and wrapped one arm around her waist, holding her to him as he pushed the door shut.
“Where’ve you been? What happened? There was all this dust and these people attacking us and then I was here. How’d you get here? How did you get out of your room?”
He’d begun walking with her in his arms, staring down at her with those deep brown eyes. When he set her down, her feet touched the floor again and she looked down in question. She hadn’t realized she’d actually jumped up into his arms and now she felt slightly embarrassed by that fact. Each time she was around him, she did things she didn’t normally do and while she kept telling herself it meant nothing, she was starting to rethink that too.
“You’re fine. Just relax. There’s nothing to worry about.” He spoke calmly while she felt anything but.
“Well, that’s not entirely true. I don’t know where I am or why I’ve been locked in a room and I have no idea what the hell that thing was outside that brought me here.”
He lifted a hand to smooth down her hair, using the other one to run over the side of her head with the low-cut hair. His touch was of course warmer there and sent a soothing bolt of heat throughout her body.
“Where are we?” she asked, deciding to narrow it down to one question at a time.
“We’re at a place called the Office. It’s where I work.”
“I thought you worked at the Legion Security Company. They’re in a building downtown. I looked it up after you told me,” she said. It occurred to her that she should probably move away from him while they had this conversation since it was of a serious nature and him touching her made her sane thoughts scatter and reform into those soft mushy pleasurable thoughts that she’d been trying to box away since last night when he’d been in her bed.
“We have multiple offices,” he said and let his hands fall to her face, where his thumbs ran lightly over the line of her jaw.
“Okay, so we’re at your job. How did we get here? I mean I thought I saw...something
. But I don’t know, maybe I’m still delirious from the fever I had when I was sick. I thought I was over that flu the day at the pawn shop, when I saw...something,” she said and shook her head remembering that was also the day she’d seen that woman she’d thought was a ventriloquist. If she thought she’d seen something today, what if the ventriloquist was really a gh... No! She didn’t believe in those things. This world belongs to humans. Her father’s words replayed in her mind even as doubts continued to spread.
“What did you think you saw?” His voice was serious and stiff like stone.
Ravyn did ease away from him then, because her thoughts were crisscrossing. When she’d left Happy’s shop the other day and had been walking to the antiques shop, there’d been so many people on the street. People she’d almost bumped into because they’d been walking directly in her path as if they hadn’t seen her coming. But that was silly because she’d seen them as plain as day. Actually, she’d almost bumped into one of them and the other...she had bumped into but she hadn’t felt any contact.
No. She was shaking her head as she walked closer to the windows. It couldn’t be. She didn’t believe in otherworldly beings and she certainly didn’t believe in ghosts.
“What do you think you saw, Ravyn?”
It didn’t sound as if he’d moved from that spot where he stood near the door, but his words were enunciated in her mind. What do you think you saw? As if she couldn’t possibly have seen a ghost or a...a...what did she think it was?
That big ass thing out there in the yard had been carrying her, or at least that’s what she’d thought. Now, she wasn’t so sure. Maybe she was hungry, sometimes she got lightheaded when she skipped meals. But lack of calories had never made her delusional before.
“How did we get here, Steele? Did you drive?” She whirled around as another thought hit her. “More importantly, did you drug me?”
He visibly flinched, his brow furrowing as he shook his head. “What?”
“Did you drug me? Is that why I’m having trouble remembering how we got here when I know I came to your hotel room? That’s the address that was on the piece of paper and it was downtown, not here in this place. So either you drugged me and brought me here, or something else weird is going on. Either way, I want an explanation.” Because her staunchest reason for not wanting any entanglements with men was their innate need to control every damn thing, including her. She and Steele weren’t in any type of relationship and even if they were, the one thing she wouldn’t stand for was him trying to control her.
“I would never drug you or anyone else. I came in here to ask you to have dinner with me. It’s already being set up in my suite. As for how we got here, yes, I brought you here and no, I didn’t ask you first, but I should have. For that I apologize.”
She watched him carefully, looking for any sign that he was lying, but she couldn’t find one. That didn’t mean he was telling her everything, and that made all the thoughts floating around in her mind just as crazy as she’d thought they were.
“Nobody showed up at your place trying to hurt me or take the dagger?” She pressed him because her neck was still sore from when someone tried to choke the life out of her. No way that was fake.
“Yeah, that did happen. That’s why I had to hurry and bring you here. I wanted to keep you safe.” He came closer and touched her cheek lightly again.
Why did that feel so damn good?
“I only want you to be safe, Ravyn. And I’ll do whatever I have to do to ensure that happens.”
She touched his wrist. “I feel safe with you.”
Now, that may have been the weirdest thing she’d ever said to a guy, or anyone else on this earth. And she had no clue why she’d said it, because it wasn’t true. But no, she knew that it was. Hadn’t she slept in his arms last night? All night, which was something she’d never done before.
“I’m sorry you were locked in here and that you’ve been losing your mind trying to get out. I know you don’t like to be in situations you can’t control.”
He was definitely right about that.
Ravyn took a deep breath and let it out slowly.
“Ever since I got this dagger,” she started to say and then stopped.
“I’ll take it now,” he said. “I know things happened fast but we were just wrapping up our transaction. You know the money is in your account, so I’ll take the dagger and then we can—”
“We can what?”
Was this the part where he fed her a nice meal and then sent her on her way? Was she going to be upset if it was? Because that’s all this was supposed to be—a transaction. There wasn’t any reason for her to wonder about there being anything else. Was there?
“We can have dinner and try to relax,” he said.
“I’d like a tour,” she said as the thought popped into her mind. “After dinner, can we take a tour of your office?”
And then she’d return to Safeside and the life she’d convinced herself that she not only liked, but that she deserved.
“Sure,” he told her. “Tonight, you can have anything you want. We both can.”
He let his hand slide down her arm to join with hers and they walked toward the door.
“Who’re Shola and Ziva? What do they do for the company? Because Shola is definitely more of a people person than Ziva.”
Steele laughed. A smooth, rich sound that came from deep in his gut and rolled out of him in a burst that made her think he didn’t do it often. She liked the sound and knew she’d never forget it.
“You’re right about that,” he told her. “Ziva’s a security expert. She works more with hand-to-hand training, though, and Shola’s in administration.”
Ravyn was nodding as they walked out the door and stepped into a hallway that looked like it belonged on a movie set for some retro sci-fi flick.
“These walls are amazing. It’s like this place was built but the mountain still pokes through,” she said.
“Yeah, it’s amazing.”
This time his tone sounded lonely and she wondered if he felt trapped here the way she sometimes did at Safeside. A duty, a calling, a curse—the kind she could believe in.
* * *
He was an ass. A rude lying ass and he was so angry at himself that he wanted to punch something or someone. But he couldn’t. His communicator buzzed and Steele looked down to see the message.
Call if you need help.
His face hurt with how hard he frowned down at the words. Magnum was offering to help him, but Steele didn’t need or want his help. He wanted Ravyn to be safe. His beast wanted her to stay close. They were both ready to scorch every freakin’ mummy or any other being that came for the dagger he still hadn’t taken from her.
“What are we having for dinner?” Ravyn asked when they still stood at the door to his suite.
She always had questions, but this wasn’t the one he’d expected. Would she ask him about the dragon that brought her here?
Fuck, he hoped not.
“Not sure,” he said curtly.
With a shake of his head, he dropped his arm and cleared his throat, reaching up to the control panel that operated the lock. Because only the eight Drakon that lived here and Shola had access to get in, the locks on the door of each suite were designated to the individual that lived in that space and only a fingerprint was required to disengage the lock. Steele stood back while the door slid to the side, tucking into the wall while she walked inside.
Another panel along the wall a few steps to the left operated all the lights, heating and air conditioning in the space as the entrance door closed behind them. Steel turned on the lights and asked, “If you’re chilly I can turn on the heat?” Drakon were their own heating system, so the Office was kept colder than it was at the Towers.
“I’m fine,” she said, looking around as she moved farther into the space.
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Awkwardness, a feeling he didn’t encounter often, eased through him as he followed her into the living area. A couch, two charcoal-gray tables with lamps that had a clear gray glass base, and one high-backed pale gray chair that faced the large flat-screened television embedded into the wall were all he’d ever needed. He’d presumed the monochromatic color scheme was done well enough. Now he wasn’t so sure. The more her gaze assessed the area, the faster a strange feeling of inadequateness creeped along his skin.
“You have a suite at your office,” she said as she came around the couch, her fingers moving lightly over the arm as she passed. “It’s a very comfortable-looking space. Do you live here too?”
“Yeah,” he replied because suddenly he wanted to answer all her questions with complete honesty. “There’s seven more, ah, employees from Legion Security that live here.”
She looked over her shoulder as she came closer to the chair. “That’s an odd setup. How did that come about?”
He couldn’t say that Theo had defected from the Far Realm two hundred years ago when his father, the then-emperor, became possessed by a demonic spirit and almost destroyed their home. Nor could he explain that he and Magnum also had some family difficulties after a clan war in Mobo that eventually brought them to the Human Realm one hundred years ago.
“Theo, he’s the one who created the security company, liked solitude. He also wanted to protect people, so he came up with the idea of two locations for the business, one that also included private living space.” He added a shrug after his words partly because he wasn’t sure how else to explain the evolution of this group of dragon shifters that had come all the way from another realm to settle in this place full of humans.
“A personal and business space. Hmm, I guess that means the eight of you that live here are pretty close friends. Like a family of sorts.”
“Like you and the others that live in your underground place.” It was uncomfortable talking about something he couldn’t really share with her. There was so much he had to leave out and so many foreign emotions stemming from that fact circling through him. And then there was the part where none of this should have concerned him because there was no keeping her. He’d expected and accepted the immediate punch of his beast with that thought, but it was true. Even if all his other emotional baggage were to miraculously disappear, there was no future with him and Ravyn. She was human, and as such lived in a different world than he did. How could he ask her to leave the people she was committed to helping, to come out here to live with him and seven other dragons in a mountain dwelling filled with magick?