Dangerous Decisions (Obsidian Flame Book 3)

by J. C. McKenzie

  “I didn’t mean the gym.”

  “What do you mean then?”

  “The whole place. This house. This life.” She waved her hands in the air and erratically pointed at the walls in the room.

  “What’s wrong with it? From where I’m standing, Dragon Princess, you have it pretty good.”

  “Don’t call me that.” Lara plopped her butt on the bench and sighed. “This place, with its beautiful view and high end furniture and equipment is nothing more than a gorgeous prison. My gilded cage. Raf’s controlling nature kicked in full force after we bonded. He practically snatched me from that dive I lived in and ‘highly recommended’ I leave my job.”

  “And without notice, too. Herb didn’t have the chance to throw you a going away party,” Misha said. A complete lie and they both knew it.

  “The only thing our boss is upset about not throwing is a tantrum. He wouldn’t spare the change to get me a card, let alone throw me a party.” Lara laughed and shook his head. “Herb may have hated me, but I enjoyed my job.”

  “So, you don’t work now. Big deal. You can find a hobby.”

  Lara fixed her with a death stare. “And what hobby could I do? I’m no longer allowed to work as a bodyguard because the occupation poses too much of a security risk. I’m no longer allowed to work out at a seedy community center gym because it poses too much of a security risk. I’m no longer allowed to venture out of the compound without an escort because going alone poses too much of a security risk. Nope. Not for me. Only the best for the Astarot’s mate. Anything less is unacceptable and poses…wait for it…too much of a security risk. Ugh.”

  “You’re the Astarot’s mate. Surely, you see how you’d pose—”

  Lara held her hand up, palm out. “Don’t say it.”

  Misha smirked and continued. “You’d pose a security risk if you left without a guard detail.”

  “Not you, too.”

  “We both work in security. If you were a client, what would you advise?” Misha bit her lip and looked away briefly. God, Lara couldn’t go outside without a guard, but how could Misha warn her without giving away how she knew? After taking a moment to control her rapidly beating heart while pretending to take in the view, she sat down on the bench beside Lara. Misha picked up her water bottle and took a long drink.

  “They’re not wrong in their evaluation, but I’m not a client.” Lara flicked up a finger for each of her following points. “I’m an adept magic-user. I can shift into a fire-breathing dragon. I have marksmanship aim with a firearm. I wield katana swords and worked as a bodyguard. How am I a security risk? Or more accurately, why am I more of a security risk than Raf? He’s allowed to go out unattended. I’m not.”

  Misha bobbed her head with each point, her ponytail swaying. Maybe if she stalled Lara she’d have enough time to think of a solution or give Father a different evil plan to hatch. “Escaping without notice will be difficult. We’ll have to time it right. If you leave now, the media will pounce on you. I had to wade through three rows of reporters and photographers just to get into this place.” Misha stood and started stretching. Better to stretch tired muscles now than sore ones tomorrow.

  “And he’s not.” Misha packed her sweaty towel into her gym back and zipped up the main compartment.

  “What?”

  “Raf rarely leaves unattended. He’s always accompanied by either you or that big beast of a ginger.” That man sent all sorts of warning signals zinging through her body—not the kind indicating imminent physical or mortal danger, but the kind that said this dangerously handsome man could wreck her world and destroy her heart in the best way possible.

  “Hank?” Lara scowled again.

  Misha nodded, not trusting her voice. Honestly, the last thing she needed in her life right now was an obsession with the enemy.

  “Hank always protects Raf,” Lara said. “As his second, they are bonded and closer than brothers. It’s Hank’s job to keep Raf safe.”

  “I bet he didn’t take it well when Raf hired you to guard him in the bedroom, then?”

  “Gingernut didn’t handle the professional rejection well.” Lara’s tone turned dry. “We’re not besties, but we have a mutual agreement to be civil. Besides, Hank wasn’t replaced. He can’t be. He’s Raf’s–” Lara straightened, and a smile broke across her face. “You can do it!”

  “I’m sorry, what?” Misha slung her gym bag’s strap over her shoulder. She needed to get away and review her life choices. Seeing Lara eliminated any possibility of going along with Father’s plans, but the visit also confirmed she had a devastating decision to make—either she defected to team dragon, or she ran away.

  “You can be my guard.” Lara reached out and grabbed her arm. “Like Hank is to Raf. You really can help me break out of here.”

  Misha’s hands stiffened under her grip. “Uh—”

  The door swung open and Hank stepped into the gym. Tall and menacing, he always looked slightly pissed off—as if one more thing would cause him to combust.

  Misha spun to face the door. Hank’s emerald gaze bore into her, catapulting into a vision so intense, she smelled the subtle rose petals in the air.

  Hank held her in bed, the puffy comforter billowing around them. Her naked body pressed against his, intensifying how every muscle rippled as he devoted every inch of movement to giving her pleasure. She kissed his salty skin and dug her nails into his back, begging for more. He hooked her leg over his shoulder and grabbed her ass, pushing into her with delicious deep strokes. More. She needed more. She needed him closer. She arched against the mattress and Hank trailed kisses with his hot mouth down her neck. Yes, this. Absolute ecstasy. She moaned his name and he growled against his throat.

  Misha stiffened and yanked herself from the vision. Ignoring the hot need throbbing between her legs, she glanced around the room. Had she called out Hank’s name in reality? Or had it stayed in the vision?

  Hank raked her body with his intense gaze but said nothing. Surely, if she randomly moaned his name when he walked into the room, he would’ve said something. He remained silent. They stared at each other for a long tense minute, Misha refusing to breathe the entire time.

  “Hank,” Lara greeted the Astarot’s second in command. Oh thank God. Misha hadn’t slipped and revealed her embarrassing vision.

  “Am I interrupting something?” Hank tore his gaze away from Misha’s face and looked at where Lara still clutched Misha’s arm.

  Lara sighed and released Misha’s arm. “Nothing you need to worry about, Gingernut.”

  “I need to go,” Misha said, voice shaking a little. She swayed. The vision’s lingering effect and feather-light fingerhold slipped away.

  “Are you okay?” Lara asked.

  “Huh?” Misha ripped her gaze away from Hank. “Just hit a wall, you know?”

  Lara sighed again, deeper and louder so everyone would know how pained she was. “You’ll think about what I said?”

  Misha’s gaze flicked between Hank and her. She adjusted the bag strap across her body. Do not make eye contact. Do not make any commitments. Remember to breathe. “Yeah, sure.”

  Misha winced. Idiot!

  “The guard will show you out.” Hank’s expression held about as much warmth as a stone.

  Misha bobbed her head again and slipped past the hulk of a man. Her sneakers squeaked against the tile. She didn’t breathe until the door closed behind her and cut off the sight and delectable smell of the Astarot’s Secundo. She walked as fast as her wobbly legs carried her and collapsed in the car.

  What the hell was that?

  Chapter Four

  Hank watched Misha leave and didn’t turn back to Lara until the door closed and Misha’s squeaking footsteps faded down the hall. Why had Lara asked Misha to think about something? What was she up to? “Think about what?”

  “Nothing. Geez. You act like I’m conspiring against my mate instead of spending quality time with my bestie grunting, cursing and strengthening our
cores.”

  “I’m not acting like anything. I simply asked a question.” He jerked his thumb over his shoulder at the door Misha disappeared through. “Who was that?”

  Lara rolled her eyes. “You know exactly who that is. Don’t act like you didn’t run a complete background check on everyone remotely connected to me the moment I entered Raf’s life.”

  Nailed it, his dragon chortled.

  Lara was right. Though he’d first come across Misha during a poker game Raf attended, they’d already ran a security check on the stunning brunette. When they decided to hire someone to guard Raf at his most vulnerable moments, their screening for Lara had been extensive, including her known associates. They knew everything about Lara Stone, including the background of her friend, coworker and workout partner, Misha Tilev. But the same background checks failed to reveal Lara’s true identity, which begged another uncomfortable question: What else had they missed?

  The room filled with the gentle thumping of music through the surround sound speakers. Lara hadn’t turned the music off, so her phone continued to send her playlist to the wireless system, unaffected by the awkwardness descending on the room.

  It’s time, his dragon said.

  Hank squared his shoulders and turned toward Lara. “We need to talk.”

  Hank waited for some sort of sign or surge of inspiration to hit him. He wasn’t good at this sort of thing. Talking. About feelings and emotional stuff. No stroke of brilliance arrived. Instead, Hank stood there and stared at Lara, saying nothing more. Her face paled. Her bottom lip trembled. Instead of crumpling, though, she pulled her shoulders back and lifted her chin. “What happened?”

  He was an idiot. That’s what happened. With four simple words, he led Lara to believe the worst—that something happened to her mate. Idiot.

  “Nothing happened,” he rushed out. “Raf is fine. You’re fine. Everything is fine.” Please don’t cry.

  His dragon snorted. A flash of hot air rushed through his brain. This is Lara.

  She’s not going to dissolve into a puddle of tears, Hank agreed. She’d more likely to punch something or someone.

  Lara sighed and used a fluffy white towel to wipe the sheen of sweat from her face. Silence dampened the room. She tossed the towel on her open gym bag and crossed her arms.

  “Shut up, Clarice,” she hissed under her breath.

  Hank looked around the room. They were alone in the gym. “Who the fuck is Clarice?”

  “My dragon. She won’t shut up, sometimes.”

  “You named your dragon Clarice?”

  That’s ridiculous, his dragon scoffed. You don’t name a part of yourself.

  Lara folded her arms and rocked back on her heels. “So what if I did?”

  “Do you name your cars, too?” He’d bet money she did. Probably something ridiculous, like Betsy or Pumpkin.

  Lara lifted her chin. “Maybe.”

  “What’s that lemon’s name?”

  “I’m not telling you.”

  “Why not?”

  “You’re going to laugh at me.”

  Hank bit back a grin. “Of course, I’m going to laugh at you. I’m already laughing at you.”

  She clamped her mouth shut and glared.

  He remembered why he sought her out and the weight settled on his shoulders again. His shirt grew tight around his neck as if it suddenly gained a mind of its own and decided choking him out was the only way to escape this conversation. “Maybe this isn’t the right time.”

  Coward, his dragon growled at him.

  “Spit it out, Ginger.”

  “You’re too young to remember,” he started and winced. No. Wait. That wasn’t how he planned to start this.

  “To remember what?” she asked.

  “Me.”

  Lara frowned. Her mouth turned down and she rocked back on her heels. “I don’t understand.”

  “I was eight when the ispolini attacked. Mom used magic to blast us from the car and signal for help while Dad fought them off. At least that’s what I remember before flying through the air and getting knocked unconscious. By the time I came to and stumbled back to the wreckage, the paramedics were on scene. They couldn’t save them. No one could. They thought it was a horrific car accident and told me I was lucky to be alive.” Once the words started tumbling out of his mouth, the invisible weight lifted from his shoulders.

  Lara flopped on the bench and covered her mouth with her hand. Her eyes grew glassy.

  “They never found the baby travelling with us. They searched and searched. They didn’t find an empty carrier or any burnt remains of an infant in the husk of the car and assumed I had bumped my head harder than they originally thought. Since there was no registered birth record, they said I made you up. I guess the imagination of a concussed boy was easier for them to accept than coyotes or wolves finding a lost baby.” He swallowed and forced his chin up to meet Lara’s gaze. His gut churned at the memory. He’d almost believed them. At one point in the hospital, before Uncle collected him, he tried to talk himself into accepting they were right. It would’ve been easier—one less person to grieve. The guilt still gnawed at him.

  Lara dropped her hand. Her lip trembled and tears leaked from her eyes to travel down her face. Lethal, ass-kicking Lara tried to remain stoic, but even Hank, with his limited social skills, saw her falling apart. He needed to get all the words out so the weight would disappear, and Lara would know the truth. She might hate him, and he could live with that. Maybe. Probably not, but at least she was alive and safe.

  “I knew they were wrong,” he whispered. “So did the rest of the dragons, but they also knew it wasn’t a car accident and made a habit of avoiding human police. By the time the Astarot arrived with his warriors to search for you, any trace of your existence had been wiped. We figured you were lost to the ispolini and they told me to move on and live my life for my family. I could never forget you.” He knelt down beside her and gathered her cold hands in his. “I could never forget my sister.”

  All these years, he thought she died that day with their parents. He’d grieved for her for almost his entire life.

  He waited. Silence descended on the room. His gut continued to churn and twist. He thought he’d lost a baby sister. Then he discovered she lived. And now he faced losing her all over again. How would he survive if she wanted nothing to do with him?

  Lara didn’t yell at him. She didn’t demand answers or scold him for taking so long to tell her the truth. Instead, she flung her arms around his shoulders and sobbed into his suit.

  Relief and grief washed through him. The invisible weight hovering over him like a storm cloud dissipated. Hank wasn’t much of a religious man. Nor was he very spiritual. He believed in the power of his dragon and his sword, but if there was an afterlife, if their parents looked down on them right now, he knew they’d be smiling. He closed his eyes and held his sister.

  “Why didn’t my adoptive parents say anything? They were friends of my…our…” She took a shaky breath but didn’t let him go and spoke into his shoulder instead. “Parents. They must’ve known you existed.”

  “I’ve been thinking about that,” he said. “They must’ve had a pact with our parents and some sort of magical alarm. They would’ve arrived in the middle of the chaos to extract us. I don’t doubt they searched for me. Maybe they ran out of time. But most likely they assumed I died, just as we assumed you were lost to us. On the Astarot’s insistence, the media didn’t cover the incident, so there was no mention of a survivor. Not knowing who to trust, the Reynolds went into hiding. They weren’t dragons. No one heard from them after the attack and no one sought them out. Our uncle took me in and raised me as his own. Since he and our father were half-brothers, they had different last names. I took Uncle’s surname O’Reilly and if the Reynolds ever heard of me after the accident, they wouldn’t have made the connection.”

  “But why didn’t they tell me I had a brother?”

  “They probably thought t
o ease your pain and sense of loss. You can’t grieve someone you didn’t know existed.”

  “And this whole time I had a brother? Have?”

  The realization of the time they lost together punched him in the heart. They’d never reclaim those lonely childhood years of growing up without a sibling. They’d never share memories of tantrums, hair pulling and car fights. He wouldn’t get to tease her about zits or threaten to beat up her first boyfriend. She’d never follow him around and mock him or ask him to buy her alcohol.

  “Your adoptive parents did the right thing,” he said, as much to himself as his sister. “They focused on keeping you safe and sheltered from our enemies. Unfortunately, they hid you from us as well.” He ran his hand down her hair, the red locks so much like their mother’s.

  “Do you remember them?” she sniffed. “Our birth parents?”

  “Only a little.”

  She nodded against his shoulder, her voice muffled a little. “I wish I could’ve known them.”

  Hank held his little sister tighter, the piece of his heart he thought he’d lost long ago. They’d never get those years back, but they had many more years to go. He let his own tears fall—not just for what they had lost, but for what they had gained.

  Chapter Five

  Misha slammed the door shut and slid down the smooth surface until her butt hit the floor. Her heart still raced, pounding like a drum so loud she feared the others would hear.

  Holy fuck.

  The moment her gaze rested on that mountain of a man, the intense vision had slammed into her. The entire time Hank and Lara glared at each other in a silent, ginger stand-off, her mind went off to la-la land with a message detailing her doom.

  Misha reached up and flipped the deadbolt. She didn’t trust Father not to barge in at any moment, demanding an update.

  Hank.

  Of course she’d seen pictures of the Astarot and the Secundo in the media countless of times, but the first time she’d seen either of them in person, she’d worked as a bodyguard, posing as her own father’s call girl for a high stakes poker game in the backroom of a club. That hadn’t turned out well, but the memory still disturbed her sleep. When she saw Hank in person, he’d sucked all her breath away. She’d had to clutch the back of Father’s chair to prevent a real-life swoon. Luckily, Lara had been too busy ogling the Astarot to notice.