by Chloe Cole
A sharp knock on the door struck her like a slap in the face and she jerked back with a start, covering her tingling mouth with one hand.
Jesus, that had been close.
Too fucking close, you idiot.
If they hadn't gotten interrupted, she would’ve gotten into some serious trouble. This whole thing was complicated enough without adding another layer to it. The odds of her surviving this mess were almost zero. The odds of a human surviving were even less. Which meant that Dan was on borrowed time.
The wave of sadness that engulfed her at that realization made the back of her eyes sting and she swallowed the rush of emotion. She hardly knew him, for god's sake. If she felt like this now--so invested already in the life of a man she'd met only days ago, what would happen if she let herself get closer? Or pulled him closer to her, only for him to have to bury her?
They could be a team, but they could never be lovers. She stepped back on trembling legs. “Company.”
Dan seemed to be less relieved about the interruption and bit back a groan.
"Is it safe to assume if that was more of your friends, they wouldn't bother knocking?"
She nodded wordlessly. If she was going to play it cool, she wasn't about to let him hear how much their kiss had affected her.
She lowered herself to the edge of the couch as he crossed the room to the front door.
"Mina?" he called softly.
Instantly, her instincts rose to the surface and she focused. She pushed Dan's scent and the lingering lethargy from his touch aside and attuned her senses to her surroundings.
"A man and a woman. He's got sandy blond hair, and she--"
"Etienne and Taya." She could smell them now. Sense their very presence in the air like a tangible wave of energy. "I know them, it's all right. You can open the door."
She made her way to the hall on still-shaky legs, a dozen conflicting emotions swamping her all at once.
What were they doing here? And how did they find her?
The door swung open and a rush of cold blasted in as she peered outside into the furious golden gaze of Etienne the dragon shifter and his lady love.
"Hey, guys," she mumbled, suddenly very aware of her disheveled appearance.
"Hey guys?" Etienne snarled, pressing his way past Dan without a word to him. He glowered down at her, his cheeks twin slashes of red. "We've been worried sick looking for you, and that's all you have to say to us? If Rene hadn't had the sense to contact me and give me a clue as to where you were, we could've lost you forever."
Exactly her plan.
Damn Rene.
But now, as she stared into the faces of the people that strangely seemed to care about what happened to her, guilt hit her hard.
She tried to think of what to say to make it better, but knew her actions were indefensible. To Etienne, at least. They still made perfect sense to her, though. Taya came up to stand beside him and laid a hand on his forearm.
"She was just trying to protect us, Etienne," she murmured softly.
He wasn't having it, though. He pulled away and stepped closer until he and Mina were toe to toe.
"You're coming back to the chateau with me where I can at least try to protect you."
Underneath all those yucky feelings of remorse, a sizzle of outrage ran through her. She was still Mina Silva. Badass bitch, and she wasn't about to let him push her around like some sort of rag doll. Fucking fake-ass big brothers. She didn't need him to protect her.
Before she could set him straight, Dan's low voice sounded from behind Etienne.
"I know she said you all are friends, but I'm going to need you to back up there, buddy."
In another lifetime, the expression on Etienne's face might have been funny. His eyes went wide with disbelief and his brow rose clear to his hairline. He slowly turned to peer over his shoulder at Dan.
"Look, Sheriff. I appreciate what you're trying to do here. But we're, well, kind of like family. I'm afraid you're going to have to let us handle this between us, all right?"
The tension between them was thick enough to suck the air from the room, and Taya stepped in to break it.
"Stop the pissing contest, boys. We all want the same thing, so can we maybe have a seat and talk this over like grown ups instead of turning this into a literal cock fight, hmm?"
Impressive. Little Taya had been so timid at first. Which made sense, considering she was the sole human at the mercy of shifters who could've torn her limb from limb when they'd met. But since turning into a Valkyrie, she'd gotten her legs under her and now she had the strength to back it up.
Mina added her own voice to the mix. "Agreed. The testosterone in here is cloying, boys. Let's shut it down and have a seat."
Dan kept his gaze locked on Etienne until the other man finally looked away first, albeit reluctantly.
"Fine. But we don't have a lot of time."
He stalked into the living room and Dan closed the door with a snap before following him.
A minute later they were all seated in front of the fire, staring at Mina expectantly.
"What does he know already?" Etienne asked matter of factly.
"He knows most of it."
"Most of it?" Dan demanded, a scowl darkening his handsome face.
"Well, all the important stuff, anyway," she said, holding up her hands in front of her defensively. "If I think of anything else, I'll make sure to let you know. But let's work off the basis that Dan is in the know. We got attacked by a pair of shifters on the country road about five miles from here. They made no effort to hide themselves at all, so what that means, I can't say."
"We missed the fight by an hour, max," Etienne said grimly. "We followed your scent and saw the aftermath. One got away, I'm guessing?"
Dan inclined his head. "Affirmative."
"If you'd told us what was happening I would've come," Etienne growled. "We could've taken them on together."
"We would've come," Taya corrected, clearly irritated at being left out. "He didn't even want me to come here with him. Tell him, would you,” she demanded of Mina. “Tell him how strong I am now."
Sweet Taya. She didn't get it, still. It didn't matter how strong she was. Etienne loved her too much to risk her safety unless his hand was forced.
"You both act like I have a death wish or something," Mina said, with a tight smile.
Their silence spoke volumes.
"I don't. I swear it. But I made my bed and now it's up to me to lie in it. It's too late to keep Dan out of this. They've seen him. He's seen them. He's tied to it now. But you don’t have to be."
"Taya and I are the darlings of the Council. They want a baby dragon so bad, they will let us get away with almost anything."
"Except treason, Etienne. If you walk away from this and stay away, they'll let you live together happily as if nothing happened. If you side with me now, they will never save face. You have to go and let me handle it. Please."
She leaned forward and took his hand, a move so uncharacteristic, he flinched. She could feel his turmoil seeping through his pores and her heart ached for him and the struggle he was feeling, but...
"Etienne. If one of you dies, then this was all for nothing."
She let those words sit for a long moment, and almost felt them sinking in to both Etienne and his mate’s consciousness. Maybe she'd said enough to get them to--
"Sorry, but if you die, neither of us could live with ourselves anyway. Pack your shit up, Mina," Etienne said, the finality in his voice killing the last shred of hope in her heart. "You can bring your friend here, too. We'll leave Montana. Find a remote place up high, without trees and a clear sightline to make the most of our advantage. You two are sitting ducks here and you know it. Put the shoe on the other foot. Would you just walk away if it was me here in the same boat?"
Her silence spoke volumes.
"Then don't ask it of me."
"He's right, you know," Dan said, breaking his silence. "We have a better chance wi
th the four of us. And as long as we take this fight away from innocent bystanders, I'm satisfied. But I'd really like to find a way to see that you’re not dead at the end of this if we could manage that."
Crap.
It felt like she was being torn in two. The part of her that was all Valkyrie wanted to turn around and tear ass out the door. Fly back to Europe and draw her enemies back with her. Etienne and Taya would be fine.
But the human part, that had become far fonder of Dan than it ever should have, couldn't go. If she left now, he’d be dead within twenty-four hours. And damn it, that mattered now.
"Okay. We'll come."
Taya let out a sigh of relief and Mina held up a hand.
"On one condition. If it gets to the point that it's over, that we have no chance and it's just going to be a slaughter, promise me this. Let me at least try to turn myself over to them in exchange for your lives. Rene still has friends in the Council. Let him broker the deal if there is one to be had."
"Mina--"
"No, Dan. That's non-negotiable. Either you all three agree, or I’ll leave now alone. I won't watch you get mowed down because of me. Promise?"
It took a few seconds, but eventually, one by one, they nodded in agreement.
"Okay." She rubbed her hands together and let out her pent up breath. "Where to?"
Dan spoke up then, his voice low and thoughtful. "How long you think it would take to get us to Colorado?"
They all began chattering about flight patterns and times as she looked on, near close to tears for the second time in as many days.
It was bizarre. As awful as their circumstances were, for the first time in longer than she could remember, she felt warm. Deep down inside. In the place that had been cold for so long.
These people cared about her. She'd be damned before she let anything happen to them.
Chapter Eleven
Gravel crunched and flew under the wheels of the rented SUV. Mina sat next to him in the front seat watching the navigation app on her smart phone. Etienne sat in the back with a possessive arm around his mate, his massive frame taking up too much of the space in the mirror. Each time Dan looked in his rearview, it seemed as if the dragon was glaring back at him.
Eventually, he stopped looking back altogether. He had no fear of the man. His years of combat had all but eradicated that particular emotion in situations that were anything less than dire. But his brain was still definitely trying to come to terms with the idea that the guy in the back of the SUV was a dragon.
What a mind fuck. How did one do that, just change from human to animal? And one that was supposedly mythical, no less.
"Next fifty feet take a hard left," announced Mina.
"Roger that," Dan snapped, though Lord knew he didn't mean the words to sound so terse. The stress of prepping for this trip seemed to have finally caught up to him. He'd had to call in favors from buddies he hadn't spoken to in a year and board a small plane old enough to have served in the second World War at a secret airstrip, all which only served to underscore the danger they were in.
The flight itself had been nerve racking as fuck due to turbulence in the air and the fact that this trip was taken without filing a flight plan. Commercial flights wouldn't have a clue that they shared airspace with a rickety piece of shit that groaned more than a whore on the clock.
It was Etienne who had secured the stealth landing and the promise to keep their arrival off the books. It had clearly involved a large amount of cash to spread around because when they landed at Boulder Municipal Airport, Etienne had handed the pilot a bulging envelope.
All illegal. All dangerous. But it was sure as shit a better deal than clutching to the back of a god damned dragon shifter while being target practice for who or what was after Mina.
His imagination ran away from him. Knowing almost nothing about the shifter world, he conjured the most hideous and deadly monstrosities, both land bound and airborne, that could attack them at any minute. How could he possibly protect Mina from that?
He gripped the wheel tighter and resisted the urge to growl in frustration.
Mina. The Valkyrie.
Beauty beyond compare and, from what he'd witnessed, strength beyond measure. He could only hope that, between all of them, they could keep her safe. They were running for their lives from a foe that he knew nothing about, and that made him feel hamstrung.
Job one after arriving at their destination was getting more intel from her. The bird-man and the mountain lion shifter they came up against provided some clue, but he needed more.
He peered over at her stunning profile and noted the worried crease in her brow. If he wasn't an asset, he was nothing more than a hindrance, and that was unacceptable.
His combat training kicked in and he became hypervigilant of his surroundings and the company in which he traveled. When Etienne shifted in his seat, Dan brought up his head to the rearview mirror again. If the asshole wanted to glare at him, too bad. He was back in "trust no one" mode.
"Dan," said Mina. "Are you paying attention?"
Fuck.
He sure was. To everything but the navigation.
He nearly missed the turnoff, though that was easy enough to do. It was tucked between two ridges of rock, one of which obscured the entrance from the road.
He swung sharply onto the two ruts that barely marked the road. It wasn't long before they met a gate. Etienne jumped out while the car was still in motion and reached it before Dan even hit the brakes.
It was going to take some getting used to, the paranormal abilities of these extraordinary people. Etienne swung open the gate and waited with an impatient look on his face.
Apparently, he wasn't moving fast enough.
He gunned the engine a bit, spitting dirt from under the wheels, and raced past the gate. But even as he slowed to let Etienne back in, the shifter had yanked open the door and vaulted in. He settled back against the seat in one smooth motion, and grabbed his mate close to him again.
"Honestly," said Taya with some exasperation as Dan downshifted to take the sharp grade upward on the road ahead.
"What, cherie?" Etienne asked with that annoying French accent of his. "Does it bother you I cannot wait to be near you again?"
Smug bastard.
Mina snorted, seeming to agree with Dan's unspoken assessment.
"What?" said Etienne all innocence in his voice.
"Is that how you got her? With cheesy ass lines like that?" Mina asked, shooting Etienne a glance over her shoulder.
"Lines? I don't need lines," said Etienne, his tone smooth as butter.
"Says the man who until recently had a harem of eight women and kept uncounted more on a string. Tell me, have you given them their marching orders yet?"
Dan noticed the slight smile that played on Mina’s lips as she teased Etienne. Clearly these two had a long history as she was totally at ease with provoking the dragon.
The thought irritated him for reasons he refused to think about and his innate dislike of the Frenchman only deepened.
"I would have, but we've been too busy looking for you," he said accusingly.
Taya, Dan noticed in the rearview mirror, pursed her lips.
Etienne kissed the top of her head. "But I will, cherie, first chance."
"In the meantime the harem still has your credit cards," said Taya, staring up at her mate one eyebrow cocked.
Before the dragon shifter could respond they reached the top of the grade and the view before them stole their attention. Directly ahead was a massive pool of blue water that shimmered with the light of the sun dancing on the surface. On the left, skinny pines reached to the sky. On the right of the lake, the top of the ridge ran like a long camel's hump, half-circling the water. It rose high enough that, at the top, only scrub pines dotted it.
"Looks like we are here," said Etienne.
"Looks like it," agreed Mina.
Dan grunted, scanning the area, instinctively seeking out choke points and d
efensible positions. Those pines on the left could be a problem, a potential place for the enemy to gather and attack. If he had the time he would cut down the trees for that reason alone. But for now, the expanse of water and vigilance would have to do as their first line of defense.
To the immediate right was a stand of pines butting against the ridge that seemed to have a section wide enough to allow a concealable space for the SUV.
He drove into the trees, pulling up enough that the vehicle was shadowed by the overhanging boughs. Then, he popped the back hatch and they all got out to grab their various bags and duffels.
"Which way, Dan?" asked Mina. "I don't see an entrance."
"My buddy said to follow the right-hand side of the lake until we see an opening. It's hidden from this vantage and from the air, but when we get to it, we'll know it."
"And the government made this bunker?" asked Etienne.
"It used to be a training base for mountain ops when we were heavily deploying troops to Afghanistan. Now, with the emphasis on Iraq it was closed and abandoned."
"Really?" said Etienne. Clearly he couldn't believe the waste of resources.
Dan shrugged. "Cost cutting. Bases close all the time."
They walked single file along the path that led around the reservoir until they came to a depression in the rock. Set further back was a set of doors with heavy chains wrapped around the handles, and above them a sign that warned off trespassers.
"Here we are," Dan said. "Home sweet home."
Etienne walked up to the chain and, with a hard yank, twisted the lock off them. The chains slid to the ground with a clink.
So maybe he’s asshole, but he might be good to have around, Dan thought grudgingly.
Inside the vestibule, they met a thick hatch. He used a flashlight to locate the security pad to enter the entrance code he'd been given. Once he'd punched in the numbers, the door swung open slowly. Emergency lights illuminated the long corridor that ran down the center of the complex. He punched in another code that shut the security door behind them.
"There should be a map," he said scanning the walls with his flashlight, "here it is. This is a blueprint of the complex. Looks like the mess hall is halfway down the corridor, officer's quarters on the left and the barracks on the right. Go pick out a room from the officer's quarters. There should be individual showers in some of those. Not so much with the barracks."