by Becca Van
“Of course we can, love.” Lance rose to his feet and glanced toward the clock on the nightstand. “It’s a wonder none of the others have been banging the door down demanding I start breakfast.”
“I slept that long?” she asked with surprise. She’d only thought she’d been asleep for an hour or two at most, but it seemed she was wrong.
“We all did, my heart.” Andre stood and stretched his delectable naked body, drawing her eyes to his muscular physique. When she felt her pussy clench and moisten she turned away from the tempting view of her naked men and entered the bathroom. There was no way her body was up for another bout of sex.
After showering and dressing she hurried out of the quiet empty apartment toward the massive kitchen and tantalizing scents of cooking food.
While she’d been showering she remembered she had to tell her mates about her superior, Anton Pandemic, who she suspected was somehow related to the deceased man she’d run through the FBI database. There was one thing she’d learned while working at the FBI and that was that a coincidence didn’t happen without there being a reason.
She walked into the kitchen and over to where Lance was placing large amounts of food onto serving plates. “Do you want some help?”
“No thanks, love. I want you to go and sit down and rest.” Lance leaned down to place a kiss on her lips and hugged her tight before releasing her. She grabbed one of the large plates off the counter and carried it over to the table. Lance picked up two more and followed her.
They all sat and ate breakfast and although she tried to listen to the conversations going on around her she just couldn’t keep her mind from spinning in circles.
“You’re very quiet, Caly. Are you all right?” Andre asked.
She nodded and shoved her plate away before taking a sip of her coffee. “I just remembered something.”
All chatter ceased and all eyes turned toward her.
“What’s that, love?” Lance asked.
“I ran a check through the FBI database on the deceased male found outside of Belinda’s house.”
“Did you find anything?” Ed asked, leaning forward in his chair.
Caly nodded. “He was going by the alias Reginald Lichen but when I couldn’t find anything on that name I ran his photo and came up with the name Regent Pandemic.” She paused to take a breath and another sip of coffee.
“Go on,” Alex encouraged.
“My boss’s name in Anton Pandemic.” Caly had expected curses or gasps or something but when no one said anything she looked up at her mates. When she met each of their eyes she saw rage and fear in their gazes.
“That can’t be a coincidence,” Ed stated in a hard voice.
“I don’t think it is.”
“Fuck!” Andre shouted and shoved his chair back before rising to his feet. “That’s it.” He turned and pointed at her. “You can’t go anywhere. The only way we can keep you safe is if you stay hidden.”
Anger began to simmer and heat her blood. She slowly and deliberately put her coffee mug on the table and stood up. “You know I can’t do that, and I won’t.”
“Caly, we don’t want anything happening to you.”
“So what? You want me to hide away in this cavern for the rest of my life? Like all of you have?”
“Now wait a minute!” Alex jumped to his feet.
Caly slashed her hand in the air, showing just how angry she was. “No, you wait a minute. I respect the fact you’ve had to hide out but you have all been missing out on so much. Wouldn’t you like to walk down the street without the worry of having a hunter lock onto you? Don’t you want to be able to show your future children the wonders of the world?”
Lance sighed loudly. When she turned to look at him she was astonished to see him nodding. “Our mate is right. It is time we stopped hiding from the world. That doesn’t mean we reveal what we are, but it’s time to take a stand.” He met each person’s gaze before his eyes connected with hers.
“It became the norm for us to remain hidden and to venture out amongst the humans only out of necessity. We only ever let our dragons free at night and after making sure that there were no hunters in close proximity, but if we had become the hunter instead of remaining the hunted maybe we wouldn’t have the trouble we are now.
“I take full responsibility for that. I promised your parents and Lady Guinevere that I would raise you, teach you, and keep you safe. Now that we have all found our true mates and there are little ones on the way, it’s time to take a stand.”
“So what do you suggest?” Eli scowled. “You want us to use our mates as bait? There is no fucking way I’m letting Bid out of this lair only to get hurt or even killed. She’s pregnant with our babe and needs to be protected at all costs.”
“I agree.” Caly nodded. “I will be the bait.”
“No!” Andre, Alex, and Aiden all shouted at the same time.
Caly drew a deep breath and as her anger calmed, her skin began to prickle and power surged through her body. She felt her hair move as if she was standing on a cliff edge with the wind ruffling her tresses and as she concentrated on what was happening to her body, she felt like she was being pulled in ten different directions. At first she didn’t know what was going on, but when she heard the whisper soft voice of Lady Guinevere in her head, knowledge slammed into her psyche.
Anton Pandemic was the leader of the hunters and he was pure evil. He and his cohorts needed to be taken out before he could reign supreme. Although Anton may not know it, Rose Medwin had managed to hide the fact she’d birthed a daughter. If Anton ever got hold of that knowledge, nothing would stop him.
Luckily for them, Rose’s descendants had no idea they had magic in their blood and Caly hoped to keep it that way.
“What the hell?” Randy gasped.
“I am the perfect bait,” Caly said. “I can feel them. They’re searching for us and it won’t be long before the leader finds the lair. We have a week at most.”
Lance moved to her side and clasped one of Caly’s hands. The heat and power running through her body grew stronger and she knew without a doubt that she was the catalyst to end the hunters forever. With her and Lance’s magic, her mates and the other dragon shifters’ help, they would destroy them all.
Now that she was mated and found love she wasn’t about to let anyone take that away from her. Love and family were the most important things in the world and she wasn’t about to let history repeat itself.
Caly was about to release Lance’s hand and sit down so they could plan but her vision sheeted and her body stiffened. She saw Anton looking for her and the dragons but in his travels a chance meeting with a woman who looked familiar had her catching her breath.
“You need to move quickly, Calysta. In three days the hunter will meet a woman of Rose’s blood. If that happens then all will be lost.”
The vision dimmed and Caly would have fallen to the floor if Lance hadn’t scooped her up into his arms. Her head ached and she felt so weak her limbs were trembling, but with each breath she took the symptoms began to wane and her strength slowly returned.
“Holy shit!” Lance muttered as he sat down with her on his lap. “Are you all right, love?”
“Yeah, just a little weak.”
“What was that?” Aiden asked as he squatted down next to her and placed his fingers on her wrist, taking her pulse.
“That was a vision,” Alex said as he staggered to his chair and slumped into it.
“Care to share?” Erwin asked.
“Give us a moment.” Andre sat beside Caly and took her hand in his. “Are you feeling any better, darlin’?”
“Yes,” Caly sat up straighter and would have gotten off Lance’s lap if he hadn’t wrapped an arm around her waist and stopped her.
“Stay right where you are, mo chroí.”
Caly nodded, picked up her cool coffee, and drained it, sighing as the dryness left her mouth. “Did you see all of it?” she asked, looking at first Lance and t
hen meeting Aiden’s, Andre’s, and Alex’s gazes.
“We did,” they all answered simultaneously.
“Do you want to explain?” she asked, not sure where to start.
“I will,” Andre said and then he told the rest of the dragon shifters and their mates what they had seen in Caly’s vision.
“If that’s the case, we need to set up a way to draw the hunters to us,” Russ stated.
“Exactly,” Caly agreed.
Chapter Eleven
Alex glanced over at his flight pod brothers and his elder. Caly was currently being held in Andre’s paw and when he looked down he saw her peeking out of a gap between his toes. He couldn’t believe that she could see them even when they were in beast form. Usually they had to concentrate to remove their reflective shields so their bodies could be seen by others—which never happened—but now that he thought about it, now that Bid and Niki were mated they didn’t seem to have trouble seeing their men in animal form either.
Times were changing and he hoped that it was going to be all for the better. This little foray into the great outdoors was to see if their mate could lock onto any of the hunters and draw them out into the open.
All the other dragons were already in place on the northern side of the Wind River Mountain Range. The only one missing was Erwin, who had remained behind to protect his pregnant mate in case the hunters somehow locked onto the lair. Niki had harangued her mates into letting her go along and had won the argument. The feisty deputy had practically browbeaten her mates to get her way, but had been ordered to stay hidden if their plan worked. Although she could fight, there was no way she could take down one of the hunters by shooting them, not unless she was able to shoot the fuckers in the heart, but since they were fast and could dodge a bullet that scenario wasn’t likely.
For the first time in his long life, Alex wished that their mates had been changed to be like them once they had been claimed. Fear wasn’t usually part of his emotions but since mating Caly it seemed to have become a regular emotion. He wished he could order her back into the lair with Bid, but she was a hunter seeker and without her they wouldn’t be able to flush the fuckers out.
* * * *
Anton managed to get back to the mayor’s house without seeing the sheriff again and although he had spent the day pacing and trying to ignore the urge to go searching for Caly until darkness fell, he had managed to. Normally he would wait for the dead of night but the urge to find her was riding him hard, so as soon as the sun set and all light disappeared from the sky he left the house and headed to his car.
It didn’t matter that he had no idea where she was nor where to start looking because his hunter senses were pinging and pulling so he tuned into his intuition, got into the car, and drove out of the backyard without any lights on.
He drove through the back streets of Rock Springs, making sure to glance in the rearview mirror often looking for a tail, but when he didn’t see anyone following him, he began to relax. Once he was on the edge of town and back on the main road he turned his headlights on and drove where the urge took him.
Anton had a feeling he would find her this very night but before he did he was to meet up with the only hunters left in existence. Just before he’d left the house he’d sent a blanket text message to his cohorts telling them to meet him on the far end of Arapahoe. The schedule had changed and he hoped the greedy fuckers looking to take him out and take over his position as the leader of them all could control their rage and avariciousness until they took out the dragon shifters and their mates.
As far as he knew, he was the only hunter alive who would be able to mate with Calysta Adani after the shifters were all dead. He’d found an old parchment predicting a prophecy that one of the dragon shifters’ mates would be graced with magic and the ability to seek and destroy hunters. At first he’d scoffed when he’d seen that old piece of paper and information, but from the moment he’d laid eyes on her he’d known it was true.
Years after finding that prediction he found part of another which foretold of a hunter claiming the dragon shifters’ mate and creating an army of elite predators. What had annoyed him was that there had been more to that little tidbit of insight but since the parchment had been ripped he didn’t know what it was.
Just over two hours later he pulled his car up into a secluded wayside stop off of Rendezvous Road. He was pleased to see that all the other hunters were in attendance and although he needed to be wary of getting stabbed in the back, he knew they wouldn’t try to take him down while the dragon shifters were still alive. There was no way one hunter could take on all the dragons on his own and win. So for now he figured he was relatively safe, but just in case he reached into the back seat and clasped the handles to the obsidian bladed katanas and then got out.
The other hunters were similarly armed and eyed each other warily, but when they saw him they moved closer.
“Thank you for coming ahead of schedule.” Anton nodded and cleared his throat when the assholes remained silent. “Tonight is the night we have been training and waiting for. We will battle those fucking dragons and take them down. Losing isn’t an option.”
“How?” one brave or stupid warrior asked.
Anton lifted his arms out. “Can’t you feel them? Aren’t your senses going crazy, pulling at you?”
He was surprised when only one of them nodded and his anger at their weakness almost got away from him. It wouldn’t do him any good to stab the bastards where they stood. He needed them to fight by his side so they could win, but once the dragons were no more then he would make his move.
He finally met Patrick’s gaze and nodded back. This was the only hunter he had trained himself. His deceased right hand man had trained everyone else in the art of fighting and wielding the obsidian weapons. Patrick had a bit of magic in him and Anton made him practice using his skills until he could no longer stand. Hopefully he would be the one to take out the elder and then Anton would be sitting pretty. Once Lance was dead the rest of the dragon shifters would follow. Their grief would be their downfall.
When the shifters were no more, Anton would kill every last one of the hunters without a backward glance. Once he had Caly in his clutches and beat and fucked the fire out of her, he would take over the world and live in the lap of luxury.
And not even she would stand in his way.
* * * *
Andre was nervous and no matter how hard he tried to quell his fears, they wouldn’t dissipate. All of the dragon shifters had spent the day in a clearing on the other side of the Wind River Mountain Range, setting up traps and searching for the perfect places to conceal their presence. Once they had everything ready Lance and Caly had tapped into their magic. He and his flight pod brothers were in awe of how she and Lance felled trees with what looked like strikes of lightning, but that wasn’t all. The trees they shot magic at first split down the middle and toppled to the ground but when another burst of magic was poured over the fallen trees and branches they exploded into nothing more than small particles of ash.
* * * *
Caly drew a deep breath and tapped into the energy racing through her veins. Her hair moved as if in a breeze and the fine hairs on her body stood on end. Warmth and tingles zapped over her skin and she stared at the tree Lance had pointed out to her.
“You can do this, love,” Lance encouraged. “Stop thinking so much and just do it.”
Caly took another deep breath and when she felt the tension ease from her body the warmth in her body heated and she lifted her hand and pointed it toward the large tree. Her hair felt like it had a life of its own and as she pushed the electricity zipping through her body and aimed it, her mouth dropped open as she saw white and blue light slam into the trunk, splitting it down the middle.
She turned to Lance and flung herself in his arms. “I did it.”
Lance hugged her tight and kissed the top of her head. “I knew you could, A ghra. You are amazing.”
“What else can
I do?” she asked.
“See if you can burn the felled tree,” Lance suggested as he eased her from his hold.
Caly did as he asked and was once more surprised that she could do such things. This time round had been easier than the first. She spun in a circle as the ash floated to the ground and laughed with exuberance. She heard Lance, Andre, Aiden and Alex laughing right along with her.
She set her determination and concentrated on learning everything she could, because she wanted to be able to live with her mates in peace.
She was aiming for another tree but hesitated when she saw Alex’s dragon tail close to the trunk. She was about to redirect her aim but she needed to make sure she was accurate so went for it.
The sound of the tree trunk splitting from the bottom to the top was loud but Alex’s dragon yelp was louder. He turned to glare at her and although she tried to keep an innocent expression on her face she knew she’d failed when the corner of his lips twitched.
“Watch it, mate, or I might just have to punish you.”
“What?” Caly asked trying to keep her tone indignant but failed by bursting into laughter.
Lance moved fast and snagged her around the waist. “Come and get her brothers.”
They were on her in an instant. The fingers sought out all her ticklish spots and tortured her until she was laughing so hard her stomach hurt and she had tears running down her face.
Finally, they each kissed her lingeringly on the lips and they all got back to work. Her heart was full of love and she couldn’t remember the last time she laughed so much. Her mates were amazing and she was going to do what she could to end the war with the hunters.
* * * *
While she and Lance worked, Andre and the other dragon shifters called to their beasts and scanned the area using their enhanced senses, ready and willing to take out any hunters unfortunate enough to find them out in the open, but that never happened. As the sun began to lower in the sky he became more restless and felt like danger was lurking all around them, even on the gentle cool breeze. There was something maliciously ominous on the wind and he wondered if they would all come out of this alive. However, as that thought coalesced he pushed his doubt away, because he would make damn sure that his mate would come to no harm. Not as long as he had breath left in his body.