by Paula Quinn
“I doubt it,” he scoffed.
“I don’t,” his sister assured him, setting down her cup. “She looks like she was carved from some snowy mountain cap. Someplace high up, close to the sky. She’s graceful and beautiful with an alabaster complexion to match her hoary mane. She speaks softly but with authority and purpose. She’s surprisingly nice and well mannered. She’ll captivate you.”
His frown turned into a wry smile that revealed a slight dimple on either side of his cheeks. “I’m not so easily entranced, little sister, and never by someone in The Bane.”
What about her? He wondered. Was Ellie entranced by Jacob? “What about her brother? Is he as beautiful, too?”
“He’s a second brood descendant, Garion,” she said, scooping Carina into her arms. “Yes, he is beautiful. But beauty wouldn’t save his life if he tried to hurt you.”
Garion stared at her over Carina’s furry head. “How did White’s manager hear about the club?”
She met his gaze and didn’t blink while she confessed. “I mailed him our brochure and offered him a deal.”
Why? What was she doing? Hunting The Bane? No. She couldn’t be so foolish. He had to stop her. “Ellie, what…?” Hell, he didn’t even know what to ask her.
“We have to protect you, Garion,” she told him. “You’re the only hope the Drakkon have.”
We? What the hell was she saying? “What do you mean we?”
“There are a lot of us. Our names are on the list.” She left her chair, still holding his cat and bent to plant a kiss on his cheek. “We’re waiting for you, Garion.”
Chapter Three
Helena left her apartment building and hurried down the street. She couldn’t believe she was late! She was never late—and on her first day as William Hutton’s violin teacher, no less! Thankfully, the boy’s mother lived two blocks away. Helena could get there in five minutes.
Her phone rang. Without slowing her pace, she pulled it out of her purse and glanced at the name.
“Morning, Jacob. I’m late to my first student.”
“Where are you?” came her brother’s voice in her ear.
“I just left the apartment, why?
“I think someone’s been following me.”
She pulled her wool cap away from her ear to make certain she heard him more clearly. “Why do you think that?”
“For the last day and a half the same guy has appeared almost everywhere I’ve been. I’m outside my apartment at the moment and he’s suddenly nowhere to be found. It occurred to me that he might be with you.”
“You think it’s Gold?” Helena asked, slowing almost to a halt, her heart thumping fast. Had she been right about El Montgomery? Had they found the Gold? Or rather, had he found them? It had been almost a week since she’d heard from El. She had the urge to tilt her head and look up at the sky. Not wanting to appear to be looking for him if he was close by, watching her, she patted her pockets and turned around as if she’d forgotten something and was heading back home. Slowly, she looked around at the faces on the streets.
“Yes,” Jacob verified, chilling her blood. “I think El told him about us and he’s come to—”
To what? She wanted to ask him.
“He’s big, Helena, like 6’4”, maybe 6’ 5”,” her brother continued. “He wears all black including a cap low on his brow and covering most of his hair, which, by the way, is gold—really gold, like soft glowing yellow metal. Do you see anyone like that around?”
“No, I—” She stopped as a taxi passed on its way uptown, revealing in its absence, a man bending to tie the laces on his boot. He was already looking at her when he straightened to his full towering height. He was dressed in black from his cable-knit cap to the tails of his long, wool pea coat snapping around his calves. His topaz eyes were fixed on hers, daring her to run.
But she wasn’t going to.
This is him. This is the dragon.
“I don’t see him,” she told her brother, unable to look away from the man on the other side of traffic. “He isn’t here.” If she told Jacob who she was staring at, he would have hopped into the nearest taxi to get to her—and likely get them both killed with his useless bullets.
After so long, it was the Gold that ended up finding her. It had taken only the slightest bit of interest in the Gold’s sister to draw him out.
He was just a few feet away. She didn’t move, afraid he might bolt —toward her throat or in the other direction were equally undesirable outcomes. Her life had been a pursuit to find him. She wouldn’t lose him now.
“I’m late,” she said into the phone. “If I see him I’ll call you.” She hung up before Jacob had a chance to respond.
Traffic stopped. She didn’t blink. She didn’t run or breathe, taking in the size and glory of the man who strode toward her. He moved with fluid grace that accentuated every hard planethat carved him beneath his clothes.
Stray strands of sun-gilt hair escaped from beneath his hat, casting shadows across his eyes. His jaw was carved with determination and strength that did not soften on her.
She ached to snap a picture of him. Up until now, no one in The Bane knew what he looked like, except her brother. Pictures would be good to have on file in case they lost him again.
It wasn’t easy to stay in her spot when he reached her. Her heart hammered and made her feel lightheaded. His shoulders blocked part of the sun while the rest of the light exploded around him, giving him an invincible, ethereal appearance. She remembered a monster, a ruthless killer, capable of making more ruthless killers. She’d prepared herself for a beast, not a Norse god, a mythical king garbed in the sun.
No. She couldn’t let herself forget what he truly was.
She looked up into the flames of his eyes and kept her thoughts focused on the night he’d lit up the sky with fire from his gaping mouth.
He knew she was Bane. El Montgomery was cleverer than Helena had given her credit for.
“Is your sister well, Mr. Gold?”
His nostrils flared slightly. “She is now, Miss White.”
Helena had worked too hard to wilt at the sight and the sound of him. It was like dreaming awake. He was here, right in front of her. He’d killed her father and over forty members of her family and emblazoned her path upon her heart. Fourteen years of envisioning him and the day when she found him had arrived. There were a million questions she wanted to ask him before she alerted the Elders of his existence and they set The Bane on his ass. Who was he? Did he fly often? How had he remained hidden from the world for so long, both as a dragon and as a man? There was so much they didn’t know about this anomaly. What did he know of the Drakkon that had hatched him? How many Drakkon had he transformed? Could he breathe fire as a man?
Better not to chance it. “I meant your sister no harm.”
His inscrutable gaze roved over her features, dipping guiltlessly to her lips before returning to her eyes. “Fortunate for you.”
Another flash of the Drakkon streaking across her mind sobered her thoughts and hardened her mouth. “Would you transform and ravage me and more of my family?”
“Would you tempt me to turn?” he countered smoothly while his coattails snapped behind him in the wind. “It would be the only way to kill me. Or has Patrick White’s daughter abandoned the law of The Bane of only killing fire-breathers?”
He knew who her father was. Good. She wouldn’t have to waste time telling him while she killed him. “No, I haven’t abandoned our law,” she assured him, keeping the treble of her voice steady. It wouldn’t do any good to threaten him. He’d either kill her or run and go back into hiding. “But we wouldn’t harm your sister to force you to change,” she assured him sincerely. “And why are you so sure we want to kill you? Maybe there are things we can agree to, avoiding any more death.” Not that she would ever trust the word of man with a dragon heart. She’d promise him almost anything to keep him around long enough to learn more about him—like his flying habits.
&nb
sp; “What did you have in mind?” he asked. His voice was a blend of deep baritone and music enchanting her ears and making her kneecaps tingle. “If it involves trusting The Bane, I’m afraid I must decline,” he said, sounding superior in true god form.
She barely stopped herself from rolling her eyes at him and his arrogance. “Then we remain at an impasse.”
“No, Miss White,” he said, still unruffled. “There is no standoff. You’ll do as I say and stay away from my family. If you do, you’ll never hear of me or from me again. If you don’t, I’ll fill the sky with your nightmares. You have my word on that. I don’t offer it to many.”
Were those his conditions? To stay away from his family? “And who, exactly, is your family?”
“Don’t play games with me,” he warned. “You know who they are. Whites have been harassing them for years. It stops now.”
Yes, she knew. Marcus Aquara and Samantha Montgomery. The Bane had spent two years watching them, terrorizing them until Marcus put an end to it by killing most of them.
Was that all it took to keep him at bay? But The Bane needed more than a docile Drakkon. Who knew what would trigger his turning again or from turning others? He needed to be stopped and there was only one way to stop him. He had to turn and she needed to be there when he did. She had to befriend him or at least convince him that he could trust her. She had no other choice.
“I appreciate that, Mr. Gold,” she managed without sarcasm. Better to pacify his ego than chuckle at his orders. “I’ll do my best to make sure the others agree, if you’ll give me something in return.”
He tucked his hands into his pockets and looked at her with a skeptical curl of his lips that made her want to promise him more.
“What more do you want besides my promise not to bring war?”
To keep from staring at him like a senseless fool, she thought of every vile thing anyone at the boarding school had ever said to her, the smell of charring flesh and screams in the night, watching her brother live a meaningless life in a band he was unhappy with. She had to find a better way to resist the effect of the Gold’s powerful masculinity. She’d trained her entire life for this. She would see it to the end.
She blinked her lush lashes, darkened with mascara, up at him and offered him a smile laced with challenge.
“Breakfast.”
#
Garion took a moment to ponder which of her features was the most beguiling. Was it her wide, expressive eyes, painted in the same shades as a cool pre-dawn sky that he found so compelling? The strength in her defined brows and high cheekbones or the delicate curve of her nose and lips? Her hair fell down her sides in matching ivory braids beneath her pom-tipped hat. Her milky complexion reminded Garion of the Norse winter moon and made him miss home.
Hell, Ellie was right. Helena White was captivating.
It wasn’t like him to veer off track and venture into the open. Never for a woman, though he hadn’t known many. This one was his enemy.
Yet, he remained in his spot instead of refusing her offer and walking away. He’d warned her. There was nothing else that needed to be done. But she was a peculiar one. Breakfast? He almost laughed. That was what she wanted? Why? What was she up to? He was curious to find out. He could intrude on her thoughts but they were on move even ground this way.
“All right,” he accepted. “Where?”
“Really?” She took a half-step back, looking as surprised as he must have appeared to her. “That’s good. It’s a start.”
A start to what? He cast her a frown that she either didn’t see or she did and she ignored it.
“I just have to teach my first lesson and then we can meet up at Tony’s.” She turned to go then paused when he pulled his hands from his pockets and held his arms out at either side.
“Who’s Tony?”
She smiled and it appeared more genuine this time, modest as she swept her eyes over him. “It’s a diner on Twenty-fourth. We can meet up there…or… you could come with me and wait outside.”
“All right.”
“All right,” she echoed when he picked up his step and walked beside her.
“What do you teach?”
“Violin,” she said, quickening her pace. “William Hutton is my very first student and I’m unforgivably late.”
“Take twenty percent off your fee.”
She turned while they hurried and looked up at him. “I was thinking of doing just that.”
He was tempted to smile at her. “It’s fair since you’re late.”
She nodded. “Yes, it is.”
He looked away from her curious gaze and shoved his hands back into his pockets. Fairness was a good virtue to possess, one he didn’t believe any member of The Bane practiced. Was she sincere in her offer to get the others to agree to forget him and his family?
Ellie and her cryptic group of friends wouldn’t be pleased with the agreement—if there were to be one. He would remain the only living Drakkon and he would remain alone.
“Well, this is it,” she said, stopping after another few minutes. She tipped her head back to meet his gaze and squinted against the sunlight behind him.
When she drew in a tight, little breath, his gaze dipped to her mouth and then to the pulse beat at her throat. He fought the urge to bend to her and inhale her neck.
“I’ll be back in forty minutes,” she promised and then turned to leave.
Garion watched her enter the apartment building in her pale pink parka, jeans, and boots and let his eyes linger on her longer than he should have, admiring her.
He should go. What did he know about having breakfast with a woman who wasn’t one of his three relatives? He hadn’t shared breakfast with anyone since he’d left England seven years ago. He’d been a recluse for as many years, for hell’s sake. He wasn’t sure how good he’d be at keeping the conversation going through a meal.
She was the daughter of the first man who ever tried to kill him for his blood. What was she after?
Garion was intrigued by Patrick White’s daughter. She hadn’t been afraid of standing before a man who could become Drakkon before she had time to stab him with some golden dagger she carried hidden away. She didn’t seem to be affected by such sensitivities. Instead, she’d stood her ground with him, not budging despite his most fearsome scowl. She’d cleverly used her wiles on him, demanding breakfast with him of all things. And she seemed to find him tolerable.
He wondered who had raised her after Marcus killed her father and how she ended up in New York. Who had initiated her into The Bane and made them enemies? Who had taught her to be fair?
He leaned against a parked car and wondered if he’d gone crazy. This interest she’d piqued in him was too dangerous. They’d been looking for him and they’d found him through his sister. The Bane would never stop until he was dead, or they were. The thought of killing Helena White didn’t appeal to him. The thought of killing anyone didn’t appeal to him. He’d killed before, merciless to screams and searing flesh. He never wanted to let it control him again.
A sound filled the air around him and drove out everything else. Soulful, haunting music drifted down from the sky, stirring his blood toward something more ethereal. Pushing off the car, he looked up instinctively at the sky. The music wasn’t coming from beyond the clouds, but from a window on the second floor. A violin being played by masterful fingers. He listened, letting the melody create images of her in his head. Her instrument tucked between her shoulder and jaw, her alabaster cheeks smudged by her long lashes resting on them, her expression lost to what she was playing.
William Hutton’s mother should be paying her son’s tutor for the privilege of listening to her play.
Ellie had told him Miss White played for the Philharmonic. Garion decided he’d like to go to one of her concerts.
He shook his head. What was he doing standing here waiting to have breakfast with a member of The Bane? Considering going to see her play? He did have many questions about the organ
ization. How many more of them were there? How dedicated were they to killing him? After over ten years of not turning any Drakkon, would The Bane forget he existed?
Perhaps this was the best opportunity to be done with them.
When she returned to him exactly forty minutes from when she’d left, he watched her as she came closer. Her father had flown. Drakkon essence ran strong in her blood. Maybe she wanted something much more serious than breakfast. Something like his blood.
”You waited,” she said, reaching him with surprise sparkling in her eyes.
“I did.”
“Hungry?”
He nodded and picked up his steps to walk at her side. It was odd and a little discomfiting to feel so at ease with an enemy. But then, she was a White, known for being amiable and easygoing. When Ellie had told him about Helena and Jacob White entering her life, the first thing Garion thought about was stopping them from getting any closer to his sister. Now, he was on his way to Tony’s with one of them. “You play very well.”
For a moment, she looked confused then she turned to look over her shoulder at the Hutton’s window. “Oh.” Her soft laughter drifted across his ears, rivaling the beauty of her brow. “You could hear.”
“Where did you learn?” he asked, nodding.
“Private school in Scotland,” she told him, crossing Twenty-fourth. “What you heard was the result of years of hard work—and I have a long way to go.”
He looked at her while they walked to the diner, taking in the way humility illuminated her face, the subtle arch of her brow, and the sun in her eyes. “It sounded perfect to my ears,” he said before he could stop himself.
They reached Tony’s and Garion stepped forward and held the door open.
She glided by him, a wispy thank you on her lips, a brief glance his way that made his skin go warm. She greeted a few people as if she came here often. She laughed with some of them. The sight and sound of her singed Garion’s blood and made him want to possess her the way a Drakkon possesses its treasure. He looked away, denying the unfamiliar effect she had on him. She was his enemy and the daughter of his father’s enemy. She was human.