by Riley Storm
“I’m in private security, ma’am,” she heard Rann say.
“A security guard?” her father said.
“Ah, no sir,” Rann said. “I’m a specialist contractor, I guess you could say.”
“What does that mean?”
Gayle couldn’t believe what was happening. Her parents were actually talking to him, giving him the time of day, and he was responding. Instead of trying to shift focus away from him, he was actually taking it and holding it.
And keeping it off of you.
Her eyes narrowed slightly as she tried to determine whether it was on purpose or just Rann’s personality shining through. He was a natural charmer, she knew that much, but she couldn’t tell if it was fake or not at this particular moment. It didn’t seem like a show, but then again, what did she know?
“I don’t sit at a desk and watch video cameras, ma’am,” Rann said with a wink. “They call me in for much more high-level situations. Scenarios where someone with special skills would be an asset to the completion of their task.”
“Like the Secret Service?” her mother asked.
“Um, I don’t work for government, but in a way, yes, I guess. I don’t normally do the bodyguard part, but close enough, without giving away any trade secrets,” Rann said, smiling wide from ear to ear.
“Right. Okay,” her father said, nodding as if he understood what Rann was getting at.
Gayle knew her father well enough to know that he was bluffing. None of them knew what Rann meant about his work, but neither were they going to ask.
“So how did you and Gayle meet?” her mother asked.
Gayle wilted. She knew that question. It was the prelude into her mother digging, trying to figure out who and what Rann was to her.
Even I don’t know the answer to that, mother. Please, just leave it alone, she pleaded mentally, knowing it was useless. Nobody was paying any attention to her anymore, they were fixated on Rann.
“Actually,” she said, interrupting, hoping to take the conversation back, and get rid of Rann, “we met while volunteering. You remember that charity I told you I was helping out with a lot, Mom?”
Three sets of eyes swiveled back to Gayle, suddenly reminded of her presence.
“Yes, of course. dear,” her mother said, glancing between the two of them. “That place you go to do work for free. I remember.”
“Mother, we had this conversation already,” she said. “I hate the cubicle job. In fact, I’m thinking of quitting the firm entirely. It’s a soul-sucking position that leaves me dead and empty on the inside. I hate it.”
“You just need to put in some time,” her father said. “Things will get better the longer you’re there.”
“I love you guys, but you’re hopelessly outdated on the way the world works,” Gayle said bluntly. “You don’t get ahead anymore by staying with the same company. You have to move around to get the real raises and promotions. It’s not for me. I like the charity, and I like working in Lilly’s store. That sort of stuff makes me happy, full, and content.”
Gayle fought back a blush as her mom’s brown eyes flicked to Rann, as if to say, ‘I know exactly what makes you happy, full, and content.’
“Anyway,” she pressed on, glancing over at her father, catching his bespectacled gaze and smiling. “Rann here was also volunteering his time, helping out a friend with the delivery of product. We started chatting.”
She saw Rann’s forehead crease at the lie, but there was no way she was telling her parents the truth, that they met in a bar where she was drinking after her ex dumped her. That story could wait to come out until a drunken family get together or something.
You’re assuming he’s still going to be around for that? Why would you do that?
Gayle gritted her teeth.
“Actually, a mutual friend sort of forced us to get talking,” Rann said, chiming in. “Turns out, we get along quite well.”
“Quite,” her mother said, a pointed reference to the fact that he’d come out of Gayle’s bedroom.
Can I die yet? Please. Just stop my heart. I can’t do an entire afternoon of this!
She wanted to tell her mother that it was just a random hookup thing, but that wasn’t ever going to happen. Gayle did not discuss her sex life with her parents. Ever. So she had to pretend like it was more. As if they’d hit it off.
It would be so much easier to just say that she never meant to sleep with him, but she was drinking and alone on her birthday, and look at him! How was Gayle supposed to refuse a specimen like him?
“Well, if we’re done judging me,” Gayle said with a bit more bite in her voice than intended. “Shall we go to brunch already?”
She almost added that she was hungry but caught herself in time. Things were already awkward enough. If she gave her mother the chance to make some comment about ‘having worked up an appetite,’ Gayle would just keel over and call it quits on life right then and there.
“Will Rann be joining us, dear?” her mother asked, a wicked curl to her mouth.
Gayle glared. Her mother was enjoying this!
“Unfortunately, no,” Rann said, speaking up first. “I have other commitments that I cannot miss. However, it was lovely meeting you. Perhaps we can meet again?”
“Yes,” Gayle’s mom replied brightly. “Perhaps we can all go out together one time. Though, Rann, might I make a suggestion if we do?”
Gayle tensed. Oh god, what was her mother up to now?
“Of course, Mrs. Weber,” Rann said.
“Maybe next time, remember to do up your fly first.”
Gayle closed her eyes.
Kill me now.
Chapter Eighteen
Rann
His mind was torn between duty and desire.
“He’s going to try and kill you, you know that, right?”
Rann glanced up at Trent, noting the worried look in the blue-eyed giant’s eyes. The older shifter was standing above him, pacing back and forth in the room while Rann sat on a bench and lost himself in thought. His friend was concerned for his safety.
And well he should be.
“Yeah. I do. That’s why the viewing room is packed,” he growled. “Lots of people know that there’s probably going to be some fireworks today. The bastard.”
They were referring to Rann’s opponent in his next match. Prax had easily defeated his foe and moved on, meaning a second-round meeting between the two had become inevitable. Everyone knew about the bad blood between them, and now it was going to finally come to a head.
“So why don’t you look focused on beating his smug ass?” Trent asked, crouching down on his thick legs until he was at eye-height with Rann.
Rann sighed. “She hasn’t answered my texts.”
“What?” Trent blinked, swaying back at the unexpected answer. “What are you talking about? I mean the fight, Rann. What about it?”
“It’s been over a day now, and I haven’t heard from her,” he went on, as if Trent hadn’t spoken a word. “I’ve sent her some texts. I even called her once. She won’t answer. I don’t want to be a pest or that guy who can’t take no for an answer, but…”
Trent snorted. “Have you ever been told ‘no’ by a woman you wanted before?”
Rann rolled his eyes. ‘Of course.”
Trent waited.
“Once.”
“Yeah, that’s what I thought,” Trent said, shaking his head and rising from his crouch. “So you found one that isn’t interested in you. It’s not the end of the world. You’ll find someone else.”
Rann surged to his feet and closed the distance, rage burning through him. “What if I don’t want anyone else?” he snarled, incensed by the suggestion that Gayle didn’t matter to him.
Trent bared his teeth. “Back off,” he growled. “Before I make you.”
The two shifters stared each other down for a double-handful of seconds before Rann pulled his gaze away and relaxed.
“Sorry,” he said, running a han
d through his long hair. “I’m not sure why I got so mad at you.”
“Nah, don’t worry about it. I said something dumb,” Trent replied.
They glanced at one another then nodded and that was that. They moved on.
“You need to get your head in the game for the fight today, Rann,” Trent said.
“I know. But we’re supposed to go out tonight. Then after yesterday, I don’t know. I…I don’t want to let go of her Trent. What the hell does that mean?”
Trent smiled. “It means you actually can care for someone,” he said. “Shocker, I know.”
Rann glared. “Ha-ha. I’m serious. I’ve never had this problem before.”
The other shifter stared at him for a moment then threw back his head and roared with laughter, the mighty guffaws echoing in the small changing room. “Oh, that’s good. That’s rich. ‘Problem’. Perfect word. Too good.”
Staring at his friend, Rann looked around in confusion. “Was it something I said?”
Trent, shoulders still bouncing with laughter, clapped him on the back. “You’ll get it one day. For now, though, you need to focus on Prax. If you let him beat you, he’s going to ensure you never get to see her again. Ever.”
By the time his friend stopped speaking, the laughter had left his square face, and the royal blue of his eyes had gone hard and cold.
“Do you understand me, Rann?”
Rolling his shoulders, Rann looked at the ground and then back up at his friend. Jade met cobalt, and the two exchanged a fierce stare.
“Oh, I’m ready,” he growled, cracking his neck first on one side then on the other. “One problem at a time, right?”
“Right,” Trent snarled. “Even if you aren’t going to be clan leader, Prax needs to be stopped. If he gains control, Atrox is going to become a cesspool.”
“Truth,” Rann said, his voice deepening. “Have to stop him.”
A distant bell rang, signaling the fighters to emerge.
Trent preceded Rann out of the door and into the room. He exchanged one last look with his friend then bent his legs and easily leapt up through the hole in the roof to take a spot on the ring, looking down at the participants.
A moment later, Prax came out of his chamber. He was wearing black compression shorts, and his gray eyes filled with hatred the instant they focused on Rann.
The two couldn’t be more opposite. Whereas Rann had long shaggy hair—now tied back to keep it out of the way, since he knew Prax wouldn’t hesitate to grab it—bright green eyes and a strong, chiseled face, Prax was his antithesis.
Taller, somewhat leaner, though still packed with muscle, Prax had cold gray eyes, a high-fade modern haircut, and a nose that was just a little too long for his face. The hatred etched onto his face seemed tailor-made for his features however, and Prax wore it like a familiar glove.
The man was nothing but anger. If he were to win and become the leader of Clan Atrox, he would mold it in his image. Angry. Rude. Uncaring.
Can’t let that happen, Rann said, vowing to himself that he would win today, no matter what.
Win the fight, and then go find Gayle.
“Ready?” he asked.
Prax responded by thrusting a fist forward and sending a blast of cold, hard ice at Rann’s chest.
“I guess that’s a yes,” Rann said as he stepped aside, easily avoiding the blast, bored at the tired predictability of his opponent.
Prax didn’t believe in rules. Didn’t believe in respect or being sportsmanlike. He believed in himself, and he believed in winning. That was it. In Prax’s eyes, that’s all there was in life.
Rann believed in more. He believed in the whole over the individual, and that’s why it was imperative that he win. Prax was angry.
“It’s about time you got what you deserved,” the gray-eyed, perfectly-groomed shifter snarled as he came forward behind a blistering fusillade of ice spears.
Steam flashed as they met a wall of flame, the searing fire mixing with the ice and causing the projectiles to explode as they were superheated. Rann lost sight of his foe behind the wall of fire and billowing steam clouds, but the oncoming rush of ice was a dead giveaway.
“I’ve been waiting a long time for this,” Prax said, the voice coming from a lot closer than expected.
Rann ducked, but he was a little slow as an ice-covered fist plunged through his defensive wall of fire and connected with his jaw. Only the fact that he’d already been moving prevented Prax from almost ending the fight then and there. The blow ripped apart the skin along his jaw and sent Rann to the ground, but he didn’t lose consciousness.
His foot lashed out reflexively, and it caught Prax straight in the gut. Rann had anticipated the other shifter would want to immediately close and end the fight, but the rapidly dissipating wall of flames had left him covered just long enough to deliver the blow.
Prax shot backward, flipping over in the air and landing in a crouch. He immediately popped back to his feet and came at Rann a second time. Ice hardened into blades along his arms and flowed over his hands, turning them into mailed fists.
Flaming armor coated Rann, and he met the charge head on. His feet slapped against the bare rock as he accelerated at Prax, snarling and pulling his teeth wide.
Prax grinned and came right in.
Idiot.
Once his foe was committed, having assumed Rann was coming in for a standup fight as well, Rann dropped all pretense of it. He dropped to his knees, taking Prax out at the ankles and then popping back up to his feet as the other shifter catapulted forward, smashing his face on the ground and bouncing twice before recovering his feet.
“I’m going to kill you,” Prax hissed, spinning to face Rann once more.
“Still won’t change the fact she went home with me, not you,” Rann drawled, inciting Prax’s anger even more. “Still won’t change the fact you lost.”
That was the source of their bad blood. A competition over a woman, back when Rann had been interested in such things. He’d won. He always won. Prax had been an ass back then too, and women saw through his gentlemanly façade with ease.
Prax hadn’t taken it well. It didn’t help that Rann had gloated in front of a number of other shifters, embarrassing Prax. But he’d been a different person then.
“Fuck you,” Prax spat, and a snowstorm billowed out from his palms, obscuring Rann’s vision.
He ducked to the side, sensing more than seeing the icicle that narrowly missed his chest. A second one crashed into his side however, nearly impaling him. It pierced his skin, but Rann was already calling upon flames to protect him, and they melted it before it could dig into the muscle and organs.
Hissing in pain, he rolled far out of the way, calling upon a matching flamestorm. Yellow-orange fire filled the room with Rann as its focal point. It warred with the ice, and hot steam billowed up into the viewing chamber. There, a storm dragon flicked an idle hand, and winds swirled it up and through a hole in the cave, preventing any of the observers from being burned.
Grunting with effort, Rann thrust his fists forward, exerting pressure on Prax. He pushed the other shifter back until he was trapped against a wall, a snow globe of ice surrounded by whirling, searing flame.
“It’s over Prax; you can’t win!” Rann howled over it. “Surrender!”
“To you? Never!” Prax shouted.
Then, he did something Rann hadn’t expected. He coiled up tight to the wall and propelled himself forward, straight at the living avatar of flame.
Ice coated his body, evaporating almost as soon as it was formed. But the self-sacrificing technique had caught Rann completely by surprise. The two impacted, falling to the floor, their respective elements fading away into nothing within seconds as they wrestled, grappling for better position.
Rann managed to slither around back first, but Prax drove an ice-coated elbow into Rann’s bleeding midsection, tearing the wound open more. Rann bellowed in pain and anger and replied by grabbing Prax’s other arm a
nd wrenching it hard in the wrong direction. Prax howled and resisted, trying to pull it back into his chest.
So Rann, gripping tight to the wrist, smashed his head into the elbow from behind, dislocating it. Prax cried out sharply, and in his pain, he managed to twist out of Rann’s grasp and get to his feet—
Just in time to receive a blast of fire straight to the face.
The flames burnt away his eyebrows and turned Prax’s skin red before he could put it out with his ice. He tried to respond, but Rann was already surging to his feet, and he caught the unprepared shifter with a mighty uppercut that lifted Prax from his feet and deposited him, unmoving, on the ground, eyes wide and unseeing.
Rann knelt over him, a flaming blade coming to rest next to Prax’s jugular.
“It’s over,” he snarled when the other shifter finally came to. “Yield.”
Prax looked ready to continue, but once he came to his senses and saw his predicament, he relented. Self-preservation won over pride. He nodded but never stopped staring at Rann, hatred in his gray eyes promising that it wasn’t over between them.
“Come on,” Rann said, stepping back, offering a hand. “Good fight.”
“Go fuck yourself,” Prax hissed, and Rann had to duck out of the way of an icy blast. “I’ll never take your hand.”
Rann watched the other shifter get to his feet and head back to his changing room.
“Whatever,” he muttered, and did the same.
He had other, more important things on his mind. Like what was he going to wear to his date that night.
Gayle might not be picking up her phone, but she hadn’t canceled on him, and until she did, Rann had every intention of showing up and showing her a fun time. After all, that’s what dates were supposed to be.
And he was sure it was a date.
Pretty sure.
Chapter Nineteen
Rann
The suit itched like hell.
All Rann could think about as he crept along the rooftop was taking the damn jacket off and incinerating it. Being that he was a fire dragon, it would be easy. Just a simple flick of his fingers, and voila, no more itchy jacket.