She opened her eyes for a moment and saw that Knox had closed his own eyes at this point. He was moving faster and faster now, nearing his own wonderful release. Before Bree’s body had even finished trembling, he let out a long, loud roar. His body stiffened, and he found his release, pulsing into Bree and truly becoming one with her.
It took several minutes for them to both catch their breath again. When they had, Knox slid out of Bree and lay beside her, pulling her into his arms. They could not sleep yet. It was too early. They had cold burgers to reheat and eat, and plans to make for tomorrow. But, for now, they let themselves savor this moment, safe and content in each other’s arms.
And in that moment, he was not a dragon and she was not a wizard. They were not two people living two completely different lives, with no idea how they could build a life together. They were just two people, with hearts that had the same heartbeat.
Bree smiled happily and snuggled her face into Knox’s chest. What more did you really need than that?
Chapter Fourteen
Even though the blinds were closed, the bright morning sun somehow found a way to stream into the tiny bedroom of the apartment. Knox’s face lay inconveniently right in the path of the large sunbeam, and so he woke very early, even before the alarm clock had gone off. The summer days were long right now, and the sun rose before most of Mountain View’s residents had opened their sleepy eyes.
Knox looked over at Bree, whose face was turned away from the window at the moment. She was snuggled deeply underneath the dark gray comforter, which was rising and falling with the rhythm of her sleep. A smile turned up the corners of Knox’s lips as he looked at her. He could hardly believe what had happened between them last night. It had been a whirlwind day, and he had never expected it to end with the chance to make love to Bree. But he was eternally grateful for that chance. He felt deep down in his bones that she was his lifemate. Her soul was connected to his, and they had bonded. He would find a way to make things work between them, no matter what the price. She was worth it. If he had to give up his position as leader of the Redwood Dragons to be with her, then he would. He hoped with all his heart that it wouldn’t come to that, but he was willing to give up everything for Bree. She made him whole in a way he had never been whole before.
A buzzing from Knox’s phone drew him out of his reverie. He looked over to see that Noah was calling him. Knox sat up quickly, surprised. It was still rather early for Noah to be calling. Was something wrong back in the Redwoods? Were his clan members all okay?
Knox grabbed the phone, slipping silently out of the bedroom and closing the door behind him so that he wouldn’t wake Bree. He answered the call quickly once he made it to the apartment’s living room.
“Noah? Is everything alright?”
“Hey, boss! Yes, everything’s fine. Sorry if I woke you, but I’ve actually got some good news.”
“Don’t worry. I was already awake,” Knox said. “What’s your news?”
“I got a call from a guy I met in Portugal. A bear shifter who helped me a lot with my mission over there. I trust the guy completely. He’s one of the ones who told me he’d heard rumors of there being more dragon stones, and he’s been following the news on the dragon sapphire closely. He learned last night that the sapphire should be arriving in Mountain View today. It was supposed to be coming next week, but the gem collector bumped up the timeline quite suddenly because he got wind that someone might be trying to steal it.”
“Looks like the other guys who are after it are being sloppy, huh?” Knox asked.
“Maybe,” Noah said. “Or maybe more shifters are learning that the dragon sapphire exists. I talked with Pierce and he’s worried that word has leaked out.”
Knox frowned. “That’s not good news,” he said.
Pierce was a unicorn shifter, and one of the shifter protectors. He had helped with the recovery of the emerald dragon stone, the original dragon stone that, until a few days ago, Knox had thought was the only dragon stone in existence. As a shifter protector, Pierce was responsible for the safety of the shifter community as a whole, and he kept a close eye on anything that might threaten shifter safety. Pierce had seen it all, and if he was worried, there was probably reason to be worried.
“Well, if word has leaked out, the best thing to do is take care of getting the dragon sapphire as soon as possible. The sooner we can get a hold of it, the less chance there will be of someone with bad intentions getting their hands on it. And I think today might be your best shot at it.”
“Sounds like you’ve got a plan worked out?” Knox asked.
“I do,” Noah said. “I’ve spoken with our contact who was working on the fake dragon stone for you. He’s all finished up with the replica, and he’s going to meet you at your apartment to drop it off. He should be there in about an hour. Then, you and Bree are going to intercept the armored guard driving the truck with the real stone to the gem collector’s house. The gem collector flew in to Los Angeles to try to confuse people, and now he’s riding back to Silicon Valley in one of those trucks driven by an armored guard. He’s coming up Highway 101, and the bear shifter I spoke with has eyes on the truck. He’s going to let us know when it’s getting close to you guys, and we’ll plan an intercept somewhere on a relatively deserted stretch of highway.”
“You’re sure you can trust this guy?” Knox asked, although he already knew the answer to the question. Noah would not be listening to the man if he didn’t trust him.
“He’s definitely trustworthy,” Noah said. “He’s a good guy, and helped me out a lot on my last mission. He wants to make sure that the good shifters stay in power. He told me his family lost a lot during the last great shifter war, when the evil shifters almost took over. He has a son, and he wants to make sure that his son doesn’t have to deal with the same horrors he did during his childhood.”
“Okay,” Knox said, satisfied by Noah’s explanation. It was a common story, shared by many shifters around Knox’s age. Knox himself was an orphan due to the last shifter war, as were the rest of the Redwood Dragons. They understood all too well how much could be lost when evil took over.
“So the only hitch in our plan is that we don’t really have a plan for how to replace the dragon sapphire without the armored guard or the gem collector realizing what we’re doing,” Noah said. “Ideally, we’d like to make the switch without them realizing anything had happened. That way we don’t have to fight them. This would also keep the bad guys off our trail. If they think the gem collector still has the real stone, they’ll keep chasing him instead of chasing after us. Hopefully, by the time they realize that a switch has been made, we’ll be far, far away and they’ll have no idea who was actually behind the switch. That’ll make it much easier to keep the dragon stone safe.”
“That would be ideal,” Knox agreed. “But it’s going to be tough to replace a dragon stone in an armored, guarded vehicle without anyone realizing what’s going on.”
“I know,” Noah said. “But we were kind of hoping that Bree might have some tricks up her sleeve. There’s got to be some sort of spell she could cast to distract the guard and the gem collector.”
Knox couldn’t keep a smile off his face at the mention of Bree’s name. “I’ll ask her,” he said. “I’m not very knowledgeable on the latest wizard trends, but hopefully she knows of something that will work.”
“Alright, well, keep me posted on what she says. I’d suggest that as soon as the fake sapphire has been dropped off that you guys start driving south on Highway 101. The sooner you can intercept the armored vehicle, the more chances you might have to make the switch.”
“Roger that,” Knox said. “I’ll go wake Bree up and we’ll start getting ready to go. How are things with the clan?”
“Everything’s great,” Noah said. “Don’t worry about us. The guys here are working on some practice missions, and the guys out on the field are making good progress on their real missions. Everything is running smoothly
.”
“Sounds like you don’t need me at all,” Knox said with a laugh.
Noah chuckled. “We do need you. We need each member of our crew. We make a good team together.”
“Very true,” Knox said, pride filling his chest. His dragons were all special in their own ways, and together the ten of them made a powerful team.
“Alright, well, I’m going to let you go so I can get back in touch with the guy bringing you the fake stone. I’ll let you know when I have an exact time that he’ll be arriving.”
“Ok,” Knox said. “Bree and I will start working on a plan for swapping out the stones.”
“Sounds good, keep me updated,” Noah said.
“Will do.”
Knox hung up the call, then looked up and nearly jumped out of his skin when he saw Bree standing in the hallway, leaning against the wall and smiling over at him.
“Hey you,” she said with a slight chuckle. “Startled you, didn’t I?”
“I’ll say,” Knox said, shaking his head. “I didn’t hear you moving at all.”
“Wizards are pretty good at stealth,” Bree said. “But unfortunately there’s no spell for listening in to the other side of the phone conversation. Sounds like you got an update on our mission?”
Knox nodded. “Yup, that was Noah. Looks like we’re going to be on the move today. Which is too bad, because I’d like nothing more than to spend the day in bed with you.”
Bree smiled. “Trust me, the feeling is quite mutual. But we knew that we’d be busy. Finding the dragon sapphire is more important than anything else right now.”
“Well, today might be the day we actually recover it,” Knox said. Then he filled Bree in on everything Noah had told him. Bree furrowed her brow and came to sit at the small kitchen table. Knox followed her with his eyes, taking in how lovely she looked even with her messed up bed head hair, and wrinkled sweatpants and t-shirt. He felt a stiffening between his legs and he knew his eyes were blazing with desire. If only he had met her some other time, when the fate of so many people wasn’t resting on their shoulders. He would have loved to forget all his responsibilities for a while and run off with her, soaking in every moment together.
But now was not the time to leave behind responsibilities. And, besides, the dragon sapphire had brought them together. It had brought wizards back into the world of shifters. Perhaps Knox would never have met her if it hadn’t been for the stone. All he had to do now was get the stone quickly today, and then he’d have time with Bree. Simple, right?
Something told him that things were unlikely to work out so quickly and easily.
“It wouldn’t be that hard to trick them, actually,” Bree said. “I could use an invisibility spell to hide from them. Then I could use an unlocking spell to open the truck. The hardest part will be making sure they don’t see the truck opening. I can’t make the truck door itself invisible because that would be too obvious. So even if I’m invisible myself, they’ll still see the door of the truck opening.”
“Can’t you do some sort of spell to cloud their eyes or something?” Knox asked.
“I could,” Bree said. “But then they might get suspicious. They would know that their eyes were clouded over, and unless they were idiots they would guess that it was because someone was trying to steal the stone.”
“But you would have switched the stones out by the time their eyes were unclouded and they checked the stone. So they would think everything was fine,” Knox said.
“Maybe,” Bree said, but her voice was doubtful. “But I’m worried that if they have any hint that something is going on that they would check to make sure the stone hadn’t been replaced with a fake. It seems to me that the gem collector is very suspicious already. He wouldn’t fly to a different airport and hire an armored vehicle with a guard if he didn’t think that someone was trying to get the stone. And if he thinks that someone is trying to get the stone, he’ll probably double check to make sure it’s not a fake.”
Knox shrugged. He supposed that Bree was right. They could not be too careful, as far as Knox was concerned. He wanted this stone recovered today so this mission could be wrapped up and he could focus on other things—like getting back to his dragons and spending time with Bree.
“How long do you think it will take you to do the unlocking spell and switch the stones?” Knox asked.
“It’s hard to say,” Bree replied. “It depends a lot on how complicated the locks are on the vehicle. But I’ve always been good at unlocking spells, so unless the locks are crazy different from anything I’ve seen before, I should be able to make the switch in five minutes tops.”
“Will the unlocking spell be noisy?” Knox asked.
Bree shook her head no. “Not any noisier than the door of the back gate of the truck opening. The unlocking spells should not set off any alarms because they aren’t actually ‘breaking into’ the doors. They’re actually unlocking them in proper fashion.”
“Maybe it’s as simple as distracting the guys with conversation, then,” Knox said. “If we can catch them before they stop for lunch, then we should be able to easily make the switch. The drive from L.A. to here is long enough that they’re bound to want to stop for lunch, or at least a snack, right? When they do stop, I’ll just talk to them for a few minutes so they aren’t watching the truck, and then you can switch the stones.”
“That’s probably the best plan,” Bree said. “But it does assume that they’ll be stopping, and that the back gate of the truck will be facing away from the window of wherever they stop. I’m worried that they might only stop once, and that they’ll still be closely watching the truck. The drive isn’t that long, you know. It’s not even seven a.m. now. If they’ve already left and they drive straight here, they’ll be in Mountain View by lunchtime.”
“You’re right,” Knox said with a frown. “We might need to create a diversion of some sort. Like a closed road.”
Bree looked up at him and grinned. “Oh that should be easy enough. Although it will require damaging the road, which is probably against the law.”
Knox laughed at the mischievous look in her eye. “I’m pretty sure that stealing an enormous sapphire is against the law, too. If we’re going to be criminals, we might as well keep going once we’ve started.”
“True enough,” Bree said. “Sounds like it’s time for me to put some destructive spells to work.”
Knox grinned, and just then his phone buzzed. It was a text from Noah.
The guy with the fake stone will be at your door in ten minutes. The real stone is on the move, an hour north of Los Angeles. We are monitoring its position closely.
Knox looked up at Bree. “We better get dressed. The fake stone will be here in ten minutes, and we should be ready to move as soon as possible after that.
Bree’s eyes widened as she nodded over at him.
“I can’t believe it’s actually possible that we might get the stone the first day we’re here,” she said. “I thought it was going to take much longer than that.”
“I did, too,” Knox said. “Which is why we got the apartment. But if we don’t actually need the apartment, I’m not going to complain. If we get the stone on our first attempt, that would be a dream come true. More time to get to know you.”
He winked at Bree, and she blushed, then abruptly stood.
“I’m gonna go get changed,” she said.
Knox watched her walk toward the bedroom, his heart beating wildly in his chest.
“Please let this crazy plan work today,” he said aloud to the empty room. “I need more Bree time in my life.”
He’d never thought he’d be the type to pine for a woman. But oh, how quickly things could change when you found the right woman.
Chapter Fifteen
Bree squinted at the road ahead of her, wishing she hadn’t forgotten her sunglasses at the apartment. The sun was unbelievably bright today, and after several days of being in the relative shade of the Redwood forest, her eyes pro
tested at its unforgiving brilliance.
She glanced over at Knox, who was in the passenger seat with his cell phone glued to his ear, consulting with Noah about the location of the armored car. According to Noah’s sources, who were following the armored car at a distance, the armored car had not yet stopped. It was speeding toward Silicon Valley at a consistent pace of ten miles per hour above the speed limit—the perfect pace to go as fast as you could without running a real risk of being pulled over by the police.
Bree glanced down at Knox’s lap, where an inconspicuous cardboard box was sitting. The box looked like one of those simple favor boxes you might get at a child’s birthday party, but what it held was quite different from plastic childhood trinkets. The box held the fake dragon sapphire, which had been dropped off at the apartment in Mountain View about an hour earlier. Bree had marveled at the replica, which filled the entire palm of her hand and looked surprisingly like a real sapphire. Bree was no expert in gemstones, but even she could tell that this was not some cheap knockoff. The guy who had made this replica knew a thing or two about making fake gemstones. Bree had a feeling that it would have fooled even an expert.
But would it fool the gemstone collector and the armored guard? That was all that mattered for today. They needed to replace the stone quickly and without the gem collector knowing what had happened. Bree glanced down at the giant gem that adorned her own finger—the large ruby on her magic ring, which glinted brilliantly in the sunlight. She felt a nervous twisting in the pit of her stomach as she reviewed in her mind the spells she was planning to use to carve a large fissure in the middle of the highway, effectively blocking traffic, and, hopefully, giving her a chance to steal the real dragon sapphire.
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