by Zoe Chant
“Oh!” An elderly woman clutched her nightgown closer around her at their sudden appearance. “Is there a fire? Should we evacuate?”
“No, ma’am,” Dai said, politely touching the edge of his helmet. “But we need to make sure everyone’s safe. Can you tell us where the elevator is?”
“That way.” The old lady pointed down the corridor. “Is that what made that awful noise?”
“Shit,” Hugh muttered under his breath. He raised his voice, aiming his best glare at the spectators. “All right, back inside, people! We can’t do our job with you lot breathing down our necks!”
The gawkers unwillingly retreated into their apartments. With the humans out of the way, Hugh could see the double metal doors of the elevator at the end of the hallway. It was immediately apparent what had made the ‘awful noise’—the doors were buckled outward. Hugh guessed that the falling elevator must have somehow hit them and become wedged.
Dai rapped on the distorted metal. “East Sussex Fire and Rescue! Can anyone hear me?”
“Help!”
The trapped girl sounded young. From the way her thin, panicked voice seemed to be coming from near the ceiling, the elevator was evidently stuck somewhere between this floor and the one above.
“Don’t worry. We’re going to get you out.” Dai was already prizing at the doors, without noticeable effect. “John!”
The seven-foot-tall sea dragon braced his feet, fitting his massive fingers into the twisted seam of the doors. The tendons of his neck stood out as he applied his full strength. The doors emitted an ear-splitting squeal, moving the barest fraction of an inch.
“It’ll move, but we need more leverage.” Dai’s broad shoulders bunched as he too threw his full weight against the door, forcing it open a tiny bit more. “Hugh, crowbar!”
Hugh extracted the tool from their gear, tossing it to the dragon shifter. His own hands clenched as he watched the two men strain to open the door. He hated not being able to help, but there wasn’t any room for him to add his strength as well.
“I’m going to go up to the next floor,” he said abruptly, unable to contain his burning need to do something. “Maybe I’ll be able to see something from up above.”
*Be careful,* Dai said telepathically, too out of breath for words. *Just look, and tell us what you see. Don’t take any risks.*
Since Hugh’s talents were usually best deployed on the back lines, away from the heat of danger, it was understandable that his colleagues were somewhat over-protective of him. Still, it was bloody annoying. He was a fully trained firefighter as well as a paramedic.
“I can take care of myself,” Hugh snapped, grabbing another crowbar. “Try not to sprain anything in my absence.”
He hastened to the next floor. The elevator doors here weren’t as damaged as the ones below, though they were still a little bent. Hugh worked the crowbar into the rippled gap, braced himself, and heaved.
He might not have the brute size of a dragon, but he was still a mythic shifter. The doors slid open with a screech of protest.
Hugh angled his flashlight into the dark void of the elevator shaft. The reason for the elevator’s bizarre position was clear—all but one of the main cables had snapped. A couple of the loose ends were hanging free, swinging slightly.
“What in the name of all that’s holy did that?” he muttered, staring at the dangling ends.
They looked dissolved, like acid had eaten through the thick cables. Playing his flashlight beam down the one remaining cable, he could see deep pits in its surface. Whatever had destroyed the other cables had nearly gotten this one too. He had a nasty feeling that it was only a matter of time before it gave way as well.
He panned his flashlight lower—and jumped so badly that he dropped the damn thing.
Bloody hell, was that a face?
The flashlight clanged away down the side of the shaft, but not before the wildly spinning beam of light had flashed across someone crouched on top of the elevator.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Hugh yelled, his voice echoing down the narrow shaft.
“I’ve got to rescue my sister!” From the voice, the figure was a woman, though Hugh couldn’t make out anything other than a vague impression of a short, curvy form.
“That’s our job, you idiot!” Belatedly, Hugh remembered his three rounds of remedial sensitivity training. “I mean, we have the situation fully under control. Please, leave this to us professionals.”
The woman didn’t look up from whatever she was doing. “Like hell I will!”
So much for trying to do this by the book.
“Don’t you dare make me come down there!” he yelled.
“Bite me!”
His inner unicorn stamped a hoof. She calls to us! We must go!
Personally, Hugh was not certain that ‘bite me’ qualified as an appeal for help, but there was no arguing with his unicorn’s compulsion to race to the aid of fair maidens. Or, in this case, a cranky and annoying one.
With a growl of irritation, Hugh felt around the inside of the elevator shaft until he found the internal access handholds. Before he could talk himself out of it, he swung himself into the darkness.
“What the hell are you doing?” the woman shouted up as he started to climb down.
“My damn job, thank you very much.” Hugh groped for the next handhold. It was as black as the devil’s own armpit down here. “Which you aren’t helping with.”
*What on earth are you doing?* Dai’s telepathic voice demanded inside Hugh’s head. *What’s all that shouting?*
*Little busy right now!* Hugh sent, and slammed his mental walls up. He couldn’t risk getting distracted, and he didn’t want to divert Dai and John from the equally important task of getting the elevator door open.
He jarred his foot unexpectedly against the roof of the elevator cage, and bit back a curse. The single, overstrained support cable groaned in answer.
“Watch out!” The woman sounded simultaneously pissed off and frantic. “You’ll bring it down!”
“Do I look like an idiot? I’m not going to put my weight on it.” Bracing himself on the access ladder, Hugh stuck his other arm out, groping for the woman in the darkness. “Come here. I’ll get you to safety.”
She scrabbled away from his searching fingertips. “Don’t touch me!”
“I’m not trying to feel you up, woman,” Hugh snapped in exasperation. “Just take my hand.”
“I can’t. I lost my gloves.” Her voice came from low down, as if she was on her knees. “And I can’t get this bastarding access hatch open!”
Despite the swearing, her voice was trembling on the verge of tears. Clenching his jaw against expected pain, Hugh reached out again. The tips of his fingers brushed a denim-clad shoulder.
“Huh,” he said in surprise.
How about that. She’s a virgin. Practically rarer than I am.
She flinched from his touch. Typical. The first adult in months who hadn’t given him a screaming headache on contact, and she was as evasive as a buttered ferret.
He tightened his grasp, not letting her slip away. He could feel her jerky, labored breaths as she fought to contain her sobs.
“I promise, everything will be all right,” he said more gently. “My friends are getting your sister out. I can tell that they’ve nearly got the door open.”
She went still under his hand. “Really?”
“I promise.” From her scent, she was a shifter, though he couldn’t tell what kind. “We’re all shifters too. I can sense them telepathically. They’ll have her out in just a second.”
An ear-splitting screech echoed up the shaft. Hugh steadied the woman as the elevator cage shuddered underneath them.
*We have her, shield-brother!* John’s telepathic voice was a deep, triumphant chord, like a mix of cellos and bassoons. *She is shaken, but unharmed.*
*Let me be the judge of that,* Hugh sent back. *I’m on my way.*
“Your sister
’s out of the elevator,” he said out loud. “But I want to check her over. I’m a paramedic. My colleagues are excellent firefighters, but considering they tend to view broken bones as minor inconveniences, you really don’t want to rely on them for medical advice.”
“Hope’s safe?” Naked relief was clear in her voice.
“She’s safe.” Hugh squeezed her shoulder in reassurance. Maybe it was just the fact that he could touch her without pain, but he felt a sudden, deep surge of protectiveness toward her. “Now let me take care of you.”
Always, his inner unicorn whispered.
What? Caught off-guard by his animal’s unexpected comment, Hugh blinked. He was very aware of the heat of the woman’s body, even through her thick clothing.
“I can take care of myself,” the woman said, though there was something less certain about her tone, as if she too had felt that peculiar spark of connection. “Move out of the way. You’re blocking the ladder.”
Hugh cleared his throat. “Yes. Right. Well, at least let me help you up.” He struggled to reclaim his usual ironic detachment. “I can’t be the only firefighter who doesn’t rescue someone. It’ll look bad on my mid-year appraisal.”
She snorted, shrugging off his hand. “Tough, because I don’t need—“
Her words cut off in a scream as the last elevator cable snapped. On pure instinct, Hugh lunged, losing his own foothold in his haste to catch her.
He slammed back against the wall, dangling from the access ladder with one hand, the other clamped around the woman’s bare wrist. His arms screamed in protest, nearly wrenched out of their sockets.
“Let go! Let go!” the woman shrieked, which was not the usual response of someone dangling over a ten-floor drop.
“Damn it, woman, are you out of your bloody mind?” She was actually clawing at him. “Do you want me to drop you?”
“I don’t want you to die!”
“Neither do I, thank you very much! So stop thrashing about!”
*HUGH!* Dai and John’s mental shouts blasted his mind, nearly making him lose his grip on the slippery ladder.
“Damn your eyes, are you all trying to kill me?” Hugh snarled. His boots scrabbled at the side of the elevator shaft, hunting vainly for a foothold.
*We’re coming,* Dai sent, his telepathic tone frantic. *The ladder’s destroyed down here, we have to go up to the next floor. Just hold on!*
“Oh, well, and here I was considering letting go,” Hugh said under his breath. “Take your time. I’ll just be hanging around.”
The woman had finally stilled, much to his relief. “You…you’re still alive?”
“You sound,” Hugh grunted, finally getting a toe-hold on the ladder with one foot, “surprised.”
“You’re touching me! You should be dead! I can’t control my venom, not in a situation like this!”
The penny dropped. There was only one shifter in all of Brighton—probably in all of Britain—who was that deadly.
Hugh had never met her, but he’d certainly heard enough about her. He’d had more than one occasion to curse her name as he frantically battled to save someone from her venom.
“You’re that bloody wyvern shifter, aren’t you?” he demanded.
A moment of silence.
Then, “Yes,” she said, in a very small voice.
Well, that explained the fizzing tingle where his hand gripped her bare skin. As a unicorn, Hugh was able to neutralize any poison on contact.
“My venom really isn’t affecting you,” the woman said in disbelief. “How is that possible?”
Shit.
Unicorns weren’t the only type of shifter who could heal, but they were the only type powerful enough to counteract even a wyvern’s deadly abilities. He could only hope that the fact that unicorns were meant to be extinct would stop her from guessing what he truly was.
“I’m just very stoic.” Hugh gritted his teeth as he hauled her up one-handed. “Actually, I’m in terrible agony. Oh, the pain. Argh.”
She clung to the rungs next to him, her curvy body pressed tight against his. He still had hold of her wrist. He could feel the wild beat of her pulse.
She brought her hand up, blindly tracing the line of his jaw in the dark. Hugh’s own blood leaped at the tentative brush of her fingertips against his skin.
“No one’s ever been able to touch me,” she whispered. “Who are you?”
Flashlight beams stabbed through the darkness from above, illuminating her face at last. Hugh looked into her wide, emerald eyes…and knew.
“Oh shit,” he said. “I’m your mate.”
Chapter 3
He’s my mate.
It was all Ivy could do to keep her hands tucked safely in her armpits. Her palms tingled—not with venom, but with a desperate hunger to reach out and touch him. She couldn’t tear her eyes away from the paramedic’s elegant profile as he knelt next to Hope, checking her for injuries.
Normally, the sight of someone else near Hope caused her wyvern to fly into a jealous rage. But her beast was quiet, as intent on the paramedic as he was on his patient. Her wyvern didn’t mind that he was touching its treasure…because he was its treasure too.
And oh, he was beautiful.
His white hair gleamed in the dim corridor as if spun from moonlight. His skin was pale too, flawless as fine pearl. His high, sharp cheekbones could have been carved by Michelangelo. A strong jaw and chin balanced the elegant lines of his brow and nose, making his features unmistakably masculine.
For all his unearthly good looks, there was nothing delicate or fragile about him. She’d felt the strength in those swift, long-fingered hands when he’d saved her from falling. Even shrouded in the shapeless, bulky firefighter uniform, his shoulders were broad and powerful.
No one could ever call him merely pretty. He was beautiful, like lightning. He looked like an angel—but not the insipid Christmas-card sort. He was an avenging angel, filled with a fierce power so bright it hurt the eye.
And she was meant to be his mate.
No wonder he’d taken one look at her, and said Oh shit.
He hadn’t so much as glanced at her since. She tried to tell herself that he was just being professional, that he had to concentrate on Hope…but in her gut, she knew better. He was the most breathtaking man she’d ever seen, and she was…her.
Ivy, the wyvern shifter. The freak. Ugly. Unwanted.
Untouchable.
Yet he had touched her. The heat of his skin had seared her to her very bones. She felt like she would carry the invisible brand of his fingers around her wrist for the rest of her life.
He’d been in contact with her venomous skin for at least two minutes. And yet he was still alive.
Was it because he was her mate?
Her hands shook. She clamped down on them with her arms, hugging herself. A terrifying new emotion was growing in her heart, battling her wyvern’s ever-present rage.
Hope.
She thrust the unwanted feeling back down, trying to lock it away again. The naked dismay in those pale blue eyes had been painfully obvious even in the dimness of the elevator shaft. Even if he could touch her, why would he want to? Looking like he did, he could have anyone. He probably did have everyone he wanted.
Ours, her wyvern snarled. No one else’s. Our mate! Kill rivals!
Just the thought of someone else touching those perfect features had her inner wyvern on the verge of murder. Ivy swallowed hard, forcing back the burn of acid in her throat.
He doesn’t want you, she reminded herself savagely.
Her life—her sister’s life—depended on her being tough. She’d spent her entire life fighting the whole world, tooth and claw, in order to keep Hope fed, sheltered, and out of the foster care system. The lessons she’d learned on the streets were burned into her soul.
Never rely on anyone.
Never trust anyone.
And never, ever show a hint of weakness.
If he didn’t want her, well,
screw him. She wasn’t going to beg. Letting someone know that you needed them more than they needed you was like handing them a loaded gun. No way was she giving anyone that much power over her.
“Ma’am?”
With a heroic effort, Ivy managed to tear her eyes off her mate—no, she couldn’t keep thinking of him like that. Turning away from the bastard, she looked up at the firefighter who’d spoken. It was the red-headed one, with the soft Welsh accent. The other one—a towering, dark-skinned man—had gone down to check that the crashed elevator hadn’t started an electrical fire.
“Here,” the firefighter said again, holding out a pair of gloves at arms’ length. From his wary stance, he knew full well what she was. “I think it would be a good idea if you put these on.”
They were clearly his gloves, part of his turn out gear. Ivy accepted them, being careful not to get close to his bare skin. The thick fire-resistant material dwarfed her hands, engulfed her from fingertip to elbow.
The red-headed man’s broad shoulders eased down a little once her skin was safely covered. “That’s better. I’m Firefighter Daifydd Drake of the East Sussex Fire & Rescue Service.”
“I know who you are.” Ivy didn’t let a hint of fear show on her face, although her heart was pounding. “You’re Alpha Team.”
There was only one all-shifter group of firefighters in Brighton. Ivy had run into Dai Drake before—though that time, he’d been snarling down at her in red dragon form. She’d met some of the other members of the team before too, under less than pleasant circumstances. Since then, she’d done her level best to avoid their paths crossing again.
Which, apparently, was exceedingly ironic. She forced herself to keep her eyes fixed on Dai rather than glance again at the gorgeous paramedic.
“I remember you too,” Dai said, in a tone of voice that made it clear he too didn’t relish the memory. “There was a large amount of property destruction involved on that occasion as well. I need to ask you a few questions.”
“Back off, Dai,” the bastard snapped, before Ivy could respond. He didn’t look up from his examination of Hope. “Leave my—patients alone. I’m not having you badgering them while I’m working.”