by Willa Hart
“What’s crazy is the fact I’ve been kept in the dark about all of this.” I didn’t care for the way he looked at me, as if I was to blame for him not knowing stuff. “Do you know who Titus is?”
“That Romanian dragon who attacked us.”
“How do you know him?”
I stood back up and moved behind the chair so he wasn’t looking down on me. I didn’t care for his accusatory tone, as if I was conspiring against him or something.
“I don’t. All I know is that he attacked us.”
“But surely you learned something while dragging my best investigators around the city for this long.”
My fingernails dug into the supple leather of the chair as I tried to control my temper. “That’s the business of Maximus Investigations, not yours.”
His lip curled in irritation and his voice grew louder. “On the contrary. When you put my investigators into harm’s way, then it’s absolutely my business. Which brings up another question. What is your relationship with my employees anyway? Hmm? Why is Kellum suddenly so protective of you when you only met last week?”
“If this is how you treat him, no wonder he wants a little change of scenery,” I snarled back, color flooding my face.
Lazlo’s eyes flashed to a bright silver, and I knew his dragon was close to the surface. But before he could say another word, the door slammed open behind me. Kellum rushed in, pushing Niles off him, while the other guys grabbed Lazlo’s keeper and held him back.
“Kellum, what is the meaning—” Lazlo started, but Kellum shut him down.
“This meeting is over, Lazlo.”
We locked eyes and Kellum subtly nodded toward the door. Fine by me! I glanced at Lazlo before leaving and gave him my haughtiest nod before heading for the door.
“Good day, Mr. Aurelia.”
Turning my back on a man had never felt so good.
Chapter Five
Words.
Words I didn’t know with my mind, but my heart understood them. My eyes couldn’t interpret them into anything meaningful, but my soul knew the translations. The meaning of the strange sequence of symbols floated just out of reach in my mind, like the name of a childhood friend nearly forgotten, lost to the relentless waves of time beating against a cold coast. The message was on the tip of my tongue, so close I could almost taste it, but too far away to grab hold of properly. I knew I had to hold on, cling to it as long as I could manage. It was as important as it was inscrutable to the eye, but I had to try my best. I had to try. The fate of the world, or at least my little corner of the world, depended on it.
Keep it close.
Keep it safe.
It was all disappearing, fading away into the void like sand through a sieve…
I awoke with a start, clammy and shivering. Goosebumps pebbled my skin and I shuddered under the old crocheted throw on Max and Shirley’s sofa. The room gradually came into focus, along with the bright beams of midday sun filtering through the drapes.
And then something else. Or someone else. Five of them, actually. I summoned up a weak smile for them, my boys. They watched me expectantly.
“Well?” Hale asked, sitting down on the sofa near my feet and laying a hand on my ankle. “Did it work?”
“Kinda,” I said as I sat up, making room for a couple more handsome men to sit next to me.
Normally I felt groggy after a nap, but this hadn’t really been a normal nap. It was a cerebral mission, a foray into whatever strange dark fissure in the void I could slip through to find the truth, into whatever shadowy corner it cowered. This time I went out searching for Max.
I’d found him before, and with all the crazy shit going on, we really needed to talk to him. I still had no clue how I was even capable of such a thing. I had no control over it, like when I’d woken up inside the elder council chamber. Most of the time it just sort of…happened. But the guys had encouraged me to be proactive this time.
“I need a notepad,” I muttered, rubbing my forehead in an attempt to not let what I saw fade into oblivion.
Ash scrounged up a pen and paper, and while I drew the strange symbols from my visit to Max’s lair, the rest of them peppered me with questions.
“Did you see Max?” Kellum asked.
Then it was Danic’s turn. “What did he say? Any clues about Titus or what’s going on?”
“What’s your favorite ice cream flavor?” Ryen added. When the others turned to look at him, he shrugged. “What? I’m curious if she’s a cookies ’n cream kinda gal or a freak who prefers licorice ice cream.”
I snorted as I finished the last symbol, then looked up at Ryen. “Rocky road.”
He grabbed his chest as if I’d shot him in the heart. Turning to the others, I told them the hard truth none of us wanted to hear.
“Max wasn’t there this time. I found his lair, but there was no sign of him.”
Danic scowled and sat on the sofa’s arm. “If he’s not here, and he’s not in his lair, where is he?”
“Maybe he doesn’t want to be found,” Ash offered.
“But why?” I asked. “Why hide from us?”
I felt a little pouty that my trusty, crusty uncle hadn’t been available when I needed him, which I knew was juvenile, but…I missed him. It also made me uneasy. His lair had looked exactly as I remembered, but the emptiness of it had shaken me for a reason I couldn’t place.
“Maybe he’s not hiding from us,” Kellum said grimly.
That wasn’t a thought I wanted to entertain for long. Anything or anyone who was scary enough to force Uncle Max into hiding was certainly a force to be reckoned with. Max was the casique of his weir. He was strong. Tough. Unruffled by danger or risk. If there was something out there sinister and dangerous enough to force him into the shadows, then what hope was left for the rest of us?
“Or maybe he just went out for some In-N-Out,” Ryen added, easing my worry slightly. Max did love their “animal style” fries.
“What’s that?” Hale asked, reaching for my drawing.
I handed it over. “It was on a piece of paper in Max’s lair. I think it’s a note, but… What the hell is all that gibberish I scribbled? I swear I understood it inside my vision, but it makes absolutely no sense to me now.”
Hale’s brow creased as he passed the note to Kellum. “I think it’s Balaur.”
“What’s Balaur?”
Kellum adopted Hale’s scowl and nodded. “It’s our ancient tongue. It’s all but extinct, honestly, though there’s a push by old-timers to bring it back so we don’t lose our heritage.”
“I can make out a few of the words, but not enough to make sense of it all,” Hale said. “You?”
“A few,” Kellum nodded.
Ryen fixed a surprised look on me. “Favor, how do you know a dead dragon language? Did Uncle Max teach you?”
“No, I never even knew you guys had your own special language until Enoch mentioned it.”
The thought of poor, misguided Enoch Trinkas brought a profound wave of sadness. There were few enough dragons in the world for a band of them to murder one of their own. My hands clenched with a burning desire to hunt down the dragon responsible, a Romanian named Titus, and make him pay.
“Weird how I almost understood it all before I woke up,” I said, peering at the paper in Kellum’s hand, as if that might help. “What’s it say?”
“I’m not really sure. I can pick out some names and a couple of other words. What about you guys?”
The boys passed the note around and pointed out the words they knew. In the end, none knew enough to have the entire note make sense, but Max had mentioned Titus by name. He’d also written the Balaur words for dragon, Romania, fly and, farther down the page, Par’tia Niles.
“That’s your boss’s dragon keeper,” I pointed out, recalling the rather uptight human who’d greeted us at Drakonis a few hours earlier. “Maybe he knows something about Max’s whereabouts.”
Danic lit up. “We should go talk to him.�
�
Ash shot a concerned glance over at Kellum, who looked troubled himself. Ryen’s gaze bobbed around the group, as if expecting one of them to say something.
“Uh, you do know Lazlo’s our boss, right, bro?” he finally asked Danic. “We’re already skating on thin ice with everything that’s gone on, and now you want to interrogate his par’tia?”
“Talk to,” Danic corrected. “There’s a difference.”
“We need to tread carefully here, Danic,” Ash said.
Kellum shook his head. “We can’t step on Lazlo’s toes. Not only is he our boss, but with Max MIA, everyone’s looking to Lazlo as the acting leader of the weir. For all intents and purposes, until Max returns, Lazlo is our casique.”
“Uh uh, no way,” I said, launching myself up from the sofa and planting my hands on my hips. Of course, I had to tip my head way back to meet Kellum’s surprised gaze, which probably didn’t make me appear all that threatening, but someone had to stand up for what was right.
“I don’t give a rat’s ass that Max isn’t physically here. He’s the casique of this weir. Period.”
Kellum grimaced. “You don’t understand, Favor—”
“Oh please! Are you really going to stand there and tell me Max hasn’t disappeared for weeks at a time before? He’s a thousand fucking years old! A week is like a blink of an eye to you people.”
“What do you mean ‘you people’?” Ryen joked, referencing a gag from an old movie.
I wasn’t in the mood. “Listen, I know for a fact Max has left town for longer than a week during his tenure as casique. Does Lazlo try to wrest control of the weir for himself every time Max leaves town for a P.I. job?”
“No,” Kellum said, rubbing a hand through his close-cropped hair, “but Max isn’t on some assignment. He’s just…gone. No one knows where.”
“That doesn’t give Lazlo the right to jump into the void,” Danic said, coming to my defense. “Favor’s right. Lazlo’s a good guy, but he can’t fill Max’s shoes and we all know it. Hell, he probably knows it.”
Kellum held his hands up to calm the situation, but it only further irritated me that he would continue to defend a usurper. Apparently Danic felt the same because he knocked one of Kellum’s hands away. Naturally that didn’t go over very well. Kellum’s eyes flashed bright blue, a sure sign of his dragon. They both puffed out their chests and got in each other’s faces, and I momentarily wondered what a brotherly dragon fight would look like. Human brothers would have wrestled until the winner gave the loser a noogie or a purple nurple. I had a sneaking suspicion dragon brothers did things a little differently.
The energy in the room grew a sharp edge, almost metallic on my tongue. Danic and Kellum circled each other like furious animals, baring their teeth and seeming to grow a little taller. I might not have noticed it if I hadn’t seen their transformation into dragons. The others backed away, ready to give the brothers space to duke it out, but I didn’t want to waste any more time with such nonsense.
“Enough,” I snapped, grabbing Danic’s wrist and pulling him toward me.
It was a little like trying to budge an annoyed elephant, but when he realized it was me grabbing him, he relaxed a little and backed away from his older brother. He delivered a hard look to the rest of the guys and gave a low growl.
“We’re going to talk to Niles.”
And that was that. The others backed away, giving us plenty of room to pass. We didn’t say a word as we headed for his SUV, but I kept my hand on his wrist. He led me to the passenger side and, ever the gentleman, even in anger, he opened the door for me. As Danic revved the engine to prove some testosterone-fueled point to his brother, I bathed in the glow of his rage. It intoxicated me in the strangest way.
I’d always been an empathetic person, but ever since I started hanging out with dragons, I picked up on their moods more than ever. Danic was pissed off, so I was pissed off. That shared anger heightened my senses, so when he reached across the console between us and laid his hand on my thigh, a tremble of arousal shivered down my spine.
As Danic turned onto Pico Boulevard and headed for Drakonis Security Systems, I took a deep breath and centered myself, letting the anger energize me in whatever way it would. Something niggled at my brain but instead of ignoring it, as I usually would have, I leaned into it. I gasped and my eyes popped open with understanding so certain it couldn’t be denied.
“He’s not there!”
Danic shot me a look. “What?”
“He’s not at Drakonis. I can feel it.”
“You can… Wait, what?”
I shook my head. “I can’t explain it, but I know without a doubt that Niles is not at Drakonis.”
“How?”
“I-I don’t know, I just do. It feels a lot like how I know when you guys are near, only not quite as…” I dug around for the right word. “Sharp.”
“Max was right that your powers are developing really fast,” he said. “Where is he?”
I stared at his strong profile for a long moment, disbelieving that he’d actually believed me. Not only that, but he hadn’t even questioned me. He hadn’t scoffed or quizzed me, he’d simply trusted I was telling the truth. It took all my strength not to grab his face and kiss him right there as we drove down the busy street, but causing a multi-car accident didn’t seem like a good idea at the moment.
“Turn around.”
Without a word, Danic flipped a U-ey at the next light and headed back the way we’d come. I closed my eyes, cracked my window, and let the wind dance across my face. I felt him smiling, even though I couldn’t see him. I also felt his hand creeping up my thigh. The same intense magnetism coursed through us both at our strange connection. He might have been at the wheel, but I was the GPS leading us to our destination. I couldn’t help wondering if it would be the same in bed.
“Here!” I cried when I felt the tug of Niles’s presence.
I opened my eyes to find we were in front of Roscoe’s House of Chicken and Waffles, a very popular local restaurant that served…well, the name said it all. Danic found a spot in the small lot, and before I could jump out, he rushed around to my door and lifted me out of the tall rig. But he didn’t release me. As soon as my feet hit the pavement, he took my face in his hands and frantically kissed my forehead, my cheeks, my neck, my jaw. Everywhere but my mouth. When his lips finally crushed mine, I returned his ardor.
We were on fire, blazing so hot it threatened to burn us both to ashes. The people standing in line to get into the restaurant could see us, but I didn’t care. His calloused, powerful hands slid down my body, groping my breasts and grabbing my hips as I stood on my tiptoes to better reach him. The passion burned intensely enough I almost lost my self-control, but when he broke our kiss to devour my earlobe, I managed to get hold of myself for long enough to push him back a few inches. He growled with urgency, but I remained steadfast.
“I-I need to tell you something,” I choked out, my throat tight with need and anxiety.
He watched my eyes and waited. How the hell was I supposed to tell him? He’d be crushed. Or furious. Or both. Swallowing hard, I met his gray eyes.
“Kellum and I… Um, we, uh… Slept together. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner!”
I winced as I waited for him to erupt, but to my eternal surprise, he appeared completely nonplussed.
“Yeah, we know. So?”
Then his lips were on mine, crushing me into oblivion.
Chapter Six
Danic’s lips were more insistent, more demanding than Kellum’s, nearly pushing the fact he’d barely reacted to my bombshell out of my head. Still, it took a second for me to process the fact he — and apparently the other guys — not only knew about my little adventure with Kellum but didn’t care. When that settled in, a huge burden lifted, one I hadn’t even been aware I was carrying. I released any hesitation on my part and dove lip-first into making out with Danic.
Propping one booted foot onto the runn
ing board for better purchase, he half-lifted me by my ass and I responded by wrapping my legs around his, my low heels digging into the backs of his knees. I clung to him like a baby monkey, unable to get enough of him. His tongue explored mine, his hands roamed my body, his intoxicating scent, which reminded me of sandalwood and bonfire, made me woozy.
A shadow passed over my closed eyes and I peeked them open long enough to see a couple of guys who’d been waiting in line edging closer to get a better view. Danic’s back was to them as he ran his hand up my thigh and to my breast. I almost didn’t care that we had an audience. Almost.
I marshaled all the will I possessed and placed my palm on his chest, gently pushing him away. It was one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do in my life. His confusion was totally adorable.
“What’s wrong? You don’t want this?” he huffed, his chest heaving in and out.
“Oh, I want this,” I murmured, eyes wide and roving over his body with an open hunger I usually tried to hide. “But this is also the parking lot of one of the most popular restaurants in the area.”
He stared at me blankly, as if I’d just spoken a foreign language.
“In the middle of lunch hour,” I added, then shot a glance past him to the small crowd staring at our display.
Understanding started to filter through but hadn’t really taken hold yet. “Okay…”
“Which means someone’s either going to call the cops or start charging admission to the show.”
I tried not to snicker when he looked back at everyone staring at us. When he turned back to me, amusement and excitement flickered in his eyes.
“I see your point, but if they want to watch, more power to ‘em. I don’t care who sees how I feel about you. And considering how little alone time we get, we might not have much of a choice.”
I laughed outright. “What, because you can’t control yourself?”
Danic’s smile fell away and he grew serious enough that I followed suit. “Not where you’re concerned.”