by Skye Jones
Nathan blew out a long, slow breath, struggling for calm. “We are going to see her.”
“You think it’s wise?”
“What do you suggest? Letting our mate go? Not trying to get her back?”
“No. I have a different suggestion.”
He rolled his hand, encouraging Dom to spit it out.
“We give her space. Let her miss us–and she will. Let her come to terms with all of this. She’d only been here a few days. And where we realize dragon mates fall fast and hard, Ice had no clue. She has a human perspective. To her the whole falling for someone at first scent—it seems weird, or unbelievable. She seemed about to come around when all this happened. Then whamo, she’s descended from an annihilated and hated clan. So if she’d been on the fence at all…” He trailed off. “I think it gave her an excuse. A reason to leave. She half wanted this, but half freaked out over it, too.”
Dom sipped water from the bottle in his hand. “So, yeah. Give her time to think about things. Time to realize her true feelings, how strong they are, and to miss us. Let her train for her fight, and go watch it. Support her. Show we care about her and the things she deems important. Show we can be flexible and modern. Then we try to win her back.”
As far as plans went, it didn’t sound half bad. Giving Ice time wouldn’t hurt. It would hurt him, but it ought to help the situation. Plus, going to see her fight would show her they weren’t as sexist and set in their ways as she thought.
“Downside to your plan is the six full weeks we’ve got till her fight. Six weeks without her.”
Dom smiled again. “We’ll have to use the time to get to know one another better, eh?”
Nathan’s mouth twitched in response, as did his cock. He supposed the time could be used constructively.
“What about her safety? We can’t leave her out in the human world, unprotected.” Nathan hated the idea. “Not now the Welsh Clan have seen her. She’s in danger.”
“I’ve thought about this. How about we put a guard on her? Someone who’ll fit in with the humans. Someone like Jonathon?”
Jonathon enjoyed spending time amongst humans. He loved their movies, TV shows, their clothes and cars. Most of all he loved their females. So he hung around in bars and nightclubs, picking women up. He’d also not spent any time around Ice. She wouldn’t recognize him.
Nathan nodded. “He’s a good choice. He’s strong, and a good fighter. He’ll fit in well, as you say. Ask him. I’ll give our Welsh friend, Robert, a ring. I want his assurances now Ice has left our settlement, she will be safe. I’ll tell them she’s been exiled as punishment. If I paint it as us sacrificing our mate in exchange for her safety, there’s no way he can refuse without it being seen as the act of war they threatened us with.”
Dominic nodded. “I’ll go get the ball rolling.”
An hour later, Nathan sat nursing a brandy. He’d struggled through a long and boring talk with Robert about Clan rules, but at least the other leader acknowledged their great sacrifice in giving up their mate and that a debt was owed. He’d vowed Ice would be left alone. Of course, Nathan didn’t bother to mention his hope she’d be back in his bed within weeks. He’d face the shit storm her returning to them would bring when it happened.
Ice unwrapped her hands and cracked her neck, side to side. She’d been training for five weeks solid and was in the homestretch. She turned the shower on hotter than she could stand. Anything to distract herself. She let the near scalding water sluice over her spent muscles.
And boy did she train! She’d never worked so hard in her life. Sadly, not due to her amazing commitment, but her need to work off the insane emotions circling her all the damned time. She spent every day hyped-up and strung out. Not to mention the demented levels of horniness. Plus, the whole lovesick thing. Not actual lovesickness, because she couldn’t be in love with two men—dragons, after only a couple of weeks—it would be insane.
Whatever the explanation for her condition, it didn’t matter. It mattered how she felt, and how she dealt with it. So she did what she’d always done, buried it under a thick layer of ice-cold detachment. When that failed—epically—she decided the only solution was to physically exhaust herself. She’d got her body fat to its lowest percentage ever. She ate clean and worked hard. The title was closer to being hers than ever before, but the sense of joy and achievement she ought to be rolling in never materialized. Instead, her roiling emotions of lust, fear, heartache, and despair, all warred within, wringing her out.
After dressing, she sighed and grabbed her gym bag. The thought of heading home depressed her. She’d call Sian and see if she fancied a good old fashioned girl chat. She’d already shared some of what happened with her friend. Not the dragon stuff, of course, or the matched mates deal, but the other bits. The crazy, hot sex for instance. Sian had been impressed.
The main hall lights were off. Cursing, she gingerly picked her way around the equipment. Donald better not have forgotten about her and locked her in. But his office lights glowed reassuringly on the second floor.
Nearing the door, she rummaged in her bag for her phone.
She rattled the handle to the outside doors but it didn’t budge. Crap! Donald had forgotten her. Pivoting on her heel, she headed back into the gym. Someone grabbed her neck from behind and hot flames of agony seared her spine. She screamed.
“Don’t move, bitch.” A low, female voice whispered against her ear. “You’re coming with me, and do not make a fuss, because if you do, I’ll burn you to cinders. Oh, and my helper will fry Donald. Such a sweet old man, running this gym, and helping kids find an outlet for their aggression. It would be terrible to have the death of a good man on your conscience. A painful death, too.”
Ice froze, the searing pain too intense to do much else. The threat wrapped fear around her heart. She’d couldn’t—no—wouldn’t let them hurt Donald.
These were dragon people, the fiery heat told her as much. Most likely the Welsh Clan. Her leaving Arach Caim hadn’t been enough for them.
“Now, come with me. And don’t think your bodyguard will help, he’s out cold in the equipment room.”
“Bodyguard?” She should have known Nathan and Dom wouldn’t leave her out in the world alone. Whoever he was, he’d been discreet. She’d never noticed anyone unusual. Hope flared, but then died.
How would they find her? Damn it, if she’d stayed longer, learned more about her magic, she could fight or try to connect with them. But she was useless.
They stepped outside, and Ice finally got a look at her attacker. The redhead. What was her name? Ellen? Ellie! Yeah, Ellie.
Ellie’s grip tightened as she pulled Ice toward a long, low black car idling at the curb. Did she get in the car or try to run? If Ellie were human, she’d fight the bitch. Second choice being to run. But Ellie possessed magic, powerful too, if the burning hold on her neck were any indication.
“Where are you taking me?” she asked, keeping her voice calm.
“Shut up.” Ellie squeezed tighter and let go a pulse of intense heat.
Ice gasped and instinctively pulled away, only for more burning pain to hit.
“Some advice, dear. Keep still and shut your mouth. You be a good girl and I won’t have to hurt you. Not yet, anyway. When the time comes for you to endure pain, it will be somewhere nice and private where you can scream all you like and I can enjoy it.”
Then Ellie laughed and the sound fell on her ears, as harsh as shards of glass on the pavement. Sharp, jarring, and most terrifying of all, unhinged.
Chapter Thirteen
Nathan answered his phone, his hip braced against the kitchen counter. “Yeah?”
“She’s gone,” Jonathon said.
Nathan froze. He’d been expecting a regular update. “What the hell do you mean gone? You were supposed to watch her.”
“Yeah, and I did, until someone laid me out cold.”
“What kind of dragon are you to let a human get the better of you? Gods but you fucked up!”
Dom appeared beside him, his blue eyes filled with worry.
“Not a human my friend, one of our own. Some red-haired bitch, and a big bastard came to the gym. I was lurking around, waiting to follow Ice, when they waylaid me. I focused on the big bastard, but the female put me down. Used her magic and it’s strong!”
“Fucking Ellie.” Nathan bit out. He threw his mug, and it shattered on the far wall, ceramic shards scattered everywhere. Dom winced.
“I’m so sorry,” Jonathon whispered.
“Save it. Don’t apologize; get to work on finding her. We’ll be there soon as we can. I need to make one call first.” He hung up and locked eyes with Dom.
“Ellie took her?”
“Yep, so much for Robert’s meaningless promises.”
Nathan jabbed the buttons on his phone and once more held it to his ear, drumming his fingers on the counter with his other hand.
“Hello?” Robert’s rich voice boomed out.
“You fucker. This is war. You hear me? War!”
Then Nathan hung up and stormed out of the room toward the bedroom. Dom jogged along behind him.
“Hey, slow up. What’s the plan?”
“The plan is I go and get our girl back.”
“No, Nate. No, you don’t. We do.”
Nathan didn’t stop, but he slowed his stride to turn and look at him. His anger faded for a moment as he looked at the male he’d finally admitted he loved. “Okay. Yes, you’re right. We do.”
Dom gave a small smile.
Nathan’s phone buzzed in his pocket, and he pulled it free. Roberts’s caller-id flashed on the screen.
“Don’t bother to try and justify it. You gave your word and broke it. We’re done. Through. I don’t get Ice back…your clan and ours…war.”
“She’s missing.” Not a question. “I guessed as much from your call a moment ago. I sent out a mental scan of the clan, only two people gone from here; Ellie and her mate Sam.”
“Mate? She’s two mates. Met them decades ago.” He pushed the bedroom door open and went straight to his closet.
“She did have two mates, but Toby died. He’d been injured in the war with the Havsa clan and never fully recovered. He’d reached an old age, but not as old as most of our kind. It broke something in Ellie. Soon as I picked up her absence, I guessed. Should have seen this coming, and I didn’t, which is definitely on me. But I did not start a war. Furthermore, I will help you get her back. I can track Ellie, she’s my clan. You can’t. Where are you heading?”
“Glasgow. A gym off London Road. We’ll be there in about two hours. You can try to locate her using your connection. Ellie will try to block you, and she’s strong.”
“Not as strong as I,” Robert returned. “I’ll work on it. You guys get going. And Nathan?”
“Yes?”
“I’m sorry. Truly.”
Nathan gave a grunt and disconnected.
“He going to help?” Dom tossed some clothes into a small bag.
“So he says.” Nathan rummaged through his clothes. “Don’t trust him though.”
“No. Me either.” Dom sighed and zipped his bag closed.
“Don’t say it.” Nathan didn’t want to hear the words.
“Say what?”
“I get why you blame me. You’re probably thinking we should never have let her go.”
Dom sighed again. “Not true. My idea, remember? I am thinking Ellie is strange, always sensed something seemed off about her. I don’t blame you. We’d no choice but to give Ice some space. What else? Keep her here as some sort of prisoner?”
Nathan smiled, despite his heavy heart. He looked at Dom. At his striking face, and his blue eyes. He flashed back to the previous evening. Him fucking Dom, and Dom taking it all, taking everything. Face flushed, moaning as he came all over Nathan’s hand. He thought back to the other morning when Dom fetched him a coffee in bed and the weekend papers. He remembered their flight two nights ago, both of them heading up, up, up towards the stars before swooping back down to skim the earth. And something in his heart cracked, like some ancient fissure opening up, it split wide open, spilling boiling hot emotion into him, heating him from the inside.
“We’re going to get her back. No matter what. I love her, and you love her. She’s ours. Our mate. We are going to get her back.”
Dom’s face went soft and his eyes filled with warmth. “Yes, we will.”
“You need to understand something,” Nathan continued.
Dom paused.
“What I feel for Ice, I also feel for you. I’ve wanted you for the longest time. I always thought we’d be great together, but I didn’t think it would be this strong. I love you, Dom. Much as I love her, I love you.”
Dom’s face turned deadly serious. He took two steps to Nathan and pulled him into his body, tight. One arm went around his back as he whispered into Nathan’s neck. “Love you too.”
Three hours later, and Nathan was about to lose his mind. Jonathon and Dom paced around the gym. The old guy who owned it was keeping it open for them while they tried to figure out their next move. They’d heard not one peep from Robert, and when Nathan tried to call the other clan leader, he got no reply.
When his phone buzzed in his pocket, it made him jump. He grabbed it and answered with a grunt.
“She’s in a warehouse about a mile from the gym.” Robert sighed. “It took me ages to track them. I couldn’t get a lock on Ellie, her magic is too strong, and it’s dangerous for me to keep trying, when she’d more than likely pick up on me trying to locate her. Sam is another matter. I managed to get a faint echo of where he is, and I doubt he’ll have a clue. Sending you the address now.”
“Appreciate it.” Nathan jabbed the end call button.
His phone beeped with an incoming message and he clicked to open it. “Got a location. Let’s go.”
In five minutes, they’d be there. Stay alive, Ice. We’re coming.
Stinging cold water yanked Ice back from oblivion. She was stretched crucifixion style, with heavy chains holding her limbs out.
“You don’t get to sleep, bitch. I can’t hear your screams if you’re asleep.” Ellie’s prodding voice came with new pain. Something sharp pressed through her flesh, slicing skin and muscle. “We’re going to play a game, I’ll write on your back and you tell me what it says.”
Two vertical strokes and a horizontal one. She panted through the pain.
“What is it?” Ellie demanded. When she didn’t answer, Ellie took the carving all the way to the bone of her shoulder blade.
“H. It’s a fucking H,” she wailed
Ellie drew the next and the next. Compliantly, she said each letter carved into her back. “A. V. S. A. T. R. A. S. H.”
“What’s it spell?”
“Havsa trash.”
“Now the whole world knows what you are. Now, you know what you are.”
A bubbling itch on each letter burned, not with heat but the sharp sting of nettles. Each second that passed, it hurt more.
“Why? I know you want me dead,” Ice said. “But why? Why not take me to your Clan to stand trial? Have justice served?”
“They failed me. Betrayed me. Just like your father. Robert actually called you an innocent.”
She didn’t have a clue what Ellie rambled on about. “I don’t understand.”
“My mate, the saintly Toby, hero of our Clan for his acts of bravery in the wars, the hypocritical piece of shit, had an affair behind my back, behind Sam’s back, for years. More than a century!” She shrieked the last word.
“I don’t understand what the hell this has to do with me.” Ice leaned forward against her chains, anger making her forget her fear. They clanked as she came up against their limits and pulled on her wrists. She wore only her underwear, and where the chains wrapped round her belly, they pressed in hard and cold.
“You’re one of the results of his affair, you little bitch.” Sam spoke, for the first time, shocking her. “Toby
took one look at your mother and fell head over heels. He helped her escape the war—going against everything he supposedly stood for. The Havsa were meant to be wiped out, but he saved one of them, because he thought with his dick. He betrayed Ellie in the worst way. Me, too. Dragon males don’t cheat. There are a handful of cases in history, and the males are always ostracized.”
Ellie laughed. “Except, ostracizing my Toby seemed a tad...lenient. So we killed him instead…Slowly. I’d heard he helped your whore mother escape the Havsa clan and set her up in Britain somewhere. She turned her back on dragon life. But I spent decades tracking her through Toby. Once I found her, I killed her. Afterwards I saw the picture of you as a child in her purse, along with five others, your siblings I presume. I don’t know why she gave you all up. Unless she realized I closed in. I figured she’d turned her back on our ways and wanted you brought up human. She even converted to Christianity, the stupid female.”
She became achingly aware of the gold cross around her neck, the one her mother gifted Ice before she gave her away. The idea she had brothers or sisters out there that she may never get a chance to find hurt as much as the physical pain.
“I tried to find you. Hoped there’d be the usual paper trail, but she must have had you all adopted privately. I searched a long time, but never found any of you. Imagine my surprise when you turned up with Nathan and Dom. I gave my Clan one last chance. One last chance to show me the loyalty I am owed. They refused to execute you or to declare war, so frankly, my dear—I no longer give a shit about the dragon code.”
Sam watched this exchange with excitement in his eyes. “Can I cut out her eyes? I’d love them for souvenirs.”
She swallowed bile at the leer on his face. They were both insane!
“Of course, my mate. Let’s move this along. It’s been fun, but by now, her males will realize she is missing. And I want us out of here before Robert realizes we’ve got his precious gold.”
Ellie handed Sam an ornate dagger, and he smiled as he hefted its weight in his palm. Sam stretched up to loosen the chains binding her.