Single Red Dragon
A Dragon Shifter Fated Mates Novel
Michelle Ziegler
Introduction
Was she rescued or kidnapped by a dragon? She doesn’t know. Lilly’s entire life has been to protect others from her, but this dragon shifter doesn’t need protecting. He needs something from her though, and she’s having a hard time saying no.
Earth woman aren’t easy. He’s an elite dragon shifter, a warrior, and yet she doesn’t want him. That’s fine though, he needs her for something else. His brother’s mate is in trouble and she’s the key. Love’s much more complicated than war, unless the war is with the woman that has the power to break you.
Copyright © 2020 Michelle Ziegler
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical method, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial users permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, write to the publisher addressed “Attention: Permission coordinator,” at the address below.
[email protected]
Publisher’s Note: This is a work of fiction. Names, character, places, and incidents are a product of the author’s imagination. Locales and public names are sometimes used for atmospheric purposes. Any resemblance to actual people, living, or dead, or to businesses, companies, events, institutions, or locales is completely coincidental.
To my fans who need some love and laughter right now in the time of the ‘rona. Love you all.
Acknowledgments
Every book feels like a little of my soul on paper. I always have so many that inspire and help me. My husband (who never reads my books anyway) inspires me and my kids let me have the time to write.
I have so many readers to thank, but especially my Beta/Alpha readers. Thanks Lucia, Bev, Carol, and Donise! They have a knack for reading between the lines.
Thank you Emcat Designs for my cover and Editing by Elizabeth for services.
Of course, my review team is a group that has my undying gratitude!
Lastly - thank you readers! Thank you for giving me a chance and escaping into my world and loving some confused dragon shifters from outer space.
Contents
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Coming Soon
Also by Michelle Ziegler
About the Author
1
Lillyanna crouched next to a dumpster. She gagged on the stench of rotting food and drink. Drink. God, she could use a drink right now, water, anything. Her legs burned, her throat was parched.
She'd never gotten this far in any escape. What was she supposed to do now?
Glancing around, she tried to get her bearings. She wasn't great at this direction thing. Living in a five by five cell would do that to you.
She was out, though. Free. And freedom didn't smell very good right now.
She recoiled as the smells permeated her nose. They weren't going to use her. Not this time. She wouldn't allow herself to be used ever again.
Her hand banged against the metal of the bin next to her and she cried out at the searing burn down her neck.
Her vision doubled. She could get through it, she was used to this. Lillyanna breathed through the pain.
Breathe. Just breathe.
Shaking her head, she tried to ignore and forget the man she'd run from. The pain might drown out his words. What had his name been? She needed to focus beyond this. Eadric. His name had been Eadric.
The air she dragged in through her clenched teeth sounded like a hiss. This pain was different from before. She couldn't shake this pain, thinking about her rescuer - no, her new captor.
Her eyes pinched close. Focus on something, anything. The pain. No. She couldn't. She had to. It would pass.
Eadric mentioned he needed her to get something for him. Well, he was just going to have to figure out how to save his friend's wife, girlfriend, no wait. Mate. He was a shifter. They believed in fated love. Something her sister had always talked about.
The searing burn behind her eyes lessened as Lillyanna, no wait, Lilly - that's what he'd called her. Lilly. She liked the nickname. Shaking her head, she tried to forget the way his lightly accented tongue said her name. She liked the way he sounded. The pain lessened when she thought of him.
Why, though? He was nothing to her. He only needed her to save someone else. No. She couldn't like the way he did anything. Alone was better. Easier, anyway. Hell. For all the hours she'd spent alone, she'd never truly been alone in that lab.
The pain dulled for a moment, allowing her to take in the alley's darkness closing in around her. What did she do now?
His eyes flashed in her head. No. She leaned her head back against the rough surface of the building. He wasn't allowed in her head, memories or not. She would not be used again.
But what now?
Her plans had never gotten past finding a way out. The lab kept her under lock and key and twenty-four-hour surveillance.
Freedom had always been a dream. She'd imagined a world like Jane Austen. Trees and fields. Instead, she'd found sand, and this. A small smelly space behind a building.
How far had she run? Who the hell knew. She'd finally gotten out of that spaceship. She would not trade one prison for another. But, this. A door with the words Drunken Rooster didn't exactly help her figure out where she was or what she could do with that.
Voices echoed, and she crouched lower. They were male voices, and she knew men were never up to anything good. She almost felt bad, the huge guy, dragon, alien, whatever the hell he was really thought she was meant for him. Stupid. There were no fairy tales. No happily ever afters. Love didn't exist.
That stupid guy had no idea what he was dealing with when he left her alone. Metal can bend and melt with extreme heat, and that's exactly what the pipe had done. Bent like a wet noodle.
Peeking around the dumpster she tried to see if they were coming her way.
A whole new fear settled in. Outside of that ship, she was exposed to the world she barely knew. Her entire life had been built out of isolation.
The thrum of the pain continued as a dull ache. If she never got this thing out of her, she'd never be free.
Something moved and she jumped.
Lilly knew fear all too well. Every day she feared who'd get hurt, but this was different.
Reaching up her handcuffed wrists, she traced where a trail of foreign heat still lingered. She hadn't been afraid when Eadric had run his hand down her jawline. It had been nice actually, right before she'd head butted the guy, anyway.
For a few precious seconds she'd wanted something other than freedom. For a few seconds she let herself actually think that love might be real, and not just some fantasy dreamed up on the TV.
That would have been wrong, though. He was just one more man trying to put her in a cage. Use her.
The metal of the cuffs
rubbed against her skin as she moved. Damn it. Shaking them, she tried to burn them off again. These stupid things weren't made of anything organic apparently, they weren't budging. Stupid aliens. She hated people, aliens, pretty much everyone.
A tear stung her cheek as it broke free. She sniffed. No. Now was not the time to feel sorry for herself. Another sniffle she couldn't quiet.
Why though, for once, couldn't she have what she wanted? Why couldn't she be sad for her pathetic existence, just once? Why couldn't she be mad at the fact that just once in her life, her heart had felt something other than anger and hate as the shifter had touched her?
His voice, smooth like a decadent dessert, not that she'd ever tasted one. But damn, if she had, she was pretty sure her mouth would have watered just as it had when he'd spoken to her. His words had seeped into her soul, touching something deep within her, something broken.
What the hell had she been thinking, giving him her name? What kind of stupid damsel in distress crap was this? God. It wasn't like she was one of those helpless women in old westerns. No, she wasn't, because if she was, someone would have ridden in on a horse and saved her before she had to save herself long ago.
And that's what she was doing. Saving herself.
Freedom. Finally. This was what freedom smelled like. She sniffed. Eh. Well, maybe not just yet.
"Lilly? Where are you?"
Pressing against the wall she held her breath.
Shit. How had he found her already?
She crouched back into the shadows. This couldn't be happening.
"Lilly. Come out. I won't hurt you, but we need you."
Fuck off, little man.
Well, okay. Big man. But, that seemed to be a moot point.
"Lilly."
Her nickname repeated in her own head. She wanted to be something to someone. She'd settle for someone different.
Her lungs were starting to burn, but at least it was something she chose to feel. God. What if he did catch her? Did it matter? Maybe she liked this stupid dragon alien guy. But, did she like him enough to trade her freedom for another prison?
Only, if she stayed, he'd get hurt.
This time her thoughts were cut short as the sharp sting stabbed at her brain. She slammed her head back as the pain ripped through. Curling her hands into fists, she slammed them against her temples.
It needed to stop.
Swallowing the screams, she squeezed her head harder. No. No. No. He couldn't find her. He wouldn't find her. Her father, he couldn't find her.
Lilly channeled the fire constantly running a hellish river of pain through her. She let it out, praying it flowed through her hands into her head. She needed to fry the fucking tracker. She wasn't one of his experiments. Not anymore. Never again.
This time she was sure she screamed out loud.
Oh my God.
She gnashed her molars together as the heat grew hotter and hotter. So close. She knew it was there. She could feel her fire growing hotter as it slowly attacked the foreign object within her. If she fried her own brain while trying to do this, so be it. She should have done it sooner. So much sooner. Death would be welcome. Anything was better than that fucking lab.
"Eadric? Stop her. She's killing herself."
The sound of someone she didn't recognize broke through.
"What the fuck. Stop. Lilly. Fucking stop. I won't hurt you."
She opened her eyes, everything blurry.
A blurry shadow approached her, and she had nothing left to fight him. She wasn't dead yet though. He'd stopped her concentration. No. She could do it again.
Seconds. She had seconds.
Summoning everything within her, she called the fire internally. Either this chip would die or she would. The outcome would be peace.
Only, the heat of a strong hand pulling her arms away from her head brought on a brand new feeling that she'd never be able to describe if she lived for a million years.
Tears, her familiar companion on those bad nights while she lay alone in her fireproof box, started to fall.
"Lilly, stop. I don't know what you are doing. But you're safe. Stop. Please stop. We need you. I need you."
Need? Need? Want. She wanted to be wanted.
"No. No need. I have nothing to give." She didn't know where the words came from. Her vision was still nonexistent. Her hair smelled like someone had just set fire to her head, because well, she had. And yet. Here she was having a tiny little pity party for one.
No more fighting. No more running. Maybe she'd just let this god have her. Nothing could be worse than her life was before.
"Lilly. Look at me. Stop running from me. You're not my prisoner."
Look at him? Sure. If her vision would clear, maybe. If the pain would stop.
Crap, her body felt really heavy. Exercise and this chip's relentless calling all in one day was too much. It would all be funny if it didn't hurt.
Lilly wanted to wince away at the heat of a hand touching her skin. No. He couldn't touch her. Wait. Her hand. What was he doing?
One wrist fell free and then the other.
"You aren't my prisoner. I'm just really shitty at this. I didn't know how to keep you safe."
Wait. What? Safe?
The word bounced around her broken head. So tired.
The stabbing pain wasn't coming back though. Or was it, and she was used to it?
Maybe she was dying, and this is what peace felt like?
Opening her eyes, the objects still blurred. His shadow the largest in front of her. If he were the last thing she saw, that would be okay.
This was peaceful. Why should she fight it? No, instead of fighting she let the exhaustion claim her. Lilly fantasied, running her hands down his pecs and over his washboard abs. She'd had to pass the time until she could run away, and now here she was back in the same spot as before.
Her voice was coarse as she tried to keep up her will to fight. "I'll just run again."
He snorted.
"And I'll just find you again. And again. And again. I'll follow you for as long as it takes."
She rested her head against the brick and closed her eyes again.
"As long as it takes?" her words were weak.
His hands rubbed her wrists, as if he cared that the cuffs had been biting into her skin. The heat of his touch taking the sting away.
"As long as it takes for you to accept me as yours."
She sucked in a gulp of air and choked.
"Lilly? You okay?"
What the hell had he just said? Yours? She'd never owned anything, ever. Nothing was hers. Her own life wasn't hers.
No. Hers? No, that meant something to protect. Something to keep away from herself. After all, she was dangerous, a monster. She couldn't protect him.
Lilly meant to yell a warning to him. Help him remain safe. Help him get away from her.
Instead, it came out slurred and a little crazy. "Get away from me."
She didn't need to look to know he wouldn't go far even if he wanted to listen.
"Please. Go away. I'm dangerous."
His hand feathered up her arm, her body on high alert. What? No one ever touched her. Was she imaging it?
An exhaustion she'd carried with her for so long finally broke down the dam within her and punched a hole through her steel heart.
The issue was her head throbbed. Her body was tired. She couldn't keep running like this. But she needed to, only her father ensured she couldn't.
Blinking against the pain in her head, she tried to remain awake.
"I won't hurt you."
She wanted to believe him. Wanted to think he was different. How, though? How could she think he was different?
The pain. It was growing again. She hadn't fried it. All that work and it still controlled her. She had to go back. Had to make this stop. No. She'd rather her beautiful dragon kill her before returning her to her father.
"What is wrong?" She heard him ask through the tunnel in her head.
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br /> "Everything." She managed to lift her hand that weighed thousands of pounds and bring it to her neck. Touching the small line that signified where the chip had been inserted she tried to choke back another tear of pain.
Too much, it was too much.
Her head hurt so bad that when a small prick in her arm gave her a moment of distraction she took it.
And then the world quieted, and she slept.
2
Eadric pulled the syringe away and watched as she slumped over into him.
She looked up, her eyes wide. "Ouch."
He cradled her as her eyes began to close.
"How can we help you?" he asked. Eadric hated having to sedate her, but he literally couldn't think of anything else.
Her eyes fluttered. "Tracker."
He watched her try to move her arm again, but she couldn't muster the energy. That was the power of a sedative. At least she couldn't run away again.
Tracker, though? Shit.
"That should keep her from hurting herself, right?"
Deo nodded.
"Did you see her?" he asked.
Deo nodded again.
"You really suck at conversations lately," Eadric said, and turned back to his Lilly.
Even in the shitty lighting of the alley her skin was pale, much more so than when he'd found her.
"She said something about a tracker. What do you think? Can that make her sick like this?"
Deo came closer, careful to not touch her without Eadric's permission. Marked or not, she was his. His dragon flexed the confines of Eadric's soul. Yes, she was his.
Lilly shook, and his instinct kicked in. Pulling her close, he tried to pull the fear from her. Not that he even knew what she was afraid of.
Single Red Dragon: A Dragon Shifter Fated Mates Novel (Space Dragons Seek Mates Book 2) Page 1