by Zoe Chant
It was the familiar barking of a dog.
“Diego?” Without thinking, she ran after Jonathan.
How the hell had Diego made it out here? They’d left him with the girl who’d volunteered to dog-sit. Had he run off again?
But how would he have made it here? But then, they do say that runaway dogs always find their way home...
She ran straight into Jonathan’s back, who flung out his arms to shield her.
But it was already too late.
Before them spread a small room, the walls undecorated and unpainted. It wasn’t filled with a Hollywood billionaire’s treasures: no huge diamonds, no Picassos or Rembrandts, no secret supercomputers holding Swiss bank account codes.
Instead, there was a simple plinth of concrete in the center of the room. And on that plinth rested what looked like a crown of iron, decorated with small, red rubies.
“Diego!”
The poodle stood before the concrete plinth, staring at them, his tongue lolling out as he panted.
Angel took a confused step towards him—and then Jonathan’s arm shot out, keeping her from moving forward.
At the same moment, Diego’s small, familiar body began to shimmer.
Angel felt her heart plummet into her stomach as the dog’s furry body turned strangely translucent for the fraction of a heartbeat.
Then the poodle was gone. Instead, an unfamiliar and very much naked man stood in front of them. He had unkempt, shaggy black hair, and there were several scars on his chest and arms.
Most importantly, as soon as he’d shifted, he lunged behind the pillar of concrete before either of them had a chance to move.
A second later, the stranger pointed a gun at them, which he must have hidden there.
“Diego?” Angel said, her voice trembling in disbelief.
How is that possible?
The man gave her a grin, unbothered by his nudity. “The name’s Sean, actually. And I’ve had about enough playing the stupid little lapdog for folks like you. Diego, sit! Diego, come here!” He bared his teeth at her. “I’d love to show you how I feel about all of that, honey, but unfortunately I’ve got more important things to do.”
Angel was still reeling. “So you were a shifter all along? But why?”
Diego—no, Sean—chuckled darkly. “Why do you think, stupid? This isn’t about you. It’s about this. It has been all along.”
He reached out and casually took the iron-and-ruby crown from its plinth.
Nothing happened. No sudden alarm began blaring, no trapdoors fell shut.
He laughed again. “Almost too easy. Of course, the main problem was figuring out who had it, and where it was hidden.”
“That’s iron,” Jonathan said calmly. “I don’t know what they told you, buddy, but that’s nothing more than a worthless piece of junk. And those rubies are small and flawed. No fence will give you more than a few hundred dollars for that.”
Sean held the crown idly in his hand. “That’s where you are wrong, buddy. All high and mighty dragon shifter—but as easy to fool as the rest of them. You dragons and werewolves and lion shifters are all like that, so strong and proud. You never look twice at a dumb mutt like me.”
He smirked, the gun still pointed at them. “Even in my own family it went like that. I was the runt of the litter, as they say. Weak as a child. Not good at anything. But there’s one thing that makes me special. Have you still not figured it out?”
“I didn’t know. All this time... I can’t sense that you’re a shifter,” Jonathan said slowly.
“That’s right.” Sean looked satisfied. “A useless power, you might think. Of course, as soon as I figured it out as a teenager, I left my home. You can’t imagine how useful that skill can be when you want to get in and out of places unnoticed.”
“That still hasn’t answered the question of what the hell you want with that thing,” Angel said.
“Oh.” Sean chuckled. “It’s not for me. It’s for him.”
Through the mate bond, Angel felt sudden alarm flood her heart. At the same moment, Jonathan whirled around.
The gloomy corridor behind them was no longer quite as dark. As Angel turned around in dread, she saw light spilling out of the tunnel. The tunnel was empty, as far as she could see—but someone must have turned on a light.
“The dire wolf,” Jonathan said, clenching his teeth as he looked at her. “He’s here.”
“I was just laying the trap,” Sean said behind them. “Given that you can sense him, but not me.”
There was the sound of boots on the floor above them. Suddenly it stopped. A long moment later, a dark shape appeared at the end of the tunnel, little more than a silhouette of black against the glare of the light.
Then he came towards them.
It was a man, this time, not a wolf. But when he stepped at last into the small room, Angel didn’t need Jonathan’s senses to tell her that the man was a shifter.
He had the same terrifying, yellow eyes of the beast she’d glimpsed in the blizzard.
He was older. He might have been in his sixties, for all that he had the powerful body of a man twenty years younger. But his hair was gray, and so was his beard.
There was an aura of menace surrounding him that made Angel shiver instinctively. She couldn’t even say what about him scared her so. But something about the hardness of his eyes told her that he was the sort of man who didn’t care if he had to kill someone to get ahead.
Fortunately, right now, his gaze wasn’t resting on her, but on the iron crown in Sean’s hand.
“Well done, puppy. See, I knew you’d be useful after all.”
“Don’t fucking call me that. I got you your crown, Reed.”
“Even though you fucked up and nearly burned down the house.” Reed smiled, although it did not reach his eyes. “But I’ve got the crown. And you’ll be paid for it, just as I promised.”
“Who are you, and what the hell is going on here?” Jonathan demanded.
“Ah, and here’s our weak little dragon who decided to cause so much trouble for us. You should’ve stayed in the ice. Easier for all of us. But now that you’re here—this doesn’t have anything to do with you or your mate. But you just had to meddle. Which turned you into a problem.”
Reed gave them another brief, cold smile, then pulled a gun from his pocket and gestured with it. “Against that wall. Sean, come here. We’re going to leave you two now.”
Her heart beating in her throat, Angel slowly moved towards the back of the small room, just as Jonathan did.
What was Reed planning to do? Was he going to just leave them here and escape with the crown?
She didn’t trust him. And he didn’t seem like the sort of man who’d leave witnesses behind. Witnesses who could tell the Mitchells all about what had happened here...
The moment Sean had reached Reed’s side and handed over the iron crown, there was the sound of a shot.
Angel heard herself cry out, instinct taking over as she lunged to hide behind the concrete plinth.
Jonathan!
For a moment, she felt nothing but the iron fist of terror clenching around her heart.
Jonathan! Are you okay?
Chapter Eighteen: Jonathan
The second Jonathan saw Reed raise the gun, the dragon within him took over.
The room was too small for his dragon to shift—he’d just end up with a broken neck. Even so, the powerful need to protect his mate at all costs took over. Without regard for his own safety, he hurled himself at Reed.
A heartbeat later, the iron scent of blood filled the room. But Jonathan couldn’t feel any pain.
Then, right in front of him, Sean crumpled to the floor with a stunned expression. Blood dripped from between his fingers that clutched his chest.
“I knew you’d meddle with this, too,” Reed said coldly, raising his gun a little higher to aim it straight at Jonathan this time. “But this is over now. Goodbye, ice dragon.”
Reed pulled
the trigger. For a moment, time seemed to stand still.
Jonathan saw the bullet come hurtling out of the barrel—and in the same split second, the dragon within him broke free at last.
His dragon’s power crackled through his veins with the force of electricity, the air he exhaled turning to white clouds. The ice was his element—and now, at last, even though he had drained himself of his own power for so many years, it rushed out of his heart. It filled his body with energy, from the roots of his hair down to his toes.
It exploded out of him in a jet of pure ice, the beautiful, pristine cold that made flowers of ice bloom on windows and adorned houses with brilliant icicles.
Now it enveloped the gun with the cruel grip of winter. Ice surrounded the metal of the gun—and it also entrapped the bullet just where it had left the barrel.
“Fuck!” Shaking his hand, Reed dropped the gun to the floor, his fingers white with frostbite.
He looked up, his face a mask of rage—but as soon his eyes met Jonathan’s, he seemed to change his mind.
A second later, Reed turned on his heels and fled through the corridor.
Jonathan’s dragon was roaring in his chest to go after him. Instead, he raced back to Angel’s side.
He’d seen her take cover behind the plinth, so he knew she couldn’t be hurt. But even so, it wasn’t until she was in his arms that his dragon began to calm down.
“You’re all right!” she said, her fingers touching his face, desperate.
A moment later, her mouth was on his.
He couldn’t even say who’d leaned in first. For one breathless moment, they clung to each other.
And then a sound behind them made Jonathan reluctantly part from his mate.
When he turned around, he saw that Sean was still curled up on the floor, coughing weakly.
“Shit. We’ll need a doctor for him,” Jonathan said as he knelt down by the dog shifter’s side.
Sean was still alive. The bullet hadn’t hit his heart—but it had hit his chest. Even with fast shifter healing, that wasn’t a wound that could heal on its own overnight.
Shifter healing isn’t much help if he dies from blood loss first...
“Hey, can you hear me? Keep this pressed against the wound, okay? We’ll find you a doctor,” Jonathan said. He pulled off his scarf to bundle it up and press it against where blood was still dripping from the gunshot wound.
“Will he be okay?” Angel asked, staring down at Sean as if she still couldn’t believe that he’d fooled her for the past few weeks.
Jonathan hesitated for a moment. “No promises. But he’s alive now, which is good. If we can find a doctor in time to stop the bleeding...”
“Are you okay?” Angel asked, narrowing her eyes at him. “You look pale.”
Only now did Jonathan realize that he’d used up all of the power his dragon had regained. But there’d been no other choice. Not with Reed about to kill them all.
Shifting again and flying Angel back to the Snow Castle would be difficult—but still, they had no choice in that either. He wouldn’t leave the dog shifter here to die.
And he definitely wouldn’t try to hike back through the snow with a homicidal dire wolf still lurking around.
A dire wolf who’s made it more than clear that he wants all witnesses of his crime dead.
“I’m fine,” he said, then grabbed her hand. “Come. Someone needs to stop Reed.”
Angel stooped and picked up the gun Sean had dropped. She gave him a determined nod. “This time, he won’t surprise us.”
Together, they made their way back into the living room. It was deserted—but Jonathan could still feel the presence of the dire wolf. He was somewhere nearby. Maybe they could still stop him.
But as soon as they left the house, the sharp sensation of wolf that Jonathan could feel niggling at his senses suddenly spiked.
There was an incredible surge of power that came from somewhere nearby. As if Reed had suddenly, unexpectedly, gained a lot of power.
Or as if he’s no longer alone...
Jonathan pressed his finger to his lips as they slowly moved towards the corner of the house. There were tracks in the snow—tracks left by a single man.
Reed had left the house this way. But he hadn’t shifted and run off into the mountains surrounding them.
Why?
A sudden howl coming from behind the house made him narrow his eyes.
It was the howl of a dire wolf—a challenging howl. Had Reed sensed his presence and was preparing for another fight?
“Don’t worry,” Angel whispered, “you can shift if you want.”
“I don’t want to leave you alone here—”
With a fierce smile, Angel raised the gun she was still holding on to. “This time, I’m not unarmed.”
Jonathan hesitated for a heartbeat—but the strange sensation of growing power kept increasing. Whatever Reed was planning, there wasn’t much time.
“Be careful,” he said hoarsely—and then he took a step forward and allowed his dragon to take over.
Energy raced through his veins, making his skin prickle. The dragon within him was still bristling with protective anger at the threat to their mate.
This time, he wouldn’t let the dire wolf get away. It would end, here and now.
Ahead of them, the wolf howled again. Jonathan beat his wings, lifting off the ground.
The wind had picked up. Grey clouds had come racing across the sky. Even before he left the ground, the first snowflakes landed on his skin.
Another dire wolf blizzard?
By the time he’d made it above the house, the air was a flurry of white, the wind howling around him.
This time, there was no doubt at all that the storm was magical in nature. No blizzard would arrive within seconds.
It had to be the dire wolf’s power that had summoned the storm. He probably planned to use the blizzard as cover to get away.
But he’d thought wrong.
Jonathan was no longer the weakened dragon of their first encounter who’d just spent ten years frozen in the ice.
He’d recovered enough from that foolish decision to be able to use his own powers, just as the dire wolf did. And unlike Reed, Jonathan had a mate he’d do anything for.
He’d just begun to descend, trying to find the dire wolf in the storm, when he saw something that made him hover in the air in confusion. The storm tore at his wings, but he didn’t budge.
There wasn’t one dire wolf beneath him—there were two.
As he watched, the two giant wolves began circling each other. Their eyes glowed a yellow gold. Power seemed to rise off them.
And now, at last, Jonathan understood how the storm had arrived so quickly.
It wasn’t Reed trying to get away. This blizzard was nature’s reaction to two powerful dire wolf shifters using their powers against each other.
Something glinted red in the snow, catching his attention.
When Jonathan narrowed his eyes, he was able to make out the iron crown with its rubies, half buried beneath the rapidly falling snow now.
It rested on the ground between the two wolves. Every time one wolf tried to take one step towards it, the other increased its grip on the storm to force its rival back.
Jonathan opened his mouth for a silent laugh.
He still had no idea what was going on, but it didn’t matter. Let Henrik deal with the consequences later. Two dire wolves couldn’t mean anything good.
Like all mythological shifters, dire wolves were incredibly rare. And to have two of them here could only mean that he and Angel had interrupted some terrible conspiracy.
Jonathan breathed in.
Then, without forewarning, he folded his wings against his body and dropped down like a stone, coming straight at the two distracted shifters.
Once he was close enough, he parted his jaw and released his icy breath. Like a projectile of freezing air, it came barreling right at the two dire wolves.
; A heartbeat before his attack hit the ground, the two dire wolves jumped back.
One of them was bleeding, Jonathan now noticed. Had he interrupted a fight for the spoils of their burglary?
It didn’t matter. They’d deal with it later.
Jonathan raised his wings, then swerved, flying a narrow curve to come straight at them again, this time much closer to the ground.
The bleeding dire wolf saw him coming—but instead of fleeing, he dug his claws into the ground and opened his jaw, revealing sharp fangs as he howled.
Jonathan inhaled deeply again, pulling on the power within him. It took effort this time. Something inside him ached, as if he’d put too much weight on healing muscles.
But that didn’t matter. Maybe his power wasn’t at a hundred percent yet—but he wasn’t fighting another dragon. And he’d be damned if he’d let a dire wolf get the better of him.
Drawing on the small, secret core of power within him, he felt the winter’s cold race through his veins once more. It spread through his body, filling him with the clear beauty of glaciers, the smooth hardness of a frozen lake, the relentlessness of a winter storm.
And then he exhaled.
His attack turned the air white. Like a lance of cold, it rushed through the air straight at the bleeding dire wolf. This time, the shifter was too close to run.
Jonathan spread his wings to soar—but then, even before his ice enveloped the wolf, the shifter howled again. It was a piercing sound of rage, loud enough to make Jonathan’s ears rattle.
At the sound, the blizzard picked up with such force that Jonathan found himself hurled back in the air, fighting just to stay afloat on the powerful gales that tore at his wings.
When he managed to finally stabilize himself in the air, he saw that the dire wolf had evaded his attack again.
The powerful wind had diverted Jonathan’s attack, and instead of hitting the shifter, it had hit the ground next to him, where a harmless patch of ice had spread.
Damn. If this lasts any longer...
He’d drawn on his power in the belief that this would be over within moments, and that he’d have enough left to easily carry Angel back to safety.