A woman with curling brown hair stood on one porch, talking with her hands while the man across from her smiled. Kiera felt like she was witnessing a private moment. The man didn’t look like a grinner. He had massive shoulders and the kind of brow that lent to brooding glares.
“That’s Jude and Cole. Jude is the new clan leader. You’ve met her cousin, Jasper.”
Fright slapped Kiera in the face. She bolted upright at the mention of Jasper. The gold dragon that overturned Norman’s reign was a monstrous beast. There was no denying that Jasper was capable of utter destruction if anyone so much as stepped out of line. He’d proven it, making the man who filled Kiera’s nightmares submit in a single day.
And here was that beast’s cousin. Jude noticed the car now. Kiera wanted to sink into her seat and disappear. She swallowed and forced herself to get out of the car where everyone could see her. More dragons appeared. A short female dragon shifter raced toward Charlie and threw herself into Charlie’s arms, locking her legs around her.
It seemed Charlie had made fast friends here. The short shifter dismounted Charlie and turned her attention to Kiera. The dragon woman’s short, lavender curls bounced over her shoulders. There was so much energy bubbling out of this woman that Kiera didn’t know how to react. It drew her in and, at the same time, made her want to run away.
Kiera wasn’t used to this kind of friendliness. The dragon woman enveloped Kiera in a tight hug that lasted too long. The stoic man that came and dragged the lavender-haired woman away was Kiera’s hero for a moment. Kiera heaved a sigh. She glanced to Charlie, wanting to tell her friend that she wasn’t up to this, but Charlie wasn’t paying attention.
The brown-haired man with striking green eyes had distracted Charlie. He must be the reason Charlie was so happy. He seemed nice enough, nodding and laughing as Charlie told the story of how she’d lost her leftovers. Kiera’s cheeks heated.
She wanted to disappear. This was too much. There were too many unfamiliar dragons. Kiera didn’t know any of their rules. She didn’t dare speak for fear of breaking a rule. So, she clutched her hands in front of her and kept her eyes on the ground, waiting for someone to tell her what to do.
It seemed like forever before someone remembered she was there.
“Jude said you can stay in the little cabin,” Charlie said as she grabbed Kiera’s bags.
Kiera jumped in to take her bags, but Charlie wouldn’t let her have them. They were Kiera’s responsibility, not hers. Kiera didn’t quite understand what was going on. Maybe, once this was all over, Kiera would owe Charlie a big favor. It seemed like this was all going in that direction. Nothing was ever done without expectation of something in return.
For a moment, Kiera wondered how she’d let herself get pulled into a situation like this, then she remembered that she was basically a push-over. She’d been one long before Norman took her in. Norman just took advantage of it and made sure she would never change.
Charlie showed Kiera the little cabin. It was truly little, with only a small kitchenette and little table. The rest of the cabin was the bedroom. The back wall looked new.
“Alec fixed that recently. I promise we will paint it soon.” Charlie flashed an apologetic smile.
Kiera nodded, wondering what happened to the entire back wall to make them replace it. With these many dragons, Kiera would have suspected a rowdy fight ended with some dragons busting through the wall. But all these dragons were mated. Fights didn’t break out among mated dragons as much.
Charlie opened her mouth, like she was going to say more, but a rumble approached the cabins, and Charlie stopped. Her brow furrowed and she rushed to the front of the cabin. Kiera, confused and curious, crept along behind her.
“That’s not one of ours,” someone said outside.
The muscle car that came down the driveway was familiar, though. Kiera had seen it only an hour ago, when the dragon man at the diner opened the trunk to find a new shirt. Now, even Kiera was confused.
The entire clan gathered at the end of the driveway. Even white-haired Asher Knuden and his mate had appeared. It was strange to see a celebrity in person. Asher seemed more inquisitive in person, rather than intimidating like he was on television. His mate rose on her tiptoes, whispered something in his ear, and then retreated.
The woman, a fox shifter, climbed the porch of Kiera’s small cabin. Kiera stepped out and had to promptly apologize for startling the shifter woman, who held her hand over her heart.
“I didn’t mean to startle you,” Kiera whispered.
“Oh lord,” the woman wheezed. She took a moment, probably calming herself. “You’re fine. I was just trying to stay out of the way. If you want me to leave I can…”
Kiera held up both hands in an effort to say it was alright. The door of the muscle car had opened now. It yanked Kiera’s attention away from the fox woman. Just like she thought, the dragon man from earlier stepped out.
“Dragon business,” the fox woman groaned. “Exactly why I backed out of there.”
The mystery man looked everyone up and down. He stepped out from behind the car door, slamming it shut behind him. He took one step forward before one of the dragons launched himself forward. A shout rang out, Jude calling her mate back.
He didn’t stop though. Jude’s mate slammed into the mystery man. They both tumbled to the ground. A chorus of groans and growls filled the air. Kiera rushed off the porch before she knew what she was doing. Someone grabbed her hand and held her back from the fight.
Kiera didn’t understand why they were attacking him. The man had done nothing. She needed to stop it. She couldn’t bear to watch it for another moment. Jude’s mate had the man pinned to the ground, fist in his shirt and the other crushing the man’s face. The mystery man roared and bucked. Jude’s mate went flying, but before the mystery man could get to his feet, a third shifter joined the fray.
“Heath! What are you doing?” The lavender-haired woman screamed.
The two female dragon shifters entered the fray and tore their mates away from the mystery man. Kiera found herself taking two steps toward him before stopping herself, fist clutched to her chest while a knot of concern ached inside it.
The mystery man had blood trickling down his temple. He leveled a fierce glare at the clan of dragons facing him. His lip curled in a snarl then he caught himself and swallowed it. When he got to his feet, Kiera felt the need to rush forward and help him remain standing. Kiera didn’t know this man, though. He was no one to her.
She’d never wanted to help another male shifter in her life. They’d always smacked her away, always hurt her. The pain they gave her had removed any kind of empathy she might have felt for any man. Until now. The mystery shifter tamped down his aggression. He even took a step back and lowered his gaze.
He was trying to be as unchallenging as possible. Kiera watched the change, from powerful to submissive, and was impressed. No male dragon she’d ever known had been able to set aside his pride.
“That’s…It can’t be…” Heath muttered. He looked to his lavender-haired mate. “He looks like your father.”
The woman stilled. Slowly, her head turned toward the mystery man. Her lips parted, but no sound came out.
It was Jude who stepped forward, placing herself between this mystery man and her clan. She put her hands on her hips and looked up at him.
“Tell me why you’re here and make it very quick. I’m prepared to feed you to the lake if I have to. Give me a reason to spare you.”
Mystery man’s brow furrowed as he took in Jude. It seemed he was confused as to why a woman would talk to him until he truly saw her. Was her beast in her eyes? Or did Jude exude a natural dominance that bull-headed shifters could feel? Kiera couldn’t tell from where she stood. All she could see was that the mystery man rocked back on his heels.
“My name is Link Webster,” he began.
There was a round of gasps and hisses from the clan. Kiera searched their faces for clues, but sh
e couldn’t read anything past anger. Beside her, Charlie reached for her hand. Charlie was nearly vibrating with anger. It bled into her grip, making her squeeze Kiera’s hand too tight. Kiera didn’t say anything, even when her fingers began to throb, because she didn’t want to disrupt the moment.
When no one said anything, Link went on. “I’m searching for my father. The last place public records put him is here.” His gaze leapt from face to face. “Are any of you familiar with an Alistair Webster?”
The only sound was the soft white-noise of nature. No one spoke up. They just stared at Link like they couldn’t believe he existed. Kiera craved more, to know why the clan treated him like such a threat when he hadn’t been the first to strike.
“You look a lot like him,” Jude’s mate said.
“Cole,” Jude snapped.
Cole’s only response was to fling his hand out at Link, as if to say just look at him. Kiera was getting a sinking feeling in her gut, like right before Norman would strike her. She could see trouble hurtling toward them. Something was about to blow. She needed to either flee or defuse the situation. But she didn’t know the right words to defuse this bomb.
And she couldn’t flee. Her feet refused to take another step away from this man. She took him in, trying to see past the blood and fading bruises. He was incredibly tall, nearly a head above every other man present. The denim jacket he’d been wearing was gone, probably covered with whipped cream and stuffed in the trunk of his car.
What struck Kiera the most was the honest pain in his eyes. He watched the clan with hope. It was a hope that was slowly dying by the second. Every now and then, his eyes would flash with color. The beast was trying to push to the surface, but he was battling it. This was a man who wouldn’t give in to his primal self.
“Do you know what your father did?” Charlie asked, her voice cracking.
Her mate stepped up behind her and put a hand on her shoulder. His lips were a firm, flat line and his eyes, well, they were somewhere else. Back in time, perhaps. Kiera couldn’t tell.
Link was quiet. There was a flicker of color in his eyes, there and then gone. “I don’t know anything. He disappeared when I was younger.”
Kiera could feel a story in the air, the kind that wrapped the clan in a haze, transporting them back to a time in which they suffered. The men were trapped in the middle of that story. It consumed them until the lavender-haired shifter squealed with glee.
“I have a brother!” She bounded toward the man and threw arms around his neck. It required quite the jump, but she managed it and knocked him off balance.
Link staggered. Kiera thought the sour mood would start to dissipate, but it only grew thicker. The silence was honed like a sharp blade waiting to slice through veins. Nearly everyone aimed it at Link. While the lavender-haired shifter prattled on, the others were pulling away.
Charlie yanked Kiera away. Kiera stumbled, trying to pull back, but the familiar fear slipping over Charlie’s features was enough to make Kiera give in. She gave one last glance over her shoulder and found Link watching her. She offered a sheepish wave. It was the best she could do before she was forced to leave.
The last thing Link expected was to be jumped the moment he got out of the car. His jaw still throbbed from the man’s attack, but Link didn’t think about it while he watched the woman get dragged away. She was the same one who’d spilled pancakes all over him. His beast told him to ignore the threatening men and follow the short-haired woman.
Instead, another female dragon shifter held him in place. She was practically bouncing, bubbling with joy. She’d called him her brother. He shook himself and turned his attention to her. Once he truly looked at her, he could see the similarities. They had the same nose and lips, even if her stature was vastly different.
“My name is Buffy Cumberland. I only recently learned who my sire was, but you’ve always known. Haven’t you?”
Buffy? What kind of a name was that? Link knew his father didn’t come up with that one. If the man he knew had any say in her name, she would have been named something plain. But Buffy did say she never knew her father. Not like he did. She must have been a surprise to him.
“Where is he?”
The only response were snarls. Buffy sighed. He expected her to roll her eyes, but a bit of the exuberant light in her faded. A heavy weight descended over them, like a smothering blanket. Link held his breath.
“He’s not dead,” Buffy began. “Well, not as far as we know. No one really knows where he is these days. I guess you could say the man he used to be is dead.”
“Damn, you really look like him. I could have sworn it was Alistair returning to finish what he started,” a white-haired shifter said with a whistle. He shook his head, like he was trying to shake off the tension that came before a battle.
Link was seeing all the clues, but he didn’t want to put them together. He knew his father wasn’t a good man. There was no denying that Alistair Webster was strong and opinionated. Link knew what was coming. He needed it said, though. Someone had to validate what he feared to be true.
Cole snarled. “He almost killed us ten years ago. Your father decided that it was his right to rule the world and when we tried to stop him, he decided we weren’t worth the air we breathed.”
Heath’s lip curled. “Some of us didn’t survive. There was a human woman. Your father killed her to make me submit. And when we found a way to stop your father, he convinced the witch working with us to sacrifice another of our ranks so he could live.”
Link heard every word of what they said. Alistair turned on them ten years ago. That would be right around the time his father stopped visiting. But if Alistair wasn’t dead, then what happened to him? Their story was muddled and given in broken fragments. Link couldn’t put all the pieces together.
“Our father wasn’t a good man. You and I, though. We’re better than that. Right?” Buffy looked up at him hopefully.
Link didn’t know what to tell her. It was like there was a whole side of his father he never knew about. How could he tell them he was different if he didn’t know what he was different from? It should have been an easy answer. They saw Alistair as a monster. Link knew he wasn’t a monster, but he wasn’t sure if he was as different from that monster as they hoped.
He was nothing like this woman. All they shared was a few similar features. The bubbly presence that oozed from her was foreign to him. Alistair never had that kind of energy. Link’s mother certainly didn’t. What Link saw in Buffy was a product of the parent they didn’t share, not the one they did.
“I just…I just want answers,” he whispered.
That wasn’t all he wanted, but Link was starting to realize he wouldn’t find what he needed here. This clan was closed off. Buffy was more like her mother than her father. It allowed her entry into this family. Link, on the other hand, had been barred from it the moment he stepped foot on their territory.
All because of what his father did ten years ago. Link had never really had much love for his father. The man came and went from his life, visiting only every so often like he had to remind Link of where he came from. Alistair never tossed a baseball with him. He never came to any of the big moments in Link’s life. Yet, Link never hated the man, either.
Not the way these people did. They had witnessed a side of Alistair that was cruel. Link could see it in the way they looked at him, their faces twisted in disgust because they didn’t see Link before them. They saw Alistair in him.
Link wanted to roar. His beast snarled and clawed at him from the inside. It was all he could do to keep the creature back. It, too, wanted to prove something. The beast’s methods wouldn’t endear him to anyone, though. The beast worked through violence and dominion. This clan already had a leader.
She stared him down like she was trying to open him and read the pages he kept hidden. The gold flash in her eyes told him all he needed to know. This clan was protected by a gold dragon. He’d heard tales of beasts like her.
Mostly male dragons with a need for conquest. They spread their power as far as they could reach, squashing all who dared rebel.
She would be a formidable match for the monster that lived inside him. Her scales might have been gold, but Link knew he would be able to keep up with her. That was what his father gave him. This creature lurking beneath his skin that was always aching for victory.
But this time, the beast wasn’t asking for a battle with the gold dragon woman. The creature wanted to know where the smaller dragon woman had gone, the one with the pixie haircut and small voice.
She’d been dragged away. His beast wanted to sniff her out and figure out why it needed her so badly. He wanted to wrap his arms around her again, like he did at the diner. There might have been squished pancakes between them, but he would gladly go back to that moment.
“Coming here was a mistake,” he grumbled.
“No,” Buffy declared. She clutched his arm, refusing to let go.
Buffy’s mate growled, low and threatening. The other man who’d nearly destroyed Link’s face stood just behind Heath. They were a wall, blocking Link’s access to the place that might hold the last remnants of the man Link called his father.
“Stay,” she pleaded. “We’re blood. You should stay the night. We can compare notes, and if you want, you can leave in the morning.”
Link expected the two men to speak up, but it was Jude who made the final decision.
“Get to know your sister. You both deserve that much. And, if you turn on us, know that her mate will kill you before you get out the door.”
Link’s stomach churned. This might be a bad idea, but he wanted to know more. Here was his chance, even if it meant having a few dragons prowl around his ankles like yapping dogs.
Buffy dragged him along, to what he supposed was her cabin. Heath wasn’t far behind. Link could feel the man’s murderous glare on the back of his neck. Still, Link searched the territory for the other woman. He would ask about her when the time was right, but Buffy was in control of the situation for now. And she might have answers Link needed.
Link (Keepers Of The Lake Book 5) Page 2