by Jadyn Chase
The endless waves of delicious ecstasy pulsing through my veins hungered for everything that the growl meant. I wanted to be his, to belong to him in all his dragoness. I wanted to be the one who understood him, who craved him for what he truly was.
I could never want him or need him like this if I had never found out the truth about him. I could never give myself to him in utter sublime rapture without seeing that dragon in his eyes.
He cradled my face in both hands. He kissed my lips while his shaft kissed my insides in gentle, massaging strokes. The unstoppable power of that mystical connection overwhelmed me with its beauty and its raw, unvarnished primal force.
I couldn’t stop my body writhing and twisting to take it all the way to its hilt. I needed so much more of him inside me and all over me. I needed him in my mind, in my soul, in every facet of my life.
Before I could stop it, the mounting energy erupted out of me. I would have screamed out loud, but he covered my mouth with his own to muffle the sound. Nothing could stifle the explosion tearing me apart, though. My nipples grazed his chest. My hips rocked to take him to my depths. Another throb of bliss knocked me off my moorings until I lost awareness of everything but his powerful body encompassing me and taking me to the stratosphere.
8
Ezra
I trailed my fingertips through Nora’s hair. She slept tucked into the corner of my shoulder, but I didn’t sleep. I had to stay alert so I didn’t accidentally touch her back or any other sensitive part of her.
I buried my nose in her hair and inhaled a deep breath. How could I find such a matchless woman, only to lose her so fast? In a few hours, the Tennessee State Troopers would take her away from me. I would probably never see her again.
I would never forget her. I knew that now. I couldn’t imagine myself loving any other woman—certainly not the way I loved her. I never told her I loved her. That would only scare her off, and what good could it do anyway with her leaving in the morning?
I admitted it to myself, though. In these private moments before dawn, I let the words cross my mind. I love you, Nora. I love you so much. I love you more than anything in the world.
Now, with her asleep in my arms, those words sounded so right. They fitted everything that happened between us last night. They were the logical conclusion to me spending the night with her. They were the only conclusion.
For the first time in my life, I cursed the coming dawn. I always woke up early so I could start my day and watch the sun come up, but not today. I didn’t want the sun to rise. I didn’t want the day to come. I wanted to stay right here with her in my arms forever. I never wanted to be anywhere else.
When I kissed her and held her and owned her last night, I could believe she felt the same way. Hell, she even said she felt the same way. She said she didn’t want to leave. She might even love me back, but love wasn’t enough to keep her on Smokey Ridge.
Every hair on her head shone with angelic light. I cherished every gentle breath breezing through her nostrils. Every inch of her majestic skin made me love her even more. How could something so good hurt so much?
She stirred in her sleep and leaned back. Her head rolled onto my bicep, and her peaceful face came into my line of sight. I had to kiss her. I couldn’t stop myself. She eased into my embrace, and her sweet lips broke my heart.
Her fingers in my hair drove me insane. I couldn’t do this, but I couldn’t stop it, either. I wanted to cry. I wanted to run away from the agonizing intensity of my own emotions, but her kiss held me captive.
At that moment, an almighty explosion rocked the whole house. Nora jerked out of my arms and jolted upright. “What the Christ was that?”
Another blow shivered the roof timbers. The windows rattled, and someone screamed downstairs. I couldn’t hesitate a second longer. I leaped out of bed and snatched my jeans off the floor. “Get up, girl. Come on. Hurry.”
She dove out of the blankets. She put on her pajamas before she went to sleep last night. The sheets irritated her burns and kept her awake, so she got up fully dressed except for her bare feet.
I yanked on my jeans and tore the door off its hinges getting out of the room. People flooded the hall pouring out of every doorway. More explosions battered the house. Glass broke somewhere out of sight.
I bumped into Pop in all the confusion. “What’s going on?”
“How the hell should I know?” he bellowed. “You and Kylen take your Ma and your sisters and Nora and get to the bunker. I’m getting the boys out to see what’s going on out there.”
I didn’t need to hear any more. I grabbed Nora’s hand and plowed into the sea of bodies. I roared at the top of my voice. “Ma! Where are you? Lucy!”
Kylen appeared out of the dark. “I’ve got Lucy. I’ll find Ma. You find Hazel.”
“I’m right here!” My Ma emerged from the cloud of dust choking everything.
“Where’s Hazel?”
Liam materialized out of nowhere. “She’s not here. She went to visit Colton Phelps over the Ridge. She’s miles away.”
“Lucky her,” I snarled. “Come on, Ma. We’re going to the bunker.”
The sound of more breaking glass caught my attention. I cast one glance sideways and saw Pop in my own bedroom. He jabbed a rifle barrel through the window pane and brought the weapon to his shoulder. He fired several times.
Liam rushed him. “What are you doing?”
Pop whipped around, and his face made my blood run cold. “It’s the Lynches. They’re attacking the compound. Move, all of you!”
Everyone burst into motion at once. I towed Nora toward the stairs with Ma right behind me. Kylen and Lucy brought up the rear. Luka met me on the landing climbing up from the living room. He carried a shotgun in each hand and shoved one at me. “Take this.”
I grabbed the weapon and sidestepped around him. I put out my foot to go downstairs when the whole house blasted apart before my eyes. A whistling tornado of splinters and wood and metal and glass peppered face. The concussion knocked me back ten feet.
Screams and shouts woke me from a daze. I struggled onto my knees and looked around. The devastation didn’t make sense to my stunned brain. The whole living room, the front wall of the house, and the porch—everything below the landing was gone. A ragged gaping hole looked out on the yard where trucks, ATVs, and a few cars skidded up the driveway.
I couldn’t see much through the dust and smoke. Headlights swiveled in the creeping dawn mist. I caught sight of the gate hanging off its hinges and two dead bodies on either side of it. I didn’t need to see any more.
I pushed myself to my feet. Nora lay on her back among the remains of the house. She convulsed and gnashed her teeth in pain. I grabbed her under the armpits to hoist her up. I didn’t care anymore if I hurt her. I had to get her on her feet. “Come on. Get up. We have to get out of here.”
All around me, more people hauled themselves off the floor. I took a deep breath and boomed at the top of my lungs. “Get up! Get up, all of you! They’re right outside.”
That did the trick. My brothers scrambled for any weapon they could get their hands on. They scurried in all directions. I couldn’t pay attention to them anymore. Pop gave me a direct order, and I had to carry it out.
I made sure Ma and Kylen were up and doing before I faced the immediate problem of getting out of the house. I jumped down into the wreckage of the living room and held up my arms to Nora. “Come on. Jump.”
She hopped into my arms. She yelped when my hands dug into her back, but she didn’t hesitate. She moved out of the way to make room for Ma and Lucy to jump down after her.
Kylen tossed me my shotgun and landed next to me. “Let’s get out of here.”
“How?” Nora asked. She glanced over her shoulder. The Lynches had parked their vehicles, and men and boys climbed out.
Before I could answer, a dragon floated into view from somewhere above the house. It landed in the yard and blocked the cars. It shivered the ground sta
lking toward us.
It opened its mouth and narrowed its eyes. When you see that sign as often as I have, you can recognize it anywhere. I spun around and tackled Nora, Lucy, and Ma with both arms. “Get down!”
I flattened the three of them in the broken splinters of siding and two-by-fours. They screamed in unison, and the dragon blasted the house with a devastating jet of fire. The heat singed over my head and woofed off the shattered walls.
I kept my head down until I heard a menacing roar right next to my ear. The flames stopped in an instant. I dared to peek out to see another dragon, a coal-grey one, rise out of the rubble.
In a flash, it wheeled to face the enemy. It spread its wings, and fire deflected off its chest. I saw my chance and rocketed to my feet. “Go! Get out of here!”
Ma turned back and held out her hand. “Kylen! No!”
“Move!” I thundered. “We can’t help him. He’s protecting us while we get away, now go!”
I gave her a vicious shove. Her lip quivered, but she obeyed me. Flames bounced off Kylen’s chest and wings. He flailed and screamed in agony, but he held firm long enough for me to push the women through the back door into the yard behind the house.
At that moment, a sizzling streak of smoke shot out of an upstairs window. A rocket launched into the still morning air and hit Sam Lynch in the head. It detonated, and his fire died with a puff of smoke. Kylen collapsed in a heap, and all the other Lynches rushed forward in a posse.
I didn’t stand around to see the outcome. I rounded on Ma and the girls. “Get moving! Now!”
“Where?” Nora yelled.
“There!” I pointed down a steep path cut into a ravine behind the Ridge.
She darted for it and plunged into the dark forest. I herded Lucy and Ma down the twisting trail behind her. The faint dawn light faded and left very little to see by, but Nora found her way with no trouble.
Gunfire and rocket explosions echoed through the canopy behind us. I dreaded thinking about what was going on back there, but I had a job to do. No one else would do it now that I’d lost Kylen. Was he still alive? I might never know.
I drove myself to the brink of exhaustion, but my mind wouldn’t stop spinning. What could induce the Lynches to attack our compound like that? Making an incursion into neutral territory was one thing. Driving up to our house and blowing the roof off—that was another thing altogether.
This went way beyond just trying to start another war. They must have some reason to bring it to our front doorstep.
Nora charged forward faster than ever until she spotted the bunker entrance between the trees. She rushed to the door and flattened both hands against it. She panted through her bared teeth. “How do we get inside?”
I shouldered to one side. “There’s a combination.”
I pushed aside a curtain of vines to reveal the tumbler dial. I spun it and entered the combination. The heavy steel door swung aside, and she gazed down into the dark.
“You and Ma and Lucy get inside. I’ll lock you in. You’ll be safe in there until someone comes for you. There’s enough food and water in there to last you three years, so you’ll be fine.”
She spun around. “Where are you going?”
“I’m going back. I can’t leave Pop and the boys to fight the Lyches alone. I’ll arm up and go back to the house.”
I started to duck into the bunker, but she stopped me. “If you’re going back, I’m going with you.”
“You can’t, honey,” Ma interrupted. “No one can fight the dragons but more dragons.”
“What about you?” Nora fired back. “I don’t see you fighting them.”
Ma gave her a sad little smile. “I’m human, honey. I’m just as human as you. I’m no dragon. I fell in love with Isaac, and I had to turn my back on my whole family to marry him. I can’t fight those things any better than you can.”
Nora blinked at her. “You are?”
Ma squeezed her arm. “Yeah. Now come on. We’ll be safe in here. They built this bunker just for me, so I’d be safe in situations like this one.”
Nora looked up at me, and a curious expression came over her face. The alarm and confusion of the attack dissipated, and her eyes cleared. She drew herself up. “I’m going with you. Give me a weapon.”
“Listen, girl,” I began. “You can’t….”
“Give me a weapon!” she snapped.
The sharp tone of her retort startled me into silence. I stared at her.
She shook her hair out of her eyes and leveled me with a clear, steady gaze. “I’m going with you. I fought those things once before and I can do it again. This is my fight more than yours.”
“What do you mean, your fight?” I asked. “This has nothing to do with you.”
“Don’t you get it? They came here for me. They tracked me here. They’re here to kill me to get rid of the last witness to their crimes.”
My head swung up, and I found myself looking at someone I realized I knew absolutely nothing about. I knew nothing about what she was capable of. How could she, alone among all my Clan, have figured that out?
Only now when she pointed it out to me did it all make sense. The Lynches would never dare attack our compound for any other reason. They must have planned the attack on Jacks River thinking they would kill all the witnesses. Ever since Nora escaped, they must have gone into damage control mode.
They tracked her here, just like she said. They wanted to kill her. They would hazard anything to cover their tracks. They had to make a big enough mess to make it look like she got killed in a Clan war across the Ridge.
She waited with saintly patience for my pea brain to fathom what she divined in a split second. Who in the name of God was this woman?
She blinked again and said in a calm, soothing voice, “Give me a weapon, Ezra.”
I was raised to follow orders. I was raised to do as I was told in an emergency without questioning. I recognized an order when I heard one.
I dove into the bunker and switched on the overhead light. I grabbed a few assault rifles, a dozen handguns, and as many clips of ammo as I could carry. I ferried everything to the door.
I slung my shotgun over my shoulder and jammed three handguns into my waistband. I stuck another in my boot. Nora slammed clips into a few more pistols and stowed them into her pajamas. Then she took a rifle from me and laid an AK47 across her shoulder bandolier-style.
My Ma watched all this with her lip trembling. “Don’t do this, honey, please. I can’t stand to see you get hurt again.”
Nora patted her arm. “It’s all right. I owe your family this. Now you and Lucy get inside. Ezra will lock you in. We’ll come back for you when it’s all clear.”
She pushed Ma and Lucy toward the entrance, but Ma hesitated. She peered up at Nora with moist eyes. “Will you…. Kylen….?”
“I’ll find him. If we can save him, we’ll bring him here. Don’t worry. You have my word we’ll find him.”
Ma nodded. She compressed her lips and turned away. She walked into the bunker, and I shut the door on her. I spun the dial and let the vines drape over it. When I looked up, I found Nora studying me. “You all right?”
I nodded down at the ground.
“We’ll find him. I promise.”
I lifted my eyes to her face. I still couldn’t believe I spent last night with this woman, and now here she was, giving me orders and arming up with the best of them. I moved in a daze where nothing I thought I knew or understood fit with reality anymore.
She nodded at my guns. “Are you ready to go?”
I nodded again, and we both turned up the path the way we came. Muffled booms drifted through the trees. My guts spasmed at the thought of going back up there.
Nora took the first step. Her energy and momentum impelled me to join her, and we marched up the ravine until daylight broke through the branches.
9
Nora
I crouched behind the bushes and peeked into the open. What was left of the
Kelly house sagged in the middle of the yard. A single wall remained standing, and a sad remnant of the roof drooped from it to touch the ground. Only the blackened woodstove stood alone in the middle of a pile of charcoal.
Sam Lynch strutted back and forth in front of the house in his dragon form. He eyed the derelict and belched fire at it at intervals. The eruptions of fiery breath blasted another corner post out of position and the roof dropped.
Flames danced from the shingles. Smoldering sticks of lumber and piles of curtains smoked around the ruins. A few other dragons covered the rest of the compound while four or five armed men lounged against their trucks and laughed.
“Where is everyone?” I whispered to Ezra.
“They must have fallen back. There’s another bunker down the other side of the Ridge. They probably went there to regroup and mount a concerted assault.”
“I’m guessing you know where this bunker is,” I remarked.
“Of course I do. I know every dirty little secret hidden on this Ridge.”
I turned to him. I could barely keep my voice low from the tension racking my nerves. “Here’s what I want you to do. I want you to run around the other side of the Ridge and find your Pop and Luka and the boys. Get everyone together and bring them back up here, but make sure they don’t show themselves. Keep everybody hidden and surround the compound.”
“What?” His eyes popped out of his head “What good will that do?”
“I have an idea how we can smoke these bastards.”
“How?” he whispered.
“They’re after me,” I told him. “We can lure them into a vulnerable position by using me as bait. Then the rest of you can ambush them and put them in the ground. Understand?”
He blinked at me. “You can’t do this, Nora. You can’t use yourself as bait. It’s too dangerous.”
“Nonsense,” I snapped. “It’s the only way. If we don’t put them down now, they’ll just keep torching everything in sight until they destroy the whole Ridge. Who knows how many more people they’ll kill? We have to put a stop to this. As soon as they see me, they’ll drop their guard. They already think the Kellys are hiding in a hole somewhere with their tails between their legs. So much the better. Let them think that. Once they see me, they’ll think they’ve got me. I’ll play up to them and act helpless. They’ll all converge back here and surround me. They might even decide to kill me right here. All those idiots sitting back and picking their teeth will want to get in on the action. They’ll come over, too. Make sure you have enough guys to get the job done in one blow. Forget weapons and half-measures. You’ll all shift at once and blow them to kingdom come. Understand?”
