by Anna Lowe
Sophie, the she-wolf, gave a friendly wave as she walked by. Anjali was with her, holding a blond baby that looked a lot like Dell.
“Hello, Cal. Did you have a good night?” Anjali called.
He could sense the men tense up. It was just like the previous evening — the women of Koakea were willing to give him a chance, but the men were ready to rip him apart.
“Couldn’t ask for more,” he murmured.
Tim and Chase exchanged looks, which was fine with Cal. He wasn’t there to make friends. He just needed them to give him space and to do their part in keeping Cynthia safe. And from the looks of it, they were doing a pretty damn good job. He’d prowled the perimeter of the property early that morning — hounded by that overly zealous lion shifter the entire time — and confirmed his impression that the defenses were solid. The shifters kept a constant lookout, and there wasn’t an amateur among them.
Still, no one could rest easy, even in a place like this. He looked out over the sea. That land-water boundary was a mixed blessing. On one hand, it formed its own line of defense, what with the fringing reef and surf. On the other, the sea could be used as an avenue of surprise attack. So could the mountains on the inland side. It didn’t take much to imagine a squadron of dragons swooping in out of the blue, Pearl Harbor-style.
He scanned the jagged ridges, making a mental note of rocky outcrops that might suit his purpose. Later that day, he’d head out for a closer look. Scouting was the first step. Establishing extra defenses – and arming them – was the second, and who knew how much time he had?
He bent over the wood and whittled faster.
Dell laughed as he walked past. “Don’t tell me you’re planning to take down a couple of dragons by hand.”
Cal didn’t bother looking up when Dell’s footsteps came to a sudden halt.
“Are you crazy, man? You can’t slay dragons with darts.”
Cal kept on whittling, and finally, the lion shifter sauntered off, muttering, “I think he really is crazy.”
Cal snorted. No, he wasn’t crazy. Not too crazy, at least.
“Heya, Joey,” Dell called.
Cal’s head snapped up. He hadn’t seen much of Cynthia’s son the previous day. But there he was, a little redhead with bright green eyes. The spitting image of Barnaby.
Cut that out, Cal ordered his inner wolf when it started to growl. That’s just the kid, not Barnaby.
The man who stole our mate, his wolf growled.
He gritted his teeth, getting himself under control. He’d despised Barnaby, going so far as toying with the idea of murdering the guy. He’d come close too, sneaking into Barnaby’s office to catch him unawares. That was a year after Cal had been forced to leave Cynthia, when everything had seemed so clear.
Kill Barnaby. Find Cynthia, his wolf had insisted. Race her off to the farthest corner of the world where we can finally live in peace.
But Barnaby, damn him, had simply rotated his huge leather chair and spoken casually.
“Mr. Zydler. I’ve been expecting you.”
Cal’s jaw had nearly dropped, but he’d done his best to fake nonchalance.
“That must mean you’re expecting to die, too.”
Strangely, it hadn’t appeared as if Barnaby resented the notion much. After looking Cal over once, he’d waved to a chair.
“Take a seat. Please.” Barnaby’s voice had been weary, his eyes pained.
Cal had obeyed, mostly out of curiosity. He could listen first and kill later. That would be fine too.
At first, Barnaby just sat there, silently regarding the books that filled the floor-to-ceiling shelves. Most of them were old, leather-bound volumes, making the place smell like a goddamn library. Books on shifters, science, history — you name it. Cal spotted an entire section devoted to ancient Rome, and his wolf snorted. Not one book on engine repair, not a tool in sight. Didn’t dragons concern themselves with real-world problems?
But finally, Barnaby spoke. Slowly at first, then faster and ever more passionately. The more he revealed, the more Cal’s astonishment grew, and the more his assumptions crumbled.
Barnaby wasn’t the arrogant ass Cal had thought him to be. He was just as reluctant about mating with Cynthia as she had been. Of course, Cal would have been happy to kill him anyway. But then Barnaby had uttered four words that would change everything.
“I need your help.”
Cal had snorted and waved around the man’s opulent office. Barnaby ran a business worth millions of dollars. He owned an estate in Connecticut that came with a stable and private guards. Hell, the dragon shifter could hire an army of mercenaries if he chose.
“What do you need me for?”
“To protect the woman I love. I do love her,” Barnaby added quickly. “If not in the way you’d expect.”
Cal might have scoffed, but Barnaby went on, laying it all out. All the hidden intricacies of the dragon world — details Cal had never even guessed at. All the feuds, all the vendettas gradually coming to a head. The tightening noose Barnaby sensed closing around his world. A great new force was rising in the dragon world, and even a shifter as well-connected as Barnaby had to be on guard.
“Believe me, I’d love to hunt Drax down and fight him myself.”
Barnaby’s fingers had flexed, and it was easy to picture them turning into claws and tearing into Drax, the ruthless dragon intent on dominating the shifter world.
“But I can’t,” he finished. “I have Cynthia to think of now — and our little one.”
A shock wave had thundered through Cal’s body. Cynthia was pregnant? With another man’s child?
If he’d thought his world had fallen apart the previous year, he’d been wrong. His wolf howled inside, and he’d come close to falling to his knees. Cynthia living with Barnaby was bad enough. But Cynthia bearing Barnaby’s child… The two of them would be bound together in a way that could never be undone.
“Yes, our little one,” Barnaby had murmured. A bittersweet smile played across his lips, but the bitter outweighed the sweet, and Cal had to wonder why.
Then Barnaby cleared his throat and went on. “In any case, our enemies are multiplying. Worse, they are turning to methods we dragons have never stooped to before.”
For the first time, disdain crept into Barnaby’s voice, and a little bit of old-world arrogance showed. He scratched at the leather blotter on his desk with nails that lengthened in front of Cal’s eyes, gouging the soft material.
“I need your help,” Barnaby repeated, sounding more resolute than ever. “I will not soil the family name by stooping to such means myself, but I am willing to adopt…shall we say, unconventional weapons?”
Cal’s eyes had just about popped out of his head. Did Barnaby mean him?
He’d barely caught the rest of what Barnaby had said that night. Cynthia really was lost to him forever. But he would always love her, and that meant protecting her.
Doesn’t mean we can’t kill Barnaby, his wolf had tried one more time.
But he’d extinguished that fantasy immediately. Killing Barnaby would make Cynthia’s child an orphan, and that was wrong, no matter how badly his wolf cried for revenge.
That unexpected encounter had turned into the strangest evening of Cal’s life — one that threw him into a whole new level of turmoil. But instead of drowning in emotions as he had over the previous year, he’d discovered a new purpose in life: protecting Cynthia. She might never find out about his secret role, and that hurt. But nothing mattered as long as she was all right.
Cal blinked in the soft, tropical light of Maui and focused on the child approaching him. Joey. Just seeing the boy made his heart ache.
The little redhead skipped across the driveway, circled by a hyperactive dog. Cal silently did the math in his head. Joey had to be going on six. The “little one” Barnaby had referred to at their first meeting, over a decade back, had been miscarried early on, and Joey had only come along years later.
“Buzz and
I played catch,” Joey called to Chase, looking happy as can be. Then he caught sight of Cal and walked over.
The air went perfectly still, the way it might in the Old West when a gunslinger walked into town and everyone in the streets scattered — including the dog, who took one look at Cal and ran off with his tail between his legs. Everyone, in short, except that one innocent kid who didn’t know enough to get the hell away.
Well, if anyone thought Cal posed a danger to the kid, they were wrong. He’d saved the kid’s life — twice, in fact, even if neither Cynthia nor the boy knew it.
“What are you doing?” Joey asked, coming right up to the point of Cal’s stick.
Cal stared, amazed that such innocence still existed in the world. Not only did he have a six-inch blade in his hand, he had the makings of a pretty sturdy spear, but the kid didn’t consider either a threat. Which, Cal supposed, reflected well on Cynthia and her friends. The boy had every right to grow up suspicious and afraid. But somehow, they had managed to let Joey be a kid.
“Wow.” Joey leaned in, studying the point of the spear. “Can I touch it?”
“Not sure your mom would like that,” Cal murmured, glancing toward the men ready to rip him to shreds.
His mind spun, and his stomach flipped. It was crazy, the effect that child had on him. Joey was a living legacy of the man Cal had tried – and failed – to hate. The symbol of destiny laughing in his face. At the same time, that child was the most precious thing in Cynthia’s world.
“Whatcha making?”
“Just messing around,” Cal bluffed.
He set the spear down, making sure to keep the point away from the child. Then he picked up a forked branch. Within seconds, he had the branch cut down to a size that would fit in the kid’s hand. Joey watched, fascinated. Cal smoothed the edges, figuring the kid’s hands weren’t half as callused as his, and cut two slits into the ends of the Y. Then he motioned over to the shelf built into the barn.
“Get me that big rubber band, will you?”
Why his voice was so gritty, he had no clue. It was just a kid, for goodness’ sake.
Joey skipped over on command, and Cal watched his every move. The boy didn’t have a hint of Cynthia in him. Not on the outside, anyway — not with that flaming red hair and toothy grin.
“This one?” Joey called.
Cal cleared his throat. “Yeah. That’ll be fine.”
The kid scampered back so eagerly, it frightened Cal. It wouldn’t take much for an enemy to trick this child and do who knew what. No wonder the other men looked ready to pounce.
“Hold it out, will you?”
Joey did as he was told, stretching the rubber band. Cal carefully cut it, exaggerating his movements to show he was moving the blade away from the kid. The last thing he needed was for the shifters around him to spring into animal form and attack. The kid would be terrified, for one thing.
“Okay. Now, we do this…” He tied one end of the rubber band to the left branch of the stick.
It was funny, how a simple movement could dredge memories out of a man’s mind. More often than not, they were bad ones. But this time, Cal smiled. His father was an utter deadbeat, but his uncle had always been calm, quiet, and patient. Out of nowhere, Cal had a flashback of crouching by his uncle’s knee, watching him whittle just like Joey did. Cal even found himself uttering the same words his uncle had once used.
“Now, we stretch that side over there…”
“A slingshot!” Joey clapped in delight.
“Yep,” Cal said, just as coolly as his uncle once had. “You want to try it out?” The kid nodded eagerly. “Well then, go find yourself a rock.” Cal jutted his elbow out to point.
The moment Joey’s eyes caught on Cal’s arm, the redhead’s bright eyes went wide.
“Wow. You have a lot of scars.”
The fact that Cal’s heart started pounding harder had less to do with the remark than with the fact that Cynthia walked up at exactly that time.
“Sweetie, it’s not nice to say things like that,” she said, gently touching her son’s shoulder.
Cal peered up into those amazing black eyes. Cynthia, he wanted to whisper. Can we talk? Please?
But instead, he shook his head and murmured, “I don’t mind.”
“How did you get them?” Joey asked, entranced.
Cal mulled that one over. He couldn’t exactly say, Fighting dragons. Not to a kid who’d lost his father in a dragon attack.
“Just a burn. Now, did you find some ammo for your slingshot?”
Joey squeaked and jumped back into action, scouring the ground.
“Joey, honey…” Cynthia called.
“It’s okay,” Cal whispered, as much to himself as to her. Because damn, his hands were a little shaky, and his voice was about to crack, just from being close to Cynthia. A damn good thing Joey came running back with a couple rocks a moment later.
“Okay. The first rule is never to point your slingshot at anything you can hurt or break. It’s just for fun, okay?” Cal said.
Joey nodded, and the deep furrows in Cynthia’s brow eased slightly.
“You load it like this, and then you pull it back like this.” Cal demonstrated, then handed the slingshot over.
The kid took it with a look of such delight that the achy, conflicted feelings in Cal’s chest eased. He grabbed a can of nails and set it down a few paces away. Then he walked back to Joey and pointed.
“See if you can hit that. But make sure you check that nobody gets in the way.”
Joey nodded and drew back the slingshot, focusing intently. Cal watched, fascinated. Maybe the kid did have a little bit of Cynthia in him, after all.
Joey’s first shot missed by a mile, but Cal shrugged. “I couldn’t get it my first time either. It takes practice, that’s all.”
He picked up a rock and motioned for Joey to give him the slingshot. Then he took aim, doing it slowly so the kid could watch.
“When you release, make sure you keep your fingers clear so it can fly straight.”
He released and, bing! The rock bounced off the can and tumbled across the driveway.
Joey looked on in awe. “Wow. You’re good.”
Cal hid a smile. If only the kid knew how accurate his shot was or the size of the targets he’d managed to take down.
Walking out again, Cal dragged his boot through the gravel, marking a wide circle around the can.
“Try again. Five points if you get inside the circle, and ten points if you hit the can.”
Cynthia tilted her head, looking at him in a way that was hard to decipher. Cal turned away quickly, telling himself not to think too hard.
Joey let another stone fly, and Cal nodded. “Five points. Way to go, man.”
Joey looked pleased as punch, and the other men smiled, too. Were they finally getting that Cal wasn’t the enemy?
“This is fun,” Joey announced.
Cal’s gaze traveled across the driveway and down the gentle green slopes. It was fun, actually. The sun was shining, the air was scented with tropical flowers, and nobody was threatening to kill him — for now, at least. Koakea was a nice place, especially for shifters, who had a closer link to Mother Earth than most humans did. It was a nice place to raise a kid too.
Cal glanced at Joey. The poor kid had lost his father, but he had a loving mom and, from the looks of it, several doting uncle types. He lived in a beautiful, quiet place, sheltered from the dangers of the shifter world.
But a cloud passed over the sun, casting a shadow, and Cal frowned. It didn’t matter how sunny or warm a place was. Danger could strike anywhere, anytime.
Hailey came up and motioned Cynthia over with a question of some kind.
“You could make a really big slingshot. A bunch of them,” Joey said, grinning. “And put them all around, so if the bad guys come, we could get them.”
Cal froze for a moment, then covered up with a weak smile. “I guess you could.”
Smar
t kid, his wolf murmured.
“Like up there.” Joey pointed to a cliff.
The others had tuned in to Hailey’s conversation with Cynthia, so Cal leaned closer to Joey and jutted his chin. “There’s a better spot. See that ledge? Now that would be the perfect place to position your defenses. Don’t you think?”
God, he was pushing his luck. But, hell. It felt good to hint at this plan, even if it was just to a kid.
Joey nodded a mile a minute.
Of course, we’d need different ammo, Cal’s wolf hummed.
And just like that, his mind veered off into all the preparations he had to get moving with. More spears. Parts for the weapon he planned to build. More—
“Joey, sweetie,” Cynthia called.
Cal snapped his eyes back to the ground before he gave anything away.
“It’s time for some schoolwork. I promise you can play with the slingshot as soon as we’re done.”
To Cal’s surprise, Joey didn’t so much as groan. He just took his mother’s hand and fell into step beside her. “What are we doing today?”
“Some math, some spelling…” Cynthia said.
Cal looked from Cynthia to her son. Homeschooling, huh? It figured. One, because whatever Cynthia did, she liked having control over. Two, because she did a damn good job at anything she set her hand to, and being supermom was right up her alley. And three, she couldn’t send her son to a regular school, where he would be vulnerable to enemy shifters.
Cal’s chest tightened. His childhood hadn’t been a barrel of laughs, but he’d had his freedom. He looked at Cynthia and Joey, finding himself mourning for them both. Cynthia’s childhood had been just as restricted as Joey’s. Was that why she had reveled in the time they’d shared?
If I tasted freedom, it wasn’t for long, her sad eyes reminded him.
But to Joey, she said, “After spelling, we’ll read our book.”
“Yay!” Joey smiled. “The history of dragons.”
