It was interesting that she found it easier to read his reactions when he was in dragon form.
Or maybe she was getting to know Drake a little better. She’d thought him impassive and inscrutable once, but she was learning to detect the signs of his emotions. It didn’t hurt that he seemed to invariably be on the side of honor and justice.
That was familiar and welcome.
In fact, Ronnie was reassured by his outrage. He would only have been so angry if Jorge had lied. “I didn’t really think it could be true. I didn’t think you had ever lied to me.”
“I have failed to tell you all of the truth, for we have had little time for such confidences. I would improve upon my record.”
“Starting now?”
“One never knows how matters will unfold,” Drake said grimly. “Your husband was killed by a viper, much like this one, a malicious worm spewing his toxin into the world in the hope of gaining men to his side. Your husband battled him to his very last, and there is no more noble death than that.”
Ronnie nodded. She spared a glance to the ground, now so far away, and held a little tighter to her dragon. Were there more dragons below? She thought so, although it was hard to pick their figures out of the darkness in the rain. She saw several plumes of fire and guessed that there were two pairs battling in the air. The building where she’d been imprisoned was in flames and she could hear sirens drawing closer.
“His death could be said to have been my fault,” Drake admitted. “For I failed to kill that viper when first I hunted him. I was caught under his spell, and he did much evil before I could finish what I had once begun.”
“And Cassandra? Did you truly abandon her?”
“Not by choice,” he admitted, acknowledging the truth in the charge. “I left reluctantly, to do the service I owed.” That was familiar to Ronnie, too: Mark had never wanted to leave when he was going to ship out, but he had believed in fulfilling his duty and in serving the greater good. That was the way of honor and justice. Ronnie liked that Drake had that trait in common with Mark. “That viper’s spell held me captive until long after Cassandra had died. I cannot undo that she and my son never knew of my fate.”
Ronnie thought of all the days and nights she’d been uncertain of Mark’s whereabouts, or even whether he survived and wasn’t nearly sure she was ready to sign up for that life again.
Drake’s tone turned suddenly urgent. “Trust in the firestorm, Veronica. Unlike me, it never errs. That it has chosen you as my destined mate means that there is promise in our match. I know that to be so. I want you to know that is so, to have no shred of doubt, and to use that confidence to obstruct the charm of a viper.”
Her grip tightened upon him at the implication beneath his words. “But you just saved me.”
Drake shook his head. “I have stepped into his trap, but I did so to confide this truth in you.” He cast a glance downward and his eyes narrowed. Ronnie looked down to find a furious gold and topaz dragon flying straight toward them very quickly, and she clutched at Drake in fear.
“And now comes the moment that I shall pay the price for provoking Jorge’s wrath.” His voice dropped low again, even as she realized the dragon in pursuit was Jorge in his other form. “Remember, Veronica. Remember and believe. He is powerless if there is no soil for his venomous seed to take root.”
The thing was that Jorge didn’t look very powerless to Ronnie at all.
“But…”
“He will let you live, because he wants the child.”
“And you?”
Drake smiled, revealing a great many dragon teeth. “I shall have to earn the right to survive this night.” He lowered his voice to a rumble, and Ronnie felt his words in the vibration of his chest as much as she heard them. “All is not necessarily as it appears.”
Ronnie caught her breath, but Drake spun in mid-air. He held her fast against his chest with one great claw, even as he dove down toward Jorge. Clearly, she was going to have a front-row seat to this dragonfight. She could see the gleam of Jorge’s cold blue eyes, closing fast and saw straight down his gullet when he opened his mouth.
She hoped Drake wouldn’t drop her into that maw, with all those sharp yellow teeth.
The Slayer emitted a plume of dragonfire, shooting it directly at them, but Drake elegantly moved aside so that it blew past him. The flames crackled and snapped, looking like the eruption of a volcano. Little sparks loosed themselves from the main torrent of fire to glow against the night then wink out.
Before Jorge could stop breathing fire, Drake darted down and seized the Slayer’s tail. He sank his teeth into it and tore the flesh with a vicious gesture. Ronnie saw the wound, up close and personal. Jorge howled as the end of his tail was torn off, and Drake flung it downward, leaking black blood.
Drake spat the residue from his mouth and Ronnie smelled the vileness of that black blood. She felt a drop of it burn the back of her hand where it fell. Drake roared and snatched at Jorge’s genitals with his spare claw, ripping open the flesh. Jorge bellowed and belched flames again, snatching suddenly for Ronnie. She felt the golden talon slide through her hair, then Drake rolled in the air, turning his somersault into a dive.
Jorge, of course, was fast behind him.
Breathing fire.
Ronnie held on for dear life.
Chapter Eight
Sloane returned home from Chicago, exhausted.
There was nothing like healing other Pyr to wear him right out. There was an emotional component to the best healing practices, a need for him to pour his own energy into the treatment of the wound. Erik had been torn up pretty badly, and it hadn’t helped that the leader of the Pyr was a bad patient.
Erik never wanted to rest or take a break, especially when there was fighting to be done and Slayers on the rampage. In a way, Sloane couldn’t blame him for that. In another, he wished Erik would learn to delegate a bit more. It would have been far better for the older Pyr to have rested, rather than characteristically pace the floor.
Maybe Erik’s determination to be fighting as soon as possible would help facilitate his healing. Sloane had grown tired of arguing about it and had left Chicago, surrendering Erik to Eileen’s care.
His healing had begun, and she was more accustomed to charming him into appropriate behavior. Sloane had too much to do to linger where he wasn’t needed.
It was late by the time he got his truck out of the paid parking at the airport and drove home. There were a ton of messages and texts on his phone, but he needed some down time to recover his balance. Whatever battles the Pyr were fighting on this night, they could fight without him.
Sloane found the gentle roll of the land reassuring and took his time, savoring the sense that he returned to his refuge as well as his lair. He indulged himself in a memory of that hot night with Sam and wished he hadn’t made her so angry.
He knew exactly what would be the best down time—another night with her, exploring and pleasing each other.
He wondered how—or if—he could make things right again. He could accept her terms, ask no questions and make no emotional demands.
He could apologize for researching her acquisition of the house, though he didn’t think it was wrong to check on new neighbors. He certainly hadn’t meant to offend her. Maybe tarot card readers thought that people should just all trust each other and get along. It wasn’t a bad idea, but people certainly didn’t always turn out to be trustworthy.
He could cover his tattoo, if that put her concerns at ease.
Sloane parked the truck in the garage, then walked back to the shop. He had a faint sense that something was wrong, but couldn’t see anything amiss. The alarm system registered no entries since he’d left. The greenhouses were intact and the automated watering system was on, right on time, the water rising from the beds to fill the greenhouses with a faint mist. He walked through the rows of herbs behind the greenhouses, savoring the scent of the rosemary and lavender and the feel of the earth beneath
his boots. His dragonsmoke boundary was intact and still resonant, barely faded during his absence.
To Sloane’s surprise, he caught a whiff of Sam’s perfume on the front porch of his own house and his body responded with immediate enthusiasm. He wondered when she’d come to his door—then he wondered why.
Maybe she’d wanted to make up. Maybe she’d been hot again. That was more than distracting and he turned to stare across the fields at her house.
Was that a light at one window? It looked like a candle flickering. Maybe he’d go over and check.
First, he needed a shower and something to eat. He could hardly argue his case when he looked as he did.
Filled with new purpose, Sloane unlocked the door and strode into his home, entering the code into the alarm system by rote. Everything looked as it should, but he had a sudden sense that something was wrong.
Very wrong.
He locked the door behind himself and took the stairs two at a time to the basement. Sloane had upgraded, at considerable expense and in almost complete secrecy, the laboratory that had long been in his basement. In his quest to isolate this virus and create and antidote, he had added new equipment that he’d never needed before for his herbal cures, as well as containment for biohazards. He’d implemented protocols for containing dangerous toxins, which was part of the reason that only Pyr were permitted into his house: they couldn’t catch the virus.
There was a glass wall opposite the base of the stairs, the first barrier and airlock before the lab. There was a hum of the generator that kept the reverse air pressure constant and the lights were dim. The control panel showed that the door had been sealed since before his departure, but even through the protective barriers, Sloane could see the broken glass on the floor of the lab. He leaned against the glass, unable to believe his eyes. Everything inside the lab itself was broken, shattered, stomped, torn or burned.
His lab had been trashed and the fact that no one had passed through its door made it easy to guess whom.
A Slayer who had drunk the Elixir.
Sloane suited up in a hurry and tapped his toe with impatience as he worked his way through the airlocks to the lab itself. Finally, he was inside. It was before the line of refrigerators that he was assailed by one pungent punch of Slayer scent.
Jorge.
Sloane guessed the truth then. The seal that he’d left intact on the fridge was broken, which was bad news. He opened the fridge, fearing that he knew exactly what he’d find.
Or more correctly, what he wouldn’t find.
It was no consolation to be right. The vial of infectious blood, the sample from which he was trying to isolate the Seattle virus, was gone.
As if it had vanished into thin air.
Jorge must have spontaneously manifested inside Sloane’s lab, just to steal it. Given that Jorge had been the one to introduce this plague to Seattle in the first place, there couldn’t be a good reason for him to need more of the virus.
Plus, he’d evidently known that Sloane would be gone, which meant Jorge knew about the Slayers who had attacked Erik. Maybe he’d even sent them. Maybe the whole point of the attack had been injuring Erik badly enough that Sloane had to leave California to tend him.
Sloane didn’t even want to think about why Jorge wanted more of that virus.
How was he even going to be able to find a cure, without having a sample to test against? His research was completely stymied by this. He had a back-up of his notes and hoped that was intact, but without the virus to test against, he’d never know if any antidote worked.
And he had no idea how he’d get another sample. The first had been collected by luck and bravado, before the officials had mustered their resources and put containment measures in place. It would be much tougher to get another now.
Deeply frustrated, Sloane pulled out his phone and called Erik, feeling more than sick over the tidings he had to confide.
The phone was ringing when he wondered whether Sam had been at the door while Jorge had been in the house. Terror slid through him and he knew he had to check that she was okay.
He didn’t trust Jorge to take more than his due, after all.
He updated Erik quickly as he ran to Sam’s house and ended the call in her driveway.
* * *
Sam nearly jumped out of her skin when someone hammered on her door. She sat bolt upright at the noise, her heart hammering. Her mind was filled with memories of Nathaniel and there were wet tears on her cheeks. For a moment she wasn’t sure where she was.
“Sam!” a man shouted. “Are you there? Are you all right?”
Sloane!
Relief flooded through Sam, then concern as he kept knocking hard. It sounded like he was going to come through the door.
“Sam!” he called again, his urgency making her heart leap.
“I’m coming!” Sam hurried to her front door, wiping her cheeks as she went. Last thing she remembered, she’d been drilling herself on the meanings of the individual tarot cards with a new reference book. The clock in the kitchen told her that she must have dozed off, because it was later than she remembered. Thank goodness the candle she’d lit was in a glass votive.
She unlocked the door to find Sloane looking agitated. There was a shimmering blue light around him, like an aura, but when Sam blinked, it disappeared. She must have imagined it. Relief flooded his features and he surveyed her quickly, as if to prove to himself that she was all right.
“What’s wrong?”
“I just got home. I thought maybe you’d been hurt.” He shoved a hand through his hair, leaving it disheveled. He looked tired and his shirt was wrinkled. She knew he noticed the tracks of her tears, because his voice softened. “Are you all right?”
“Fine,” Sam said, folding her arms across her chest. There was no way she could confide in him right now, not with those memories so bright in her mind and her heart aching as if it had been shredded before her eyes.
It pretty much had. There was a lump in her throat and Sam felt vulnerable, which she didn’t like one bit.
Sloane seemed to recognize her reaction because he took a step back. He pinched the bridge of his nose and took a steadying breath. “Sorry I disturbed you. Long flight.” He might have walked away, but Sam did appreciate his concern.
And she wanted him to linger.
“Why did you think something was wrong?”
He gave her an intent look. “Someone broke into my place. I was afraid he might have come here next.”
Sam supposed it was reasonable to assume that the intruder was male, as most burglars were, but it sounded almost as if Sloane knew who it had been.
That was crazy, though. She was tired and making stuff up. “Was it last night?”
Sloane met her gaze, a question in his eyes.
“I saw lights at your house. They came on then went off again just a few moments later. I figured you had to have an alarm system…”
“I do.”
“Well, it didn’t go off. So, I thought maybe you’d just come home.”
“No.” He turned as if he’d leave and Sam kept talking, just to have him stay a little longer.
“I had a funny feeling, so I walked over today, but it just looked like you weren’t home.”
Sloane gave her a steady look. “Is that the only reason you came over?”
It was the best opening she was likely to get. Sam took a deep breath. “No. I owe you an apology,” she admitted. “I’m sorry that I reacted so strongly. If you have a tattoo, it’s your business, not mine.”
Sloane shook his head and looked down at his shoes, but not fast enough to hide the twinkle in his eyes. Sam’s heart leapt, because she suspected he was giving her a second chance.
“Damn,” he muttered. “I was hoping you were hot again.”
Sam laughed despite herself, glad that he didn’t seem to be holding a grudge. She leaned in the doorway. There was something his manner that tempted her to flirt with him. “Come to think of it,
maybe I am a bit warm. Would you like to come in and talk about it?”
“Talk?” Sloane echoed, the sparkle in his eyes indisputable. He braced a hand on the door frame and leaned closer, his amusement clear. “What about no confessions, no questions, and no commitment?”
“Okay, so we can find something other to do than talk,” Sam said, smiling back at him. The air warmed between them and Sloane lifted a hand to wind a tendril of her hair around his fingertip. His eyes glowed, just the way they had that first day. Sam felt alive, admired, aroused, and didn’t want the moment to end.
Sloane’s cell phone, which was in his hand, gave an alert. He flicked a glance downward at it, clearly a habit, but then frowned at the text message. He excused himself and read it, his expression telling Sam that it wasn’t good news.
“Something wrong?” she asked.
Sloane sighed. “Only that as much as I’d love to take you up on that offer, I have to go.”
“You said you just had a long flight. You must be tired.”
“That and now, I’ve got to catch another flight.” His expression was rueful and if anything, he looked more tired. “Chicago, then New York.”
“It would have been easier to go from one to the other.”
“If I’d known this morning that I had to go to New York.” He shrugged, even as Sam wondered what kind of emergencies could make him hurry across the country twice in rapid succession. “Isn’t that what friends are for?”
“Can I help?”
Sloane smiled a little, then bent to brush his lips across hers. The fleeting touch left Sam tingling and hungry for more. “That would require a confession, I think.”
Sam felt herself blush a bit, but she knew he was teasing her. “Maybe I wouldn’t mind knowing a few of your secrets.”
“Maybe you’re better off not knowing them,” he replied, to her surprise. She opened her mouth to ask, but Sloane dropped a warm fingertip to her lips. “I’ll call you when I get back,” he promised. “We can pick up right here.” She had no chance to agree because he kissed her more thoroughly.
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