by Katie Reus
Sentinel of Darkness
Darkness Series
Katie Reus
Sentinel of Darkness
Copyright © 2018 Katie Reus
Cover Art by Sweet ‘N Spicy Designs
Edits by Julia Ganis
* * *
This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locales or organizations is entirely coincidental. All rights reserved. With the exception of quotes used in reviews, this book may not be reproduced or used in whole or in part by any means existing without written permission from the author.
Also, thank you for not sharing your copy of this book. This purchase allows you one legal copy for your own personal reading enjoyment on your personal computer or device. You do not have the right to resell, distribute, print or transfer this book, in whole or in part, to anyone, in any format, via methods either currently known or yet to be invented, or upload this book to a file sharing program. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. Thank you for respecting the author’s work.
ISBN: 9781635560480
Table of Contents
SENTINEL OF DARKNESS
Copyright
About the Book
Dedication
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Thank You for Reading!
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Complete Booklist
She thought she’d put her past behind her…
Local artist Keva might be human, but she knows about the things that go bump in the night. Years ago, a dragon shifter saved her from certain death. Ever since, she’s lived in his clan’s territory and put her life back together. But the feeling of security is only an illusion, because her past has come back to haunt her. A past with claws and fangs, demanding blood.
He’ll do whatever it takes to defend his mate…
Dagen has finally met his mate—except he insults her the first time they meet. He’s not too proud to grovel to get back into her good graces. But when a threat from her past emerges, he realizes that he’ll do anything to keep her safe. Even if it means dying—or losing her forever.
Dedication
For Kari. Thank you for helping me plot this story during our writer’s getaway in beautiful Leavenworth, Washington. You are one in a million and I’m lucky to call you my best friend.
Prologue
Four years ago
Keva’s heart raced out of control as she sprinted through the woods, her hair flying behind her, a tangled mess of knots. Faster, faster. Her leg muscles ached as she jumped over a fallen log. Her lungs burned, the icy winter air harsh and unforgiving.
She had no idea where she was going. Just that she had to get away from him. Her ex-boyfriend. Wolf shifter. An asshole who wanted her dead. Because he was obsessed with her, refused to let her go.
He’d beaten her the first time she’d tried to leave. Raped her the second. This time, he’d kill her.
She knew it in her bones. Just as she knew she was likely going to die today and no one would ever know. Her bones would be scattered or buried in these woods in the middle of Montana. She could run fast, but she was just a human. Something he liked to remind her of. A silly, weak human who was no match for his strength. His speed.
But screw him. She was going to keep running until she ran out of energy. Or before—a branch snapped behind her.
Adrenaline surged through her as she broke free from the trees into a clearing. Snow covered a wide swath of land. Even if she could outrun him, he’d see her tracks.
She bit back a sob as she continued running, tears tracking down her face as she heard his growl somewhere behind her.
Run, run, run.
Glancing over her shoulder she saw a blur of fur and fangs burst through the tree line.
She sobbed this time, unable to hold back the sound. Keva didn’t want to die. Didn’t want to end up ripped to shreds and left for the wild animals to pick apart because she’d been young and stupid and picked the wrong man.
So very wrong.
She cried out when she tripped, sprawling into the fluffy white powder. This was it. His growl grew louder, harsher. Heart racing, she shoved up, kicking snow everywhere as she tried to run.
But then he was on her. All the air left her lungs as he pinned her to the snow. He roared, the sound reverberating through the trees as a shadow fell over them.
And that was when she realized he wasn’t roaring.
Suddenly the weight was off her. Rolling over, she had her fists raised even though she knew it wouldn’t do much good.
But he was gone. Running away from her, making the most pathetic whining sound she’d ever heard.
The roar split the air again. Then there was fire everywhere. Orange flames burning, destroying, melting… She stared as a dragon—a fucking dragon—swooped down from the sky.
And let out another stream of fire at Randall’s retreating figure. She couldn’t move as her ex disintegrated before her eyes, his body disappearing even as the snow and earth below melted away.
Another sob escaped as relief punched her in the face. He was gone. Dead. She was free.
The dragon stopped breathing fire and turned to look at her. Though it was impossible, she swore the giant beast with the diamond scales and jade-colored wings glittering under the midday sunlight looked concerned. His big head turned slightly to the side and he let out a puff of smoke.
Instinct slammed into her, and without thinking she ran at the dragon, only too late realizing how insane she was. She knew shifters existed, had heard rumors that dragons were real, but this… What the fuck was wrong with her? She couldn’t hug a dragon to thank it. That was insane. Yep, he was going to kill her too. Burn her right to a crisp. He hadn’t saved her—he’d probably just saved her for last.
She collided with the big snout, letting out an oomph as she fell back. “I wasn’t attacking you,” she whispered. “I just wanted to give you a hug.”
Swear to God, the dragon let out a sound that sounded a little like a laugh. A sort of huffing chuckle as only smoke came out of its nostrils.
“Thank you for saving my life,” she whispered, apparently unable to talk any louder than that. And she really hoped that he had been saving her. “He was an asshole and he would have killed me.”
The dragon nodded, clearly understanding every word. A dragon. Her brain was now catching up with reality as the huge beast started shrinking, sparks of what she assumed where magic flying up everywhere, and then a giant, naked man with gray eyes stood before her.
“Are you okay?” the man asked quietly, gently.
Looking away, she nodded. “Fine.”
He didn’t make a move toward her, just crouched down, then made an uncomfortable sound. “Ah…sorry about the lack of clothes. And also that…you saw me in dragon form. I did not intend to scare you and I won’t hurt you.”
“No problem,” she squeaked out. No big deal that she’d just seen a dragon kill her ex. Then shift into a huge, hulking human.
“Who was the male chasing you?”
“My ex-boyfriend. He was
a wolf shifter. Which, of course, you must know.” She kept her gaze averted still. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw him nod once.
“So you know about our kind.” Not a question.
“Well, I know about wolf shifters and that there are other animals like bears, jaguars and stuff. But dragons? My ex told me you guys were just a myth.”
“As you can see that’s not true.”
“I won’t tell anyone what you did.”
He made a small scoffing sound. “No one would believe you if you did.”
For some reason, that made her laugh, the sound more manic than amused. God, she could imagine how that conversation would go. Yes, detective, I saw my ex-boyfriend, who’d been chasing me through the woods in wolf form, about to kill me, get incinerated by a mythical creature. No sir, I am not on any sort of drugs and no I’m not intoxicated. They’d lock her up and throw away the key.
He let out a sigh and stood. She remained where she was, very aware of her own mortality in that moment. Finally, he spoke. “You’re going to come with me now. And I’m going to put on some clothes. Then we’re going to talk about this ex-boyfriend of yours and what the hell he was doing in my territory. Above all, I can promise that you will be safe and you may remain in my territory if you so choose.”
Keva wasn’t sure what he meant by his territory exactly, but she could guess. And she wasn’t sure she believed him when he said she’d be safe. But if he wanted to kill her, he certainly could have. So she was going to trust this dragon. For the moment.
Still looking away, she pushed to her feet and nodded. “Okay. My name’s Keva.”
“I am Conall.”
Chapter 1
Present day
As he stepped through the glass doors of the four-story building filled with various offices—lawyers, real estate agents, and more—Dagen glanced at the text on his phone before shoving it back into his pocket.
You’re late.
Yeah, no shit he was late. Not bothering to respond to his new clanmate, he stared hard at the elevator doors, annoyed that he had to take the damn thing instead of the stairs.
But there was tape across the door to the stairs, proclaiming it was undergoing maintenance. It was stupid that after all these years he still hated small spaces. He was a dragon shifter. He could bust out of an elevator if he needed to. Could literally rip the doors off with his bare hands in human form. Still, being in a small metal box had all his hackles rising. He rolled his shoulders once as a petite female headed his way.
Her long, dark hair fell around her shoulders in soft waves, framing firm-looking breasts—and she most definitely wasn’t wearing a bra. He realized he was staring way too hard at the stranger so he abruptly turned away to face the elevator doors.
Not looking at her didn’t do a damn thing to get the image of her out of his brain. Especially when he could still see her out of the corner of his eye. Her long dress was bohemian, flowing down to her ankles. Her bracelets jangled in tune with the sound of her sandals, which made little snaps as she approached. When she didn’t walk past him, down the hallway to one of the many offices on the first floor, but stopped next to him instead, he subtly inhaled her scent.
It was wild, reminding him of the ocean on a windy day with undercurrents of something sweet and sensual.
His entire body jolted at the scent, his dragon waking up, nudging him to move closer. He was big, even by dragon standards, so it wasn’t as if he could step closer without her noticing.
He felt as if he was being tugged to her against his will, a puppet on her strings, but she barely looked his way.
When the elevator doors opened, he shoved back his urge to step inside in front of her. It was shifter nature to go into any room first to protect a female—for a mate. But it was a human custom to let females go first.
And as stupid as he thought the human tradition was, he wanted to be civil, so he let her inside first.
She gave a polite smile as she stepped inside.
“What floor?” she asked, finally looking at him and giving him the full effect of her greenish-gray eyes. They were vibrant against her bronze skin.
It took him a moment to find his voice. She was stunning. “Three.”
“That’s where I’m going too,” she said, her voice melodic.
He could discern the faint scent of members of his clan clinging to her, but nothing overt and nothing to indicate that she had any current sexual partners. He couldn’t help that he could scent that, even if he was sort of invading her privacy. But he couldn’t deny that part of his nature.
As the elevator moved upward, it suddenly jerked to a halt as a groaning sound filled the air.
The subtle scent of her worry sparked the air. She pressed the button again but nothing happened.
“This can’t be good,” she muttered.
He gritted his teeth and reminded himself that he wasn’t in that prison. He was in a stupid human construct, in a small Montana town, that he could easily bust out of if he needed. He wasn’t in a warded, enchanted stone prison thousands of miles away. He couldn’t act like a scared rabbit in front of her. Not in front of this female who his dragon wanted to impress.
He pulled out his cell phone and called the number on the wall for building maintenance. Being stuck in this little box with such a beautiful woman wasn’t the worst thing in the world. Still, he couldn’t stop that familiar tension that wrapped around his chest.
As he ended the call, he turned to the woman. “We should be out of here in twenty minutes.”
“I certainly hope so,” she said with a little laugh. “You sounded very authoritative.”
His mouth curved up in a small smile. He had been kind of brusque with the guy. But that was simply his nature.
“So what are you here for?” he asked, shoving his hands in his pockets and trying to appear smaller. Not that it would really help. But he wanted her to feel as safe as possible and he knew his size could be intimidating. Sometimes he used that to his advantage, but not with women. And definitely not with humans.
“A super boring meeting I have no interest in.” She shrugged and gave him another one of those smiles he felt deep inside. This woman was simply stunning.
And that was when he noticed the dangling necklace between her breasts. Two wings that were most definitely fashioned after dragon wings, not angel wings as he often saw in jewelry. Maybe she knew of their kind? Maybe she was dating one of his kind.
He frowned at the thought and realized he was scowling when she took a small but subtle step back.
Shaking himself out of his thoughts, he scrubbed a hand over his face and leaned against one of the walls to give her as much space as he could. “I’m here for a meeting too. My name is Dagen,” he said, holding out a hand.
“I’m Keva,” she said, taking his much larger hand.
As they touched, he felt the electricity between them spark as if she’d actually shocked him. He couldn’t tell if she felt the same but her cheeks flushed a faint shade of pink as she took her hand back.
“So what do you do?” he asked, inwardly chastising his dragon who wanted him to step closer and run his nose along her neck. Yeah, because that wouldn’t send her running—or pepper-spraying him.
“I make jewelry and art. Sculptures and small pieces mainly. I own a shop downtown.”
That was when it clicked into place. This was the woman he was meeting. Her first name was Eileen. But he’d seen her middle initial was K—and she clearly went by her middle name.
This was the woman he was supposed to be trying to buy property from? He resisted the urge to rub the back of his neck in frustration. Shit, he needed to shred the offer he’d had his attorneys draw up. It wasn’t the worst, but…he had lowballed her. The building wasn’t for sale, but the clan owned almost all the buildings on that particular strip and it was in a prime location. So he’d had one of his attorneys reach out to her so they could discuss buying it.
“It’s okay,�
�� Keva said softly, cutting into his thoughts. “Even if we do fall, we’re not even one floor up. We won’t be hurt.”
He frowned at her reassuring tone and wondered why she was telling him this—until he realized he was holding on to one of the metal bars. And gripping it so tightly he’d slightly dented it. Shit.
“I hate small spaces.” A confession he’d never told anyone. He eased his grip and hoped she didn’t notice the damage. That was definitely a little more than human strength could do.
“If I was as big as you, I’d probably hate small spaces too.”
He barked out a laugh at her words and she nailed him with a smile he felt bone deep. In that moment he felt like a jackass for the offer he’d drawn up to buy her shop. He was used to lowballing people, and while it was simply business for him, with her it made him feel like a dick.
“Do you live in the area?” she asked. The wild, sweet scent rolled off her and it was driving him crazy.
“Yeah. Been here about six months.” Which was nothing for someone his age. Dragons weren’t technically immortal, nothing really was, but they were close enough. He’d never gone into Hibernation, however. Not yet anyway.
“I’ve been here over four years. There’s great skiing in the winter and always something to do the rest of the year.”
He nodded once. He’d been working nonstop and hadn’t taken the time to enjoy himself, though his new clanmates were always trying to get him out. Instead he did what he did best. He made lots of money. He knew it was part of the reason Conall had agreed to let him join the clan. They had a very distant blood tie that linked them, but he was good at turning a profit. Always had been.
