Cohen

by Emilia Hartley

  “Damn it, woman!” Gareth’s voice barked into the darkness.

  She shot forward, propelled by the strong faith of the beast inside of her. The beast trusted this dragon man implicitly. So far, Rhiannon figured he was the only one that hadn’t betrayed her so far. In the distance, she could hear GOE’s sirens. She was thankful that her beast’s scales were dark enough to blend into the night when she made her break for freedom. It was probably what had actually saved her this night. Not her spectacular flying skills, sarcasm implied.

  “What the hell is going on?” Gareth growled as she slid into the passenger seat of his truck. Even though his voice was filled with anger, he reached out and laid a reassuring hand on hers. Almost as if to assure himself that she was there with him and alive.

  “Wilson’s plan was a trap,” she breathed. The adrenaline and magic were wearing off. Her eyelids were getting heavy. The beast inside of her settled back, trusting that Gareth would keep them safe. “Why do I have clothes after shifting?”

  “Why can a dragon turn into a man? Magic is the only answer I have for you.”

  She barely registered his response before sleep gripped her. She slipped into unconsciousness in the safety of the cab of his truck.

  Chapter Seven

  Rhiannon woke not where she’d passed out. At first, a wave of panic gripped her. It quickly washed away as the night’s events returned to her. Her trusted friends had betrayed her and she’d been forced to put her faith in a man that would have been her enemy weeks ago. Hell, he had been the enemy.

  She let her head fall back with a sigh. A sharp pain stabbed her in the back end. It made her hiss.

  “Are you okay?” Gareth’s voice held a tinge of panic when he stepped into the room. His massive form was at odds with the soft concern in his eyes. It wasn’t the first time he had aimed that look at her, she remembered. Just the day before he had mopped her up after she performed a minor surgery on herself and immediately fallen into a psychological shock.

  “I think I’m fine. GOE managed to land a shot in my tail last night. I must be healing.”

  “I gathered that you shifted when you asked why you had clothing. How did that go for you?”

  “It was… different. Also, I suck at flying.”

  Gareth nodded as he picked up her feet and sat on the end of the couch. He replaced her feet in his lap, his hands never leaving her. “Flying is a tricky art. I mean, airplanes make it look easy and all. I guess it’s not too accurate to compare an airplane to a dragon, though”

  She laughed. It was impossible to compare the lithe, muscled body of a dragon to an airplane. She knew how it felt to command the body of one now. She knew, without a doubt, that she was not human. She’d never been human. It was a lie that tainted her entire life. As she was raised, she was taught to associate dragons with evil and selfish.

  Her eyes fell on the man that was cradling her feet in his lap. Despite the anger that she’d seen burning inside of him, he was not selfish or evil. He was almost human.

  Rhiannon rubbed her face with her hands. She had no idea what she was going to do. Everett and Wilson framed her during their so-called mission. It was out now that she was secretly a dragon that had been working for GOE. Undoubtedly, her house would be under constant surveillance. There was no going back home.

  “You’re quiet,” Gareth said. “What are you thinking about?”

  She let her hands fall away from her face. They fell slack in her lap. “I’m homeless. I’m officially a traitor.”

  Gareth shook his head while avoiding her eyes. He looked down at her feet. His think fingers touched the tips of her toes. “You have a home here, on the Territory, if you want. I’m not asking you to move in with me. Far from that. The Territory is vast, hundreds of miles wide. There are homes you could move into. Most of them would probably need work, but the family would pitch in. Then… you could live in anonymity if you wanted.”

  He was babbling nervously, Rhiannon thought. The beast inside of her surged forward at the thought of living here, on the Territory. It welcomed the promise of safety, purring loudly. It yearned to be close to Gareth. She was getting better at reading the emotion behind the beast’s sounds, even if it still couldn’t use words.

  Rhiannon, on the other hand, didn’t know what she thought of the proposition. It was comforting to know that she could disappear into the depths of Snowdonia, but her human rationality reminded her that GOE was still gunning for the Territory. Especially her former mentor. The safety that Gareth proposed would be short lived if Wilson had his way. And he might, given her performance last night.

  “I can’t,” she whispered. Rhiannon threw her feet to the floor. They felt cold without Gareth’s warmth, but she couldn’t sit here all day. She had to do something.

  “You can’t seriously be thinking about going back to GOE. Are you insane?”

  She threw her hands in the air. “What else can I do? I put you in danger with my own idiocy. Wilson framed me for an attempted attack on GOE and I used my dragon form to escape. There’s no doubt in their minds now that the dragons are a threat. Do you know what that means?”

  “What could they do to us that they haven’t already?” He growled as he turned his eyes up toward her.

  “How about a full-on assault? How about large scale weapons and the levelling of all Snowdonia?”

  She watched the color drain from his face. She felt terrible for pouring this awful truth on Gareth, but he had to know. He needed to know what terrible thing she’d done to all of them. The guilt weighed heavily on her. It sat on her shoulders and pressed on her until she felt like her feet were breaking through the floor beneath her.

  Gareth surged from his seat. He gripped her face between his hands and turned her chin up so that she had to look him in the eye. “This is not your fault. Nothing that has happened is your fault. You are a victim trying to do the best with what life has dealt you. You did what you had to do to live. I am forever grateful for that. Do you hear me? I will forever be grateful that you managed to survive last night.”

  Rhiannon found herself leaning into the dragon man before her. The urge to raise her own hands and grab him was overwhelming. They moved of their own accord, running over the flat planes of his stomach. They moved upward without her consent. She stopped fighting and let her hands have their way. Gareth’s eyes lowered to her lips.

  She knew what was happening this time. She could push away from him. She could leave the house, but she didn’t. Instead, she gripped the sides of his waist and pulled his body into hers. When his lips descended upon hers, she opened to him.

  His tongue pushed into her mouth while his cock grew hard against her. She moaned into his kiss and rocked her hips into his bulging erection. His hands fell away from her face. They gripped her hips and jerked her closer to him.

  Her hands moved through his hair, pulling hard until he groaned into her mouth.

  Neither of them heard the visitors outside until the door crashed open. Rhiannon jumped away from him as if electrically shocked. She fumbled to pull the hem of her shirt down from where it had ridden up between them.

  A force unlike any she had ever seen before filled the doorway of Gareth’s home. The man had brooding eyes that looked as though they were made of ice. There were streaks of silver on either side of his trimmed beard that gave him an air of kingly authority. Maybe that was the smothering presence that followed him.

  Beside her, she heard Gareth audibly swallow.

  “I don’t even know where to begin,” the intruder said, his glare locked onto Gareth. “Why was a dragon spotted at GOE last night?”

  Instinctively, Rhiannon stepped between them. She held her head high with her chin up despite the force that was pressing in on her. The intruder’s eyes studied her from head to toe while his nose flared.

  “What the hell?” he muttered.

  “I was that dragon,” Rhiannon informed him. She desperately wanted to pull this man’s attention fr
om Gareth because the promise of violence in his voice was palpable.

  The man’s lips pulled back from his teeth as his brows lowered over his eyes. He suddenly lunged at her. Her reaction timing was slow, but hands grabbed her. Gareth spun her around and put himself between them. She heard the tearing of cloth and Gareth’s hiss of pain.

  “Would you care to let us explain what happened?” Gareth said through his pain.

  “What I want is for you to stop causing trouble that affects the whole family. What you and your stray did last night put all of us in the way of immediate danger. How dare you bring an agent of GOE into our home, dragon or not. She works for them.”

  Rhiannon spoke from beneath the shelter of Gareth’s body. “I didn’t know that I was a dragon until the other morning. I found a silver implant.”

  Silence filled the room. Rhiannon was acutely aware that Gareth was bleeding. The smell touched her nose and set her beast into a pure panic. Her lips pulled back from her own teeth in a feral gesture. Her beast would not let anyone hurt Gareth again.

  Rhiannon slipped out from beneath Gareth’s body to cover him from the intruder. She’d been trained to fight, to protect. She could take him on if he attacked because she was expecting it now.

  She wasn’t expecting the intruder to be standing with a dumbstruck look on his face. His eyes roved over her, taking her in from a whole new perspective.

  “How old are you?” His voice was barely more than a whisper, but she heard him with her improved hearing.

  “What does that matter?”

  “Just tell me,” he pleaded.

  She studied his face, wondering what was going on behind his cold eyes. He clearly knew something that she didn’t. He knew something about where she might have come from. The urge to know everything was suddenly overwhelming. The world had been ripped out from beneath her like a rug. Here was her chance to rebuild it.

  “I’m thirty-five,” she said.

  The man seemed to do a bit of thinking, possibly a bit of math, before he spoke again. “The timeline almost adds up.”

  Gareth let himself fall to the floor. He sat cross-legged, his head in his hands. Rhiannon startled, sliding to the floor beside him. Her hands touched his face, trying to pull his gaze back up to her. He looked back at her with half-lidded eyes.

  “Fret not, lass. He’s healing. Just remember to get him a snack once the wounds close. Though I doubt he would attack you.”

  Rhiannon stayed where she was beside Gareth, her fingers wrapped around his wrist to keep watch over his pulse. Her stomach swayed, caught between caring for her only ally and learning who she really was.

  “Right then,” the man said before leaving the room. She wanted to call after him, but Gareth collapsed onto her. His head fell onto her shoulder. She wrapped her arm around him protectively.

  Gareth’s heart beat slowed, but remained beneath her fingertips. His breathing deepened into something closer to sleep and her beast’s fierce protectiveness began to fade. Footsteps announced the return of the older man. She looked up as he placed a plate with two thick sandwiches on a table beside her.

  Her stomach grumbled in response. Layered with meat, cheese, and garden vegetables it looked divine in that moment. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d eaten.

  “Take one while I tell you a short story.” The man seated himself on an armchair before looking down at her.

  Eating in front of him felt inappropriate, but her stomach won the battle over manners. She snatched up a sandwich and voraciously bit into it. The spice of mustard greeted her past the smooth dairy of cheese. In moments, she’d inhaled the sandwich and found herself craving more. The change between shapes must have drained her of more energy than she thought.

  “You can feed yourself properly when I am finished,” the man said. “First, hear me out. About thirty-eight years ago a dragon couple left the Snowdonia Territory as emissaries. They worked with Human Dragon Relations in an effort to broaden our rights as Welsh Citizens. It meant a lot to them as they just had their first child. They were supposed to be the poster family for dragon families inside the territory. It was the perfect plan. Their daughter was quiet and had a somber way of looking at the world. People like it when children don’t cry or throw temper tantrums, so, naturally, they loved her.

  “A few years after their campaign began, it was said that they attacked agents of GOE. The agents said they used deadly force to protect the civilians on the premises and, in the process, the young girl died with her parents.

  “For the longest time, I couldn’t fathom why Jacob would attack anyone. He was a quiet dragon with a long history of honor. His wife was human. I told myself that if anyone harassed his mate, it might explain why he would attack. I wouldn’t put it past GOE agents to harass a woman. I served in the military and I know how it can be in those kinds of environments.”

  Rhiannon snorted. She’d been a woman in that environment. She’d seen the looks thrown in her direction during office hours or during PT. For years, she assumed the only reason they didn’t act on those looks was because they didn’t want to offend Wilson. How many of those gawkers had known exactly what she was?

  “The timeline adds up and the more that I think about Jacob and Annie, the more that I can see them in your face. GOE must have kept you after they killed your parents. They implanted you with silver to keep your beast under control as you grew older. It makes sense for a toddler who never experienced a change to forget that she was more than human.”

  Jacob.

  Annie.

  Chapter Eight

  Gareth sucked in a ragged breath. His beast shoved him into consciousness, raging and upset. They’d left Rhiannon alone with Drystan. While Gareth knew that Drystan would not try to hurt his mate, his beast didn’t want to leave that up to chance. Drystan had been furious when he arrived. That kind of anger didn’t vanish into thin air.

  The beast forced him to surge to his feet. Wide eyed, he scanned the room, his body poised to defend.

  Two pairs of eyes looked up at him, one with confusion and the other with laughter. Nothing was broken. Even the air seemed calm and reserved. Gareth sank back down beside his mate, putting a protective hand around her shoulder. She shot him a look of annoyance, but he couldn’t help himself.

  Rhiannon leaned away from him and it took all of his control not to yank her back into the shelter of his body. A second later she leaned back into his form and presented a plate of food. His heart warmed even though he was fairly certain that she did not put together the sandwich on the plate. It wasn’t something he’d ever felt before.

  “Drystan said you would need to eat.” Her voice was flat, but he saw the concern flicker through her eyes. He didn’t know what she’d gone through while he was healing. It made him angry to think that Drystan had forced the situation. He was a ferocious leader that was forced to keep a handful of young dragons in line, but he hadn’t bothered to wait for questions to be answered this time.

  His leader was teetering on the edge of balance. With GOE directed not only at his Territory, but his family, the leader’s beast must be in an uproar all the time. Gareth tried his hardest to understand where his leader was coming from. Sometimes force got things done, but not all of the time. Gareth couldn’t help himself when he lifted dark eyes toward Drystan.

  Drystan held his hands up, palms facing out. “I did not harm your…” his eyes fell on Rhiannon and Gareth could see the snap decision being made. “I did not harm your friend.”

  Gareth was grateful that Drystan chose to leave the word mate unsaid. Rhiannon’s life was upside down at the moment, with the discovery of the beast inside of her and the betrayal of her co-workers. She didn’t need the word mate thrust upon her like a binding. She was too wild for that. Gareth wanted to win her over, to earn her trust and love so that their bond meant something.

  “I would like to see photos of the people you speak of,” Rhiannon said.

  Gareth looked betw
een her and his leader, not following the conversation. What had he missed while he was healing? Apparently, food had been prepared, but that wasn’t all that happened.

  Drystan nodded. “I’m sure that with some time I could dig up something. At the very least, Maggie could do it. She’s the one that knows where everything is in the house.”

  “Thank you,” Rhiannon said, her voice little more than a whisper.

  Gareth turned to search her face for answers. Perhaps she would tell him later what happened. If not, he would leave the subject alone. It was her decision. He only wished, at that moment, that he could lean in and nuzzle her cheek or bury his face in her neck to breathe in her scent. She was his mate and she was here with him.

  “Until then,” Drystan added. “I would advise teaching your friend here a bit more about being a dragon. Given what has happened to her, she is woefully unprepared for the times to come.”

  “Times to come?” Gareth asked, finally turning his attention away from Rhiannon and toward his leader.

  Drystan turned toward Gareth, eyes narrowed. He could see the tic in Drystan’s jaw. “Because of the events that passed last night, GOE has convinced the local government to launch an attack on the Territory. The government’s goal is to shut down the Territory, but everyone in this room knows that GOE’s goal is to see us eradicated.”

  “Fucking Elgar,” Gareth muttered. It was that ancient ass’s fault that any of this was happening. If his mate hadn’t been an attention whore she might have lived. If Elgar had loved her better, she wouldn’t have been killed.

  The events of the Occurrence had nearly been repeated last month. Gareth doubted that his cousin would have gone off the deep end the same way that Elgar had, but no one knew how someone would react until the worst actually happened.

  “What’s done is done,” Drystan announced. “We cannot go back and undo the past. Elgar is paying for his wrong doings the only way that he can. That leaves us to deal with what is happening now.”