“Cry all you want,” he said as he pulled her out of the stool by her hair. “No one can hear you.”
“Wh-where are we going?” She asked as he dragged her down the hall. Then she saw the door to the dungeon and she started to scream. “You can’t take me there! Kade! No! Please, I didn’t do anything. I swear.”
She was too worked up to even think about trying to shift, which had always been one of Melissa’s biggest problems. When she got scared or afraid or even very sad, shifting became impossible for her.
It was an issue with many dragons.
Kade didn’t need to drug her or inject her with an anti-shifting serum to detain her. Nope. All he had to do was make her very, very upset.
That shouldn’t be a problem.
She screamed loudly as he approached the door, begging incoherently and struggling aimlessly as Kade dragged her the way he would an unruly dog.
He said nothing as he pushed the door open and dragged her down the stairs. Her screams rose higher and higher as he strapped to her the table, then they stopped when he gagged her.
“Get comfortable, slut,” he whispered into her ear. “You’re going to be here a long time.”
19
When Lindsey was a little girl, her parents got a divorce. She was upset at the time, as most kids would be, but her friends all told her it was normal.
“It’s better this way,” her best friend, Adele, had said. “This way, you get to have two houses and two birthdays and two bedrooms. You even get two of all your favorite toys.”
“That sucks,” Lindsey had told her. “I don’t want that. I just want my parents to love each other again.”
“Well, they don’t.” Adele had said, climbing up the ladder to the slide. “So you’d better stop hoping they’ll get back together. That never happens.”
“It happened in The Parent Trap,” Lindsey responded.
“Movies aren’t real,” Adele explained, as if Lindsey had been nothing more than a toddler.
She hadn’t been a toddler though.
Not even close.
And the divorce had been nothing like the movies. She didn’t get two of anything. Her dad simply vanished. And when Lindsey’s mother remarried the man she eventually came to know as “dad,” Lindsey had always wondered what it would take to drive that father off, too.
If she was a bad girl, would he leave?
If she got poor grades, would he run away?
As Lindsey lay on the floor of the castle, she thought about Adele’s words: movies aren’t real. No, they definitely weren’t real. If she had ever been so disillusioned as to think they were, she definitely didn’t think they were now.
In a movie, she would find a time portal in the corner of the room. She would pull a stone out from the wall and find a magic portal that took her to another time. That’s what would happen.
Lindsey looked wearily to the wall. It was pitch black, but she knew the wall was there. What would happen if she could just grab a stone? Just pull one out?
Even as she thought about the absurdity of being able to transport to another place, she wished with all of her heart that movies were real. She wished she could find some way to escape the castle. She wished she could find a way to get out, to break free.
She screamed, yelling out into the darkness, but it didn’t matter. No one would find her in time. She was going to die here and Kade would think, what? That she had run off? That she was already dead? Would Melissa tell him she had abandoned her position as his slave?
Lindsey stopped crying at the thought of her taking a position as a slave. Who did that? After years of studying slavery in school and learning about how wrong it was, she had chosen to become someone’s full-time, 24/7 submissive.
What’s worse was that she loved it.
She truly, truly did.
Before she had come to Dragon Isle, Lindsey had been lost. She didn’t even know how alone she truly was. Her life had merely been a façade. She had been a good girl who made all the right choices, but for what?
A lover who ran off at the first chance to get away?
A mountain of debt that slowly choked her to death?
A shitty apartment she could barely stand to live in?
Kade had changed all that. If Lindsey survived, she would thank him and then Victoria. Victoria was the one, really, who ought to be thanked. Without her, Kade and Lindsey never would have found each other.
Because really, who would want to be a slave to a dragon?
If Lindsey got out, she would swear to be with Kade forever.
“Forever?” She whispered into the darkness as the thought floated through her mind. Is that really what she wanted? But she knew, even without rationalizing, that it was. She didn’t want to go back and join some corporate firm trying to make money off people who were suffering. She’d rather stay with Kade, maybe do pro-bono counseling on the island, and serve him.
She’d rather be the girl who gave up everything for the dragon she loved than be the girl who wouldn’t even try.
But Lindsey’s time was running out.
And she wondered if Kade would ever know how she felt.
Kade walked out of the dungeon covered in Melissa’s blood. Disgusted, he walked into the first floor bathroom and stepped into the walk-in shower. Steam rose as the hot water poured over his body, immediately staining the shower tiles.
He should have bathed in the ocean.
But he needed something hot to burn away what he had just done.
Kade never should have let things get this far. He should have known Melissa would crack, that she wasn’t okay with how things had ended between them. He shouldn’t have suspected that the dragonwoman was fine being around Kade’s slave.
He should have known.
Tiles crumbled as Kade’s fist connected with them over and over again.
And then once more.
His scream was feral as he cried out into the empty house. Where was she? After a life lived alone, Kade had finally found someone who made him happy. It wasn’t just having a slave, though being able to control someone completely instilled in Kade a sense of power he had never known before.
But Lindsey was so much more than he had ever hoped for.
And now she was just gone.
Kade had collared her, sure, but did Lindsey even know what that meant to him? Kade had never collared anyone. Never. Lindsey probably thought it was just part of the contract, but it wasn’t. It had never been just a collar to him.
She didn’t know he was planning to ask her to stay with him when their time was up.
Because Kade had gotten a taste of something incredible and he didn’t want to just let that go. He couldn’t.
Kade was not a good man, nor did he pretend to be. He was strong, he was cunning, and he was shrewd. When it came to Lindsey, though, he was also a protector, and he would stop at nothing to save her.
It was time to go see Victoria.
20
Victoria had been living the dream.
When she first came to Dragon Isle, she hadn’t wanted to stay, but that’s exactly what she ended up doing. She ran her late mother’s restaurant and tavern while spending time with her mate, Daniel. The island was beautiful, and though Victoria wasn’t a dragon, the inhabitants of Dragon Isle had welcomed her warmly, reminding her that you don’t have to fit in to be accepted.
Yes, it was safe to say she had never been happier.
So when Kade stormed into the tavern with a harrowed look on his face, her heart leapt into her throat before plummeting into the ground.
“It’s Lindsey,” she said before he even spoke. Victoria had not seen Lindsey since the young woman arrived on the island, but she knew her friend was in good hands with Kade. The dragonman was harsh and unrelenting, but he was also fiercely loyal. When he took a slave, he took full control of her life, but he also offered her everything he had.
Including his protection.
“She’s gone,” Kade said. He didn’
t sit. He just stood in the doorway. All of the patrons turned to stare at Kade, but he ignored them and looked straight at Victoria. “Melissa took her.”
Gasps were heard throughout the room, but Kade kept his gaze focused on Victoria.
“I don’t know where she is, but we need to find her. I don’t know how much time she has.”
His voice was strained, worried, angry.
He sounded nothing like his usual, confident self.
“Closing early, folks,” Victoria said to the room, throwing her towel on the table. “If you want to help us look for Lindsey, consider your tab covered. Otherwise, pay Ashley and leave.”
Not a single dragon moved or protested.
“All right, I’ll consider you all helping,” Victoria said. Daniel came in from the back room and took one look at Kade. The dragon was shaking with anger and every shifter in the room could sense exactly how much fury he was radiating.
Even Victoria, the one human female present, could sense his anger. She considered herself to be fairly clueless, so that was saying something.
“What happened?” Daniel asked Kade.
Kade looked at Daniel and took a deep breath before growling through gritted teeth. “Melissa took Lindsey somewhere. She’s still alive. Don’t know where she is. Couldn’t be off the island. I wasn’t gone long enough for that.”
“How do you know Melissa took her?” Victoria asked quietly. She immediately wished she had kept silent.
“She told me,” Kade threw his head back and roared his frustration. His claws began to peek out from his nails and Victoria knew he was fighting the urge to shift and destroy the entire village. That couldn’t happen. Even in a fury, wild dragons weren’t permitted and the head of the clan would put a stop to that immediately.
“Where is Melissa now?” Daniel placed a calming hand on Kade’s shoulder, silently warning the dragon to control himself.
“She’s gone,” Kade said. Then he turned and left the building.
Daniel turned back to the room with a grim expression on his face. All eyes were on him.
“Seems Melissa had decided to leave Dragon Isle,” he said. No one protested his version of the story. “And little human Lindsey is missing. You,” he pointed to a group of tables clustered together. “Start in town. Check every abandoned house and every basement. You don’t need to look in occupied buildings aside from Melissa’s home and that dragon she’s been seeing. Alan, is it?”
Alan rose from the back of the room and held his hands up. “I don’t know anything about any of this,” he said. “But go ahead and search my place. Please. I had no idea she was crazy.”
Daniel ignored him and shouted directions to the rest of the group. A few dragons would circle the island, visually searching the shores for any sign of Lindsey. He only hoped they wouldn’t be too late.
Dragon Isle was a fairly unfriendly place to outsiders and if someone who wasn’t part of the village came across a stray human, there was no knowing what would become of Lindsey. Though most of the dragons adhered to a strict code of conduct, there was always leeway when you lived away from the group.
“Ashley,” Daniel summoned the hostess. She scurried over, her brightly dyed hair bouncing in twin pigtails as she walked over. “Go tell Emerson what’s happened and that there will be dragons scouting along the coast. We don’t want him to think we’re going behind his back.” The head of the dragon clan was notoriously cranky and didn’t like his authority to be questioned.
Ashley stared at Daniel for a second, obviously trying to decide whether she was brave enough to face him or not. She likely remembered the last time someone had stood up to Emerson. That dragon hadn’t been allowed to fly for a month, though they hadn’t particularly felt like it after Emerson flamed them.
“If you don’t go, you’re fired,” Victoria said coolly.
Ashley left immediately.
Daniel turned to his beautiful mate and wrapped his arms around her as the restaurant continued to clear out.
“I’m scared,” she whispered.
“I know,” he told her. “But I promise you, everything will be all right in the end.”
“Do you actually believe that?”
Daniel was silent, and Victoria started to cry.
21
Kade didn’t go with any of the groups. He knew Melissa was sneaky and evil. She was angrier than he’d thought and she was cunning. After all, she’d completely tricked him. He had never suspected that she might steal his sweet Lindsey in an effort to keep him for herself, though he did know he wouldn’t kill her.
No, Melissa would want to leave Lindsey alive so the human would suffer. This meant she would be somewhere isolated that no one would hear her scream.
Kade knew just the spot.
He shifted with a loud roar that could likely be heard for miles, but he didn’t care about waking up elderly dragonwomen who were trying to get to bed early.
He had something more important to save.
His body ached as he sprouted wings and claws and talons. His skin disappeared and was replaced with sleek scales, but he barely noticed the pain as he began running, then leapt into the air.
Kade was on his way.
Melissa had been angry with him. He knew that now. He never should have started anything with her, never should have offered to share his pet. He wished a million times he would have been smarter when it came to her, yet he wasn’t.
He had been mesmerized by her sadness and wanted to bring her a bit of the joy Lindsey had brought him. And that very well might be his slave’s undoing.
Kade flew faster, gliding over trees and lakes and ponds, aiming quickly for the spot he knew so well, but that he hadn’t been to since he was a child.
The castle.
Yes, it was the perfect spot to hide an unwilling captive. It was the ideal place to keep a small human, unobserved, for any period of time. Dammit. Had Melissa even bothered to leave water? Food? Anything? Lindsey must be scared beyond belief.
Did she know Kade would come for her? He wanted to believe she knew, wanted to believe that beyond anything else, she could be certain in his dedication to her.
He flew faster, soaring higher than he had in years, taking turns sharply and flying recklessly as he made his way to his Lindsey.
His.
The decaying remains of Castle Naga stood like a beacon, calling to him. The walls were crumbling, yet remarkably sturdy. They had survived wars and arguments and dragons.
Oh yes, they would be standing for many years to come.
He landed quietly, almost silently. Despite being a rather large dragon, he had perfected the ability to land stealthily without detection. This served Kade well throughout his life and it served him well now. He didn’t bother telling Victoria that he didn’t feel particularly keen on other male dragons of breeding age searching for Lindsey.
If they found her first, he knew exactly what type of reward they would want.
Exactly what type of reward they would take.
No, Kade needed to find her first. He only hoped she would still be alive, still in one piece, still relatively sane.
She had to be.
He shifted back to his smaller, human self. He didn’t stretch or relax for a moment, didn’t catch his breath. Kade took off running for the castle, barely noticing the way jagged rocks began tearing up his feet or the feel of the cold, clammy moss against his skin.
“Lindsey!” He called out when he reached the inside of the castle walls, but he heard nothing. Although small by royal standards, the castle was huge to Kade. He knew it would take humans days to search, but he didn’t have days.
He might not even have hours.
He paused as his dragon eyes adjusted to the darkness. His eyesight was keen enough that he could see well despite the dark interior of the castle. Castle Naga had once been powerful, full of magic and lore, but years of decay had left it in ruins. Few dragons came here anymore and Kade sometimes wondered wh
y there hadn’t been any initiative to restore it to its former glory.
If anything, maybe Emerson could live there. At least then none of the dragons would have to deal with him on a daily basis. Though the dragon was fierce, he was sometimes too fierce.
Kade walked quietly through the hall. His feet left the cold stone and found their way to moldy, rotting carpet. As he walked, he stopped occasionally to try to pick up Lindsey’s scent. He knew she had to be here. She must.
While many of the dragons would search the caves along the shore, Kade knew they wouldn’t find anything. Melissa was too dark for that. She didn’t want Lindsey to just die. If she did, nothing would have stopped her from flying up and dropping Lindsey to splatter on the ground.
No, Melissa wanted Kade to suffer, which was why he knew she had stored the girl away somewhere. Melissa wanted Kade to struggle to find her and to discover much too late that he wasn’t dragon enough to save her.
And he hated her for that.
He could still hear her screams echoing through his head as he marched through the castle. Room-by-room he searched the south wing. Room-by-room he looked through the castle, trying to find any sign that Lindsey was there, but Melissa was smart. She wouldn’t have just left the girl on the floor somewhere.
She would have carefully hidden her.
But where?
The first and second floors of the castle were empty. Kade cleared them fairly quickly and somehow managed not to shift into his dragon form. Wouldn’t that be lovely? “I’m sorry, Lindsey. I tried to save you, but I accidentally shifted while searching for you and brought down the entire building.”
He could picture the castle walls crumbling as he tried to shake his giant body free from the tiny hallways of the castle, but couldn’t stand the thought.
He had to find her, and soon.
Kade remembered playing in the castle as a boy. He had known every good hiding spot. Though almost all dragon children played in the abandoned castle at some point, none played there quite as much as Kade and his siblings did. His younger brothers loved to hide in the dungeons of the castle. They were creepy and dark. They were also damp and moldy smelling. If you stayed there too long, you would start coughing. Then whoever was looking for you would immediately discover your hiding spot.
Dragon Isle Book Bundle 1-3: My Lord and Dragon, The Dragon Fighter, and A Dragon's Bite Page 13
