Kadin: A Scifi Alien Romance (Dragons of Riddich Book 1)

by Teshco, Mel

  He sighed. “Don’t you get it, Grace? Everyone has a price—even your closest work operatives.”

  “What are you saying?”

  He raked a hand through the tousled length of his dark hair, and inexplicably she ached to go to him, to lean into his strength and forget the utter betrayal suddenly eating at her from the inside out.

  God, she was all kinds of fool to feel this way. A highly trained operative knew better than to fall for her target’s lies and supposed compassion. Knew better than to show any dents in an outwardly tough and impenetrable armor. Bloody hell. She hadn’t felt this inadequate and vulnerable since…

  She wouldn’t, couldn’t go there. Not now.

  The PDA, Paranormal Detection Agency, was her only family now. Her team her only friends.

  “Look, we should leave. Your team knows things about you now, things I’ve known for a long time.”

  Her belly squeezed painfully.

  He was telling the truth. Despite her obvious vulnerability, this time she was certain her instincts weren’t wrong. It didn’t mean she’d go along with his every command.

  Her chin lifted. “I’m not going anywhere with you. Not until you tell me what the hell it is that everyone seems to know about me.”

  He exhaled slowly and then nodded. “You’re a breeder, a human with the genetic capability to successfully breed with a dragon shifter. With me.”

  She was stunned. Yet a dry laugh burst from her lips as she mocked, “If you think I’m having your dragon babies, think again.”

  His eyes narrowed fractionally. “When I left my world, my people were on the brink of war with a race of fierce aliens called Tantonics, who far outnumbered our small population. I have no way of knowing if my people are even still alive.”

  She gaped. “So you’re saying I might be your last hope for your kind’s survival?”

  “I have yet to definitely ascertain that, but … yes.”

  She shook her head and ignored an intimate flash of heat. “Do you take me for a fool? I’m an agent. An assassin. I track down paranormal beings to capture and sometimes kill! I am not an incubator.”

  “Tell that to your boss who expects just that from you.”

  Whatever control she’d had dissolved as she flew at him with knife-hand strikes. “Don’t you dare try and turn me against my own people!”

  He caught her wrists, his movements superhuman and way too fast for Grace to evade, even with her superior skills. His stare glittered. “Don’t you see? The agency has you exactly where they want you—dancing to their tune. You’ve killed for them.” His eyes darkened. “Fucked for them.”

  She wanted to block her ears, to shut out the truth he spoke so eloquently. But the truth couldn’t be denied. She’d been so narrow-minded in her need for revenge that somewhere along the way, she’d become as bad—worse—than the creatures she hated most.

  An alarm abruptly screeched. Kadin froze then shook her a little, yelling over the noise of the alarm. “Your team is here. We have to leave. But you’re going to have to trust me now, okay?”

  Barely leashing the wild, seesawing of her emotions, she nodded stiffly, desperately pushing back the memory of the little girl who’d walked into the bloodbath of her parents’ bedroom.

  He answered back with a solemn nod of his own, and shouted, “I’m going to become dragon.” The alarm was ear-piercing. “Once I’ve pushed through the change, climb onto me and hang on.”

  Timber flew as the front door splintered. Her team’s latest technological advances had clearly not been successful at disabling the alarm. Of course, Kadin would have only the best security money could buy.

  Kadin stepped back. His eyes held hers. His towel slid from his hips. Then he crouched to the floor and began the change.

  Chapter Three

  The process of shifting took less than a minute. And yet, for Grace, watching his painful transformation was akin to watching a car crash in slow motion.

  His eyes grew large and glowed red. His face expanded, twisted. He snarled as his face elongated with a snout, his hands fisting at the pain. Even above the noise of the shrieking alarm she could hear the snap of bones as his arms and hands extended, became legs and clawed feet.

  She knew the moment he passed out because although his body kept right on shifting, he showed no signs of pain, no response at all. Not even when a massive tail formed from his tailbone and huge, paper-thin wings pushed through his skin.

  He regained consciousness seconds after his skin changed texture and pulsed with a chameleonic rainbow of colors before his mottled scales settled into pitch black, like the darkening night outside.

  He stayed on his belly though he could easily have climbed onto all four of his clawed feet as the entrance door blasted off its hinges and skidded across the floor. Grace turned as five members of her team—the best operatives in the business—stalked through the opening in standard formation, their faces fully masked.

  Oh shit.

  She sucked in a deep breath and held it as she sprinted for the crouched dragon that was easily twice the size of a Clydesdale. His nostrils flared, going from pink to deep red as he roared a warning at the intruders.

  The operatives paused briefly, probably stunned at the beast before them, and then fired a thunderous round of teargas grenades into the room.

  Grace knew she was in trouble. The team would need to use a gas many times more powerful than normal to have any effect on the dragon. Easily enough chemicals to kill a human … kill her.

  Did all the years living as a tight-knit unit, protecting each other’s backs, count for nothing?

  She shut a door in her mind to block the pain of her team’s betrayal as she leapt, snaring hold of Kadin’s smooth-scaled neck before closing her eyes to the toxic fumes and slinging a leg over his back. One of her spiked heels jabbed into his scaly flesh. His skin shivered. Then he rose, and for just one moment faced the team.

  If he truly was able to breathe fire, he didn’t, perhaps because he understood the flammable risks with the chemical compounds misting the air. With one last roar, he spun around and lunged toward the floor-to-ceiling windows.

  He took just two powerful bounds before Grace heard windows pop and shatter as the full force of his weight hit them. A rush of air—fresh, crisp and oh so welcome—blasted her face. Sucking in a breath, she jerked her eyes open as the world tilted and they went into a free-fall.

  Grace thanked god for her training as she instinctively tucked her legs up behind her so Kadin could raise and stretch out his folded wings. He immediately leveled out and they soared through the air, the penthouse alarm a quickly fading noise behind them.

  She shivered as the wintry night air bit into her mostly exposed skin. She was hardly in decent attire to be sailing through the freezing night skies. She cuddled closer to the luxurious heat of Kadin’s scaly skin, breathing in his smoky, sulfuric dragon scent and struggling to comprehend her reality even as his huge wings beat the air.

  The city lights thinned out below and eventually disappeared completely before Kadin pulled his fragile-looking wings back and slowly descended. Out of the velvet darkness, the black bulk of a heavily treed mountain rose upward to meet them.

  She braced herself, her legs gripping his sides where muscles rippled with every movement. He landed with graceful ease in a small clearing and immediately crouched low.

  Grace scrambled off his back, all too glad to be on solid ground once again. She rubbed her chilled arms, her teeth chattering. But the chilly temperature and the dragon, the man, were the least of her concerns.

  Her team, her friends, they were the enemy now. And Grace was once again alone in the world.

  She wrapped her arms around her chest. Her gaze clung to Kadin. No, she wasn’t completely alone. Like it or not, her one-time lover had just become an unlikely ally.

  Still in dragon form, Kadin circled around the small clearing, his big, spiked tail dragging across the ground, sweeping leaves and
twigs along until they formed a large pile. His eyes glowing crimson, he sucked in a breath and released a plume of fire, directly into the leafy mound.

  As the explosion of flame died down, Grace stumbled forward, holding her chilled hands out to the warmth. Only after the heat penetrated deep into her numb body did she realize Kadin had already begun the shift back into his human form.

  She stared, mesmerized by the sheer beauty and horror of his change that looked much more eerie beneath the flickering light of the flames. He fell to his knees and then onto his side, losing consciousness once again at what had to be the worst of pain as his body tore itself apart and then reformed.

  He woke in his human form less than a minute later, fully naked. He stiffened, but then relaxed as his eyes met hers. He did a slow, careful stretch, and then hunkered by the fire. “Take off your clothes,” he croaked, his face shadowed with lingering remnants of pain, “and throw them into the fire.”

  “What?” And then it hit her. Aside from the fact teargas could well be sticking to her clothes, Kadin assumed—correctly—that her team had placed not only a tracking device somewhere on her clothes, but some kind of wire or listening device too.

  But of course they had. The clothes she’d worn for her “mission” had been bought and fitted by the PDA.

  Damn it. She’d really lost her touch. Any other time, any other place, she’d have known better, her mind clicking at a hundred miles an hour to analyze any probability, any crack in her defenses. But it seemed all her years of training, all her expertise meant nothing when met with this shape shifting dragon.

  The fire was unable to take the edge off the chill deep inside when she undressed and tossed her clothes into the rapidly diminishing flames. Pulling her stilettos free, she pitched them in too, watching as the crimson straps shrank and charred in seconds.

  Kadin really was clever. He’d used just enough flammable material to burn her clothes, her shoes. But soon there would be no more fire, no flickering light to alert any trackers to their location.

  She swallowed, sick to her soul. She’d given her all to the top-secret agency that specialized in paranormal investigation. She’d replaced her blood kin, her deceased family, with the bureau that had recognized her talents and harnessed her hatred, embracing her into its fold.

  In retrospect, she realized she’d been too caught up in the idea that she’d been needed … wanted … to see the exploitation and manipulation for what it was. With her gift of paranormal detection, she’d been indispensable. But now that they knew her secret legacy, knew how much Kadin valued her life, she’d become expendable. A target.

  “Are you okay?” Kadin murmured huskily.

  She nodded, only half-aware of his quick recovery, of him climbing to his feet and moving behind her. “Just … deep in thought.”

  His hands settled on her shoulders, his fingers gently kneading. “I’m sorry.”

  She stiffened. “What for?”

  “For being the one to turn your life upside down.” His hands stilled and he tugged her backward a little until her taut shoulders rested against his unnatural warmth, his rock-hard strength. “But I’m not sorry we made love. I’m not sorry you’re here with me now.”

  She let loose a ragged sigh as she absorbed his heat, trying to gather her scrambled senses. “Thank you, I think.”

  He laughed a little, the sound rugged and masculine and tying her belly up in knots. His warm breath feathered her hair. “You know, when you think about it, if you weren’t so close to freezing your ass off, this is actually rather romantic.”

  She tilted her head back, viewing him upside down. “How so?”

  He grinned. “The warm fire, the bright stars shining like fairy lights in the night sky, my arms wrapped around—”

  The sound of an approaching chopper cut him short. She stiffened, scrambling from his hold. Kadin caught her hand and said harshly, “Let’s move.”

  Grace nodded. It was too late to stamp out the fire now. Doing so would only take precious time they didn’t have.

  They moved like wraiths through the night and she was thankful that, at the very least, her training had conditioned her for the physical toughness and endurance needed to jog down a mountainside on bare feet, without clothes to keep her warm.

  In the valley below, Kadin ignored the farmhouses with their lights shining bright. “I flew here because I know the area. I have a safe house nearby.”

  She shook her head. “My team know about your safe houses—all of them.”

  “Of course they do,” he muttered. “There are holiday homes farther down. Most won’t have anyone in them. We can break into one of those and hopefully find you some clothes and take a brief rest.”

  “We’ll be hunted down. They’ll use tracking dogs to follow our scent.”

  “Perhaps,” he acknowledged. “But I doubt it. They’ll have to retrieve the dogs first. It’s not like they would have been prepared for our escape. Either way, we have a little time on our side.”

  She resisted expelling a relieved sigh when, half an hour later, they stopped beside a house shrouded in shadows. The inky darkness of a lake lapping at its small front yard seemed even darker in the light of quaint lampposts that rimmed the lake. Grace knew they shouldn’t stop yet, not anytime soon. Her team wouldn’t back off, wouldn’t give any quarter. In fact, she had little doubt she’d become a prize, a trophy that any one of the team would now want to capture or even kill.

  How quickly life could be turned on its head.

  The powers that be would no doubt offer a career promotion and big cash incentive in exchange for her capture. Add the kudos of capturing a shape shifting dragon to the mix and it would be a very fine prize indeed.

  “We won’t stay here,” Kadin murmured, barely out of breath. He jerked his head to the other side of the lake, where weak lights twinkled in the distance. “It will be faster if we swim. And if they do use dogs, the water will drown our scent.”

  “Good plan,” she conceded. “But wouldn’t it be easier if you shifted back into a dragon and flew us over the lake? In fact, flew hundreds of miles away from our enemies?”

  Enemies. She could barely fathom the idea.

  He stepped forward on silent feet, evidently cautious of the homeowners who might just be inside. “That would be nice,” he conceded in a murmur. “If only this thin earth air didn’t make it so difficult to fly.”

  Evidently the height of his penthouse suite had made flying a lot easier, even with her extra weight.

  He paused at the lake’s edge and looked at her. In the light of the lamps, she perceived his somberness. “Besides which, not only is shape shifting an unbelievably agonizing process, it consumes an incredible amount of energy. If I’m to shift again anytime soon, I’ll need calories, and I’ll need a lot.”

  She nodded her understanding and stepped into the cold water. “Then let’s get this swim out of the way.”

  His teeth glinted in the darkness. “Yes. Let’s.”

  Chapter Four

  Almost an hour later Grace stumbled from the cold clutches of the lake. If she thought her teeth had chattered earlier, they were an orchestra now. She was just glad she’d put in daily sessions at the lap pool, or she might still be treading water and trying hard to keep up with Kadin’s smooth strokes.

  His hand clasped her forearm, his possessive touch somehow comforting as he said, “Come on, we need to get you dry and warm.”

  She couldn’t talk through her clattering teeth, couldn’t even form a token protest when he bent and lifted her into his arms, pulling her close against his chest.

  She leaned even closer. “You’re so warm.”

  The breath fanning her scalp was even warmer. “Mm. It’s a dragon thing.”

  His bare feet squelched on the sandy shore with its scattering of too-bright lamps. He paused, scanning the row of waterfront homes. “Which one?”

  Of the eight houses she could see, five of them were shadowed in darknes
s and presumably unoccupied. She gestured to the one in the center. It was older and well maintained, but probably had no alarm system. It was also the last one her team would check. They would flank the community of houses from either side and work their way in to all but eliminate any possibility of escape.

  Kadin nodded his approval. “Let’s go.”

  He placed her on her feet at the wooden front door, searching the shadows behind them as she plucked the last surviving pin from her hair, designed especially for lock picking. She swatted a disheveled, waterlogged lock of deep-red hair from her eyes and concentrated on the task. Even shivering and with shaking hands, she took no longer than five seconds to unlock the door.

  “Nicely done,” he said as she eased open the door and slid the pin back into her hair.

  They moved silently inside, shutting and relocking the door behind them. They left the lights off as Kadin drew all the heavy drapes in the lounge. There was no reason to risk attention from the neighbors. In such a small community, everybody probably knew when each home was occupied.

  Kadin found a blanket slung over a recliner and draped it around her. She whispered thanks at the immediate warmth before he disappeared into the darkness to climb upstairs on silent feet. Straining her ears, she could just make out his footfall as he prowled each room, ensuring the house was indeed empty.

  She flicked a lamp on with his return. He moved into the kitchen and rattled through some cabinet drawers. “Here we go.” He held a candle and matches aloft. “Now let’s get you into a hot bath.”

  He lit the candle and cupped the flickering flame to subdue its light as he led her upstairs. And even under such sparse illumination, she couldn’t help but notice the perfect rounds of his ass cheeks, the muscular trunks of his thighs and the broadness of his back and shoulders. He was a big, impressive man who’d easily surpass six-foot-five.

  She followed him into the bathroom, where he placed the candle onto the white-tiled floor away from the window. “You know, you would have made a great operative,” she mused aloud.