by Juniper Hart
She got to the elevator, heart pounding. She jabbed her finger into the button to go up and waited patiently. She was sure Storm’s men would expect her to go to the bottom floor to get away, but she was always one step ahead. She would go up. Her cunningness and ingenuity are what kept her alive for so long. She patted her foot in a rhythm against the ground.
“C’mon, c’mon, c’mon,” she muttered. “Hurry up.”
The door dinged open. She sauntered inside and placed her finger on her neck choker after hooking her whip on her belt for easy access. She closed her eyes and focused. She was no magician, but the choker had the magic inside itself already. Her image fizzled and was replaced with another image. Every time she used one of her images, she had to come up with a new one so people couldn’t recognize her. This time she chose to be a tall man holding some very large flowers, not a small woman with a rifle and mean whip. If someone touched her, the game was over because it was only an illusion. But as far as everyone’s eyes were concerned, a man stood in the elevator.
The elevator rose gently with pleasing music in the background. She waited. The guards would find her eventually. The first thing they would do after realizing that she hadn’t smashed into the asphalt from diving off the balcony was come to find her.
Lilith hit the fourth floor. One more floor to go. She hoped the guards wouldn’t be waiting for her, but there was a good chance they would be. She had to make her disguise look convincing.
Fifth floor.
The doors slid open to reveal four guards, all toting heavy weaponry. They were smart. If she had killed the first two that had breached her room, there were two others hiding somewhere to call for backup. She was willing to bet that the hotel was littered with them. Storm didn’t take his security lightly.
“Oh god!” Lilith yelled, making herself jump backwards like she was some regular human who were scared of the rifles. “Holy fuck, what the hell!”
“Sir,” one said. “We need you to calm down!”
“Calm down?” She roared in a deep voice. She loved that the charmed choker even made her sound like the illusion that she was a man. “Get away from me!”
“We’re not going to hurt you!” one snapped. He turned to the others. “The little bitch jumped!”
Little bitch. Honestly that didn’t even make the list of the top hundred creative insults she’d received. She cowered in the elevator and listened as the men went down to the floor where she’d just come from.
“Storm will not be happy!”
“Calm down,” one ordered. “We got Night Star. At least that’s something.”
“We’re going to catch Red Shadow,” the fourth one promised. “I’m going to wring her throat myself.”
It was the last thing she heard before the elevator doors shut and she continued up to the top floor. She disengaged her choker so she could return to her normal appearance. It was a valuable tool, but it felt like her skin was being chafed by sandpaper when it was activated, so she was only able to withstand the pain for short amounts of time.
She took the elevator up to the top floor, then she jogged out to the roof access ladder and climbed up. It wasn’t locked. They often weren’t, surprisingly. If Lilith owned a building, she’d make extra sure that everything was locked up tight.
Red Shadow broke onto the roof, which was littered in snow. It was winter in Seattle, and the snowstorm had been unexpected.
“I need a less stressful job,” she said to herself as she stalked over to the edge of the building. “Why am I talking to myself?” She frowned. “Why am I answering myself?”
She got to the edge of the roof and glanced down. She was high, way too high up for her comfort. Even after all her training, she still had a fear of heights. Her heart sped up as she peered at the scene below. It was just like she thought; dozens of men below scoped out the exits of the hotel like she was going to walk out into their arms. That was an amateur’s mistake: to panic at the first sign of trouble.
Storm rarely attended planned social events. When an informant alerted her to his name on the guest list, she was thrilled. Unfortunately, Night Star also knew about Storm’s planned appearance. Rather than fight it out, the two decided to team up.
Her green eyes scoured the crowd for the dragon shifter.
“Where are you?” she muttered.
She caught sight of his powerful frame moving through a flock of bodyguards into a black SUV. He was hot. Really hot. With tousled pitch-black hair and a chiseled face, he looked like he had just stepped off the runway. Lilith couldn’t suppress the excitement she felt between her legs that moved quickly and powerfully through her core.
She had second thoughts about killing such a perfect-looking specimen, but it didn’t take long for her to remember he was also a dangerous dragon. And besides…money was money.
She brought her rifle up to her shoulder and leaned it up against the side of the building for support. It was an easy shot. Nobody saw her, somehow. Storm was well-protected, but not from the rooftops. She could still hit him. She might take out a bodyguard in the process, but hey, the bodyguard knew the risks when he took the job. Calmly, she chambered a bullet. The trick to being successful in the Slayer business was not getting rattled. Getting rattled meant getting anxious. Getting anxious meant you made stupid mistakes that got you caught or killed.
She lined the dot on his skull, breathing coolly and evenly. Storm had been shot before, but never by a gun like hers and not with a bullet like that one, and not in the head. Storm was outrageously powerful. She couldn’t doubt or deny that. Most dragons were powerful, but Storm was magnificent. His father was the Dragon King, and his mother was Mother Earth. The legends said that Mother Earth had given each of her sons the power over an element, and Storm controlled the wind. The dragon was literally capable of creating a tsunami with his mind.
Several guards raced up to Storm, and his posture became more rigid. Storm moved quickly to his SUV. The guards probably just told him they’d apprehended Night Star, but Red Shadow was still on the loose.
Before she could take the shot, he was gone.
“Fuck!” she hissed, lowering her barrel.
He was gone, but he could still be tracked. She’d waited too long.
Gone…but not untraceable. She had her methods. She took her clip out of her rifle and popped in another one. They weren’t bullets, but they were trackers. Small, effective trackers.
The SUV started to pull away. She quickly jerked her gun up, aimed, and fired. The little tracker was well-hidden, but it would be easy to miss and hit the window or somewhere too noticeable. The small black tracker zipped through the air and went, against all odds, into the exhaust pipe. Literally the best possible scenario. Nobody looked inside the exhaust pipe for a tracker.
It wouldn’t be easy, but she had no other choice than to track him. She wasn’t going to let a bounty of that size get away. Besides, for her, it was personal. Storm had killed her friend and ally, Raven, when Storm and his army invaded a nearby Slayer building. She was going to kill that heartless creature if it was the last thing she did.
He was like all dragons: cold, heartless, and arrogant. They didn’t deserve to live, in her opinion. All they did was steal, loot, and murder. At least, that’s what she’d been told.
She slung her rifle over her shoulder, watching the SUV vanish into the distance. She’d find him. And when she did, she’d put a bullet in his skull. It was for the money, of course, but also for Raven.
She touched her choker, and her image was replaced with that of one of Storm’s men, complete with the insignia. She’d prepared for this contingency.
She was coming for Storm.
Lilith had no problem making it out of the hotel in her guard form. Nobody even questioned her.
After rushing into the parking garage, she found her steed: a solid steel sports car with a tinted glass windshield, four off-road tires, and the symbol of a phoenix on the bumper. It was painted green in th
e same tone as her suit. She couldn’t help it. She knew it was too obvious, yet she couldn’t resist the temptation to make a car version of her. And it was a car version of her. It was sleek, fast, and just plain sexy.
The keys were securely placed on the fender of the front driver’s side wheel, magnetized firmly to the frame. She unlocked her car and stepped inside. It was her own, personal cave, and it felt like home.
Everything in her car wasn’t completely functional though. She added a few personal touches that made her smile, such as the miniature disco ball that she kept around the mirror for fun.
She placed her phone into the GPS holder and fired up the app paired to the tracker. Within seconds, the tracking dot appeared on the map. Storm was moving away.
She followed.
3
Storm headed exactly where Lilith thought he would: his home high up in the mountains a couple hours outside of Seattle.
Just because she knew where his home was located didn’t mean her task would be easy. The home nestled away in the snowy peaks of Washington state was one of his many homes. This particular home was invisible to humans—even Slayers. Many had tried to find it, but they never did, even though they knew it existed. Besides the hidden location, another challenge was the security that surrounded the mountain.
This wouldn’t be easy.
The legends about Storm said that from high up on his mountain peak, he would create massive storms that he kept contained, just to hear the wind scream.
The thought of facing a being so powerful in such a secluded destination was terrifying, but Lilith would never admit that. Why didn’t she take the shot faster at the hotel? That would have been a million times easier.
She had her work cut out for her, and she would have to make part of the journey by foot. She was glad her shoe socks were enchanted to keep her feet warm. This was going to be an arduous mission.
The base of the mountain was heavily wooded with pine and cedar trees. The vegetation was littered with snow, and from the base of the mountain, she couldn’t see its peak.
Well, I’ll take my car up as far as I can, she thought as she tried to come up with a solid plan of attack.
Lilith applied chains to her already off-road tires and started up the mountain. The trees were far enough apart at the bottom that she could slip up through. Her car didn’t like it though. There was barely enough traction, but Lilith was going to avoid trekking up the mountain for as long as she could. It didn’t take long.
The snow covered a small ravine, and without warning, the front of her car plummeted forward. Even though she had only dropped a few feet, there was no way her car could continue the journey. She opened her car door, stepped out, and kicked her door wildly in frustration.
Hold it together, Lil, she thought, giving herself a mini pep talk.
She attempted to cover her car with branches to hide her tracks, but her attempts were futile. She needed to move before Storm’s guards found her. Lilith reached inside her car and grabbed her gun.
It was cold outside for a late afternoon in the middle of winter, but she felt almost comfortable in her suit and hood. The sun was out, and there was hardly any wind, which made it more tolerable.
Soon, she was hundreds of meters from her car. The climb became more intense as she moved higher. She almost fell several times, which would’ve been disastrous. She’d smash into a tree if she was lucky. If she wasn’t, she’d fall down farther and hit one of the jutting boulders.
Out of nowhere, she saw something move. It was Storm.
Did he see me? Lilith thought. She realized he didn’t or she’d be dead.
Storm wore a copper-colored coat with big boots and was simply walking and looking at the ground. He had a strange look on his face. Pensive, almost lonely.
She followed him, trying to be quiet while waiting for the perfect moment to take out her target. He walked slowly through the snowy trees, and the Slayer could hardly believe her luck.
Storm had unwittingly exposed himself. They were on the top of a snowy cliff that rose hundreds of feet into the air, about they were only seventy meters apart. She thought about pegging him from afar, which had been her plan all along. But, something intrigued her and she wanted to get up and close, to really see the fear in his eyes when she extinguished him.
Raven would have liked that, and after all, part of the reason she wanted to kill Storm so badly was to avenge her friend. She crept closer and closer until she was fifteen feet behind him. He was so lost in thought that he couldn’t hear her moving over his own footsteps. She took out her rifle and prepared to call his name.
He stopped before she spoke and held out a hand to something in the trees. She hesitated. Were there guards? She ducked back. She didn’t want to kill him without knowing if he was alone.
A majestic, white elk with blue horns shouldered its way through the trees and looked down at the dragon shifter with expressive eyes. The elk nuzzled up against Storm’s shoulder before placing its soft muzzle against his fingers.
“Hello, sweet beast,” Storm said.
It was the first time that Lilith had heard him speak. His voice was soft and gentle, without a hint of malice. “I wish I had something for you.”
Fuck.
She wasn’t going to kill a man who was treating a beautiful animal with such love and kindness.
You know what? No. It didn’t matter. He’d killed Raven. She raised her rifle to her shoulder, avoiding the scope. She didn’t need it at that close of a proximity. The elk saw her movement and dashed away.
Storm turned to face her. His copper-colored eyes watched her.
“Red Shadow,” he said. “You don’t give up easy.”
“Nope.” She slid her finger over the trigger.
She had him. He had no time to transform before she could shoot. Trees swayed in the distance as she inhaled deeply. She could do this. “Any last words?”
He laughed. “You’ve got me, Slayer. Congratulations. I hope the money is worth it.”
“It’s not only for the money,” she snapped. “You killed Raven in cold blood! He did nothing to you!”
He scowled. “Raven tried to kill my brother. You expect me to let him go? That man was evil.”
Did this dragon actually have feelings? He was ruthless and dangerous, yet he was so kind to the elk. And he seemed to truly care about his family.
She faltered.
He saw her hesitation. “Leave, Red Shadow. I will not send my men after you. Leave in peace. You and I have no quarrel.”
She tried to pull the trigger.
Do it! Lilith screamed in her mind.
She could use her lifetime of training and walk away avenged with a healthy chunk of change.
Lilith’s heart didn’t listen to her mind. Her finger wouldn’t pull the trigger. She tightened her entire forearm in a vain attempt to make her finger squeeze the steel trigger. She wouldn’t miss. She’d shoot him in the head with a bullet of that caliber, and he’d be down.
But was she that kind of person? Her family thought so. The world thought so. She met his eyes, which was a bad decision. She could see that there was more to this dragon’s soul than she originally thought, a person with hopes, dreams, and passions.
She tried once more the pull the trigger. She just wouldn’t do it, not with him sitting there, unarmed. It was dishonorable, especially since he had killed Raven to protect his family. She lowered her weapon.
With the amount of time it took her to contemplate killing him, he could have killed her.
He didn’t.
But why?
He walked forward, towards her. “Leave,” he ordered in a harsher tone. “I will only offer an easy escape for you once, Slayer. Your kind are nothing but a thorn in my family’s side. Next time, I will kill you.” He pushed his chest up against the end of her rifle. “Kill me or be gone,” he ordered, meeting her gaze firmly.
The shifter wasn’t scared of her.
“Son o
f a—” she started, taking one step back.
After a lifetime of training, she failed. She wasn’t a ruthless killer, and apparently, neither was the Keeper of the Wind.
The ground beneath her feet shifted. Her courage dropped through the floor as the earth started to shake and move. In a moment, she was slipping along with an avalanche of snow down the side of a mountain.
She saw a shape transform and fly away.
Well, he won’t kill me himself, but he sure as hell doesn’t care if the snow kills me, she thought while scrambling to grab hold of a tree or anything solid to stop her from falling to her imminent death.
The snow washed her along the ground, stealing her rifle and dunking her under the snow. She couldn’t see, breathe, or move. All she could think about was the cliff that wasn’t too far off in the distance as the snow continued to carry her. She was completely helpless.
The snow shifted, and she emerged from the wave of white and saw where the earth dropped off into open air. The Slayer snatched her whip from her hip and slashed at a nearby tree. The whip wrapped around the trunk and snapped tight, stopping her progress immediately just a few feet from the cliff edge. She managed to hold on, despite being so close to death.
Snow continued to batter her, ripping her hood from her head, exposing her face to the elements. This gave her an excellent view of a boulder crashing down through the mountain towards her and her tree.
“Uh-oh,” she said, panicking and grabbing hold of her whip as tightly as she could. The boulder bounced after hitting a ledge and came down straight near the base of her tree. “Fuck!”
The boulder smashed into the roots of the tree before bouncing past Lilith and into open air. The roots shattered, and the trunk snapped almost in half, tossing her over the edge of the cliff. The tree was still holding on, but not for long. Snow still washed through, pushing the tree further out of the ground and straining its integrity more and more.
