by Lizzy Ford
She should want to cage him, not to strip her clothes off and join him!
His hands went over her breasts and down her stomach before the circled her body to her rear end. He ran them up her back next, her shoulders, then pulled her ponytail to the side. At first, she thought he was looking for the tattoo, until he flipped the ear bud out of her ear.
“Where’s the mic?” he demanded.
“Fell out while flying,” she lied.
His hands went to her breasts again then slid into her shirt. He pulled the mic free from her bra strap and dropped it to the ground beside the receiver. He continued searching her, feeling her hips and down each leg.
His touch left her body. She was fevered once more from the brusque treatment. He swept up the electronic devices and stepped away.
She stayed where she was for a long moment, not at all certain she wanted to know what came next. Her gaze drifted towards the door.
“You, um, didn’t even lock it,” she said. “Not afraid I’ll run?”
“There’s only one way off this mountain, and that’s me. Unless you want to jump.”
She turned in time to see him pulling up a pair of jeans over the perfect, round globes of his ass. He zipped the jeans. They hung low on his hips, and his upper body was bare. The muscles of his back rippled smoothly beneath the taut sun-gold skin, and she assessed he could probably take her as a human or a dragon.
Could she ever look at him without remembering what he really was?
As if hearing the thought, he faced her. He finished wrapping a rubber band around his hair then dropped his thick arms to his sides, studying her with the same predatory look he’d given her at the warehouse. It made her want to take her chances jumping off the mountain.
“Who’s on the other end?” he started, holding out the electronic devices.
She shook her head, not about to rat out her friends, no matter how scared she was.
“You’ve got about ten seconds to start talking, slayer.” Chace dropped both and crushed them with his heel.
She was having a hard time coming up with anything at all in that moment, torn between fear and the heat blooming in her belly at the sight of his supple skin.
“Time’s up.” He started towards her.
She darted towards the door and had made it a few steps outside the cabin when he tackled her. She didn’t have a chance to fight him. He rolled off her and snatched her arm, pulling her over his shoulder while simultaneously standing.
Her legs were pinned in place, and she slapped at his back. There was nothing for her to grab for leverage.
He set her down and whirled her, wrapping one arm around her to hold her against his chest.
She stared down at their feet, trying hard to backpedal away from the cliff. Hundreds of feet straight down was a valley between two peaks. The valley was filled with jagged rocks and the occasional pine tree that looked like a fuzzy green dot from their height.
Chace braced one leg against a tree hanging out over the edge and shifted forward.
With her feet hanging over nothing but empty space, Skylar clawed at his arm, struggling to find a handhold in case he decided to drop her. She stretched back and locked one arm around his neck.
“Let’s try this again,” he said. “Who are you working with?” He worked her arm free of his neck, overpowering her with ease, and pinned it to her body.
She said nothing, staring at the rocks far below.
His grip loosened, and she started to slide.
“No!” she shouted, struggling to free one arm to grab something.
“There we go,” he said, satisfied. “Now that you’re talking …”
His arms tightened again, but she couldn’t shake her frantic need to find something stable to grab.
“Your name,” Chace said.
He was close enough for her to feel his words tickle her ear. Unlike her, he was completely in control, unconcerned with dangling over a cliff’s edge. The heartbeat at her back was steady and strong, his breathing even.
Heartbeat?
“Skylar,” she managed. “Nielson.”
“You’re a dragon slayer.”
“The last.”
“Interesting,” he said, his arms loosening. “So if you’re gone … the dragons are safe.”
“You didn’t bring me here to kill me!” she said, squirming again. She stretched with her foot to reach the edge. He shifted farther out in response.
“Knowing you’re the last might’ve changed my mind. I can keep my kind safe this way.”
“You’re the last, too!” she shouted, wrenching one arm free and clutching at his forearm.
“What?”
“There are no more dragons. Just you.” She was slipping down his body faster.
“Keep talking,” he said.
“I just wanted to bring you in. Not to … kill you. We found your bar and then things went … off track. You wanted me to … find … you …” She gasped.
He released her. Unable to reach the ledge or the tree, she clung to his arm with both of hers and dangled helplessly over the cliff’s edge.
“The last time I checked, there were five dragons.” The note in his voice terrified her.
“Not anymore,” she said then rushed on. “I didn’t hurt them. You’re my first.”
“The other shifters? You’ve been hunting them down, too, haven’t you?”
“It’s not how it works. I can only track you,” she said quickly. Her eyes went to the rocks awaiting her. She looked away fast, trying not to panic. “Dragon slayers hunt dragons. Cat slayers hunt … cats.”
“How many kinds of slayers are there?”
“I don’t know,” she mumbled.
He gripped one wrist, prying her hand free from his arm and holding it.
“Six!” she shouted. “Six!”
“There is no reason on the entire planet I should let you live,” he said in a hard tone. “Your kind kills mine!”
“No! We only protect normal people from attacks by shifters.”
“Where do you get this shit?”
“It’s the truth!” she said in a mix between desperation and frustration. She sensed him debating.
Finally, he straightened, drawing her back towards the cliff. He lifted her by the wrist he held until her tiptoes were able to reach the edge of the cliff between his legs. He didn’t move but snaked his other arm around her to pull her against him.
She’d never been so happy to perch precariously on a cliff. Skylar heard herself panting and wrapped her arms around him, not daring to let him go. His muscular chest was warm beneath her chilled cheek, his scent winding through her senses.
“If we go inside, you gonna talk?” he asked gruffly, lifting her chin to see him.
“Scout’s honor.”
His eyes narrowed, and he leaned forward, knocking away her feet from the ledge.
Letting go of the tree of a man keeping her from falling, she took his face in his hands and pulled it down to her.
As she had before, she sought to distract him with a simple kiss. Pressing her mouth to his, she didn’t expect him to respond so fast. Chace’s lips were soft but demanding, and she instantly caved, opening her mouth for him to taste her while she kissed him hard and deep. His velvety tongue was hot, the pressure of his lips – combined with her surging adrenaline from the near-fatal fall – rendering her response far more passionate than she intended.
“I’ll make it worth your time,” she whispered, pulling away and resting her cheek against his. “Again. You know I can.”
He said nothing for a moment, didn’t move. They breathed the same air, and she felt how fast his heart was beating.
Why does he have a heartbeat this time?
Uncertain what he was thinking, she nuzzled his cheek and traced kisses down his jaw then claimed his lips again, this time in a slow, deep kiss.
Despite his declaration, he responded with the same hunger that was working its way through her system.
At last, he took one step back then another, until her feet were firmly on the ground. His grip grew slack and he withdrew from the kiss.
“Let’s get one thing straight,” he said, meeting her gaze. “Of the two of us, I’m the one who can fly. Don’t think for a moment that I won’t throw you off the mountain, if you piss me off again. Got it?”
She nodded, afraid to say anything that might see her at the bottom of the valley.
He took her arm and led her back to the cabin. She stepped inside, and he closed the door behind them. She was about to sigh in relief when he spun her and kissed her again, this time harder.
Fire spread through her the same way it had the first time they made love. She leaned into him, not caring what they did, so long as she wasn’t hanging over a cliff anymore. She let her trembling hands skim over his bare chest and down the muscular arms. He gripped her ass and pulled her hips against his. His erection was hard against her, and his fingers slid around her wrists.
She didn’t register the cold metal for a moment, too caught up in the sensations of his body against hers. She wanted her clothing gone, so she could feel her skin against his and to run her fingers through his long hair once more.
He lifted her hands above her head then ran his palms down her arms, her chest, her sides, taking her hips to hold them against his. Enjoying the sensation, she left her hands up while he explored her body, enjoying the sensations.
“You cannot kiss your way out of this one,” he whispered, pulling away.
Scattered from a mix of desire and the saturation of her senses, she didn’t understand what he meant, until he shifted away. She went to lower her arms and looked up, startled to find her wrists were shackled together and suspended by the chain between them on a hook over her head.
She yanked at it.
“Sorry, Skylar,” Chace said from a few feet away. “Can’t have you trying to escape or call for help.”
Stunned he’d tricked her, she lowered her gaze from the ceiling to him. His eyes glowed with desire but also fire, and his talons had begun to grow. She swallowed a retort, the sudden urge to hide somewhere filling her.
He moved into her personal space once more, smelling more of bonfire than honey. She was able to see the unnatural flames in his pupils clearly, and he radiated heat, the way he had before he shifted into a dragon earlier.
She discreetly pulled at her bonds, afraid of what happened if he turned into a dragon. She was trapped in place, able to move about a foot in either direction but no farther.
Chace traced a lengthening talon down the side of her face and neck, leaving a trail of fire that tickled and burned. His finger continued down her collarbone and arm. He held her gaze while he touched her lightly.
The finger slid under her shirt and traced a path from the small of her back to her belly. The nail was sharp enough to sting, and her skin quivered.
He lowered his head and kissed her lightly, and she felt the teeth that were lengthening, as if he was getting ready to shift. Terrified yet turned on, she responded to him timidly this time, too aware of the heat of his chest and the talon making its way up her body towards her breasts.
“Don’t try anything,” he warned against her mouth.
She said nothing, shivering under his light touch. The tender man who made love to her two weeks ago was gone, replaced by this stranger, who seemed all too aware of how much control he had over her body and its reaction to him.
Chace moved away, stalking towards the door and out. He slammed it behind him, and the screen door creaked closed.
Skylar breathed a sigh of relief. Her legs were quaking, the sacred hollow between them wet while her body was tense with fear. Looking up, she stood on her tiptoes and tried to shake her hands free. The hook was too deep for her to lift her chain over the edge.
She studied the area around her. He’d hung her in a perfect place – right in the middle of everything but too far from anything she could stand on. She stretched and leaned towards the closest thing, an ottoman, but wasn’t even able to graze the small piece of furniture.
“Come on!” she said angrily. “This is not how it’s supposed to happen!” She gave up for a moment then tried again.
What the hell have I gotten myself into?
Chapter Nine
Chace understood why Mr. Nothing pointed him in the direction of the shifter slayer without fully knowing how to deal with her.
This time, his shifting was involuntary, an instinctive reaction to his emotional turmoil. He’d never hurt anyone in his life and yet, dangling the helpless girl over the cliff, it had taken every piece of his willpower not to drop her. He was torn between wanting to strangle her and to make love to her, an emotional powder keg he didn’t think possible before meeting her.
That she was so nonchalant about hunting down and slaughtering shifters who were just trying to live normal lives infuriated him. Distracted by the intense attraction between them, the chemistry that made him topple into bed with her without bothering to ask her name, he didn’t know what to think.
Skylar. It was a perfect name for someone whose eyes were the color of the heavens.
What part of what she said was true and what part was a lie? He was too angry to try to figure it out.
Chace barely registered the pain rippling through him as he morphed. He needed to feel the sky, to release the emotion inside him before he threw the only lead he had to what was happening to the shifters off a cliff.
He launched into the air and hovered beside a tree, trying to gauge his size. Unless the pinecones had grown huge over night, he was about the size of a dragonfly this time. He alighted on a pinecone for a moment. The scent of pine and nature soothed him somewhat, and he let his dragon senses absorb everything around him. He needed to replace the womanly scent of Skylar and the memory of how soft her skin was. All she did was piss him off, and he didn’t think he’d be able to stay human long enough to question her, if he didn’t erase all traces of her from his system.
The calm of nature worked into his system slowly, and he released the anger that was boiling over. When he felt under control again, he left the pinecone and soared upward. Too small to deal with the wind currents high above the mountains, he kept to the treetops and explored the mountain where he’d placed the cabin with his magic.
Eventually, he managed to center himself and fluttered back towards the cabin. He landed gently on the windowsill and peered into his home, wanting to gauge his instinctive response to see if he was ready to deal with her yet.
She’d managed to make a mess in the time he was gone, a true accomplishment, given that he’d laid out strict orders for the cabin’s magic. He’d told the cabin to make room for her to go to the restroom only but to keep everything else out of reach. Somehow, she’d managed to knock over a chair, pushed the ottoman out of place, smashed a vase that used to be on the stand next to the couch …
Her wrists were bleeding. She was working hard to get free, no doubt anxious to get away from the monster she considered him.
She has no mercy for our kind, he reminded himself. His eyes followed the blood from her wrists down her forearms, and he forbade himself from feeling bad about it, not when she was helping slaughter shifters.
But he still did. She was frantic, a trapped animal, one whose lies about not hurting the others he was almost able to believe, even if he didn’t want to. He’d seek out Mr. Nothing again later, but right now he wanted to know more about the woman in his home.
His magic returned to his control, settling within him. Chace flew away from the window, back to the jeans he’d left in the grass when he’d shifted.
His dragonfly body expanded, the tearing and reshaping of sinew, muscles and skin making him grimace. At last, he was human again. He waited for his wings to be absorbed into his body then tugged on his jeans and drew a deep breath.
As long as he stayed calm dealing with the slayer, he wasn’t going to run away to morph.
Chace t
ook another moment to settle the last vestiges of his anger then strode towards his cabin. He flinched at the sound of something else smashing to the ground a second before he opened the door.
Determined, he entered his home and surveyed the damage.
Skylar twisted to face him, apprehension crossing her features. She was gorgeous, with large blue eyes lined with feathery lashes, high cheekbones and an oval face with olive complexion framed by dark hair. Above average height and trim, he’d intimately experienced the lean muscles of her body. Remembering how well they fit together made his blood stir.
He found himself looking too long and closed the door. She’d been in his place for all of an hour, and already, he was struggling not to breathe in her heady scent.
Chace crossed the room to the stove, aware the mountaintop got downright cold at night. He ordered the magic in the cabin to clean up her mess and right all his furniture where he preferred it.
Her gasp confirmed that the furniture was moving back into place, as if possessed. Chace straightened from placing wood into the fireplace, debating. After a moment, he grudgingly ordered the magic of the cabin to make her wrist chains so they wouldn’t hurt her.
When he turned, she was staring up at her hands, puzzled. The interior of the metal cuffs were lined with pink fleece and their edges topped with pink feathers.
Pink? Really? There were days when even his magic cabin pissed him off. It was a reminder that he and the magic coexisted – intertwined but still independent.
Irritated, he moved towards his prisoner. She moved away instinctively. Chace preferred to be in contact with her and gripped her hips, pulling her into his body. Her tight ass settled against his hips in a way that was almost too distracting while her frizzy hair tickled his chin.
“Stay,” he ordered.
She mumbled something he couldn’t hear but didn’t move. With her body resting against his, he reached up and tugged at the chains. The magic obeyed his command, and her shackles went through the hook holding them up. He wrapped one arm around her shoulders to keep her in place then lifted one arm to see the damage.
She’d rubbed the skin right off her wrists. It looked as though she’d tried to pull one hand through a cuff. It was raw and red all the way to her thumb knuckle.
