by Willa Hart
The others followed suit, making sure at least a few fingers were touching me. The anxiety that had threatened to knock me to my knees a few seconds ago turned to a confidence I didn’t deserve to have. The elders stared at us in flat-out surprise.
Danic stood directly behind me, his larger-than-life presence looming over us all. “Guess we’ll just have to knock some heads until they give us Zoe.”
Lazlo arched an eyebrow at him. “How many heads do you think you can take on, Danic?”
Danic squeezed my shoulder before he answered, and I knew his words were truth. “As many as it takes.”
Chapter 12
Tamar’s big SUV bumped along the cobblestones of Turdzi as we headed for her brother’s place. I still wasn’t entirely sure if the little house — which most Americans would think of as a condo, if they didn’t know how old the buildings were — was Luka’s home or simply the rebels’ headquarters. Regardless, watching the ancient buildings of the village whizz past never got old.
“Luka was just waking up when I messaged him on WhatsApp around dawn,” Tamar said, then took a sip from a travel thermos with a silly cartoon monkey on it. “Hopefully, they will have the melot ready to talk again by the time we get there. Luka can be lazy in the mornings, always has been.”
You sure about this, Favor? Kellum asked in my head, which automatically linked me in with the other guys.
Yeah, you don’t have to face him again, said Ash.
The others didn’t need to “speak” for me to know they were all worried about me. The last time I’d faced Levan, I’d passed out, but now that I knew how to harness the strength of my boys to boost my powers, I was certain I could dig deeper into his mind without the ill effects. But discussing such matters in front of Tamar, as much as we trusted her, was against our group decision to hold our information close to the vest.
I’m sure, I told them, sending out a vibe I hoped would ease their concerns enough to stop talking inside my head. It drained me.
“Oh god,” Ryen groaned as he rubbed his belly, giving me a quick wink that told me he trusted me. “If he ate half as well as I did last night, I can’t blame him.”
“Oh?”
Danic nodded. “Mariam made egg pizza for us.”
“What?”
“I think she called it khachapuri,” Kellum explained.
Tamar threw her head back and laughed as she picked her way through the narrow streets. “Yes, I can see what you mean. I am glad you enjoyed her cooking, but I am sorry to say that Mariam’s cooking is, at best, agreeable.”
Hale grinned up at her as he patted his hard abs. “Sure agreed with me.”
“Hmph,” she snorted. “Wait until I convince Bunica to cook for you. I mean really cook for you. If the jadokari don’t kill you, Bunica will feed you to death.”
Kellum gave an exaggerated wince at her joke. “Oof, too soon.”
“A life you can’t laugh at isn’t a life worth living,” she said with a grin as she turned down the street that would lead us to Luka’s house.
Only instead of deserted streets, a handful of people were gathered on the street out front, Luka pointing frantically in a bunch of different directions. His face was almost purple and he looked both pissed off and alarmed all at the same time. Each time he pointed, a different member of his team sprinted in that direction. The downside of dragons secretly living among humans was that they couldn’t simply shift and fly away, regardless of who may be watching. Tamar pulled to a stop in front of the house and hopped out. We were close on her heels as she ran up to her brother.
“What has happened?” she asked, breathless as she glanced around at all the activity.
Luka scrubbed a hand through his brown hair and shook his head at the same time. “He is gone.”
My heart jack-hammered in my chest, knowing exactly who he was talking about but not wanting to get worked up before my ears got confirmation. “Who?”
He only gave me a grieved look, then turned on his heel and headed inside. As soon as the door closed behind us, it felt as if we’d entered battleground headquarters. Every stitch of furniture had been moved or overturned, and the sounds of people searching every inch of the small house echoed down the stairs. Alek’s voice came from the living room as we passed, shouting to someone named Tibor. Mariam stood in the kitchen with a cell phone pressed to her face, shouting in rapid, angry Romanian.
When he finally came to a stop in the kitchen, Tamar grabbed his arm. “What do you mean, gone?”
“Gone!” he snarled. “The melot has escaped. Mariam took his breakfast up to him a short while ago and he was just…gone.”
“How the hell does a human slip out from under the noses of a house full of dragons?” Kellum asked.
Luka threw his hands up in frustration. “What do you think we are trying to figure out? It has been chaos all morning. We have torn the place apart and no sign of him. Mariam is speaking with some of our spies in town, and I’ve called in reinforcements to search the area.”
“Shit!” Tamar hissed. “This is bad, Luka.”
“You think I do not know that, Tamar?”
Kellum stepped between the siblings. “We could call in our enforcers to join the search.”
Luka nodded gratefully. “That would be helpful.”
“Hey, what are we? Chopped liver?” Danic asked, stretching his muscular arms and rolling his shoulders in an impressive display that might have got me all hot and bothered if we hadn’t been smack in the middle of a crisis. “I’ve been thinking it’s been far too long since I’ve been in a fight.”
Hale gave his cousin a dubious look. “It’s only been a few days, cuz.”
“Exactly.”
“When humans invented arcades, and the fighting games came out, we didn’t see Danic for two weeks straight.”
I had to bite my lips not to laugh at that. Fortunately — or maybe unfortunately — the situation at hand wasn’t the least bit funny and my mirth died quickly.
“As I believe you Americans say, the more the happier,” Luka said as he texted someone on his phone.
“Merrier,” Ryen corrected, but Luka didn’t hear. Or care. Either way, he finished up his text before speaking again.
“The night guard reports he was in his room at three this morning, so he probably has not gone far. The more bodies we have, the more area we can search.”
Kellum’s phone binged and he nodded as he read the reply from Jordy, one of our L.A. enforcers. “They’re on their way. I’ll stay here to guard Favor while the rest of you search, sound good?”
The stubborn part of me wanted to insist I didn’t need guarding, but hell…this town was crawling with evil dragons and the keepers who would kill for them. I may be dumb, but I’m not stupid! Danic grinned and practically ran outside, while Tamar led the others from the house. By then, Mariam had stabbed the face of her phone, ending her call, then turned to us.
“I’ll stay with you,” she said to Kellum in Balaur, her eyes twinkling as her gaze drifted down his fine form.
That same sassy part of me wanted to scratch her damn eyes out for daring to look at my man — one of my men, anyway — but when Kellum’s gaze flicked over to me, my jealousy turned to pity.
Poor girl. She never stood a chance.
“I’ve got this,” he said, his fingers interlacing with mine. “Our guys will need as many local guides as you can spare to point them in the right directions.”
Mariam’s catlike green eyes darted between Kellum and me for a moment, then skimmed my frame in what I took to be disbelief. Her lush lips pursed into a perfect cupid’s bow, one that would turn the head of any guy.
Almost any guy.
Luka broke the tension between us by adding a different kind. “Did Mariam tell you? We have set up the exchange with the jadokari. Of course, that was before one of their melots escaped, so we need to act fast. Favor will deliver the guli to a secure location, then the human will be released within hours. I am
reasonably confident they will honor their word, but I would still like to discuss some basic precau—”
“Sorry, change of plans,” I interrupted. “That offer is off the table.”
Luka shot a look at Mariam and said something in Romanian. Then he turned his frown on me. Mariam stepped forward, her gaze bouncing between Kellum and me, as if she wasn’t sure who to address. She finally settled on me. Maybe she wasn’t so dumb after all.
“Is this a joke?” she asked in Balaur, the only common language we shared.
I shook my head calmly. “Not a joke.”
She huffed out a shocked laugh and gave Luka an equally shocked look. “What the hell? Don’t you want your friend back?”
I rolled my shoulders back and pulled myself to my full height, which was still a few inches shorter than her. Bitch.
“Of course, I do. But we are no longer willing to give up the guli. Final answer.”
They didn’t like our secrecy — not that I could blame them — but I stood my ground. Mariam’s mouth open and closed like a dying fish’s as she struggled to find her words. She finally did.
“You know they’ll kill your friend, right? Does your tiny human brain comprehend that? You should know by now who you’re dealing with. The jadokari will not only see this as a slap in their face, but as you breaking your word. You’ve been jerking them around for weeks as it is, and now this? Just as they’re willing to bend to your demands? What kind of idiot are you?”
Doubt crept into my mind. Surely she knew the jadokari better than I ever could, so common sense suggested I should listen to her, follow the local rebels’ lead. I sure as hell didn’t want anything happening to Zoe. But then Kellum slipped his hand into mine and the swirling mass of anxiety in my tummy calmed to a mere uproar. The rest would have circled around me, no doubt, but with only one of them nearby, a simple handholding gave me confidence in our decision.
“They want the Heart, the guli,” I said, locking gazes with her, as unsettling as it was. “They’re desperate for it, that much is obvious. They’ll do anything to get their nasty little hands on it, and right now Zoe is their only bargaining chip. If she dies, so does their hope of ever laying eyes on it. In fact, if even a single hair on her head has a split end by the time I get her back, I’ll throw the damn thing in the Marianas Trench. I’m sorry if that upsets you, but that’s the way it’s going to be.”
I squeezed Kellum’s hand, sucking every ounce of courage from him as I stood up to Mariam. She spun away and made a fed-up hand gesture at Luka. My hand itched to cover the Heart in its hiding place against my stomach, but I resisted the urge. I refused to be controlled by the jadokari, the rebels, or the Heart.
Luka gave me a worried look. “Are you sure about this?”
I licked my lips, not sure at all. But at the same time, I was. Damn, this sucked.
“Yes,” I finally said.
He shook his head and shrugged at Mariam. What more can we do? that shrug said. Mariam sighed, then turned her attention back on me.
“I won’t try to talk you out of it, as long as you know what might happen. Do you have it with you? The guli?”
“Why?” Kellum asked, giving my hand the slightest tug.
That tug reminded me to not answer, or at least not honestly, as we’d all agreed on. We could have spoken in our heads with each other but I almost preferred this silent connection. It made me feel somehow closer to him when I could read his tiny actions as easily as words.
Mariam shrugged. “Honestly, I’ve been very curious about it. I’d like to see what the jadokari want so badly.”
“Me too,” Luka said, taking a step closer, his eyes sparkling as he looked at me. “They value a lot of different malums, but I’ve never seen them willing to negotiate over one. They usually take what they want, no matter the consequences.”
The damn thing pounded against my skin, never letting me forget it was nearby, waiting, biding its time. To do what, I had no idea, and I didn’t want to find out. If it fell into the hands of the wrong people, I had no doubt I’d find out very quickly. I took a deep breath and gave them an apologetic smile.
“Sorry, but I hid it for safekeeping. Not even Kellum knows where it is, do you?”
Kellum shook his head. “Nope. She was very insistent on that none of us knows where she tucked it away, just in case we’re caught and tortured.”
My heart lurched at the mere idea of any of my guys being tortured, but I didn’t let on. Mariam and Luka looked disappointed, but before either could say anything, the sound of a vehicle distracted us. We all moved to the doorway to find Lazlo’s ancient SUV pulling up and every last L.A. dragon climbing out, ready to search for Levan.
“Damn, that was fast,” I said, returning Rufus’s cheery wave.
Luka grabbed a stack of little booklets and hurried outside, where Ryen, Ash and Hale joined the newcomers. Apparently, Danic hadn’t felt like waiting around.
“Here,” Luka said, passing the booklets around. “These are old Romanian-English phrase books that might be helpful, if you need to speak with locals and don’t have a native speaker with you.”
“Oh, thank god,” Ryen said, flipping through it with a broad grin on his face. “I can finally ask about the price of dried pork like a real Romanian.”
Rufus’s stomach growled.
“Favor,” Tamar said, joining us, “you two might want to wait somewhere else. We cannot rule out the possibility this is a ruse to get a shot at you. You are what I think are called sitting ducks here. The melot has been furious all week that you got into his head, so I would not put it past him to come after you, if he has the chance.”
“Good idea,” Kellum agreed.
Sounded good to me, but I didn’t want to go all the way back to our hideout. I preferred to be someplace close by, in case we were needed in a hurry.
“Tamar, do you think Bunica would mind visitors?” I asked. “I’d love to get to know her better.”
Tamar brightened. “She’s babysitting my son, Soso, today. I have no doubt she would love a little adult company.”
“Then we’re all settled,” Luka said in English, looking around at us a little impatiently. “As you say in your country, let’s roll.”
Chapter 13
When we decided to branch off from the rest of the group, Kellum and I asked Luka if we could borrow one of his vehicles to go to visit Bunica. As it turned out, Tibor, one of the guys in his crew of vigilantes was a homespun mechanic, the kind of man who could fix just about anything with an engine. And the “anything” Tibor rather fiendishly offered us was a motorcycle. Not a Harley or other robust road bike I was used to seeing on California highways. No, our ride was little more than a dirt bike with a bent handle bar and a seat that looked as though a flock of birds had pecked all the vinyl away, leaving tufts of stuffing spilling out every which way.
Kellum shot me a quick look as Tibor got the bike started. It took four tries.
“You okay with this?” Kellum asked.
“Hell, yeah. Over the river and through the woods to grandma’s house we go! On the back of a barely road-worthy motorcycle. Sounds like an adventure to me.”
Tibor handed us a couple of helmets that looked like they’d been put to very good use, with scuffs and gouges all over them. I tugged mine on and tried not to laugh when the thing flopped to one side because it was far too large for my head.
“How do I look?” I asked Kellum, unable to even see him because the helmet covered my eyes.
“Uh, great,” he lied.
“You’re the worst liar in the world, you know that? Come on. Be honest. On a scale of one to ten, how ridiculous does this look on me?”
“I’d probably clock you at a cool eight and a half. But judging by the look of this motorcycle, you’ll need a helmet that fits. Try mine.”
Sure enough, the helmet Tibor had given Kellum fit me perfectly and vice versa. Once we were outfitted, he lifted me easily and sat me on the back of the b
ike, while he took his seat in the front.
“Hold on tight,” he shouted over his shoulder, barely audible over the coughing and blatting of the crappy motorcycle. “I haven’t ridden a bike since the seventies.”
When a sexy dragon tells a girl to hold on tight, what else can she do but twine her arms around his waist and press her body against his? Safety first!
The ride to Bunica’s rustic house outside of the village was rougher than I remembered, which was no doubt due to the bike’s non-existent shocks. It wasn’t until we pulled up to the front of the dwelling and the bike sputtered to a rocky stop that I realized I’d been clenching my teeth the whole time. Kellum looked equally relieved to be done with the drive as he lifted me off the seat and set me on the ground. Not that I needed the help. But I couldn’t deny I liked it.
“Was that enough of an adventure for you?” he asked as we pulled off our helmets.
He took my hand and led me toward the door, which was a good thing because my knees were vibrating as hard as the bike had, and walking was proving to be an interesting challenge. Before we’d picked our way across the stone pathway, the door swung open wide and Bunica stepped out, a smile on her weathered face.
“Salut!” she called as she waved, even though we were almost on top of her. She grinned her nearly toothless smile at us and waved us inside. “Come, I will make you tea and biscuits. Well, not the biscuits. Those come in a package.”
“Good morning, Bunica,” Kellum said, bending low to give her a peck on the cheek. “Favor, you go have tea. I’ll be out here keeping watch, just in case.”
A thread of worry wriggled down my spine. “Do you think—”
“No, it’s fine. I’ll just feel better, like I’m doing something.”
All of his brothers and cousins, the rebels, our enforcers, and even our elders were out searching for Levan, and he was stuck babysitting me. Yeah, I got it. I stood on my tiptoes and brushed my lips against his bristly cheek, a shiver of love wrapping around me like a cozy blanket.
