by J. L. Wilder
This was the difference between lovemaking and sex, she realized. She wasn’t pursuing pleasure. Pleasure was all around her. Every moment of this was exquisite.
And when she finally came, in perfect tandem with him, it was the most overwhelming orgasm of her life, shaking her to her very core. She forgot her own name. She could only hold his name in her mind.
Ryker. Ryker. Ryker.
Her mate. Her lover.
How wrong that they had ever been apart. How wrong that they had ever allowed themselves to lose this. They belonged together. That was obvious now.
When they were both finished, when they lay side by side recovering, Ryker wrapped his arms around Haley and pulled her tightly against his chest, her back to him, and she felt as if he owned her completely. It was wonderful, belonging to somebody like this. Every part of her wanted it.
“I’ll never let you go again,” he murmured into her hair.
She hoped it was true. She wanted to be with him for the rest of her life.
And in that moment, she trusted him to keep to his word. She trusted that he wouldn’t abandon her again the way he had before.
I must be crazy.
Perhaps she was. But she wasn’t going to dwell on the past anymore. She was going to move forward, and she was going to rededicate herself to her bond with Ryker.
You don’t find your true mate every day, after all.
She just hoped he wouldn’t let her down.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
RYKER
“Are there going to be other dragons my age?” Danny asked eagerly.
“Maybe,” Haley said. “But if there are, we’re not going to meet them today, all right?”
Danny frowned. “Why not? I want to.”
“I know you do,” Haley said. “And we’ll get to meet the whole clan pretty soon.”
“There are other kids,” Ryker said. “I don’t know how old everyone is exactly, but there are definitely some around your age. You’ll find some friends. No worries there.”
“But why not today?” Danny asked.
“Today, the three of us have to go to a meeting,” Haley said.
“Why?”
She glanced up at Ryker. She was clearly asking him to take over the telling of it, but he wasn’t sure what today. She wasn’t sure exactly how much Haley wanted Danny to know.
Deciding that it was better to tell the boy less than more, at least for now, he gave him an abbreviated version of the facts. “We need to go before the clan council members,” he said. “It’s part of the process if you and your mother are going to join the clan.”
“Is it a test?” Danny asked. “Are they going to make us prove we’re real dragons?”
“They’ll want to know that you’re real dragons, yes, but it’s not a test,” Ryker said, smiling. “Remember, the people in this clan already know who your mother is. They know she’s a dragon.”
“I bet they’ll be really happy to see you again, right, Mom?” Danny asked.
“They might be surprised to see me again,” Haley said carefully.
“What do you mean?”
“Well, some of them were angry with me when I left.”
“Why? Did you have a fight?”
“Something like that,” Haley said.
“Your mother and I were mated to one another for a long time,” Ryker said. “Ten years.”
“Before I was born.”
“That’s right,” Ryker said. “And it’s not often that dragon mates separate from one another. Everyone was surprised when we did. They’ll be surprised to see that we’re...that we’re friends again.”
He didn’t dare tell Danny that he had more than friendship on his mind. If things didn’t work out between Haley and himself, their son stood to be hurt. Ryker didn’t want to be responsible for causing Danny any suffering.
“Why did you leave each other in the first place, though?” Danny asked. “You guys like each other, don’t you?”
“Yes, we do,” Haley said.
“So then why?”
“It was complicated,” Haley said. “Like you said, we got into a fight, and we were mad at each other. You know how sometimes you fight with Sarah, and then later you realize that you were being silly?”
“Yeah,” Danny said. “Were you being silly too?”
“Very silly,” Ryker said.
“I didn’t know grown-ups did that.”
“Grown-ups are even sillier than kids are, most of the time,” Haley said quietly.
“So,” Ryker said to Danny, “today we’ll go and meet the council.”
“Are they nice?”
“Not especially nice, no. But they’re going to want to take care of business pretty quickly. What they’re going to want is to get a good look at you.”
“Why?”
“Because you’re interesting,” Ryker said, and Danny chuckled. “You don’t need to say anything unless someone asks you a question. Otherwise, you just stick close to your mother and let me do the talking, all right?”
“Okay,” Danny said, and for the first time, Ryker saw a bit of anxiety on his face.
“Nothing to worry about,” he said reassuringly. “And once it’s over, we’ll all go back to the house where we’re going to be living, okay?”
“We already have a house?”
“It’s the house I lived in with your mother when we were together,” Ryker said. “I’ve been living in it alone since she left for Shifter Town. It’s all ready for the two of you to move back in.”
“You said I would have my own room, right?” Danny asked.
“Definitely,” Ryker said. “We actually had a room all picked out for you before you were ever born. We knew which room would belong to our child. It’s not set up yet, but that’s okay. Tomorrow, first thing, we’ll go out and get some furniture. Whatever you need.”
“Where will I sleep tonight?” Danny asked.
“There’s a couch in there,” Ryker said. “We’ll put some sheets and a blanket on it, and you can have a couch campout.”
Danny grinned, and Ryker felt pleased with himself. Fatherhood was a difficult endeavor, but so far, he and Danny seemed to be taking to each other pretty well. He was glad things were progressing so easily.
It might not last. Things might get harder.
But somehow, he felt as if he was prepared to deal with it. If his son grew angry with him for one reason or another, everything would be all right. The one thing he wouldn’t do ever again was to allow something to divide him from the people he loved. He had learned that lesson in the hardest way possible.
“So when do I get to meet other dragons?” Danny pressed.
“Well, the council members tonight will be dragons,” Ryker said. “But I suppose you really want to meet the ones your own age.”
Danny nodded. “Sarah always had other wolf friends,” he said. “They could shift and play together. No one wanted to play with me when I shifted. They were always too afraid.”
“It won’t be like that here,” Ryker said. “You’ll have plenty of people your own age to run around with. There are packs of little dragons who go to the park to play all the time.”
Danny’s face lit up. “Did you hear that, Mom?”
“I heard it,” Haley said. Ryker thought she sounded uneasy.
She’s not used to being around other dragons either. She hasn’t seen any in ten years.
She would adjust quickly, though. She had always been good at rolling with the punches. Before long, their lives would be completely back to normal.
It would be as if she had never left at all.
And Ryker would be in the alpha seat, where he belonged.
Chapter Forty
RYKER
Standing outside the door of the council house, Ryker felt a burst of nervous anticipation. Everything was finally about to come to a head. Shane was going to have to account for the way he had treated the clan for so long.
I’m sure the
y’ll be thrilled to have me as the new alpha, he thought.
But a worm of doubt crawled through the pit of his stomach. He wanted to believe that he was right about this, but there was every possibility that he had it wrong, and that the clan would resist the idea of change. If that happened, Shane would be excited about the support he had, and things probably would come to a fight.
“Just stay near the door when we go in,” he murmured to Haley. “In case.”
She nodded. Her face was pale, but her jaw was set, and Ryker knew that she was ready.
“Danny,” he said, “you stay with your mother, okay? Remember, let me do the talking.”
Danny nodded. The eager excitement had faded from his face. He looked nervous now.
“Nothing to worry about,” Ryker assured him. “We’ll be in and out of here.”
He reached out and opened the door.
The council room was empty.
Ryker frowned.
Barty would have called him if the time of the meeting had changed, wouldn’t he? He would have said something, surely?
Maybe he’d missed a call. He reached for his phone—
“Grab them! Now!”
The room was suddenly full of bodies. The dragon in Ryker surged to the forefront, ready to defend, but he fought it back. If he shifted, others would shift.
Haley and Danny. They can’t be here if it turns into a fight.
The thought flashed through his mind in a matter of seconds before he had time to process what was happening. As his head cleared and he looked around, he saw that Haley and Danny were standing on the opposite side of the room from him. Each of them was being held still by two members of the clan.
Haley’s eyes were wide. Her face had gone bone white, and she was staring at Danny. She was panicking, Ryker saw.
But Danny didn’t look quite as terrified as his mother did. He was anxious, it was obvious, but he didn’t know what this meant. He didn’t know what to expect.
“Danny,” Ryker said quickly. “Just stay quiet, okay? Just like we talked about. Everything’s okay.”
He turned to Haley. “It’s all right,” he said. “Just keep calm. As long as we keep calm, we’ll be fine.”
“And so you’ve decided to come home,” a familiar, unpleasant voice said.
Ryker couldn’t turn to face the speaker—he was being held too tightly—but he didn’t need to. He would have known that voice anywhere. “Hi, Shane,” he said.
“You go away for a week without leave, knowing what kinds of problems it causes for this clan when you do, and then you march back in here and say hi, Shane as if you’ve done nothing wrong? You actually have the audacity to call a council meeting? Who do you think you are?”
“I’m the true alpha of this clan,” Ryker said quietly.
To his surprise, Shane laughed. “The true alpha,” he said. “I know you like to tell yourself that! Poor Ryker. You’ve spent your whole life in pursuit of the alpha position, but you couldn’t even manage to find yourself a fertile mate. And now you come back with the woman you sent away ten years ago and some random child—”
“He’s not just a random child,” Ryker said.
“I know all about it,” Shane said, waving a hand dismissively. “He’s your son. Isn’t that what you’re going to say? Barty told me all about your little plan, I’m afraid. Isn’t that right, Barty?”
Ryker caught sight of Barty. He was standing in the corner looking miserable. He felt as if he had been punched in the gut. He told?
“Loyalty is rewarded in this clan,” Shane said, as if in answer to Ryker’s question. “Barty knows that.”
“I’m sorry, Ryker,” Barty said. “It’s just...you were going to let her manipulate you again. This isn’t a genuine way to take over leadership of the clan. You can’t just invent an heir.”
“Look at him!” Ryker practically growled. “Just look at the boy! Can you seriously doubt that he’s mine? He looks more like me than his mother, for God’s sake.”
“We don’t even know that she’s his mother,” Shane sneered. “Personally, I doubt it. She’s supposed to be infertile. How does she suddenly have a child?”
“It’s hardly sudden,” Haley snapped. Ryker was filled with admiration for her. “I’ve had him for ten years. All his life. I’ve raised him. I gave birth to him. I’ve got the fucking stretch marks to show for it if you want to see them.”
Shane laughed. “Don’t imagine for a second that there’s anything you could show us that could turn you into a credible person, Haley,” he said. “You made it clear that you were willing to lie to get your way. Barty told us that too. He told us how the two of you were going to fake a pregnancy in order to remove me from power. But I guess you decided bringing a child with you would make a more effective sales pitch, is that right?”
“I didn’t know about my son at first,” Ryker said. “Of course I didn’t. That doesn’t mean he isn’t mine. Barty, how could you have done this?”
“You don’t have to explain yourself, Barty,” Shane said arrogantly. “You did the right thing. You, at least, put the clan first. You weren’t willing to lie to your fellow clan members, and you’ll be rewarded for that.”
“What’s going to happen to them?” Barty asked nervously.
“Take the woman and the child to cells in the basement,” Shane said. “As for Ryker, we’ll deal with him here and now. He’s caused enough trouble, and we won’t have any more of it.”
Chapter Forty-One
HALEY
The shift happened without conscious thought.
They started to drag her away. They had their hands on her son. And Ryker was being pushed forward, toward all those men with sinister looks on their faces...
It didn’t even feel like a normal shift. It felt like her teeth and claws were coming out. It was pure rage, pure desire to fight.
The shift wrested Haley out of the grip of the men who had been holding her. She kicked back at one of them and sent him flying, then launched herself at the two who were holding Danny. One of them panicked, seeing her lunging toward him, and stumbled backward, letting go of Danny’s arm.
Danny wrested himself away from the other man and ran to his mother’s side. The air around him seemed to shimmer, and a moment later, a smaller dragon with underdeveloped wings was standing by her side.
Ryker was yelling something, but Haley couldn’t make out what it was. In truth, she didn’t think she cared very much. He had led her into this trap. Nothing mattered until they had gotten themselves out of it—until Danny was safe—
But the men around her were moving toward her, not away. They had dangerous smiles on their faces. They weren’t afraid of her. And with a sinking feeling, she remembered that everyone else in this room was a dragon too. It wasn’t the way it had been for so long in Shifter Town. She had no advantage here. When they shifted, they would be larger than she was, and more powerful.
They could kill me right now and take Danny—they could do whatever they wanted—
She had been terrified of what the grizzlies might do with her son, but this was so much worse. Ryker had made it perfectly clear what kind of person Shane was. He would raise Danny to be so much worse than just a petty thief. He would raise a monster, like himself.
I’ll kill him.
But Shane was already shifting, and he was bigger than she was. He was so much bigger than she remembered. It had been years since she’d seen another dragon fully grown. She wasn’t used to anyone being larger than she was when she was in her dragon form.
But Shane dwarfed her. If the ceiling hadn’t been so high, he would have gone through the roof.
“Kill her, Shane!” someone yelled.
“Yeah! Teach the bitch a fucking lesson about messing with our clan!”
He advanced on her.
She didn’t fall back. If he thought she was going to submit to him in any way, while her son was on the line, he was insane.
Run, Danny, sh
e thought desperately. Get out of here before it’s too late. She wouldn’t be able to hold Shane off for long.
The one saving grace of the situation was that the other dragons hadn’t bothered to shift. They seemed more interested in watching Shane destroy her. If everyone had gotten in on the fight, Haley knew she would be dead already.
She lunged at Shane, teeth snapping, claws swiping. If this was going to come to a fight, better to have it quickly, before there was time for them to strategize amongst themselves or make a plan. She couldn’t rely on anyone. She stood alone. That gave her one advantage—she could act more quickly than they could.
And I’m not overconfident. So that’s two advantages.
Then again, maybe Shane wasn’t overconfident either. Maybe he was just accurate in his assessment of his own strength. Maybe he was going to wipe Haley out so quickly that this would be over before it had begun.
He didn’t hold his ground when she lunged at him, though. He fell back a few paces. And was it Haley’s imagination, or did he look a little uncertain? Maybe even frightened?
No, I must be imagining that. He would never be afraid of me.
He had dodged out of reach of her claws, that’s all. He was being evasive.
But maybe she had alarmed them. Because now two more men stepped forward, away from the wall, their eyes darkening, their shoulders hunching, and Haley knew they were about to shift, which meant the fight would be lost. She could hold out for a short period of time against Shane, perhaps. But she couldn’t hold on against three.
There was only one thing to do. She would have to resume her human form so that she could tell Danny to run away. They would kill her much more quickly, but she had to tell him. She had to get him out of there—
Suddenly, with a roar of outrage, Ryker surged past her. Haley barely had time to register the size of his body moving toward Shane before the room was filled with light and heat—fire.
It was everywhere. The floorboards caught. The flames surged up the walls to the rafters.
