by Reus, Katie
“It was just a simple question.” And okay, he wanted to see her cheeks flush that dark shade again.
She started to respond, then he heard the front door open downstairs. “Someone is here… My brothers,” he finally said when he scented them.
She glanced at the locked door before looking back at him. “Do you want me to leave, or…”
“No.” Never.
“Good.” At that, she laid her head on his chest, splayed her arm and leg across his body and simply relaxed into him.
He didn’t push her with questions about the future or anything at all. He simply held her close, savoring this quiet moment where it was just the two of them. Naked and sated.
“This is going to sound crazy, but did you feel an earthquake earlier?” she drowsily mumbled a few moments later, her breath warm on his chest.
“Just get some sleep,” he murmured, stroking his hand down her back. He didn’t answer her directly because she had definitely felt the earth rumble beneath them. But it hadn’t been an earthquake. His mating manifestation with her had kicked into overdrive. He needed to fully explain to her what it was to mate to a dragon, but…soon.
First he had to convince her to be his mate.
Chapter 22
Mikael stepped into the kitchen the next morning to find Ivyn leaning against the countertop, drinking coffee as a pancake sizzled on the stovetop. His brother had been cooking for all of them since they’d moved in, trying new recipes. It was very interesting and something Mikael attributed to the new human female Ivyn was pretending he was not seeing.
“You came in late last night,” Mikael said, pouring coffee for himself. Avery had been right, he now liked the stuff and found it was a nice part of his morning ritual—though he would much rather eat her every morning. He’d thought about that this morning, but she’d looked so peaceful that he hadn’t wanted to disturb her. She worked too hard as it was.
His brother lifted an eyebrow. “And you did not sleep alone last night.”
There was a hint of something in his brother’s tone, he wasn’t certain what though. Both Ivyn and Cas knew how he felt about Avery. So did her brothers for that matter. It was not a secret. “And?”
“And…” Ivyn sighed and flipped the pancake. “You’re my big brother. I love you and…I love her too. But I don’t want you to get hurt.”
He blinked in surprise. He knew Ivyn liked Avery. They all did. Hell, they all adored her because she was perfect and wonderful. “If I get hurt, then I get hurt.” He spoke quietly since he could hear her descending the stairs. He patted his pants pocket, felt the little button that had fallen off one of her work shirts. He’d scooped it up this morning and liked having it with him.
Ivyn nodded once and slid the pancake off onto a plate stacked with them.
“So why were you so late last night?” he asked, mainly to needle him a bit.
Ivyn swatted at him with the spatula. “None of your business.”
Avery stepped into the room, her cheeks turning pink as her eyes met his. “Morning.”
“Morning.” He wasn’t sure how things would be between them today, if she would openly kiss him or… He didn’t know how he would feel if she wanted to hide things. Technically she could not hide anything from his brothers since they had supernatural sensory abilities and would easily scent her all over him. But she might not want to acknowledge that things had changed between them. He rubbed the middle of his chest.
“Pancakes?” She stepped into the room, her eyes widening slightly. “And is that whipped cream?”
“A friend of mine said we should try it on pancakes,” Ivyn said, pouring another one.
“Friend, huh?” She snorted and gave Ivyn a brief hug. His brother kissed her on top of the head in a brotherly way and only a part of Mikael wanted to smash him in the face for touching Avery. Just a small part.
“Is there something you’d like to say?” Ivyn murmured to her, a grin on his face. “Because if you want to talk about my friend, let’s talk about your sleeping arrangements last night, Avery.”
Avery punched him in the shoulder and went to grab her own coffee but didn’t respond. Instead she shot Mikael a look, eyebrows raised.
“Avery’s sleeping arrangements last night are none of your concern.”
She groaned as she poured creamer into her coffee then came to stand next to him at the countertop, wrapping her arm around his waist.
Mikael stilled at her show of affection. It wasn’t like she was full-on claiming him when she wrapped her arm around him. But she kind of was. At least in front of his brother, here in the privacy of their kitchen.
“So you all know…about us?” she asked.
Ivyn simply shrugged and nudged a plate with two pancakes her way. “You need to eat.”
To Mikael’s surprise she leaned up on tiptoe, kissed him right on the mouth, then grabbed the plate.
It didn’t matter that they’d shared a lot last night, her public claiming of him did something to him. His beast settled down in a way he had never experienced.
“Look, Mikael is a grown-up,” she continued, as if his world hadn’t just shifted under his feet. “And so am I.” She put a dollop of the whipped cream on her pancakes. Then another. “So I don’t want to hear anything from any of you about what we’re doing. You all just keep your thoughts to yourselves. Or I’ll start harassing you to bring your girlfriend around.”
Ivyn gave her a salute and poured more pancake batter into the frying pan, a half grin on his face. Then he murmured, “She’s not my girlfriend.”
“Yeah right. Oh my God, these are so good.” Then she moaned in a way that made Mikael’s dick want to stand at attention.
Unfortunately they had a long day of work ahead of them. His poor cock was going to have to wait. Especially when he glanced at his phone and saw a text from King—that he’d sent to both him and Avery. Looked like they had an errand to run today.
* * *
Avery clutched Mikael’s scales tight as he dipped lower over the treetops. They were going to see Dallas for a personal visit before meeting up with a contact of King’s who’d flown down from Montana. In a plane, not as a dragon, though she thought their contact might be a dragon. Flights were a whole lot rarer now and as far as she knew, there weren’t any commercial ones going anywhere. Some Alphas had managed to get some people who had been displaced back home—if they still had a home to go back to. But that was a level of organization she didn’t even want to think about right now.
All she knew was that she was meeting someone about kitchen supplies, but not until she’d stopped at Dallas’s. She wondered if she should feel guilty for taking a break to see her friend, but she squashed those thoughts. It was okay to see her friend and it wouldn’t affect her current work timeline at all. If anything, they were ahead of schedule at this point.
Still, she had this driving urge to always be active lately. Subconsciously worried that if she stopped, the world would stop too. It was ridiculous, of course, and she was working on it. Though last night when Mikael had been giving her the orgasm of a lifetime, she hadn’t felt guilty or thought of anything at all. Her whole body was still sort of in a state of shock after that—in the best way possible.
Mikael’s expansive wings made the green leaves ripple like a giant wave spreading out before them. She didn’t think she would ever get used to how beautiful he was in dragon form. Well, in both forms, but as a dragon he was this magnificent piece of moving art.
The smoky gray of his wings glittered almost silver under the sunlight, sometimes almost disappearing and other times they shone a brilliant silver. She petted one of his big scales, fascinated by the texture. They were hard but smooth, and not uncomfortable to sit on. Leaning down against him, she enjoyed the wind rolling over her.
Suddenly his big body jerked and she instinctively clutched him tighter. She knew he would never hurt her but this was the equivalent of turbulence during a plane ride.
&nb
sp; He banked right sharply and that was when she felt it… A ripple of something.
A heavy blanket descended on her, in the air, though she couldn’t see it. It scraped over her skin like talons, making all her hair stand up even as a prickle of awareness coated her from head to toe. She looked around, the wind whipping, but couldn’t see anything out of the ordinary.
She could feel it, however. And it was clear Mikael could too.
Suddenly he banked even more sharply, diving in a hard angle toward a spread of farmland. He skimmed over it, jerking to a halt before rolling suddenly and tumbling her off.
She landed on the grass with a thud, though it was fairly gentle considering he could’ve literally thrown her off. “Mikael—”
Her eyes widened as a giant seam ripped open in…the middle of the air, as if the very fabric of the world had been torn straight down the middle.
Right. In. Front. Of. Them.
He shoved her back with his wing, roared loudly and flew straight at the tear. She stared in horror and raced after him even though she had no idea what the hell she was doing. And why was he flying straight toward it? They needed to get out of there. Now.
He breathed fire at the giant tear and abruptly disappeared into the opening. She jerked to a halt as it vanished. Poof. As if it had never existed at all.
Her heart racing, her breathing out of control, the deafening silence shook her to her core. She spun in a slow circle, looking for any signs of life. Everything was eerily quiet, the sun shining, the grass flattened in the areas where Mikael had landed and shoved her back.
But he was gone.
“Mikael?” she cried out, her word coming out more of a sob than anything else. “Mikael!”
She sucked in breath after breath as she tried to wrap her mind around what had just happened. Only problem was, she had no idea.
Panicked, she raced across the grass as she tried to find an opening or something… Some trace of him, maybe. As she reached the area where he’d disappeared, there was nothing there. Just flattened grass.
With a trembling hand she managed to get her cell phone out of her front pocket—and was glad it wasn’t broken from her fall. But she had no service, which was no surprise. Even though most of the satellites were still up and running, a lot of towers had come down during The Fall. Reception was hit or miss, especially out in the middle of nowhere.
Think, think, think. She was maybe five miles from Dallas’s farm. She could run back there if she could figure out how to get to a road or cut through all these farms. She hadn’t been paying attention to Mikael’s path, since he’d been flying.
She needed to call his brothers. They would know what to do. And if they didn’t… Then she would go to King. Because she refused to think she might have lost Mikael. No way. A world without him in it? It was unthinkable. But she knew what she’d seen. An actual rip in the fabric of reality. Or…she guessed that was what it was.
She started jogging back in the direction they’d come from, panic riding her hard as she crossed the rest of the field. A huge pond stretched out in front of her and she let out a growl of frustration. As she tried to figure out which would be the easiest—and quickest—way around it, water shot up into the air, covering her in a tidal wave as a giant dragon with glittering scales the color of diamonds shot out of it into the air.
She fell backward, covering her face and curling into the fetal position as it burst into the sky above her. Her scream caught in her throat as she tried to make herself as small as possible.
It didn’t matter. The dragon had seen her. It landed in front of her, its huge jaws opening wide. Then it shook its head and wings, throwing water everywhere, soaking her even more.
No, no, no. She had nowhere to go. Not that she could actually outrun a dragon. She grabbed her pendant instinctively, hoping it would keep her safe. But she had no idea how it would work against a dragon bite. Or dragon fire. Or…
The dragon inhaled deeply and looked at her, its head tilted to the side slightly.
Then sparks of colors flashed into the air and suddenly a tall, broad-shouldered male stood before her with a dark beard, gray eyes and a frown.
All she could do was stare.
Chapter 23
Mikael let out a scream of fury, his dragon unleashing the raw power of his fire on the male on the ground.
The male, face obscured as if spelled, raised his hands and shot a ball of fire at him.
Mikael barrel-rolled to the left, but the fire clipped his wings. Surprised, he felt it burning—scorching along his scales. He let out another roar of fury and returned a blast of fire. It engulfed the male.
When it cleared, the grass around the attacker was gone, replaced with black, charred earth—but the man was still standing there.
Damn it!
Mikael couldn’t see Avery anywhere, desperately tried to shelve that knowledge as he focused on the immediate threat. He’d flown straight into the opening, knowing that if he didn’t, the enemy would come for Avery.
Now they were in a sort of magic bubble. He’d been trapped in these before, usually by witches who thought they were strong enough to take down a dragon. They were always wrong.
Something about this power felt familiar, however. But…that was impossible. The power was ancient, from a long-dead line of beings he wasn’t even certain how to define in modern terms.
He flew upward and slammed into an invisible barrier. He was definitely in a spelled dome.
Take down this threat. Get to Avery. The words were a staccato beat in his head.
A blast of fire rolled upward at him. He pulled his wings in tight and descended straight toward the male in a free fall.
The male who smelled like vampire held out his hands again, drew them back and Mikael rolled midair. As he did, the blast of fire went wild, missing him completely. He shot his own fire at the same instant, engulfing the enemy again. He wasn’t sure what this being was, but if the male was anything like dragons, enough firepower would weaken their strength and eventually Mikael would be able to rip him apart with his fire. It was what he was counting on anyway.
The male stumbled once then righted himself, the remaining grass rippling out all around him under the force of Mikael’s firepower. It didn’t burn the rest of the landscape, however.
Risking a glance behind him, Mikael scanned his surroundings again, looking for Avery.
Nothing.
Panic like he’d never known rode him hard and he screeched, blasting fire at his target again as he swooped back down through the air. If he could get close enough, he would bite the male’s head off. In his experience, nothing survived a beheading. Because nothing was truly immortal. Long-lived, yes. But everything could be killed.
Fire blasted up at him from below, clipping his tail this time. He reined in his screech of pain, not wanting his attacker to know he’d been affected as he flew upward and then dive-bombed again, blasting fire as he did.
This dome was too small, making it impossible to gain much speed or even move to attack—which was likely the damn point.
Mikael attacked again and again. He wasn’t sure how long they battled, how long they blasted fire at each other. It felt as if an eternity stretched out, though in battle time was often impossible to gauge.
When the male stumbled again, Mikael felt a shift in the power of the dome. Almost like an invisible crack rippling through the air. There!
A seam in the enclosure ripped open. Mikael was weakening him.
He breathed more fire, this time knocking the male onto his ass.
The seam rippled again, growing brighter. He could see outside the dome now. Could see patches of blue sky.
More fire flew at him, the reddish-orange flames weaker this time, and when a wild stream hit his wing, it rolled off him. Like oil and water.
This was it. This male was finally weak. He could take him out now.
Mikael flew in a sharp, deadly line straight at his target. He opened his m
outh to blast fire—and chomp off his head—when the male wrapped a cloak around himself and…disappeared.
The dome around them cracked and shattered, the sharp, sparkling shards suspended in air before they suddenly disappeared into nothingness. Just as their creator had.
Avery! He saw and scented her at the same time, far over the field below him by a glittering pond.
A male was standing next to her—a naked male.
He didn’t think, simply shot straight toward them, fire building in his throat. No one threatened his female.
Chapter 24
Mikael pulled up short as he descended toward Avery. He recognized that scent. And the male wasn’t threatening her, but standing in front of her protectively.
He called on his magic before he’d even hit the ground. Pain and pleasure punched through him as a kaleidoscope of colors burst forth, a waterfall of sparks filling the air before he was once again in his human form.
Standing ten feet away, Mikael stared, shock too dull of a word for the emotions rolling through him. “Zephyr?” The word came out a strangled whisper.
Zephyr stared at him as well but he didn’t seem to have the same shock. Or maybe he did, but it was overwhelmed by pure joy at seeing him. “My brother.”
“We thought you died,” he rasped out, staring at his older brother. A male he’d never thought to see again. Thousands upon thousands of years hadn’t erased the memory of Zephyr. Mikael had taken on the mantle and responsibility of the oldest but he’d never wanted it, never wanted to replace the male in front of him.
“As you can see, I am still alive and as handsome as ever.” Only an inch taller than Mikael, he was broad in the way dragon shifters were, had the same dark hair and gray eyes of their family line. Though he had a big beard and scars covering his body that had not been there before. So many scars.
Mikael stared, the tension in his chest a tight ball, and with every breath he took, shards cut into him. This was his brother, his oldest brother who he’d thought long dead. Murdered thousands of years ago. Now he was standing in front of him as if no time at all had passed.
