As the sun began to sink over the dense woods, Jason calculated he’d traveled about fifteen miles in the direction of the nonexistent mountains. He hadn’t found a portal or any directions from Nickelova on how to reach her. Still, he was confident the dragon fae knew he was coming. Her spidey sense was powerful enough to detect when a fly entered her web.

Jason was no fool. He didn’t labor under the delusion that he could sneak up on Nickelova’s lair. On the contrary, he assumed he’d be invited in. That was the point, wasn’t it? Once inside, he’d lie, cheat, beg, or steal to get Selene out alive. Then Nickelova could do with him what she would.

When he came upon a stream, he made camp, thankful for the fresh water and a safe, stony bank to start a fire. He pulled the chains and locks from his backpack. He wouldn’t need a tent. In less than an hour he’d shift into wolf form and grow his own fur coat. All he had to do was keep the wolf contained until morning.

As the fire blazed to life, and he put a kettle of water on to prepare his freeze-dried meal, he undressed and crisscrossed the chains around his neck and chest. When he was confident the wolf would not be able to free itself, he padlocked himself to the nearest tree. No need to hide the key. Paws weren’t good at using one.

He huddled inside his bedroll and ate four human helpings of the food he brought. As the sun dipped below the horizon and a full round moon came into view, he wondered what Nickelova was doing to Selene. Was she cold? In a place she could safely shift? Had she been fed? Clothed? The thought of her being tortured because of him made his stomach turn.

“Don’t you hurt her,” he yelled toward the place where the mountains should be. “Don’t you hurt her, Nickelova!”

When his skin began to tingle and his bones to stretch, he used his last human strength to douse the flames of his campsite. No sense risking a forest fire. Once he sprouted fur he wouldn’t need the extra warmth.

His groan turned into a growl as the pull of the moon took over. And the person who was Jason gave way to the wolf within.

* * *

The first thing Jason noticed when he woke the next morning was the temperature. It was considerably colder than before he’d shifted. The second thing was the snowstorm. It swirled around him, stinging his skin and catching in his eyelashes as he blinked toward the risen sun. He trembled, naked, in a wolf-sized dent of packed snow.

Fuck! The chains were gone and so was his campsite. He stood and turned in a circle but could barely see through the wild white blizzard around him. What he could make out, as he hugged his naked chest, was that he’d awakened on the side of a mountain, and several miles above him was the mouth of a cave.

He cursed again as he realized all of his gear, the silver cylinder Ryker had lent him, his phone, his clothes, everything he’d brought with him was back at the campsite, wherever that was. It seemed his wolf had escaped the chains and found the portal without him. Or else had been freed intentionally. He was betting the second. Nickelova wanted him weak. It was possible she wanted him dead.

Shivering, Jason began the painful climb toward the cave, teeth chattering in the storm. If he was lucky enough to make it there before freezing to death, he prayed the goddess would send him some ideas, because he had nothing to fight Nickelova with, aside from a lovesick heart and his two bare hands.

Reaching for a stone, he pulled himself up the ever-steepening side of the rock. His fingers and toes were bright red and hurt like a bitch. The pain in his extremities told him he was in trouble. Frostbite, for sure.

A quarter mile from his destination, bad turned to worse. He lost all feeling in his hands and feet, the tips of his fingers blackening. Not only could he no longer grip the side of the mountain, severe fatigue had set in, tempting him to curl up and fall asleep, a choice that would surely mean his death. But it was hopeless. His body could go no further. As the cold and the wind coaxed him toward unconsciousness, he closed his eyes and tried to meditate as Selene had taught him, to escape the pain by retreating to a place within his own head.

And then she was there, the bright blue light of Selene’s soul on that plane of consciousness where they’d met before. “It’s a trap,” she said. “Nickelova is coming for you.”

Was it real? Or a figment of his desperate imagination. Darkness closed in on him. He stopped fighting.

“I love you,” he murmured. “And I’m sorry.”

* * *

“Wake up, sleepyhead,” Nickelova said. “You’re no good to me dead.”

Jason’s body slapped the floor in front of a raging fire. He might have screamed if he had any control over his body at all. Unfortunately, that was not the case. He was conscious and in pain but physically immobile.

“Your wolf surprised me. After I freed him, he made it all the way to the vertical drop outside my cave before giving up. Much farther than I expected. Still, you are exactly in the state I hoped you’d be in when you arrived.”

Slowly, painfully, Jason blinked his eyes, his warming limbs throbbing with pain.

Nickelova held a small vial over his lips. “A drop of fire lily juice can heal you, but before I give it to you, I need you to see who I have here with me.” She yanked his chin to the side so he was facing a large pile of bones near the back of the cave.

Standing naked, her dirt-marred flesh shivering, Selene pressed her hands against an invisible barrier between them. Her butchered hair curled around her ears, rough-cut and matted. Jason tried to speak, tried to move to her, but he couldn’t. His words were useless grunts.

“There, there, loverboy. We can talk about what happens to her next when you’re better. It’s all up to you. You decide her fate. But mark my words, if you betray my trust, it won’t be you freezing to death outside my cave. It will be her.”

With that, Nickelova tilted Jason’s head back and administered a drop of healing elixir.

Warmth radiated from his stomach out to his extremities, thawing his frozen fingers and toes, and returning the blackening flesh to a ruddy hue. The process was painful, like burning from the inside out, but Jason welcomed the pain. He channeled every ounce of suffering into the dark place in his soul, the place he planned to draw on when he had the opportunity to rip Nickelova’s heart out.

As the pain reached a crescendo, Jason’s muscles spasmed. He curled on his side, his eyes catching on a glowing column of liquid entrenched in the stone wall on the far side of the cave. What the hell? Alex! He was naked, suspended inside like some sort of science experiment gone wrong. Eyes open, unblinking, he stared at Jason. Was he dead? Preserved? His body appeared to be healed. Why was Nickelova keeping him in that state?

Jason grunted and lifted a knuckle in Alex’s direction.

“Oh, you found Alex. He’s almost ready to return to us. Your sister’s attack left him very near death, but I suspended him there, lung torn, liver split. He would have died without my intervention. That’s a fire lily balm he’s encased in. It’s healed him from the inside out. I could revive him now, but I wanted to leave him where he is until you and I had a chance to… reconnect. Alex can be difficult. Jealous.”

Stretching and contracting his hands, Jason tested his major muscle groups, rolling his neck as his body finished healing. He swallowed. Cleared his throat.

“I’m here now.” Jason locked eyes with the beast in the red dress. “Let the girl go.”

Nickelova gave a breathy chuckle, the edges of her pale hair catching in her sticky red lipstick as she leaned over him. “I can’t let that happen. I need your loyalty and fidelity, Jason, and she’s my leverage to make sure I get it.”

Although everything inside him wanted to turn toward Selene, to swear his love and loyalty to her, he knew doing so would seal her fate. Her survival and his mission’s success depended on convincing Nickelova to underestimate his feelings for Selene and to lower her guard. To trust him.

He was naked, weaponless, in the heart of the dragon’s lair. But Selene had taught him that his soul was composed of great darkness as well as extraordinary light. He’d worked hard to get back to the light, to be good enough for Selene. But just now? This was a job for the darkness. He reached deep, calling up memories of Professor Matthews, of the dark days that once ruled his soul. Internally, he whistled for his wolf, loosed the vice he’d worked so hard the last month to suppress. Then he shielded his heart and did what he knew he had to do.

Composing himself, Jason rose to his feet, turning away from Alex to face Nickelova. Thank the goddess his back was to Selene. He wasn’t sure he could do this if he could see her. He allowed his gaze to rake down Nickelova’s face, linger on her breasts, her waist, and come to rest at the apex of her thighs. With some effort, he lifted one corner of his mouth, flashing the roguish smile he’d perfected over the years. He lowered his chin and looked at her through thick lashes.

“Why do you feel like you need her?” Jason said. “Haven’t I always been a good doggie and come when you called?”

“Don’t play me for the fool. I know what you feel for this girl. I felt it through our connection. Magic doesn’t lie,” Nickelova said through her teeth.

Jason approached her as he ran his gaze over her again. Closer, until his lips hovered next to hers and the back of his knuckles skimmed the front of her dress. “If your curse is so good at reading my feelings, tell me Nickelova, what am I feeling now?”

He almost cheered when he saw her lips part on an inhale and her thighs press together against the ache he presumed he’d started there. Before Jason had known what she was, he’d been a thorough and careful lover to Nickelova. He’d made her beg and scream. He prayed to the goddess that the catnip he’d planted was enough to lure her back.

“Hmmm.” She looked down between them at Jason’s naked body. “Is that for me?”

“Why don’t you get a better look and find out?” he whispered. “And once you get a good look, you better taste it to see if it’s your flavor.”

She narrowed her eyes on him.

“I’ve missed you, Nickie.” Jason pressed his lips to hers, the sticky feel of her lipstick smearing across his mouth. He forced himself to ignore the repulsion growing within him. He’d faked this before and he’d do it again if it meant Selene’s life. He kissed Nickelova as if Selene’s life depended on it, grabbed her hips, and ground himself into her belly.

Breaking the kiss, she panted, breathless, between them. “I knew you couldn’t deny what we had together forever. You are more than simply a werewolf prince, Jason. You deserve to be alpha.” She trailed her fingers under one of his nipples and down the hills and valleys of his abdomen. “When Alex wakes, you’ll defeat him, force him to bow to you, then the three of us will take your pack and your society. And you will be alpha.”

“You think I should call the shots instead of Alex?” This genuinely surprised him, until he thought about Alex’s body in the jar. Alive or not, healed or not, he was obviously not the man he used to be. His body was likely weak after months of lack of movement, and who knew what kind of damage being jarred like a preserved frog might have done to his brain? He finally understood why Nickelova had wanted him here so badly. She needed him. There was no telling how much Alex there was left.

“Oh, I think you can rise to the occasion, and with my help, you’ll have more power than you ever dreamed.” She licked her lips.

“First things first,” Jason said. “Where can we be alone? I want to show you how I reconnect.”

“Right here isn’t good enough for you?”

“There’s no bed.”

“You’ve never needed a bed before.”

He sighed. “I don’t like the audience.”

“Afraid to upset the girl?” Nickelova asked with venom in her voice.

Jason forced himself not to look in Selene’s direction and instead turned his gaze on Alex. “Actually, I was referring to your boyfriend. The way his eyes are open like he’s watching us… it’s creepy.”

Nickelova frowned. “Hmm. He’ll have to get used to the idea. No time like the present.”

Jason cringed. “Are you telling me he’s conscious in there? He can see us?”

“And hear us. He’s in an altered state of consciousness but his senses still work. Everything is simply slowed down.”

With a shake of his head, Jason tried to maintain his composure. He called on the wolf again, who growled and eyed his prey. “Privacy, Nickelova. Now!”

He was taking a risk speaking to her like that. He was defenseless and she could shred him with one pulse of her amulet. But he’d had enough experience with her to know she liked a man to take control. Nickelova was a dragon, but she was also all female. And Jason wasn’t above using sex as a weapon. He stared her down.

“Come, my darling.” She threaded her fingers into his and led him past Selene’s cell. Jason glanced at her, just long enough to notice Selene’s tear-stained face. He prayed to a goddess he didn’t believe in that she’d catch on to what he was doing. Trust me, he thought. But there was no way to tell her. Nickelova turned a corner and they descended deeper into the mountain.