Cameron
She.
Is.
Our.
Mate.
I’ve never been one to believe in dragon mates. To me, the idea of having a mate has always seemed like some fantastic fairytale that mothers dream up to get their children to sleep at night. Now that I’ve met Peggy, though, I’m starting to wonder if there’s some truth to the stories.
There’s just something about her that calls to me.
I’m fascinated by the fact that she swore a dragon’s oath. She made a vow to my sister, a woman she didn’t even know, and she kept it. She got Daisy to Fablestone. She trekked through the darkness of the forest, escaped from me, faced an evil wolf shifter, and lived to tell about it.
She’s strong and she’s courageous, and I don’t even think she knows it. I don’t think that Peggy looks at herself in the mirror and thinks, “I’m incredible.”
I think she looks in the mirror and thinks, “How can I help someone today?”
She has a heart of gold.
She’s also beautiful.
As she leans against me, holding Daisy, gripping my back, I’m filled with a sense of caution and this protective instinct I’ve never felt before. Oh, I’ve felt watchful of my sister. I’ve taken care of her, looked after her. This is different. This is more.
I killed for Peggy.
I killed that wolf.
I didn’t want to, but he was threatening her, and he wouldn’t back down.
She is our mate.
My dragon keeps whispering to me, urging me to do something about the fact that I feel something deep inside of me linking us together. Is this the mating call? Is this the link? Is this what my mother told me about all of those years ago?
I push the thoughts from my mind as I soar because right now, the most important thing is getting back to Fablestone and warning the others. I’m not sure what Wilson will want the clan to do. Maybe he’ll have us secure the perimeter of our home or perhaps he’ll want to play offense. Either way, it’s going to be a bloodbath, and I don’t want to have any more death on my hands.
Not today.
I wish I could communicate with Peggy as I fly to tell her it won’t be much longer now. She’s been hanging on so well and having such a great attitude about this entire thing. She could be bitter if she wanted to be. She could be sad or angry. She didn’t ask for any of this, but she got it. She could have walked away from my sister at any point. Hell, she could have turned Daisy in to the authorities and I never would have seen her again.
She didn’t, though.
Whether or not we end up being mates, whether or not she decides that’s crazy, I will owe her a debt forever, and I will never forget what Peggy has done for my family.
*
The sun is high when we reach Fablestone. At one point, Peggy fell asleep on my back. I heard her breathing deepen and I knew she had passed out. I’m experienced enough with flying that I understand how to balance during flight. This means I was able to ensure she didn’t roll right off my back. Daisy slept, too, so I hope they’re both feeling well-rested and ready for everything we’re about to deal with.
I could make a dramatic entrance and land in the center of town, but I don’t. Instead, I choose to land directly in front of Wilson’s office. He doesn’t even wait for me to shift before he comes barreling out.
“What in the world?” He says.
“Oh, um, hi,” Peggy says slowly, and I can feel her carefully sliding off of my back. The kittens are meowing loudly and angrily, and Daisy begins to fuss. “I’m looking for Cameron,” she says.
“Is that right?” Wilson says smoothly. His voice is even and betrays no emotion.
“Yes. I have an important message for him from Ellie,” she says sweetly. “Also, we’ve been traveling for awhile, so if you have any diapers and more formula for Daisy, here, that would be great. She could probably use a change of clothes, as well.”
“You have Ellie’s child?” Now Wilson can’t hide the emotion in his voice, and I quickly shift back to my human form. He turns to look at me. Wilson is holding Daisy now, and Peggy is standing there, looking confused.
“Bad news, boss,” I say. “Ellie sent a message.”
“Yeah, I can fucking see that,” he holds Daisy up, motioning toward her with his head. Loretta Smith, his secretary, comes out of the office, probably to see what the commotion is all about.
“Oh my word,” she says, and she takes Daisy from Wilson.
“Loretta, can you please call my mother?” I ask her. “Tell her we’ve found Daisy and we’re going to need her to take care of the baby and,” I jerk my head toward Peggy. “Two little kittens.”
“Well, I never,” Loretta says, shaking her head, but she goes back inside my office, and I know we have about seven minutes before my mother arrives.
“I’m not giving your mom my kittens,” Peggy says, glaring at me. She hikes her backpack up on her back in a protective motion, but I smile at her.
“Don’t worry,” I tell her. “We’re going to have to deal with a lot for the next couple of days, and we can use all of the help we can get. My mother is a vet. She’ll be fine with the kittens.”
“A vet?” She asks. “Like, for animals?”
“Yes.”
“Is she like, your town doctor?”
“What? No! Shifters see shifter doctors. Normal animals see a normal animal doctor.”
“Oh,” Peggy says, but I don’t think she really understands, and that’s okay. I don’t have time to explain the dynamics of how caring for dragons works or the fact that our clan doctor left us to fend for ourselves. We’ve been operating at half-power, but we’ve been doing our best. Sooner or later, we’re going to have to find a proper shifter doctor to care for the clan.
Right now, my mom does what she can.
“What do I need to know?” Wilson says, looking at me.
“Well, I think that we need to find Cameron first,” Peggy says. “Because he’s the one I’m supposed to talk to.” She holds up her wrist, showing Ellie’s mark. “I promised.”
“She swore an oath?” Wilson looks at me, and I nod slowly.
“Do you know him? He’s part of this clan, right?” Peggy asks, ignoring his question, and Wilson just sighs.
“Come on, man. It’s time.”
I know he’s right, but somehow, I don’t want her to know I didn’t tell her. I don’t want her to think less of me or that I’m less of a man, somehow, for keeping this from her.
“What? Time for what?”
“Peggy,” I step forward and take her hands in mine. “I’m Cameron.”
This is the part where she slaps me.
This is the part where she calls me a creep and tells me to get lost, where she shouts that I should have told her earlier, where she tells me I could have stopped all of this from happening if I’d just been honest.
“You’re Cameron?” She asks, her eyes wide. She doesn’t quite seem to believe it.
“Yeah.” I swallow hard, waiting for the inevitable shouting, but it doesn’t come. Instead, Peggy looks relieved.
“Oh, thank dragons,” she says, wrapping her arms around me.
“What the fuck?” Wilson says, scratching his head. He seems just as surprised as me.
“I was hoping it was you,” she says. “This makes things so much easier. You already know everything and I don’t have to repeat it all to some weirdo I don’t even know.” She glances over her shoulder at Wilson. “No offense,” she adds.
He just shrugs.
“You’re not angry?”
“What? That you didn’t tell me your name?”
“Well, yeah. I thought you’d be upset.”
“No,” she says. “You saved me, and you saved Daisy, and you made everything okay. Thank you, Cameron. Thank you for everything.”
She hugs me tightly, then, and I’m not sure what to do, so I awkwardly pat her hair. Wilson bites back a laugh and I flip him the bird. Thankfully, Peggy doesn’t notice.
She pulls back and looks up at me. Then she reaches on her tip-toes and kisses me on the cheek. A wave of heat rushes through my body.
“Thank you,” she says.
“For what?”
“You saved me.”
Wilson clears his throat, breaking the moment, and we both turn to look at him.
“Sorry to interrupt,” he says. “But if you two would like to fill me in on how this human not only managed to acquire a shifter child, but get it to Fablestone safely, I’d be quite pleased.”
“Of course,” I say. I open my mouth to start telling him the story when I hear a shrieking sound from behind me.
That can only mean one thing.
My mother is here.
She marches up to us and wraps me in her arms.
“I should probably be slapping you,” she says. “But who has time for that? Where’s Daisy? I want to see her.”
“Daisy is inside,” Peggy offers helpfully. “A woman is getting her changed and fed.”
“And who are you?” Mom cocks her head to the side, looking at Peggy. She doesn’t look like she’s judging her. Rather, she’s simply curious.
“Peggy Dane, ma’am.” Peggy holds out her hand to shake my mother’s, and my mother looks at Wilson and me to silently ask if this is really happening.
“Peggy brought Daisy back, Mom,” I tell her. That’s all the information my mother needs. She wraps Peggy in her arms tightly and starts telling her how grateful she is, how we all owe her a debt of gratitude, and how she doesn’t know what we’d do without her.
Then my mother scurries into Wilson’s office and once again, we’re left alone.
“Okay,” Peggy says, turning to Wilson. “So it all started a few days ago when I was leaving work.”
She explains how she ran into Ellie, how she found out about Fablestone online, and how she had two strange people stop at her house. There were a few details she had left out the first time she told the story. When she explains that the people who stopped at her house seemed to be searching for Ellie and Daisy, my skin bristles. I have to fight the urge to shift and go find them right now because I want to kill them for trying to hurt my niece.
For trying to hurt my sister.
For trying to hurt Peggy.
When she’s finished, Wilson turns to me.
“This is bad,” he says.
“We should have moved sooner,” I point out, and he nods.
“We wanted more intel,” he sighs. “Fuck.”
“Look,” I tell him, placing my hand on his shoulder. “Nobody ever said being clan leader was going to be easy. It’s a hard fucking job. We should have gone after David as soon as he was missing, but we didn’t know anything. We didn’t know if he’d been taken, if he’d just left his wife, if he’d gotten hurt somewhere. Going in without an information would have been dangerous. Now we have something, at least. We know Lucky is searching for us and they may have already located our base. It’s only a matter of time before they attack, so we need to be ready.”
“Or,” Wilson says. “We could bring this fight to them.” He looks at me, and my old friend seems sad and pained. I know. This hurts. All of it hurts. There’s nothing simple or easy about figuring out how to stop one of the worst organizations we’ve ever come across.
Lucky is known for capturing shifters and for performing experiments on them. I don’t know if they’re developing weapons, but I know they’re not trying to find the cure for cancer.
“I don’t like the idea of them coming here, Cameron.”
“I don’t, either.”
“I don’t like the idea of them coming onto our turf and attacking us in our own homes. If they’re planning to do that, they must have some sort of weapon that will prevent us from shifting.”
“Either that or they’re counting on us being too afraid to shift.”
“Maybe,” he agrees. “But I think it’s time to stop playing defense, brother. We’ve been in this forest a long time. We’ve lived among our own kind, minded our own business, and stayed out of the affairs of the world. Maybe it’s time to change things.”
“What are you thinking?”
“Not tonight,” he shakes his head. It’s only the afternoon, but it’s been a long day of traveling. I need rest. Peggy needs rest. I’m sure Daisy absolutely needs rest. Although part of me wants to go fight for my sister right now, sometimes having a good offense means being careful in the right ways. We won’t be timid anymore, but we’re going to play this smart.
“Tomorrow, then.” I tell him.
“I’ll send scouts out tonight,” Wilson says. “To see what information we can gather. We’ll send messages to Thunderstorm, too. The clan has our back, you know, and I have a couple of favors I can call in. The reality is that what affects one dragon clan affects all of us, though, so I don’t think that’s going to be a problem.”
“What can I do?” Peggy speaks up quietly.
Wilson sighs. “You can’t come. I’m sorry. You were very brave, miss. Trekking through the forest with a child and your,” he motions to her backpack. “Animal companions is an incredible accomplishment, but at the end of the day, you’re still human.”
For a minute, I think she’s going to argue with him, but she just nods.
“You’re right,” she says. “My skills will be better used elsewhere and not on the battlefield. I’m sure I’ll find some way to be useful.”
“What do you need from me?” I ask Wilson. He’s the clan leader. It’s his job to hold down the fort and keep everything together. Whether it’s organizing a funeral or assisting with a ceremony or breaking up fights at the bar, Wilson has his hands full managing the clan.
He does a damn good job of it, too.
“You look like hell, brother,” he says. “No offense, but go home, Cameron. Get some fucking sleep. Come back in the morning. I’ll have come up with a plan by then.”
“Do you need me to go get anyone?” I ask, not quite ready to leave. Leaving means being alone to think about Ellie. It means being alone with my thoughts and sometimes, thoughts can be nightmares.
“Just go home, Cameron,” Wilson waves me off and turns to head back into the office. “Peggy, come on. We’ll find a place for you to stay. There are a couple of dragons who keep guest rooms available. I’m sure someone has something that will be fine for a human.”
“Wait,” she says. She darts up the steps to the front of his office and slides off her backpack. The kittens inside begin to mew loudly. Then she hands the backpack to him.
“What are you doing?” Wilson stares at the backpack like it’s grown two heads. Leave it to the clan leader not to know what to do with a couple of little baby kittens. Wilson might be an incredible leader and he’s unbeatable when it comes to organization, but dealing with small children and animals isn’t really his thing.
It’s okay.
We can’t all be perfect, right?
“Please give this to Cameron’s mother,” Peggy says. “Cameron doesn’t think she’ll mind watching them. Just for tonight. Their names are Mocha and Frappe. They’re hungry and fussy, but they’re tired, and if she just puts them in a little box, I’m sure they’ll go right to sleep.”
He stares at her.
“I’m going to go home with Cameron,” Peggy says, just in case her intentions weren’t perfectly obvious by this point. She looks over at me and she bites her bottom lip. “If that’s okay, I mean,” she adds.
“It’s fine,” I say quickly, trying to control my racing heart.
Peggy wants to come home with me.
She wants to stay with me.
Obviously, this isn’t a promise of love or a public declaration that we’re mates, but it means she actually wants to be around me. She’s not mad that I didn’t tell her before. She’s not upset I didn’t reveal my name. She wants to be with me tonight and even if that means we sleep in separate bedrooms in my house, it means the fucking world to me.
Right now, I could use a win.
“Are you sure that’s a good idea?” Wilson asks her. “You don’t need to feel pressured to stay with an unmated male, Peggy.” He looks at me and I glare at him. Wilson shrugs again. “I mean, there are plenty of other places you could stay with our clan. If you’d be more comfortable staying with a female dragon, I don’t mind arranging it.”
“I want to stay with Cameron,” she says, looking at me. Then, under her breath, so quiet I almost can’t hear, she whispers, “I need to.”
“Well, then,” Wilson says, turning and opening the door to the office. “I guess my work here is done. See you at dawn, Cam.”
He goes inside and Peggy turns back to me.
“Shall we go?”
“Yes,” she whispers, taking a few steps toward me. “Wait,” she looks back at the office. “Do you need to say goodbye to your mother?”
“Loretta is her best friend,” I tell her. “They’re probably playing dress up with Daisy right now. Trust me. They’ll be here for hours and if we go in now, we’re never going to get some sleep. I’ll talk with her tomorrow and we’ll figure out what’s going on. For tonight, let’s go get some sleep.”
“Okay, Cameron.” Peggy places her hand in mine and she stays by my side as we walk away from the office and toward my home. With each step, my heart flutters more and more and I feel like it’s getting harder and harder to breathe.
Soon I’m going to be alone with Peggy, with the human I believe is my mate.
Soon we’re going to be together and anything could happen.
Soon everything is going to be fine.
I have to believe this story has a happy ending. I have to. She couldn’t have come this far, traveled so long, and fought so hard for us to not win. We have to win tomorrow. Ellie has been through too much for us not to win. David…David’s been to hell. We have to rescue him.
“Hey,” Peggy stops walking and turns to me. She places her hands on my chest. It’s a familiar gesture, but it’s not one I’m uncomfortable with. “Are you okay? You seem distressed.”
“I’m fine,” I tell her.
Be honest with her. She can handle it. She’s our mate.
She watches me for a second, and I take another deep breath.
“Actually, I’m feeling worried.”
There.
That wasn’t so hard, was it?
Being honest wasn’t so terrible.
Peggy hugs me.
“I’m worried, too,” she admits. “But I have a feeling that everything is going to be okay, Cameron. Everything’s going to be fine. We’re going to get through this together, okay? You and me, Cam. You and me.”