Chapter Ten

 

 

They stopped very briefly just outside Autumn Grove to resolve their urgent kitten issue. Ben—after glancing around for witnesses—jumped out of the car, naked, and opened the trunk. "Here," he said, popping the lid off a Rubbermaid tote. It was full of winter gear and emergency supplies, which Ben dumped unceremoniously into the bottom of the trunk. "This ought to hold them."

"Do you have anything to make air holes?"

Ben got a screwdriver out of his toolbox. He took over driving, while Tessa sat in the backseat with the tote full of kittens and punched holes in the lid.

"Where are we going?" she asked. They'd passed through downtown Autumn Grove and turned onto the highway.

"We need to find a motel, preferably one off the road. As soon as we find somewhere to stop, I'll call my friend Derek and have him bring us some clothes."

"How bad are you hurt? Are you okay to drive?"

"I'm handling it," was all he said.

After the better part of a very tense hour, with both of them frequently checking the rear-view mirror, Ben turned off suddenly into a small town beside the highway. He drove around the tiny downtown until Tessa pointed out a motel.

"You're going to have to pay for it, I'm afraid," he admitted. "Unless you also grabbed my wallet when you got the gun."

"I didn't get your wallet, but I did get your phone. It's in the carrier, too."

Ben perked up a little, though he still looked weak and pale, as well as filthy and bloody. Tessa left him in the car, calling his friend Derek, while she went into the motel to arrange for a room.

The motel was a tiny family establishment that allowed her to pay with cash, to her surprise; she hadn't even known places like that existed anymore, though it took nearly all her cash. She gave their names as Bob and Tina Gunderson, and requested a room around at the back, "for privacy."

The entire time, she was very aware of the clerk nervously studying her scruffed-up hair, cat-scratched arms, and stained T-shirt. She'd rolled out of bed without so much as touching a brush to her hair, got chased by a dragon, and had a bloody naked man draped on her, and she was pretty sure all of it showed.

"Family vacations, huh?" she said with a weak attempt at a smile, hoping they didn't have a good enough view through the window of the motel to notice that the driver of the car was stark naked and covered in blood.

"Do you have pets with you?" the clerk asked, taking another look at her arms.

"A cat," she said. "A small cat. Very well-behaved. Small pets are okay, right?"

She ended up shoving another twenty across the counter as a pet deposit. That left just enough cash to buy a couple gallons of gas or dinner at McDonald's without having to dip into her credit cards, which were mostly maxed out and would leave a trail anyway.

What are we going to do? she wondered as she went back out to the car with the motel key. She'd had to leave all her spare clothes and even the cat food behind. They had nothing except the clothes on their backs ... and Ben didn't even have that much.

Oh, and five hyperactive kittens.

"Derek's on the way," Ben said, sliding over so she could get in the driver's seat and move the car to park outside their room. "He'll be here in an hour or so with the stuff we need."

"I hope that includes money, because I used just about the last of it getting this room."

"I'm sorry about—"

"Ben, stop apologizing. You remember I'm the reason why we're both in this mess in the first place, right? You could've just walked away and left me at the shelter."

His pain-tense face relaxed into a smile. "No, I couldn't have."

She had to help him out of the car. He leaned on her heavily as she unlocked their room door. "Are you sure I shouldn't be taking you to a hospital instead of a motel in the middle of nowhere?"

Ben shook his head with a pained grimace. "Shifters heal fast. I'll be fine. All I really need is sleep and food. I can get the first here, and Derek's bringing the second."

Tessa's stomach growled, reminding her that they'd been rousted out of the cabin without having a chance to stop for breakfast. "Lunch sounds great. What's he bringing, do you know?"

"I don't know. I just said 'food, and a lot of it'."

She helped him sit down on the bed, and went back for the kittens—keeping them in the tote-carrier for now—before locking the door and making sure the blinds were closed. The room was small and musty, with a pervasive smell of stale cigarette smoke despite the NO SMOKING sign on the door. The carpet was threadbare; the one bed barely looked big enough to accommodate two people.

But it was clean, and the bathroom had decent water pressure and very hot water. She washed her face and hands, then soaked a washcloth and picked up a towel. Ben was lying down when she came out of the bathroom, looking like he'd simply flopped down where he was sitting; he hadn't even bothered to pull a blanket over himself.

"Let me help you get some of that off. Unless you think you could manage a shower."

Ben cracked his eyes open. "Actually, a shower sounds pretty good."

"Do you ... want help?"

His faint smile warmed his gray eyes. "That'd be nice."

At least there were no clothes to try to get off him without hurting him. She shed her clothes on the bathroom floor and cranked the water all the way. Under the hot spray, she gently washed Ben with the cheap mini-bottle of shampoo from the back of the sink.

Despite the amount of blood, he wasn't hurt as badly as she'd feared. The dragon's claws had scored his shoulder and chest, and he was bruised from getting knocked around, as well as having hit his head hard enough to break the skin open and soak his dark hair with blood. But it was mostly superficial, and the gashes had already closed up. She tried to wash them gently so as not to start them bleeding again. Pinkish water swirled down the drain.

"Hold still," she murmured, working the last of the soap into his hair.

"Mmmm." If he was a cat, he'd be purring. He melted into her, and leaned against the side of the shower enclosure as she washed him thoroughly and followed it up with a kiss on his lips, wet from the shower spray.

Ben dragged her lip lightly through his bottom teeth, then pulled away and smiled at her through the shower's haze. "You're still the most gorgeous thing I've ever seen, but don't get your hopes up too much. I don't know how much activity I have in me right now, after everything this morning."

"And you're the most gorgeous thing I've seen," she said, looping an arm carefully around him to turn off the shower. "I would love nothing more than to have you lay me gently down in bed and have your way with me, but right now I'm going to lay you gently down in bed so you can get some sleep."

"There's also the likelihood that Derek will interrupt us any minute," Ben said as she gently patted him dry with a scratchy motel towel.

"Yes, that too."

She didn't voice aloud the possibility of a different kind of interruption. But she noticed that when they got out of the shower, Ben took his gun from where she'd placed it on top of the cat tote, checked the remaining bullets, and put it under his pillow before crawling into bed.

Kittenish squalling and claw-scrabbling started up inside the tote. "Would it bother you if I let the kittens out?" Tessa asked. "I hate keeping them cooped up in there."

"Sure," Ben mumbled. "Go ahead."

Tessa popped the lid off, and the muffled chorus of distressed mewing escalated suddenly to full volume. She had put the carrier inside the tote so they had a soft place to curl up, but from the look of things, all they'd done was climb on it and flatten it. Small furry faces turned up to her and little sharp-toothed mouths opened in anxious mewls.

"Hi, little guys. It's okay." She lifted them out one by one. The most anxious ones instantly vanished under the bed, but the rest of them set off to explore, creeping cautiously around the baseboards and trying to climb the dangling bedcovers.

Tessa noticed that they'd used one corner of the tote as a litterbox, which reminded her that she'd had to leave behind all the kitten supplies. "Ben, I don't suppose your friend Derek would mind picking up some kitten food, too?"

Ben plucked a kitten off his face, sighed, and sat up. "May as well. I can talk to him when he gets here."

"I'm sorry," Tessa said contritely, retrieving the one from the bed, only to see another appear over the opposite side. "I was afraid they'd bother you."

"I don't think I'd sleep anyway. I'm too tense." He rubbed a hand across his face, and adjusted the pillows to prop himself against the head of the bed. The newly arrived kitten crawled into his lap. Tessa could hear it purring from where she was sitting on the floor beside the bed.

"We need a plan," she said, picking tiny kitten claws out of her shirt so she could set down the one she was holding. Not to be deterred, it started climbing her leg. "How do we stop this guy from coming after us?"

"I ... can think of some people I could talk to about that," Ben said, his gaze distant.

"Melody?"

"Among others."

"You know more dragons, then." It wasn't a question. "Well, I guess you must. Because of Melody. But ... she's your sister." She had been trying not to think too much about that part, but it kept popping back up, like something submerged that kept floating to the surface. "Ben, you aren't a dragon, are you?"

"You've seen me shift," Ben pointed out.

"Yes, but I don't know anything about how dragons work. For all I know, maybe it's possible for someone to be a dragon and a panther at the same time."

"It's not," Ben said quietly. "Believe me, I'd know. And anyway ... I wouldn't lie to you."

"I know," she said, feeling stabbed. "I didn't mean to imply that I thought you were. So how did Melody come to be, then? Is she adopted?" This sent another stab through her chest. All these years, when she'd envied Melody her happy family—what if they'd had that in common all along, and Melody had never told her? "Or ... are you adopted?"

"No, she's not, and I'm not. We're half siblings. Same father, different mothers."

"Ohhhh," Tessa said. "So Melody's mother is a dragon."

"Both her parents are dragons. I'm the odd one out. My mother is a panther shifter."

"Your father is a dragon?"

Ben nodded. He looked slightly embarrassed.

"That must be ..." She hesitated. "Actually, I have no idea what that would be like. None at all. What is that like?"

"It's normal for me," Ben pointed out. "I grew up with it, so it was just regular life. Like anyone growing up with two divorced parents. My mom didn't have a whole lot to do with my dad, and my dad didn't want a whole lot to do with me, since I'm not a dragon."

Ben's earlier words about dragons came back hauntingly. Dragon families are very close-knit. Not very welcoming of anyone they don't consider part of the clan. He'd been speaking from experience. "You and your dad don't get along?"

Ben shook his head. "Not really. I think he's been making a little more of an effort lately, but he still never lets me forget what a disappointment I am."

"Could he help us against Reive?"

"No," Ben said flatly.

"Melody did."

"I know, and she's going to be in awful trouble with Dad because of it. Everything I've told you about draconic honor is stuff Dad taught me. He really takes it seriously, and he tried to impress on us to take it seriously too."

"Yes, but this is life and death! All that is fine, but surely if your life is literally in danger, he'll change his mind—"

"He won't," Ben said simply. "A dragon like my dad won't interfere in another dragon's business. He'd let me die rather than break his code of honor."

Tessa looked up at him. There was no denying the flat certainty in his gaze ... or the veiled pain. All her life, she had wished she'd been able to know her parents, but if this was what having parents was like, suddenly she wondered if she might not be better off as she was.

Especially if her parents had done something so terrible that someone had sent dragons after her because of it ...

A sharp knock at the door made her jump. Tessa opened her mouth, but Ben raised a hand. He got quietly out of bed, retrieved his gun from under the pillow, and went to the door as the knock came again. It was followed an instant later by a male voice. "Keegan, if you're in there, I've got your shit."

"Derek," Ben said on a sigh, and unlocked the door.

Tessa's first impression, especially sitting on the floor, was: Wow, he's HUGE. Ben wasn't a small guy, but Derek was much taller and broader—not a speck of fat on him, just solid muscle, his wide shoulders straining at the T-shirt he wore with a truck-stop logo on it. His hair was buzzed off, and she glimpsed tattoos peeking out from under the T-shirt sleeves.

"Well, this is a turnaround from the usual state of things," Derek remarked, sounding amused. "You know, you naked and covered in blood, me having to fetch and carry—"

"Just shut up and give me some pants, asshole."

Derek grinned and shoved a duffel into Ben's arms. "There you go. The clothes are mine, so they're gonna be a little big on you, but it's better than running around bare-ass naked. And—" He held up a bag with a burger chain restaurant logo on it. "Brought you some meat."

"Derek, I could kiss you." The duffel gripped to his chest, Ben grabbed the bag with his free hand.

"No thanks, I'll pass. And on that topic, Gaby had me throw in some of her things too, since you said there was a woman with you." Derek turned to give Tessa a grin, flashing very white teeth. "Aren't you gonna introduce me? Sorry you have to deal with this jerkass and his lack of manners, lady."

"I was getting to that," Ben said through a mouthful; he already had the wrapper off a burger and had crammed a third of it into his mouth. "Tessa, this rude asshole is my friend Derek Ruger. Derek, this is my mate, Tessa."

Derek's eyebrows went up. "No shit? You didn't mention that part."

Tessa scrambled to her feet, realized she was holding a kitten, and put it quickly on the bed so she could hold out a hand. "Hi. It's nice to meet you. Thanks so much for helping us."

Derek clasped her hand in his. "Pleasure's all mine."

"Quit flirting with my mate, Ruger," Ben said as he set the duffel on the bed.

Derek laughed. "I've got a mate of my own at home, and a six-months-along bun in the oven. I just think she deserves some recognition for putting up with you."

Their easy rapport made Tessa feel shy. She used to think that she and Melody had a friendship like this, but now she was starting to think she'd never known Melody at all. She sat on the end of the bed and picked up a kitten to comfort herself while she watched Ben getting dressed in the loose workout clothes Derek had brought him.

"You want to bandage those before you bleed all over my best sweatshirt?" Derek asked. "I brought first-aid supplies."

Ben shook his head. "No, it'll heal up better if I don't cover it. It's partway there already. I just need protein and calories to finish the healing process." He started to unwrap another burger, paused, and held it out to Tessa. "Here. You haven't had anything yet."

"Thanks." She was able to muster up a smile for him, and set the kitten aside as she took the burger. She'd never had trouble hiding her feelings from anyone before, but Ben looked at her with a soft gaze that seemed to see right through her.

"Are you okay?" he asked.

Derek slapped him on his uninjured shoulder, making him wince. "Of course she's not okay, nitwit. There's a dragon hunting her. Seriously. What's your plan?"

"Don't really have one yet." With a last, concerned glance at Tessa, Ben sat on the edge of the bed and stiffly, one foot at a time, leaned forward to pull on socks. "The cabin's compromised. I'm not entirely sure how he found us."

"Ghost found me and Gaby at the cabin last year, too. Apparently," Derek said, reaching into the bag for a burger of his own, "your safehouse isn't as safe as you think it is."

"Ghost bugged your car, which is why I took special care to sweep mine. I really don't know how this guy tracked us down. The cabin's not in my name, and the only people who know about it are people who would never give me away." He turned, frowning, to look toward Tessa.

"What?" she said, startled. "You don't think I did something, do you?"

"No, of course not. I'd never think that. But do you mind if I see your necklace again?"

"Um ... I guess so." She fished it out of her T-shirt and this time slipped the chain over her head. It was still warm from her skin as she placed it gently in Ben's hand. She had to force herself to let go; she'd rarely taken it off since she'd opened the box and found it there, let alone given it to someone else.

"Huh." Derek leaned over to get a better look as Ben studied it. "What's that?"

"It's just a cheap crystal that my mother left me," Tessa said, feeling self-conscious. The necklace meant a great deal to her, but it was worthless to anyone else, at least as far as she knew. Her neck felt cool and bare without the chain around it.

"I'm starting to wonder about that." Ben held it up, twining the chain through his fingers. "Dragons always know where every piece of their hoard is located. At least that's what I've been told. Tessa, is there any chance this could have come from a dragon's hoard?"

"How would my parents get their hands on something from a dragon's hoard?"

"Could they have stolen it?" Derek asked.

Tessa wanted to laugh, but she couldn't manage it. "My parents weren't thieves!"

"How do you know?"

"Because they just ... weren't!" She fretfully tore off pieces of her hamburger bun. "I don't know much about them, I was only a few years old when they died, but my dad was some kind of salesman and my mom was a nurse. They were just ordinary people. They weren't thieves or spies or anything special."

"Maybe they didn't steal it," Derek suggested. "Maybe they found it."

Tessa gave him a flat look. "My parents just accidentally found something from a dragon's hoard. And put it in a safe deposit box for me."

"Hey," Derek said, "I'm just throwing ideas out there." He took a bite of his burger.

"It's not likely," Ben said. He turned the crystal over in his fingers. "I still think this might be how Reive found us, though. Unless you have anything else on you that might have been used to locate you."

Tessa shook her head. "Unless he visited my apartment and planted a tracking device in my suitcase."

"I didn't think of that," Ben said.

"I was joking!"

Ben leaned forward. "Tessa, they're obviously very committed to finding you. There's no telling what they'll be willing to do. Would you consider getting rid of the necklace?"

Tessa snatched it out of his hand, a surge of rage rushing through her. "No! It's mine!"

Ben and Derek exchanged a look, and Tessa felt her rage draining away as quickly as it had come. She opened her fingers to find she'd clenched her hand so tightly that the edges of the crystal had left red imprints in her skin.

"I'm sorry," she said. "I just can't stand the idea of not having it. It was my parents'. You probably don't understand how much that means to me, if you aren't close to yours. But it's all I have left."

"I know it's important to you," Ben said. "But ..." He reached out. "Can I hold it again?"

Tessa hesitated.

"I'm not going to take it away. I just want to hold it. I've never seen you like this about anything else."

"That's because I don't have anything else that means this much to me." She had an even harder time letting go this time. She trusted Ben, but there was still a tiny part of her that was irrationally afraid he'd take the necklace away for good.

"But you've only had this for two weeks, you said?"

"Two weeks, two days, it doesn't matter. It's from my parents. It's not special other than that."

"I'm not at all convinced that's true." Ben held the crystal up to the light. "I think there's something very special about this. I just don't know what. We need to show it to another dragon, Melody if we can find her, or—I hate to say this—my dad if we can't."

Tessa barely heard the last part; she'd almost forgotten that they'd last seen Melody engaged in battle with a much bigger dragon. "I really hope Melody's all right. It won't give away our location if we call her, will it?"

"I'm not going to worry about that," Ben said, making her realize he was just as worried as she was. "Do you want to call her? I think it might be better coming from you than me, in case she thinks I'm on Dad's side. Or do you have your phone?"

Tessa nodded. "It's in my pocket. May I have my necklace back? You said you weren't going to keep it."

Ben handed it back, with visible reluctance.

"I don't think it's hurting her in any way," Derek said quietly. "I mean, she looks fine."

"Maybe not, but it's definitely got its hooks in her somehow."

"You guys are imagining things," Tessa snapped. "It's my necklace. If there was anything magic about it, I'd know."

She tried calling Melody, but the call went to voicemail, so she sent a text: Mel, thanks for the save, but we're worried! I'm with Ben. Call me.

"Well, I guess that settles it." Ben sighed and swung his legs off the bed. "I need to take you to see Dad."

"Is your dad even going to let me in?" Tessa asked. "From everything you've said, about how he doesn't want to get involved—and if it's possible for them to track me somehow, we'll be getting him involved whether he wants it or not—"

"I don't care." Ben's eyes were hard as steel, and just a few shades darker. "You're my mate. I'm not giving him a choice about it."

Tessa set aside the other half of her burger; she'd lost her appetite. Two of the kittens converged on it. She caught them and held them in her lap, to their obvious displeasure.

They're hungry, she thought. I can give them some of my leftover burger for now, but what they really need is to be taken somewhere I can give them proper food and a litterbox.

"How do you suppose your dad feels about cats?" she asked Ben.

The grin that spread slowly across Ben's face was a wicked one. "I don't know, but I can't wait to find out."