Chapter Nine

 

 

Ben's bed was more than big and comfortable enough for two people to sleep, spooned together. Tessa was awakened in the morning by Ben sitting bolt upright in bed next to her. Early morning sun shafted through the window, turning his skin soft gold and evoking pleasant memories of the night before.

"Mmm?" she managed sleepily.

"I hear an engine. Someone's coming up the driveway."

That cleared the sleep out of her foggy brain. "Your friend Derek, maybe?"

"Maybe." He got out of bed and went to the window, then shook his head and started to dress in a hurry. "But he'd have no reason to think I'm here. I didn't tell him I was coming out to the cabin, and it's not even a weekend. There's no reason why anyone who knows me would visit."

Tessa reached for her clothes as well, spurning the sexy crop-top for another of her oversized T-shirts. "You said no one could follow us here. Is there any way someone could have found us?"

"I don't see how." Ben strapped on his shoulder holster over a T-shirt. "The cabin's not in my name. Only a handful of people know about it, and I trust all of them. Well, my dad—" He stopped, then shook his head. "No. I don't trust my dad, but the exact reasons why I don't trust him are also why I don't think he'd sell us out in a situation like this."

That made exactly zero sense, but Tessa didn't think now was the time to ask him to explain. She could hear the engine now too, a loud coughing roar that sounded like it was coming into the yard of the cabin. "Is that a motorcycle?" she asked.

"Sounds like it," Ben said grimly. "Stay here."

Tessa shook her head. "I'm not letting you face danger without me. Besides, this probably concerns me, and I want to know what's going on."

He huffed a sigh. "Fine, you can come downstairs, but stay out of sight."

Tessa stuffed the pendant down the front of her shirt and bent over to tie her shoes. "I guess there's no chance we could just lock the doors and hope they'll go away."

"With my car outside? I doubt it."

Outside the cabin, the loud, coughing engine died. Ben opened the bedroom door and went down the stairs two at a time, vaulting over a kitten. Tessa followed more quietly, picking up the kitten (it was either Twix or Butterfinger; she couldn't tell them apart) and taking it with her to the bottom of the stairs. If they were going to have to leave, she should start getting them back into their carrier, but for now, she went softly to the window beside the door and peeked out from behind the curtain.

A figure in a black leather jacket was just swinging his leg off a large, gleaming motorcycle, its chrome shining in the morning sun. That was definitely Reive. So much for Ben's assurances that they hadn't been followed.

Ben closed the door behind him and went down the porch steps. "You're a long way from home," he said evenly.

"So are you, panther. So are you." Reive wasn't wearing a helmet, and his black hair was wind-tousled. He pushed a pair of expensive-looking sunglasses to the top of his head.

"This is my home. You're trespassing on private property." From her perspective at the window, Tessa saw Ben's arm shift as he moved a hand to the butt of the gun holstered against his side. He hadn't covered it with a jacket this time; the strap cut across the back of his T-shirt in a sharp diagonal slash. "And I'm telling you to leave right now. If you don't, there's going to be trouble."

Reive held his hands out, showing the palms. He didn't appear to have any weapons, though he could be hiding anything under his heavy jacket. "I've told you, my quarrel is not with you. It's the woman you're hiding that I want."

"Leave. Now."

The kitten in Tessa's arms hooked its tiny claws into her shirt. She absently freed its small, soft paw without tearing her eyes away from the window. She knew she shouldn't be delaying like this; she should be packing up the kittens and getting ready to leave. But she couldn't look away from the confrontation in the yard.

"You won't desist, will you?" Reive's words came out resigned.

Ben drew his gun. Tessa had to stifle a gasp. She'd never seen anyone use a gun in real life before. He wasn't pointing it at Reive, but he held it in a way that made it very clear he could raise it in a heartbeat.

"Very well," Reive said. "If it's a fight you want, no one ever accused me of bringing a knife to a gunfight."

His last words came out in a rumbling growl ... and he changed.

Tessa recoiled away from the window, the kitten in her arms turning to a snarling, hissing ball of claws. Ben's shift from man to panther had been a gentle transition, his body easing with feline grace from one to the other. This transition was violent. Reive erupted in a wall of scales, rearing upward against the clear morning sky. Spikes burst from his neck and shoulders; a pair of wings erupted forth and spread to block the sun. Tessa couldn't even tell what happened to his clothes. They seemed to become part of him, vanishing into his glossy scales.

His lean, spiky body seemed to go up and up forever. The long-jawed reptilian head bowed over Ben like the head of a cobra mesmerizing a mouse. The dragon was copper-colored, gleaming in the sun like a polished brass kettle. A red stripe ran down each side of his body, making it look as if he'd been painted in blood. Each of the claws on his enormous forepaws, poised over Ben like a cat's claws, was as long as a sword.

The kitten wrenched itself from Tessa's arms, leaving bloody scratches down her wrists. The pain recalled her to herself. She had to get the kittens and get out of here. There was no way she could fight something like that. There was no way Ben could fight something like that. Their only chance was to flee and find somewhere to hide and ...

... and she didn't know, she didn't know how she was ever going to be free of this, but even running forever was better than being torn apart with those terrible claws.

Base animal instinct told her to just run out the back, to get away as far as possible. But she couldn't leave Ben, and she couldn't abandon the helpless kittens who depended on her.

Right now the nearest of the helpless kittens had wedged itself as far under the couch as it could go. "Come out out," she whispered, afraid to make too much noise for fear the dragon would hear her.

A sudden burst of gunshots outside made her jump with a small scream. The kitten hissed and backed even further under the couch, out of her reach.

"Come on, come on, baby." Tessa fought to keep her voice calm as she strained to reach the kitten in its hiding place. "I'm trying to help you."

The gunshots had to be Ben. A dragon wouldn't carry a gun.

A roar outside the cabin rattled the windows. That was the dragon. It was followed by the snap of another gunshot.

With panic breathing down her neck like hot dragonbreath, Tessa gave up trying to retrieve that particular kitten and went after the other ones. They had all panicked and run for cover, but most of them hadn't been as successful at finding a hiding place. She scooped up one of them in a corner of the kitchen and caught another under a chair.

A tremendous crash shook the cabin and sent adrenaline jolting through her, almost making her drop the kittens. I have to get out of here! She sent her desperately worried good wishes in Ben's direction as she took the kittens into the back bedroom.

Here she discovered another problem.

The kittens hadn't objected to being stuffed into the carrier at the shelter. It was a new experience for them, so all she'd had to do was grab them and pop them in, one by one. This time, however, they knew what was coming, and they did not like it at all.

It was amazing how one small kitten could suddenly consist of about ten legs and 400 claws, half of them attempting to hold off the carrier and the other half aimed at Tessa's hand and arm.

"Get in there!" Tessa ordered between her teeth, jamming Kit Kat down just as Toblerone tried to make a break for it. "I could just abandon you ungrateful little jerks, you know!"

Sobbing with frustration and fear, she managed to get them all jammed inside and zipped up, along with another she found cowering under the bed. She was tempted to just leave the other two (one under the sofa, the other hiding in some unknown location), but what if the dragon burned down the cabin? Could real dragons breathe fire?

And once she caught the kittens, what then? She and Ben were going to have to escape past that thing.

If Ben was even still alive. She hadn't heard any gunshots lately. Panic choked her, not for herself, but for the man who, in so short a time, had become so much a part of her that she couldn't imagine her life without him.

 

***

 

Ben stood his ground as the dragon reared above him. Even if he was willing to consider running—and there wasn't a chance, not with Tessa in the cabin—it wouldn't do him much good. The dragon wasn't really built for sprinting, but with those wings, it could follow him anywhere.

He'd watched his father shift on more than one occasion, so this wasn't the first time he'd seen a dragon in the flesh. It still never got easy. They were not just huge, but alien-looking, every part of their body adapted to be the most powerful and efficient predator in the modern world ... perhaps the most effective predator the world had ever seen.

The sudden, incongruous image of a dragon fighting a dinosaur popped into Ben's head. His lips twitched.

"Why are you smiling?" Reive demanded, his voice a deep rumble. Dragons were among the only shifters who could speak in their animal form.

"Just wondering if you'd win in a fight against a T-rex."

Reive stared down at him. "Are you stalling?"

"Not really. Just giving you a chance to change your mind. If you don't shift back immediately, I won't hesitate to use lethal force against you."

He wasn't sure if the curl of Reive's lip was amusement or contempt. "Puny little shifter, you couldn't hurt me if you tried."

Ben squeezed off a fusillade of bullets at him.

Despite his warning, he was trying to stop Reive, not kill him, so rather than aiming for the head, he fired into center mass: in this case, Reive's chest, a broad expanse of shimmering copper scales. That would've been a kill shot on a human, but given Reive's size, Ben wasn't even sure if the .38 would have enough stopping power to penetrate his scales.

Reive grunted, more in surprise than pain. Bright blood glistened on his chest, so at least the bullets had done some damage, but he showed no signs of being badly hurt.

"Really?" Reive rumbled. "You think that's going to stop me?"

"Worth a try." Maybe he should've gone for a headshot after all. By his count, he had four shots left—and no spare ammo, because it was all in his jacket (still in the house) and in his car.

Not that reloading would help a whole lot, unless what he was reloading was a cannon.

Reive had been crouching on his back legs, making himself nearly as tall as the roof of the cabin; now he crashed down to all fours, his massive foreclaws tearing chunks out of the meadow turf. His body was low-slung, the shoulders angled slightly outward like an alligator's.

"Listen," he said, staring at Ben down his long scaled snout. "This isn't your fight. I have no quarrel with you. I just need the girl."

"You're going to kill her."

"Well, yes, obviously, but that doesn't have to be your problem."

"Even leaving aside the fact that I'm a cop, and I'm not just going to let you eat someone—"

"Eurgh, I'm not going to eat her! What kind of barbarian do you think I am?"

"—every one of her problems is my problem too," Ben said. "She's my mate."

It was hard to read expression on Reive's inhuman features, but a frisson of some sharp emotion passed across his face. "No wonder you're so persistent. Suppose I can't expect you to get out of the way, then."

"Nope," Ben said, and shot him in the face.

He aimed for the eye, one of the few parts of Reive's well-armored dragon body where he thought the gun's tiny bullets could do serious damage, but Reive's reflexes were hideously fast, faster even than those of most shifters. The dragon jerked his head to the side. Blood sprayed anyway, and for a moment Ben couldn't tell if he'd actually managed to put an eye out, but then Reive opened his eyes, the right slightly bloodshot with a mask of blood around it. The bullet must have grazed the lid or winged the softer, less scaled flesh just beneath it.

"Honorless scoundrel," Reive growled, and lashed out with one huge forepaw.

Dragons were fast, but panthers were fast, too. Ben sprang out of the way, keeping a firm grip on his gun. He would've vastly preferred a larger weapon (a bazooka might have come in handy) but at least the pistol didn't interfere with his ability to maneuver.

If he survived this, maybe it would be a good idea to invest in a hunting rifle to keep in the cabin. He didn't own one because, when he hunted, it wasn't on two legs. However, a larger weapon than his service sidearm might come in handy in case of—

—unexpected dragon attacks? Okay, so this wasn't the kind of situation likely to come up again. Hopefully.

"Hold still," Reive snarled, swiping at him again. Ben ducked behind one of the rough-hewn wooden poles supporting the porch roof; it splintered under the blow driven by Reive's powerful shoulder muscles.

"So you can claw me to death? I don't think so!"

He wanted to draw Reive away from the cabin, but didn't dare try. Reive wasn't stupid. The dragon had to guess Tessa was in there.

Would she have the presence of mind to try to escape while Ben held off Reive? So far, she hadn't come out or made a sound that he could hear. The cabin had no back door, but the windows in the bedrooms were large enough to get in and out of. Derek had told Ben that he'd gone in through a window while his mate's family was being held hostage in the cabin last year.

Ben wished true telepathy went along with the mate bond. Longtime mated pairs joked about being able to read each other's minds, but so did long-married human couples. It was really just a matter of being completely in sync with each other, and reading the other's small tells.

Still, he thought desperately at Tessa, Get out! Don't worry about me!

"This is such a waste of time," Reive complained, shaking splinters out of his claw. The porch roof sagged alarmingly over Ben's head.

"If your time is that precious to you, I have a suggestion. Leave."

"I would if I could." Reive reared on his back legs and smacked a paw on the unstable end of the porch roof. Ben dodged out of the way as it crashed down where he'd been standing.

And I just got done fixing the cabin from the damage last summer!

"But I can't return to my clan empty-handed," the dragon went on, weaving his head in an attempt to locate Ben in the rubble. "I've been given a task and I'm honor-bound to complete it."

"What'd she do, anyway? She doesn't even know what dragons are!"

"Not my problem," Reive growled, stalking toward him. The tip of his tail, just visible in the long grass, twitched like a cat's.

"Oh really? What about honor? Is it honorable to kill an enemy who has no idea what you want from them, without even giving them a chance to explain or offer an alternative?"

"You know," Reive said, "killing her is a necessary and unpleasant duty, but I'm starting to rather look forward to killing you."

Good, Ben thought. Chase me, not her.

Inside his chest, his panther snarled. Let me at him!

The urge to shift was strong, but as a panther, he'd lose his human advantages: the gun, the opposable thumbs. Still, it wasn't like either of those was doing him any good at the moment. And he would have his panther's weapons, the sharp teeth and claws that his human body lacked.

"Enough stalling," Reive growled, and swung a paw at him. Ben dodged, but Reive clipped his arm, knocking him to the ground. The gun fell from his numb fingers.

Let me fight! His panther was nearly frantic. We're going to die—and our mate will too!

The panther was right. He couldn't win like this; he didn't even have a chance. Ben didn't bother taking his clothes off this time. With the dragon poised to spring, there was no time.

He felt his panther take over, his human clothes parting along the seams as the cat leaped out of him. A shrug of his shoulder sent his holster falling into the grass, and then the lean black panther sprang out of the way of the dragon's next scimitar-clawed swipe.

"Oh, you do have some fight in you, then. I wondered what kind of shifter you were." The dragon shrugged and turned back toward the cabin. "Not that it matters. You can't stop me."

Ben sank his teeth into the dragon's tail. Reive hissed and whipped his head around, but Ben was already gone into the grass. Still, the dragon was horribly fast. One clawed forepaw crashed to the ground inches from Ben's whiskered nose; the next blow caught him in a vicious slap and sent him tumbling end over end.

As Ben struggled to get to his feet, dazed and reeling, blinking blood out of his eyes, he saw the dragon lunge up the cabin's porch and knock the door off its hinges with a casual slap of a paw.

 

***

 

When the dragon crashed through the door, Tessa—dusty and scratched—was halfway under the couch, her fingers brushing against kitten fur.

Tessa screamed, letting the end of the couch crash back to the floor as she recoiled in shock. The kitten zipped out from under the other end of the couch and shot across the floor to cower beneath a chair.

"Trying to hide won't save you," the dragon growled.

"I'm trying to rescue my kittens, you beast," Tessa yelled, so terrified that she barely heard the words coming out of her mouth. "Where's Ben?"

"Don't worry about him. You're the one in trouble."

The dragon thrust his massive head through the door. Tessa screamed again, snatched up the squalling kitten carrier, and ran into the kitchen. The dragon's shoulders, too wide to fit, crunched against the doorframe as he tried to push his way through.

Looking around wildly for a weapon, Tessa spotted a large cast-iron frying pan hanging behind the stove. She grabbed it with her free hand and started beating him in the snout with wild swings.

"I have to say I admire your fighting spirit," the dragon remarked. He winced and turned his head to catch her makeshift cast-iron club on the armored side of his jaw rather than the sensitive snout-tip. "It gives me no pleasure to do what I must do."

"It gives me even less pleasure, believe me!" She punctuated her words by slamming the pan repeatedly into his face. "Where! Is! Ben! You! Monster!"

"Aargh! Stop that." The dragon wrestled one of his legs inside the cabin; the doorframe crunched and buckled. "It'd be easier and less painful for you if you'd cooper—"

Tessa whacked him in the teeth. With irritation that could be read even on his reptilian face, the dragon snapped his teeth shut on her makeshift weapon. Tessa engaged in a very brief tug-of-war that the dragon won, wrenching the pan out of her hands. He spat it out with a clang.

Tessa grabbed a canister of black pepper, opened it with her teeth, and flung it at his face.

"Troublesome little—atchoo!"

While the dragon coughed and sneezed, a terrified orange blur sped past Tessa's feet. She bent down, grabbed the kitten, and performed the hastiest kitten-stuffing maneuver of her life on the kitchen counter, jamming him on top of the others and holding them down while she zipped the carrier shut again.

If there was an Olympic gold medal for kitten-wrangling, she felt like she'd earned it.

The dragon blinked watering eyes at her and, with another heave of his shoulders, broke out more of the doorframe and got his other leg inside, scraping off a shower of copper scales. Now half of him was in the living room and he could easily reach her.

Tessa backed up into a corner of the kitchen. She was trapped, but she wasn't going down without a fight. She seized one canister after another, pelting him with sugar and salt, raisins and a shower of nuts.

"Really?" the dragon said. As Tessa ran out of projectiles, he opened his jaws.

One of the living room windows imploded as Ben's black panther came crashing through in a cascade of shattered glass and curtains.

He launched himself at the dragon's head, swiping a paw across its face. Reive roared as Ben's claws slashed across one of his eyes.

Ben hit the ground and shifted human in an instant. His face and shoulder were bloody; Tessa gasped in shock. "Out the window!" he ordered. "My car keys are with my clothes. Get—" He broke off and rolled out of the way as the dragon snapped at him.

"There's still one kitten in here, and I don't know where it is!"

"Forget it! Just go!"

Easier said than done, Tessa thought, eyeing the window. To get to it, she had to get past the dragon.

Seeing her predicament, Ben offered her an opening by backing up against the far wall of the living room, trapping himself but leaving her a clear path to the window. He shifted again, dropping on all fours to the floor, and sank his teeth into the dragon's leg.

Tessa screwed up her courage and dashed across the room. She dropped the kitten carrier out of the window, and wriggled out after it, falling into the long grass beside the cabin.

After the chaos inside, it seemed incredibly peaceful and serene out here, except for an occasional thump from behind the cabin wall. Tessa gulped down a couple breaths of the meadow-scented air, and then picked up the cat carrier and ran around to the front of the cabin.

It looked like there had been a heck of a fight here. The ground was churned up, the grass flattened, and one side of the porch roof had caved in. The dragon's coppery hindquarters—all of him that was visible, with the rest inside the cabin—shifted this way and that as he tried to attack Ben.

Tessa's first thought was that finding Ben's clothes out here was going to be like hunting for a needle in a haystack, but then she saw the glint of his gun, and found a pile of torn-up clothing next to it. So that's what happens when he shifts in his clothes. She retrieved his keys and, while she was at it, scooped up his gun and his phone, stuffing them hastily into a side pocket on the cat carrier. Then she ran to the car, threw the carrier in the back, and half-fell into the driver's seat.

The car started easily, and Tessa took a deep breath for what felt like the first time since Reive had shown up at their door. She was in a car with the engine running. She could get away.

Except ... Ben was still in the cabin.

She had Ben's gun, but she didn't know how to use it, and she was afraid to try. What if she missed the dragon and hit Ben instead?

Instead, she revved the engine and rammed Ben's car into the dragon's hindquarters.

It felt like hitting a brick wall. The dragon's back legs went out from under him, and there was a startled roar from inside the cabin. A moment later the dragon began to writhe, trying to back out, and Tessa realized he was stuck in the doorway.

Ben's panther leaped out the shattered window. He landed awkwardly, stumbling; he was clearly hurt.

And he had a kitten in his mouth, carrying it by the scruff of the neck like a momma cat.

Shifting human again, he dropped the confused-looking kitten into his hand and tumbled into the car through the passenger-side door, cradling the kitten against his bare chest.

"Are you—" She started to ask if he was all right, but he was covered in blood and dirt; clearly he wasn't.

The dragon thrashed as he tried to get out of the cabin doorway.

"His motorcycle," Ben panted. He leaned into the backseat to put the kitten in the carrier with the others. "Ram his motorcycle. Push it into the creek behind the cabin."

"What? Why?"

"Just do it!"

It seemed like a ridiculous waste of time. The dragon didn't need the motorcycle to pursue them; it had wings! But Tessa trusted Ben. She gunned the motor and the car thumped into the motorcycle. The wheels started to spin. Tessa accelerated, and the motorcycle was pushed backward, tearing a swath through the meadow grass.

"Push it where?"

"Creek! Behind the cabin!"

She gunned the engine and the car sped up. Ben suddenly shouted, "Stop!" and Tessa slammed on the brakes. The motorcycle tumbled over a small embankment and there was a tremendous splash.

"Now go, go! Get out of here!"

Tessa didn't need the urging. She whipped the car around, accelerated past the still-trapped (but rapidly escaping) dragon, and jolted onto Ben's overgrown driveway.

"Why did you have me do that?" she asked as the car bounded over ruts, branches whipping across the windshield. She had to cling to the steering wheel with both hands. Losing control at this speed would probably mean slamming into a tree and killing them both. In the backseat, the distressed kittens wailed.

"It's part of his hoard," Ben said.

"What?"

"Dragons prize their hoards above all else." Ben twisted around, trying to see out of the car's rear window. "Damage a dragon's belongings and you might as well hurt them directly. If it's a choice between chasing us or getting the motorcycle out of the creek before it's too damaged to salvage, he'll go for the motorcycle first."

Tessa was not at all convinced, but they didn't seem to have an angry dragon chasing them yet, so she would just have to believe him. She fishtailed out onto the main road. "Which way?"

"There's really only one way." Ben pointed. "Toward town. The other way, the road just goes up into the mountains and dead-ends. We'd be trapped."

"I feel trapped anyway!" She pushed down the accelerator, picking up speed, all too aware of how easy they would be to spot from the air. "We're sitting ducks out here."

"I know. We have to get to the main highway. Once we get there, he'll have to guess our direction randomly. And there'll be more witnesses in other vehicles."

"Why does that matter?"

"Dragons don't want to be discovered," Ben said. "He'll be less likely to chase us if he might be seen."

Right now, they were alone on the rural road; they hadn't passed a single other car. At least she didn't have to worry about dodging other traffic. Navigating the curves at this speed was bad enough.

"How long do you think he'll wait before—" She shut up as a shadow fell over the car. "Oh shit."

"My sentiments exactly," Ben said grimly. He rolled down his window a crack to look out.

"Damn, damn, damn," Tessa whimpered. She pressed down the accelerator, pushing the car up past 60 despite the sharply winding road. "What's he doing?"

"I think he's having trouble keeping up. Don't slow down."

She glimpsed the dragon in the rearview mirror, a flash of his broad-winged shape against the blue sky as they whipped around a turn. Then Ben's head blocked her view as he craned into the backseat.

"Ben, sit still! I can't see!"

"New problem," Ben said. "Your kittens are getting out."

"Are you kidding me!"

Tessa risked a glance over her shoulder to see that the frantic kittens had torn open a gap in the soft-sided carrier. Two of them were already loose in the backseat, tumbling over each other as they crawled around, exploring. Another one was in the process of squeezing its way out of the hole.

"Get your gun!" she said. "It's back there with the carrier. They might, I don't know, accidentally shoot us or something."

"The kittens have my gun," Ben muttered. "This is the worst day ever." He struggled up to his knees in the seat, gasping in pain. Tessa tried not to let herself be distracted by his bare hip and pale flank as he leaned into the backseat.

She had more than enough distractions already. One of the orange kittens squirmed quickly through the gap between the seats and plunked into her lap. There were mewls and the sound of claws on upholstery all over the backseat. Every last one of the little jerks was loose back there now, from the sound of things.

I am suing whoever made that carrier! Tessa thought desperately. Kittenproof, my ass!

Wind whipped suddenly into the car, ruffling her hair. "Did you roll down your window again?" Tessa cried, trying to keep her eyes on the road as the kitten in her lap batted at the steering wheel. She caught another glimpse of the dragon flashing overhead; he was making up time since she'd slowed down because of the kittens. "Roll it back up! They'll fall out!"

"It wasn't me," Ben said, with a grunt of pain; he was draped over his seat now, half of him in the backseat. "They're trying to climb the doors; I think one of them got a foot on the window controls."

Tessa took another startled glance over her shoulder. To her horror, she saw that the driver-side back window was halfway down, with one of the kittens actually trying to climb up to reach it. "Are you telling me the kittens rolled down the window?!"

"Yes." Ben stretched across the backseat, trying to reach the window controls. "Where did you say you put my gun?"

"It's in a pocket of the—"

"Watch the turn!"

Tessa hastily looked forward, yelped in dismay, and slammed on the brakes, cranking the steering wheel through a tight turn an instant before they went off the road into the woods. There was a series of thumps from the backseat as various items, including kittens, tumbled into the rear footwell. The kitten on Tessa's lap tumbled across her knees and fell on her feet.

Her feet ... which were currently driving the car.

"No!" she said, trying to keep her right foot on the gas while using her left foot to fend off the kitten. "No, get out of there! Bad kitten! Ben! Help!"

"Kinda busy right now!"

"Me too!" Tessa wailed.

The car was on a straight stretch, so she risked bending down and groping under her feet until she got a hand on the kitten and was able to fling it (gently as possible) out of the footwell in the general direction of the passenger seat. Ben grabbed for it, missed, and made a startled noise as the kitten scrabbled up his bare back and jumped onto the dashboard.

"Get off there!" Tessa freed a hand from the steering wheel to swipe at the kitten, trying to get it out of her field of vision.

The kitten's foot slipped down onto the radio controls. Suddenly AC/DC blared deafeningly into the car.

I definitely feel like I'm on a highway to hell, Tessa thought grimly. She got a hand on the kitten, plucked it off the dashboard, and tossed it over Ben's head into the backseat.

Ben shouted something.

"What?" Tessa yelled over the blaring electric guitars. She slapped wildly at the radio, trying to turn it off. It didn't help that she was driving an unfamiliar car and had no idea where the controls for anything were.

"I said I can't see the dragon anymore!"

"Is that good?"

She got her answer an instant later when she whipped around another turn and something huge blocked the road in front of her. Tessa shrieked and stomped on the brake pedal. The car fishtailed wildly, kittens and other loose items went tumbling across the backseat, and Ben's naked body squashed her against the window. Somehow she managed to keep hold of the steering wheel and stopped them about ten feet from the dragon standing in the middle of the road, head up and wings raised, one eye half-closed with bloody claw marks around it. If dragons could look annoyed, this one definitely did.

"I think he's pissed about the motorcycle," Tessa murmured. "Um, not that this isn't nice, but—"

"Yeah. Sorry." Ben struggled off her, back into his own seat. As he did so, a kitten plopped into her lap. She caught it reflexively and tossed it to Ben, who tossed it hot-potato-style into the backseat and then bent down to reach into the footwell in front of his seat.

"What are you doing?" Tessa hissed. The dragon hadn't made a move in their direction yet. She had a feeling Reive was still figuring out what to do. Or possibly just deciding between the many different possible ways to kill them.

"Gun," Ben said. He sat up with it, grimacing in pain. Holding the gun in his bare lap, he popped out the magazine and then slapped it back in.

"How many bullets do you have?"

"Three."

Tessa couldn't tear her eyes away from the enormous predator in the road. "That doesn't seem like enough to me."

Ben let out a short, choked laugh. "Yeah, this caliber isn't too effective on something that size either, so it might not matter how many we have."

"You mean he's bulletproof?"

"Not entirely, but it'd have to be a one-in-a-million shot."

"Maybe I can drive around him," Tessa suggested.

Ben shook his head. "All he has to do is stomp on the car and he'd crush it flat, and us along with it." He took a deep breath. "Okay, here's what we're going to do. I'll get out and distract him—"

"I hate this plan already. No splitting up."

"If I can give you a chance to escape—"

"No!" Tessa said. "Look, it's me he's after, right? If anyone should distract him so the other can get away, it ought to be me."

Ben gave her a horrified look. "I'm not going to run off and leave you."

"Right, so don't expect me to do the same thing."

He huffed a soft laugh and gave her a small smile. "Fine, I get it. We're in this together."

"Exactly." Tessa removed a kitten from the steering wheel and tossed it into the backseat. "Any plans that don't involve heroic sacrifices?"

"I hate to say it, but I think shooting him in the face and driving as fast as we can looks like our best bet." He turned as the dragon took a step forward. "And I guess we better do it quick, while we still have a choice."

"Ready," Tessa said. She shifted the car into gear, foot pressed down on the brake, and blocked another kitten with her elbow.

Ben was just reaching for the controls to roll down the window when a silver streak dived out of the sky, seemingly out of nowhere, and slammed into the dragon.

Reive staggered off the road, knocking over a few small trees. As the silver creature stumbled to a stop, narrowly missing the car, Tessa realized it was another dragon. This one was much smaller and more slender than the huge copper dragon, though "small" by dragon standards was still larger than the car.

"Is that one on our side?" Tessa asked, her hands white-knuckled on the steering wheel.

"Yes," Ben said. He was grinning. "Oh, yes."

Reive picked himself up, growling, and Ben stopped smiling. The silver dragon was clearly outmatched. As Reive stalked toward the smaller dragon, Tessa couldn't help thinking of a small dog picking a fight with a larger one.

The silver dragon curled its head over its shoulder, neck bending in a graceful loop. "Go!" it shouted. Its voice was higher-pitched than the other dragon's, and beautifully musical, like the harmonies of a pipe organ.

Tessa didn't need to be told twice; she slammed her foot on the accelerator. Reive started to spread his wings to pursue them, but the silver dragon lunged at him, dragging him back to earth with gleaming steel-colored claws.

Ben kept staring back as they tore off down the road. Slowly he lowered his gun, and absently caught a kitten trying to crawl into the front seat.

"Do you know that other dragon?" Tessa asked—words she never thought she'd hear come out of her mouth.

"Yeah," Ben said softly. He plucked a stray kitten off the back of her seat. "You do, too."

"I don't know any dragons!"

"You do," Ben said. "Melody."

"Wait, what? Melody's a dragon?"

"Didn't you recognize her voice?"

"No!" Tessa said, but even as she said it, she realized that there had been a familiar cadence to the dragon's pipe-organ tones.

"I can't believe she did that." Ben was looking back again. "Dragons aren't allowed to interfere in other dragons' business—not like that. They might cast her out, or worse."

"What? She saved our lives!"

"There's no room for sympathy or mercy in dragons' honor," Ben said. "Or for family either." He sounded sad.

Tessa glanced back. The site of the battling dragons was hidden by twists of the road; all she could see were trees. "From what I can see, it looks like Melody chose family over honor today."