“No! Maggie, no! Leave the pilot alone!”

Lance chuckled as Maggie finally paid attention to Keeley’s exasperated tone. The tiny dragon swiveled her head around on her long neck, an injured ‘Who, me?’ expression on her face.

Keeley sighed. “Don’t give me that look, baby. I’m not the one trying to blind our pilot as he flies us a million miles above the ground.” She tapped Maggie on the tip of her snout. “Some of us need this helicopter to stay in the air, okay? We don’t all have wings.”

She flicked a grin at Lance, and his heart turned over.

“Ready to meet your first full-grown dragon?” he asked out loud.

Keeley grimaced. “Sure. I’ll just hide behind Maggie if he gets too scary.” She wrestled the baby dragon into her lap and re-secured the makeshift dragon-seatbelt around her.

Lance sighed quietly and rubbed his forehead. He gave it ten minutes, max, before Maggie got tired of being cuddled and broke out of the restraints again.

*Don’t sweat it.* Harley’s psychic voice was all grin. *I’ve flown with a half-dozen of my nieces and nephews in the back. I can handle one miniature dragon.*

*Even with her wings over your eyes?*

In the pilot’s seat, Harley shrugged. *I’ve been looking for a new handicap. Might mention it at the next race meet.*

Lance sat back in his seat, grinning. A nudge from his snow leopard made him reflect that, yes, a few days ago Harley’s comment might have made him groan. Maybe he was a little less uptight now.

He glanced at Keeley again. I wonder why that might be.

The unsteady feeling that had plagued him since they first discovered the scale shields was gone, too. Lance no longer felt as though he was walking on the edge of a crumbling cliff, afraid that every next step might be the one to plunge him into the abyss.

Again, no surprises why. Keeley’s presence—her bravery, her protectiveness, hell, the way she gritted her teeth when she was angry—everything about her grounded him.

The world still held its mysteries. There was still crime in the world, shifter as well as human. Briers had been dealt with, but Lance wasn’t convinced that he was the final piece in the puzzle. Something was still missing.

But it didn’t frighten him anymore. Even if his next steps did send him tumbling into the unknown, he wouldn’t be alone—because, as Keeley put it, he was no longer being a dumbass who thought he had to deal with everything on his own.

He had his gorgeous mate by his side. Loyal friends who he trusted. They’d been there all along, he’d just been too boneheaded to realize he could rely on them. Grant and Irina, Mathis and Chloe. He’d been a fool to leave them out of the loop about his investigations.

Julian, too. He’d kept the dragon shifter separate to protect him… on Briers’ recommendation. No more. Julian Rouse had more reason than most of them to smoke out the last traces of whoever was involved with the attack on his family.

And Frankie. Lance straightened his shoulders. Frankie Delacourt, his old friend who he’d lost before he even knew any of this was going on. She was another victim of the criminals’ web of lies. She deserved better than the self-imposed exile that was her current existence.

He’d bring them all together. And together, they’d deal with the situation once and for all.

His comm crackled, and Chloe’s voice burst into his headphone. “Hey, helicopter! Found you!”

Lance laughed and un-muted his mic. “You mean we caught up with you,” he said.

Keeley leaned over Lance to look out the window. “I didn’t realize this was a race,” she muttered.

“Did someone say race?” Harley called from the front of the helicopter.

This time, Lance did groan. But—he had to give himself credit—he laughed, too.

The helicopter swung around, heading for distant mountains. Nestled in a small town in the foothills was the safehouse where Julian Rouse had been living for the last six months. Alone, except for his guards.

Well, he wasn’t going to be alone anymore. Soon he’d have his niece with him—and two more eggs, which were probably as ready to hatch as Maggie had been.

Keeley wrapped her fingers around his. “Hey,” she said, bending her head towards him even though thanks to the helicopter’s engine noise, they were speaking through the headsets. “How big is this safehouse, anyway?”

“Two stories, a yard. Why?”

Keeley nodded to where the two dragon eggs were safely stowed behind them. “They’re going to come out dragon-shaped too, aren’t they?”

“Ah.” Lance thought about this.

He glanced at Maggie, who stared innocently back. One of the reasons the makeshift seatbelt was so unsuccessful was that the tiny dragon was rapidly becoming less tiny. Eating twice her body weight in fish and red meat for every meal was having results.

We’re going to need a bigger safehouse, Lance thought, looking sideways at Maggie.

And if her behaviour here in the chopper was anything to go by, she was ready to start flying. At less than a week old. With two more dragonlings on the way…

A bigger safehouse. In a more remote location. A very remote location.

“I’ll sort it out,” he said automatically, and Keeley elbowed him with a grin on her face. “Sorry. We’ll sort it out.”

The mountains rose up in front of them, and Lance’s heart lifted as he glimpsed snow in their highest peaks.

Maybe he didn’t have all the answers. But he had something better. A mate who loved him, and friends he could trust with his life.

“We should arrive in time for dinner,” he broadcast to the rest of the helicopter and the others driving on the road below. “And after that—who wants to help me save the world?”

The resounding cheer from everyone on his comms was so loud he had to tear his headset off before his snow leopard came out and ripped it off for him. He kissed Keeley’s hand, staring into her laughing eyes as the helicopter headed for the mountains.

Who knew? Maybe, once Maggie was settled with her uncle, they might even have time for a mountain vacation.

Maggie

Maggie liked the helicopter. It was fast, and went high, and the fwoom-fwoom-fwoom of its spinny wings was so loud it made her entire body rumble.

Best of all, under the hot makes-things-go smell and the familiar smells of Keeley and Lance and the new but also friendly smell of the other man, it had gold in it.

Maggie climbed up Keeley’s front and peered over her shoulder to where her hoard was. It was still there. Good.

But the box was too small to put the helicopter in.

Bad.

Maggie chirped sadly to herself, then nibbled on her gold chain to make herself feel better. Above her head, Keeley and Lance and the cat man were talking. It was too much work to listen to their voices through the fwoom-fwoom-fwoom, so Maggie snuggled herself down in Keeley’s lap and listened to their feelings instead.

The other cat-man was full of fly-fast-fly-fast feelings. Maggie liked him immediately. Lance and Keeley were mostly soft fluffy feelings, especially when they looked at each other.

But there was something else, too. They weren’t all fluffy all the time, which was good, because that would be very boring.

Keeley was a little bit scared of being up high and going fast. That made sense. She didn’t have another being inside her who she could send out to be tougher. All she had was her human body. Maggie shivered. Being a human was terrible. Poor Keeley. No wonder she was scared.

Maggie draped a bit of her necklace over Keeley’s hand to make her feel better.

Just a little bit of it, though. It was her necklace, after all.

Lance was different. He was excited, with sharp edges. And his excitement reached out in front of them, up where the ground came even bigger than buildings.

Maggie stretched her neck out. What was Lance so excited about out there? Her wings fluttered, and Keeley made an oh-no noise and held onto her more tightly. Maggie didn’t mind. She didn’t actually need to flap her wings to sniff over by the mountains. She just liked doing it. Having wings was the best.

She didn’t need to actually sniff either, but she did, anyway, poking her snout this way and that while she stretched out her mind to see what Lance was so excited about.

When she found it, she shrieked and flew up to the helicopter’s ceiling.

Keeley and Lance were both making oh-no noises now, but Maggie ignored them. She dug her claws into a bit of soft stuff in the ceiling and trilled excitedly.

There was another dragon.

A big dragon.

He was too far away for Maggie to talk to him, but that didn’t matter. She already knew the shape of his mind. He’d been around… before. When she was still in her egg.

He’d been sad then. And he was sad now, too, which made Maggie’s claws itchy.

But they were going to see him. Maggie perked up.

She knew he’d feel better when he saw her. Everyone felt better when they saw her. And then they gave her things! She’d be able to show the big dragon all of the things in her hoard. Like the bottles. And the scarf. And her necklace and her watch and the sparkly paper, and Keeley and Lance.

Maggie snuggled down in Keeley’s lap, matching her chirrups to Keeley’s human heartbeat. Keeley and Lance were absolutely the best bits of her hoard. Even better than the necklace. They gave her food, and cuddles, and also they carried the rest of her hoard around. The best.

She couldn’t wait to show them off to the big dragon. He would be so jealous.