Chapter Eleven
They’d made the drive from their wooded get-a-way back to the city.
“Are you sure we need to come here?” It was late by the time they reached Seattle. Walking down the sidewalk toward the gallery, the hairs on the back of Edmund’s neck rose. “I don’t think this is a good idea.”
“I just need to check on one thing before we go to my apartment.” Cassandra raised on her tiptoes and gave him a peck on the cheek. “Alin probably cut out early. Anyway, it won’t take long.”
All his dragon senses went off at the same time.
You felt it too?
It was that moment, when a dragon and his mate became one. There was no other way to explain it. Even now, his body quaked in the aftermath of their joining. He could feel all the adrenaline pumping through his veins. Not his, but Cassandra’s. And as every breath he breathed, he shared with her.
This is what her mother had been talking about. A bond so deep, that even their hearts beat in perfect rhythm together. He had no idea it could be this profound. Her love would fulfill him to this depth.
While his mate had not spoken her true feelings aloud, he did not need to hear the words because they embedded inside him along with the rest of their connection.
But it wasn’t their deep bond causing the unease now filling him.
As Cassandra reached for the door, she frowned. A “Closed” sign swung from the glass door. “See, I told you Alin wouldn’t be here.”
Before she unlocked it, he caught the scent of sulfuric hibiscus wafting with Cassandra’s musky sex and vanilla scent.
“Wait.” He stopped her from going inside first.
“Edmund. No one is here.”
Despite her annoyance, he stepped in before her. Lights out, his eyes shifted, and his dragon scanned inside. The streetlights through the windows didn’t make the gallery look any more prestigious than the trashed studio it had become. Egg shell fragments crunched under his feet. Several large paintings of dragons that once hung on the walls lay ripped and discarded.
“Stay here.”
“The lights are in the back. I’m surprised Alin would turn them off. I always leave them on, so you can see inside at night.”
Edmund turned, blocking her view. “I’m sorry, luv. I don’t think he’s coming back.”
“Alin!” Cassandra’s face fell, stricken. His heart plummeted along with hers. She shoved him out of the way. She stumbled over shards of egg shells. A strangled cry, like a wounded animal escaped her lips. “My gallery! When I get my hands on him!”
“Not him. I smell a hint of Margaret in all this.” While they shared everything, she didn’t share his dragon sense of smell. He wrinkled his nose. “And a bit of axel grease with a tinge of burnt rubber.”
“I should have known. Alin wasn’t sent to watch over the gallery. Drake must have sent him to retrieve the package, so he sent me away. Stupid block-head didn’t know where I hid it.”
Cassandra rushed through the gallery to the storage room. Edmund followed behind her. “Package?”
Edmund kicked several boxes out of the way. Ripped cardboard and upside-down crates littered the floor. Several more paintings lie tossed aside, damaged and ruined.
“Margaret sent me a package the day you came into the gallery. Drake knew. Damn him! He probably thinks he can suck up to Margaret if he has the package.”
Edmund watched as she waded through packing materials and tossed boxes aside to get to the back wall. She flicked on the lights. Momentarily blinded, he heard her gasp. Dragon sized claw marks greeted her. Every wall in the studio appeared to have been attacked.
Slowly she turned, the blood draining from her face. Edmund reached for her, but she pushed him away. Her eyes widening at the massacre within her gallery space. She walked over, bent down and picked up one of the torn banners that had days before hung from the ceiling.
Edmund reached over and put his hands down on her shoulders. She hung her head. By the rumble in her chest and quick intakes of breath, he knew she fought to gain control of her emotions. Something inside him clawed at his chest, leaving a burning sensation of anger and grief.
“I think it’s time to go. We can come back and clean this up later.”
Cassandra shook her head. “No. They can’t do this to me. This was my place first. My gallery. My art.” Her breath hitched. “My dream.”
“Easy, luv. Let me take you back to the apartment. I’ll make a few calls, we’ll get this cleaned up. Right now, we need to focus on the meeting.”
“Yeah. You’re right. But first, I need to check on something in the back.”
She walked further toward the back of the studio. Edmund took the canvas she picked up. He set it against the wall. A half-torn face of a dragon, the black fury friend of Blake’s mate, Emily, Jacques, stared back.
As she opened the door between the studio and storage room, he bolted for her.
Cassandra cried out, yanked inside the darkness.
Burnt rubber singed his nostrils.
“It’s about time,” Drake’s curt voice rattled her senses. He jerked her to the side as Edmund lunged for her. He twisted her around. His arm cold, shifting to an armor of scales. Long ivory claws extended against her throat. Cassandra froze.
Edmund’s platinum eyes narrowed on Drake. He growled, his shirt buttons straining against his widening chest. His nostrils flaring as he circled her and Drake.
“Call your dragon off. I’d hate to slit this pretty throat of yours.”
Drake pressed his claw deeper against her throat. She felt the sharp edges draw blood. “Edmund… Don’t…”
Her heart slammed in her chest. Drake’s other claw curled around her waist, the tips jagging into her.
“Let her go.” Edmund clawed off his shirt. Scales swept up his arms, and like Drake his hands sprouted claws.
“There isn’t enough room in here for one dragon, let alone two. I would hate for you to become a casualty of your mate’s recklessness,” Drake said.
“You would hide behind a woman?” Edmund’s neck cords bulged. She could feel him fighting the shift.
“Only until I get what I came for.” Drake leaned his lips close to her ear. “I’m disappointed. I thought you would have chosen better than this.”
“You mean because I didn’t choose you?”
Drake shrugged. “There will be another one like you in another century or so, that’s the thing about you humans. But we dragons, we are irreplaceable, which is why you will hand over the egg the Keeper’s Mistress sent you.”
Edmund tilted his head, he stared at her and at Drake. Tell him you’ll give him the egg, luv. Whatever he wants to let you go. I can’t get to him holding you.
“I can’t.”
“Give me the egg, or say goodbye to your mate,” Drake snarled, his body temperature raising. Sweat beaded on her forehead.
“You’ll never find it.” She’d rather die than let Drake hurt those babies. I’m sorry.
“Tell me now.” Drake’s claws bit into her flesh. Blood drizzled down her neck. Edmund winced at her pain. Then Drake’s claws of his other hand pointed to her heart. “So, your bond is deep.”
Cassandra held back her sob. Drake laughed. “Sweet. No, I can kill you both with one blow.”
Edmund shifted.
He pounded his tail against the wall between the storage room and gallery. It fell, and Drake shoved Cassandra away to protect himself. He raised his hands over his head, too late to shift, the wall collapsed atop him. Wooden crates stacked against the far wall toppled as Cassandra hit the floor. Edmund screeched, smoke pluming from his nostrils. He tilted his dragon head, holding the largest of the crate stacks from crumbling on her.
Are you okay?
Cassandra shook her head, pain shot down her shoulders.
Drake roared, bursting up through the piece of wall, half-shifted man-dragon. Edmund swung his head, tossing a crate at Drake who batted it out of his way. Edmund rammed him in the corner of the room. Pinned between his horns, Edmund snorted fire up from his nostrils.
Drake growled, attempting to shift. Spitting ice at the bronze dragon.
Edmund winced then rammed him harder in the corner.
Cassandra’s heart raced. She scrambled to her feet. She spotted the marble sculpture dumped from its crate. She grabbed the largest piece of the castle tower sculpture. Heavy, like a cement block, she lugged it in her arms, clambering up Edmund’s side.
Cassandra?
Help me.
He lifted his hind leg, boosting her atop him. She scooted across his back. He moved forward, fighting to hold Drake back from shifting and shoving against him. Reaching his horn, Cassandra clung to him. She almost dropped the marble on Edmund’s head at the sight of Drake’s body shifting, pushing him back. Off balance she fell forward tossing the marble piece with all her might, it landed on Drake’s head before Drake could complete his shift.
She slid off Edmund’s face and landed on Drake’s blue dragon body. With little room to spare inside the storage area, Edmund climbed over Drake, holding him down.
Luv?
“I’m fine. I’m fine.”
She pulled up on her hands and knees, dazed. Using Edmund’s shoulder, she steadied herself to her feet. Her body trembling, she scrambled over his shoulder. “Oh, God. I think I killed him.”
Ice dragons are too hard headed. A bronzed dragon head lowered, she leaned against his muzzle, relieved not to have murder amongst her recent list of misdeeds.
Drake’s body twisted, shrunk, and shifted back into a naked man.
You did knock him out cold.
She stroked his bronze skin, like stiff rippled leather, her heart unable to stop its fast beating pace. “I was so scared. I love you too much to lose you.”
Edmund jerked back from her. Startled, she looked up, watched him shift back to a man, and sighed when he yanked her into his arms. He kissed the top of her hair. “And I you, luv.”
Cassandra pulled him down to her, kissing him.
When his hands touched her neck, she winced. Seeing the blood smeared, he said, “Let’s get you some medical attention.”
“What about him?” Cassandra glanced over at Drake.
Edmund frowned. “I don’t suppose getting the authorities involved in this is a good idea.”
“Margaret will just pay off the police chief like she always does.” Cassandra stepped over the rubble. “I’ve got a first aid kit under the counter, or what is left of the counter.”
Edmund swept her up in his hold. He carried her past the fallen wall.
“You know, Drake is really Margaret’s problem. We should just let her take care of this.”
“You really think that is a good idea? There’s always the draconian counsel.” Edmund sat her up on the counter and rummaged under it until he found the first aid kit.
“You know what Margaret had him do to Jacques. Imagine what she does to those who try to steal from her.”
“You are a shrewd woman, mate.” Edmund poured antiseptic on a pad and patted it to her neck.
She hissed, and he blew on the cuts. Placing bandages where Drake’s claws had pierced her flesh, he kissed each spot. “Only when it comes to protecting what I love.”