Crouching Tigress Horny Dragon (Fire Mates #3) Read online

“Egg or baby?” Ryan blurted out.

  Kellan snorted. “That’s the sixty-million-dollar question. My sister is in the bedroom with them.”

  Ryan let out a ragged sigh of relief. Kellan’s sister was a nurse. And a dragon. No matter what Sera gave birth to, Kayla wouldn’t be freaked out in any way.

  Ryan pictured the twin brother and sister shifters in Tyson’s home, helping Tyson and Sera with the biggest moment of their lives. A finger of guilt stabbed at him.

  He should have been there. Instead, he’d bolted to the U.S. when the attention from Tyson’s public shift started to get on his nerves. Christ, what a tosser he was.

  “Is Sera okay?” he asked, watching dawn paint the eastern sky a deep purple-pink.

  “Kayla says she’s good.” The dry laugh that was always in Kellan’s voice made Ryan want to smile. “Your brother, on the other hand…”

  Ryan frowned at the dangling declaration. “What’s up with Ty?”

  Kellan chuckled. “Let’s just say he’s not coping and leave it at that. When he’s holding his babe in his arms, he’ll be a million times better.”

  “You got much experience with babies, Donovan?” Ryan asked, his gut a twisting knot.

  Shit. His brother needed him and he wasn’t there. Instead, Tyson had turned to a guy who was, essentially, a rival. As such.

  “Only those I deal with when giving talks at schools,” Kellan answered.

  A picture of Kellan surrounded by excitable young school-age children filled Ryan’s mind. Kellan Donovan, one of the most intimidating dragon shifters in Australia, a dragon with scales so black they seemed to devour any light around them and a fire blast so searing it once melted tungsten metal, was also the “face” of the state’s fire brigade educational unit and the man who spent a lot of his time when not fighting fires visiting schools for presentations.

  Ryan chuckled.

  “Yeah, laugh it up, Conley,” Kellan reproached. “One day I’ll be laughing at you with your own kidlets.”

  The comeback reminded Ryan exactly why he’d called his brother. Smile fading from his face, he rubbed at the back of his neck. “Any chance I could talk to Tyson?”

  “Hold on. I’ll check.”

  “Thanks, dude,” Ryan said.

  “Oi, sis?” Kellan shouted. Ryan had to jerk the phone away from his ear to save his preternaturally sensitive eardrums. Kellan would know that. One of these days, Ryan was going to thump the bastard in his sizeable arm. “Can Conley 2.0 talk to Tyson?”

  Conley 2.0?

  Ryan rolled his eyes. And then snorted back a laugh when Kayla’s faint answer came through the phone. “Not unless they both want Sera to rip their wings off.”

  “Hear that?” Kellan asked Ryan.

  “I did.”

  “Can I help you with anything?”

  The unexpected offer stilled Ryan, even as the unrelenting heat of the mating fire flared again. He hadn’t had that much to do with the dragon from Newcastle. Kellan wasn’t a rival to Ryan—Ryan was never planning to be an alpha, thank you very much. He was quite content with being an omega. Omegas came with zero responsibility—but Kellan was still an apex dragon with apex, alpha instincts.

  As if aware of Ryan’s uncertainty, Kellan sighed. “I’m not going to exploit your weaknesses, Conley, if that’s what you’re thinking. Just one guy asking another guy if he needs a hand with anything. If it helps, I know the Australian ambassador in the U.S. His daughter is a firefighter here in Newey.”

  For a moment, the urge to spill the beans to Kellan about everything happening to him rushed through him. Kellan was over a hundred years older than Ryan. He was experienced in facets of human and dragon life Ryan had yet to even consider. The word was, he’d dealt with more than one Extraho Venator in ways best not described. The other, more muttered word was, he was insanely good in bed and had defeated the mating fire’s power (although that rumor seemed ridiculous to Ryan now, given what he was going through).

  “Everything okay, Ryan?” Concern laced the question.

  Scrunching up his face, Ryan shook his head and clawed his fingers over the back of his neck. “All good,” he answered. “Tell that brother of mine he needs to send me a pic of the egg as soon as he can.”

  Kellan laughed. “Will do. And if it’s not an egg?”

  Ryan forced a shaky snigger past his lips. “Catch you later, Donovan. Thanks for being there for my family.”

  “Anytime, Conley,” Kellan answered. Ryan didn’t miss the genuine warmth in the other man’s voice. “I’ll keep them safe for you until you get back.”

  Ending the call, Ryan tossed his mobile onto the bed and turned his attention to the dawn sky beyond the window.

  No answers. Still no answers.

  Just a hungry craving for Deanne he had no hope of denying. No hope of controlling. And an even more powerful urge to shift into his dragon form.

  Fuck. He had to find her. Now.

  Chapter 6

  Julian studied her. Silent. Unmoving.

  His dark brown eyes didn’t blink or waver from her face. His body hung loose, relaxed. Poised to strike. He held a gutting blade in his right hand the way others would hold the neck of a bottle of beer. She’d seen him remove the heart of three dragons with that blade. One in Germany, one in New Zealand, one in Iceland. The one in Iceland had still been alive as he did so, shifting back into human form as Julian cut into it.

  Deanne had thrown up at the sight of the old man screaming and pleading for Julian to stop.

  Her father had lectured her about the weakness of emotions, of allowing herself to feel connected to her target, after that. He’d spent long hours teaching her how to ignore the unsettled anger she’d experienced. She’d been only sixteen at the time. She’d committed herself fully to becoming detached, needing Julian’s approval. If she impressed him, perhaps she’d be able to forget the way her body had felt like it was burning up with rage at the old man’s screams.

  Yet even now, ten years later, she remembered the terror and pain in the dying dragon shifter’s cries, and the fury and loathing in her own body.

  Even now, the gutting blade made her sick to look at.

  So she kept her focus on Julian’s face instead.

  “Tell me again,” he instructed finally, after what felt like an eternity of taciturn scrutiny.

  She swallowed.

  The first retelling of what had transpired between her and Ryan had twisted her stomach into knots, and now her father wanted her to do it again?

  Did he know she was leaving out details? Like how incredibly right being with Ryan had felt? Like how every molecule in her body had not just craved him, but burned for him?

  Did he know the “quick pathetic kiss” she’d said they’d shared as part of her plan to lure him into shifting had actually been the most intense and amazing and raw sex of her life?

  Did he somehow know that the blue fire had engulfed her during the most incredible orgasm she’d ever experienced, instead of—as she’d described—when Ryan had stuck his tongue in her mouth?

  Refusing to shift her feet under Julian’s drilling gaze, she licked her lips, her mouth dry. The retelling would be easier, she was sure, if her stupid body wasn’t yearning for Ryan’s touch again. It was impossible to think straight with her mind replaying over and over the feel of his lips on hers, the caress of his tongue over her skin, the exquisite sensation of his thick, hard erection sliding into—

  “Deanne.”

  Deanne jolted at her father’s sharp snap.

  Heat flooded her cheeks. Oh God, she really needed to get a grip. Or help. Or…or something.

  Answers. She needed answers.

  “I lured the dragon shifter out of the bar with the promise of sex in the alley,” she burst out, desperately trying to shut down the images the statement created. “By the time we made it out there, I felt intoxicated in some way, like he’d drugged me with some kind of sexual aid. We were interrupted by Kestar, who shot at
him—and missed, the idiot—and that was when Ry…the dragon shifter dragged me out of the alley. We ran to a park. Once there, we resumed kissing. I could tell he was horny and my plan was to seduce him into shifting so I could kill him. It.”

  If her father felt something about her declaration was wrong, he didn’t show it. “But your crossbow was still in the alley. Hidden. How did you plan to kill without it?”

  Deanne swallowed. Her heart was racing. Why did she feel like she was being interrogated? “I…I don’t know,” she confessed, face growing warmer. Admitting a failing like that to Julian hurt. “I think by that stage, whatever he…it…the dragon had drugged me with was clouding my judgement.”

  “I see.”

  A chill rippled over her at the pointed words. See? See what?

  “Go on,” he instructed, expression unreadable. “Tell me about the fuck flames. When did it happen? You said when you were kissing, but as you clearly can hear, the word fuck is a part of the name. Fuck. Flames. Not kiss flames. Explain.”

  Deanne licked her lips again. Her pulse pounded like a cannon in her ears and her throat.

  Julian leaned forward in his chair, resting his elbows in his knees, the gutting blade loose in his grip. He held her stare, his eyes dark and intent. “Tell me about the sex, Deanne. Tell me what happened when it stuck its cock into you. Tell me what happened to you when it did that.”

  Deanne’s eyes stung with hot tears. A cold lump filled her throat, which was probably a good thing because she truly felt like she was going to throw up. Her stomach was a boiling mess. Her skin prickled, like a million pinpoints of lava rolled over her. “I…” She stopped, her mouth too dry.

  Julian didn’t speak. He didn’t move, just sat, his elbows on his knees, the blade dangling from his fingers, and waited for her answer.

  “I felt out of control,” she finally said, the words little more than croaking rasps. “I felt like I was burning up, and yet I wasn’t. It wasn’t just good sex, Father, it was perfect sex. And then the blue fire engulfed me and it was even more perfect.”

  “Did it tell you what was going on?”

  It. It. Julian never referred to dragon shifters by gender. Deanne had affected the same trait as she grew up. And yet she couldn’t think of Ryan in any other way than he, him, even when she tried.

  “He…said it was the mating fire,” she answered. Her heart smashed harder against her breastbone. Her head roared. “He said I was…he said I was his Fire Mate. That I was a dragon.”

  Julian’s eyes narrowed. Or maybe they didn’t. She couldn’t really tell. He was so still. “And if you were?”

  She blinked.

  He laughed. The sound was cold. She’d heard him laugh like that before—after a successful hunt, as he’d had her photograph him beside the slain dragon. The sound that bubbled up from him then—elated triumph—hung in the air of his suite’s living area now.

  Deanne frowned.

  And then sucked in a sharp breath as a surge of sexual hunger flooded through her like a tsunami.

  Ryan…

  An image of the Australian filled her head. He stood on a sidewalk somewhere, the dawn sun bathing him in muted light, his face turned to it, his eyes closed.

  Seeking her…searching for her…

  Her body throbbed. Her sex did the same.

  Julian rose out of his seat, watching her. “Describe what is happening to you, Daughter.”

  Deanne pressed her arms to her belly, her heart wild. An invisible pressure wrapped around her existence, tugging at it.

  Ryan…

  She licked her lips, frowning at her father. “Do you know what he’s done to me? Tell me. Please! I need to know. I need to understand it so I can fight it!”

  Julian’s eyes narrowed some more. He slowly circled her, trailing the tip of the blade over her skin. The contact burned like a soldering iron and she winced, jerking away. What was he doing? Why was he doing it? It was like he was threatening her. Or more to the point…taunting her, like he would one of his downed prey.

  He chuckled. “Well, I guess it was bound to happen eventually,” he murmured behind her.

  Touching her shoulder—no wound? How could it hurt so much and not leave a wound?—she frowned at him. “What? What are you not telling me?”

  His lips pulled away from his teeth in a smile devoid of warmth. “So many things, child. Things you couldn’t hope to understand. Tell me, what do you remember of your mother?”

  Deanne’s stomach lurched. She hugged herself again. She felt…weird. “My mother? I don’t…what’s my…what does she have to do with this?”

  Julian chuckled again. And then leaned close to her. So close she could see the veins in his eyes. “You can feel it, yes? Calling to you?”

  “Y-yes.”

  “The same way you always have? You have been able to detect dragon shifters better than anyone else. I know that. It’s because you’ve felt them, yes?”

  She drew in another breath. Her soul ached. Craved. It made no sense but it was the only way she could think to describe it. “Yes,” she answered.

  What was going on?

  “But this dragon…you feel it more,” her father said, his voice low. “You feel him more.”

  “I do,” she confessed. “Why? Can you stop it? What has he done to me?”

  “If I were to ask you to go to it right now, you would be able to. Without even knowing where it was. Wouldn’t you?”

  It was a ridiculous suggestion, and yet Deanne recognized the truth in it. She could. And if she were to stay where she was, Ryan would be able to come to her.

  And if he did…

  She dropped her burning gaze to the blade in Julian’s hand. A blade as ancient as the very beasts the Extraho Venator hunted.

  Tell me, what do you remember of your mother?

  You’re a dragon. Behave like one for a fucking second…

  …you just happened to exude the same pheromones as female dragon…

  …it was bound to happen eventually…

  The words—Ryan’s and her father’s—whispered in her head, warring with her sanity.

  She snapped her stare up to Julian’s face. “What’s going on?”

  “Can you find it for me, Deanne?” he asked, his eyes feverish and yet cold at once. “Can you find the dragon that fucked the fire into you?”

  You’re a dragon. Behave like one for a fucking second…

  “Father…” She swallowed. “Tell me what’s going on? Why did the blue flames not kill me? Why did Ryan say I smelled like a female dragon? What…”

  You’re a dragon. Behave like one for a…

  “I’ll tell you later, child.” Julian drew closer. Deanne frowned. “After you lead me to it.”

  “I sent Ryan flying through the air with a single punch,” she remembered on a breath.

  “Of course you did,” Julian murmured.

  She shook her head. “How could I do that? How could I—”

  You’re a dragon… Ryan’s statement whispered through her head again.

  “Find it for me,” her father said, stare locked on hers. “Lead me to it so I can kill it.”

  …exude the same pheromones…

  …my Fire Mate…

  …dragon…

  Tell me, what do you remember of your mother?

  Deanne shrank away from Julian. Her head roared. Her heart pounded, harder than ever.

  Oh God. Oh God.

  Oh God.

  Julian watched her, expression revealing nothing. Nothing. No concern, no elation. Nothing.

  “Lead me to the Y Ddraig Goch,” he instructed, inching closer to her again. “So I can—”

  An invisible inferno blasted out of Deanne.

  She had no idea how, but it did. She saw the skin of Julian’s face blister, saw his eyelashes and eyebrows singe, a split second before he arced across the room as if slammed by a wrecking ball.

  He smashed into the wall. The framed paintings on it clattered to t
he floor, their surfaces charred. The glass shattered.

  Deanne noticed the shards tumbling free of the frames were beginning to melt, and then she noticed nothing but the room blurring as she turned and fled from the suite.

  If Julian followed her, she didn’t know. If he lay dead amongst the glass and paintings back in the suite, she didn’t know that either.

  She sprinted for the stairs. Down them.

  The musty coolness of the stairwell offered little comfort to the blaze inside her. As did the booming echoes of her feet—and her feet alone—pounding the steps.

  What felt like a few seconds later, but surely had to be longer, given her father’s suite was on the twenty-fourth floor, she burst into the lobby.

  A distant part of her brain told her heads swung her way. That same part recognized shocked confusion on the faces of the people in the lobby as she ran for the entry door.

  She didn’t slow.

  She had to get out. She had to—

  Fly.

  The notion swept through her, powerful and intoxicating. Heat razed her flesh.

  No, she screamed wordlessly, increasing her speed.

  She needed Ryan. She needed to find the bastard and find out what was going on.

  At the thought of his name, something unseen and undeniable fisted in her soul and yanked.

  She ran blindly through the dawn Chicago streets. What few people she encountered leapt out of her way.

  She didn’t apologize or thank them.

  All she could do was run, pulled toward an unknown destination, her body on fire.

  …what do you remember of your mother…

  …exude the same pheromones…

  The words assaulted her. She ran faster. Her lungs burned. Her muscles did the same. More than once, an agony unlike any other tore at her bones, making her stumble. Each time she shut out the pain, all too aware how enticing and seductive the sensation was, and ran faster.

  She turned corners. Sprinted the lengths of blocks.

  With every pounding footfall, the tug on her very existence grew more powerful, until she was sure she was about to be crushed by it even as she ran.

  And then she saw him running toward her.

  The moment his stare found hers, the insistent pull on her body vanished, but not the fire. Not the hunger.