Dragon in Denial: Bad Alpha Dads (Taming the Dragon Book 3) Read online

  “Probably.”

  She gave a little eep and tripped over a protruding root as she twisted around and pressed her back to the tree she’d been using to shield herself from view. Ketu moved into her line of vision, stepping around another fat, old oak tree.

  “How did you find me?” she asked, working to regain control of her heart rate.

  “I followed you.”

  She sputtered, “F-followed me?”

  Instead of explaining further, he glanced around at the dense copse of trees and then from the ten-foot fence with rolls of barbed wire lining the top to the vast, empty parking lot that butted up to a handful of old warehouses, all with lights blazing from inside.

  “What is this place?” he asked.

  “What do you care?”

  “Well, besides the obvious, I’m concerned for your safety. You shouldn’t be out here at night by yourself.”

  She snorted. “I can take care of myself. Why don’t you go on back to Detroit and get the hell out of my hair?”

  “Speaking of hair, I like it.” He waved at her windswept curls.

  “Stop trying to be nice.”

  “Fine. Tell me about Henri. I take it his father’s name is Micca? Is he in the picture? Are you mated?”

  Antoinette sighed. “Yes, his father is named Micca. No, he’s not in the picture, and no, I’m not mated. Now, why don’t you go away?”

  “What’s with you? Ten years ago I used to tease you because your stories were so long. Now you barely give me enough information to make sense of anything.”

  “Probably because I don’t really want to talk about it.”

  “Why not?”

  She flung her hands into the air. “I screwed up, okay? I met Micca at a bar. We hit it off. I went back to his hotel with him and we spent the night together. The condom broke. I ended up pregnant. And when I contacted him to let him know, he informed me that he was mated and didn’t want his mate to know he’d messed around on her. So he sent me a big, fat check and told me to have a nice life.”

  “Whoa. Seriously?”

  He didn’t sound condescending. Or critical. Or disapproving. Or anything that Antoinette might have expected from him.

  She sighed again. “Yep. Pretty much. Stupid, huh?”

  “Of Micca, yeah. That kid’s pretty cool. Shame his dad is missing out on all that personality.”

  Her gaze flew to his. He smiled crookedly.

  “Uh, yeah.”

  “So you and Henri live with my parents?”

  She nodded. “Mamá insisted when I told her I was pregnant and the dad wasn’t in the picture. She said every parent needs a village and they had plenty of room. Plus, I think sometimes your mom pretends I’m her daughter. If you told her Henri wasn’t her grandson, she’d probably give you a tongue lashing to end all lashings.”

  “Duly noted. So, you’re a single mom, living with my parents, and what, exactly, do you do for a living?”

  And small talk, over. Antoinette instantly stiffened and shifted her gaze to a whole lot of nothing located over Ketu’s shoulder. She couldn’t admit to him what she really did. It was too dangerous to her own well-being.

  As small of an impact as she made on Darius’s drug trade, it was enough that he had dragons out patrolling, searching for her—well, the mysterious person who kept attacking his dealers—and she didn’t fool herself into believing they just wanted to talk.

  Ketu’s parents knew about her side business and so did Mitch; she’d made the decision to confide her dangerous secret because she knew she could trust them and she had needed to ensure Henri would be taken care of if something happened to her. But Ketu?

  She didn’t even know him anymore. He’d been gone for ten long years, disappeared without so much as a goodbye, and he hadn’t once contacted his own parents during all that time. He claimed he was back in town on his reeve’s orders, but why, exactly, did a reeve from Detroit need to send one of his dragons to New Orleans? And why Ketu? She had far more questions than answers, which translated into not inviting him any further than necessary into her complicated life.

  She cleared her throat. “I tend bar at Mitch’s.”

  His thick, dark brows shot into his hairline.

  “It’s true,” she said, a tad too defensively. “I work days so I can be home with Henri in the evenings.”

  He opened his mouth, then snapped it closed. She watched as his gaze roved over the cluster of warehouses on the other side of the fence. Shit. Of all areas for him to have tracked her down.

  “What’s this place?” he asked again.

  Antoinette looked at the nearest warehouse with all its lights ablaze. On paper, it was a manufacturing facility owned by the Rojo reeve. No one knew what the place was actually supposed to produce, and no one seemed inclined to ask questions, either.

  But Antoinette knew it was where Darius produced and packaged those little figurines filled with dragon’s blood. She’d come here to see if she could catch a glimpse of how the operation was occurring, how those dealers were getting their hands on the figurines once they left this place. Maybe if she could figure that out, she’d find a more efficient way to destroy the trade. Or at least make a bigger impact than she was currently.

  “Some kind of manufacturing facility,” she finally said. “We should probably get out of here.”

  “What do they manufacture here? Does the reeve own it?”

  Leave it to Ketu to ask what no one else dared. Of course, he’d been gone so long, he had no idea how the colony operated anymore.

  When she didn’t reply right away, he shifted his focus to her, and it was like having all the air sucked out of her lungs for a moment when those pale, hazel eyes caught hers. While she struggled to regain her equilibrium, her damn dragon was rolling onto her back, spreading her hind legs and purring like a freaking kitten.

  Yeah, okay, he has nice eyes. Chill.

  And a handsome face. And beautiful, bulky arms. And that flat stomach, those strong legs. What do you think his dragon looks like?

  I don’t care.

  Yes, you do.

  All I want is to destroy the dragon’s blood empire.

  That’s not all you want. We want.

  “You okay?” Ketu asked, his brow furrowed.

  “Yeah, why?”

  “You look…conflicted.”

  She cleared her throat. “I’m fine. Come on, let’s get out of here.”

  He shook his head. “Tell me how I can convince you to trust me again.”

  She rested a hand on her hip and canted her head. “Is this how we’re going to play it? Every time I ask you a question, you counter with one of your own?”

  “Technically, neither one of us asked a question; however, I’d like to point out that you’re doing the same damn thing.”

  Her lips thinned. “We’re never going to get anywhere like this.”

  “I agree. So let’s play nice and maybe we’ll both win.”

  Her dragon definitely wanted to play, but nice didn’t necessarily have to be part of the equation.

  Antoinette rolled her eyes.

  “Your dragon trying to talk you into it?” Ketu said.

  She allowed the smallest of smiles to escape. “Something like that.”

  “Good. I like your dragon already. Now, back to these warehouses. Do you think—?”

  Antoinette caught sight of movement over his shoulder and lunged forward, clamping her hand over his mouth. The brush of his lips while he continued to try to speak for a few seconds was way more tantalizing than it ought to be.

  She grabbed his rock-hard bicep and tugged him forward, wrapping her arms around him and molding her body to his, hopefully giving their hidden audience the impression they were a pair of star-crossed lovers looking for some privacy, and not two dragons scoping out the area, trying to figure out how to destroy the commodity being processed inside. Ketu’s erection began to swell instantly. After a moment, she glanced down between them and then ba
ck at his face as she quirked a brow.

  “Hey, a beautiful woman basically wraps herself around me, things are gonna happen,” he protested.

  “Just any beautiful woman?” Why the hell had she asked that? She didn’t want to know. She didn’t care. She—

  “Actually, no, I don’t think so. Pretty sure it’s you. Ever since—”

  She pressed her fingers to his lips to silence him again. “We’re being watched. No, don’t look around.”

  He shifted his hips and warmth spread from her belly outward.

  “And for the love of the gods, don’t do that.”

  He did it again. She pinched his arm. He chuckled.

  “For your information, these guys don’t fuck around,” she whispered. Flirting with Ketu was as dangerous of a game as stalking these dragon’s blood pushers, in her opinion. Possibly more so. The chances of getting burned were certainly higher when it came to her relationship with Ketu.

  He pushed her hand away from his mouth. “I’m guessing that ten-foot tall fences topped with barbed wire means this is the sort of place people want to keep other people out of.”

  “That would be a logical guess.”

  “Okay, how many are out there?” he whispered, suddenly all business.

  “Not sure. At least three, but I’d bet more.”

  “What’s the best way out of here?”

  Antoinette glanced at the darkened sky. “Flying.”

  “You sure they’re dragons? We don’t need any humans to catch us shifting.”

  She nodded. “I’m sure.”

  “All right, you go first. I’m right behind you.”

  Without any additional warning, he pushed her away. She gave him a quick glance and then turned and ran, summoning the magic as she did so. Her dragon roared in her head, its powerful, leathery wings already spread wide in her mind.

  The tingling sensation raced down her spine, like putting on a sweater loaded with static electricity, as her body began to transform. Her tailbone elongated, her skin turning into scales while spikes formed at the end. Her fingers and toes grew and curled into razor-sharp, black claws, and she pulled them close to her body as wings sprouted from her shoulder blades and began beating faster and faster, lifting her from the ground and taking her toward the clouds.

  A moment later, a different sort of magic washed over her, something she’d never experienced before. Antoinette had lived in New Orleans for her entire life, so she was well aware that dragons were not the only supernatural beings in existence. Gargoyles and witches were also plentiful in this area. She’d even run into a few over the years in her quest to destroy the dragon’s blood trade. But she’d never come into contact with whatever sort of magic they possessed.

  Was that what this was, this foreign sensation now encompassing her entire body? It felt like she was on fire, but it wasn’t painful. It was actually quite…sexual.

  Ketu, Ketu, Ketu, her dragon chanted between pants.

  What the hell is wrong with you, Antoinette asked the beast. He’s right behind… She glanced over her shoulder, and as soon as her gaze clashed with his, she forgot to keep beating her wings for long seconds.

  Antoinette, another voice shouted in her head. A masculine voice.

  Her dragon didn’t have a masculine voice.

  Antoinette, what the hell are you doing? Fly!

  She finally became aware of the fact that she was falling toward the ground at an alarming rate, and willed her wings to flap. They caught air and lifted her, and she allowed herself to be distracted from the fact that, first, she could hear Ketu talking in her head, and, second, she was so outrageously attracted to him at the moment she was desperate to get them both to the ground so she could have her wicked way with him. Wherever the hell they landed didn’t matter. She planned to not even magick her clothing back onto her body when they shifted into human form. She would jump into his arms, wrap her legs around his waist, and—

  Incoming, someone yelled in her head. Not someone—Ketu. That was definitely Ketu’s voice, and since they were in dragon form, he couldn’t very well be talking out loud because dragons couldn’t talk. They could speak telepathically, but in all of her life, the only dragon’s voice she’d ever heard was her own.

  Until now.

  Why can I hear you speaking to me?

  You aren’t going to like my theory, Ketu replied. But let’s deal with the more pressing issue first. Dragons, coming up quick, and they look ready to fight.

  She glanced over her shoulder. Oh shit! Four scaly, red dragons were bearing down on them. One spewed a ball of fire from his massive jaws, close enough that Antoinette could feel the heat.

  Fight or run? Antoinette asked.

  Am I gonna have to worry about them taking you down?

  Hell no.

  Then let’s do it.

  As if they’d discussed the plan more in depth, they turned as one to face their adversaries, and as soon as the four dragons were close enough, Antoinette and Ketu both breathed fire at the same time. One dragon was hit hard enough that he yelped and pulled out of formation, presumably to tend to his wounds. Another simply shook off the singeing heat and continued pressing forward with the other two.

  Focus on that one, Ketu’s dragon said in her head as he nodded at the one with a minor burn on his snout. Together. We knock him out and the odds are much better.

  Got it.

  They both turned their heads slightly to the right and breathed fire at the same time, but the object of their attention twisted to the side and avoided a direct hit. A scant second later, the fourth dragon slammed into Ketu, sending him spiraling through the air like an out-of-control bowling ball.

  Ketu! Antoinette veered left and flapped her wings as hard as she could, chasing him. When he righted himself, his thoughts penetrated her head.

  I’m fine. Quit worrying about me and focus on taking these assholes down. And then another thought hit her with such force she obeyed without thinking:

  Duck!

  A fireball rolled past her, so close it scorched the horns curled over her head.

  Damn it, let’s get this fight under control, she thought.

  Hover and let them get closer, Ketu’s instructions wafted through her mind. And when they’re just about on us, drop low and shoot fire up at their bellies.

  Got it.

  They both held steady, hovering like they were treading water, facing the other four dragons, taunting them. It was working—the four drew closer and closer. One opened his mouth, presumably to let out a belch of fire, and Ketu’s voice in Antoinette’s head yelled, Now!

  They dropped in unison, both lifting their heads and shooting fire upward. One dragon took the brunt of the hit and dropped like a stone. The reverberating crash a few seconds later indicated he hadn’t been able to gain his wings before hitting the ground.

  One down, Antoinette thought.

  Celebrate later, Ketu responded. There are still three to go.

  She nodded at the one they’d hit with their first round of fireballs. On the count of three, charge him, together. She didn’t give Ketu a chance to argue.

  One, two, three!

  Apparently, he knew when to follow directions because they flew toward the injured dragon, who was too slow to get away from them. At the last second, they both turned their backs and slammed into the beast, sending him rolling through the sky much like Ketu had earlier. Except this guy didn’t recover in time. He ended up smashing into a tree and got caught in the sprawling branches. He thrashed around like a fly in a spider’s web, no doubt exhausting himself. The only way out was for him to shift into human form and climb to the ground, where he dropped onto his ass and stayed there.

  Unfortunately, the two remaining adversaries went on the offensive, working together, and all Ketu and Antoinette could do was dodge incoming fireballs and attacks. Antoinette didn’t want to admit it, but she was growing tired. They needed to end this before she couldn’t hang anymore.


  We need to retreat, Ketu said in her head. You’re too tired to keep this up.

  I can handle it.

  No, you can’t. Let’s go.

  He swerved left, and she reluctantly followed as he headed away from the lights of the city, where their dragon forms would melt into the darkness of the sky, making it easier to escape.

  After an exhaustive flight that lasted probably less than an hour but felt more like fifteen, Ketu dropped low to the ground and Antoinette did the same, their presence stirring up birds and swamp creatures alike until he nodded at a rickety dock jutting into swampy water and surrounded by cypress trees, their fat trunks protruding from the murky depths. The dock was attached to an old, wooden shack, and there was a stone gargoyle standing sentry on the end of the weathered planks.

  This is a witch’s home, Antoinette pointed out to Ketu.

  It’s all right, he responded. I have a friend who is a gargoyle.

  Wait, he had a friend who was a gargoyle? When had that happened? Dragons and gargoyles weren’t pals. They didn’t hang out. They basically steered clear of each other.

  If Ketu heard any of those thoughts, he did not respond, instead flying toward the dock and shifting into human form at the last moment, landing with a quiet thud that sent water rippling from the structure. Antoinette tried to land next to him, but she miscalculated and would have tumbled into the murky water had he not grabbed her and pulled her into his arms.

  Which were, wow, really, really strong. And his chest was warm. And solid. She wanted to tug up his T-shirt to see what the muscles underneath looked like.

  Oh shit, she forgot to magick hers back onto her body!

  She quickly did so, ducking her head in case Ketu was able to see her flaming face despite the darkness all around them. “Um, you can put me down now.”

  “Are you sure? I was rather enjoying—”

  “Yes!”

  He put her on her feet, dropping his hands to her waist presumably to help her keep her balance. She pushed him away because, damn it, her entire body had suddenly become an erogenous zone and even though her limbs were so exhausted she wasn’t sure she had the strength to walk toward the shack at the other end of the dock, her dragon wanted to crawl back into Ketu’s arms and convince him to play all sorts of wicked dragon games.