Page 62 of Spike

"You'll wait here until Jack's ready to see you," Clive said with a sneer. "I hope you have all your affairs in order because you'll never see your grizzly protector again."

Despair hit me at those words, but a spark of defiance still lit inside of me.

"Will Jack really risk a war with the Grizzly Reapers MC?" I asked. "Because make no mistake, my mate will come for me, and he won't be alone."

Clive scoffed. "Let them come. We have a dragon."

"A brainwashed dragon," I muttered.

I was tempted to tell him we also had Colin, but hesitated at the last second. A wild idea came to me.

What if Draven neglected to tell Jack and the other werewolves about Colin’s existence? After all, Spike mentioned he didn’t see any of Jack’s wolves in the woods, only Draven was there.

Was Draven not completely under Jack’s control as we initially thought?

I remained silent and Clive and the other werewolf finally left. Alone in my dark and dirty cell, Clive's words played repeatedly in my head.

No doubt Jack's plans for me would end with me dying agonizingly slow. And Spike... my mate must have noticed my absence by now.

I knew Spike. He would come right for me... and what then? Draven would burn him and any other grizzly shifter with Spike to a crisp.

The thought was unbearable to me. Exhausted, I dozed off, only to be awakened by the sound of my cell door opening.

A tall, dark-haired man with gold and black eyes entered the cell. Not one of the wolves.

I backed into a corner, but he only set a water bottle and a plate with a sandwich on the floor.

This was my only chance to see if Draven was truly Jack’s creature or if he still had a mind of his own.

"Draven?" I asked in hesitation.

Draven kept his distance from me, watching me rather cautiously. Was he only here to talk? Talking was something I could do. In fact, it was a welcome distraction from my depressing thoughts.

"You know the grizzly intruders who entered the wolves' territory," Draven began.

"One of them is Spike, my mate," I answered.

"And the white dragon with them...?" Although Draven tried to sound neutral, I could hear the hunger in his voice. He badly wanted to know who Colin was.

"His name is Colin," I replied.

Draven's gaze darkened. "And is Colin a captive of the grizzly shifters?"

"No," I blurted out. "He's happily mated to one of them."

Draven seemed to relax at those words.

"I had never met one of my kind before," Draven murmured, and I detected a hint of sadness in his voice.

Spike was wrong about this dragon shifter, I realized. Draven wasn’t dangerous, not really. He was simply…lonely and I knew a thing about that.

Before Spike entered my life and changed my entire world, I felt terribly alone especially after my dad passed away.

"Never?" I prodded.

Draven nodded. "I lived on my own, far from civilisation for a very long time and was minding my own business until..." He trailed off, looking angry now.

"The Payne witches came?" I ventured.

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