Page 59 of Dragon's Code

“Plan F?” Kash asks.

I glance up at him and then glance over at Declan. “Yeah for totally fucked.”

Declan smirks. “You got it.”

Kashton squeezes my hand again reassuringly.

“This can’t be a coincidence,” I say, getting serious again.

“What do you mean?” Kash asks me.

“You guys all get together in one place. Jasmine comes here on the orders of her king to spy on all of you. She claims to be Kashton’s mate for reasons unknown. There just happens to be someone killing potential dragon mates. Now there’s a freaking army out there, demanding that all supernaturals be brought out and for what? To be shipped to a camp for a holocaust? One thing would be a coincidence. This was planned.”

Everyone in the room goes still, all processing my words, the silence growing heavier and racking up anxiety and dread.

Kashton’s hand drops out of mine and he steps forward and slams his fist on the table. “We’re idiots and now we’re in the thick of it.”

“Kash,” I say gently. “I think I need to go with Raphael the next time he shows himself. And he will show himself.”

Kash spins around so fast it startles me. “What? No. Why?”

I don’t like this idea any better than he does, but I have to do something to help. I don’t want to be the princess stuffed up in a tower waiting for her Prince Charming to arrive to save me.

When I was a little girl, that was what I wanted. I wanted to be rescued. Then I had to rescue myself when my own father turned his back on me. Then I knew that if I was going to live in this world I’d have to learn to save myself again and again. Except…Kash has always been there for me, so I haven’t been alone. He’s been my one saving grace.

Now I can finally do something for him. Something that could make a real difference.

“He’s here for a reason. I’m guessing, my gut tells me, that he needs me for something. And he’s here for Grey. If he’s a techno fae, I’m guessing that means he’s good with technology. How do you think they’re getting addresses for these potential mates or whatever? I don’t know how they’re being located…”

Penelope chimes in. “It’s a spell. It produces a name and a location.”

My brow furrows. “So the Terminator goes down the phonebook and kills everyone in that city with that name?”

“There’s a little more to it than that,” Penelope explains. “The spell connects to the mate directly. And the location is not like a city. It’s like GPS accurate to a couple of feet.”

“Oh. Well, that’s handy. That’s how you figured out that I’m someone’s mate.”

“Not someone’s,” Kash growls. “Mine.”

I glance at him but don’t reply. Now’s not the time to argue about whether he’s ever going to actually claim me, if he doesn’t want me in this mess, if he doesn’t want me to turn into a dragon. “Someone needs to interrogate Jasmine and get to the bottom of what she’s actually doing here. I’ll go with Raphael and attempt the same. The rest of you figure out how you’re going to stop the army of hillbilly sons-of-assholes from finding out that there is a hotel full of dragons and their friends. And if it means shifting into dragons and lighting them up, then so be it. You guys have been hiding for centuries. Long enough that humans forgot you existed. You can hide again.”

“It’s a different world now,” Jerrick says, “but I agree with your assessment. We’ll figure it out if we have to go into hiding. There are plenty of places dragons can get that humans can’t, at least not easily.”

“I am not okay with this,” Kashton says to me.

“I don’t care, Kash. This isn’t your call to make.”

He glances at everyone. “I’m going to be the one to talk to Jasmine.”

“Not alone,” Jerrick snaps.

“Fine.” Kash points at me. “Athena and I are going to have a private chat first.”

He grabs my wrist and all but drags me from the conference room into another smaller room. He pushes me up against the wall, his hand goes around my throat, and he presses against me.

“You’re not going to let Raphael get close to you, let alone take you away from me,” he snarls.

His hand around my throat isn’t tight. It’s possessive. It’s demanding. It’s not threatening. It’s comforting. Not at all like the nightmares I have about Raphael or the men who took me all those years ago.

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