Page 69 of Dragon's Code

Jerrick and Jonathan appear above me.

“Athena was taken by her stalker ex-boyfriend, but she told Jonathan that she was going with him willingly. Any idea what the fuck your girlfriend is doing?”

“She actually fucking did it? I thought she was kidding. She wanted to help. She wanted to…help.” I sag against the bed and stare up at the ceiling. “She wanted to fucking help.”

“That’s a good thing, is it not?”

“Let me ask you how happy you’d be if Anya decided she wanted to help out her stalker ex-boyfriend who is also a fae and possibly working for fucking Grey?”

Jerrick growls loudly.

“Exactly. Now let me fucking go.”

“I’m afraid not. I told Miss Athena I would not let you go after her. Furthermore, I’m not going to let you shift and escalate our current predicament.” Jonathan’s voice is stern, but his eyes remain kind and sympathetic.

The steam flows right out of me and I sag on the bed, letting the tension ease out of my limbs so I’m not pulling on the bindings anymore. I realize that if I shift now and go after her, I’m putting a lot of people in danger, including her.

My dragon however, hasn’t calmed down one iota. In fact, as I try to make my body relax, my dragon gets angrier. Scraping and scratching, pushing and charging, trying to shove his way into my limbs, my head, to take over. Shifters can lose control. It happens more often than any of us would like to admit, but Athena is the strongest person I know and if she went willingly, if she made the choice to do something, I have to respect that.

My dragon doesn’t want to respect her choice, though. He wants to plow through the army outside and find her and rip Raphael’s head off his shoulders and eat it.

“My dragon’s pissed,” I mutter.

“We know,” Jerrick says. “Your dragon is looking through your eyes. The only reason why you haven’t shifted is because of the cuffs that are on you.”

I give him a curt nod. I hadn’t realized the cuffs were shifter cuffs, just like the ones they put on Jasmine. Made by clan witches, they keep dragons from shifting. I’ve heard the other shifters have something similar. I’ve never been in them, but I can feel their power now that I’m paying attention.

The more I focus on the outside world, focus on staying in my body, the less power my dragon has inside of me. The more he has to be a passenger inside of me until it’s time to let him out. I know that it's going to happen. Men with guns don’t show up to not use them.

When he does come out, he’s going to slaughter.

Jerrick lets out a low whistle. “You, my friend, have amazing power over your dragon. If my mate wasn’t under this roof, my dragon would’ve taken me immediately. No questions about that.”

Jonathan leans over and unlocks the cuffs.

“Might not be a bad idea to keep a few of those on hand,” I mutter as I sit up once I’m free.

My dragon gives a tentative push against my skin, but I ease my hand down my chest trying to soothe him. “We’ll get her back,” I mumble.

The growl in my chest lets me know that he’s listening. For now.

I stand up. “How long was I out?”

“Not very long at all,” Jonathan says. “Miss Athena is amazingly intelligent.” He points at the multi-screen wall across the hallway. “We already have eyes on her because of everything she set up.”

“Show me.”

Jonathan and Jerrick lead me into the room and I see how big the security command center really is. There are four people manning it. More of Jerrick’s trusted guards. There is video feed after video feed of the strip, inside other hotels, and in some of the shopping areas.

“She did all of this. I know she’d tapped a few, but not this many.” I look from screen to screen to screen.

Jonathan points to a screen that is an empty conference room. “She’s behind that door.”

“Where is that?” I ask.

“Not entirely sure,” Jonathan says. “She didn’t tell me where this was when the feed dropped into my inbox. It was the last thing she sent.”

“She didn’t send this,” I say.

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