Page 82 of The Dragon's Mate

She looked away. “I spend time with Bishop,it would have been difficult to keep it a secret from his other friends.”

“Is that right?” he said.

“Yes.” Fuck, she hated lying to Bren. Itmade her feel awful and like she was betraying him somehow.

He let go of her hand and she missed thecontact of his warm skin almost immediately. “A year or so ago, I had a murdercase. A woman who worked as an emergency nurse was being stalked by one of herpatients.”

“Bren -”

“That’s how I met Ava. She was the nursebeing stalked. She and her friend were out one night, and they were attacked.The friend – Brody – was killed. Do you know how he died, Kaida?”

He didn’t wait for her reply. “He wasburned to a crisp. Nothing but ash and fragments of bone. The medical examinerhad never seen anything like it. I never caught the guy who did it. He just…stopped stalking Ava. Seemed a little odd to me, but what could I do? Thecase went cold and Brody’s murderer was never punished. There was no justicefor his death.”

“There was,” she whispered.

He reached out and grasped her chin gently,lifting until she was staring at him. “The stalker that was after Ava. He wasa dragon, wasn’t he?”

“Yes. He belonged to Avena’s clan. Hebelieved that a female in the clan was his mate even though she was mated toanother. He murdered her mate. Avena and the rest of the council banishedhim. Only something went wrong. He went mad but he didn’t kill himself. He cameto this city, discovered Ava, and decided she was his mate. He went after her afew times but Bishop and Kat and Mal – they stopped him.”

“What happened to him?” Bren asked.

“Once we realized it was a rogue dragon andwhich clan he belonged to, Avena and the others came to the city to destroy him.Only, he had gone after Ava again and this time he was successful.”

“Holy shit,” Bren said.

“He took her into the woods, tried to hideher, but…” she hesitated, “we can sense the other members of our clan. If we concentratehard enough, our dragons can find each other. His clan council searched for him.They found him and…”

“And killed him,” he said.

“They had no choice, Bren. He had gonemad. He’d killed a dragon and a human and he would have hurt Ava.”

Bren released her chin and ran both handsthrough his hair. “Has something like this ever happened before? A dragongoing mad but not killing themselves?”

“Never,” she said. “But it hasstrengthened Cadmus’s belief that banishing dragons from their clan is wrong.”

“You think?” he spat.

She flinched, and he immediately reached outand took her hand again. “I’m sorry. This is a lot to take in and I…”

“I know,” Kaida said. She stared at theirclasped hands as silence fell between them. After a few minutes, she said, “Weshould get some rest.”

“Yeah.” He released her hand and laid down,turning over until his back was facing her.

Her dragon growled unhappily, and she triedto soothe it. Truthfully, she was feeling rather miserable herself. Bren was disgustedby her and her clan and there was nothing she could say or do to fix it. Whatthey did was terrible and there was no justifying it.

You have bigger issues than Bren nolonger being into you.

She wanted to keep ignoring her innervoice, but it had been growing steadily louder all evening and it would nolonger be ignored.

They will kill Bren when they find out heknows dragons exist. The council will vote, and they will vote to destroy him.It’s bad enough that he’s human but his father…

She laid down, her pulse jumping and thuddingand her dragon growling repeatedly. Bren had done them a favour by allowingSika to give birth in his home. She would explain that to the council and theywould see that they owed him a debt. If the hatchling had been born on the sideof the road in plain sight of any human driving by…who knew what would have happened.

She would explain that to the council and theywould let Bren live. They had to.

And if they don’t? If they vote to burnhim alive?Her inner voice whispered.

Her dragon snarled with an intense furythat Kaida had never felt before.

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