Page 18 of Forked Tongues Are Fun
“I didn’t put— Never mind,” I said through clenched teeth. There was no time for explanations, especially since they were all crazy. “Do I look like a dragon shifter now?”
“Fuck no.” She took up her cigarette again from the ashtray. “You’re missing the hoity-toity attitude and the complete disregard for humans.”
“Close enough.” I clambered into the front seat and nearly fell to the ground when I elbowed open the van. Precious seconds flew past as I tried to get my feet underneath me, let alone take a step with these damn heels on. “Wish me luck?”
“You don’t need it, Booklet.”She shook her head as her thick lips wobbled some, and she pressed them together. “I only wish I’d known you when my Ashley was sacrificed. I know you could’ve saved her.”
I didn’t know what to say to that, so I didn’t say anything. I just shut the door and slapped the van twice as a thank you. I was terrible with those, mostly because I’d never had anyone to say it to. No one had ever done a damn thing for me except Asa. Until Bad Mama. Until the three dragon shifters.
As soon as I rescued Asa, I would learn how to say it properly.
My heart raced the dragon fire faster through my veins as I lifted my gaze to the clock attached to the tower of a nearby building. Thirty minutes. Thirty minutes before the full-moon ritual in which my brother would be sacrificed.
On trembling legs that were only just barely supporting me, I started across the street toward the dragon shifters’ lair.
Chapter Seven
Apower couple beatme to the front glass door of the Vivix building, both of them dressed with a crispness and polish that made me feel like a slob in comparison even in my amazing royal blue gown. It was obvious I didn’t fit in here. Even more obvious when the guard blocking the way on the other side of the door ignored the power couple as they passed by him and flicked his gaze to me.
Shit. Had they handed him an invitation? I hadn’t even seen. The weight in his stare cramped my gut, like he expected me to produce something, todosomething. Like what? I had nothing. No way would I come this close to saving Asa, only to fail at walking through the door because I didn’t have an invitation.
No.Relax, I told myself, but my shredded nerves weren’t having any of that.
I reached out to grasp the thick golden handle on the door just as it was shutting, lifted my chin, and breezed inside, just as I had at the three dragon shifters’ home hours ago. This would not be the hard part. I refused to let it be. I lifted my eyebrow at the guard, daring him to stop me as I walked right on by.
He winked, and let me.
Thank fuck. I must’ve still reeked of sex and come and was a walking billboard for dragon shifter mating season. But if it got me this far, I’d take it.
Dragon shifters milled around everywhere with glittering stemware between their fingers and their huge, gaudy rings clinking against the glass. Some of them funneled up a short set of stairs through large double doors flanked by two enormous marble dragons. Their wings were folded to their sides, yet their stance was threatening, almost mid lunge, their teeth a row of sharp reminders of what I was walking into—the belly of the beast.
Through the double doors were more dragon shifters than I’d ever imagined there could be. Easily a thousand, packed tight in this massive room, and this was just the first floor of this building. How on earth would I walk out of here with Asa, still very much a human kid, and no one noticing?
Panic collected at the base of my spine and threatened to buckle it. Someone walked by with a tray of champagne glasses, the pink bubbly drink filled high enough to flirt dangerously with the edges. I reached out and snagged one, and downed it in one fluid motion.
This was my most important job, one I’d worked on for an entire month since the second after I’d discovered Asa missing, and I was cracking under the pressure. I couldnotfail. Not at this. If I saved Asa but the dragon fire killed me anyway, then it was better than him being dead. The world, cruel and devastating as it was, needed his purity and laughter in it.
