For the Memory of Dragons (13 page)

Terra squeaked in surprise as a hand came
out from behind her and covered her mouth. Something sharp bit into
the skin of her neck, and heat flowed from that point as her
assailant injected her with some unknown substance. Adrenaline
raced into Terra’s system as she realized what was happening. She
had just been drugged! Remembering her self-defense classes, she
went limp in her attacker’s grasp. The hand covering her mouth
slipped away as she dropped unexpectedly. “
Alex!
” she
screamed as she twisted, driving an elbow into the body behind
her.

Apparently, the man attacking her hadn’t
expected her to fight back. He grunted as the well-placed hit drove
the air from his lungs.

Terra scrambled away before he could regain
his grasp on her. The sound of running boots on the hardwood floor
gave her hope. She found a place against the wall and reached up to
the needle still stuck in her neck. Pulling it out, Terra covered
the wound with her free hand. Whatever had been in the hypodermic
was burning its way along her veins. She turned and watched as Alex
came down on her attacker like a fury from hell. The edge of her
vision wavered, and she tilted her head up, trying to stop the slow
spin the world had acquired. It didn’t help. Terra closed her eyes
as the sound of the struggles subsided. Hopefully, Alex had beaten
the crap out of that guy and would know what to do for her. She was
in no shape to make any decisions at the moment.

***

After directing Terra to the bathroom, Alex
turned back to the refrigerator and pulled the door open. There had
to be something in there good enough to eat. He wrinkled his nose
at the contents.
Leftovers and lunchmeats.
True, he wasn’t a
bad cook, but his dragon refused to let him offer her anything but
the best, and these scraps were far from his best. Deciding on the
lunchmeat, he pulled out two packs of cold cuts and some cheese. He
dropped them on the counter and went to the pantry to get a fresh
tomato. What he found there horrified him. One of the tomatoes had
gone bad while he was gone. There was no way he was going to serve
that to his mate!

When that thought hit him, he stopped,
staring at the contents of his cupboard without seeing them. He had
to stop that train of thought right there. Yes, Terra did have the
potential to be his mate, but there was no way he could offer her
that right now. Regaining his memories had been both a blessing and
a curse. Yes, he was in a position to offer her a comfortable life,
but he also had a very stressful job that took up a lot of his
time. He was an Elite in Eternity. A job that few could do. And
with someone killing dragons, his skills would be in more demand
than ever. There was no way he would be able to hold down a healthy
relationship while trying to help investigate the murdered
dragons.

Letting out a deep sigh, Alex picked the
basket of tomatoes up and looked at the ruined fruit. He pulled the
bad one out and dropped it into the waste can. The remaining
tomatoes looked all right. They just needed a good washing. Moving
the basket to the sink, he set about cleaning them as he
thought.

Why did life have to present a mate right
now? Why couldn’t it have been six months ago, before the whole
issue with the solitary dragons list started?
Then he could
have quit Eternity and set about courting his mate properly. No one
would have even questioned him for giving up his job. All of the
men he had gone through training with were already retired. The
only person who had been in the service longer was Daniel, and he
was the king’s right-hand man.

Over the last few years, Alex had been
drifting away from the men he worked with. Their social gatherings
didn’t appeal to him as much as they had in the past. He just
didn’t feel any real connection with the younger crowd rising up
through the ranks. Hell, if it hadn’t been for his job, he would
probably be on the solitary dragons list already.

That thought stopped Alex.
The solitary
dragons list.
All of the missing people had been on that list.
Stepping back into motion, Alex moved the tomatoes to a cutting
board and started to slice them up for sandwiches. His thoughts
churned over everything he had learned about the list of victims
he’d been given. Other than being on the list, there wasn’t much
they had in common. They ranged in age between just over a hundred
to just under five hundred. Their backgrounds were different. Their
habits were different. Their dragon types were different. There
were both males and females. It boggled Alex’s mind as he tried to
figure out what they all had in common. Just that blasted list.

Alex paused again as another thought struck
him.
Maybe that was the connection. They had all been on that
list.
He worked his battered memories to see what he could
recall of the records of old dragons. It took a moment, but
something else occurred to Alex. There were actually two lists of
solitary dragons—those under five hundred and those over five
hundred. The older dragons had lived in a time when it was
dangerous to be dragons and preferred to remain hidden away from
the world. For their peace of mind, only the highest level of
Eternity had access to that list, but Alex was sure he would have
heard if one of the ancient dragons had been killed.

There hadn’t been any noticeable increase in
disappearances of dragons under one hundred. But these dragons
weren’t tracked as closely as the older dragons were. In fact, it
was rather hard to tell the difference between a dragon and a human
unless someone told you. Everything fell into place as Alex moved
on to cutting up the cheese. The individuals who had disappeared
had been targeted
because
they had been on the solitary
dragons list.
That made sense!
Working off the list was the
only way to ensure that the people you were going after really were
dragons. The answer had been staring them in the face the entire
time, and everyone had missed it. Now he just had to figure out how
that list had gotten into the hands of the group responsible for
the murders.

A squeak from the hall drew Alex out of his
thoughts. He looked up from the counter just as Terra screamed his
name. Dropping the half-made sandwich, he bolted from the kitchen
and skidded into the hall. Rage coursed through his veins when he
saw Terra stumble away from a man.
Mine!
Red filled his
vision as he and his dragon roared in anger. The distance to the
intruder disappeared as he barreled into the man, knocking him back
into the wall. Two quick punches had the man down. A few more made
sure he wasn’t going to get up anytime soon.

Alex stepped back and looked at the
unconscious man. His dragon wanted to tear the intruder limb from
limb, but Alex wanted him alive to find out who he was and why he
was there. Pushing down the rage, Alex turned around. There were
more important things to take care of at the moment.

“Terra?” Alex spoke her name softly as he
went to where she was leaning against the wall. She didn’t look
good at all. A trickle of blood ran down the side of her neck from
some kind of wound hidden under her hand. Her fair skin was
flushed, and she was starting to break a sweat. “Terra?” he called
her name again as he reached for her. Pulling her hand away from
her neck, he checked on the wound. It was only a small tear, and it
had almost stopped bleeding already. He pressed his thumb over the
wound to apply the pressure it needed to seal.

The steady pressure drew Terra out of
whatever haze she was in. She tried to focus on him, but Alex could
see there was something wrong with her. Both of her pupils were
blown up huge. Something clattered to the floor next to them.

Alex glanced down at the hypodermic needle
that had fallen from her hand. His eyes came back up to her. Worry
quickened his pulse. “Terra?” he said again as he pulled her into
his arms. Her assailant had to have dosed her with some kind of
drug, but the question was, with what?

“Alex,” she finally answered as she shifted
to lean against him.

A whiff of scent hit him, driving his dragon
to near frenzy. He knew this scent, but it shouldn’t have been
coming from her.
Dragon hormones.
And not the ones that had
been making the rounds in the clubs. These were the hormones put
out by a female dragon at the peak of her fertile cycle. It was one
of the few things that could drive a male dragon out of his mind.
His body tightened with need. This was not going to be pleasant for
either of them. “Come on.” Clamping down on his control, he tried
to ignore the physical reaction he was having to the pheromones
coming off her. They needed help. Badly. There was no telling what
else had been in that needle.

Wrapping his arm around her back, Alex
shifted Terra to his side to help her to the garage door. He opened
it and slammed it shut again. There were two more men in the
garage. He clicked the lock into place and looked back at the man
he had knocked out. No wonder he’d gone down so easily—he had been
cannon fodder, sent in to dose Terra. Then, when the pheromones
bouncing around in her system affected Alex, his buddies would come
in and finish the job.
Who the hell
were
these
people?

“Come on.” Alex coaxed Terra back towards
the living room. Since the garage was blocked, they had to find
another way out. The back door should provide a good exit. The
sound of breaking glass stopped him. Of course, whoever these
people were would have the back of his house guarded as well.
Crap.

For half a second, Alex considered taking
Terra upstairs, but that would corner them. That was a bad idea.
Pushing that thought away, he turned back to the small hall leading
to the garage. “This way.”

Terra nodded and followed his direction.

Running his fingers over the knotty pine
paneling next to the bathroom, Alex found the seam he was looking
for. Digging his nails into the crack, he pulled open the hidden
utility closet. Until a few weeks ago, this space had held his
ageing water heater. Alex had pulled the damned thing out when it
had sprung a leak and ruined part of the wall in his closet.
Instead of replacing the damaged appliance with a new one, Alex had
decided to go with one of those inline water heaters, leaving the
utility cabinet empty.

“Get in.” Alex pushed Terra towards the dark
closet.

She nodded again and climbed inside without
question.

Aww hell.
Terra’s unquestioning
response set all of Alex’s instincts tingling. He had never seen
the new designer drug in action, but he’d read all the reports on
how it affected its victims. They would start out delirious and
move on to highly suggestible. That described Terra’s condition
perfectly. Alex pushed her farther into the closet and climbed in
behind her. Pulling the door closed, he ran through the list of
symptoms, hoping he wasn’t right.

Working around her, Alex reached for the
wall at the back of the closet. Terra let out a soft moan,
confirming Alex’s fears. On top of the female hormones, she seemed
to have been dosed with the drug making the rounds in the clubs.
The next phase would find her insatiable and demanding. This was
the reason getting a rape charge out in court was so hard. You
couldn’t really call it rape when the woman was the aggressor. Even
if she were being driven by a chemical reaction. They needed to get
out of there now. He was barely holding out against the pheromones
as it was. It was going to be even harder when they started
affecting her. Alex shushed her softly and popped the piece of
drywall out of the wall. He’d been working on patching the damaged
wall for a while now, but everything had blown up at work, and he
hadn’t found time to finish nailing the new board in place. Now he
was glad he hadn’t.

The new opening led into the back corner of
Alex’s closet. Sliding the plaster out of the way, Alex guided
Terra out into the open space he had made to work. She moaned again
as his hands touched her. It was not going to be long now before
she completely lost control.

Sliding the closet door open, Alex looked
out into his bedroom. So far, there was no one there. “Come on.” He
pushed Terra out into the open space next to his bed. If he could
just get her outside, he had a plan that might work to get them
away. His hand slid down to the small of her back, driving a much
louder moan from her. There was no way they were going to make it
out if she continued to make sounds like that. He was going to have
to do something fast before the intruders heard her.

Grabbing her in his arms, Alex turned Terra
around and dropped his lips to hers. A zing of lust washed through
him, driving all thought from his brain. He was already hard with
desire, but the taste of her lips drove him to the very edge of his
control. He groaned as he pulled her in against him. Her arms came
around him, and she pressed into his front eagerly. The feel of her
against him was exquisite. All thought of the men invading his home
ran from his mind, and they stood together, lost in each other’s
passion.

A rustle of scales broke through the lust as
the sounds of footsteps on the stairs echoed through the room.
Danger to Mine!
his dragon growled, reminding him of their
situation. They needed to get out of there. He pulled himself away
from Terra’s clutching hands just enough so he could think
again.

Sliding his hands to her hips, Alex pressed
Terra back without releasing her lips. If he could just move them
to the other end of the room, he had a plan for their escape.
Slowly, he walked her backwards across the room. The hungry sounds
she was making were muffled in his mouth. A note of hope crept into
his heart as he continued to kiss and guide her towards the far
wall. Stepping on the heels of his boots, he worked them off as
they went.