Henchgirl (Dakota Kekoa Book 1) (19 page)

This obviously wasn’t Wyvern’s first time here. The little crater was littered with valuables, watches for the most part, he also had home items, gold vases, a full bronze statue, and all sorts of little treasures, all lying about haphazardly.

The word nest came to my mind.

Trove.

I knew what it was; he had made himself a little hoard.

What I was searching for with my gaze sat at the top of the incline nearest to me, an open duffle bag filled with neatly folded clothing.

I would have to turn my back on Wyvern to crawl up to the bag, and I thought crawling was all I could possibly manage.

Crawl or freeze? I would rather freeze.

Wyvern either followed my gaze or saw my teeth chattering; he climbed the hill and carried down the duffle-bag.

Wyvern took a seat on my left side, my weak side, with the excuse of pulling clothes out for me.

I did not like it, but did not want to give him the satisfaction of seeing me scoot away either.

I knew I left myself open for attack as I pulled the sweatshirt over my head and slipped sweatpants up my legs under my tattered dress. I risked it. I did not even try to get my left arm into the sleeve.

Wyvern had positioned himself in my weakest spot, all he needed was to touch my injured arm and I would be down, but I would have to do a full turn to attack with my good arm. I knew it, he knew it, and it was a statement that I could not ignore. I was not out of his claws yet. Worse, I was now in his nest.

I pivoted only slightly, I did not want him thinking I was planning anything but he was too smart to assume that I just wanted a clearer view of his face.

He had barely a scratch on him that I could see. Great, he probably healed when he transformed like a werewolf, no weak points to utilize. And me, I was one big vulnerable wound.

I stared right up into his dark brown eyes, he was examining me too. “I would thank you for setting my arm if you had not broken it first by turning into a hideous dragon and throwing trees at me like javelins.”

“Most women tell me my dragon form is beautiful,” he said with a little smirk playing across his lips.

“Women will say almost anything when they’re begging for their lives,” I said, and rolled back my good shoulder. Stiff did not begin to explain how my back felt.

His smirk turned into a grin and for a second I saw the same smile that he had given my little sister, but it vanished leaving his features blank. He said, “So, your aspect is singing.”

I just rolled my eyes; I did not have enough energy to pretend.

“Not a singer, then,” he said, his silver-white eyebrows rose up his forehead. “Shocking. What is even more surprising is that your grandfather included combat training in your etiquette classes. I mean, since he told us he had only one female soldier and you weren’t her.”

A flare of that all too familiar rage bubbled out of him and without thinking I grabbed his hand and drained it into me. And that was when I realized my ring was missing.

“Ahhh!” I screamed into his face, so angry I could not think, “What did you do to my ring?”

Wyvern’s eyes widened in shock and he tried to yank his hand from mine; I should have let him, his emotions were too much for my mostly human body. His rage pumping into me intensified how weak I felt. Yet, for some reason my fingers tingled and did not want to let go of him.

“My ring! Give me my ring!” I shouted.

Wyvern stretched out, plucking a little black ring from the red dirt. Not letting go of his hand, I lifted my finger so he could slip the ring onto my finger.

“Open it!” I demanded, my voice was low and grating.

He leaned down; examining the ring, then snapped it open.

My whole body sagged as the rage drained into the ring. The rage would act as a beacon for my grandfather, so now I just had to survive until my grandfather found me.

Wyvern shook his head like he was trying to dislodge something, then blinked rapidly. “You’ve made your point. Stop doing what you’re doing in my… mind.” He hesitated before the word mind and I knew why, I wasn’t in his mind, emotions had little to do with the mind and everything to do with the soul.

I did not stop, I gripped his hand tighter because I sensed the shape of his soul once more and it was different than last night, well not different exactly, but contained. Like he had stuffed that enormous dragon soul into something much smaller, and it was tightly bound.

I could not help but wonder, did I actually put a small piece of my soul into his massive soul?

I seriously hoped not.

Backing away from the compound that was his soul, I read through his surface emotions; fear, he was racked with fear, sadness, anger, guilt, and the three from last night, pride, protectiveness and that strong possessiveness.

I threaded my fingers through his and was shocked when tingles spread through my hand and his soul vibrated a pulse of desire.

Suddenly, I was on my back on the dirt. Wyvern’s hand held my throat without pressing into it. Somehow, with this move Wyvern had managed to not injure my shoulder further as he pushed me back.

He said calmly, “If you don’t let go of my mind voluntarily, I’ll put you to sleep and then you’ll have to let go.”

“Afraid?” I asked.

“You have me at a disadvantage, you open your mind to me and I’ll allow you to continue in mine,” he said.

“I can’t,” I said.

“Of course you can’t,” he said.

I was not sure I wanted to feel his emotions anymore, anyhow.

Desire? For me? Doubtful.

More likely he just liked his dates black, blue and bloody. The psycho.

I pulled back my power and stopped combing through his emotions. When I tried to let go, he would not release my hand, nor did he move off me.

“I know who you are, Dakota. I’ve heard of your grandfather’s little ‘henchgirl.’ Your power is too unique to have not reached my ears.”

His face darkened and I felt the anger resurge, zinging through his hands. He leaned his face down, his nose almost brushing mine. “Did you really think I wouldn’t figure it out?”

I was going to argue that I was not really hiding what I was, but all the evidence was to the contrary; the first two times he met me, I was playing human, the third I was a ‘singer.’

“Sing for me now little henchgirl,” he whispered, almost tenderly down to me, “Tell me all about your assignment and what happened to Honua.”

My mind screeched to a halt. What happened to Honua…um, I was missing something. I said, “I ran into the Hale’s house to find her but then you made like a catapult with automobiles. I did not have enough time, which was your fault, Sir Psycho.”

He examined my face slowly; the smile he gave me was surprisingly gentle, considering he had me by the throat and all. “You continuously amaze me,” he said, “I can smell your fear, it’s like a thick, sweet perfume spraying from your glands, yet you keep insulting me.”

Well, that answered one question. I responded, “The insulting thing is a disorder, it’s involuntary. Don’t pay any attention.”

“We both know that I am not stupid enough to believe that it was a coincidence that your assignment was to pretend to be a human at Honua’s school. You’re the only teenager I met in your family pretending to be human. Honua loves you, you got close to her, gained her trust, and now she’s missing.”

Wowzer, that did sound bad; if the situation was reversed, I would not believe me either. My usual line that I gave to my relatives that: ‘I played human to better the family’s access to the human community,’ would just confirm his distrust in me.

I inhaled and met his eyes, then I admitted to him, “Yes, I go to a human school because I have an assignment there, but I promise you, Honua is not my assignment—”

“You think I’m stupid, then?” His nostrils flared. He was too close, his face just over mine, his breath warming the cold air with that same hot sweet-pepper scent.

“No,” I said, completely serious. “I’m telling you the truth.”

A shuffling sound drew both of our attentions away from each other.

My grandfather stood at the top of the little dirt dune across from us, glaring down. He pointed a rifle, sighting Wyvern down the barrel. “Get off my granddaughter!” His voice was thick with a familiar rage. For a second, I thought it was my true grandfather and not a doppelganger, as he absolutely pulsed with the white hot rage that sung with Wyvern’s energy. Then a line of doppelgangers stepped up beside him, all armed with rifles, all oozing rage.

This was interesting.

His doppelgangers circled the small canyon on all sides, and I could see the tops of the heads of more doppelgangers lining up behind the first row.

Wyvern was not stupid; he stayed exactly where he was.

“What have you done with my sister?” Wyvern shouted, his own anger building in him. The moment his emotion rose, I pulled it from where his arm brushed against me, my grandfather’s doppelgangers’ eyes widened as the doppelgangers’ clouds of rage expanded.

“Who is your sister?” My grandfather demanded, a couple more of his doppelgangers aiming at Wyvern.

“I’m tired of this,” Wyvern said, sounding just that, “You assigned this soldier to get close to my human sister, my sister is missing, it’s obvious who has her. Give me Honua, I’ll give you your granddaughter, it’s an even trade.”

“I have no human girls to trade, I knew of no sister. All I have is insulted hospitality and a cherished granddaughter injured at your hands.” When my grandfather was really pissed off, he started being poetic, it was probably because he was so old.

“Swear you don’t have Honua and I will give you Dakota.” My grandfather did not hesitate. The crowd of his doppelgangers parted and my true grandfather stepped through. He was unmistakable, the rage had transformed his face, his cheeks had hollowed and jutted out of his skin which had tightened to thin leather. He might still be wearing the same tuxedo from the party yet he had a distinctly reptilian look to him.

It was entirely my fault. I seriously hoped it was not permanent. Did ‘my bad’ cover it? Somehow, I did not think so.

Even though my grandfather was putting his worst face forward, it did not seem to have any effect on Wyvern. Wyvern stayed completely still perched over me, his fingers still on my throat as my grandfather neared us.

My grandfather stopped near a gem encrusted dagger that I recognized; it had been a wall piece in the Volcano Resort. The hand that my grandfather used to pick up the dagger, had what looked a lot more like claws than fingers.

My grandfather drew the blade slowly across his other palm, splitting open the skin. He turned his hand dripping spots of crimson on the red dirt. He said, “I swear that I did not know you had a sister until you told me from your own lips. I swear that I did not kidnap your sister nor did I order anyone to do so or have any knowledge that it was committed before you told me. I swear this and if I have lied may I be dragged to serve in my father’s halls for eternity.” He flicked out one more spray of blood then ordered, “Now give me my granddaughter!”

Wyvern turned to again face me, this time his nose did brush mine. “It’s your turn.”

“That wasn’t part of the deal!” my grandfather said, snarling.

“No, I want to,” I said, meeting Wyvern’s gaze. “Otherwise, he won’t believe me.”

I knew that my grandfather did not want me to do it. Swearing to a half-dragon, especially when blood was involved was stupid all around, even they were afraid to do it to each other. But I did not want to run the risk of him smiting or slaying me, or anything else that sounded cool but was not, if Wyvern thought I was the one who kidnapped his sister.

“Are there any other blades here?” My grandfather asked, dropping his bloody dagger to the dirt. Three of his doppelgangers descended the slope searching the items strewn among the rocks.

“Yeah, seven,” Wyvern said.

My grandfather kicked another vase I recognized from his resort. He said, “I’ll be expecting compensation for the items you took from my properties.”

“My steward handles that,” Wyvern said, keeping his gaze on mine.

Maybe it was because having him so close, staring into my eyes was making me seriously uncomfortable, or maybe it was because the threat to my life was becoming less and less believable, my mouth spoke before my mind thought, again. I whispered, “So you’re a stuck-up, psychotic, man eating dragon and a kleptomaniac. Wow, the list just keeps getting better and better.”

The grin that spread over his face was so smoldering I swallowed involuntarily. He whispered back, “You have no idea. And I only eat smart-asses.”

“I’ll need my hand back,” I whispered.

He gave me a smirk and slowly untwined his fingers from mine.

One of the doppelgangers dug a dagger from the dirt and cleaned it on the inside of my grandfather’s suit jacket. The doppelganger handed the dagger to my outstretched right hand.

It was a show of respect that my grandfather did not shout instructions at me. I knew what he would have said if Wyvern was not there, ‘most importantly, make every statement only refer to the past, be as specific as possible, promise nothing that is out of your control, and say nothing that could be interpreted as a promise for the future.’

I used my right hand to uncover my left hand from the sweatshirt and without hesitating drew a long cut in my palm. It hurt, but as everything else on that side of my body hurt much more, the pain was overshadowed. With effort, I turned over my palm to drip blood on the dirt and returned my gaze to meet Wyvern’s once more.

Speaking slowly, I chose each word with a surgeon’s precision, saying, “I swear that I had no conscious knowledge that Honua was your sister until you drove me to the Hale’s mansion yesterday. I swear, that to my knowledge at this time, I received no orders in the past that intended harm towards Honua in any way. I swear that if I played any part in Honua’s disappearance yesterday, it was without my knowledge or my intention that Honua would disappear, be taken, or otherwise extracted against her will or with her permission from the Hale estate yesterday. If I am lying, may I be dragged to serve in my great-grandfather’s halls for eternity.”