Mere Temptation (12 page)

Sidon shouted a curse that had Isa backing away several steps.

Kai moved forward. “The chairman has requested we return to headquarters immediately, and he commands that you accompany us.”

Sidon lifted his head and stood taller. Again it looked to Isa as if he were growing.

“And If I refuse?” His tone was even, but every muscle on his body was primed, and his eyes flashed black

“We are to detain you with force if necessary.” Kai and Laird moved apart to coordinate their attack.

“Fuck you.”

The Council dragons acted in unison—Kai rushing Sidon while Laird morphed slowly into a white dragon. Sidon flashed before her eyes. One minute he was human, the next he was half reptile, his body so enormous he had to bend to fit in the room. The Asian dragon drew his long sword, but Sidon knocked him across the room with his tail. Stumbling up, Kai launched himself at Sidon’s back and climbed up his hindquarters. The half-dragon whipped around. The sword plunged into Sidon’s shoulder, and he tossed Kai against the window-wall, where he slid slowly down to the ground. The white dragon circled as his dazed partner attempted to stand again.

Sidon took his full dragon form—chocolate brown laced through with green—and dove at the white dragon. The enormous reptiles growled and snapped at each other, but the brown one bit hard into his opponent’s neck and swung him toward the door, hurling the human form Kai a moment later. Curving back to half-human, Sidon spoke, his voice magnified like it had been in the cave the day before. “I don’t want to kill you, but I won’t leave the Key unprotected. Now, get the hell off my island!”

Unsurprisingly, Kai spoke. “You’ll lose your standing, Sidon, your position, and any hopes of rising in the Council’s ranks.”

“Yeah, yeah.” The half-dragon scoffed. “I’m
really
upset about that.”

As they left, Sidon turned, bleeding and still savage, back to Isa. Then the monster’s nostrils flared, smelling her fear, and he began to shrink and morph back to a man. His jagged injury healed a bit as he shifted, his tail and hind legs collapsing into human limbs.

“Sidon.” Isa didn’t know what to say, so she decided to go for straightforward. “What is up with the half-dragon thing?”

Shrugging, he said, “It comes from the mere side, I think.”

“And being able to do that makes you more badass than just a plain old dragon?”

He smiled at her, that little glint of conceit on this face. “Well, I guess you could say that. Full-blooded dragons have only two forms, dragon and human. And because they have to go from man all the way to reptile, they take a while to shift. Being half mere means I can shift into a half-dragon form, which is faster.”

“And you figured this out when?”

“During Guardian training. The trainers… Well, they wanted to teach me to shift as quickly as possibly under a variety of circumstances—pain, fear, starvation. I didn’t have any choice but to get faster. Everyone was surprised when I figured out a new form.”

Isa ached a bit for the young boy who had gone through such pain to become stronger. She pressed on. “But why can you make yourself grow bigger?”

“Oh, most dragons can do that” he said in an offhand manner, as if becoming a giant was something people did all the time, like being able to ride a unicycle or do a cartwheel.

“But only a few of us can do it in human form.” He grinned at her full-on now. “Because, sweetheart, I’m just that badass.”

She wanted to smack him but instead took a deep breath and cleared her mind.

“Si, thank you.”

She shielded her eyes beneath her hair, but he ducked to meet them. “What for?”

“For staying.”

“I told you I would.” He said it with a bit of an eye roll, but she caught a hint of frustration as well.

“I know.” She moved into the cage of his embrace and took in his salt-and-sea-and-man smell, allowing his chest hair to tickle against her wet cheek. He was so perfect, she realized. It was her that couldn’t quite fit.

“You know you’re wonderful, right, Si?” she whispered against his skin, half hoping he wouldn’t hear her.

“Yeah, I know.” He lifted her into his arms then and pressed his mouth onto hers, taking her breath away.

* * * *

Karon sucked in the honey-spice scent as he buried his face at the crux of Gracie’s thighs. She’d never let him do this before. He didn’t want to attribute her sudden change of heart to his having shared confidential information. Then again, maybe he didn’t care. Her scent muddied his brain, and he lost himself, and his worries, in her slick wet folds.

“John,” she panted. “Oh, John, that is so good.” He pushed his fingers—two at her pussy and one at her ass—slowly into her as she closed on her peak. Her climax came like a freight train against his hand. The spasms locked soft on his hard fingers. Her juices flowed thick on his tongue like melting sherbet.

Karon kissed his way from her perfectly manicured triangle up the thin line of sweat between her breasts and then over her ripe mouth. She never used to let him kiss her either, but now he did it every chance he got. Her perfect white teeth scraped his tongue and he wondered if the taste on his lips excited her as much as it did him.

When he pulled away, she looked sheepish. “Thank you, John. That was nice.”

“Nice enough to last all day?” He grunted as soon as the words slipped out. He didn’t even know why he asked.

Gracie looked at him a little sadly, reading his meaning all too well. “It would be, but I can only drain a man through his member.”

“Oh.” Karon drew back. He’d been sort of proud to do something just for her. Now he felt like a dumb-ass.

She pressed her graceful hand along his face, and looked into his eyes. “It was wonderful, though. Thank you.”

He tried not to sound too whipped as he said, “Anything else I can do for you, baby?”

Something flashed in her eyes, and he hoped to fucking god it wasn’t pity.

“Do you want to make love to me, Captain Karon?”

He hid his desperation, and caught her hand and pressed it into the thick ridge at his fly.

“You know I do.”

* * * *

“Hello, dragon.” Sidon didn’t recognize the sultry voice on the other end of the line. “I think I have something you want.”

Sidon smirked. It was the woman from the boat. “Really? I wouldn’t be so sure if I were you.”

Her laughter broke like glass. “You want to know what Dendric is up to, right?”

“Of course.”

“Well, I’ve managed to acquire their plans for this island and its inhabitants, but I can’t leave the ship. You’ll have to come and get it. I have the study protocol, schematics of the ship, budgets, and I even threw in some of the background studies. Just in case you want to either fall asleep or vomit.”

“So they’re doing research on mere?” Sidon was unsurprised. Wacky pseudo-scientists were always looking for mermaids. They were just never this well-funded.

“Oh, they’ve already studied them. Now they want to go bigger. They have some crazy plan to use them to create a vaccine that will turn people into monsters.”

“But what does that have to do with the mere?”

“It’s like this. Mere can turn human right? I mean not just human-form, they can become real honest-to-god human.”

“Yeah…”

“Well, can a dragon do that?”

Sidon thought about it for a moment, not getting her meaning. “No.”

“Neither can succubi or other demon-spawn, vampires, or werewolves, or fairies. The mere are the only paranormal type that can change like that. The guy doing the research, Dr. Grathers, he thinks if mere can become human, he can figure out the trigger, reverse it. As you can imagine, that would mean big money.”

“Well, all that is interesting, but how do I get them to leave my island?”

“I can’t help you with that, dragon, I have my own plans. But I’ll give you what I know, and maybe you can figure something out.”

Her voice caught, and Sidon sensed she was readying to hang up the phone. “I’ll come out. I can be there by five p.m. Where do we meet?”

* * * *

Isa puffed up. “But I want to help, Si. I could act as lookout.”

Sidon regarded her with endearment. Too bad that was the last thing she wanted to see from him.

“Sweetie, of course I want you to help me figure this out. You can watch the video feeds and listen to the audio, take notes, and I want to hear what you think. But you’re not going anywhere near that damn boat.”

“I’m not helpless!”

“You’re close enough.”

“Damn you, Si! I am not helpless, I may not be as strong as a marked mere, but I’m fast, really fast for a fry. You’ve even said it yourself.”

“You could be faster if you wanted,” he said quietly.

Isa thought about that for a second. He was right. She could be stronger and faster if she wanted. She could have mere song loud enough not only to communicate over long distances, but to send shock waves through the water. “Listen, Si, let’s just focus on learning what we can about these guys.” She took a deep breath. “And after that I’ll think about how far I’m willing to go to help. I’m not promising I’ll go through the change, but—”

Sidon brought her into the circle of his strong arms. “Seriously Isa, I can handle it.”

She shrugged him off. “Alright fine, go off on your fact-finding mission with the mysterious spy-lady. I’ll just sit here and twiddle my thumbs.” Sarcasm dripped like acid from her words. “Maybe I’ll clean your house and have dinner ready when you get home.”

Roving the house getting ready to leave, he answered absentmindedly, “Yeah, that sounds great, sweetie, thanks.”

Isa knew it was petty, but she barely said goodbye when he left. She flopped down on his office chair and switched on the monitor and began sifting through the feeds of the various areas of the boat. At least she would be able to watch him. Office, deck, hallway, small medical room, holding cells. Horror, cold and raw, crept through Isa’s veins. They’d made another catch, and this one looked bloody. She strained her face to the monitor to watch each little chest rise and fall. They were all unconscious and hooked up to IVs. Armed guards stood nearby. Throwing her clothes off, she ran down the stairs to the cave.

She shifted and dove deep, kicking at full speed. Sea grass cut salt into her skin as she wove through the shallow-water shortcut. Small schools of pinfish split in two at her approach. The water grew deeper and greener, and she kicked out into the channel. Soon an enormous hull loomed in the distance. A lizard tail whipped halfway between her and the boat. She shot forward.

The look on Sidon’s face when she swam up from under him was murderous, but she grabbed him and gestured for him to rise to the surface. At first he tried to shake her off, pointing back through the water in a silent demand for her to go home. Grabbing his arm, she kicked upward, pulling his bulk to the surface.

“Dammit, Isa, turn your fish tail around and head back!”

She stretched her neck up, trying to look as large as possible. “I’m a marine mammal, not a fish. And I don’t take orders from you,
dragon
!”

Before he had a chance to argue, she cut him off. “There are more kids onboard. I saw them through the feeds. Three little girls, alive but unconscious. The cells are guarded.”