Chase Me

His father always had so much faith, such high expectations for him, too bad he wasn't living up to a single one of them.

  The town came into view, and Jakob spotted one of the demon dragons slipping between two buildings at the edge of the settlement. He didn't yet see the other one, or Ciara, but he knew they were near. He could feel them.

  If the beacon from his soul shard was any indication, they were near the town square in the center. He was set to follow the light, which still astounded him, but it left the other demon dragon to wreak havoc wherever it wanted to. Which, of course, is exactly what it did.

  Its black shadow crept up the side of the home and pulled an unlatched window open.

  Normally, the townsfolk didn't need to worry about locking their doors or their windows. The worst crime in this rural area was someone not paying their bar tab on time. That's what happened when they were protected by dragons.

  The scent of a brand-new human life hit Jakob before he saw the baby. The thought of what the demon Dragon could do to that little soul punched Jakob square in the esophagus. He couldn't swallow past the thought of that evil piece of shit spreading its plague to the child.

  Fear gripped that lump in Jakob's throat and held on tight until he had the demon Dragon in his talons. He shredded the bastard before it could even take its next breath and spew fire at him. His ashes scattered on the wind created by the powerhouse of his wings pushing them through the air.

  He landed softly since as of yet, the residence had not noticed any disturbance in town and awoken.

  Something near his heart went all squishy staring in at the babe. It's life force was strong, but Jakob blew some of his healing Dragon's breath over the child, just in case. The gentle puff of green smoke made it sneeze, but did not wake up.

  He would have to bare one of these of his own one day. Every Wyvern needed a first son to continue the lineage of leadership. He'd rather have a daughter. One was sparkling green eyes and lovely blonde curls, just like Ciara’s.

  Too bad dragons didn't have daughters.

  If he didn't get his head out of his butt and go save her from the other demon dragon this cozy little future life he'd envisioned would be nothing more than a silly dream.

  A scream wrenched through the night and Jakob saw the body of a demon Dragon tossed into the air like it was bouncing on a trampoline, spinning and flipping, but not having a good time.

  What was his witch doing now?

  Jakob bounded over the nearest rooftops and into the town square. Ciara was huddled under the metal awning of a payphone. She had her eyes scrunched tight and the phone outstretched as if it were a weapon.

  The demon Dragon crashed onto the cobblestone in front of her. It lifted its head, shook it like a dog, and growled at her. “I kill you.”

  “Eek.” Ciara waved the phone again, and the demon Dragon was blown across the square, tumbling cartwheel style, reminding Jakob of a children's cartoon.

  It would be funny, if it wasn't so, so… fucking hot.

  She was using the wind to keep her enemy at bay. The dumbass demon kept getting back up and rushing at her again and again. Each time it took a little flight up in the air, ass over tail, and once even spinning like a disco queen, in a dust devil she created.

  Jakob leaned against the nearest building. He could watch this all day.

  But, after a few more blows, Ciara wilted against the phone box. He could practically see her energy throwing up the white flag and waving it.

  The demon Dragon knew it too. On this next run at her, it dodged her attempts to push it away and blew a stream of fire at her. Jakob moved to throw up a wall of dirt to block the fire, but she beat him to it. That act of magic took her remaining strength and she slumped to the ground, falling hard on her ass, but still clinging to the phone handset.

  Jakob opened a hole in the ground beneath the demon Dragon. It was sucked into the earth and before it could scramble out Jakob was there spearing it through the skull with the spikes on his tail. It disintegrated to black ash that Jakob buried in the ground.

  “Go away, leave me alone.” A light breeze smacked Jakob in the face.

  “Ciara. I’m here now. Don't—”

  Jakob lifted into the air, and dropped on his back six feet away.

  Ciara was again on her feet, trembling and wobbling but with the wind whipping her hair, and fire in her eyes. “I said, leave me alone.”

  What a woman.

  Chapter Seven

  Escape

  Ciara jog-walked away from the villa and the battle dragon-Jakob was immersed in with the black snake people. She could not put enough distance between all of that nightmare and herself.

  It was a good half an hour before she found anything resembling civilization. But, finally she saw lights up ahead. She pushed herself even more and made it into the town, if it could even be called that, in another ten or fifteen minutes.

  This place was the definition of a sleepy little village, and it would be quaint if she didn't need to find a live human being with a phone. Not a single light was on in any of the windows. The place was dark save for the streetlamps.

  In a minute, she was going to just start shouting to see if anyone was alive in this place. She walked a few more feet, beginning to hobble a bit, should anyone want to look at her feet. Then, lo and behold, a payphone, so old Superman probably had changed outfits and it. She limped across the street, sure she was leaving bloody footprints as she went. The phone booth didn't have a door, more like metal hood to protect it from the elements. She grabbed the handset and thanked the Lord there was a dial tone. But, how did one place a collect call from a foreign country?

  She punched the zero hoping to get an English-speaking operator. A man's voice came across the line and and said a whole streak of words she didn't understand.

  “Hello? Do you speak English by any chance?”

  “Yes, a little. How can I help?”

  “I need to make a call to the US.”

  “Do you have a calling card?”

  How was she supposed to explain that she been kidnapped by a dragon and left her wallet at home? “No, is there any other way to pay for the call?”

  “I can connect you to a service that can provide you with minutes over the phone if you have a credit card.”

  Once again, no wallet or purse. What she did have was a mind like a plastic trap. She used her Willingham Weddings business credit card so often on flower vendors, cake makers, and last minute seamstresses, that she had the number memorized. Of course, her mother would flip out when she saw a bill for an international calling card. But, dammit, this was an emergency.

  She could practically hear her mother's voice saying “your lack of planning, does not constitute an emergency on my part.”

  Not like she could have planned ahead for kidnapping. “Yes, I will do that option. Thank you.”

  “Connecting you now.”

  After a series of beeps and an automated voice, thankfully in English, Ciara entered the digits on the phone. She was given one hundred minutes for the price of one hundred crowns. She'd have to figure out how much that was later. She punched in the 01 to get through to America, and then her mother's phone number. The line rang and rang.

  Crud, what time was it in America? She didn't even know what time it was here. She wasn't even a hundred percent sure where here was. She was most likely in the Czech Republic, because Jakob had said his villa was not far from Prague. But how far was not far for someone who could fly thousands of miles?

  Ciara figured that Europe was probably about six hours ahead of the East Coast, and it looked to be pretty late at night since nothing in this village was open.

  She was sure she was going to get her mother's voicemail in another ring or two, and thought about who else she could call.

  “Why are you calling me at this hour Ciara Tara Mosley – Willingham?” Her mother's voice came through as clear as if they were standing ten feet apart. While the average person wouldn't hear th
e ire in her mother's voice, because her mother didn't allow that, Ciara cringed.

  How had her mother known it was her? “Mother, I'm sorry, but this is an emergency.”

  “You know how I feel about your emergencies.”

  Yes, she did. “No, mother. This is actually an emergency I've been —”

  “Call me in the morning at a reasonable hour, and when you have resolved your little crisis. I have clients who will need your attention.”

  Before Ciara could even say the word kid, much less kidnapped, the line had gone dead.

  She looked at the phone, and frost crystals grew over the handset.

  Should have known better.

  Well, shit.

  Who else could she call? Who else is number did she actually know? Without her cell phone, she was missing part of her brain.

  But, she wasn't kidding anybody by pretending she didn't know Names phone number by heart.

  Yeah, she would call him. He was probably worried sick about her.

  She dailed up the operator again and went through the same routine, and found that her short call to her mother had used up a third of her minutes. She would need this call to Name to be succinct. She rehearsed in her head what she would say before she dialed the number, and then waited for the ring. The phone rang, and rang again, and rang another three times. No, she couldn't get his voicemail. She hung up the phone, picked it right back up, and went through the whole routine again. The phone rang, and it rang, and it rang again.

  “Hello?”

  Ciara could barely hear him. The thump thump thumping of loud music, and so many voices, drowned his out. “Name? Name, can you hear me?”

  Ciara? Is that you, babe?”

  “Yes.” She stuck one finger in her ear and pressed the handset tight against her face, trying to hear him even though the noise was on his end. “I am in Prague.”

  “You're a frog?”

  She'd rehearsed this but it didn't do any good to tell him she was in Prague kidnapped and needed him to come get her, if he couldn't understand what she was saying. “No, I am… In… Prague.”

  “If you're sick, doll, your mother will kill you.”

  Dammit. “I'm not sick. I'm in the Czech Republic.”

  “Yes, I'll check with her.”

  Dammit dammit dammit.

  “I've been kidnapped.” She shouted the words, but doubted it would help at this point.

  “A nap is probably a good idea.”

  Ciara banged her hand against the metal awning. Then another voice came across the line. “Hey, can I buy you a drink?”

  What kind of a place was Name at?

  “Hey doll, gotta run. See you on Thursday. I think you'll like this place.”

  The phone went dead, and Ciara stared at handset.

  That had not gone like she expected it to even a little bit. She'd imagined Name rushing to the airport and booking a ticket to Prague to come and get her, and they’d live happily ever after.

  Boy, had she been wrong.

  What the hell was she going to do now?

  She supposed she could just hang out here in the area near the phone. It appeared to be some sort of a town square. Maybe in the morning people gathered here to, what, sell their wares?

  In a few more hours and it would be morning in America, she could try to call again then.

  Ciara's stomach rumbled, and she wished she would have eaten some of those tea cakes Mrs. Bohacek had. She was pretty hungry. Her stomach growled again, this time a whole hell of a lot louder.

  Ciara swallowed, and put one hand on her belly. That sound had not been her insides wishing for French fries.

  She turned slowly, feeling like the TDTL girl in the horror movies. Too Dumb To live.

  Oh, yeah. There was something out of a nightmare behind her, she could feel its hot breath on the back of her neck. Breath that smelled like poo mixed with pig guts.

  “I get witch.” Its voice was slimier than a drunk used car salesman on the last day of the year.

  Was he talking about her?

  See? TDTL. Of course, he was talking about her.

  The real question was, what the hell was she going to do about it?

  Fear curdled her brain like rotten chocolate milk, but somewhere in the gooey center was Mrs. Bohacek's voice. “Use what you've learned.”

  What she'd learned was that this world was not what she'd thought it was. Oh, and she was a witch.

  A smart witch.

  Ciara stuck her hand out and pointed toward the sky. “Look, a big purple Dragon.”

  She hoped against hope that had distracted the monster for just the second she needed. She pivoted and pointed at it, the handset for the phone still in her fist. Wind help me now. Pretty please.

  The black snakelike creature flew into the air and landed on top of the metal awning with a crash. Ciara screamed, partly out of surprise, and partly because it had worked. That was short lived.

  The thing reached for her and snagged one shoulder of the dress, which tore when she blew it into the sky again.

  The first wave of exhaustion hit her, but nothing like it had in Jakob's lair. She stood firm in her spot, not letting it seep into her bones.

  The beast came at her again and again, each time she she blew it away like Wile E. Coyote standing in front of a wind machine. The waves of fatigue grew bigger with each of her efforts. She maybe had one more push in her, but knew that a tsunami of tiredness would hit her.

  Either, she could use the wind again and run away or try something different. Mrs. Bohacek had said she had an affinity for the earth element. She had gotten out of that stupid cavern. Earth it was.

  She crouched to the ground, but miscalculated and hit it hard with her butt.

  The demon thing must have taken her new position as weakness, because it charged at her again, but this time fire spewed from its mouth, exactly like what she thought a Dragon could do.

  Shit, shite, shat.

  In her mind, she envisioned a wall of dirt and in reality one flew up between her and the fire. She had every intention of burying the bastard in the ground but, she couldn't seem to move. That tsunami had hit her.

  She was going to die. Her gravestone would read – Eaten, and not in the fun way. Didn’t that just sum up her whole damn life.

  Another monster swooped down and Ciara shut her eyes tight waiting for the first chomp. Maybe if it bit off her head she wouldn't feel the pain.

  No pain came. Was she already dead?

  She took a breath, no that people didn't breathe, as far she knew.

  A voice rumbled around inside of her head. Adrenaline pumped through her blacking out anything but her fight or flight instinct.

  “Go away, leave me alone.” Even the effort of saying those words center into a gray tunnel of oblivion.

  No, she would not die this way.

  She stood again, not knowing where the energy came from, but using it anyway. She was operating a thousand percent on instinct now. The wind whipped around her, helping to hold her up. She shot it out in all directions, hoping to blast her enemies to kingdom come.

  That voice was back in her head again, but this time it was laughing. Not like snidely whiplash, but like… Jakob.

  She rubbed her eyes and saw the big green Dragon sauntering toward her. She couldn't have been happier to see him if he was Puff the Magic Dragon.

  “Ciara. You were magnificent.”

  He snuffled her with that great snout of his. She smacked it. “Jesus, Mary, and Jiminy Cricket. I thought you were one of those things. And what the hell were those things. I quit talking in my head. And you turned back into a man right this second.”

  The adrenaline that had been thumbing through her veins and arteries and brain and fingertips crashed. Tears trickled out her eyes and she blinked not wanting to cry in front of him.

  He shimmered and shifted back into the sexy ass man she knew.

  She had two choices here. The first, stay mad and fall apart and cr
y. Or, jump his bones.

  One or the other of those two were going to happen. If she fell apart, she looked like a big fat baby, and he'd simply carry her back to his lair where she would probably die.

  But if she jumped his bones, she wasn't sure should be able to look herself in the eye in the morning.

  Well, she deal with that in the morning. Guess that was that decision made.

  She grabbed his shirt and yanked him to her.

  He opened his mouth, not to kiss her but to speak. She slapped her hand over it and said, “shut up, and kiss me.”

  He raised one eyebrow, pulled her hand down off of his mouth, and it is he was told.

  Boy, oh, boy, did he do as he was told.

  Jakob grabbed her around the waist and yanked her tight to his body. His tongue dipped in and out of her mouth, mimicking exactly what she wanted other parts of their bodies to do.

  Jakob apparently did too, because she could feel his erection pressing against her stomach. Either that or he had a – no, no that was definitely a long hard dick in his pants, and he was happy to see her.

  He pushed her up against the metal awning and reached down, lifting her left leg and wrapping it around his hip. He ground against her, pushed his hand into her hair and growled her name.

  “Ciara. You fucking taste like licorice and fire.”

  That adrenaline she thought was gone sang a song of exultation as it rushed back through her body. She didn’t even care that they were outside, that anyone who peeked out a window would see them dry humping in the middle of the square. She wanted this man with a ferocity she’d never known.

  He grabbed her other leg and lifted, ripping the skirt of the dress, so she straddled him. Sweet baby Cheeze Whiz.

  If he were anything other than a guy who could turn into a dragon she’d be worried they were both going crashing to the ground. No man picked her up, she wasn’t that lithe wispy kind of girl. She didn’t need to worry about the insecurities attached to her size with him. God, that felt amazing.

  Desperation, adrenaline, and lust were all in the driver’s seat. She wrapped her legs around his waist, her arms around his neck, and her tongue around his teeth.

  All she wanted right now was to crawl inside of him, or rather have him inside of her. The part of her conscience that was flipping out, telling her to take it slow, and called her mean names was outmatched by the happy, excited, let’s get laid part.