Chapter 5

CHAPTER 5

CAYE

C aye wasn’t sure when she had blacked out or how long she had been asleep. The last thing she remembered was the fight and how Andreas had shifted, lifting off and flying with her grasped in one of his talons. She’d come to for a few moments to hear the blizzard raging around her but feeling safe and warm. Andreas had wrapped his body around her, sharing his warmth and using his wing to shield her from the storm.

Now as she came to, she could smell food, hear a crackling fire, feel warmth and a soft bed of sorts beneath her. Caye had camped out enough to know she wasn’t lying in a bed, but it was a damn sight more comfortable than the cold hard ground.

“Hungry?” asked Andreas, who had shifted back into his human form and managed to find clothes and boots that fit.

“Yes, and whatever it is that’s cooking smells great.”

“It isn’t fancy, but I managed to snag us a snowshoe hare. I borrowed some money from your stash and managed to get some clothes for me, groceries, and some other supplies.”

Caye looked down at the bed—an air mattress as well as bedding including flannel sheets, a down comforter and a heavy quilt—and then at her surroundings. The stone walls, ceiling and floor indicated Andreas had found them a cave to hole up in. No wonder she was so comfy—something soft beneath her and shelter from the icy cold of the mountains. She hated the cold. She really, really hated the cold.

He turned a spit over a small open fire he’d made on the floor of the cave. The rabbit smelled wonderful. “I figured we’d eat roast hare and vegetables tonight and then I’d make a stew for tomorrow.”

“You know how to cook?”

“You forget, I was alive during the Klondike gold rush.”

“How?”

“The spell or curse, if you will, was slow-acting and I was able to counter it enough to delay it until I could put enough time and space from those who thought to destroy me to build my sanctuary and encase myself in ice. So yes, over an open fire like this one, I can cook. But one of the things I picked up along with some pots and other things was a book about campfire cooking.”

“You know how to read?”

“I am a dragon, not an idiot.”

“Sorry. I didn’t really know how old you were or if reading was something dragons did. I noticed there is only one bed.”

“We are mates, and even with the fires I have lit, it is still cold.”

“Why not take me down to wherever you flew?”

“I don’t know who we can trust and who we can’t. For now, I figured we were safest up here on our own. The entrance to this cave is fairly well-hidden, and this chamber itself is well ventilated. I must say there were many things of which I had no knowledge. You will need to help me with all of it.”

She drew her knees up to her chest. “What makes you think I will?”

“We are fated mates. I know you can feel it, too. You are now drakaina as well as hellhound.”

“I’m not admitting to anything. I still think you’re a bastard for turning me without my consent, but it is mitigated by the fact that I am still a hellhound, although I have to admit, I’m a bit surprised. I would have thought dragon DNA could overwrite anything.”

He nodded. “Anything but a hellhound. From what I’ve been able to learn, little has changed since Apophis cast the spell that sent me to sleep.”

“So, it was Apophis who defeated you?”

Andreas shook his head. “Apophis was dragon first and wizard second. He knew I was a threat to him and his kind. If he was to rise to power, he needed me gone for he knew I would never allow him to live. He could not defeat me—not in the true sense of that word. No wizard had the power to defeat one of my kind, but he crafted a spell that forced me to retreat from my world and find a place to sleep until my fated mate came to release me.”

Caye snorted. “You do know I was only checking to make sure you were either dead or somehow locked away so that those who followed Apophis couldn’t find you and use you against us.”

“Destiny brought you to me.”

“Get over yourself. My original plan was to kill you if I wasn’t convinced you had been neutralized.”

“You would have killed a sleeping dragon?”

“One I thought could be used against us? Absofuckinglutely. I knew firsthand how dangerous an ancient dragon could be. I knew what it had taken to end Apophis…”

“He is dead? Are you sure?”

She smiled with what she hoped was a certain degree of malevolence. “Yep. Saw him killed, then I ripped his soul from his corpse, shredded it, and a friend of mine called down the banshees to banish him to the Shadowlands. Trust me, he won’t be an issue.”

Caye watched his face, waiting for him to be frightened or at least disgusted at what she had done and how she had no regrets. She was disappointed.

“You are even more magnificent than I first thought you to be,” he said with nothing but respect and something more—a something she didn’t want to name—on his face.

Andreas rose from where he had squatted by the fire, poking at it before removing the roasted rabbit from the spit. He had vegetables cooking in a pan beneath it so they were basted with the drippings from the meat. He carved it and prepared two plates before walking over to her. She watched him, her arms wrapped around her knees, wishing she wanted to be anywhere but where she found herself.

She wanted to hate him. Andreas was everything she hated in men—of whatever ilk. He was arrogant and thought he knew best. She hated the smug look that said he knew exactly what he was doing, even when they were in the midst of a battle. She did have to admit, he was a deadly adversary and had ensured they both got out alive. He had saved her, but that didn’t excuse everything. The fact that he seemed so calm about all of this after just awakening from a who-knows-how-long sleep made her want to scream. Caye wanted to ask why—why me, why this—but he was right, she already knew the answer, and the stubborn part of her refused to give him the satisfaction of knowing she was beginning to have feelings for him.

“Here,” he said, handing her a plate. “Move over.”

“Why?” she asked all too suddenly and acutely aware she was naked. Another reason to hate him—he kept getting her naked without asking. Granted, this time she’d been passed out, but still.

“Because the bed is the only comfortable place to sit.”

Taking the plate, Caye scooched over to make room, but ensured he was sitting on top of the covers and not beneath them with her. She took a tentative bite; it was damn good.

“Thanks. This is good. You learned this all from one book?”

“More of a refresher course. You keep forgetting: I was here for the gold rush.”

“Do you have a hoard of gold?” she asked teasingly.

He took a bite and nodded. “I do.”

She must have looked shocked, as Andreas laughed. “I have some buried in a hidden and safe place, and then some in a bank in Crete, and some in the Yukon territories.”

“You expected to wake?”

“I knew you would come and free me.”

“If you truly believed that; you’re a fool.”

“And yet here we sit, eating our dinner.”

He had a point.

“Now stop with the death stares,” he continued, “and cuddle up, I’ve got the fires going, but night is falling and it’s going to be a damn icebox in here soon.”

She didn’t want to admit he was right, but with the creeping chill of the cave, he was impossible to ignore. Reluctantly, she didn’t try to stop him when he slipped off his own clothes and crawled under the covers with her.

When her eyes flickered open, she realized she must have dozed off, and hours must’ve passed because the darkness was still thick around them, but the fires had dwindled to a gentle glow. Her back was pressed firmly against something solid and warm. Andreas. She went completely still as the realization hit her.

A smile played across her face—she could feel the corners of her mouth lifting ever so slightly as his warmth seeped into her skin. He’d curled up behind her at some point, his breath steady and even. She was supposed to loathe him, wasn’t she? Yet here she was, shivering not from the cold but from the proximity of the man who’d saved her life and cared for her while she recovered and transitioned.

Maybe it was the surreal sense of being stuck in a dream, or maybe it was the way his arm draped over her like a protective shield, but Caye found herself turning ever so slightly. His face was inches from hers, softened by sleep. Without thinking, her hand reached up, tracing the line of his jaw, rough with stubble. He didn’t stir, so she let her fingers wander down his neck, over the expanse of his muscular chest.

“Caye…”

His voice was groggy, but her name on his lips felt like a jolt of electricity. Panic seized her, and she tried to pull away, but he was faster. His hand clamped around hers, guiding it insistently towards the growing hardness between his legs. A gasp escaped her lips, both from shock and the undeniable arousal that coursed through her.

“Andreas, I didn’t mean…”

But the words died in her throat. There was no denying the raw desire in his eyes as they fixed on hers, dark and hungry.

“Shh,” he whispered the command.

She was lost in the heat and need of the moment, her hand betraying her inner turmoil as it wrapped around his thick cock. He was hard, impossibly so, and the reality of what they were doing struck her with a dizzying force.

Caye had to ask herself was this what she wanted? What did it mean if she did? The questions swirled in her mind, tangled up with the fear and adrenaline that had kept them alive thus far. But as her grip tightened, and a low moan reverberated from his chest, the answers didn’t seem to matter much.

“Andreas, we can’t just have sex in this cave.”

“Why not? We are mates, and last time I checked, mates had sex, and mated dragons had lots of sex.”

She wanted to scream—fear and desire swirled in a heady mix, choking back her common sense with their thick fingers. Instead of pushing him away, she began to lightly stroke his ever-expanding girth and length. His groan vibrated through the cold cave air, and something within her unfurled, hungry and wanting.

“Caye,” he growled softly, as his hands found their way to her breasts, rough and warm. The touch of his fingertips against her sensitive skin forced a cry from deep within her. It was madness, this conflagration of need amidst the shadows of danger all around them—the storm, the cold, Xenos and his minions, the Shadow League, and who knew what else.

His hands moved lower, one slipping down her spine to grasp one of the globes of her ass as he nudged her onto her back, laying his hand on her belly to hold her in place while the other slid down between them, straight to the spot that wanted his touch the most.

Her breath hitched as his fingers teased—the heat of his skin and the roughness of his touch sending shivers up and down her spine. Caye had never felt so alive, so vulnerable, and so reckless. The thought of how dangerous this was only seemed to heighten the intensity of the moment.

“Andreas, we shouldn’t…” she murmured, the words catching in her throat.

The primitive need that had taken hold wouldn’t be denied, and her body craved the connection that she now knew only he could deliver. There had been other lovers in her past, but none had elicited the response that he did.

As his fingers trailed lower, his thumb now strumming against her clit, Caye arched into his touch, each movement drawing a low groan from him. It was clear that any resistance she might ever have thought to offer was waning, and Andreas knew it. Even as her body trembled, her mind raced with a thousand thoughts. The danger they were in, her responsibility to the Shadow Sisters, the uncertainty, the fact that they might be lost forever to the storm or to the brutal fight that still lay before them, wasn’t lost on her.

“Show me, Caye.” His words were both command and plea as he urged her on, his hand delving lower. She was on fire, every stroke, every nibble sending sparks skittering across her skin, igniting something primal within her. “Show me how you come for me.”

Caye gazed into his eyes, dark pools reflecting back her own desire, as her body shuddered as the unexpected climax began to build to a fevered pitch. She hadn’t doubted he could make her come, it was that she hadn’t thought he could undo her so easily. The sounds she was making filled the cave, sweet echoes of a pleasure so intense it bordered on pain. In that moment, it wasn’t about hate or fear, it was about being alive, here and now, with him.

His cock was heavy in her hand, and she ran her fingers up and down his length, feeling the tension and the heat radiating from him. She could feel his urgency, the desperation behind his eyes as he watched her touch him, and it only served to increase the level of her arousal, more eager to satisfy this craving they both shared.

Panting, her stare locked onto Andreas’ eyes, dark and intense, the same eyes that wanted to watch her unravel. His breath came out in ragged pulls, each one syncing with the erratic beats of her heart. Then his lips crashed against hers, raw and urgent.

“Andreas,” she murmured against his mouth as the world exploded, feeling his body tense as if her voice was a trigger.

Caye shook against him, her body wracked with the pleasure sparking from his fingers up into her brain. She arched her back, feeling the way her hot lips pressed into his, but she was gone, lost to him and only him.

She couldn’t think, couldn’t question any of it as she drifted down. She tugged him closer, her hands grasping for him, guiding her to where she needed him. Then he was there, inside her, filling her completely where she needed him most. No hesitation, no second-guessing. It was just the two of them and this primitive need neither could deny.

His movements were relentless, a rhythm that matched the pounding in her ears.

“Again, for me, Caye,” he breathed out, an order wrapped in velvet. His hand found its way to her still-vibrating clit, offering another rush, another high. Her name fell from his lips like a chant, spurring her on. “Come for me again.”

His hands slipped beneath her, grasping the globes of her ass as he thrust into her, sparking bright spots of pleasure. Andreas thrust himself so deep inside her, Caye thought she’d truly become one with him.

The cave echoed with feral cries of their pleasure as they surrendered to their raw desire. Any danger they were in seemed to melt away, replaced by a fierce, all-consuming passion that left no room for fear or doubt. She clawed at his back, desperate to pull him closer, her nails leaving trails of blood and lust.

Their bodies moved in a frenzy, their power and pace matching the wild beating of their hearts. Sweat drenched their skin, mingling their scents into an intoxicating cocktail. The cold walls of the cave melted away under his touch, replaced by the fire that blazed between them.

Her center pulsed with each thrust, each gasping breath, each ragged moan. Caye was lost in the rhythm, in the fire that burned within their joined flesh, in the desire that coursed through her veins. She arched against him, her back bowing, as the sensations started to build into something that made her breath catch in her chest, as the world narrowed down to a single pinpoint.

“Andreas!” she cried once more, everything sharpening into vivid sensation as she shattered beneath him, her orgasm tearing through her like an avalanche hurtling down the side of a mountain.

He held her close, his own motions growing more frantic until he shoved deep and stilled, his release hot and sudden. In the chill of the night, they lay there, panting and entwined, the fire crackling its own silent applause.