The air turned to smoke and screams until nothing remained.
Silence.
Only thecrackling of embers.
Vector turned.
And there?—
Raven.
Her wide, stunned eyes locked onto him, her breath hitched, her body frozen.
Smoke curled around his massive, scaled frame, blood and battle still clinging to his hide, his eyes burning with the feral possessiveness of a dragon whose mate had been taken.
The moment stretched.
Dragonlowered his massive head.
She would come to him now.
She must.
The deep, guttural voice of his dragonrumbled through the room—ancient, commanding, absolute.
“GET. ON. MY. BACK.”
Her wide, stunned eyes locked onto him, her breath hitched, her body frozen.
She stared.
Not moving.
Not breathing.
Herknees gave out, hitting the stone floorhard. Her fingers clawed at the cold ground, searching forsomething solid, something real.
He took a step forward. And for the first time since the battle began,uncertainty pierced his chest.
Would she refuse the dragon? This elemental part of him?
Would she fear him now that she had seen the truth?
The possibility sent a dark, primal terror through him.
Because if she rejected him?—
There would beno saving him.
No hope.
Nothing left but darkness and death and the executioner’s blade.
CHAPTER 16
The first sign that the world had shifted was the earth-shaking impact.
The window exploded inward in a rain of shattered glass and stone, a massive, red-scaled creature tearing through the room like a living nightmare.
