“Then I guess we’ve bought ourselves a new car.”
We called back the ecstatic salesman, haggled a bit, signed the papers, Avery wrote a check, and we both received a set of smart keys. Avery transferred Declan’s safety seat to the new SUV and kissed me with a grin.
“Thank you.”
“For what?”
“For everything. Coming into our lives. Agreeing to a family. And for just being you.”
I slid my arms around his hard waist and smiled into his eyes. “You’re sucking up because I agreed to that monstrosity.”
“True. I love you, anyway.”
With Declan humming to himself behind me, I drove the new SUV behind Avery in the rental to the agency. After he turned the car over, he joined us, and directed me to drive to a nice restaurant to celebrate. I eyed him.
“Celebrate what?”
“Our new life together.” Avery grinned impudently. “Our future family. Our new car. And the freedom from the dragon council under whose fearful doom I no longer fear to tread.”
I laughed. “They were quite nice, weren’t they?”
“And Ian, that putz, got what he deserved.”
“What happened to him?”
Avery smirked and kissed his fingers like a French chef. “He’s been shit canned as the council liaison and ordered to report for duty as the council’s new toilet scrubber.”
“No,” I gasped.
“Yes. Couldn’t have happened to a nicer dragon.”
“Avery,” I said, glancing at him. “He could easily blame you for his new assignment.”
He waved his hand, negligent. “He can blame himself. Turn right here, the restaurant is a few blocks down.”
I followed his directions, troubled. Ian didn’t seem like the type who’d take responsibility for his own actions and attitude. He’d spent three years tormenting Avery. He’d once held a position of high esteem among dragons. Now? He was a janitor of sorts. A low life.
The implications bothered me.
Declan received a booster seat from the smiling waitress. He scribbled pictures of his cats on a paper with a crayon as Avery and I smiled at one another over glasses of wine. While not exactly a family type restaurant, the staff bent over backwards for Declan. He repaid them by showing them his drawings of his cats.
We dined on steaks and baked potatoes, drank wine, and celebrated our freedom from those who’d wished us ill. Ian had his new job to keep him busy while I’d scared Carter into leaving the state. No more would either of them darken our horizons. We talked of our future, our unborn kids, and our wedded life together.
Slightly tipsy, I clutched my jacket close around my neck as we left the restaurant. Darkness had fallen, and Declan drowsed while Avery carried him across the parking lot. Snow blew in swirling circles to land on our lashes and the pavement. I vaguely hoped our drive home wouldn’t be slick and slippery as the storm around us intensified.
Avery flipped the SUV’s door handle upward to unlock it. “Here you go, little man,” he murmured. “Let’s get you buckled in.”
As he settled Declan into his safety seat, I stood behind him, shivering in the cold, and glanced around the parking lot. A few cars pulled in to park just as an even number drove out. I happened to glance at a darkly tinted pickup – and the gleam of the streetlights on polished metal.
My eyes widened in disbelief.
“Get down,” I screamed, shoving Avery into the rear seat and on top of Declan.
The rifle’s muzzle flashed red and orange.
I barely registered the flash, the bark of the rifle. The bullet struck me high in my chest long before they hit my eyes and ears.
I staggered, fell back against our new car, the shock of being shot instantly numbed all my senses. I knew I fell, dropped onto my knees, then onto my face as Avery’s screams, his panic, echoed in my now limited hearing.
