My dad’s eyes gleamed. “Everyone goes, Cole. Given the right incentive.” He tilted his head. “And if he proves…unreasonable, there are other methods.”
My dragon froze.
“What methods?” My heart hammered against the cooling lines on my chest.
“Legal, of course.” His tone went very light. “Accusations can be made. Old charges resurrected. A man with his history can disappear into the system without any…overt…intervention.”
Disappear.
The word detonated inside me.
Phoenix, locked in some cell because of me. Phoenix, dragged off a street by men who smelled like my father’s cologne. Phoenix’s eyes going flat and empty the way they must have when he’d been hurt before, used, thrown away.My mate.
My vision blurred.
“You’re lying,” I whispered. “You’re just trying to—”
“Motivate you?” he suggested. “I thought you’d appreciate knowing what’s at stake. This isn’t just about you, Cole. Or the boy you’ve allowed to compromise you. It’s about the team. The brand. The future.”
But notmy future.
The dragon stopped pacing. It rose. Not gently, not slowly. In one terrifying surge, like a wave rearing up out of nowhere.
Heat flooded my veins, slamming into the sedative, shattering the chill of Hartshorne’s ink. The lines on my skin flared from dull silver to angry red. The monitor by the bed shrieked.
Hartshorne’s head snapped up. “The lattice isn’t anchored yet—”
I didn’tmove. I couldn’t. The collars still dragged at my muscles, heavy as sandbags. But inside, something ancient and furious unfurled, stretching against its old scars.Threat, it snarled, wordless.Mate. Threatening mate.
Phoenix’s face flashed behind my eyes—not the wary, guarded look he’d worn when we met, but the moment he’d fallen asleep on my chest, mouth parted, hand fisted in my t-shirt like he didn’t dare let go.
My father kept talking, oblivious to the dragon waking.
“Once this is complete,” he said, “you’ll see how ridiculous this all is. You’ll wonder what you ever saw in a gutter rat like him. The binding will mute these…attachments.” He made a contemptuous little flick of his fingers. “You’ll thank me, eventually. Especially when he’s somewhere far away, unable to drag you down.” He looked me in the eyes. "And of course if you pursue this, I will make him go away permanently."
Something in my chestsnapped.
Not bone. Not muscle. Something deeper. A line of the old lattice, pulled too tight for too long, finally breaking. The dragon roared.
Or maybe that was me.
Heat punched outward from my sternum in all directions. The sigils Hartshorne had painted blazed white-hot, then black as if charred from the inside. The metal band at my throat seared, then cracked with a sharp, ringing sound. “Shit,” Hartshorne hissed, dropping the brush. “I told you tokeep him calm.” The heart monitor went berserk. Every beep blurred into a frantic, continuous tone.
My father took a step back, for once not in control. “What are you doing?” he snapped at the doctor. “Stop it!”
“I can’t just—this isn’t a switch I flip,” Hartshorne snarled, yanking open another drawer, grabbing for a syringe. “He’s pushingback. The construct’s destabilizing—”
I understood his panic. You werenotsupposed to push back. You were supposed to lie there and take it. Be good. Be quiet. Let other people decide what you were allowed to feel. The dragon didn’t know how to do that. Not anymore.
It lunged.
Fire surged through every nerve, but it wasn’t like the old uncontrolled rush. It was…focused. A blade instead of a bomb. Every time my father said Phoenix’s name with that contempt, it flared hotter.
Hartshorne lunged toward me with the syringe. “Hold him—”
The air around his hand shimmered. The sedative in my veins boiled. The syringe exploded, plastic shattering, liquid hissing into vapor.
Hartshorne swore and jerked back, shaking his hand where red welts were already rising. The overhead light popped with a sharp crack, showering sparks. The room plunged into dim emergency glow. Somewhere outside the door, an alarm began to howl, low and insistent. My father stared at me, horror carving lines into the smooth mask of his face. “Cole,” he said sharply. “Stop this. Now.”
