She had seen photos of him, of course, and video footage from the Harper Island operation. So she already knew about his soot-black hair, bottle-green eyes, and sharp-featured face. But the cameras hadn’t captured the way all his individual features put together made a man more breathtaking than anyone Francine had ever met.
They hadn’t captured the torment behind his eyes, either.
A lump formed in Francine’s throat, and she forced her eyes back to the road.
“There’s a change of clothes for you in the bag on the back seat,” she said. After his part-transformation, Julian’s shirt was hanging off him in rags, displaying far too much distracting musculature. Another thing the videos hadn’t shown.
Julian didn’t move.
“What are you?” Julian’s voice was husky, and she glanced sideways to see him staring at her with wary interest. Something twisted inside her as their eyes met.
Look at the road,she told herself, and cleared her throat. “Your knight in shining armor,” she replied breezily. “Shining armored car, at least.”
“That wasn’t what I meant.” He leaned closer, and Francine breathed in before she could stop herself. Her nostrils flared as she caught his scent.
He smelled like ice, and fresh green leaves, and— Francine groaned and squeezed her eyes shut.And that’s all,she thought grimly. Neither of them had time for anything else right now. And he must feel the same—asking her what she was. Honestly.
If he wasn’t going to come out and say it, then neither was she.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Francine had meant to keep her voice light, but the words fell like anvils.
Julian didn’t reply, and Francine had to bite the inside of her cheek to stop herself from looking at him. Silence filled the car until it thundered in her ears.
“Very well.” Julian’s voice was so cold, Francine half expected to see ice forming on the windshield. “Then perhaps you will at least tell me what your plan is to save my family.”
“Of course.”Part of it, at least.“Tonight, we fly direct to Ushuaia, Argentina, where we meet the ship that will take us to Antarctica. From the peninsula, we travel overland to your family’s lair.”
“A simple jaunt across the frozen waste of my homeland. And how exactly do you know where my family’s lair is?”
Eyes on the road.“I assume you remember where you grew up?”
“I’m asking howyouknow.”
“I don’t. Not yet. In five days’ time, the people whodoknow will send directions to whoever pays the most for access to the only known dragon shifters in the world. I—wehave connectionsthat will allow us to intercept the messages, but I’d prefer to get there before the auction begins.”
“The auction.” Julian’s voice was hollow, and Francine repressed a ridiculous urge to reach over and take his hand. “How can shifters treat their own as though we are objects, not living, breathing people?”
Francine swerved around another late-night driver. “Don’t be fooled. They see everyone as people. People that can be used and manipulated to further their own ends.” She swallowed hard. “Some of the groups attending the auction … let’s just say they make Gerald Harper look like a kitten. I don’t want to think about what they would do with the ability to move through the world unseen.” Or whatever else the dragons were capable of.
“We must stop them. I already lost my family once. I won’t lose everything else.”
Hairs rose on the back of Francine’s neck as Julian’s growl ripped through the air. For one heartbeat, she wanted to tear off her seatbelt and throw herself out of the moving car, running until the predator beside her was a distant memory.
Then the moment was gone, and she was left breathless and amazed.
Was that howshemade people feel?
No wonder it had always been so effective.
They made it to the airport within schedule, which was a testament to the importance of including buffer time in plans. Though she hadn’t expected the buffer to be used up escaping an exploding building.
Julian finally reached over to the back seat to grab the bag of clothes. Francine almost leaped out of the car as he stripped off his ragged shirt. Thankfully, the valet serviceappeared a moment later, and she busied herself acting as though everything was too late, too slow, the lights too bright, the temperature wrong…
The valet scurried off in search of backup, and Francine hid a pinch of guilt. Behind her, the passenger door opened, and Francine turned without thinking.
She had selected the clothes in the emergency grab-bag without care: a long-sleeved knit sweater, jeans, sneakers. Plain, casual clothing.
The knit sweater clung to Julian’s shoulders and chest like it was painted on, and the jeans—
