Because she was lying to Julian. She wasn’t here on Lance MacInnis’s orders. She was here for herself—to redeem herself for every cruel and monstrous thing she’d done since Gerald Harper twisted her around his little finger.
Except now the man she was lying to turned out to be her fated mate, and that made her a monster again.
It doesn’t matter,she told herself.The plan stays the same. It’s the only way to save the other shadow dragons—becauseeven if I did tell Lance what was going on, he would never believe me. Nobody would. We would waste too much time. By the time he acted, it would be too late.
Francine was a Delacourt. For most of her life, that had meant that whatever she wanted, she got. And then Harper had found her, and being a Delacourt meant that she was a useful, dangerous tool—a half-wild lioness shifter with endless funds and self-importance who could be sicced on her own friends to distract attention from what Harper was doing to other shifters.
Now it meant that even if she wanted to do good, no one would believe it. But it also meant that she’d heard about what was planned for the shadow dragons in Antarctica, from sources Lance and the others didn’t have access to. After all, she was still rich. She was still Francine Delacourt. And people who thought she was like them—that she’d been Gerald Harper’swillingally—shared things they thought she wanted to know.
Terrible things.
If she wanted to stop them, she had to stick to the plan.
She swallowed back a bitter cough of laughter. Her lastplanhad destroyed her life, and almost ended up with her friends dead. But not this time. This time she had all the information. Nobody would trick her again.
Anyway, they were here. She let go of Julian’s arm long enough to key in the override code for the basement stairs and led the way down. The basement level was meant for storage: climate-controlled concrete rooms lined with shelving units, every crate and sack and bottle neatly labeled. Nothing out of the ordinary.
Except for the dust. Her nose wrinkled. Even with the air filtration, it smelled like no one had been down here in months. She would have to fix that.
Fix it? When?she asked herself, pressing her lips together to stop herself from baring her teeth in a mad grin.Do you thinkLance will let you out of prison long enough to renovate his safe houses if he catches you?
Lance had been her friend once. But that was a lifetime ago.
Her heart thudded as she ran her fingers along the edge of a steel-framed storage unit. If Lance had removed the escape route…
There it is.Francine pressed the hidden button with one finger and knelt to activate the secondary switch beneath the storage unit. The whole unit, and part of the wall behind it, swung out to reveal a narrow passageway.
“Come on,” Francine said, waving Julian over. There was a low electronic hum, and she swore. “That’s the lockdown gone. If we hurry, we’ll make it out the other end before they know we’re not in the house anymore.”
The escape tunnel led under the grounds of the safe house to a hidden exit in the forest. If they could make it that far, they could make it to her car.
She hurried down the passageway, glancing over her shoulder to make sure Julian was right behind her. Behind them, the wall slid back into place. If anyone tried to move the storage unit without pressing the release buttons, it would come away from the wall like a normal piece of furniture—and the wall would stay put.
The passageway was dark. The safe house was meant for shifters, after all, with enhanced shifter senses, so the escape passage didn’t need to be well lit. At least, that had been Francine’s reasoning five years ago.
Don’t tell me you’ve taken my night vision with you when you went off to sulk,she asked her inner lioness in disgust.
It bared one lazy fang at her. She frowned.What’s distracting you?
Something. It wasn’t sure yet.
Which couldn’t be good news.
She squinted in the gloom, trying to make out how far it was to the exit steps before she tripped over them.
“What should I call you?”
“Excuse me?”
She turned around. Julianwasn’tfollowing her—he was still on the steps, and she had to tilt her head back to squint at him. Tosquint.What sort of lioness shifter had tosquint?
Her lioness didn’t deign to reply. Something was still distracting it.
“What’s your name?” he repeated slowly. “I feel I deserve to know that, at least.”
There was enough light to see in the tunnel after all. Or maybe her lioness chose that moment to beef up her senses.
Francine’s breath caught in her throat.
