9. Chapter 9 #2
The air tasted like a light tremor of purity and metal. The link relaxed as if his proximity lessened the strain on it.
His lips curled around a relieved smile. She’s here.
Pain grew behind his eyes. His dragon tried to break free. She hid somewhere within, and nothing would prevent him from reaching her. He bounded up the stairs to the porch. Only when he faced the door, leg raised to kick it down, did he figure he should try to act civilized.
He rang the doorbell.
The chime sounded like a dinner bell to the hunger building inside him. Footsteps thudded toward the entrance.
“You’re here early,” a male voice with a familiar Cockney British accent said as the door swung open. Glazed doughnut half raised to his pasty white face, his gaze landed on Daxton, widening like the devil himself stood at his doorstep. Simon froze in recognition.
This was the lanky man that took Izzy from him. Fire tinged with protectiveness burned through his mind, and his dragon instincts reigned. Daxton’s fist launched. At the last moment, he reeled back, and his fist connected with the door frame.
Simon’s donut slipped from his limp fingers.
Fiery pain scorched up his hand that lay inches from Simon’s face. Shit. Shit. Shit. He stumbled backward until the railing pressed into his back. Sourness filled his mouth as his stomach hardened.
“Bloody…hell. Did you just almost hit me?” Simon asked, swallowing loudly. “And are your eyes shifting color?”
“Instincts. Hard to control after pent-up frustration.” He sucked in a breath. “I’m sorry.”
“What even are you?” He held the door as a shield between him and Daxton. “You better now?”
“Yes and no. I need to see Izzy.”
“I’d say you two need to see each other. You’re both out of control.” He opened the door and tilted his head back. “She’s in the tower. Follow the books.”
He strode past Simon into a walkway separating the living and dining rooms. Books cluttered the dark space.
Straight ahead lay the hallway filled with more texts.
As he walked down the corridor, dust blanketing Izzy’s scent, he stumbled upon a wall covered in hanging frames instead of books.
The abrupt detail pulled his rationality to the forefront of his mind. He stopped and inspected them.
They were degrees. This was the hallway Simon talked about.
Some were master’s, others doctoral. He could barely make out that the oldest, most timeworn degree was from the 1800s. While the subjects and the universities changed, from places like Harvard and Stanford, a clear pattern emerged: each set was earned by a different, but feminine or unisex, name.
Near the end of the hallway, a master’s degree in biochemical engineering rested against the wall. The name printed on the front gave his heart a hefty throb.
Camilla Andrews.
His dragon vibrated with a possessive growl.
Her scent led him toward the tower.
He walked through the arched entrance and crept onto the platform of a staircase leading to the bottom of the tall room.
Five stories of what appeared to be miniature laboratories and walls of books stacked up the tower like honeycomb offices.
A long, raindrop-like chandelier hung from the center, illuminating the complex system.
Movement caught his eye, and he found Izzy reading something with her wings stretched out behind her, wider than she was tall and spanning the length of her back. She hovered as quiet as a butterfly. A few white feathers clung to the base, but otherwise, the ivory skin of her wings was bare.
His breath caught.
A peculiar yellow light, woven into her wings, appeared solid enough to keep her aloft. Just like a damned Tattered One.
Learning she was the origin of the Tattered Ones had been a shocking stab to the heart, which still bled as she hovered above him. But the idea of that Tattered One still hunting her made his blood boil.
Izzy had used the same yellow light to stun his dragon.
He had a feeling she projected it herself.
It wasn’t something her body did naturally, since her wings weren’t like that the first time he’d lain eyes on her in the forest. She seemed like she was on autopilot, her attention glued to the text in front of her, mouth open while her chest moved in deep breaths with each flap of her wings.
He knew firsthand how hard it was to maintain a hover. Much like an eagle, dragons soared more than hovered. It wasn’t an easy task to learn or endure. But to hover and create the facsimile of tissue at the same time?
She was incredible.
He inhaled deeply, bringing in a citrusy scent. Following the fruity aroma, he found Izzy’s physical body passed out on a red chaise, like a child’s forgotten doll.
Her skin stretched gauntly under her simple blue dress printed with white daisies.
The outfit wasn’t practical for the cool subfloor.
She didn’t even have shoes or a blanket to cover her thin frame.
A thick-rimmed pair of glasses lay crooked on her face.
Her dull hair lay in a mass of tangles, as if she’d spent hours sleeping there.
The tray of untouched food sitting on the coffee table nearby caused his dragon tail to twitch, anger streaking up his spine.
How could someone abandon and neglect their human body in such a way? Dragons appreciated their human side. Rational thought and emotion rooted their dragon side and kept them from becoming Lost.
A soft current of wind tickled his face. He looked up. Her spirit floated down with her back toward him. Her caramel-blond hair cascaded between the featherless wings. His eyes strayed to the curves of her backside noticeable through the elegant white business suit her spirit form wore.
His dragon barreled against the locked tight barrier between them.
The words he wanted to say burned in his throat.
He’d never reacted like a drooling behemoth to a woman, but his discipline deteriorated beneath her feet.
When she drifted within reaching distance, the impulse to connect them tugged at him.
His hand rose toward her and gently grasped her ankle.
A jolt scored through his body. She was translucent and soft, like a warm, sheer piece of silk. He jerked his hand back.
She gasped and whipped around.
When their eyes locked, the book slapped against the floor like thunder.