Chapter Two Maxim #2
In truth, I was too focused on keeping us all out of a ditch to feel the magical charge of the witching wards Theo Mercury has woven around his private retreat. But I am not the strongest warlock in this harem. Just the strongest dragon.
Unsettled in the confines of this swaying vehicle, my dragon stirs and grumbles in my chest.
Zephyr leans into Ash’s protective arm and looks queasy. “How long precisely have we yet to travel?”
“Um, let me look. Oh, crap!” Still twisted to check on Zara, Neo has dropped the smart phone behind his seat.
Before anyone else can react, Neo voices a mouselike squeak of dismay and unbuckles his seatbelt. “Hold still, okay, Lucius? I think it fell between your feet—”
“Look out!” Zara cries suddenly, sharp with fear.
My hands clench around the wheel.
With startling suddenness, a pale belly and flashing hooves appear in our headlights. An impressive rack of antlers rears before the windshield. A jostle of shaggy gray haunches and a thicket of antlers stream across the road.
Saints of the northern steppes.
Can those be… reindeer?
Swearing vigorously in my mother tongue, I pump the brakes and wrench the wheel into a hard twist. Prophetic visions of shattered glass, a crushed grille, and (absurdly) an overturned sleigh flash through my head.
Curse this snow.
I will forever be known as the Gemini king who ran over Santa Claus.
My inner dragon roars in alarm and tries to rise. Grimly I battle down the instinct to shift. Clearly, this is not that time.
Under my determined grip, the SUV swerves, barely avoiding the fleeing bodies of the herd. We fishtail across the road. I steer into the swerves and pump the brakes to bleed speed. Shaggy gray and brown creatures scatter and bound before me.
Somehow, miraculously, I manage to miss them.
Fortunately I was already driving slowly, for safety reasons. The SUV has nearly skidded to a stop when our front wheels slide into a ditch.
The front end pitches forward and the rear end tilts up. I am thrown against the wheel, but the shoulder harness holds my weight. A white wall of snow fills my windshield.
The hiss and pop of an airbag explodes from my steering wheel in my face. The rapidly expanding balloon forces me back in my seat.
Well.
At least we have finally stopped skidding.
The engine sputters out. The vehicle fills with a stunned silence.
“The fuck,” Ronin gasps behind me. “Were those bloody things reindeer?”
“Mountain elk, surely.” Lucius is already unbuckling his seat belt. “Zara, my dear, are you quite all right?”
I fight free of the airbag and twist around in alarm.
But Zara is already releasing her seatbelt. “Yeah, I’m fine. Neo, baby? You okay?”
My gaze shoots to the seat beside me. For some reason, the passenger airbag has not deployed.
Neo is slumped facedown over the dashboard.
Because he was searching the floor for his fallen smart phone when the reindeer—or elk—appeared, he was not wearing his seatbelt.
“Neo Mercury, do not move.” Alarmed, I wrestle my airbag to one side and switch on the overhead light.
Neo’s face is buried in his outstretched arms, purple curls dark against his green parka. I inhale sharply, but I can smell no blood. The windshield before him is intact.
“Neo!” My senses jangling with fear, I touch his shoulder gently. “Can you hear me?”
To my immense relief, this sweet mate I cherish stirs and voices a thick groan. “Oh… wow… my head.”
With my anxious assistance, Neo sits slowly up and falls back against his seat. One hand fumbles with his spectacles, which thankfully have not broken. My sharp shifter eyes zoom in on his forehead, where the purple shadow of a goose egg swells.
“Neo, be still. You have bumped your head.” Gently I capture his fumbling hand and peer into his bleary eyes. “On the dash. I do not know why your airbag—”
“Never mind that. Lemme up there.” Ash is a healer and he will know what to do. But he is trapped in the back until the others move.
Already Ronin is pushing open his door and scrambling out of the bucket seat. Everyone shifts around so Ash can shoulder his way out of the vehicle. A gust of cold winter air and a flurry of snowflakes curl into the warm interior.
“Lights,” Vasili calls, staring intently through his window. “There’s a house or something. I see lighted windows through the trees.”
“Oh my God, Neo.” Awkward with her pregnant belly, Zara is straining to lean between the front seats and reach for Neo. Her turquoise eyes are wide and anxious, her face pale and filled with fear.
“S’okay, babe.” At once, Neo’s hand gropes to find hers. His eyes are closed and his brow is furrowed, but he knows she is there.
“I said there’s a house,” Vasili repeats impatiently from the rear. He is trapped back there by Mordred and a mountain of gifts.
And our snake does not like to be ignored.
“Yes, Vasili, we see it.” Lucius is supporting Zara as she leans into the front, his strong hands bracing her from behind. But our wolf is Neo’s alpha too, so Lucius is straining to get his eyes upon our boy.
“Can’t be the chalet,” Zara says softly. “We’re nowhere near the summit. Neo, baby…”
“I’m okay,” Neo mumbles, sounding dazed. “Just a headache. But I won’t mind… getting out of the car. I think I might be sick.”
By now, Ash has clambered into the ditch, plowed through the snow, and swung open Neo’s door. “Just stay put for a sec, okay, Neo? Lemme get a look at ya.”
Knowing that Neo is in the best of hands with our resident healer and Zara both tending him, I push the airbag farther from my face and swing open my door. It opens halfway, then thuds into a snowbank.
A fresh flurry of cold gusts into the vehicle.
Fortunately, I am not a bulky dragon. (No matter how much I eat.) I swing my legs out, squeeze my shoulders through the narrow opening, and drop into the snow-filled ditch.
A thick drift of fallen snow rises above my boots to encase my thighs. Thick wet flakes kiss my face and swirl past my eyes. I zip up my parka, pull up my hood to shield my eyes, and peer between the snowy boughs that fringe this narrow road.
Through a thick lattice of trees, I glimpse the warm golden glow streaming through a row of mullioned windows, set deep into snug stone walls.
I breathe in and fill my lungs. Over the balmy tang of spruce and the fresh metallic scent of snow, I smell the acrid char of burning wood.
Smoke curls through the chimney and floats over the eaves.
The house burrows into the woods, barely visible from the road. From my vantage in this ditch, standing hip-deep in snow, I cannot even see a driveway.
Clearly, my Zara was right.
This house is too small to be Senator Mercury’s celebrity retreat. It is more a huntsman’s cottage than a house.
Ash’s voice drifts through the open car door behind me. “Kid’s only half conscious. We gotta get him inside, wake him up, keep him warm. Beautiful, grab my med kit from the back, will ya?”
He is speaking to Vasili and not to me, but no matter. I know what I must do.
An electric current of resolve and purpose crackles through me.
I twist and duck to peer into the car. Ash is hovering over Neo, peering into his eyes and asking Neo gently to count Ash’s upraised fingers, while Neo mumbles something I cannot decipher.
Zephyr’s slim form hovers at Ash’s shoulder.
He too is Neo’s lover, and anxious for the boy, as we all are.
Ronin squeezes in alongside, slinging an arm around Zephyr to share body heat.
In the dim glow of the overhead light, Zara’s worried face turns toward me.
“Do not worry. This is Mercury property,” I say gruffly. “We are inside the senator’s wards. Whoever lives in this house will be someone he knows. I will go there now and see.”
“Okay, Max. Try to hurry.” Her teal brows draw together in a furrow. “But be careful, okay? The last thing we need is you getting hurt too.”
“I will be quick but careful, my sovereign.” I lean in to press a kiss to her anxious brow.
Her hand rises to clutch my shoulder. Her worry for our sweet Neo flows through her grip and floods our mating bond.
“Do not be afraid, my Zara. I will bring help.” Ablaze with determination to protect Neo and all our mates, I turn away and scramble from the ditch.
Without warning, Vasili slithers through the open rear door. Tall and slim and lethal, he floats over the ditch with his levitation witchcraft, lands on the bank, and rears over me like a king cobra. Framed in the upturned collar of his dark woolen coat, his sharp pale face looks cold and vicious.
Yet he bends to grip my hand and lift me the final meter to stand at his side.
“I’m coming too,” he hisses, “to find whoever lives in that house. If for any reason they don’t care to help, I don’t intend to offer them a choice.”
God knows, Vasili and I do not always agree. But when it comes to protecting our mates, we are in full accord.