through, as her mother used to say.
She eyed the sea stacks sticking up like…like…
The teeth of a dragon, her beast murmured.
She steeled her nerves, then plunged downward.
“What? Get her!” one of the dragons roared.
She flicked her tail, daring them. Sure. Come and get me.
Chapter Nineteen
Lachlan extended his claws and dove at full speed. The dragon beneath him glanced up too late. It screamed and dropped to the ground, flapping shredded wings. The shifters near the jetty scattered as the dragon thumped into the ground and went limp.
Lachlan turned to the next dragon, who backed away, wide-eyed. It scooped its wings in a sign of dragon surrender and started sputtering.
“I…I’ll be going now.” With a flick of its tail, the dragon fled.
Lachlan shot a halfhearted plume of fire after it. He burned to chase down and kill the bastard, but there was no time. He had to get to the other side of the island.
Holly! his dragon cried.
Damn it all. How had it come to this?
Leaving Holly on the mountaintop had taken all the resolve he had, and he’d thought he was doing the right thing. It was only when he’d been drawn into the skirmish by the jetty that he’d realized it was all a diversion. The most gut-wrenching, sinking moment of his life. He’d left Holly when she needed him most. Worse, he’d sent her directly into danger.
Never leaving her again, his dragon vowed.
No, he wouldn’t. Ever, even if it killed him.
He scanned around. Two dragons fewer to face meant… How many foes left?
The commotion made them hard to count, but it was clear the tide of battle was turning in favor of his forces.
“Go,” one of his men called. “Help the others. We can only pray Lombardi hasn’t slipped away.”
Lachlan took one last look around, then sprinted down the glen that bisected the center of the island.
Of all the nights to stage an attack, his dragon muttered, spotting the heights where he and Holly had perched just a short time ago. No time to process it all.
True, but he had the feeling Trevor’s revelations would take more than one night to grasp. And right now…
He flew hard and fast, nose stretched forward, tail as streamlined as possible. Every second counted. Finally, the landscape beneath him changed from brambles to the groomed carpet of the golf course. The villa loomed ahead, its doors wide open. Lights spilled out over the lawn, where shifters fought savagely.
On approach, he unleashed a roar that made every shifter on the scene jerk in surprise. Hell, he nearly jolted at the sheer ferocity of it. Then he barreled directly into the aerial battle, making both sides scatter.
Hell of an entrance, Liam quipped into his mind.
Lachlan snorted. “Holly. Enzo. Where are they?”
Liam’s blank look scared the hell out of him. “They were over there, but…”
An enemy dragon closed in, cutting off Liam’s reply. Lachlan nearly sprinted over to help, but Gemma called out from the midst of her own fight with a huge dragon.
“They went that way.” She tilted her chin one way, then broke off the gesture to return her attacker’s fire.
Lachlan shot a huge blast of fire past her attacker as he flew by, making the dragon spin out of control.
“Thanks,” Gemma grunted, moving in to finish the bastard off.
Lachlan didn’t stop to look, but a panicked yelp and hard thump told him all he needed to know. One more enemy down meant Gemma could help Liam and his claws in their lopsided battle.
Slowly, his side was seizing the upper hand. But the last desperate throes of battle could be the deadliest if a soldier didn’t keep his head in the right place.
Which Lachlan was definitely not doing. Not with Holly out of sight. He rushed along the shore of the island, desperately searching for her.
Then he turned a corner and spotted a whirl of action. A group of dragons had drifted away from the center of the battle to fight amidst…the sea stacks? He squinted into the darkness. What fool would venture there?
Holly, his dragon whispered, spotting a coppery flash in the distance.
In hot pursuit were two dragons, and his heart jumped to his throat, seeing how close they were to Holly. Plumes of fire illuminated the night, blazing like arrows until they struck a sea stack. Then the flames would split and swirl like a stirred-up hearth, often backfiring on the dragon who’d spat them.
Bloody hell. That was a deathtrap. He raced forward. But even at top speed, it would take