Dragon's Second Chance Romance - Riley Storm Page 0,66

friend and teammate agreed. “What do we do?”

The final decision was on Pietro. It was his mate who was in there, in harm’s way. Rann wouldn’t break the rules and go without him. Pietro had to make the call. Did he abandon the plan and go with his gut? Or did he wait for her father to exit the building, like they’d agreed upon?

“What do we do?” Rann asked again.

From inside the building came a shrill, piercing shriek. No human could have made such a sound. There was only one creature that could.

A vampire.

Pietro’s dragon roared in response.

“We go,” he snarled, already rising from cover.

Rann must have anticipated the answer because he was moving before Pietro had finished speaking. The two hurdled the rubble in front of them and landed, accelerating at a near sprint as they headed for the opening.

With a grunt, they launched themselves into the air, landing in a crouch on the tiled flooring of the ruined building, nearly twenty feet in the air. The way the building was perched on the outcropping of earth was a strong reminder of the power of an earth dragon unleashed.

Pietro raced through the hallways, searching for the room where his mate was, trying to find her before the vamp recovered. It would only be down for a short period of time. He had to get in there before that was up.

“Claire!” he bellowed, dust drifting down from the ceiling as his voice filled the hallway.

“In here!”

He turned and simply barreled his way through a wall, heading in the direction he’d heard the voice come from, the flimsy interior walls collapsing under his unrestrained power.

Bright, flaming red scales, practically the color of his mate’s hair, rose to cover the surface of his skin as he prepared for battle. He blasted through another wall and came to a stop at a strange tableau in front of him.

Claire was kneeling behind a chair, frantically struggling at the bonds that held her father to it. In her right hand was a long white cylinder emitting a purplish light.

Even as he watched, a vampire came close to her, but Claire waved the wand in its direction, and the creature retreated swiftly with an angry hiss. Nearby, another vampire was on the ground, clutching at its face, rolling around, still making that horrible sound.

Pietro grinned. The plan had worked! The UV wand, meant for sanitizing the house, wasn’t strong enough to kill a vampire, but when shoved into the unhinged jaw of a vampire going in to bite someone it would hit the fleshy, painful inside of its mouth.

“This is enough!” the preacher shrieked, throwing off his shock at Pietro and Rann’s arrival and going for Claire, hoping to stop her.

Pietro darted forward to help her, but the remaining vampire intercepted him, blocking his path with a hiss, fangs extended.

Flame roared to light in his hand.

“Get Claire!” he snapped at Rann, squaring off with the vampire.

It glanced warily at his flame-filled hand, watching it intently. Too intently. Pietro bit down on a smile and led the vampire on like a matador, swirling the fire around, occasionally launching small bursts at the vamp.

Behind him, he heard a grunt and a thud. He smiled. Rann would make short work of the preacher, that was for certain.

He brought his flame-filled hand in close to his chest and then snapped it as far out to the side as he could. The vamp’s eyes tracked it precisely.

Which is when a stream of flame from Pietro’s other hand caught it in the chest and hurled it back against the far wall, burning its clothing and starting to melt its skin.

“Ro!”

He spun to see Rann unconscious on the ground, blood pouring from his head, and the other, injured, vampire standing over him with a long piece of metal in its hand. The creature from the Otherworld must have surprised the dragon, waiting until he was out of visual range to strike.

The vamp raised the pole and prepared to split Rann’s skull open with it.

Dammit.

Pietro flung himself forward, taking the blow in the side even as he collided with the vamp and the pair tumbled to the ground. Pain erupted from his ribs. At least two of them were broken—he’d felt them go—and breathing was excruciating. Even short, shallow breaths were almost more than he could handle.

Getting to his feet, doing his best to ignore the stabbing pain in his side, Pietro faced off against the vampire. Its mouth was a mass of bubbled,