Page 11

His face was expressionless, his stance stiff, as he finally turned a corner and came into view.

I figured he was in a bad mood, though I couldn’t read it, but something else instantly distracted me. There was a small black patch over his right eye, his wolf’s eye. It was a small patch, and didn’t seem to be attached by any strings. I’d never seen him wear such a thing before.

“Did something happen to your eye?” I asked him the second he was within ear shot.

One of his dark brows went up. “This way,” he said, striding back the way he’d come.

“Is your eye okay?” I asked again, sincerely worried.

“It’s fine. I wear this whenever I’m among humans.”

“You never used to.”

“Things change. Appearances must be kept. The eye could raise questions.”

I didn’t like that, hated that he had to hide even the physical aspects of who he was in public now.

“Fucking druid politics,” I muttered.

I saw a corner of his mouth turn up, but he didn’t comment.

“Stay here,” he told the druids who had been trailing us as we approached a lone elevator. He used two keys before the doors slid open. I followed him in.

“I spoke to Caleb and Christian about the meeting this afternoon,” he said idly as he punched the button on the elevator to send us to the bottom level. “They said they’d be there.”

I was tense, waiting for him to say something about me ditching my tail the night before, but he didn’t bring it up, and I sure wasn’t going to.

“Thank you,” I responded. Caleb had made me memorize his current number, but I hadn’t had a chance to call yet.

“I know that you work best with those two, and the three of you will certainly be essential for the task force. If there is anyone alive with firsthand experience in dragon-slaying, they aren’t on any of our rosters, so you three have a distinct advantage.” As he spoke, he took off his eye patch, slipping it into his pocket.

I knew of at least one who had experience slaying nearly the entire female population of my family, though I couldn’t imagine he’d be on any druid roster.

“The dragons have at least one slayer, as well,” I told him as we disembarked from the elevator. “One with experience killing many dragons. He is my father’s pet.”

He sent me a startled look, and I thought I caught a hint of the worry in his eyes. “I’ll need to know all about that. You’ll brief me later.”

I sighed, knowing I was about to piss him off royally, but unable to help it. “I need to talk to the dragon you have in custody. How about we exchange a briefing for a talking?”

His jaw clenched, but he took it better than I’d thought he would. “We’ll discuss it later. For now, I need to walk you through the steps I’ve taken to secure our son before I have to leave on urgent business. Everything else can wait.”

We passed two sets of guards in the hallway before we made it to the next door.

“There will be four guards in this hallway at all times,” he explained, “as well as two to guard the elevator doors up top.”

He walked me through a hand print scan, eye scan, and voice activated door, inputting my information into all three.

“Who all has access to the vault itself?”

“You, me, and my lieutenants, and one of the seven will be on active guarding duty at all times.”

I didn’t want to ask, but I couldn’t help it. I would never trust the bitch. “I’m assuming Siobhan is the exception to that?”

He sighed. “She’ll never be guarding our child, if that’s what you’re getting at. She’s loyal, but I knew you wouldn’t approve of that.”

“She shouldn’t have access, either. She’d harm him if she could. You’re being naive if you don’t believe that.”

“She is exempted from guarding, and she would be unable to access the vault if she tried. I haven’t even told her about it, though with this many guards, our child won’t be a secret from anyone for long. I didn’t see another option. Better to err on the side of caution than to rely on discretion alone. Any more questions?”