She glanced over at the treehouse. Was it okay? If it burned down, Declan would be devastated. So far, it remained in one piece. She wasn’t sure how much longer it would be before one of the dragons fell and landed on it, crushing it. If that happened, the fight would only escalate because it would move out of the air and onto the ground.
The fire started to spread, and it brought her attention back to what was happening in front of her. Kellen slithered closer, and then in one, quick movement, he wrapped around her legs. She was bound, frozen in place. He hissed at her, watching her carefully.
Why was he looking at her?
Oh, he wanted to scare her. He was a sadist. She knew that. Now she saw that what really excited this asshole was seeing her afraid.
Well, too bad.
She wasn’t scared anymore. Not of him. She was doing just fine without Kellen in her life. She’d find a way out of this, but she was going to have to do it on her own. The Monster brothers were distracted, trying to fight off the dragons who were trying to save them. It had been a clever ruse, she thought. Kellen had come up with the perfect plan for separating all of them.
Too bad it wouldn’t be enough.
A tree branch fell, still burning, and Zoa stretched out, trying to grab it. Kellen squeezed her tighter, but she forced herself to keep trying. The branch slid through her fingers, but she tried again. Kellen wound himself around her body once more.
Now he was wrapped up to her waist. It didn’t matter. She wasn’t going to die.
“You got this,” she told herself.
Zoa knew that she had to get out of this. She had to find a way to be free. She wanted to believe that everything Declan and his brothers had said was true.
She wanted him to be her mate.
She wanted the happy ending.
“Fuck you,” she screamed out as loud as she possibly could. Her voice filled the night air. One of the dragons closest to her noticed, and gestured for the others to stop. The fighting ended instantly.
Zoa wrapped her hands around the branch, grabbing it tightly, and brought it back to Kellen. Then she pressed the fiery branch to his snake body, burning him. He hissed, instantly shifting back to his human form.
“You bitch!”
He’d been busy focusing on her, though, and he’d forgotten to watch out for the chaos unfolding in the air. The dragons had stopped their fighting. Now they were landing all around them, coming in for the kill, and suddenly, a shadow fell across Kellen. He looked around to find himself surrounded by nearly a dozen dragons who were staring at him.
Zoa breathed a sigh of relief.
It was over.
She was safe.
Nothing was going to happen to her now.
“No,” he said, taking a step back. “No, it’s not what it seems. She hurt me. I was trying to save her, and-”
He was cut off by a huge dragon that stepped forward. The creature towered over Kellen, making him appear very small. Beside the dragon, Kellen looked weak and afraid.
Zoa had noticed that Declan and his brothers were identical in their dragon forms, but she knew perfectly well that this one was him. She could sense him. She just knew that it was him.
Some people might not be able to tell the identical shifter dragons apart, but Zoa could. She didn’t know whether it was because they were mates or whether it was because his eyes were the same even in this form, but she knew.
It was him.
Declan stretched a talon out and, almost so quickly that Zoa didn’t know it was happening, he sliced Kellen across the throat. Kellen Brotella instantly fell to the ground, dead. He hit the dirt with a loud thump, and then Declan shifted back at once and looked at Zoa. He reached for her, grabbing her shoulders. She looked away from the body and back to Declan. He had killed Kellen.
The snake was never going to bother Zoa again.
“Are you okay?”
“I’m okay,” she nodded quickly. Then she looked at all of the other dragons. Oh, they were so big, and they were so beautiful, and they’d all stopped fighting at the same time to make sure she was okay. How wonderful was that? “He set a trap,” she said quickly. Zoa tried to get all of the words out as fast as she could. “He set a trap for all of you. He said there was a dragon in trouble and to come here, but it was only so he could try to get me again.”