Before he could stop himself, Caleb found his mouth opening to do just that, before he quickly snapped it shut again.
“Is there something I can help you with?” he asked coolly instead – of course, his own clan’s power and prestige couldn’t match the Heit Clan’s, but he was still a dragon.
Mr. Heit glanced at him, his smile still in place.
“Oh no, I just happened to see Ranger Dearborn’s car parked outside, and I thought I’d swing by to see if she’d reconsidered my generous offer. I wasn’t aware that she’d brought in… outside help.”
“I haven’t,” Kira snapped, before Caleb could say anything, or hint to Heit that Kira hadn’t asked him for help, and didn’t even know they were dragons.
“No amount of money is going to make me drop it. I’ll fight you every step of the way,” Kira continued, her voice rising. “You can’t buy me off – it’s just not going to happen. So get back in your sleazemobile and get out of here.”
“Now, now, there’s no need to be so rude,” Heit chided her. “It was an offer made in good faith. I just wanted to make your life easier. You can’t blame me for that. In fact, if you’ll drop this silly legal challenge, I’ll even consider doubling it. We’re going to get the land anyway, so you may as well get something out of it.”
“She’s already told you she’s not interested,” Caleb said, his voice even. At this moment, he didn’t care how much richer and more powerful the Heit Clan was. All he cared about right now was making sure Kira didn’t have to deal with this clown for even a moment longer. “I think it’d be best if you left.”
Heit seemed amused by his words, flashing a grin – but his eyes were cold and deadly. “Oh – and who are you?” he asked, looking Caleb up and down. “I don’t think I recognize you. To whom do you belong, exactly?”
“Caleb Tanner,” Caleb said. He didn’t think Heit would be at all impressed by his name – his clan didn’t amass money, after all – but telling him might stop him from asking something it might be awkward to have to explain to Kira just now.
“Ahh, Tanner,” Heit said, as if that placed him. “Quaint! Very quaint – tell me again, what is it that’s in your family’s hoa—”
“Film,” Caleb said firmly, before Heit could get the word out completely. It wasn’t that he wanted to hide the truth from Kira, but he wanted to be able to tell her in his own time, on his own terms. He’d find the right moment, but it wasn’t now, in the middle of an awkward scene in a diner.
“Ah – yes. I remember now.” Heit smiled, shark-like, once again. “And can I enquire about why exactly you’ve come here to help Ranger Dearborn? What is it exactly you hope to achieve?”
“He didn’t come here to help me,” Kira said, shooting Caleb a confused look. “He’s a visitor I was showing around the park. What are you two talking about?”
“I’m just here on a trip, I didn’t know anything about what was happening with the forest,” Caleb told Heit, hoping that would be an end to that line of questioning. He knew he’d have some explaining to do to Kira now, but perhaps that was for the best. Yes, he wanted to tell her in his own time, but perhaps having Heit apparently speaking in riddles would make it easier to bring the topic up – certainly, it would mean he could be honest about what he was really looking for in the woods, which meant maybe he could get Kira’s help, which meant the curse would be broken quicker, which meant he’d be able to help her.
“Oh… then I must be interrupting something,” Heit said, affecting shock and looking over his shoulder at his two minions, who smirked at him. “I’m terribly sorry, it wasn’t my intention to crash the party. I’ll be on my way now then – but please, Ranger Dearborn, it’s not too late. I wouldn’t want anyone to feel like they’d been hard done by, and my offer stands right up until the day the woodland leaves the trust. But after that, you get nothing, and we get the land anyway. Think about it.”
Heit grinned over his shoulder as he walked away, raising his eyebrows sleazily at Caleb as he went. Caleb glowered at him – he couldn’t help it. His dragon was at the forefront of his senses, eyes glowing with rage.
He cannot be allowed to speak that way to our mate! Chase him down, and challenge him to a dragon duel!
You know I can’t do that,Caleb told it – though in this moment, he really, really wanted to. Dragons don’t do that kind of thing anymore. And even if they did, I’m not about to cause that many problems for myself, or for Kira. I wouldn’t dare fight a duel until the curse is broken anyway. I’d trip over my own feet.
“Bastard,” Kira muttered, drawing Caleb’s attention back to her at once. And his dragon’s, too – the sight of her downturned, furious face made it forget, at least for now, about the idea of running off and challenging Heit to a duel. Right now, it was clear Kira needed him.
“Yeah, well… you won’t get any argument from me on that score,” Caleb agreed. “What a sleaze.”
“He keeps making that same offer, as if he thinks if he just waves enough money under my nose I’ll give up protecting the park,” Kira said, shaking her head. There were angry tears in her eyes. “But since he does keep making it, it makes me hope he knows on some level that we’ll have a good case if we challenge the sale of the land. It’d just be a hell of a lot easier if we had that will – it’d be open and shut then. Heit wouldn’t have a leg to stand on. As it is, we don’t have any choice but to go through a lengthy, expensive court process, and as generous as people have been, we can’t hope to collect enough money to pay for our legal costs if Heit decides to draw things out.”
“Then I guess what we need to do is find that will,” Caleb said.
“Easier said than done,” Kira countered him, sighing. She lifted a hand, scrubbing her eyes. Unable to help himself, Caleb reached across the table, laying his hand comfortingly on her arm. Kira looked down at it in mild surprise for a moment, but then she seemed to relax into the touch, letting out another long, slow sigh.
“Sorry, I don’t mean to be negative,” she said. “But believe me – I’ve combed the county archives as much as I can. There’re some restricted sections you can only get on request, but the clerk there told me the will was stored in the building that went up in smoke. They seem pretty sure of it.”
Hmmm.
Caleb narrowed his eyes. He wasn’t a suspicious dragon by nature, but this all seemed just a little too convenient. “An important document like that – surely there had to be at least one copy made.”
Kira bit her lip, shaking her head. “Maybe. But no one seems to think so – and so, if it does exist, finding it seems like it’d be a one in a million chance.”
Nodding, Caleb tightened his fingers on her arm slightly. “But it’s still a chance, right?”
Kira blinked at him, frowning just a little. “Yeah. It’s still a chance.”