Fire Born (City of Dragons Book 5)

  Contents

  Synopsis

  Copyright

  Title Page

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR

  Fire Born

  City of Dragons

  Book Five

  by Val St. Crowe

  Penny Caspian again. Nine months pregnant. Big as a house. And there’s another serial killer loose in Sea City.

  This guy uses compulsion to kill his victims, forces them to do it themselves, and makes it look like a suicide. But my boyfriend Detective Lachlan Flint and I have uncovered his gruesome methods and are on his trail. As the bodies pile up, we know we have to stop him.

  What else? Oh, my cousin showed up, pregnant as well, disowned by my grandparents. An old flame of Felicity’s is driving a wedge between her and Jensen. And Lachlan and I are struggling with our vow not to share blood. We know that if we do, we’ll rekindle blood bond, and we aren’t going back to that darkness.

  But every time we touch, it tempts us. So… we’re not touching so much these days. And I miss touching him. I miss kissing him. I miss all of him.

  FIRE BORN

  © copyright 2016 by Val St.Crowe

  http://vjchambers.com

  Punk Rawk Books

  Please do not copy or post this book in its entirety or in parts anywhere. You may, however, share the entire book with a friend by forwarding the entire file to them. (And I won’t get mad.)

  Fire Born

  City of Dragons

  Book Five

  Val St. Crowe

  CHAPTER ONE

  I awoke for the eighteenth time that night.

  Okay, maybe it wasn’t eighteen times. Maybe it was more like ten.

  Still. It was a freaking lot of times that I had woken up. I was the size of a small continent, and I slept in a pile of pillows, but I still wasn’t comfortable, because I was insanely pregnant.

  Part of being that pregnant is peeing. Constantly. All night.

  No one takes how annoying that is seriously, either. If I complained about it to someone, that person would inevitably quip that it was getting me in practice for when the baby got there. And maybe that was true and all, and maybe it was easier to be nine months pregnant than it was to have a newborn. But a little sympathy for a pregnant lady was not out of line, in my opinion.

  I threw aside the covers and climbed out of bed. Then I waddled out of the bedroom and into the bathroom.

  I emptied my bladder, knowing that it would be full again in twenty minutes. Its capacity was severely diminished due to the fact that my unborn son was sitting on it. Actually, I guessed he was head-butting it, at least if he was in the right position, he was. If he was butt down instead of head down, then there was a chance he might deliver breech, and I really didn’t want that, because of the complications and all that.

  Leaving the bathroom, I ran into Lachlan Flint, my boyfriend, who was standing outside the guest bedroom, scratching his bare stomach. “Hey,” he yawned.

  “Did I wake you?” I said.

  “Nah, I was up,” he said, blinking hard.

  I didn’t believe that for a second. He had big time sleep face.

  He closed the distance between us and kissed my eyebrow, one hand coming up to rub my swollen stomach. “Go back to sleep, Penny.”

  I nodded. “I’ll do my best.” I waddled back the hallway and into my bedroom, where I climbed into my bed and rearranged all my pillows.

  Alone.

  I told Felicity, my best friend, that I had kicked Lachlan out of bed two months ago because it was too uncomfortable to try to share the space with him, and it wasn’t exactly untrue. Between me and my belly and my pillows, Lachlan only had about two square feet of space to sleep on anyway, because I was taking up the whole bed.

  But…

  Well, I could have bought a king-sized bed, you know? It wasn’t as if we couldn’t afford it. I’d inherited a lot of money when my parents died. I was a member of a dragon dynasty, and most dragon families were pretty well off. Mine was no exception.

  And even if I couldn’t have afforded it, Lachlan could have. The man had been squirreling away eighty percent of his salary for years, living cheaply, surviving on the bare minimum. It was because he had been completely destroyed after the violent death of his young daughter two years ago. Afterward, he had closed in on himself. Anyway, he had quite a bit of money saved up.

  We could have afforded a new bed.

  But when I suggested Lachlan move to the guest room, he hadn’t brought up the idea of a king-sized bed either. He’d looked relieved and said it was a great idea.

  I knew why.

  Being close to each other was… tempting.

  Lachlan and I had a blood bond, some rare connection that happened between dragons and vampires. It meant that we had incredible power if we kept it charged up, which we did by sharing blood, mostly him drinking mine.

  However, the blood bond changed us. It made us power-hungry. It made us lose regard for people’s lives. It turned us into terrible people.

  We had resolved never to give in to it again. Only the most dire of circumstances would make us turn to it, and then only as a last resort.

  Which would have been all fine and good if it weren’t for the fact that we both missed the blood sharing something awful.

  Lachlan loved the way my blood tasted, and I loved the way his drinking my blood made me feel—connected to him, connected to the universe. We both craved it, and we craved it worse when we were physically close.

  Anyway, slowly, over the past few months, we had stopped touching so much. We’d blamed it on my belly. I’d claimed that I was too pregnant, and he’d accepted it, and now we slept in separate beds and almost never kissed on the lips or touched each other for longer than a few seconds.

  It was better this way, but it was also sad.

  I missed him. I missed his touch.

  I pulled the covers up over my body, burrowing down in my pillows.

  Inside my enormous belly, my baby boy began twisting and kicking.

  I rubbed at him, trying to get him to calm down. “Go back to sleep,” I whispered to him. But my voice was thick with tears.

  * * *

  ~Lachlan~

  Lachlan Flint watched as his girlfriend Penny shut the door to her bedroom and blinked hard. He rubbed his eyes, trying to get the sleep out of them.

  In truth, it was probably him that had woken her up. She must have heard the alarm on his phone. He had tried to stay up late, but he hadn’t been able to, so he’d set that alarm when he found his eyes closing.

  But now, he only had a few minutes to get downtown.

  He went into th
e bathroom and splashed water over his face. His chin looked shaggy, but he didn’t have time to shave. Not that it mattered if he shaved anyway. It was only that everyone would know the color of his hair, and that he’d be easier to identify, which he didn’t necessarily want.

  He glared at himself in the mirror, feeling empty, feeling angry, feeling lost. It was the way he usually felt these days. He knew there was only one way he could stop that feeling, and he was on his way to make that happen.

  He stumbled back into the guest room, which was now his bedroom for all intents and purposes. He tugged a knitted hat over his head, pulling it down over his eyebrows so that it almost obscured his eyes.

  He yanked on a pair of jeans and a sweater.

  He sat down on the bed to tie his shoes.

  Then he went out of the room. He walked down the hallway to the living room and took his coat off the rack. He shrugged into it as he walked back up the hallway to the door to the balcony.

  It would be easier to slip out back here. No one would see him and ask awkward questions.

  When he pulled the door open, he was greeted by a gust of freezing air. It was February, and there always seemed to be a cruel wind coming off the ocean in the winter. He shut the door to the balcony firmly behind him, huddling under his coat as he hurried down the steps to the sand below.

  At the bottom, he looked out over the cold ocean. In the darkness, it was nothing more than an endless abyss of dark water.

  He shivered.

  Thrusting his hands into his pockets, he trudged around the hotel where he lived with Penny now. He’d moved in a few months ago, and it should have been triumphant. After everything that he’d been through, after he’d struggled through what he could only term a living hell for years, he’d found Penny. And he’d thought that finally the nightmare was over. That he could relax and be happy again.

  Sure, he wasn’t normal. He was a vampire. She was a dragon. They had somehow conceived an impossible child together, and they had powers and a connection so deep that it hurt to be separated from her.

  But he’d had hope.

  And now, that hope seemed far away. It was a flame in a window too high for him to reach, and the wind was coming in and making it flicker on its wick.

  The flame of hope hadn’t gone out. Not yet. But Lachlan wasn’t sure how much longer he could keep it burning.

  He sighed, the wind blowing in from the water at his back, cutting through his jeans, finding its way inside his jacket, down his neck like icy fingers on his spine.

  She could never know that he left her like this on these nights. It was bad enough that he hadn’t fought to stay in her bed. If she knew he was leaving her alone in their apartment, going off to chase the things he was chasing…

  Well, he didn’t want her to know.

  He emerged in front of the hotel, and he hurried to his car. He got inside and turned the key, rubbing his hands together, waiting for the heat to come on.

  When there was a thread of warmth coming through the vents, he buckled his seat belt and closed the door. Then he backed the car up and pulled out onto Atlantic Avenue, which was deserted this time of night, this time of year.

  No one came to the beach in Maryland in February.

  Because of the wide open roads, he made good time, driving right to the place he was looking for, a seedy strip club on the south side of the city that catered to vampires. The girls there could be bought for the right price. For the right price, they could be tasted. It was completely illegal, of course.

  There was a time when he would have nothing to do with the place except to have it shut down.

  But things were different now. He was different now. The vestige of the man he used to be grew paler and paler with each passing day.

  He parked his car but didn’t bother to lock it. Locking a car was a challenge in this part of the city. If he locked it, he’d more than likely end up with a busted window plus a missing stereo. Leaving it unlocked meant he’d keep his window.

  However, he was hoping he’d keep the stereo too. It was cold outside. What thief was running around in the twenty-two degree weather looking for stereos to steal? Especially in the winter, when there were no tourists about?

  Hands in pockets, head down, as much to ward off the cold as to be inconspicuous, he strode across the parking lot to the front door of the strip club.

  It was one of those places that has a glowing doorbell next to the door. Can’t get in unless you’re buzzed in.

  Dutifully, Lachlan rang the doorbell.

  There was a buzzing noise and the door unlocked with a click.

  He yanked it open.

  A burst of warm air hit his face—so different from the cold outside that it was startling.

  “ID?” said the the guy sitting inside the door. He looked bored.

  Lachlan smiled at him. “You don’t need to see my ID.” He felt the talisman he was wearing grow a little warm against his chest as he pushed compulsion magic onto the guy. Lachlan hoped the doorman wasn’t a magical creature of some kind. The vampire’s compulsion would only work on a human. Once, Lachlan had been powerful enough that he could push his will far and wide, command an army to do his bidding. He made vampires and drakes die for the sake of him whims.

  But that was all over.

  And he didn’t want to go back to that. Ever.

  Still… sometimes he was wistful for it.

  But the doorman simply bobbed his head. “Yeah, okay.”

  Lachlan stopped smiling. Shoulders hunched, he moved into the club. The room was dimly lit with reddish lights. There were two stages, one at either end of the club, and each featured girls in various states of undress. Scattered about were tables and booths, the chairs covered in plush red cushions. The music was a slow, thumping, seductive sound, like a sensuous heartbeat.

  Lachlan stayed hunched inside his coat as he made his way between the tables. He was warm. Beads of sweat were breaking out on the back of his neck and under his arms. But he felt safer in the coat. Less obvious. Less recognizable. He was a police officer in this town, after all. If anyone got wind of his being here, it could cause problems for him.

  He looked from left to right, searching the faces of the few men that sat in the plush chairs throughout the room. Young men, old men, fat men, tall men. None of them were the man he was looking for.

  And then Lachlan saw him.

  The man was lounging on a red couch near one of the stages. He had his feet propped up on a nearby table. He wore a velvet suit jacket with no shirt underneath. A tangle of talismans on thick, gold chains lay against his bare skin. A velvet hat with a feather in it perched on his head.

  Lachlan thought he looked like some kind of overgrown, perverse Peter Pan, but he figured it was best to keep his mouth shut about that.

  Instead, he sidled over. “You Carl Hill?”

  Carl looked up. “That’s me, all right. Do you need something?”

  “I, uh, have a little business I’d like to conduct with Minnie,” said Lachlan. “I hear you’re the person to talk to about setting that up.”

  A grin slid over Carl’s face, huge and welcoming. “Well, ain’t that the truth. Have a seat, brother.”

  Lachlan considered telling Carl that he wasn’t his brother. He decided against that too. Instead, he sat on the couch.

  “Minnie’s quite the looker,” said Carl. “You chose well.”

  “That’s not why I chose her,” said Lachlan, and then realized there was no reason to go into that.

  Carl raised his eyebrows. “You a vamp, then? Looking for someone who’ll let you tap a vein?”

  Lachlan grimaced. He should never have brought any of it up. At all.

  “That’s extra, you know,” said Carl.

  Lachlan reached for his wallet. “Do I pay you?”

  “No, no, that’s not how it works. It ain’t payment, either, mind. You and Minnie, you have a nice time. And afterward, if you should feel obligated to give her a littl
e gift, to the tune of about five hundred if you drink blood, that would be much appreciated. Understand, though, that if you don’t give her that gift, I will find you and break your kneecaps.”

  Lachlan rolled his eyes.

  “If she’s damaged at all, passes out from blood loss, that kind of thing, the gift should be doubled.”

  “Right,” said Lachlan, gritting his teeth. “Well, that won’t be a problem.”

  “You’d be surprised how many vamps say that and then find they can’t control themselves.”

  Lachlan swallowed hard. “Where do I find her?”

  Carl smiled. He reached into his pocket and took out his cell phone. “Let me get in touch with Minnie and see when she’s available.”

  Lachlan took a deep breath. He settled back into the couch and stared forward.

  The girl on stage was taking off her top.

  Lachlan looked at his shoes. It was a very good thing that Penny didn’t know he was there.

  CHAPTER TWO

  ~Lachlan~

  Minnie blinked at Lachlan. She had a small waist and impossibly large breasts, which must have been augmented surgically. That part of her was grotesque, he thought, distorted and disgusting. But her face was pretty and young. She had a pug nose and long, dark lashes.

  She was smoking. She flicked ass in an empty beer bottle by the bed.

  They were in a hotel room across the street from the strip club. The bed looked fairly hastily made, as if it had seen other uses that evening.

  Lachlan’s stomach lurched.

  “So,” said Minnie, looking bored as she sucked on her cigarette, “you wanna fuck first, or you want blood first? Or are you one of those who likes to do it at the same time?”

  Lachlan shook his head. “I don’t want to do any of that.”

  She raised her eyebrows. “Look, I don’t do oral, and I don’t let guys tie me up or rub themselves against my feet or—”

  “No,” he said. “I’m here for information. I understand you might know something about Bartholomew Collins. Maybe he’s been a, um, client of yours.”

  She dropped the cigarette in the beer bottle. “Look, sweetie, if you think—”