Page 59 of Dragon in Denial
“What makes you think I’m moving back to New Orleans?” Ketu snapped, a little too quickly. Like he didn’t really want to. Like his decision was made.
Mate or not, he was heading home to Detroit just as fast as his wings would carry him. Antoinette knew damn well she would go with him, of course, but couldn’t he at least act like it was a difficult decision? Although she supposed it wasn’t for him. Still, she was going to walk away from the only home she’d ever known to be with him. A little sympathy for her situation would be nice.
Boom!The explosion, which came from the direction of the warehouses Antoinette believed housed Darius’s drug manufacturing facility, shook the ground a moment before a group of men burst from the reeve’s house and took off running down the sidewalk.
“There they go,” Delilah said.
One by one, the men shifted into dragon form and flew away, getting swallowed by the darkness and wispy clouds drifting across the inky sky.
Ketu pulled his phone out of his pocket and looked at the screen. “The distraction has begun,” he confirmed.
Another handful of dragons rushed from the house and then all was quiet. Rahu stood and Ketu grabbed the front of his shirt and pulled him to his knees. “We wait,” Ketu snarled.
Long minutes passed. Rahu tapped his thumb against his thigh. Ketu’s leg shook. Antoinette clenched and unclenched her fist. Delilah kept sighing, over and over.
Finally, Ketu said, “Okay, let’s go.”
Rahu leaped up like his ass was on fire, while the others straightened and stretched like normal dragons.
Ketu slapped Rahu’s chest. “Quiet. Careful. Pay attention to your surroundings.”
“I hope you’re talking to all of us,” Rahu replied.
“Oh, stop it,” Delilah snapped, and she strode toward the mansion like she owned the damn place. Which, of course, she fully expected to. Soon.
While Delilah headed for the front door, Ketu grabbed both Antoinette and Rahu’s arms and guided them toward the backyard. They stepped around a perfectly symmetrical herb garden. Antoinette was no expert, but she recognized valerian, passion flower, and lavender, as well as cilantro, parsley, and garlic.
Rahu grabbed a fistful of lavender leaves and breathed deeply. “My mom used to put this in my bath when I was a kid. She said it helped calm me down, made it easier to put me to bed.”
Ketu snorted. “Short of Benadryl, I can’t imagine anything calmed you down until you made up your mind to crash.”
They climbed the back porch steps, silent as cats, all but hidden in the darkness thanks to a new moon.
The house was quiet. The kind of eerie silence that was common for the middle of the night.
When Rahu reached for the knob on the door, Ketu grabbed his arm. “Check for wires first. There’s probably an alarm,” he whispered.
Rahu did as he was told, and after a few moments, shook his head and tried the knob. When it didn’t open, he pulled something out of his back pocket, fiddled with the lock for a minute, and then the door popped open.
No alarm sounded.
Antoinette glanced at Ketu, who was looking at her. No alarm at a reeve’s home felt…off.
“Maybe our distraction worked better than we hoped,” Ketu whispered. “Maybe they took off without taking the time to set the alarm.”
Hopefully, he was right.
They stepped into a starkly white living area with glossy hardwood floors that gleamed despite the lack of light. White couches formed a seating area around a massive stone fireplace that was probably rarely used. Beyond that was an oak dining room table that could comfortably seat at least twelve, and an open-air kitchen with granite countertops and stainless steel appliances.
Ketu led them through the main level to a staircase that was tucked between the kitchen counter and a pantry that was big enough to house enough food for the entire damn colony.
They crept up to the bedroom level, pausing every time they heard a sound: the scrape of a branch against a window or somebody snuffling in their sleep or what sounded like someone moving along the floorboards. But that last sound stopped and didn’t start up again, so Ketu eventually motioned for them to keep following him as he made his way closer to what they were guessing was the reeve’s bedroom, which they’d determined was the most logical first place to check for clues.
After finding a floor plan online, they’d ruled out anything on the first floor as too easy to access in the event of an attack. They’d made an assumption that his hoard was kept in the crawl space beneath the main level, and no dragon slept in the same place as his hoard, no matter how tempting it may be.
Which left the upper level.
The first door revealed a pretty bland guest room. The second led to a bathroom, which connected to that first room as well as another. Across the hall was another room that, while decorated nicely enough, smelled stale, like the door hadn’t been opened in a long time.
