Wicked Burn (Realm Enforcers #3)(54)

Bear coughed. “Avocado? Weird choice there. I’d have gone with melon or onion, or even cucumber. Avocado shows some really odd childhood issues, demon.” His sarcasm failed to mask the very real concern glowing in his brown eyes.

That was it. Nick lowered his chin and shot a piercing blade into Bear’s head along with images of death and destruction.

Bear’s bourbon-colored eyes stared back. He blinked.

Nick frowned. There was no reaction from the bear. Shifters were usually overly susceptible to mind attacks. Sucking deep, he shoved harder and sharpened the imaginary blade.

Bear growled, and then his pupils widened until his eyes were a glimmering black.

“What the hell?” Nick asked, releasing him, staring deep. Bear’s pupils had changed shape to oblong, while a lighter black colored the iris. Eyes could change colors, not shapes.

Bear shrugged. Pain radiated from him. His face elongated. “You wanted to know.” Somehow, his voice had gone raspy.

Nick stepped back several feet, ready to drop into a fighting stance.

The oxygen popped around them, and sparkles glimmered through the molecules. Bear shifted, going from human to an eight-foot-tall grizzly. Stretching his neck, he let out a monstrous roar. His coat thickened down his body into a brownish-gold fur, and a small tail emerged.

Nick tried for another mind attack, honing his aim for the base of Bear’s skull. The bear clapped its huge paws, allowing the claws to clang together. He eyed Nick and snorted.

The mind attack still hadn’t worked. Nick’s temples began to ache with the pain of shooting the powerful blades, but no reasons for the failure came to mind.

Then Bear stilled. The air continued to shimmer and pop, and he stretched out, dropped to all fours, and morphed into something else. Agony vibrated on the breeze from him. Black with scales, a long snout, longer tail . . . holy crap, it was a dragon.

Nick breathed out. A real, breathing, moving dragon stood in front of him. The thing of legends and fairy tales. “Holy f*ck.”

The beast nodded. “Yeah, I know. It’s a shocker.” The voice was Bear’s but deeper and kind of hoarse. He glanced down at the ripped clothing on the ground. “You owe me new jeans.”

Nick shook his head. “You don’t exist.”

Bear stretched weird-looking arms and then stood upright, bigger than any animal on earth, about twice the length of the car.

Nick frowned. “I would’ve thought a dragon would be bigger.”

Bear blinked, his eyelids moving sideways and not top to bottom. Flames danced along his mouth like the embers of a dying fire. Hot and ready to ignite at any time. “That’s not nice.”

Nick rubbed his chin, not sure whether to stab Bear or study him. “I guess it’s like shifting into a bear—you have to be roughly the same size, if a little bigger in animal form.” He’d grown up with shifters, so seeing a dragon wasn’t exactly a far stretch of the imagination. The surprise was in their ability to keep themselves a secret. “Dragons. Interesting.”

Bear stretched his back, and scales rippled. “Dragons have kept to themselves, mainly, and the headquarters is in the middle of the North Atlantic, not far from Ireland. That’s where they probably took Simone.”

“Who took her?” Nick growled, accepting the new reality because he didn’t have time for denial. If he was going to go after her, he needed intel and fast.

Bear slowly shifted back to a grizzly and then a man. With a sigh, he reached down and hopped into the ripped jeans, his lips turning down. “Maybe I can fix these.” Then he fell back against the car, his body shuddering.

“Bear?” Nick narrowed his gaze. “What’s wrong?”

Bear shoved off the driver’s side door. “Nothin’. It has just been a while.” He staggered in place for a moment and then seemed to gain his balance, but his coloring remained wan.

Nick settled his stance. “Bear? Who took my . . . Simone? Who took Simone?”

Bear sighed and shoved a hand through his shaggy hair. “Okay. The dragons are led by our cousin, Desmond, who probably ordered my half-brother, Flynn, to take her. She was taken because Vivienne called Desmond for help, and Desmond wouldn’t let his own flesh and blood be killed by the witches.”

“She’s safe?” Not that Nick was going to take any chances.

“Well, maybe. If she says that she had anything to do with the death of our father, then she’s not safe.” Bear scratched his arm.

Nick opened his mouth and then shut it. “She didn’t kill Roman.”

“I know that.” Bear shook his head. “But she will cover for you or me, I’m afraid.”

Urgency tightened Nick’s shoulders. “Who the hell do they think killed Roman?”

Bear shuffled his bare feet. “Well, they actually think I killed him.”

Nick stilled. “You took the rap for Simone?”

“Yeah. She’s my sister.”

Nick shook his head. “Wait a minute. If they didn’t punish you, what makes you think they’ll punish Simone?”

Bear tugged his ripped jeans up. “Who says they didn’t punish me?”

“What do you mean?”

“I’ve been exiled from the dragon community, and if they catch up with me, they’re gonna put me to death.” He shrugged. “That’s why I moved to the States and have stayed under the radar.”