Midlife Dragon Daddy (Midlife Shifters Book 10) Page 7

  “More random house checks on the unmated women to make sure we don’t have men in here without his approval,” she said. “And I’m sure he’s doing checks on the mated women to make sure they’re not seeing anyone other than their mates.”

  “He should just let them live with their mates if he’s so worried about it,” Ryker said.

  “A lot of the women think that the men are taking advantage of the separation to fuck around on them,” Farrah said.

  “With who, though?” Ryker asked. “Sounds like Shane’s going the extra mile to make sure nobody’s having sex with anybody outside of a mated bond.”

  “No, that’s not what he’s doing,” Farrah said quietly. “He just wants to be in control of it. When he and the betas come to do the checks on us...well, they take what they want.”

  Ryker felt himself grow rigid. He’d known his cousin was being abusive toward the women of the clan, but he hadn’t known it went that far. “Did they do anything to you?” he asked, his voice coming out in a low growl.

  “No,” Farrah said. “I think he feels protective of me because I’m his cousin. He’s not going to let anybody near me. Not even if I do find my mate.”

  “God,” Ryker said. “He’s out of control.”

  “Next time you go wild, will you take me with you?” Farrah asked.

  Ryker looked at her.

  She lowered her voice as if she was afraid the walls had ears. “I’ve had enough,” she said. “I can’t waste my whole life in this clan. Going off alone is dangerous, but at least it would give me a chance. I want to find love before I’m too old.”

  Ryker exhaled and nodded. “I promise, Farrah,” he said, “I’m going to help you.”

  Chapter Twenty

  RYKER

  Ryker left home before dawn to return to Shifter Town and meet up with Haley again. Farrah’s tale had only made him more determined to act quickly, before Shane and his betas had time to inflict more brutality on the women of the clan. Things had to be put into motion immediately.

  The sun was just breaking over the horizon when he reached the little town. He’d seen it before, of course, when he had been putting up his flyers advertising for help, but at the time, he had had no idea that this was where Haley lived. Now he looked around, trying to imagine her in one of the ramshackle houses around him.

  They were tiny. The largest ones couldn’t have contained more than two rooms, and they were all only one story high. They looked like a stiff wind might blow them away. Some of them looked to have been deliberately constructed according to a plan, at least—boards were nailed to posts, and strips of asphalt formed the roofs. In other instances, though, the houses had been created by simply propping sheets of plywood against one another and capping them with tin.

  Was Haley living in a place like that?

  His stomach clenched.

  This was the woman who had been his wife for ten years. She had cooked him his meals, and they had held one another in bed each night. Things had ended badly between them, but he had never wanted anything like this for her. Even when he had sent her away, he hadn’t imagined that he was sending her to this.

  I should never have done it.

  He should have found another way. He should have done things differently. If she’d been living in one of these barely there structures for the past ten years and it was all his fault...well, he didn’t know how he was going to live with that guilt.

  At least it won’t be like that for her anymore. He thought of the money he had already paid her. She’d be able to buy a real house with that. She could leave this shithole behind her.

  At least now he was doing the right thing, even if he hadn’t before.

  Somewhat reassured, he approached a man who was standing in front of one of the more ramshackle houses. “Excuse me,” he said. “I’m looking for Haley Griffin.”

  The man looked at him appraisingly. “Ain’t seen her.”

  “She’s about forty, with brown hair—”

  The man spat on the ground. “I know who she is. I ain’t seen her.”

  “When was the last time you did see her?”

  “Dunno,” the man said. “Not sure I’d tell you if I did. Who are you?”

  “I’m a contractor. She’s working for me.”

  The man narrowed his eyes. “Reckon you can go talk to Valerie Simms.” He pointed at one of the tidier-looking houses. “Val might know where she is.”

  Ryker nodded. “Thank you,” he said. “I appreciate that.”

  The man shrugged and walked away.

  There had been something disturbing about the whole encounter, Ryker thought. He wondered if people around here were always like that.

  He headed across the way to the house the man had pointed out to him and knocked on the door.

  There was no answer.

  He knocked again. “Is this Valerie Simms?” he asked. “I’m trying to find Haley Griffin. Can you point me in the right direction?”

  The door cracked open. Someone peered out at him, then slammed the door shut again. A moment later, the door opened wide enough to admit a short, thin woman with a distressed look on her face.

  “I don’t know you,” she said. “Are you Ryker Rivera?”

  “That’s right,” Ryker said. “Are you Valerie Simms?”

  She nodded. “What are you doing here?”

  “I’m looking for Haley,” he said. “I guess you probably know she’s taken a job working for me?”

  “Then she isn’t with you now?” Valerie asked, her face going rather pale.

  Ryker frowned. What could she mean by that? Obviously, Haley wasn’t with him right now. “No,” he said. “I haven’t seen her in a couple of days. I came back to find her so that we could talk about the job I hired her for. Could you just point me toward her house?”

  “She isn’t there,” Valerie said shakily. “She didn’t come home last night. I thought...I assumed she must be with you. Wasn’t she with you?”

  “No,” Ryker said slowly. “I haven’t seen her, like I just told you. What do you mean she didn’t come home? Where was she?”

  “I don’t know!” Valerie said. She wrung her hands. “I see her every night. I even went over to her house to make sure. But it was empty. I was a little upset with her for changing the plan without talking to me, but I assumed she’d be back this morning. I never thought—”

  “Which house?” Ryker asked urgently.

  Valerie pointed.

  Ryker sprang into a run. Haley’s house was only a few yards away from Valerie's, but it felt like miles. His heart was in his throat.

  I don’t get it. Where could she have gone? Why wouldn’t she have told her friend she was leaving?

  Would she have left town to get away from me?

  She wouldn’t have done that. She’d made it clear she wanted to work with him.

  But what if she had? What if this was because of him?

  He reached the house and pounded on the door. “Haley!” he called. “Haley, it’s Ryker! Let me in!”

  There was no answer.

  He heard voices behind him. People were watching, murmuring about the scene he was causing. He heard Valerie’s voice in the distance, calling, “You two, stay in this house!”

  He ignored all of them.

  He grabbed Haley’s door and yanked it open.

  It came open too easily.

  It hadn’t been locked.

  He looked down at the door jamb and saw that the cheap bolt had been broken.

  He wasn’t the first person to have forced this door.

  Somebody had broken in.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  HALEY

  Haley came back to consciousness feeling as though she wasn’t waking for the first time. The frightening strangeness of her situation—the fact that her hands were bound behind her back and a rough strip of cloth covered her eyes—scared her, but it didn’t exactly surprise her. She had been awake before. She had known about this.


  “She’s moving,” a low, rough voice said. “I think she’s awake.”

  “Take off her blindfold, but don’t un-gag her,” another voice said.

  A pair of hands moved roughly behind her head, yanking at the knot there. Thick fingers snagged strands of her hair and pulled at them hard. She could feel them being yanked right out of her head. She forced herself not to cry out. Whoever had done this, she wasn’t going to give them the satisfaction of knowing they’d hurt her.

  The blindfold came free.

  For a moment, the light was too bright, and Haley couldn’t see anything at all. She blinked hard several times, willing her eyes to adjust.

  “Look at her,” the second voice said. He gave an unpleasant laugh. She looks like a lizard, blinking like that.

  The room around her came into focus. She was lying on the floor of a small room with high windows and tin walls and floor. It looked like the inside of a trailer, although she couldn’t be sure. The light was coming from a lantern that someone had hung overhead.

  Two men were in the trailer with her. It was hard to see their faces—they weren’t in the direct light, as she was, but in the shadows by the walls. But after a moment, one of them moved forward, and she was able to make out who he was.

  It was Steve—the leader of the grizzlies. The man who had tried to recruit Danny for his criminal endeavors.

  He grinned at Haley. “Knew we’d come back for you, didn’t you?” he asked. “That’s why the boy wasn’t in the house, right? You moved him somewhere because you knew he wasn’t safe with you. Smarter than I gave you credit for, actually. We’d have taken him tonight if he’d been there with you.”

  Haley tried to scream, but the cloth between her teeth muffled the sound.

  Steve laughed. “Scream all you want,” he said. “Nobody can hear you out here. I don’t think anyone would come to your rescue anyway, to tell you the truth. No one in Shifter Town likes having you there, you know. You should hear the things they say behind your back. A dragon...you’re not like the rest of us. You’re something different. Wolves and bears are natural, normal things. Even if a human saw one of us, they wouldn’t be too suspicious. But if anyone ever saw you...well, they’d hunt the rest of us down just for a chance at you.”

  No one’s ever seen me, though! I’ve been living in Shifter Town for ten years, and I’ve kept myself concealed!

  But there was no point in telling them that. She doubted Steve really cared about having a dragon in Shifter Town at all. He was just trying to make her feel alone. He was trying to make her feel as though nobody gave a damn that she was missing, that no one would bother looking for her.

  It isn’t true, she reminded herself firmly. Danny cares. Valerie cares. They’ll look for me, even if no one else will.

  But that wasn’t very reassuring. Her ten-year-old son and her wolf shifter best friend. Neither of them were warriors. Neither of them had it in them to overpower these bears.

  She almost hoped they wouldn’t come looking for her. It wouldn’t be safe for them. Better that they stay away, even if it did mean she was stuck here with the grizzlies.

  She looked over at the other man in the corner. He hadn’t spoken yet, not since her blindfold had come off, but he had a pocketknife out and was twirling it around and around in his hands.

  What was he going to do with that?

  She didn’t want to know.

  “Rest assured,” Steve said, recapturing her attention, “we’re going to find that little boy of yours. And without Mommy around to protect him, we’ll get him in with us. This time next week, we’ll have him working for us.”

  Haley choked on a sob at the thought of her son being taken advantage of, used to commit crimes. What would it do to him?

  Would the police catch him? If so, he would be in very serious trouble. An ordinary human ten-year-old boy in the company of older men at a crime scene would probably receive mercy from the police—he might even get some help. But she couldn’t hope for that for Danny because a stressful situation would provoke the dragon within him to rise to the surface.

  And the police would be carrying guns.

  She felt as if the pocketknife in her captor’s hand was carving a hole in her heart. If anything happened to Danny, she would die.

  We were so close. I have the money from Ryker. I almost got him away—

  Maybe she could offer some of the money to the grizzlies. Maybe for a hundred thousand, they would promise to leave her alone forever. She would make the offer if they would just take off the gag.

  “Don’t look so upset,” Steve said. “You should really be happy that we want him at all, you know. If it wasn’t us coming for him, it would be someone else. We’ll raise him up good. We’ll teach him how to survive. We’ll probably do a better job of that than you would have. And hey, if you behave real nice and convince us that you’re not going to get in our way anymore, maybe we’ll let you visit with him sometimes.”

  I’m going to kill them.

  Steve must have seen the murder in her eyes because he turned back to his accomplice. “Put her blindfold back on,” he said. “That’s enough for now.”

  The cloth came back down over her face before Haley could do anything to resist.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  HALEY

  Haley didn’t know how much time had gone by, but now there were hands on her, lifting her, carrying her out of the trailer. She heard the rattle of footsteps on the metal box. Another voice was calling from outside—so all three of the grizzlies were here. She had assumed they must be.

  She felt hot sun on her skin as they took her outside. One of them flung her over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes and she grunted as his shoulder caught her in the stomach. A hand slapped her ass hard. “Quiet,” a voice growled.

  She shook her head—not telling him no, but trying to wriggle free of the blindfold. She wanted to see what was going on. If she could only get the piece of cloth to slide a little bit on her face, either up or down...

  She pressed her forehead against her captor’s back and dragged. The blindfold caught and moved, slipping down to the tops of her cheeks. She could see.

  But she had no idea where she was.

  They were in the middle of what looked like a recently harvested cornfield. It was flat in every direction. She could see for what had to be miles, but there wasn’t anything to see. No buildings. Not even any roads.

  Did they bring me here to kill me?

  She would have done anything to shift. The dragon within her was positively roaring. But the chains around her wrists would make that a spectacularly bad idea, and she knew it. Dragons were strong and powerful, but the bones in their wings were fragile. If she tried to shift with those chains there, there was every chance in the world her wings would break, and then she would be worse off than she was now.

  I’ll have to wait and hope they take the chains off. Then I’ll try it.

  She couldn’t see where they were going, but after a time, they stopped walking. She didn’t dare try to twist her body around to see things from another angle, but she did crane her neck.

  There was what looked like a cellar door—a storm door, maybe—built into the ground, and one of the men was unlocking it.

  Haley nearly threw up. They’re going to put me underground! How would she ever get out?

  The men threw the doors open, and she was carried down the steps and into a dank cellar that was hardly more than a giant hole dug out of the earth. There were a few support beams here and there, and a wooden platform overhead, but the floor and the walls were dirt.

  She was tossed unceremoniously into the corner. She landed on one of her shoulders, causing her arm to wrench unpleasantly behind her. She cried out in pain, but the gag stifled the sound.

  “Go ahead and take that off of her,” Steve said, gesturing to the gag. One of the other men stepped forward and pulled it, and the displaced blindfold, free. Haley took a huge breath, ready to
start screaming.

  “Go ahead,” Steve said with a smirk. “Scream all you want. Nobody’s going to hear you here. We’re miles from anything. You’ll just be making yourself sick.”

  Haley swallowed her scream. Much as she didn’t want to, she believed that he was telling the truth. She had seen enough of the outside to know that she was nowhere near civilization. No one was going to hear her cries for help.

  I should save my voice for when there’s actually a chance.

  But when would that be?

  She could try to tunnel out of here, she supposed. There were no walls, so that was always an option. She waited for them to unlock her hands.

  But they didn’t. Instead, they turned and started back toward the steps.

  “Wait,” Haley said hoarsely. “You forgot—the chains.” She rattled her arms.

  Steve smirked. “We’re not taking off the chains,” he said. “Do you think we want you shifting and bursting out of here?”

  “I couldn’t shift in here anyway,” she said. “It’s too small. It would probably kill me.”

  “Well, we’re not taking any chances,” Steve said. “Get used to the way the steel feels on your wrists because it’s going to be there for a while. We’ll bring you some food or something in a day or two, though.”

  In a day or two?

  She was too shocked to respond.

  The men turned and went back up the stairs, and Haley heard the door slam closed. The cellar was plunged into darkness.

  She felt her way into the corner and curled up, resting her head against her knees. Now that the others had left, she was acutely aware of just how cold it was down here. She longed to wrap her arms around herself to stay warm, but she couldn’t—they were pinned behind her back.

  What’s happening to Danny right now?

  She had left him with Valerie. Would her friend have had the sense, when Haley didn’t come back, to take Danny and run? She had access to Haley’s money, the funds Ryker had given her. That would be enough for Valerie, Danny, and Sarah to get away and make a new life.