Heart of a Fighter (Rocky River Fighters 1)

“Before I get into the story, let me start by saying, successfully telling lies isn’t my gift. I don’t want you to think everything I tell you is some elaborate story. My gift is actually having visions of the future.”

“Really?” she asked, eyes wide. “Wait, is that what happened the other morning when I saw your dragon eyes?”

“Yeah, it was. I don’t see my surroundings at all. I see the vision. My body shakes while I have them, and sometimes it’s hard to breathe.”

“I bet Seth doesn’t know that. He never would have let you drive his precious car if he did,” she said with a little giggle that warmed his heart and gave him hope that not all was lost with her.

“Yeah, I felt kind of bad about that. I rarely drive because of the possibility of having a vision, but I needed to go to Bear Claw.”

“I thought you went to look at your car,” she replied with a frown.

“I did. But I did that after. I had questions I needed answers to. I’m getting ahead of myself, though.”

“Okay. Start where you need to, but we’re coming back to that.”

Alex blew out a long breath. “My dad was a lion, and my mom was a dragon. I had a little sister as well. Both of us were dragons. It’s not something that happens often when there’s a parent with a different animal, but there we were. Our parents moved us often, hoping to minimize the chance of a male dragon finding us and taking my sister. Because we moved so often, we never really made friends, other than ourselves. Daria—”

“Daria?” Cammie blurted, eyes wide.

“Yeah, why?” he asked, studying her pale face. She just shook her head and waved at him to continue, so he did, vowing to come back to her reaction later. “Daria was my best friend. And when we were old enough, we shared an apartment. We were cautious, but we decided to stay in one spot, because we were both tired of moving. But staying in one place made Daria more vulnerable. I worked from home, partly to protect her, and partly because I

couldn’t drive much with the risk of having a vision. But one day, I had to go in for a meeting I couldn’t get out of. During the meeting, Daria started calling. She was frantic when I answered, and she said a dragon found her and was coming for her. I raced home, but…” Squeezing his eyes shut for a moment, he sighed. “By the time I got there, it was too late. The apartment was trashed, and my sister… my sister was dead.”

“Oh, God Alex. I’m so sorry,” she said softly. “I know how it feels to see a family member like that. I wouldn’t wish it on anyone.”

“It was awful. It took months before I didn’t see her like that in my mind. I fought against that image hard. When I remember her, I want it to be how she was alive. Bubbly, happy, in love with life. Her death destroyed my parents. They never recovered from it. I wanted to see them really live again, and I burned for vengeance. I thought if I could end the dragon who killed her, I would have what I wanted, and maybe my parents would stop being shells of people, knowing the man responsible was dead.

“I was right that day when I guessed I worked with computers. I’m kind of a computer geek, and also an excellent hacker. I managed to find the man responsible, and it was Ivan.” He paused to watch her reaction, but she just nodded, looking unsurprised with the information. “I found this serum that suppresses a shifter’s animal. It left me feeling vulnerable, and obviously, I’m no fighter. So I took lessons in how to be a spy for a few months. I wanted to get into Ivan’s compound and find a weakness, something I could use to take him down.

“Once lessons were over, I took the serum and applied for a job as a tech and hacker under a false identity. I was hired, and I flew to Canada, but I had to keep taking the suppressants. They thought I was a human and they wouldn’t hesitate to kill me if they knew I was a shifter, especially a dragon. I was given one job while I was there.” He paused, looking down at his hands, before glancing up and snaring her gaze with his. “To find you. I only pretended, though. I wasn’t handing another innocent woman over to Ivan. But one day, I had a vision. It was you and me, and from it, it was clear you were my mate.”

“Your visions… how do they work? You seem confident it was true.”

“My visions almost always happen in real life the way I see them, but sometimes they change. If someone changes their mind after the vision, if someone I don’t even see changes their mind… The thing is, mates are absolute. You know that as well as I do. Even if something in the vision changed, that wouldn’t.”

Eyes flickering with her dragon for a moment, she nodded. “Keep going.”

“I started looking for you then, for real, but I kept everything I found under wraps. It only took me about a day. There were reports from the shifter enforcers of a dragon here. I knew from overhearing Ivan one day that Adara lived here, but then there were also rumors of the fighters. They said there was a female in the crew who was tight lipped about what her animal was, and then I found the online school records of a Carrie Sanders who was with the fighters. Carrie Sanders, Cammie Samuels… and Cammie hiding what her animal was… it was just a hunch, but I felt, to my bones, it was you.

“I wrote down the address you gave the school, wiped all the info from the computer I used, snuck out of the compound, and flew back to Oregon where my car was. I drove straight here, wanting to warn you Ivan was searching for you, maybe talk you into running because I know from experience how dangerous it is to stay in one place. But right after I got here, I was in the wreck with Hannah, and well… you basically know the rest.”

“All that happened since is true, then? You really did have amnesia? How is that even possible?”

“I wasn’t totally sure of that myself. That’s why I went to Bear Claw the other night. I knew from listening to Ivan that Adara had taken the suppressant, and I wanted to ask her about it. She said it doesn’t just suppress the animal, but all shifter qualities. The only one you retain is your gift. I was just a notch above human status. That’s how I got amnesia, and why it took so long to heal and regain my memory. I wasn’t lying about what I am, Cammie, at least not intentionally. I really did think I was a human that whole time.”

“When did you regain your memory? I bet it was when you started acting weird a few days ago.”

“That’s pretty much when,” he replied with a wry smile. “Looking back, there were a lot of clues that pointed to me being a shifter. Knowing about shifters instinctively was a big one. Times when a voice inside me whispered something to me. I didn’t realize it at the time, but it was my dragon talking to me. Even my gift, though I didn’t know what it was then. I just thought I was going crazy. My memory came back one day after I had a vision in the bathroom. When it was over, I saw my eyes, and they were full dragon.”

“Were you ever going to tell me what you are?” she asked softly, looking down at where she was playing with the hem of her shirt.

“Of course I was,” he said in surprise. He yearned to go to her, take her hands in his, but he held off, knowing the truth still might not change anything. “I just wasn’t sure how to tell you. And I wanted all the facts, even if they were small, before I said anything. Which is why I wanted to talk to Adara first. I was planning on telling you when I got back from Bear Claw, but you didn’t want to talk, and then I fell asleep. Even if I could have gotten away with hiding it, I wouldn’t have tried. I don’t want lies between us, Cammie, even lies of omission.”

Cammie stared Alex in silence as she struggled to take everything in. She hadn’t been expecting the kind of story he told her, and her heart broke for his past. And his poor sister. She never would have guessed when Ivan told her about Daria and Adara, that Daria was Alex’s sister. What were the odds that the two women, besides her, that Ivan went after, were women she knew of?

His story sounded like something out of a novel or movie. Heartbreak, intrigue, danger and suspense. But she knew it was the truth. Even if Ivan hadn’t told her about Daria first, she would have known. Alex didn’t have it in him to lie about things, especially something this big.

She was exhausted last night, but she hadn’t been able to sleep. Mind spinning in circles over everything that happened that day, she turned her thoughts to Alex, hoping for a distraction. When she really thought about the man she came to know, she realized his reactions, his interactions with her and the fighters, were genuine. And then she remembered what Ian’s gift was. He knew instinctively if people were good or bad. If Alex was one of the bad guys, Ian never would have encouraged her to spend time with him, much less let him stay in the same house his daughter was in. So she’d gathered her courage to come talk to him, and here she was.