She looks flustered as her eyes dart down to my chest and then back to my eyes.
“That is irrelevant. Answer my questions please. What were you and Sperling fighting about?”
“I don’t want you to look for this guy anymore?” I tell her in a possessive tone. “If his red tail shows up, I’ll take care of him.”
“What does that mean, you’ll take care of him?”
It means I’ll kill him for you.
“Are you involved in any of Sperling’s business?” she asks when I don’t answer.
We just stare at each other. I’m drowning in awe here. She’s absolutely perfect in every way.
She doesn’t look as impressed.
“I’m with the FBI,” she snaps. “I suggest you start answering my questions.”
“Let’s go for a drink,” I say as I rub my chin and admire her beauty. “Then, I’ll answer every question you have.”
She slams her hands on my desk and stands up so hard that her chair skids across the floor. “I am here on an official capacity for the Bureau. I’m not here for a date!” She’s all flustered and furious as she gathers up the photos and stuffs them back into her bag.
Fuck, she’s hot when she’s pissed.
I’m staring in complete reverence as she yanks her bag off the chair and shoots me a defiant glare. “Are you going to answer any of my questions?” she snaps.
I can’t even speak. It feels like she’s got my heart squeezed in her fist.
“Well, thank you,” she snaps as she shoves the strap of her bag onto her shoulder. “You’ve been no help whatsoever! You haven’t seen the last of me.”
“Thank God,” I mutter as she storms out of my office. I would die if that was the last time I saw her. It was hard enough to live not knowing if my mate was out there, but now that I know, it would be pure hell to be alive when she’s not by my side.
Her delicious scent is still wafting around my office, driving me and my bear crazy. She’s my girl and I’m not about to let her just go, but she’s a feisty one as well and will probably pull a gun on me if I try to take her.
So for now, I do the only thing I can…
I follow her.
Chapter Four
Lily
I’m still pacing around my hotel room in a tizzy even an hour later. That guy had some nerve.
Sometimes it can be hard being a female agent with the Bureau. You don’t always get the same kind of respect that the men do. Like this arrogant asshole. He asked me out!
My heart is still thumping away, but as much as I tell myself that it’s from anger, I’m not sure that it is.
There was definitely an attraction there. An intense pull.
The way he was staring at me with that territorial gaze is still getting me all worked up from just thinking about it.
This is so not like me. I’ve been asked out before while on the job, but it never got to me like this did. I was so flustered. So emotional.
Normally, I’d respond to a proposition in an ice-cold manner. I usually show no emotion at all. My co-workers call me Agent Android because I don’t ever let my emotions show while on a job.
I open the minibar and pull out a little bottle of Vodka. I down half of it with a wince, but that just increases my arousal. The heat is flowing through me and settling between my legs whenever I think back to Blake’s muscular arms and his sexy broad shoulders. He really was gorgeous.
If I wasn’t on the job, I just might have said yes to that drink.
A part of me wants to go to the pub in town and hope that he shows up, but I know that’s not going to happen. The professional part of me always wins out in the end.
I drop down on the bed and stare at the ceiling as I wonder what it would be like to see him change into his polar bear.
He’s not into you. He has a mate for Christ’s sake.
My heart sinks when I realize that. Shifters mate for life with one girl and unfortunately that girl is not me.
So, he wasn’t asking me out? Did I misread the whole situation? Should I have gone for that drink to get some more information out of him?
I rub my eyes with my palms as I breathe out long and hard. Why am I so shaken by this guy?
With my head spinning, I sip on the rest of the vodka and turn on the TV. Some reality show is playing where the contestants are getting slime shot into their faces and it’s stupid, but I can’t help but laugh.
I’m half asleep when my phone rings. I jump up and spill the rest of the vodka on the bed as I check who’s calling.
Shit. It’s my boss.
“Hello,” I say after clearing my throat.
“Look alive, Burks,” he barks on the other end of the line. “We just got a tip through the network.”
I perk up on the bed, breathless with my pulse racing.
“I’m listening.”
“Blackcloud Pub,” he says. “A credit card assigned to Sperling Kirk was used seven minutes ago.”
“On it!” I toss the phone down, grab my coat, and sprint out of the hotel room and onto the street.
The pub is close enough that I’ll get there faster by running so that’s what I do. I’m sloshing and slipping on the snowy sidewalk, but I don’t dare slow down. If he used his credit card, it could mean he’s closing his tab and on his way out. I got to move fast.
My body is urging me to go the other way. It’s not fear. It’s something else… pulling me to go in the opposite direction.
I just ignore it and keep running.
When the pub comes into view a few yards away, I see him walking out.
Sperling Kirk.
I’ve seen his picture enough times to recognize him immediately. He’s tall, slim, and what most women would call handsome, but not me. I know him too well to be attracted to that monster.
I pull my gun from my hip and race across the street.
“Kirk!” I shout as I point the gun at his back. “Don’t fucking move!”
He freezes and then slowly turns around. His bright jade green eyes send cold shivers racing through my body as they bore into me.
“FBI! Put your hands up!”
I’m trying really hard not to let my hands tremble, but they’re shaking a bit. I tell myself it’s from the cold, but my pounding heart thinks otherwise.
He doesn’t move. He just stares at me with a smirk on his face. The fucker is amused by all of this.
“Put your fucking hands up, Sperling,” I warn.
“And then what?” he asks in a light voice. “You’re going to put handcuffs on a man who can rip a car in half with his bare hands?”
“Would you prefer that I put a bullet through your fucking forehead?” I shout.
“You haven’t done your homework, agent,” he says with his chin in the air. “I’m bulletproof.”
“Then I better aim for your eye,” I say as I lift the gun an inch. “Let’s see if they can stop bullets too. Want to find out?”
We stare at each other for a long heated moment and then he puts his hands up with a sigh.
“Now turn around. Slowly! And put your hands behind your back.”
My finger is hovering over the trigger as he does what I say.
When his back is to me and his hands are behind him, I slowly move up to him and pull out my handcuffs.
I lock one around his left wrist and then the other around his right.
“Keep your hands behind your back,” I say as I step back and point the barrel of the gun at the back of his head. “Don’t move.”
I know that my boss has already dispatched some backup my way. I just have to hold him here until they arrive, whenever that may be.
“What’s the end game here?” he asks as he looks at me over his shoulder with an amused grin on his face. “You going to put me in jail where I can break through the ceiling and fly away whenever I please? I’m a dragon shifter. Your human laws don’t apply to me. I can do whatever I want.”
“Don’t move,” I shout back. “Keep your eyes on the pavement.”
“I’m a dragon,” he says as he rips his arms apart, breaking the metal chain of the handcuffs as easily as if they were made of cooked spaghetti. “I don’t listen to sheep.”
He turns around and I shrink back as he starts walking toward me. I fire the gun twice before he slaps it out of my hands and it disappears into the snow.
The bullets must have hit him, but I don’t see any blood. He must really be bulletproof.
His hand darts forward and his iron fingers wrap around my throat. I try to scream, but nothing comes out. No air or sound is going up or down my throat.
His grip is so tight. He’s so fucking strong.
My feet lift off the ground as pain sears through my neck.
I claw at his flexed forearm, but it’s like trying to claw through stone.
Just as hints of blackness start to take over my vision, something huge and white crashes into him. His fingers release me and I fall to the ground with a whimper.
Savage roaring thunders down the street as I shake the fog out of my head and focus my eyes. An enormous polar bear is on top of him, viciously attacking him with his deadly paws and giant teeth.
He caught Sperling off guard, but when the dragon shifter gets to his feet, he punches the polar bear in the ribs hard, sending a whimper flying out of him. He then grabs the stunned bear by the scruff of his neck and swings him around. The white bear slams right through the wall of the pub and disappears inside.