Night's Awakening Read Free Page A

loose to frame her face made him want to see the rest of it down as well.
    The woman sighed and turned her face toward him, and the beam from her hard hat crossed her face. Guy was arrested by the fragile beauty.
    Her heart-shaped face was smudged with dirt on her forehead and chin. Her nose was small and her forehead wide, but she had incredibly high cheekbones and a mouth made for sin.
    Guy looked at those tempting lips and felt his balls tighten. He took a hasty step back, and touched his chest as something peculiar seemed to move within him.
    “What is it?” Banan whispered.
    He ignored the question because he couldn’t explain it. It had begun five months earlier with Hal. The dragon magic they had used to bind their feelings so as never to be betrayed by a human again somehow stopped working with Hal.
    Hal not only felt emotions for humans but fell in love with one. Cassie had proved herself to Hal, and to Con and the rest of them. Which had been a good thing, because no amount of dragon magic could reinstate the spell on Hal.
    Guy thought something special had occurred with Hal and Cassie, something that might not happen again for hundreds of years.
    Yet, there was no mistaking the feeling within him was stronger than the lust he usually felt. It was lust, but…there was more.
    As if he just now realized what was missing from his life, as if a part of him was missing.
    He lifted his gaze to find Rhys and Banan staring at him curiously. Guy gave a nod and squatted behind the woman while the other two knelt before her.
    Her eyes suddenly opened, and Guy clamped a hand over her mouth to keep her quiet. “No screaming,” he said, his voice deep and gruff.
    The smell of her hair and the lotion on her skin made him almost forget she was human, almost made him forget why they had spelled themselves from feeling for humans.
    “What’s your name?” Banan demanded.
    Guy slid his hand from her mouth over her chin and down her throat. He should have released her, but her skin was wonderfully smooth and entirely too tempting. He wanted to touch more of her.
    And when she pressed back against him, he kept still, amazed at her warmth and how small and soft she was. Her pulse beat rapidly beneath his hand as she tried to swallow.
    “Sloan. She fell. I tried to get help, but I got lost. I think…I think…”
    Rhys lifted his hands palm out and said in a calm voice, “Easy, there. Calm down so we can help. Do you know where you’re at?”
    She nodded, her gaze darting to her pack. “Dreagan land.”
    “Private property,” Banan said.
    She licked her lips and leaned farther away from Banan and against Guy. “I told her it wasn’t a good idea.”
    Guy noticed how she was careful not to put any weight on her left side, and the way she held her hand on her left leg signaled she was injured. He caught Rhys’s gaze and motioned to it with his head.
    Rhys went to touch the leg, when she reached out a hand and said, “No. Please. I think I sprained my ankle in the rocks over there. Just don’t…don’t touch it.”
    “We have to in order to get you out of here,” he said.
    Her head shook, causing her hair to tickle Guy’s face. He angled his head away from her so that he could watch her expressions.
    She was terrified, but she was holding it together.
    “Your name,” Banan repeated.
    “Elena. Elena Griffin.”
    Guy liked the sound of her American accent. It was almost Southern, but more cultured. “Well, Elena, what are we to do with you?”
    She turned her head and looked at him, her eyes widening a fraction. Her lips parted and she simply stared. He was trapped in her sage green eyes.
    He was drowning, sinking. Falling.
    And there was no way to stop it. Guy didn’t like the emotions swirling around in his chest. He worried over whether she was cold, and if she was hungry.
    “Please find Sloan,” she said into the silence.
    He gave a nod, thankful to have something to focus on. “Where did she