Ignited By Flames Read online

  Ignited By Flames

  Hidden Realms of Silver Lake

  Book 6

  Vella Day

  Ignited By Flames

  Copyright © 2019 by Vella Day

  Kindle Edition

  www.velladay.com

  [email protected]

  Cover Art by Jaycee DeLorenzo

  Edited by Rebecca Cartee and Carol Adcock-Bezzo

  Published in the United States of America

  E-book ISBN: 978-1-941835-94-4

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the author except in the case of brief questions embodied in critical articles or reviews.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons living or dead, business establishments, events or locales, is entirely coincidental.

  Sometimes even a dragon shifter can’t catch a break.

  While Blake Masters is elated he’s found his mate, convincing Greer Caspian that they are destined for each other is another matter. Between dealing with his now ex-girlfriend to battling an evil that seems to have many faces, there’s never enough time to explore the depths of his desire for her.

  Fate’s timing couldn’t get any worse. Just when Greer is ready to admit that Blake and she belong together, some strange transforming werewolf from Earth breaks into her house and robs her.

  They decide the only way for any peace and quiet is to go after this guy. Two dragons against one wolf? It’s sure to be a slam dunk. Right? Too bad she ends up traumatized once more and is forced to put her relationship with Blake on hold.

  What will they have to do to find the time for the important things in life? Like mating.

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  About the Book

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Other Books by the Author

  About the Author

  Chapter One

  “You’re free to go,” Detective Caspian said as he unlocked the cell door and motioned Blake Masters out.

  Thank goddess he was free. Blake never wanted to step foot in another cell again. He swung around to face the detective. “Don’t get me wrong, I’m thrilled to be out of there, but may I ask why you’re letting me go without a trial?”

  He had been accused of kidnapping a woman who worked at SinCas jewelers. They’d even shown him the security footage of him injecting one of the employees with something and then carrying her lifeless body to a warehouse where he’d promptly passed out. Clearly, he was guilty. The problem was he remembered none of it.

  “We needed some time to investigate not only the kidnapping but the murder in the warehouse. The evidence points to the fact that you were not, shall we say, of sound mind at the time. Greer Caspian, the woman you abducted, vouches you didn’t kill the man who came into the warehouse.”

  Even though relief was racing through every cell in his body, Blake was almost more surprised to learn that Greer was a Caspian. He’d had no idea she was someone who came from such a well-connected family. Most of the time, wealthy people commented on that fact. She had not.

  He was also thrilled that her family hadn’t dumped him in a deep hole and forgotten about him. “I’m thankful for that. To be honest, I thought Greer would want my head on a platter.”

  “Both she and I are well aware of the dark entity and what he is capable of. After examining the marks on the warehouse body, it was evident that this entity killed the man, not you. Greer mentioned the multiple marks on your body, so we are sure you were not responsible for drugging my cousin either. The dark entity made you do those things.”

  “Thank you for being so thorough and not jumping to conclusions.” If the police hadn’t been, he might never have seen the light of day.

  “It’s our job.”

  Good to know. From what little Greer and her family had told him before he was taken into custody, this entity had killed all of its other victims. Blake was the first to survive.

  “Where is this entity now?” he asked.

  “He’s dead, thanks to Angelique Carson and Thane Sinclair.”

  From his tone, that was all the information Blake was going to get, though it meant he’d never learn why he’d been spared. “I’m glad.”

  “So are we. Crystal Willows is waiting for you in the lobby.”

  The expected rush of excitement didn’t surface. That was strange. “Thanks for calling my girlfriend.”

  “Of course.”

  When Blake walked into the lobby, Crystal was seated with her hands knotted in front of her. Her eyes were slightly bloodshot as if she’d been crying, and her shoulders sagged, but she still looked beautiful to him.

  Crystal looked up, smiled, and then raced toward him. She threw herself into his embrace. “Are you okay? I don’t understand why they arrested you.”

  Originally, when he’d been escorted to the station, Blake had been allowed one phone call, and that call had been to his lawyer buddy, Steve. He’d asked him to call Crystal about the arrest but not to give her too many details. She’d only worry more.

  “We probably shouldn’t be discussing this in the station,” Blake said under his breath. “Let’s get out of here, and I’ll tell you everything. First though, I need to shower. Being in a cell for two days was gross.”

  Crystal threaded her arm through his. “I can’t imagine what you went through, but I’m glad they released you.”

  “Yeah, me too.” The two days in jail had given him time to think, and Crystal wasn’t going to like what he had to say.

  Blake had met Crystal when she came to work as a teller in the bank he managed, and he’d been instantly taken by her sweet nature. Because she was a tiny, take charge brunette with a killer body, he’d asked her out the first week. She’d accepted, and the rest was history.

  Being a dragon shifter, he should have waited for his mate before dating someone, but after a hundred years, he was tired of being on edge, always wondering if she’d ever appear. It got to the point where he wasn’t sure if mates even existed—at least not until he had met Greer. It was unfortunate that he hadn’t met her under better circumstances—like before he’d kidnapped her and all. Now, she might not give him a chance to see if they had a future.

  When he’d been almost mortally wounded, Greer had helped heal him. That was when his whole body had come to life for the first time.

  It was possible that because the dark entity Greer referred to as Mange had taken over his body that it had tainted his response to her. He’d been hoping that when he saw Crystal again his old feelings for her would surface. But they hadn’t.

  He’d dropped a hint about wanting to marry Crystal, but now he wasn’t so sure. His indecision had run rampant when he was in jail. He couldn’t just break up with Crystal though without knowing for sure whether he and Greer were meant to be together. While dating for six months wasn’t a real long time, being
with Crystal had become comfortable—so much so that he thought it might be time to make it permanent.

  If he and Crystal did split, it would devastate her. The poor woman had more or less been abandoned as a teenager when her dad had killed her mom when Crystal was only seventeen. Thankfully, once her father had been imprisoned, she went to college and never looked back.

  He felt terrible that Crystal, a human, looked up to Blake as her hero. If only he could be sure she’d move on if he told her he wasn’t ready to settle down with her—now or ever—Blake would approach Greer faster than water evaporated on a hot day.

  “Did they feed you okay?” Crystal asked with such sincerity his guilt surfaced once more.

  It took a moment to focus on her question. “The food was okay. I was still healing from everything so I really didn’t care what they gave me.”

  She wrapped an arm around his waist and led him to her car, acting as if he were an invalid. He slid into the passenger seat while she walked around to the other side. “Do you want to go to your place or mine?” she asked with such innocence.

  The way she said it implied she believed he’d want to make love with her, which was a reasonable assumption. While he had been injured, he had healed. “My place. As I said, I have to shower.”

  He adored Crystal, but after what just happened, he wasn’t about to run down to the jewelry store and buy that ring—not when his dreams had been filled with Greer’s face. The whole thing was absurd though. He and Crystal were perfect for each other. They were both into finance, both loved to run in the mornings, and they each really enjoyed seafood. It was a perfect match—or so he believed until he’d met Greer.

  Then everything in his life turned upside down. For now, he’d pretend—or sort of pretend—that everything was back to normal with Crystal. Before he told her he wanted to reevaluate things, he needed to see Greer again. If nothing else, he had to make sure she really was his mate. Now healthy, his dragon would let him know if they were fated for each other.

  “Steve told me that something took over your body?”

  “Yes.”

  “I can’t even imagine what that was like.” Crystal fired up the engine and pulled onto the road once the traffic cleared.

  Blake really didn’t want to talk about those few hours, but Crystal deserved to know. He’d just leave out why he was in the jewelry store in the first place. “All I felt was a slight pain at first, followed by a mind-blowing explosion in my brain. Then nothing. It was as if I didn’t exist while this thing was inside me. The next thing I remember was waking up on the floor of a warehouse. I hurt everywhere. Apparently, I had burn marks on my chest, my back, and my arms. But don’t worry, I’m good now.”

  “Oh my heavens. I’m so glad you survived. Did this person shoot fire at you?”

  “No. If it had, I would have shifted to protect myself. According to the woman I kidnapped, the injuries were due to some dark entity leaving my body. The cops have seen this kind of exit wound before. From what they have figured out, the entity took over all of my thought processes and made me do things I never would have done on my own. When it left my body, instead of exiting in one spot, it left in multiple places, which is why I lived.” Or at least that was the working theory.

  “I am so sorry this happened to you.” She reached over and squeezed his leg. “Where is this entity now?”

  “He’s dead.”

  Her shoulders relaxed. “Oh, thank goodness.”

  They said little until they arrived at his place. He needed some time to himself, even though he understood Crystal wanted to be with him. After all, she’d almost lost him.

  When she pulled into the parking lot behind the bank, he turned to her. “I’m going to shower and then take a nap. I hope you don’t mind. I haven’t really slept in a few days.”

  She placed a hand on his arm. “Of course not. You should rest, but how about if I come over later and cook you some dinner?”

  Crystal looked so hopeful that he didn’t have the heart to tell her no—but he had to. “Could I have a rain check?”

  Her gaze lowered. “Sure.”

  Blake’s heart broke seeing her like this. “Tomorrow night I’ll take you out to dinner. How’s that? I’m sure you would enjoy a break from cooking.”

  “If that’s what you want, sure. Call me, okay?”

  “I will.” He leaned over and kissed her, hoping for that rush of excitement that always came when they were together. While the contact was pleasant, it wasn’t what it had been before. Maybe it was the trauma of being possessed, arrested, and then stuffed in a nasty jail cell that affected his psyche.

  “Get some rest,” she said.

  “I plan to.”

  As soon as he jogged up the steps to his condo on top of the bank, a sense of freedom surrounded him. Jail had sucked, and he never wanted to return. Closure however would never completely come, because he would never learn why he had been targeted. All he’d done was enter a jewelry store to buy a ring for Crystal and ended up almost dying. The only positive—for him but not for Crystal—was that he’d met Greer. It was possible that she would tell him he was full of shit, and that they weren’t mates after all, but he owed it to himself to see if they were.

  Damn, he knew nothing about the enigmatic woman other than she worked in a jewelry store and was from one of the most prominent families in all of Tarradon. For all he knew, she was already mated to someone else.

  Crap. Blake headed to the shower, hoping the hot water would clear his head.

  “You should be resting,” Tory Sinclair told Greer as she added a pair of sardonyx earrings to the display selection.

  Greer stashed her purse under the counter and grabbed the polishing cloth to clean some smudges off the glass display. Her cousin was so protective, but Greer knew what she needed. “I can’t rest. I need to be working.”

  “I know the sedative has worn off, but what about the emotional trauma? You seem a bit off. Distracted perhaps.”

  “I just walked in. How can you tell?” Greer waved the cloth and then set it down. Tory had a sixth sense about things. “You’re right. I am off, and it’s not physical as much as mental.”

  Even though there weren’t any customers in the store, Greer really didn’t want to hear what her cousin would say when she told her what, or rather who, she’d been dreaming about. Tory was a take-the-bull-by-the-horns type of woman. Knowing her, she’d say to march over to the bank and ask Blake out. If they were mates then she needed to find out now. To hell with his potential fiancée. Greer however possessed a bit more finesse than that.

  Tory leaned against the counter, her brows pinched. “Did you have a nightmare or something?”

  “No. Surprisingly, this has nothing to do with the dark entity and everything to do with Blake.” Crap. She hadn’t meant to blurt that out.

  “The man who stabbed you with the needle and then kidnapped you?”

  “Yes.” She would have a hard time articulating what she felt, mostly because she was confused by it herself. “Did Anderson say what kind of guy Blake was?”

  While he seemed nice, he could be some thug for all she knew. So what if he worked at the local bank? Their cousin, Anderson, had been in charge of the investigation, so he would have done a deep dive on the guy.

  Tory shrugged. “Just that he manages the bank down the street.”

  “He told me that much.” The last thing she remembered before the incident was Blake walking into the store and asking about an engagement ring. That meant those weird, albeit rather erotic pulses she’d felt when she first touched him must have been a result of the trauma of being sedated and then kidnapped and not because he was her mate. Darn.

  Yes, he is, her dragon finally said.

  Now she talks? Her animal had been silent all night when she needed answers the most.

  “Did Anderson say anything else about him?” Greer asked as innocently as possible.

  Tory placed a hand on her arm. “Why th
e interest? You said you didn’t believe he was responsible for what happened.”

  “I don’t.”

  “Why does it matter who he is?”

  Greer normally kept things to herself, but she needed advice. So what if her cousin didn’t have a mate of her own. Tory was a good judge of character. “This is going to sound really weird, but when I was in the cage and first saw Blake on the floor, the moment I touched him, a kind of excitement raced through me.”

  “Excitement? As in lust?” Tory’s eyes widened.

  She wished her cousin didn’t act so surprised. “I’m afraid so.”

  “Since you told me he came into the store to buy an engagement ring, surely you aren’t thinking there could be something between you, are you?”

  Okay, it did sound lame. “I guess not. I should just move on, but I can’t stop thinking about him.”

  Tory placed a hand on Greer’s arm. “Greer? Are you thinking he’s your mate?”

  When she said it like that, perhaps it had been wishful thinking. Oh, sure, Greer acted like the perfect businesswoman, always putting her job first, but deep in her heart, she longed for a family of her own. “I don’t know what to think.”

  Tory lowered her hand. “Then you need to find out!”

  Just as she made that announcement, the doorbell to the store rang. When Greer looked up, her heart jerked.

  Tory checked out the newcomer, looked back at Greer, and then tossed her a sly smile. “Lookie, lookie. Why if it isn’t Mr. Blake Masters,” she said under her breath.

  Greer’s stomach tumbled. Her cousin had seen the security footage and knew who he was. The big question was whether he was here to buy that ring or speak to her.

  Chapter Two

  Blake wasn’t sure if it was a good idea to visit Greer or not, but if he didn’t, he’d never know if his imagination was playing tricks on him. Just because she wasn’t demanding he rot in jail for what he did—dark entity or not—didn’t mean she liked him. Hell, he wouldn’t be so quick to forgive someone if that person had kidnapped him. It didn’t matter that Blake had no will of his own at the time.