Page 58 of Dragon Tempted

John walked through the woods toward the main house. He wasn’t sure why he was heading in that direction. But ever since they had started getting messages—if you could even call them that—from Mia, he was restless. His body buzzed like it was subsisting on sugar, when in reality he was exhausted from lack of sleep. It had been two days since they’d heard from Mia, and he couldn’t help but wonder when the next shoe would drop. Maybe he could see if Megan had finished reviewing his journals or if Jonas had found anything else in all of his computer programs. Sienna and Ryan were in Nashville for some sort of meeting today. And that shouldn’t make him nervous, but she had been sticking close to the clan house since the attack on his cabin. He didn’t like the idea that she was away, even with Ryan protecting her.

As he walked the path and came close to the house, the sound of a UTV had him moving to the side. Tessa sped along the path and braked hard next to him. “Whoa! I was just coming to find you. Get in.”

His chest cramped and he jumped inside. “What’s wrong? Did something happen to Sienna?”

“She’s okay,” Tessa said, turning the UTV around and heading back toward the house. “But she had some excitement in the city.”

“Tessa,” he growled.

“Okay! I’m getting to it. Mia approached her, talked to her for a few minutes, and then slipped away unnoticed.”

His hands clenched into fists. “Damn it.”

Tessa skirted a tree and picked up speed, the back of the house already in view. “You need to calm down. Eric, Adam, and Marcus are in overprotective mode right now, and Sienna doesn’t need someone else barking at her. She was just starting to explain things when I came to get you. We won’t have missed much.”

Tessa parked the UTV, and they both hurried into the house. The sound of raised voices led them to the office, and they stopped in the doorway. John took a deep breath when he saw that Sienna was not only okay but also standing up for herself against her irate brothers. Marcus and Ryan stood to the side, and Megan stepped closer to Eric, looking like she was getting ready to referee.

“I can’t believe Mia came right up to you,” Eric barked.

“I can. She does whatever she wants, including throwing my wife out a sixth-story window!” Adam barked back.

Sienna held up her hands. “Okay, guys! I know that this is all coming from a place of love right now, but I’m fine. You need to calm down so I can tell you what happened.”

Megan rested her hand on Eric’s arm. “Let’s hear what Sienna has to say.”

Tessa stepped farther into the room. “Yeah, guys, give her some space and let her tell us what happened.”

Sienna nodded to John, and he was finally able to draw in another breath, before she turned back to her brothers. She jumped right into the story, and John’s dragon rumbled in his chest when he realized how close Mia had gotten to her. When she finished, the room was silent. Then everyone except him started to talk at once.

Sienna looked over at John, and something sparked in her eyes before she put her fingers to her mouth and a shrill whistle filled the air, stopping everyone’s outbursts. “Enough! I think this is a good thing. Mia obviously wants to work with us.”

“Yeah, but we don’t know why,” Eric said. “She didn’t answer you when you asked if she was trying to break the curse.”

John agreed with Eric.

“Mia’s not going to tell us everything right off the bat. She doesn’t trust us,” Sienna said.

Adam scowled. “She’s the one who reached out to me to begin with and told me about the curse. I thought she was helping us to break it at the time.”

“Well, maybe she was,” Sienna said. “And maybe she still is. We’ll just have to wait and see.”

“Why do you think she asked about another storybook?” Tessa asked.

“Because it might tell us the next steps to what’s going to happen. Or at least some representation of it. I told her that we searched the whole house and didn’t find another book.”

“It doesn’t hurt to look again,” Adam said.

Tessa leaned against her husband. “We knew Mia told her foster mom, Evelyn, that Lily was special, but her asking about Lily’s art means she knows for sure she’s an oracle.”

“Yes,” Megan answered. “We already knew that Mia was aware of oracles since she told Adam about them when she first approached him. Do you think she also knows we have the scroll with the curse?”

John’s stomach dropped at all these “what if” questions.

“She didn’t ask about the actual curse,” Sienna said.

“What would you say if she does ask?” Adam asked.

Sienna paused for a moment. “I guess it will depend on further conversations and if I think I can trust her.”