Silverback Dragon (Return to Bear Creek Book 6) Read online

  Table of Contents

  Copyright

  Foreword

  Chapter One – Fiona

  Chapter Two – Harlan

  Chapter Three – Fiona

  Chapter Four – Harlan

  Chapter Five – Fiona

  Chapter Six – Harlan

  Chapter Seven – Fiona

  Chapter Eight – Harlan

  Chapter Nine – Fiona

  Chapter Ten – Harlan

  Chapter Eleven – Fiona

  Chapter Twelve – Harlan

  Chapter Thirteen – Fiona

  Chapter Fourteen – Harlan

  Chapter Fifteen – Fiona

  Chapter Sixteen – Harlan

  Chapter Seventeen – Fiona

  Epilogue

  Get In Touch

  Also By Harmony Raines

  Silverback Dragon

  Return to Bear Creek

  (Book Six)

  ***

  All rights reserved. This book, or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner without the express written consent of the author or publisher.

  This is a work of fiction and is intended for mature audiences only. All characters within are eighteen years of age or older. Names, places, businesses, characters and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, actual events or places is purely coincidental.

  © 2017 Harmony Raines

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  Silverback Dragon

  He knows she’s here, somewhere close by, so why can’t he find her? Can fate really be so cruel?

  Harlan can sense his mate. He has sensed her for months, and yet he can’t find her. Is he too old? Are his senses failing? Maybe it’s his imagination. Maybe it’s time to leave Bear Creek, and all his hopes behind.

  Fiona has hidden away for centuries. Only when she met the people of Bear Creek and learned to trust them, did she dare reveal her other side. Only here has she acknowledged she is a dragon shifter. That’s what love does to a person, it allows them to be themselves. It allows them to trust, to believe.

  But something is stirring out there. Something that calls to her heart and her soul.

  She knows it’s time to reveal her true self. Whatever the cost. And, from experience, Fiona knows the cost only too well.

  Just when it looks as if she is going to get her own happy ever after, fate has one more hand to play. Two girls are handed to social services by their stepmother. It’s not unusual, Fiona has seen it many times before—Five hundred and thirty-one—to be exact. But these two girls are special. Very special, and Fiona will sacrifice everything to give them the home they need.

  Will her mate feel the same way? Or will she have to make the ultimate sacrifice?

  .

  Chapter One – Fiona

  “Are you OK, Fiona?” Caroline asked.

  Fiona breathed evenly, putting a frown on her face as she asked briskly, “Why wouldn’t I be?”

  “You tell me?” Caroline cocked her head at Fiona, studying her. Fiona hated being studied. She hated being weighed, judged, and assessed. But she kept her countenance calm, mixing in a small amount of annoyance. She had to keep up appearances.

  “There is nothing wrong with me,” Fiona said hotly. But there was. So much she dared not voice a single word, in case the floodgates opened and the people of Bear Creek, the people she had grown so fond of that she loved, saw the real woman inside. She had cultivated a certain persona over the last few decades to protect herself, both physically and emotionally.

  Caroline let her gaze drop and she turned to fill the kettle. “We’ve not seen much of you lately, that’s all. We thought you’d abandoned us.”

  Fiona let out a sigh. “Busy at work.”

  “I can understand that.” Caroline set the kettle to boil and turned her attention back to Fiona. “There are a lot of people in town who owe you a debt. If ever you need those debts repaid…”

  Fiona swallowed the lump in her throat and coughed. “I have never seen them as debts that needed repaying. Everything I do, I do because I believe it is the right thing.”

  “I’m a soldier too, Fiona. I understand more than most.” Caroline smiled awkwardly. “I’m sorry if I’ve offended you. I’m blunt, you understand that better than most people. However, I wanted you to know that if there is anything… anything at all, that Carter and I can do. Or Fern and Teagan: they would be there by your side in an instant if you needed them.”

  Fiona swung around to look out of the window, blinking the tears from her eyes. If she used the back of her hand to brush them away, Caroline would know she was crying. And that would not do. That would not do at all. Dragons never showed their emotions. What had being a part of this happy community done to her?

  “The hops look good,” Fiona stated.

  “Yes. I always love spring. A time for new beginnings.” Caroline accepted the change of subject, took cups down from the cupboard, and made the tea. Fiona listened to the noises: cups clattering together, water being poured, and the tinkle of a spoon stirring the tea. She closed her eyes and brought herself back to center, away from the raging emotions she had fought for the last few months.

  “And a new baby.” Fiona turned back to face Caroline, now completely in control of herself and her dragon, which was where most of this emotional upheaval was erupting from.

  Caroline patted her baby bump. “For a woman who never wanted children of her own, I seem to be popping them out like candy.”

  Fiona snorted. “You make a good mom, Caroline. And Carter seems so happy and settled.”

  “Yes, no more movies.” Caroline rubbed her back. “I think this will be our last child, though.”

  “The town is filled with a new generation.” Fiona was beginning to think it might be time to move on. She was far too attached to them all. With no other reason for her dragon’s continued unrest, their emotional attachment to the people in Bear Creek was where Fiona laid the blame for her odd behavior.

  “Yes. Fern’s going to have baby number two any day now.” Caroline looked across to Fiona, and ventured, “I don’t think I’ve ever known one person be the godparent to as many children as you are, Fiona.”

  “Guardian,” Fiona corrected. “I’ve never seen myself as a godparent. I can’t influence a child’s morals or temper their behavior with wise words. But I do know how to protect.”

  “Dear Fiona,” Caroline said suddenly, and her tone made Fiona want to run from the kitchen and fly away, so that she didn’t have to hear the next words Caroline uttered. “If there is one thing in the world I could wish for, it is that you could find your mate. You deserve to find happiness more than anyone I know.”

  Fiona put her cup down on the countertop and leaned on the smooth surface as her dragon lifted its head and breathed fire into the chasm of their empty heart. “I don’t think that is ever going to happen. Anyway, I’m too old.”

  Caroline frowned. “No one is too old for love.” She studied Fiona again, looking at her hair, which had far too many silver streaks in it, and the wrinkles on her face, which could no longer pass as laughter lines. “How old are you?”

  “A lady never reveals her age,” Fiona said tartly.

  “I thought you once said that you weren’t a lady.” Caroline reached fo
r a cookie jar. “Here. I’ll stop teasing you now.”

  Fiona took a cookie. “Thank you.” She stared at the sweet treat in her hand. “Thank you for caring, too.”

  Caroline looked stunned but hid it behind dunking her cookie in her tea. The two women stood in silence, the conversation killed by Fiona acknowledging Caroline’s thoughtfulness. And that was why Fiona kept herself so tightly bound. She took a bite of her cookie. Things truly were starting to unravel. She had to find the reason.

  Her dragon settled back down and rested its head on its taloned feet. At last, the human side of Fiona had admitted there was something wrong. There was a reason she had felt so on edge lately. Her nights had become disturbed, with fleeting sensations of something, or someone, calling to her. But then it would pass, and Fiona was more than willing to let it go. She had built a safe, stable life for herself, it had taken her decades to find a small fragment of happiness; she wasn’t about to give it up.

  Her dragon disagreed. Her dragon wanted more: she didn’t want to hide in the shadows and hold onto a fragment of happiness, she wanted to live life to the fullest. To risk everything, but for what?

  The something that was out there. The something that brushed against her consciousness.

  She touched the jade ring on her finger. Maybe it was time to take off the ring. She’d been hiding too long. But hiding had kept her safe. Was a desire for change really enough to risk her own safety?

  “Hey there, sorry we are late.” Teagan burst into the room with a heavily pregnant Fern close behind her.

  “We had to drop Walt Junior off, Theo offered to look after him while he writes an article. He’ll be lucky.” Fern looked tired, but that was to be expected. Fiona had seen so many pregnancies, but she still experienced a thrill of excitement every time a new baby was born. And a twinge of jealousy.

  “How are you, Fiona?” Teagan kissed Fiona’s cheek and hugged her.

  “As I have just been telling Caroline, I am fine,” Fiona said tartly.

  Teagan pulled back abruptly at her tone. “Have I missed something?”

  Fiona’s face colored. “No. Nothing at all. I’m a little tired.”

  “Perhaps it’s time to let that dragon of yours out for a while,” Teagan suggested. “I know if I keep my bear pent up for too long she starts to climb the walls of my mind.”

  “I’ll bear that in mind,” Fiona said, picking her tea back up and sipping it. “Now, what news of these children of yours?”

  Teagan’s face erupted into a beaming smile. “Oh, Joshua took his first steps. Want to see?”

  Teagan pulled her smartphone from her pocket and scrolled through to find the short video clip of her son letting go of the sofa and making a mad dash on wobbly legs across to Cal. The women crowded around to watch, all smiling, all laughing. All reminiscing over when their first child took their first steps in this big, beautiful world.

  All except Fiona, who had filled her life with other people’s children, protecting them, nurturing them, and taking pride as they became aware of their other side. How many shifter children had she helped?

  Five hundred and thirty-one, her dragon replied in her head.

  You counted them all? Fiona asked.

  Of course, I did. They are the future. Her dragon puffed tendrils of smoke from her nose.

  Fiona was well aware her dragon longed to have a baby of her own. It didn’t even have to be a biological baby. All her dragon had wanted these long years was to find another like herself. To know she wasn’t the last of her kind. But the jade ring kept them secret. Fiona had worn it since the time when men hunted dragons. A time when rogue dragons helped those men, in return for the captured dragon’s treasure.

  After her father’s death at their hands, Fiona’s nonshifter mother had traded a large portion of the family treasure for this one ring, imbued with magic to conceal her daughter’s other side. It had become a part of Fiona and had not left her finger for centuries.

  But the days of the hunters are over, her dragon reminded her.

  What if they are not? What if they are waiting out there for me to reveal myself? Fiona asked.

  And what if they are not? her dragon replied.

  Fiona shook her head. She needed to give this more thought. And yet she had never concealed her true self from her friends in Bear Creek. Had that been her way of testing the theory that the dragon slayers were long dead?

  No one had ever come here to hunt her. Fiona looked down at her finger, at the worn ring, and made a decision. Wasn’t it better to die in hope, than to live with fear?

  Slipping the ring off her finger, she placed it in her purse. If she expected to feel any different, she was wrong. No big supernatural finger appeared above her head, pointing down at her. No blinding light struck her down.

  Everything was as it was before. In some ways, this disappointed Fiona. She had expected fate to roll up on the doorstep immediately and point her in the direction of the nearest dragon.

  But Fiona had long since stopped believing in what the people today called fairy tales. Even though she had witnessed many of them firsthand, Fiona did not expect her own happy ever after.

  Chapter Two – Harlan

  “Are you sure you want to go back to the city?” Chrysi asked Harlan. “We’ve set up an office here that works just as efficiently.”

  “I know.” He sighed, his heart heavy. He was giving in, for the first time in his life; he was giving in without experiencing success. “But if I stay, I am going to go crazy.”

  “I’m so sorry, Dad,” Chrysi said.

  “It’s not your fault.” He kissed her cheek. “And seeing you so happy takes some of the pain away.”

  “But you still want your own mate.” Chrysi hugged Harlan tightly. “Come back soon.”

  “I will. I just need a couple of weeks to focus on something else, before I go insane.” He looked down at his daughter’s baby bump. “Nothing is going to keep me away from this little fella when he’s born.”

  “Or when she is born,” Chrysi said, with a raised eyebrow.

  “He or she, I don’t care,” Harlan said. Damn, he was excited about the child Chrysi was carrying. He was going to be the most involved granddad ever. How old did a child need to be before it could hang on tight enough to ride a dragon?

  “I know.” Chrysi stepped back, looking at him with some concern. “Just remember, this is your home too. Here with us.”

  He looked up at the house his daughter had bought with Nevis, her husband. The setting was perfect, surrounded by the wooded hills and mountains that bordered Bear Creek. The mountains and forests afforded them a great deal of privacy. Chrysi, who wasn’t a shifter, had insisted on it, both for Nevis and their unborn child, but also so that Harlan could disappear into the mountains at night and let his dragon free, without fear of being seen.

  “I know, and I appreciate it more than you could ever know,” Harlan said, his heart filling with love for his adopted daughter.

  “I figured I owed you a house. Since you took me in when I didn’t have a home or a family,” Chrysi said quietly.

  “Oh, Chrysi, you have repaid me a million times over already. And allowing me to be part of this child’s life will keep me going forever.”

  “Forever?” she asked. “I think in that forever, you are going to need a mate.” She put her hands on her hips and said, “I’m going to help you find that mate of yours. She has to be out there.”

  “I appreciate it, but if I can’t locate her, then you have little chance.” Harlan turned around and looked out over the mountains, smiling wistfully. “But at least I can sense her now.”

  “For a while, you said she’d gone completely.” Chrysi moved to his side and they stood in silence for a moment, surveying the view.

  “She had, and now she is back. I don’t know which was worse.” His face filled with sadness. “Why can’t I find her?”

  “Go, have a break, and when you come back, you will find her.” Chrys
i nodded, and Harlan kissed her cheek, before stepping away from her and walking to his car. He sure was going to miss flying over the mountains, but a couple of weeks away would reset his brain, and hopefully, when they returned, he and his dragon would find their mate.

  His dragon was not so sure. Night after night they had tried to locate the exact place where she was. But they could never pinpoint her. A mile’s radius was the closest they could get. But that mile was too big when it encompassed the town of Bear Creek. Unless they went door to door, there was no way they would find her.

  Maybe he was too old and his senses were failing. All he knew was that his mate could not be a shifter; otherwise, she would have been beating a path to his door.

  Damn it! The frustration he and his dragon shared bubbled up inside him. It was time to get going. He had a long drive ahead: he planned to get back to his house on the outskirts of the city, tonight. There was no particular rush, but he liked to give himself deadlines.

  One more wave goodbye to Chrysi and he was in his car, driving down the road that wound through the foothills surrounding Bear Creek. Only a mile from town he began to feel the familiar pull of his mate. He slowed the car and stopped on the side of the road, gazing down at the town, wishing he had x-ray vision and could look into each of the houses. He would search until he found her if he thought it was possible.

  Putting the car into drive, he crawled down the hill, deciding to make a stop at the local bakery and pick up something tasty to keep his energy up on the way. He knew it was an excuse to have one last look, or feel, around town. It was pointless, just as it had been pointless for the last few months, but even so…

  His dragon was an eternal optimist, and Harlan indulged him whenever he had the chance. It had taken all of his powers of persuasion to make his dragon see they needed a break from the constant turmoil of seeking for their mate.

  Harlan parked the car on the side of the road and got out. The sense that she was close swept over him. His dragon stirred, lifting his head and then climbing to his feet and shaking himself like a dog. His dragon puffed smoke from his nose, disgusted at the comparison.