Page 100 of The Mating Claim

Chapter 19

The Mitchell Ranchin Montana looked like a lovely, serene place with breathtaking backdrops of jagged mountains and majestic trees and green pastures where horses and cattle grazed. But it was far from serenenow.

Tension threaded through the air as Lacey followed Drust up to the main ranch lodge. Everything had happened so quickly, from the moment Drust told her they had to leave to their arrivalhere.

She didn’t know what happened, only Tristan was upset and everyone scrambled together in a search party. Snatches of frantic conversation drifted to her. “Child missing,” and “snatched.”

A missing child was endangered. Lacey’s heart squeezed tight in her chest. Whoever the child was, he or she meant a great deal to the SilverWizard.

Drust did not stop until he reached the third floor and an opened bedroom door. A nursery, she realized, spotting two cribs, two rocking chairs, toy chests and changingtables.

The crib closest to the opened French doors leading to the balcony was empty. The other crib contained a cryingchild.

The air inside the nursery was oppressive and hot. Two beautiful blonde women stood near the doors. One was sobbing, and had an ethereal glow she recognized as immortal. The woman holding the crying woman was her twin. The sour scent of fear mingled with a sweetness that reminded her of lilies, vanilla andinnocence.

Drust went to the sobbing woman and gently drew her away. “Nikita, what happened? I can get no information fromTristan.”

The woman gulped down a sob. “K-k-egan. He-s-he’s gone. It’s all my fault. My fault! I lefthim…”

Fresh, agonizing sobs wrung from Nikita as she buried her face into herhands.

Drust led her over to the rocking chair, let her sit. Kneeling at her side, rubbing her back, he leveled a look at her twin. “I need details. Now,Nia.”

Nia blinked back her own tears. “Niki was visiting with the babies while Tristan was on assignment. She’s done it many times before, we have Lupines guarding the hallway and the nursery, our security is thebest…”

“I don’t give a damn about your security. What happened?” Drustsnapped.

Breath hitching, her face blotched and her eyes puffy, Nia pointed outside. “It was the annual Mitchell Ranch picnic to celebrate the round up. We were outside, helping to set up. Our daughter was restless and didn’t want to sleep, so Beth and Dale, Aiden’s niece and our security director, took her for a ride on their horses. The twins were upstairs, napping, the doors open to the breeze. Two of Aiden’s best security Lupines were patrolling the hallway, and another Lupine was outside, below the nursery. He claims he saw nothing. And then Niki, I saw her grow pale and she screamed that one of her twins wasgone.

“We rushed back here and Keegan was missing,” Niacontinued.

From the rocking chair, Nikita raised her tear-streaked face. “I knew there was a risk, there’s always a risk in bringing the twins here to earth. They’re safe in Tir Na-nog, no one can harm them there. But it had been too long since I’d seen Nia, and it was only for twodays…”

Shuddering, Lacey looked around the pretty nursery. In the crib furthest from the doors an adorable blonde toddler gripped the crib rails like prison bars, rocking back and forth, clearlyagitated.

“No one can climb up here! It’s three stories high,” Nia criedout.

“Not climb,” Drust murmured, his gaze sharp. “Butfly.”

Nia lookedbewildered.

“Dragon,” Lacey interjected. “It was a dragon who took your nephew. We canfly.”

Niki’s sobs ceased and her blue gaze sharpened. “Impossible. I would have seen a dragon flying overhead. Nia as well. Dragons are only invisible to Skins, not Others likeus.”

Unless the dragon materialized out ofnowhere…

Lacey hoped to hell she waswrong.

Suddenly the girl in the crib let out a loud, keening wail. “Keegan, Keegan!” She rocked back andforth.

Drust went to the child’s crib and picked her up. Crooning, he held Kara in hisarms.

Lacey’s chest felt hollow. A missing child was heart wrenching, but the child of two immortals? No telling how valuable Keegan would be to Tristan’s enemies on the blackmarket.

“Who took your brother, Kara? Who took Keegan?” Drust murmured, smoothing back the girl’s blondhair.

The child put a finger in her mouth. “Dragon,” she whispered, pointing to Lacey, whose heart dropped to her chest. “Greendragon.”