Page 19 of Vex (Dragon Brides #12)

It was cold. Freezing. Blistering.

Brisk.

The words cycled through Luisa’s sluggish mind as consciousness crept back in fragments. Her skull throbbed where Zymon's blaster had struck her, a sharp counterpoint to the bone-deep ache radiating from everywhere at once.

Luisa shivered as she sat up, her evening gown and heels useless against the chill.

The midnight blue fabric that had made her feel confident in the casino now clung in icy sheets, offering no protection against wind that cut through silk like a blade.

Snow accumulated in the folds of her skirt, and her bare arms were mottled red and white.

The emerald necklace Vex had given her felt like a glacier around her throat.

She'd been dumped in the cold. Snow fell in thick, lazy flakes that would have been beautiful under other circumstances. Now they felt like frozen daggers against her exposed skin.

The Haddiac Mountains rolled on in every direction. Luisa squinted against the blowing snow but couldn't make out lights from the casino.

This was how they disposed of people. The realization hit her with absolute clarity. No messy murders in pristine corridors, no blood on expensive carpets, no bodies to explain to guests. Just dump the problems outside and let the mountain do the work. Clean. Efficient. Deniable.

The wind howled around the peaks like something alive and hungry, carrying the promise of slow, frozen death.

How many others had Maera's people taken there?

The mountain would claim her bones like it had claimed so many others, leaving nothing but another mysterious disappearance to file away and forget.

A low growl echoed from the darkness beyond the tree line, followed by the crunch of something large moving through snow. Luisa's blood turned to ice as she realized she wasn't alone on this desolate peak. Whatever lived up here would smell her fear, her blood, her vulnerability.

The cold might kill her slowly, but the local wildlife would be faster.

Panic shot through her, burning away the sluggish haze clouding her thoughts. She refused to be dinner for some beast.

Her legs were numb blocks as she tried to stand, pins and needles shooting through her calves as circulation returned.

The heels that had made her feel elegant in the casino were death traps now, their thin soles providing no traction on icy rock.

She kicked them off without hesitation, the expensive shoes disappearing into snow.

The cold bit into her bare feet immediately, sharp enough to make her gasp. But she could feel the ground, sense the subtle variations that might mean the difference between solid footing and a fatal fall. She stumbled forward through drifts, her dress tangling around her legs.

Through a gap in swirling snow, she glimpsed lights twinkling in the distance.

The casino, still perched on its impossible peak like a glittering jewel against the storm.

It looked impossibly far away, but she was definitely on the same mountain.

The lights flickered through snow, but they were real.

A destination she could reach if she kept moving.

Hope flared, warm and desperate. She wasn't going to die on this ledge. Not when Vex was still in danger, not when the mission hung in the balance. Maera might have thought she was disposing of a problem, but she'd underestimated exactly how hard Luisa was to kill.

She began trudging through snow, following what might have been an animal path.

Each step was a battle against wind that tried to knock her sideways, against snow that filled her tracks almost as fast as she could make them.

Her thoughts grew sluggish as cold crept deeper into her bones, making it harder to focus on the distant lights.

The silk of her dress had frozen stiff in places, cracking when she moved and letting wind find new places to torment her skin.

Her fingers had gone completely numb, making it impossible to gather the dress properly. The fabric caught on every branch and rock, tearing in places that let even more cold reach her skin. But she kept moving, driven by stubborn will and the knowledge that stopping meant dying.

She wasn't going to make it much longer.

The realization crept through her mind with the same inexorable certainty as cold seeping into her bones.

Her body was already shutting down non-essential functions, drawing blood away from her extremities to protect vital organs.

Soon, she'd start getting clumsy, making mistakes that would send her tumbling off the mountain path. It wouldn’t be long after that.

Oh, please, Vex, I'm out here. She didn't have the energy to speak it.

The words formed in her mind like a prayer, too desperate to hold back. She tried to picture his face, the way his eyes had looked when he'd touched her, when he'd whispered her name like something precious.

Would he even notice she was gone? Or would he assume she'd taken the transport he'd arranged and disappeared into whatever new life waited for her?

How would he know? And why would he care?

He'd made his feelings clear back in their suite. She was a liar, a thief, someone he couldn't trust. The passionate man who'd claimed her body with world-shattering intensity had looked at her with cold dismissal when he'd learned the truth about her past.

Why would he waste time looking for someone who'd already betrayed him?

But even as the logical part of her mind accepted that reality, her heart rebelled. What they'd shared had been real, regardless of the secrets she'd kept.

He was in danger, too. Zymon had caught her. He'd know Vex was up to something. And if Zymon knew, Maera would soon.

The thought cut through her self-pity like a blade. While she'd been wallowing in cold and feeling sorry for herself, Vex was walking into a trap he didn't know existed. Maera had all the pieces now, everything she needed to destroy whatever cover story they'd built.

And Vex, with his arrogant assumption that he could handle anything, would never see it coming.

They were going to kill him.

How did you kill a dragon?

The question terrified her more than her own impending death.

Dragons were supposed to be nearly indestructible.

But Maera's operation was sophisticated, well-funded.

If anyone had access to weapons that could take down a dragon lord, it would be someone like her.

And Vex, sitting in that casino thinking he was in control, would be completely vulnerable.

She had to warn him. Had to find some way to get word to him before Maera made her move. The data she'd stolen from the server room wouldn't matter if Vex was dead, and all her sacrifice would be meaningless.

Vex, she thought again. Desperately.

She closed her eyes against stinging snow and tried to remember the moment when they'd flown to the casino together. The strange sensation she'd felt when his dragon had communicated with her, that brief connection that had felt like touching something vast and utterly alien.

Could dragons hear thoughts? Somehow?

The idea was ridiculous, desperate, probably just hypothermia starting to affect her judgment. But she had nothing else left to try.

Vex.