THE NEXT evening Raven contacted Hudson and updated him on what happened at the club. Connie was in Hudson’s office and overheard the conversation.
The hunter they’d nabbed in the club? Wasn’t actually a hunter. He was a human who smelled like a hunter because the two of them had gotten busy in the bathroom. The hunter had rubbed himself all over the human, thus scent-marking him. Raven had questioned the human and found he’d just left the hunter in the bathroom when shit went down.
The human had not been harmed before they found out the truth. Of course, the poor human had to be compelled to forget the entire incident. Several of them had to be.
Cops found the dead bodies and had questioned Raven about it, not that they could tie the deaths to the attack on the club. It all seemed like a rather elaborate undertaking just to kidnap some people, not to mention Raven was now thoroughly annoyed.
The only good thing, if one could call it that, was that they had proof the hunters were still active in San DeLain even though Nox was dead, and two of the hunters had perished. Hudson had apparently killed the one he threw against the van.
Oh fucking well.
Hudson emailed the rest of the San DeLain leaders and updated them on what happened. Kage and Austin had left for Greece, and Hudson had arranged for them to borrow his private jet, which included members of his court as the crew.
Before Kage left, he reminded Hudson they needed someone to keep an eye on the human that Nox had attacked.
Seeing no sign that Hudson planned to stop working anytime soon, Connie ducked down to the kitchen and grabbed the plates of food left for them.
Taking the plates back to Hudson’s office, he placed the two trays onto the conference table in Hudson’s office. It was dinnertime, and Connie was starving.
“Oh, sorry. I didn’t realize it was so late. Thank you.” Hudson joined Connie at the table. “Pizza?”
“Homemade pizza,” Connie corrected.
Since all of Hudson’s court lived in the compound, Hudson employed a full-time staff to cook in his home. All the dragons on Hudson’s land had their own homes, but several of the single ones ate at the main house. In a very loose way, Hudson’s residence functioned like a werewolves’ packhouse.
Hudson took a bite and groaned softly. “This is excellent.”
“Did you expect anything less?”
“Nope. Stella and her staff excel in all forms of cooking. To say otherwise would be to tempt Fate,” Hudson quipped as he took another bite of pizza.
“Yeah, Fate in the form of your head cook. She’d probably whack you on the ass with one of her wooden spoons. Stella doesn’t play.”
“No, she does not.” Hudson picked up the soda that Connie had brought and took a sip. “Kage and Austin are on their way to Greece. He reminded me that the human who owns the bookstore needs protection.”
“What was the guy’s name again?” Connie asked.
“Kit Meadows. He’s the owner of The Book Spot. His ex was the hunter who let Nox into Kit’s office.”
Connie grimace. Talk about a betrayal. “Ouch.”
“Yeah. And the ex is missing too, so Kage and Austin are worried about Kit’s safety.”
Kit owned a bookstore that Austin had done a book signing at. The two had hit it off and had started to become friends when Austin had suddenly backed off.
Austin had mainly done that because he didn’t want to draw Nox’s attention to any friend of his. Not that it had done good. Nox attacked Kit, assumed his identity, and lured Austin into a trap.
“Any idea of who you want to use to babysit the human?” Connie asked as he bit into his pizza.
“I think Beckett would work nicely. He’s pretty nonthreatening for an Ancient—which is good for Kit’s peace of mind. Plus, Beckett’s a bookworm. Doing guard duty in a bookstore should be right down his alley.”
“I’ll check with him and see what he’s got going on. You do realize, of course, that saying Beckett is nonthreatening for an Ancient is all kinds of wrong, right? He’s damn near as powerful as you,” Connie pointed out.
“This human is important to Kage and Austin. That makes him important to us, which is why I am assigning a Grand Lord to watch after him,” Hudson said.
Dragons had titles that correlated with age. Hatchlings were dragons from birth to ninety-nine years old. Younglings were one hundred to four hundred ninety-nine years old.
Dragons who were five hundred to six hundred ninety-nine years old had the title of Sir/Mistress. Connie fell in that category. Any dragons who were seven hundred to nine hundred ninety-nine years old held the title of Lords/Ladies.
Dragons over a thousand years old who was not born a King or Queen held the title of Grand Lord/Lady, like Beckett, and also considered an Ancient.
A King/Queen was a solid color of whatever court they belong to. In Hudson’s case, since he belonged to the Fire Court, he was a completely red dragon.
