city of dragons 02 - fire storm by val st crowe Read Free Book Online Page B

Whitman’s mate party. In some ways, Jenna’s so grown up, but in other ways, she’s very… well, stupid. I’ve forbidden her to go to that horrible place, but I can’t stop her.”
    “I hadn’t realized so much time had passed,” I said.
    “We’re so old,” said Melinda, smiling.
    “Speak for yourself,” said Connie. “I’m easily twice as old as you.”
    Melinda laughed. “Well, anyway, we’ve heard things about you, Penny.”
    “Things?” I said.
    “That you burnt up a vampire a few months ago,” said Nissa. “On the beach. He was the leader of a gang, and he was giving you trouble, so you just—”
    “It wasn’t exactly like that,” I said.
    “We want your help,” said Melinda.
    I looked at the three of them. “My help?”
    “We thought maybe you’d be willing to deal with the vampires that are preying on our babies,” said Nissa.
    “If anyone could do something, it would be you,” said Melinda.
    I chewed on my lip. “You three are dragons, same as me. There’s no reason you couldn’t take care of this problem yourself.”
    “Oh, we couldn’t,” said Melinda. “We just… we would have no idea what to do.”
    “I haven’t even shifted into dragon form in years,” said Connie.
    “I don’t even remember how to breathe fire,” said Nissa.
    Was this really the case? I supposed that I had spent so much of my time shifting into dragon form when I was with Alastair because I was healing myself all the time. And I didn’t know too much about the married-dragon-woman culture because Alastair had never really allowed me to have friends.
    “Please,” said Melinda. “At least say you’ll think about it.”
    “We can pay you, of course,” said Nissa.
    “I don’t need money,” I said, offended.
    “Of course not,” said Melinda, blushing a little.
    I sighed heavily. “I need time to look into this a bit more. I can’t make any promises.”
    * * *
    “Flint,” Lachlan’s voice said over his phone, his tone clipped and closed-off. He obviously hadn’t checked to see who the incoming call was coming from.
    “It’s me,” I said.
    “Penny,” he said in acknowledgment. His tone hadn’t much changed.
    “You were saying that we needed to talk to people who know Fletcher?”
    “Uh huh.”
    “Are you busy or something? You want me to call back later?”
    “Why would you say that?”
    “You sound preoccupied.”
    “I’m not.”
    “Okay,” I said. “Well, there’s a big party coming up at the Whitman’s home. I heard about it from an old friend this morning, and I did some nosing around, and it’s being held here in Sea City, and any dragon who’s anybody will be there. It’s a find-a-mate party. I mean, that’s not what it’s officially called or anything, but those things are huge.”
    “Find-a-mate party?”
    “Yeah,” I said. “See, when dragons get to a certain age, and they haven’t met their one true mate, a lot of times they throw a series of parties, inviting dragons from all over the country, all over the world, to come. A dragon has to meet his or her mate to know who it is. And sometimes a dragon’s mate lives very far away, and these parties are the only way they meet.”
    “Interesting,” said Lachlan. “So, are there unmated dragons out there? Dragons who die of old age and have never met their mates?”
    “It’s rare,” I said. “But yeah, it happens.”
    “Do you think that’s because that person didn’t have a mate or just because they didn’t find one?”
    “Oh, God, do not take me down that path. You sound like my stoner friends back when I was a teenager. They’d sit around and talk about stuff like that for hours.”
    He chuckled. “You, of course, abstained from substance use.”
    “Totally,” I said. “I’ve always been scared of that stuff. We had assemblies at my elementary school about how drugs kill you.”
    “Right,” he said. “Well, you think that Fletcher’s circle of friends will be at the