Her Dragon Billionaire
Table of Contents
Title Page
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
About the Author
Her Dragon Billionaire
Lizzie Lynn Lee
August 2012
Published by Summerhouse Publishing. Copyright, Lizzie Lynn Lee. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. This book contains material protected under International and Federal Copyright Laws and Treaties. Any unauthorized reprint or use of this material is prohibited. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without express written permission from the author.
Summerhouse Publishing
http://summerhousepublishing.com
Lizzie Lynn Lee
http://ilizzie.com
Editor
Chris Stout
Cover Artist
Lizzie Lynn Lee
This is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents and dialogues in this book are of the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is completely coincidental.
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Prologue
When Eva Walkers stared into the barrel of the gun, she knew her fate had been sealed. On this fine summer night at twenty-nine years, seven months, thirteen days, eleven hours and thirty-eight minutes old, she was going to die.
Plain and simple.
No amount of pleading was going to change these men’s mind. They were professional killers, sent by the Russian mafia vory v zakone as retribution for her testimony against their boss in a murder case three months ago in New York.
She thought ruefully about the district attorney, Glenn Adams, who had promised her safety in the Federal Witness Protection Program. With a new identity, a new job, and a new home, Adams had reassured her that she would be protected from the bratva retaliation. Adams needed her testimony to put Anton Kovalenko, the vor boss, behind bars for the rest of his life. Eva had gullibly believed Adams’s words. She had done the right thing. Anton Kovalenko had destroyed many lives and he needed to be locked away forever. Justice had to be served so his victims would receive closure.
Now she could see how foolish she had been.
She should have seen this coming.
She was a librarian for Christ’s sake! And with her taste of literature in true crime, noir, and thriller, she should have known that nothing good ever came from being a squealer. The person who ratted out the mob always ended up in a tragic accident.
Still, she had gone through with it.
She was romantic at heart and innocently believed that in the battle between good and evil, good always prevailed. Now she knew the reality wasn’t nicely wrapped and sugar-coated like on TV. Reality was harsh, bitter, and vengeful.
Conditioned in the Gulag with the credo that the home for angels was heaven and the home for a vor was prison, vory v zakone made the Italian mafia look like a troupe of dancing nuns. These tall men stood before her like towering black columns of reapers who had come to collect her soul. The hard-lined faces told her that these men had gone to hell and back. Their expressions were cold. Their prison tattoos peeked underneath their suit sleeves and collars, decorating their bodies like badges of accomplishments. Eva wondered if they were really human beings who were capable of showing emotion and feelings. She doubted it. Their hearts must have been carved out of petrified stone.
They had ambushed her in the parking lot when she got out of work. She was a librarian in her old life and now she was working as a manuscript restorer for a private literary foundation. She had settled in nicely and was enjoying her new life in Chicago, putting the past behind her. But now that the past caught up with her.
They had shoved her in a van and had taken her to a clearing near a river. They spoke to her but Eva didn’t understand Russian. Either way, she didn’t need a translation. Even a village idiot could see they wanted her to suffer before she died. Their faces remained icy as one of them broke her fingers as if he was snapping annoying twigs. The pain jarred her to the bone. She had screamed, cried, and pleaded for mercy. But deep inside, she knew her life had been forfeited.
Now as she stared at the barrel of the gun, she prayed her death would be quick and painless.
The man squeezed the trigger.
Her head whipped backward. Her body collapsed.
She blinked. She was still conscious.
Damn it, they lied, she thought. People getting shot on TV. The victims on those shows always died instantly. And why she was still able to think? Even worse, why was she conscious? She wanted to speak, trying to move her limbs, but her body and her brain were no longer cooperating. Pain scorched her. It felt as if she had shoved her head into a coal furnace: blistering hot agony throbbed in cadence of her beating heart. She couldn’t do anything but endure it.
She couldn’t breathe. The air around her thinned.
The vor shot her a couple more times.
Two fiery leads burrowed into her flesh like worms from hell that sought new fertile ground to subsist and breed.
She tried to speak again, but her mouth frothed with blood and saliva, making her speech garbled.
As she sprawled on the wet June grass, she prayed the pain would go away. Minutes passed by and she still hadn’t died.
Every nerve-tip in her body screamed pain.
Darkness crept into her field of vision.
Eva shut her eyes. A tear leaked down her cheek.
Die already, she thought with exasperation. I’m ready…
The man who shot her kicked her in the stomach and pushed her into the river. In the depth of the watery abyss, Eva felt the shroud of the angel of death slowly envelop her weak and broken body.
She surrendered.
Chapter One
Liam Caderyn wondered what was wrong with his dog. Hades, the rescued golden retriever he had adopted from a no-kill shelter a year ago had been restless since dinner time. He whined and scratched the back door repeatedly. Liam didn’t let him out because of the rain. When the downpour finally subsided, he opened the door to take him for his evening walk. Hades bounded to the backyard toward the wooded area like a loose arrow, not heeding his master’s calls.
Rain had been pouring since morning, leaving the grass on his vast property soggy and squishy under his boots. Liam didn’t mind the wet. He liked the smell of the earth after rain: dense, musky, a cornucopia of steeped leaves and dirt tea, a scent of mystery and a new beginning. He just didn’t like the mud that Hades would track back into the house. The old pup would need a bath before bed time, and honestly, grooming a long-haired retriever was more time-consuming than caring for his sister’s toddler. Liam babysat Caitlyn’s son Brandon once in a while. To tell the truth, the two-year old was less of a handful than his spoiled dog.
“Hades!” Liam called. “Come here, boy.”
The dog whined somewhere far ahead. Liam silently wished that Hades wouldn’t go near the pond. Retrievers liked to swim, but now wasn’t a good time. Cutting through his property was an offshoot stream from Calumet River t
hat ended in the pond. Even though it was small, the stream was quite deep. A couple years back, Liam had it dredged to encourage the growth of the wildlife.
And from the sound of it, it seemed the dog had gone in that direction.
Liam owned a forty-acre piece of land near the Whistler Preserve where he had built his sanctuary, the quiet place where he spent most of his days painting and photographing nature. He was thirty-five when he had finally got fed up with politics and the ruthlessness of the cutthroat business world, and the scandal his ex-wife had caused. He sold his six-billion-dollar telecommunication company that he had started right after he graduated from Stanford, gave half of his fortune to charities, and retired in modesty.
Sighing, Liam ducked a low hanging apple branch and went deep into the woods to follow the eager dog. Cold, saturated sprigs of bushes smacked him vindictively as he cut a path to where Hades was. His jacket and jeans were stained with rain water. He squinted, trying to find the dog. The dark, gloomy sky didn’t affect his vision. As one of the rare few dragon shifters left on Earth, Liam was gifted with excellent sight. He blinked then caught the orange-brown movement darting under a willow tree. The retriever was restless. He kept barking and whining. Liam caught up with him. He reached for Hades and ruffled the fur behind his ear. “What’s the matter, boy?”
The smell hit him before his dog gave away the source of his discontent.
Blood.
Liam’s sense of smell was as sharp as his sight. He hissed, following the scent. Rocks and gravel crunched underneath his soles as he took measured steps onto the slope. He saw a dark figure washed out on the side of the stream; the lower half of its torso submerged in the water. Hades shot past him and braked in front of it abruptly. He wagged his tail and barked once.
“What did you find, boy?”
“Woof!”
Great. Just the last thing he needed. A corpse. The main river must have been flooded from the rain and dragged this unwanted problem right onto his property. He would need to call the authorities and the prospect of the police, coroners, and the press trampling around in his private sanctuary darkened his mood. He liked his privacy. His quiet and orderly life. His Zen. He had enough of living under the spotlight when he still ran his company. Being the youngest self-made billionaire had made the media hunger for him and scrutinize his every move. If a reporter got a whiff that he had found a dead body on his property, the vulture-like paparazzi, gossip tabloids, and TV pundits would make a circus out of it.
Liam half-heartedly trudged to Hades’ discovery. He surveyed the ground, looking for any sign that someone had purposely trespassed on his land and dumped a dead body near his house. But there were no signs of tracks. Of course, the rain could have easily erased them. He studied closer. From the look of it, the corpse seemed to have been dragged by the flood.
Liam narrowed his eyes, studying the body through the mud that covered it all over. It appeared to be female, wearing what was once a white blouse and a dark skirt. Seemed to be young as well, she couldn’t be older than thirty. Twigs and leaves were tangled in her hair. She sprawled with her arms caught in a jumble of cattail bog plants. A bullet wound was visible in her right temple. Judging from her condition, she had been killed recently. No sign of decomposition at all.
Great. A murder victim.
He took his cell phone out and was about to dial 9-1-1 when he caught a faint sigh. A breath. A dying breath even. Liam was perplexed. No way. How could she even be alive with such trauma?
Hurriedly, Liam pocketed his phone away. He plunged into the waist-high water to check the pulse on her neck. Her body was cold but the pulse was there. Barely. He had to call the ambulance so she could receive medical aide. He cleared her face from clumps of muck-covered hair. His heart sank. If a human soul was tethered to its body like a balloon, the string anchoring this woman to the physical vessel was about to disconnect permanently. He wasn’t trained in the medical field, but even he could see this woman didn’t have much time left. By the time the paramedics came for her, she probably would be dead already.
Unless he did something about it.
His grandfather once said a dragon shifter was also granted the ability to give life. The rite of blood magic. In the old days, blood magic was used by dragons who claimed a human mate to prolong their life. Dragons lived twice as long as the human lifespan. Once a dragon mated, they were bound forever. Blood magic was used so a bonded pair could enjoy life until its very end.
But Liam had never had the chance to initiate blood magic. He had claimed a mate a few years ago: Natalie Bairn, also a dragoness from the House of Bairn. Thinking that they were both dragon, he felt no need to initiate the ritual of blood magic. He married his own kind; a vow of bond should have been good enough. But it turned out the bond was a joke. The marriage didn’t last. Natalie cheated on him with his best friend. Liam got divorced at the same time he decided to withdraw from the world.
If he initiated the blood magic, he could save this woman’s life.
Problem was, she wasn’t his mate. How he was going to tell her the truth when she woke up from her injuries, good as new? Human didn’t believe that dragons existed, and his kin had never been inclined to prove the thousand-year- old myth was true. If he healed this woman, he would have to tell her their secret.
But if he didn’t help her, she’d die.
Liam wasn’t sure he could live with that on his conscience if he had the chance to save a life and he chose not to.
Help her now, everything else can be explained later.
Liam made a split-second decision.
She must live.
He slipped his arms underneath her and lifted her out of the water. Hades barked, circling him as he put the woman on the muddy ground. It appeared the gun shot on her temple was made from a small caliber. He checked carefully and found out it didn’t have an exit wound. The bullet was still lodged in her brain. If the blood rite was successful, the magic would repair any damage. And any strange objects lodged into the body like the bullet would be automatically expelled. Scratch that. Bullets. He found she had also been shot in the chest and stomach. Heavens have mercy.
How could she still be alive?
Hades settled in, watching his every move. Liam summoned his power, partially shifting. His right fingers turned into sharp talons. With a flick of his wrist, he cut open his left palm.
Chanting the rite, he bled into her mouth.
Chapter Two
Eva woke up with a start.
Her first instinct was to grope her head and her stomach, looking for the bullet holes that had almost robbed her of her life.
She found nothing.
She couldn’t figure out why she thought she had been shot, because there were no signs of any wounds at all. She was completely unscathed. A frisson of terror shot through her when she found herself as naked as the day she was born. She pulled herself into a sitting position and shoved the comforter down, examining her body.
Nothing. No pain. No holes. No bandage.
Other than a mild headache and a slight chill, she was completely fine.
Why was she naked?
And why did she think she had been in an accident?
No, not accident.
Something worse.
She felt as if she had recently been in a life-or-death situation and the horrible part was that she didn’t make it.
Strange.
She couldn’t remember anything at all.
She knew her name. Eva. And that was it. She couldn’t remember her last name. Her family, or what she did. Everything else felt like a big black hole, a leviathan eating memories that had swallowed her past.
Where am I?
Who am I?
She wasn’t in a hospital bed for sure. The room she was in looked like a private home. A luxurious one. The bed had four columns draped with sheer ivory fabric. Rich, dark furniture contrasted with the pleasant, muted tones of the walls. Everything looked so expensi
vely furnished and yet it looked so…alien. She didn’t recognize this as her bedroom. Too fancy for her tastes—she was sure of it.
There were no photos hanging on the walls, only two large oil paintings depicting wooded landscapes. Across from her bed was a large fireplace flanked by two cozy high-backed chairs upholstered in fancy velvety print.
Her gaze drifted to a vanity mirror between the nightstand and the fireplace. She saw clothing folded on the vanity bench.
Eva scooted down.
Cool flooring touched her feet as she ambled to the bench to grab them. The clothing turned out to be a bedroom robe. She donned it. The fabric felt soft against her skin. It was a pretty one. For no reason, she just knew the fabric was silk. It was strange that she knew this while everything else about herself seemed to be a big jumble of haziness.
Who am I?
What am I doing here?
She tied the robe and whirled backward to face the vanity mirror. A stranger stared back. She blinked. My name is Eva. What’s my last name? And why did I think I had been hurt?
She narrowed her eyes, scrutinizing her own reflection. She had a lush figure and pale complexion. Her reddish hair was cut just below her shoulder; it had been neatly combed but now was tousled from sleeping. She had blue eyes with an oval face and thin petulant lips. A curious face. She thought she looked like a startled mouse.
There.
She knew what a mouse was yet she couldn’t remember who she was. This not-knowing-anything was starting to bug the hell out of her.
The door opened. A matronly woman came in bearing a tray with a pot of tea and cups. She was wearing a conservative dress with a spotless white apron. She looked to be in her early sixties but she moved with the agility of a person half her age. The porcelain cups jingled on the silver tray. White plumes of steam billowed from the teapot. A smile broke out on her face. She sighed with relief. “Thank goodness you’re awake, child.”
“Hello.” Eva gave a tiny wave. “Who are you?”