Badass Dragons: The Complete Set

  BADASS DRAGONS

  The Complete Set

  Rosette Bolter

  Also By Rosette Bolter

  Shared By The Dragon Clan

  Worshiped By The Bear Kings

  Engaged To The Vampire Twins

  Stepbrother Bear

  PART ONE

  CHAPTER ONE

  It was ten past midnight when Nurse Cheryl Thames arrived home to her cats in the middle of a brawl and a sink full of dishes. She staggered in, kicking off her heels and dropped her handbag in the middle of the floor. Her cell phone spilled out across the tiles and she almost tripped on it as she made her way to the couch in the middle of the living room. She flopped down on it, absolutely exhausted. She’d started work at 10am that morning, and was supposed to finish at seven, but the hospital had to keep her back. It was all over now thankfully, at least until tomorrow. Cheryl’s mind was a total blank. She was far too tired to do anything now, but just shut her eyes and drift away into a peaceful sleep.

  Then her phone started ringing.

  Her eyes gradually opened again, and she rolled herself off the couch. Without lifting her feet, she dragged herself across the carpet until found the phone on the tiles. She flipped open the receiver and turned over on her back so she was facing the ceiling.

  “Hello?” Cheryl answered.

  “Hey,” a quiet voice breathed.

  Cheryl sat up. “Sophie? Is that you?”

  “It’s me.”

  “Is everything alright?”

  “Not exactly,” Sophie breathed. “I was going to come see you.”

  “Where are you? Do you want me to pick you up somewhere?”

  “Maybe. Just hold on a second.”

  Cheryl heard Sophie hold something over the phone. She was talking to someone.

  “Are you there?” Sophie returned.

  “Still here. Who’s with you?”

  “Nobody. There’s just this guy wandering behind me. He was trying to ask me something.”

  “Is he following you?”

  “No,” Sophie answered. “He’s only been there a minute. I think he’s on drugs or something.”

  “You haven’t been using have you?”

  Silence.

  “Sophie?”

  “You know you’re just like Mom. You’ll never get over my past.”

  “I haven’t seen you in months,” Cheryl said earnestly. “I’ve been worried about you.”

  “Yeah. Well anyway … I have something I need to talk to you about. It’s really important.”

  “What is it?”

  “I don’t want to say with this guy around. I’m not far away from Mom’s house. I’m sort of making my way out to the highway. We just had this huge fight and everything…”

  “Alright,” Cheryl said climbing to her feet. “I’ll come get you. Whereabouts do you want to meet exactly?”

  “Hold on a second.”

  There was a brief pause.

  Sophie then swore loudly.

  “What’s happening?” Cheryl demanded.

  “This guy fucking knows my name,” Sophie gushed. “He’s calling out to me.”

  “Well get out of there. Run away from him.”

  “I’m trying.”

  “Okay. Just…” Cheryl paced back and forth restlessly.

  She could hear Sophie panting.

  “What’s happening?” Cheryl murmured.

  “Oh shit,” Sophie cursed. “Oh … OH WHAT THE FUCK? JESUS CHRIST CHERYL!”

  “WHAT? WHAT?” Cheryl shouted.

  “This fucking thing’s in the sky, it’s like … it’s a dragon –”

  There was a loud thump on Sophie’s end. It sounded as though she’d dropped the phone.

  “SOPHIE?” Cheryl squealed. “SOPHIE? WHERE ARE YOU?”

  Footsteps. Someone picking up the phone.

  Cheryl could hear them breathing.

  “Sophie is that you?”

  A man gave a heartless chuckle and then the line went dead.

  “No!” Cheryl squealed. “Holy shit no!”

  She tried calling back but there was no answer.

  Sophie was gone.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Cheryl’s squeals had alerted the attention of her two cats whom had set their differences aside and come out to see if she was okay. They both stared up at her from the floor as she stood paralyzed with shock. One of them broke the silence with a distinct Meow.

  Cheryl looked to him, and then let the weight in both her knees drag her slowly down to the floor. She put one hand behind the ear of the vocal pussy cat, whilst the other one stepped off his place and rubbed his head at her side.

  Cheryl looked down at the phone in her hand. She dialed 911.

  “Hi,” she said, after the operator answered. “I have to report an attack.”

  “I have to ask, mam,” the operator droned, “if you or anyone else is any danger.”

  “I’m not sure. I just got off the phone with my sister, and I could hear she was being attacked. I think … she’s not answering her cell –”

  “What is your sister’s name?”

  “Sophie Thames. I’m Cheryl.”

  “Thames?”

  “Correct.” Cheryl inhaled deeply. “Listen, can you send someone to help me find her?”

  “What’s the location?”

  Cheryl gave her mother’s address.

  “A car will be there soon. Now I need to ask you for some more details. Are you or your sister in possession, or have access to any firearms?”

  Cheryl sighed. “I’m sorry. I can’t afford to waste any more time.”

  “Mam?”

  Cheryl hung up the phone. She rose from the floor, a dizzy blur obscuring her vision.

  She was afraid, but needed to be brave.

  She was exhausted, but needed to be strong.

  No doubt, what Cheryl had heard over the phone absolutely terrified her, but at the same time – she might be her sister’s only hope. Sophie was counting on her.

  She scooped up the spilled contents from her handbag, and then slung it over her shoulder, rising from the floor. She could have used a hot shower and a fresh change of clothes from her nurse’s uniform. She could have used a strong coffee to wake her up.

  But there wasn’t time.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Before reaching her mother’s house, Cheryl took a specific route off the highway that she suspected

  Sophie may have traveled. As late as it was, she barely saw anyone at all through the dark turns along the back roads, let alone her sister. It was roughly a quarter to one in the morning – twenty five minutes after Cheryl had left her apartment – and there was no sign of the cops anywhere. Cheryl had been in such a rush she’d forgotten to phone her mother who was probably in bed now, fast asleep. After pulling up alongside the nature strip, Cheryl got out of the car and ran up to the front door. She pressed the bell.

  There was a moment of silence. Cheryl stepped back and moved round the side of the house to where her mother’s bedroom was. She saw a light come on from behind the blinds and moved back to the porch. The front door opened.

  “Cheryl?” her mom exclaimed. “What are you –?”

  “So she hasn’t come back?” Cheryl snapped pushing past her into the house.

  Mom paused before replying. “You mean Sophie?”

  Cheryl whirled around. “Yes, Sophie.”

  “She was here. She left around midnight.”

  “I know. I spoke with her on the phone. She said you and her had a fight.”

  Mom pulled her bath robe tighter. “She wanted to borrow some money.”

  “And you didn’t give it to her.”

  �
��Why would I? She probably needed it to buy drugs. Or pay off some junkie boyfriend’s gambling debts.”

  “Yeah, well, she’s missing now.”

  “Missing?”

  “I spoke with her on the phone. She … she was attacked by someone.”

  “By who?”

  “I don’t know. A man. Some guy was following her. I heard what happened on the phone. She was struck or something and she dropped the phone. Then it went dead.”

  “Well,” Mom said moving past Cheryl, “your sister was always getting herself into these kinds of situations. I’ll put the kettle on.”

  “Forget the kettle,” Cheryl hissed. “Your daughter is in trouble – now, are you going to help me or not?”

  Mom turned slightly. “What do you want from me?”

  “Look, forget it,” Cheryl sighed. “The police will be here soon anyway. I’m going back out there to look for her. You can tell them what’s going on when they get here”

  Mom groaned. “You’re overreacting, Cheryl. Really. If you had seen her tonight –”

  “Was she on something? Was she high?”

  “No, nothing like that –”

  “Okay. I gotta go. Just tell the cops where I am. I’ll be going through the backstreets, up to the highway. That’s where she was headed.”

  “On foot or in your car?”

  “I don’t know,” Cheryl muttered. She felt the pain in her legs holding her back. But they were nothing when compared with the pain of losing her only sister…

  “On foot,” Cheryl answered. “Her phone was still ringing last time I tried it. I’m gonna see if I can find it.”

  “What if it’s been picked up?”

  Cheryl’s mouth dropped. Tears seized up in her eyes.

  “I have to try, Mom,” she said. “This could be our last chance of finding her again.”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Passing clouds had drowned out the light of the moon, and the streetlights became less and less frequent as Cheryl descended into the brittle maze before her. Keeping her eyes on the ground, she kept to the footpath, with her phone at her ear. Sophie’s dial tone humming and humming. The cops still hadn’t showed up by the time she’d left her Mom’s, and she was worried they weren’t even coming. Worse than that, her mother’s skepticism about her being able to find Sophie, while unhelpful, rang true. She went over in her mind what she’d actually heard on the phone. Something she’d missed that might have indicated that Sophie was joking around. That she wasn’t really in danger.

  What Cheryl remembered more than anything else was the laugh that man had given at the end of the call. It was so empty. So cold. It seemed to negate anything that had happened previously. An all encompassing sense of doom. It was hard to shake. Still, Cheryl kept the phone to her ear and continued listening to the dial tone.

  What else had Cheryl said before the man had laughed at her? That she was being chased, yes. But there was something else. Something horrifying she had seen. Was this the man gaining on her? Was he catching up? Sophie’s response had been one of terror. Maybe he had a weapon or something?

  Wait a moment. She had said something about the sky. Something about a … dragon. This was the last thing she’d said before the phone hit the ground. What could Sophie have meant? What looked like a dragon but wasn’t? Was she speaking in code? Cheryl shook her head. It was so weird. Such a strange thing to say. She couldn’t have meant an actual dragon, because they were make believe, but there was something she meant by dragon that Cheryl just couldn’t figure out.

  She was now at a fork. The road she was on kept going for a bit into the distance. From there you’d soon be at the highway. This was the way, Cheryl had driven in.

  She looked to the left of her. There was another, even darker street. Would Sophie have veered off here to escape the man chasing her? Why wouldn’t she run for the main road where she was safer?

  Maybe Cheryl was in a completely different spot than she’d been in the first place.

  To be absolutely sure, she decided to go down the darker side street. It seemed to go on for a while. She watched the side of the road carefully, in case she could see the light from Sophie’s phone blaring out at her. After a couple of minutes she could see the road was bending back to their mother’s house. The wrong way. She wouldn’t have come here.

  Cheryl turned sharply and started to backtrack briskly. Then a sound.

  A faint buzzing. She stopped and looked behind her.

  It was coming from the opposite side of the road.

  Cheryl ran quickly to the nature strip there, and low and behold, was a cell phone pressed face down into the grass. It was Sophie’s.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  What Cheryl was looking at right now, was exactly what Sophie saw before she was taken. Cheryl turned from her place in the grass and stared out into the darkness of the road. He must have come from there, she thought. Her eyes then moved up to the reaches of the sky. Nothing but black. Yet … Cheryl knew something had come from there. Something she couldn’t explain.

  Lights. From the other direction in front of her.

  A car.

  Cheryl pocketed Sophie’s phone and started walking away abruptly down the footpath. The car lights were moving slowly. Slower still as they approached her. She was being followed.

  Just before she was about to break into a run, a short siren was sounded, causing her to stop in her tracks.

  It was a police car. Finally.

  A young, broad shouldered constable got out of the driver’s side. He shined his flash light over her.

  “Excuse me, miss?”

  Cheryl nodded. “Thanks for coming.”

  “Are you the girl who reported her sister missing?”

  “Yes.” She reached into her pocket and produced the cell phone. “This was hers.”

  “Where did you find it?”

  “Just on this grass over here.”

  Cheryl walked back and pointed to it.

  “I see.” The officer scratched his forehead. “You haven’t seen her out here have you?”

  “No.”

  “Well, we can have a drive round to see if she’s around here.”

  Cheryl sighed. “Alright.”

  She got into the passenger side of the car and the cop climbed back in.

  “I have to be honest with you,” he said, “a person has to be missing for at least twenty four hours before we can do a proper investigation.”

  “This is different. Something’s happened to her. I was on the phone with her when it happened.”

  “What did you hear exactly?” the officer asked, pulling away from the curb.

  “There was a guy following her. She sounded distressed.”

  “Did you hear him at all in the background?”

  “Sort of. He … well, I heard them talking, and she said that he referred to her by name.”

  “So this was someone she knew?”

  “No,” Cheryl said quickly. “He was a stranger to her.”

  “Then how would he know her name?”

  Cheryl shook her head. “I have no idea.”

  “Okay. Then what happened?”

  Cheryl shrugged. “She said there was something in the sky. She was like practically screaming.”

  “Did she say what it was?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Well?”

  “It’s kind of stupid. She … said it was a dragon.”

  “A dragon?”

  “Yeah. She obviously meant something else. But as to what that could be…”

  The officer nodded. “A dragon…”

  “What?”

  He seemed hesitant to reply. “I spoke with your mother just before. She … told me a bit about your sister’s history.”

  “Oh, Jesus.”

  “It’s not uncommon for users of amphetamines to hallucinate when they’ve been using for a long time. It’s a type of psychosis.”

  “Yeah, well, maybe she was tripping. But I can tell y
ou that after she dropped her phone, that guy who was chasing her, picked up the phone.”

  “Did he speak to you?”

  “No. He just laughed. It … fucking freaked me out.”

  The officer sighed. “Okay.”

  He was silent a moment. Looking out of the car, Cheryl could see they were headed towards the highway.

  “We can keep driving round if it makes you feel better,” the officer suggested. “But we won’t be able to do a proper search until tomorrow morning at the earliest. The truth of it is, we don’t know what happened to your sister, and there’s still a reasonable chance she might show up before then.”

  “Based on what is there a reasonable chance?”

  “Well, maybe, this guy who was chasing her… Didn’t catch up. She knew her phone was slowing her down, so she flung it, and then kept running. The guy comes along, finds the phone, but has no idea where she’s gone. She’s disappeared into the darkness. More likely, she’s run to a friend’s house in the area. Or a taxi bay. Or a late night bus service. She’s taken off, and hell, you mightn’t hear from her for a full week. But she’s been okay the whole time. Do you know where she’s staying?”

  Cheryl shook her head.

  “That’s okay. We’ll figure that out in the morning.”

  They stopped at the highway’s entrance.

  It was completely dead. Orange lights poured over the empty road.

  “So do you think my theories are sound?” the officer asked. “Or would you like to keep searching for her?”

  Something suddenly caught Cheryl’s attention. To the far right, on the other side of the road, she made out the shape of a figure walking.

  “Someone’s over there,” she stated. “It could be Sophie.”

  “Let’s take a look.”

  The car dipped into the centre of the road and then shifted to the left lane and followed onward.

  The dark figure became larger and larger.

  Cheryl was disappointed to see that it was a man and not her sister.

  Once they were a few metres away, the officer sounded a short burst of the siren, and then pulled up to the side of the road. He opened his door and got out of the car to approach him.