Beautiful and deadly, she reminded herself. The last time she’d seen him shift into a dragon, he’d crushed a werewolf into a bloody mass. She took an instinctual step back.

What few people had ventured out to the shore at this early hour clearly didn’t share her sense of self-preservation. Instead of fleeing for their lives, they stopped and stared. A bunch of them pulled out their phones and began to shoot videos of the big, bad dragon, framed against the Manhattan background. Kai dipped his chin to them, puffing smoke out of his nostrils. One of the women swooned.

Sera rolled her eyes, then stared up at the dragon. “You’re not playing fair. No dragons allowed in this fight.”

She’d never seen a dragon shrug, but Kai made a solid effort. His thick, muscled shoulders rolled back, magic sparking up as his scales scraped together. He smirked down at her, his smug confidence as clear as day—even on that dragon face. Well, of course he was confident. He could wipe the floor—err, the grass—with her in his usual form. As a dragon, he’d stomp her into oblivion.

Kai’s dragon mouth opened wide, and fire spilled out like a flaming waterfall. Sera darted away, the fire licking at her heels. She kept running until she made it to the park bench. A dragon claw slashed toward her. She ducked and reached under the bench, grabbing her sword off the ground. Turning as she rose, she met the dragon’s second slash mid-swipe. Her blade hit his hard scales in a flash of magic, the impact of the collision throwing her off her feet. Her back hit the ground, nearly knocking the wind out of her. Above her, the dragon snorted.

“I’m glad you’re enjoying yourself,” she growled, peeling her sore body off the ground.

His eyes narrowed.

“I know, I know. I have to use magic, not brute force,” she said, tossing the sword aside. It was enchanted with magic—more than enough to deal with most monsters. But apparently not to break through Kai’s magical defenses.

She reached for her magic, and this time it responded right away. A tornado burst out of the ground beneath the dragon, catapulting him onto the nearby gravelly shore. He jumped up and stalked back toward the grassy field, his enormous clawed feet sliding over the shifting rocks. She had to find a way to keep him on the shore, where the uneven ground would slow him down. And she had to do it soon.

She summoned another tornado—and was surprised by how quickly it came. The swirling cyclone blasted toward Kai and hit him hard in the chest. He grunted but held his ground. This time, Sera didn’t hesitate. She summoned tornado after tornado, firing them in rapid succession at the dragon. They smashed against his body, doing no damage. But that wasn’t the point. Her attacks were driving him back, sliding him closer to the water.

She kept up the machine gun pace of tornado bullets. Sweat dripped down her neck and splashed her top, but she didn’t slow. And she didn’t stop. She reached for more magic. Different magic.

The gentle, silky rhythm of the lapping river hummed louder. Waves rippled across the surface, growing higher and higher. And higher. They swooshed and crashed and rocked. As the final tornado blasted against Kai’s chest, pushing his back foot into the river, a solid wall of water smashed into him from behind. The wave rolled over his body. An enraged growl gurgled through the salt water. Then, as the water slid down his body, retreating back into the river, he glared back at Sera.

“Well, you did tell me to use magic,” she said.

She gave him that same slow, relaxed shrug he’d given her earlier. Truth be told, she wasn’t relaxed at all—not with the strain of managing that much magic—but she wasn’t about to tell him that.

The magic was popping across her skin, so she didn’t have to reach far for it this time. She summoned earth, and the wet sand beneath Kai’s feet collapsed. Before he could free himself from the deep pit, she drew the water forward, flooding it. The dragon thrashed and splashed—and flung himself out of the hole. He glared across the shore at Sera. There was no humor in those eyes now.

Wind slammed against her back, tossing her onto the beach. As she fell, a ring of rocky fangs split out of the sand all around her, swallowing her. She stared at the rocks until they froze solid—then crumbled to sandy ash.

While she’d been busy with that rocky prison cell, Kai had stomped over to her. He towered high above, and right now he was definitely trying to look intimidating. She glared right on back, and a small cloud formed over his back, sprinkling tiny snowflakes down on him. He sneezed.

Sera pulled a tissue out of her pocket and offered it to him.

He snorted at the offering, and fire bathed the thin paper, crumbling it to ash. He opened his mouth wide, giving her front row seats to the furnace burning inside of him. The fire was spreading up his throat, pouring into his mouth.

Sera waved her hand over her head, drawing an ice umbrella. It began to melt immediately, but it bought her enough time to make a run for it. As she sprinted away, the umbrella shattered, shooting tiny ice particles all across the shore. Sera scrambled for the grass. She needed to get off this slippery beach.

Something yanked on her foot, tripping her. Her legs hit the gravel, but she managed to throw out her arms just in time to avoid a face full of rocks. She glanced back at her foot and found a tentacle of glowing magical energy wrapped around her ankle. A second arm split from the first, and it began to slide up Sera’s body. It had a familiar masculine, spicy scent. Kai’s scent.

“Let go of my leg,” she growled at the dragon.

A deep laugh rumbled in his chest.