Bad Boy Romance: Nick (Romantic Suspense Alpha Male Romance) (New Adult Rock Star Contemporary Short Stories) (Hard Rock Star Series Book 2) (44 page)

Arach roared again and took a massive step toward her.
Aurora looked at him, then back at Greyson. Her father's words resonated
through her mind. She opened her mouth, but before words could come out, she
looked down at her hands. One gripped her bouquet so tightly the thorns bit
into her skin and rivulets of blood were trickling down her palm and onto her
wrist.

Pulling her arm away from Greyson, Aurora dropped the flowers,
gathered the flowing skirt of her wedding gown in her hands, and ran up the
aisle toward Arach. As she approached, he lifted one claw and used it to slash
the bloodied dress. She tore it the rest of the way so that the skirt stopped
at mid-thigh and kicked off her shoes.

Aurora vaguely heard her mother screaming for her in the
background, but she didn’t stop. Grabbing onto Arach's wing, she climbed onto
his back and tightened her thighs around him. Arach leapt off of the ground and
Aurora watched his wings stretch as he took to the sky. She held on tightly and
closed her eyes, letting her head fall back so the wind could pull the pins
from her hair and let it tumble around her.

She was free.

****

Aurora felt herself wake up, but didn't open her eyes. She
didn't want to see what was waiting for her. If it was her bedroom ceiling, she
didn't think she could take it.

"Aurora?"

She heard her name and it immediately registered that it was
Arach's voice. A hand touched her face and she opened her eyes. He hovered over
her, gazing down into her face with those intoxicating eyes. She was in a bed,
but it was certainly not hers. Instead of crisp blue cotton sheets and an
eyelet coverlet she rested against black satin.

"Arach," she breathed, the relief so deep she
could feel the tension seep out of her as she spoke his name.

"Are you alright?" he asked, sweeping her hair
away from her face.

"I think so."

She sat up and drew closer to him; wanting to touch him, to
smell him, and to feel him near her. Her hand came to his chest and she toyed
aimlessly with the buttons on the front of his black shirt.

"No," she said after a moment's pause, "I'm
not alright. What's going on? Where am I?"

"You are in my home, in Killington."

"Killington?" she asked softly.

"Yes. It is both the name of this area and my clan. I
take it you have heard that word before?"

He asked the question with a tone that said it didn't
surprise him, but that he didn't want to lead her.

"It was on a file in my father's desk."

"What was in the file?" he asked, still guiding
her to process what was happening.

"Drawings of dragons and a few pages of information
written in code," she paused and another image flashed into her mind,
"And a drawing of a tattoo."

Arach didn't say anything, but brought his hands to the
front of his shirt and unbuttoned it. He let the shirt slide off of his
shoulders and turned his back to her. A leather strap held his hair behind his
head and Aurora moved it out of the way so she could fully see the tattoo on
his back.

Moving behind him, she sat on her knees and ran her hands
along the ink embedded in his skin. The combination of the intricate
representation of his wings and the feeling of his skin beneath her fingertips
made Aurora shiver.

"Your father was Lee Sanborne," he said.

"Yes," Aurora replied.

"Do you know why you dreamed of me, Aurora?"

"No," she answered, flattening both of her hands
on his back and stroking them down so she could feel his rippling muscles.

"You were born for me."

Aurora curled around him so that she could look into his
face.

"What?" she asked.

Arach reached behind him and looped an arm around her. He
lifted her off the bed and brought her around so that she sat in his lap, her
legs straddling his hips. Aurora moaned softly and nestled her pelvis closer to
him.

"You were born for me," he repeated, "Made
for me. Your father has been investigating the existence of my clan since
before you were born as part of a top secret security program for the
government."

"I don't understand."

Arach kissed her softly, drawing her bottom lip into his
mouth briefly.

"Very few people know of our existence. We like to stay
private and are fairly certain the rest of you humans would probably not take
too kindly to knowing there were dragons wandering in your midst. The
government apparently agrees because their secret operative has been trying to
get us under their control for decades. Some, like your father, want to
maintain peace and keep our worlds apart. There are others, however, who don't
share those same sentiments."

"What do you mean?"

"There are members of the operative who have gone
rogue. Their goal is to either eradicate us completely, or enslave and
essentially weaponize us. Your father worked very hard to build his
relationship with the clan, and when you were born my father marked you as my
future mate."

"Your mate?" she asked, "So I'm part of a
breeding program? My father pimped me out to try to make, what, an army of tiny
dragon hybrids?"

She was trying to climb off of his lap, but Arach held her
firmly.

"No. It's not like that," she wriggled again and
Arach pulled her tightly up against his chest so she couldn’t move,
"Listen to me. It's not like that. You were made for me. My father just
recognized that and made the agreement with your father that we would be the
link that would maintain peace between our worlds. Unfortunately, one of the
rogue groups found out about it and threatened a war if you weren't given
instead to their efforts."

"Oh my god, Greyson," Aurora said, realization
dawning on her painfully.

"Yes."

"So you're telling me that I've been a pawn since
birth. My own father essentially sold my ass to Greyson to keep peace that I
promise you would not last anyway. He lied to me and he tried to take away my
future because he got himself in the middle of –what? Dragons and dragon
slayers?"

Her mind was spinning. She was confused, furious, and deeply
saddened all at the same time.

"Yes, but he changed his mind."

"What?"

"Your father. He changed his mind about the
arrangement. My father had a meeting with him just a few weeks before—"

"That's why he was murdered," Aurora said quietly.

Arach nodded, releasing some of the tension on his grip so
he could stroke her cheek.

"The hunters heard of his change of heart before we
could properly protect him."

"Did Greyson…" she trailed off, unable to even ask
the question that burned in her throat.

"Yes," Arach replied carefully.

A botched break-in, the police had called it. Aurora and her
mother had come home to Lee in a pool of his own blood in the living room, the
cards for the speech he was working on spread on the marble floor around him.
Aurora remembered dropping to her knees beside him and dragging her father's
head into her lap. He looked up at her with terror in his eyes, his face
streaked with blood, and took her face in his hand. Greyson, he had whispered.
Aurora had reaffirmed her promise to him then, committing herself unknowingly
to her father's murderer.

"Arach?" a voice from the doorway broke through
the tense moment between them.

"Yes?" Arach said to the young man standing just
outside the doorway.

"They are coming."

Arach nodded and the man ran away. He lifted her off of his
lap and placed her on the bed beside him, immediately starting to button his
shirt again.

"Who's coming?" Aurora asked.

Arach didn't answer, but stood and started toward the door.
Aurora chased after him, following him out of the room and into a cold stone
hallway.

"Aurora, go back in there," he demanded, not
stopping, but glancing briefly over at her.

"Who's coming?" Aurora repeated.

She had to run to keep up with his long strides and the
stone floor felt rough beneath her feet.

"Go back."

Aurora reached out and grabbed onto Arach, yanking him to a
stop and shoving him back against the wall to the hallway. She was nearly a
foot shorter than him, but she looked up at him without intimidation.

"I have had enough of men telling me what to do in the
last few months. Today has truly been the wedding day from hell. At least, I
think it is still today. I honestly have completely lost track. I'm still
standing here in my fucking wedding dress after finding out that the man I very
nearly married murdered my father. So stop telling me to go back and instead
try telling me what the hell is going on."

Arach looked startled and took her carefully by the
shoulders to guide her a few steps back from him.

"My clan took your father's murder as an act of war.
That is why I connected with you when I did. I needed to bring you to me before
the fighting began."

"You connected with me on purpose?"

"Of course. When a dragon has a human mate he has the
ability to connect with her in her dreams so he can spend time with her without
being near other humans."

"So those dreams were real?"

"They were both dreams and real."

Aurora decided it was futile to try to understand any
further.

"Who's coming, Arach?"

"The rogues did not take my removing you from your
wedding well. They have made it known that they take it as a sign of aggression
and are coming to take you back."

Arach started walking again and Aurora chased him.

"Greyson?"

"Yes."

"How did he explain you to the guests?"

Arach led her through a massive wooden door into a room
filled with weapons. He reached up and pulled a heavy-looking sword off of the
wall.

"People only see what they think they should. By
tomorrow it will have all been explained away and only those who already knew
about us will have any idea that they saw dragons."

Suddenly Aurora heard screams from outside. Arach muttered
an obscenity and pushed past her through another door. Without a second
thought, Aurora wrapped her hand around a crossbow and followed him.

****

Outside, a brilliant sunset was dying behind the horizon,
sending tendrils of deep purple across the sky. Aurora looked around and saw
dragons at every side. She heard another scream and took off running in the
direction of the sound. As she ran, the terrain became more familiar. Soon she
found herself in the forest where she had walked in her first dream.

She ran until she came to the edge of the woods and saw a
group of men slashing with knives at a dragon far smaller than Arach. The
dragon made another of the screaming sounds and sent a weak stream of fire
toward the men. Aurora didn't understand why the other dragons hadn't come. She
started running again and as she approached the group she saw Arach rise out of
the water and knock several of the men to the ground with his claw.

To his side a man pulled a long sword from a sheath at his
hip and raised it above his head. She immediately recognized him.

"Greyson!" she called, stopping a few yards away.

Greyson turned sharply and before he could say anything,
Aurora lifted the crossbow and let the arrow fly. The sharp metal tip burrowed
through his throat, tattering the skin as he collapsed to the ground.
Everything went silent around her. The other men fell to the ground one by one,
torn and burned. Within seconds, the battle was over. She dropped the crossbow
to her feet and walked toward Greyson's body.

Blood poured from the wound in his throat and he stared with
blank eyes up at the sky. Sickness rolled through her as she looked at him, not
because of the blood or even because he had died at her hand, but because of
the trust he had so horrifically betrayed.

No longer in dragon form, Arach walked toward her and
gathered her in his arms. She hugged him back, burying her face in his chest.

"Are you real?" she asked into his shirt.

Arach pushed her back gently.

"Yes," he said.

"Was I really made for you?"

"Yes," Arach repeated.

"Prove it to me."

Before she knew what was happening, Arach had shifted and
she was on his back, riding him over the trees back toward the house. The
dragons that had swarmed the area when she first emerged were gone. She was
later learn about their rules of battle and why they had stayed behind while
Arach and the other dragon fought. For now, all she cared about was him.

Arach landed just outside the massive stone house and waited
until she slid from his back to shift back into human form. He took her hand
and led her along another stone hallway back to the bedroom. She noticed that
the walls of the hallway featured swathes of purple velvet, a sign of royalty.

When they reached the bedroom, Arach swept Aurora into his
arms so he cradled her against his chest as he walked toward the bed. He set
her on her feet at the edge of the bed and she felt his hands come to the back of
her gown. The corseting strings released and he peeled the dress away from her
body, letting it fall to the floor at her feet. She wore only white satin
panties beneath and he lowered himself to his knees in front of her so that he
could draw the damp cloth down her thighs and guide them off of her feet.

Taking her hips in his hands, Arach dipped his head forward
and used his tongue to mimic the skilled movements of his hand the first time
she had seen him in human form. The tip focused intensely on the swollen pearl
of flesh at her peak and Aurora tossed her head back to let out a cry of
pleasure. Stopping just short of her completion, Arach climbed back to his feet
and undressed, tossing his clothes aside. Aurora drank in the beauty of his
naked body in front of her. She reached for his erection and wrapped her hand
eagerly around it.