Claiming Carina (2 page)

What is it, Phelan? What did she do to you?
Denver's concerned voice floated through his mind.

She’s ours.
Our Desired.
Touch her and you will see for yourselves.

They both looked
at him in shock before reaching out to touch her for themselves. Phelan watched
as each of his brothers closed their eyes and shuddered as they felt the
connection with their Desired.

We need to get her to the clinic, make sure she's not
injured in any way.

Hart's gentle
voice came back at him.

They gently peeled
her large bag from her shoulders before Denver, who as the eldest had first
right, picked her up. Just as he stood, Drake spoke loudly, "Let's take
this inside and get these females seen to. Then we'll decide what to do about
all of our instincts flaring."

At Drake’s
voice, Phelan looked around and saw each woman had a family of brothers
surrounding them.
Except for one.
She only had one out
of two brothers, but Baxter would be in the clinic waiting for them. Were these
women the answers to all their prayers? Did five families now have their
Desired? He guessed only time would tell. He slung the woman's bag over his
shoulder and followed his brothers, and their Desired, up to the castle.

****

Carina awoke with
a scream lodged in her throat. She sat bolt upright as her hands flew to cover
her face. She focused on getting her breathing under control before lowering
her hands. It was only a nightmare, just like all the others, it wasn't real.

It. Wasn't.
Real.

She lowered her
hands, opened her eyes and froze. Three huge half-naked men stood in front of
her, all frowning at her. She scooted back on the bed until she ran into
something warm, and she spun around to find Skye there.

"
It's
okay, Carina."

Carina just shook
her head. It was not okay. Her memories came rushing back to her, hiking
through the Kata Tjuta, smelling honey, the sudden powerful cyclone-like wind
tunnel, the lightning, then passing out. When Skye attempted to embrace her,
Carina wriggled her way around Skye’s body so she sat behind her. She wanted as
much distance as possible between her and those big men with their muscular
bare chests, honey golden hair, and sparkling emerald eyes.

"Sweetie,
can you drink this? It's just water."

Carina focused
on swallowing and trying to get her heart rate and breathing to calm down. She
emptied the cup and was feeling calmer—until she looked back up and saw all the
big men again. There were six surrounding her and Skye. The three with the
golden hair she'd noticed first, and three others, equally big but with blue
hair and magenta eyes. She tried to move further behind Skye as another large
man came into the mix, carrying Becky. He placed her on the bed and stepped
back, like he didn't want to spook her. She felt Becky's hand on her leg
moments before she began to speak.

"Carina?
Honey, it's okay, these men
are big, but they will never hurt you … especially not like those assholes hurt
you."

Carina looked
her friend over, noticing the bright white bandages on her ankle and wrists.

"But you've
been hurt, Becky."

"Not by
them. They came and rescued me before I was
really
hurt."

Pain sliced
through her heart at the thought of her friend being raped like she was. She
sat frozen in her pain as Becky turned to the man who had carried her over.
"Drake, make them promise. Make the men promise Carina she will not be
harmed or forced to do anything she doesn't want to do."

Carina moved her
focus onto the man Becky had called Drake. He looked her straight in the eye
and vowed, "Carina, I can promise you that no male inside this castle's
walls will ever cause you or any of your friends harm or force you or them to
do anything you or they don't want."

She turned her
head as each of these big men held her gaze and vowed her protection and
safety. The last three men, who must be brothers as they all had the same emerald
green eyes and beautiful honey golden hair that hung around their shoulders,
looked to be in pain as they made their vows. Carina frowned in confusion.

She vaguely
heard Becky ask Drake to get all the men to leave. When they were alone she
loosened her grip on Skye and took some deep breaths.

"Where are
we? What's going on?"

"Well, what
do you remember?" Skye's gentle voice pulled her attention her way.

"I remember
the cyclone thing and being hit by lightning … then nothing."

"They call
that the Great Wind. It brought us through a portal from Earth to The Land of
Feury."

"Who are
they?"

"The men?"
Skye sighed.
"You're not going to believe us, but they have proved it. We've all seen
it with our own eyes."

Carina frowned
at her friend. What on earth was she going on about?

"They're
dragon shifters. They can be either dragons or men."

Carina's head
snapped up to Becky's gaze so fast her head spun. "What did you say?
Shifters?
Seriously?"

Becky nodded.
"Seriously, I've seen a few now. The men's hair color is that of their
scales, and their eye color is that of their underside and wing webbing."

Becky sighed.
"Your men are going to be stunning dragons, with their golden scales and
green fronts."

Skye shuddered.
“Dragons are too much like crocodiles for me.”

Carina winced as
she watched Skye rub her thigh where it was scarred from where she’d been
attacked as a child. Carina wasn’t the only one of her friends with scars.

"Hang on,
what do you mean
my men
? I have no
men—man. Nor do I want one."

With a finger
under her chin, Becky moved her head up from where she’d been staring at her
toes so Carina looked into Becky’s serious stare.

"You need
to know some other things, Carina.
Things that are going to
be very hard for you to hear, to adjust to.
These men?
They share a woman. The brothers of a family take one woman to love. Fate
chooses a woman for them, and they call that woman their
Desired
. Apparently all five of us are
Desireds
.
These men are big, but they would never hurt you. They are very different from
Earth men. When Eilagh and I were kidnapped earlier, the men dropped everything
and came straight to our rescue. They are noble and honorable—none of these men
would ever take you by force. Those stupid dragons that kidnapped us are a
different case.
Stupid dickheads."

"What? You
got kidnapped?" Carina stiffened in anger that her friends had been
treated in such a manner.

"Yeah,
earlier today Eilagh and I got taken by some rogue dragons. These four moronic
dragons flew off a few days before we arrived in search of females. They obviously
got word that we had been found and decided to come back and take a couple of
us for their own. Told us they were going to
breed
with us. Thankfully, our men came in time to rescue us—in my
case, they arrived in the nick of time. Any later and I would have been really
hurt, like you were."

"I'm glad
you didn't get hurt like I did." Carina's voice was small, but she knew
her friends had heard her when they wrapped her in a hug.

"How long
have we been here? And how long have I been out?"

"We arrived
two days ago, and we all woke up this morning. You've only been out about half
a day longer than the rest of us."

As her friends
loosened their embrace, she moved away from them and noticed a metal band
around her upper arm.

"And what
on earth is this metal thing?"

"They're
Truth Bands." Skye's band glowed green. "When we answer a question it
glows green if it's the truth and red if we lie."

"But why?
It seems a little
extreme."

Becky answered,
"My men told me over our meal. It's quite sad really. The Great Wind has
brought visitors here before. They call them
liaths
. They came and created a virus to kill off the dragons so
they could take all their land for themselves. But it backfired, and it only
killed the women and the young. These liaths were nice to start with, but then
they started hiding out in their labs. The dragons believed their lies, that
they came in peace, and paid a heavy price for it."

"So there
are no women or children here?"

"Nope, just us five."

Becky sighed.
"I better get out to my men before they come barreling in here to take me.
They are wonderful, but can be pushy as anything."

Carina grabbed
Becky's arm before she could get up off the bed. "I don't think I can ever
let one man touch me again, let alone three. I just can't. It will trigger
memories. What if I never can?" Carina could hear the fear in her own
voice.

"Just be
yourself, honey, and see where it goes. How I understand this whole Desired
thing, the men will be patient with you, give you whatever you need without
pushing you beyond what you can give. They would rather die than cause you any
pain."

Carina watched
as Becky limped out of the room. At the doorway Carina got a glimpse of a large
man picking her friend up and scolding her for walking on her sore ankle. The
love for Becky was clear on his face. Could Carina push past all her damage to
be able to have that bond with a man, or men? She seriously didn't think it was
possible.

****

Denver numbly
walked out of the room behind the other dragons. His Desired was in pain, and
he didn't know how to fix it. She was obviously scared of men. Becky making
them promise not to hurt her concerned him. Once outside the clinic and out of
the females' earshot, Phelan voiced his thoughts. "What the hell has
happened to Carina? What kind of place have these females come from?"

Drake responded,
"I don't know what's happened to her, but you three are going to have to
take it easy on her or she'll run for sure."

Denver scrubbed
his face in his hands as Calix's strained voice filled the air. "And we'd
be grateful if you could calm and claim her soon. Skye refuses to leave her
side. We want some time with our Desired."

Denver
understood Calix's concern for Skye. He was feeling the same toward Carina. The
fact that Dimitri and Max were bonding with Eilagh in a couple of hours brought
home exactly what stakes they were playing for.

"Trust us,
Calix. We're going to start winning our Desired over as soon as we can. We just
need to work out
how
."

After Denver's
declaration, the men stood silently until the clinic door opened and Becky
emerged. He watched as she came out limping, and Savren scooped her up, while
scolding her for walking on the injury. Denver wasn't really tracking what she
was saying until he heard her tell Savren that she needed to talk to Carina's
men. He, Phelan, and Hart all stepped up close to Becky—as did Drake.

Phelan spoke
before anyone else could. "What happened to Carina? Why would she think
we'd hurt her?"

"Well,
aside from the fact that you're all built as big as mountains, which is enough
to have most women think twice, Carina has some extra issues."

Denver stood
straighter as he felt Becky's stare run over him and his brothers. "All
three of you want her?"

"Yes, we
are brothers, and Carina is our Desired." Denver smiled widely at Phelan's
statement. Soon their family was going to be complete. When Becky huffed he
felt his joy begin to fade.

"I'm not
sure if you guys are going to be able to win her over." She raised her
hand to rub the bridge of her nose. "It's really her story to tell, so I
won't go into details. But know that it took her nearly a year before she told
us, her closest friends, about what happened. Carina was attacked by a group of
men, and they … ah, they hurt her."

Denver couldn't
help the growl that escaped. His Desired had been hurt, and his instincts were
screaming at him to go hunt down those responsible. Becky shot him a look that would
have made a lesser man
cower
. "You can cut that
shit out right now. You'll only scare her."

Fortunately, before
Denver opened his mouth and made it all worse, Hart took over. "Becky, I
understand it's her story, but you need to give us more than that. How many
attacked her? And how did they hurt her?"

"She was on
her way home from university. Five men surrounded her and forced her into an
alley—" Denver's blood ran cold as Becky stopped to release a sob. The
next words out of Becky's mouth ripped his heart in two and caused his very
soul to bleed at what his Desired had suffered. "They … they all took
turns … to hurt her.
Sexually."

Becky broke down
completely, and he watched, detached from his body, as Drake and Savren carried
a sobbing Becky away from them. Denver felt hands on his shoulders. The
familiar weight of his brothers' touch brought him back to his body. He closed
his eyes and inhaled deeply, trying to push past the pain he felt inside.