Her Druid Desire (The Amber Druid Series) (27 page)

           
Heck, she didn’t know the half of what they needed to talk about. “First off,
let me apologize for that.” He cleared his throat and leveled his eyes on hers.
“The kiss started out pretty rough, but that was because of what you had said
seconds before.” Making sure he had her attention, he deepened his voice and
held her gaze with his, injecting a slight glamour into his tone. He wanted to
make sure she took what he said to heart. “You are a beautiful woman. And no
matter what any person says, you always have been and always will be. You will
stop downplaying your attributes right now. I don’t want to hear another word
on the matter.”

           
Huge green eyes took him in warily, but she managed to nod in his direction. He
could sense she was reasonably calm, but he knew with the slightest word or
touch that could change.

           
“Now, the other conversation we need to have.”

           
She nodded again.

           
Drake sat quietly for a second, building up his courage. It wasn’t an everyday
occurrence that he ensured the safety of him and his brethren to someone else,
even though he trusted Nadia implicitly, he would never know how she would
react to what he had to tell her. He looked to her again. Her light green eyes
watched him, and he sensed that she was waiting to hear something totally
different from what he was about to say.

           
“Earlier, before we left for the gala, something happened. Do you remember what
I’m talking about?” He asked her carefully.

           
She bit her lower lip then slowly let it roll out. Drake could have melted to
the sofa cushions. “I remember looking into your face, and your eyes…the color
had changed, and they were…they were glowing.” She hesitated as if he was going
to laugh in her face about what she had said.

           
He nodded slowly. “Yes, the color was a deep golden color, almost bright amber.
Am I correct?”

           
At her slow nod, he continued.

           
“Were you scared? Because I remember asking you if you trusted me, and you had
said that if you didn’t, you would be across the room.”

           
She smiled slightly and her fingers curled around the mug in her hands. Drake
felt her heart kick up a notch. “I wasn’t scared.” Those green eyes of hers
landed on his face, searching deeply. “You don’t scare me. You never did.”

           
His breath hitched in his throat.
Keep talking man, tell her what you need
her to know and don’t think about sex right now.
Christ, he was so hot from
that kiss earlier that he still hadn’t cooled down yet. He had never been one
to practice abstinence, but something about Nadia screamed that he should take
his time. And he knew down the road something would happen, he had already
given in to those emotions that she roused in him so easily, so now it was only
a matter of when and where they would eventually get together. And for Drake
the added knowledge that she wasn’t his usual flavor of woman was making him
nuts. He wanted to be patient and caring for her. He wanted her to see a side
of him that he had never shown anyone else. He didn’t question why.

           
“My eyes change colors when I’m at the peak of certain emotional levels, such
as pain, pleasure, or even anger. The bright amber color symbolizes the unique
traits I carry inside of me.”

           
The utter confusion on her face spoke volumes. “What?” She shook her head
slightly and placed the mug on the small table beside her. “I don’t
understand.” Her eyes stayed on him while her brow furrowed deeply.

           
Drake tried again. He had never been good at explaining, especially when people
rarely believed what he said. Usually he had to do more of a show-and-tell
experiment instead.

           
“I have other abilities also.”

           
“Abilities?”
She stayed on the sofa, still relaxed,
but Drake could pick up the tempo of her blood coursing a bit faster through
her veins. “Just what kind of sci-fi kick are you on, Drake?”

           
“Believe me angel, there are no sci-fi kicks going on right now. Everything I’m
saying is the God’s honest truth. If you remember, I asked you earlier to
listen to everything I said with an open mind.”

           
“But when you say things like that, well,” she gulped deeply, “It’s
kinda
hard to believe you. I mean you are saying that your
eyes glow.” She didn’t scoff at him but she came damn close to it. “No one’s
eyes
glow,
Drake. You only hear about that stuff in books or movies.”

           
“But you just admitted that you saw it with your own eyes.” He didn’t want to
point out that obvious fact again, but he did anyway. When he saw the utter
confusion on her face, he felt horrible. “If you want to…and God, please listen
to what I’m saying here because I sure as hell don’t want to scare you, I can
show you very easily just what I can do.” He let his eyes rest on hers, testing
her courage and feeling the excitement that battled with just a touch of fear
inside of her. “But if I do please remember that I’m still Drake. I’m still the
same man you have always known, okay?”

           
With a determined, but still confused look on her face, she nodded then said,
“Okay, and of course I know who you are. Why would I believe otherwise?”

           
Drake didn’t say anything, but deep in his mind he prayed that she wouldn’t
bolt when she saw what he could do. With a deep breath, he gave her one last
look. “Please just keep trusting me.” He told her, his eyes serious on hers,
then he closed them and the
change begin
. With just a
slight burning sensation in eyes, Drake was finished. He kept the fangs on a
short leash. That was one thing that he sensed would send her over the edge.
Taking a deep breath, he opened his eyes.

           
She gasped, clenching the edge of the sofa with her fingers, her knuckles
showing white. Drake instantly began to send out feelers, automatically taking
in whether there was any show of real fear, because if there was, he would
immediately halt whatever he was doing. He never wanted to scare her.

           
What he felt was confusion and a deep seated curiosity; there was no fear at
all apparent to him. He figured the clenching up of muscles was just because of
her nervousness.

           
“How is it possible?” Her green eyes were glued to his and he could see that
she would need answers, but she would also need to
see
whatever he could
show her too. He prayed for her acceptance to continue, especially with
everything else that he needed to tell her.

           
“There are things about me that you don’t know yet, many other things besides
just my eyes that change.” Drake took a deep breath. “But as for my eyes, we
believe it is simply a way to show that my Druid side is awake and open for
full change.”

           
That got her attention. “We, there are others? And what do you mean when you
say your Druid side is awake and open for full change?” She sat on the edge of
the sofa while her hands continued to curl around the armrest. Drake didn’t
sense that she wanted to bolt yet. It was only a bad case of inquisitiveness
that had her looking so earnest.

           
“Yes, there are others, and like I said there are many other things about me
that change at certain moments, sometimes when I most need those special
abilities.”

           
“So when your eyes change, does it cause you to have some special seeing
ability?”

           
“Not only when my eyes change, but at every moment of
everyday I have enormous seeing abilities, and I can see in the dark, very
clearly.”

           
She pursed her lips, and Drake could see that she was starting to move her
fingers together nervously. He tested her emotions, and he could sense the
heightened interest moving around inside of her. She not only wanted answers to
her questions, but Drake would bet money that she wanted to touch him, to see
if he felt any different to her. He fought down the urge to give her a full
access free for all.

           
“Amazing…what else happens?”

           
“I can send out spells.” He threw that out there not really knowing what her
reaction would be. “I can also move faster than you can blink, read your
emotions, heal pain, and live an extremely long, long time.”

           
Her eyes got bigger, if that was possible. Now she seemed totally in awe. “I
want to see something. Show me how it works.” She sounded tremendously
inquiring, as if she couldn’t stop herself from asking.

           
Before she had closed her mouth, Drake was standing before her. The breeze from
his fast movement just then lifted a few strands of her hair where it lay on
her shoulders. Now the look in her eyes was priceless.
“Oh my
God…..” she said wonderingly, still too hesitant to touch him.
In a half
second, he was back on his chair facing her.

           
“Do you want to know more?” he questioned her and watched the wonder build in
her features.

           
“There’s more? My God, how is that possible?”

           
“Oh, it is quite possible, believe me.”

           
“I do have a question.” She asked him before he started up again. “When you
said you live a really long time, just what do you mean?”

           
Drake exhaled. This was a biggie, considering everything else was so easy to
take. “I was born on August 28
^th
of 1784, in a very small town right
outside of San Antonio.”

           
“1784?? That makes you over 220 years old.” Now some wavering showed in her
face. “It isn’t possible.”

           
“It’s very possible. I have a family bible that proves it. I also have my
parent’s marriage license and two of my own, if you want to inspect those.” Drake
watched her eyes grow huge again.

           
“Two marriage licenses?
You were married twice?”

           
“When you have been alive as long as I have, time seems to move extremely slow,
Nadia.” He answered honestly. That was the only hated concession, in his mind,
of being an Amber Druid, the slow time progression.

           
“But then how do you stay in one place?” And in the next breath, “No wonder I
could never guess your age. I was stuck between thirty-five and thirty-eight,
because you always had been so hard to pin down.”

           
“I move around every twenty years or so. People are easy to manipulate. If I
need to, I can do something we call a mind scrub; it is like eliminating me
from your memory.”

           
“You can get in someone’s mind?”

           
Drake grimaced. “No…not really, but there are certain spells that can remove my
memory from your mind, or other spells that I can put to use that will make you
see me in any way that I want you to, so it’s not really ‘getting in your
mind,’ more like making you think what I want you to think.”

           
“Oh,” she still sounded like she had a ton of questions.

           
“Want me to explain something else?”

           
“What about healing pains, and when you said “strong,” just how strong are
you?”

           
“I can heal minor pain and make emotions such as depression, sorrow and
sadness, calmer for the person experiencing them. I can’t stop blood flow.
Kale, another Amber Druid, is the only one I know of that can do that. I’m very
strong. If I’m under full change mode there isn’t much that I can’t lift, and
even as I am right now it still isn’t a problem for me to lift two times my
weight.”

           
“So when you go into full change mode, and when you experience certain things
like pain and anger, you change also, automatically?”

           
Drake nodded. “Even when I’m aroused…things happen.” His eyes pinned her to the
sofa with an intensity that probably startled her.

           
“That’s why your eyes were glowing…what else happens? I assume that isn’t it?”
She sounded breathless.

           
Drake shook his head negatively. “My senses heighten. I can practically taste
emotions from people that are around me, not to mention feel what they feel,
albeit stronger. There are a few physical changes, but the strongest are my
eyes and my teeth.” He took a deep breath after he said that, waiting for her
fear and for her to storm out of the room and maybe leave him when she found
out about his fangs.

           
“Teeth?
Your teeth change too?” Yeah, there was that
confusion, the wondering. She didn’t understand. Drake remembered the past and
the other women that had known about him then. No…Nadia isn’t like them. “Can
you show me?” Her whispered words slid under his skin. Even without prompting
from him, his fangs elongated from the sound of her voice. The Druid inside of
him rallied to the fore, breathing fires along his spine, wanting to break out
of his bonds and show Nadia the real him.

           
Running his tongue along one edge of a strong fang, Drake gathered his courage.
“Just remember who I am angel, okay?” He knew his words were a bit slurred
because of the fangs, but the look on her face egged him on. She really wanted
to see. His little Nadia was curious about him, and so far she had taken
everything else like a pro.