How to Date a Dragon (20 page)

Phil led the procession to the back door, and Bliss moved carefully so she could see what was happening but still duck behind the bar if she needed to. As soon as Phil opened the door, he stepped into the alley and looked both ways. “She’s safe,” he said, and walked back into the bar.

The two men holding Ruxandra swung her back and forth, chanting, “And a one, and a two, and a threee…” On three they launched her into the air and slammed the door behind her.

“Oh. My. God.” Bliss jogged to the bar. “Malcolm, aren’t you going to call the cops?”

Anthony rushed out of his office. “Do
not
call the police.”

Malcolm held up one hand. “I know the drill. You’ll handle it.”

The sound of pounding on the back door ensued, accompanied by more of Ruxandra’s high-pitched shouting. The guys held the emergency exit bar shut against a number of heavy pulls. At one point, Bliss heard a loud crack and was afraid the door had come off its hinges.

Anthony groaned and stared at the door. The two guys gave him sympathetic smiles, nodded to each other, then opened the door and rushed out. More of Ruxandra’s threats could be heard, but they were aimed at the guys. Thankfully, a few moments later the volume began to fade. It sounded as if the three of them were moving farther away.

Anthony returned to his office and slammed the door shut. Bliss could see him through the hole, pacing.

“Bliss, dear?” Sadie waved her over.

She approached the psychic half expecting a “See? I told you so,” but instead the older woman just smiled at her and said, “I think I’ll have that White Russian now.”

***

The fire station was experiencing a welcomed lull. The guys seemed relaxed. Kelly and Benjamin were watching TV. Bruno was on the computer. Drake pretended to read. He couldn’t concentrate on anything except what Zina might be up to next.

He had to call Bliss to make sure she was all right. Her shift was almost over, and he’d vowed to wait until it was. He checked his phone for the umpteenth time and
finally
it showed the time as eleven o’clock. He hit the speed-dial number for Bliss. Number three. He refused to make her number two, and the station had to be number one.

Several rings later, she picked up and he breathed a sigh of relief.

“Did I interrupt your cleanup duties?”

“Not really. We don’t actually do a lot after closing. I understand there’s a cleaning crew that comes in around midnight.”

Ah, yes… the “cleaning crew” consisting of two house brownies.
“Nice gig. So, where are you now?”

“Just on my way out the door.”

“Is anyone with you?” He may have asked too quickly, but he had to know she was taking his appeal for an escort seriously.

After a brief hesitation she said, “Yeah. Anthony’s right here. Do you want to talk to him?”

He let out a deep breath and said, “No. I’m just glad you have a bodyguard.”

She was quiet again for a few moments.

“Bliss?”

“I’m here. Drake, are we going to have to do this much longer?”

“It depends on Zina.”

“Any sightings?”

“No, and that makes me nervous.”

He heard her thanking Anthony and assumed she must be inside her apartment. A moment after he heard the door click, Bliss began whispering frantically.

“Oh my God, you wouldn’t believe the insane night I’ve had.”

“Why? What happened?”
Shit, and here I thought I might be able to relax for five minutes.

“Anthony’s old girlfriend showed up.”

“Ruxandra?”

“Yeah. That’s what Sadie called her—although she didn’t actually talk to her. Well, Angie was in the office with Anthony, and this blond bombshell went off like a, well, a bomb!”

Drake dropped his head in his hand. “Oh, crap. I’ve heard about her legendary jealous fits, although I’ve never seen one. Please tell me Angie’s all right.”

“She took off but never came back. Hang on… let me check her room.”

Drake waited an anxious moment.

“Nope. She’s not here.”

Crap.
“Did Ruxandra go after her?”

“If so, Angie got a good head start.”

That didn’t help ease Drake’s worry for the young bartender. Ruxandra was a vampire. She could smell her and outrun her.

“Wait. I just got a text.”

“Is it from her?” Drake mentally crossed his fingers.

“Yeah. She says she’s staying with a friend tonight. Not to worry. She’s safe.”

“Whew. I’m glad to hear that.”

Bliss put on her sexy voice and said, “That means I’m all alone tonight. Care to come over and get my cat out of a tree?”

He lowered his voice. “I’d love to, but I don’t dare leave the guys, just in case.”

“Well, maybe I’ll use my newfound privacy to take a long bubble bath or something.”

“Mmm… I’ll picture that as I’m falling asleep. Maybe I can join you in an erotic dream or two.”

She sighed. “I guess that will have to do.”

***

Zina couldn’t believe her lucky break. The back door to the bar was almost off its hinges. One good tug and she’d be inside.

She grabbed the metal handle and yanked. Surprised, she stumbled back a few inches when the whole door came off in her hand. Stifling a maniacal laugh, she glanced around the alley to make sure no one had heard the noise—no need to add more suspicion if she laughed out loud.

Fortunately, no one appeared out of the shadows, and no lights came on upstairs.
Almost
too
easy.
She set the door aside and strolled into the bar.
No
need
to
rush. Why not savor the moment?

She flipped up the hinged section of the bar top and perused the various bottles of liquor. There was a nice selection of top-shelf spirits, as one would expect in a bar on classy Beacon Hill.

One
scotch
on
the
rocks, please. On second thought, hold the ice. I’m going to need a nice hot mouth soon.
She grinned and poured herself a tumbler of scotch, then poured the rest of the bottle over the bar.
What
fun!

She took a swig of her scotch, letting the liquid burn her throat—in a good way. She shook her head hard and chuckled her approval.
Nice
stuff, but that empty bottle looks lonely.

Zina set bottle after bottle on the bar, opening each one. She threw the caps and corks on the floor. No need to be neat when the whole place was going to be ash in a few minutes. When she’d finished her scotch, she was giddy. She staggered out to the main floor and grabbed two bottles at a time—one in each hand.

Wobbling from one table to another, she drank and poured, drank and poured. Soon the entire contents of the now-empty top shelf coated every surface. And just for good measure, she splashed quite a bit on the walls, too.

“Time for my grand exit,” she muttered.

Standing in the corridor that led to the back door, she removed her shoes and stayed on the only dry spot. Zina quickly stripped off her clothing and shifted into her dragon form. Gripping her clothes in her talons, not wanting to leave a single clue behind, she took a giant step backward toward the door—or more accurately, the hole in the building that used to be the door.

She inhaled deeply and leaned forward as she blew out a column of fire about twenty feet long. The room erupted in flames. She waited just long enough to be sure the sprinklers in the ceiling were as woefully inadequate as she’d expected.

With a giggle of glee, she took off into the night and waited atop one of the buildings high on the hill so she could watch the place go up in flames. She’d have to use her imagination to picture Drake as he tried in vain to save her nemesis, but the mental image was worth a thousand laughs.

Bliss awoke to the smoke alarm blaring and immediately kicked into high gear. She couldn’t believe this was happening again! She didn’t bother getting dressed—just grabbed her precious laptop and a robe, then fled to the apartment door.

“Wait. The CD,” she said out loud. She had just received the backup design disk from the bank and it was in her room. “Screw it.”

As she was about to open the door, she felt heat on the other side and ran to the window where the fire escape was.
Was
being the operative word. The damn thing was leaning away from the building on bolts that looked rusted through.
Crap! When did that happen?
Now there was no other way out.
Damn
old
buildings.

She heard pounding on her door. Maybe Drake was here to save her again. She rushed over and threw it open. To her surprise, Adolf Balog stood there.

“Where’s the other one?” he asked.

“Angie’s at a friend’s house.”
Lucky
Angie.

“Hurry. Upstairs,” he said.

One glance and she understood why. Fire was licking up the wooden steps from below. “Won’t we get trapped up there?”

“No. There’s a secret passageway to the next building under the roof.”

“Let’s go,” she shouted and hurried up the staircase behind him.

Mr. and Mrs. Balog were already prying open the door to the attic. Why they didn’t have a key she had no idea, but at least they knew a way out existed.

“Pop the hinges, Father,” Adolf said.

“I’ve almost got it.” Mr. Balog grunted, and with one more herculean effort, the lock broke, allowing everyone entrance to the attic. The men stood back and allowed Mrs. Balog to climb the narrow wooden staircase first. Then with a grand, sweeping gesture Adolf indicated Bliss was next.
What
a
time
to
be
chivalrous!
But it was heartwarming to realize heroes came in all shapes and sizes.

What she had to climb wasn’t a ladder, but Bliss had to turn her size nine feet sideways to avoid falling off the tiny steps.
People
must
have
had
much
smaller
feet
back
in
the
seventeen-hundreds.

At last all four of them were under the rafters on their hands and knees. Mrs. Balog said something in a language Bliss didn’t understand, but she figured it meant something like, “Follow me” or “This way.”

Bliss cradled her precious laptop against her chest, which gave her only one hand to hop across the dusty floor.

“Leave the computer,” Adolf said from behind her.

“Not on your life,” Bliss said, and then she realized how appalling that sounded under the circumstances. “Um… I mean, I can’t.”

“Fine. Hurry.”

Why hadn’t the fire department arrived yet? Bliss wondered. Yes, it was the middle of the friggin’ night, but didn’t they have their clothes and boots next to their beds all ready to jump into?

Bliss noticed what looked like a couple of doll beds and some doll clothes.
Did
kids
really
play
up
here?
Because of the momentary distraction, she almost rammed Mrs. Balog in the ass. Finally they had arrived at the end of the loft.

The older woman found the door to the next building, turned a wooden latch and gave it a shove. Surprisingly, that was the only security to keep the next-door neighbors from crawling over the Balogs’ heads.
I
guess
back
in
the
day
people
trusted
each
other.
Then Bliss remembered the locked attic door.
Or
not.

“We should go two or three buildings over,” Bliss said, even though her wrist was beginning to hurt from hopping on one hand. “My boyfriend is a firefighter and said sometimes if they can’t get to the fire fast enough, the next building will go up too.”

Mr. Balog rattled off some words in another language and Mrs. Balog nodded. A moment later, they were crawling again.

Why
me, Lord? Do you really want me to drop out of this competition or something?
At last Bliss heard the faint wail of sirens.
Thank
God. Drake, what took you so long?

Their little parade paused at the next door just long enough to turn the latch and crawl through. Mrs. Balog located the stairs and led the four of them down to someone else’s attic. Then she pounded on the door with both fists.

Shit.
It hadn’t occurred to Bliss that they could be trapped in a wall if no one let them out. The Balogs weren’t calling out to anyone, so it was up to her.

“Hey! People! Let us out before we become crispy critters!”

***

A lump lodged in Drake’s throat when he heard the address of the job they were responding to. It was midnight, and the place was fully engulfed by the time they got there. He suspected a certain dragon lady had been planning this all along. If he could get his hands around her throat, he might forget she was a female.

The windows had burst from the intense inferno inside, and rather than wait for his fellow firefighters to bash down the front door, he grabbed a hose and leaped through the opening. He was glad he was the first one in there; otherwise the humans would have met with a shocking surprise.

Two little men, no more than a foot tall, stood on the bar spraying soda water at whatever they could reach. Their droopy felt hats and suits would have caught fire except that they seemed to have sprayed themselves first. The miniature firefighters glanced up at Drake, dropped the soda sprayer, and looked as if they were prepared to run away—right into the blaze.

“Wait,” Drake shouted. “Let me help you.”

He reached them in a couple of long strides and opened his jacket. “In here.” He grabbed his suspenders and stretched them out enough to make a pocket in his pants to accommodate the little guys. They glanced at each other with their alien-like, totally black, almond-shaped eyes, then leaped off the bar and into the safety Drake was offering them.

“You’re not afraid of us?” one of them asked in a Munchkin-like voice.

“Afraid of a couple of house brownies? Nope. Are you afraid of dragons?”

“Yes,” both of them answered simultaneously.

It figured.
I
hope
I
don’t shift.
“Just stay out of sight.” Drake zipped up his jacket, hiding the little fellows who were clinging to his suspenders. His fellow firefighters had finally managed to break down the front door. When Benjamin rushed inside, Drake handed him the hose and said, “I have to find Bliss.”

Benjamin had to shout to be heard over the crackling blaze and the powerful spray of the hose. “Is she here? Now?”

“She lives upstairs,” he yelled.

“Always in heat for your hottie, aren’t you?”

Drake ignored the obvious dig and quickly disappeared into the back.

If she made it out, she must have used the fire escape. He hadn’t seen any residents standing on the street out front. He prayed that he’d see her far down the alley, safely out of the way.

Drake was surprised that the back door was missing. That must have been how Zina got in. He rushed out into the night and frantically cast a glance all around, hoping to see Bliss somewhere. The fire escape hadn’t been lowered. In fact, it looked like it was about to fall off the brick facade. Meanwhile, the roof of the bar caved in.

Crap. He unzipped his jacket and said, “Out you go, boys. You’re safe now.”

The brownies hopped out of his pants and landed on the pavement. They paused just long enough to thank him and waved as they ran away.

He heard one of them mutter, “Boys. Hmmph.”

True, they had white hair and beards, and goodness knows how old they could have been. They might even be immortal like he was… rather, like he used to be.

Drake backed away, hoping only smoke had reached the upper floors. Smoke was deadly too, but he had on lifesaving equipment. If the floors could support him… Horrified, he watched as fire roared and smoke billowed out of every window.

He was needed back inside, but there was no way he could survive without shifting into his dragon form. Fucking Zina. She wanted this to happen. He threw his jacket on the ground and was about to drop his pants in order to shift so he could fly up to Bliss’s apartment on his dragon wings.

A window in the building next door opened and a couple of frightened men stepped out onto the fire escape. It’s a good thing Drake was there. They had no idea how to use it and simply froze. Drake directed them down and stayed to help the other five people from the third and fourth floors. Damn it.

Hoping Bliss had gone somewhere safer, Drake pointed at the charred shell behind him and asked, “Did anyone from this building come over to yours?”

The residents glanced at each other and shook their heads. One of the men who came down first said, “We opened the front windows to see what was happening, and the fire chief said to go out the back, using the fire escape. They were about to hose down our building too.”

“Do you think our building will burn?” one of the women asked, trembling.

“Probably not. They do that as precaution.” Although with the heat of this particular blaze, Drake figured anything wooden and dry might catch. That’s why the chief had sent them to the fire escape, not the stairs.

But where was Bliss? And what about the Balogs? He knew Angie was out for the night, but that left at least one family who may or may not have been paranormals and his very mortal girlfriend.

The nearest side street was only two buildings down, so he directed the residents to get to the chief out front and report that they were all accounted for.

“Go.”

When they didn’t move faster than a stroll, his frustration got the better of him and he yelled, “Run!”

A couple people glanced over their shoulders briefly, then they all took off at a flat run.

Finally, I can get up there and look for Bliss.
Drake made sure all the people he had helped were safely out of sight before he shed his clothes. Then he shifted until he could spread his dragon wings and flew up to the second-floor windows.

***

At last Bliss heard voices on the other side of the attic door. A key rattled; the door opened; and four dusty, exhausted people tumbled into the room of a very surprised couple.

“What the heck…” the man began to say.

His wife or girlfriend asked, “Did you escape the fire through the attic?”

“Yeah,” Bliss said. “Thanks for letting us out.” She set her computer on the bedside table and rubbed her sore wrist.

Mr. Balog bowed formally. “We apologize for entering your home like this. I am afraid it couldn’t be avoided.”

Gee, ya think?
Bliss almost laughed out loud. It sounded as if the Balogs had been invited to tea, not escaping a harrowing death.

Suddenly Bliss realized that perhaps this wasn’t the first time the Balogs had escaped something nasty. She could picture them hiding and running from communists or something. The strange language sounded Slavic.
Honestly, the stupid things that run through my mind sometimes. I should be thanking them for saving my life.

Bliss embraced Mrs. Balog. The woman stiffened, but when Bliss murmured, “Thank you,” she relaxed and patted Bliss’s back.

In English she answered, “You are welcome.”

***

Drake soared through the window that led to Bliss’s bedroom and hovered over the parts of the floor that were still intact. She was nowhere to be seen. He could see his buddies below still battling the blaze. He had to go up in case Bliss and the Balogs were waiting for rescue on the third floor.

He sought a place out of sight of the firefighters if they were to look up. In the back bedroom, which would have been Angie’s, he scanned the area for some place to break through to the next floor. Grasping a heavy lamp in his talons, he smashed it against a spot in the ceiling that looked weak. Plaster rained down on him, which he didn’t care about. However, additional pieces fell below and his firefighter buddies jumped out of the way.

Shit.
Seconds later, he heard the window above burst.
A
way
in!
He flew out the second-floor window and up to the third floor. Fire blasted out that window, so he sucked in a deep lungful of air and flew through it.

His eyes watered, but he could still see. He flew from room to room and found no one.
Thank
God.
Maybe they’d made it out safely after all. He took one last look and spotted the attic door open.
Oh, crap. Could they be hiding up there?

He flew up to the rafters and looked left, then right. No one was there. Suddenly another awful possibility occurred to him.
What
if
Zina
took
her?

Dejected, Drake scanned the area for onlookers and found it was safe to descend to the ground and shift. As soon as he was dressed again, he took off for the side street at a flat run. He couldn’t lose hope yet. Maybe she was standing out front.

As he rounded the corner, he saw residents all along the block leaning out of their windows, trying to see what was going on.

“Drake!” someone yelled.

He slowed down, scanned the building up to the top floor, and saw Bliss leaning out the fourth-floor window. She appeared a little ragged but unharmed. To him she had never looked more beautiful.

“Are you all right?”

“Yes,” she called down. “Thanks to the Balogs.”

“Are they there with you?”

Adolf appeared in the window. “We are all here. All safe.”

“Thank God.”

Bliss held up something rectangular. “I even managed to save my computer this time!”