The P.J. Stone Gates Trilogy (#1-3) (42 page)

“But what if I am dragon enough to love Bryn forever?” I hadn’t thought about that before. What if Bryn wasn’t dragon enough to love me forever? And what if I am? Was I doomed to love Bryn for the rest of my life and to maybe have him move on to love someone else? Maybe more than one someone else?

“I’ve explained this before,” Khol massaged my back slowly, which felt much more sensual than relaxing, but maybe that’s what he was going for. “It’s different for female dragons, that part of you isn’t triggered until you’ve mated.”

“But I
was
mated!” I exclaimed.

“To both myself
and
Bryn. Even if some part of your prior matings linger . . . it still . . .” His voice trailed off as he pulled away far enough to look into my eyes again from mere inches away. I gulped nervously at the intensity in his green depths. “It still means
I
have a chance with you too. And I’m not going to miss any opportunity I might be presented by Bryn’s stupidity.” He brought his lips back down to mine and kissed away any retort I may have had at the time. I moaned into his mouth as he pressed himself down into me on the bed. I felt him tugging at the towel that offered me little protection from his roving hands. I had absolutely no idea what to do. Thoughts of doubt about Bryn kept circling in my head, and yet they looped back around to the fact that I couldn’t give myself to Khol for fear of losing Bryn forever . . . But what if I already had?

A sharp intake of breath acted as a small dose of sanity for me and I pushed Khol away—only to meet the dark blue eyes of none other than Bryn. It was as if my thoughts alone had conjured him up to witness my betrayal of him.
You can’t betray someone if they left you at the curb like yesterday’s trash,
my mind offered in my defense. A split second before Bryn’s face clouded over into an unreadable mask, I saw the hurt that my actions had placed in his eyes. “Bryn!” I gasped. Khol stood and walked out of the room without another word, but I didn’t miss the smug look on his face, and I’m sure Bryn didn’t either.

Bryn’s cool assessing gaze met mine, and my face heated with shame as he spoke. “I see that it’s not going to take you long before you’re mated with him then. Good.”

He might as well have slapped me. “
Good?
You can’t mean that!” I struggled to breathe. “
He
kissed
me
, I want you—I love you! You know that! Bryn please!” I began to feel lightheaded from lack of oxygen, if only I could manage a couple normal deep breaths.

“We’re not going to have this discussion. I want you to move on, just like I’m going to . . . with Nala.”

I opened and closed my mouth, unable to find my voice, the shock of what he was saying almost too much for me to handle. “Bryn, no,” I rasped when I finally found my voice. “Don’t do this. I’ve known you since we were both five years old. I know you think by pushing my buttons, by using Nala, I’ll get angry and mate with Khol . . . Just please . . . stop.”

“So maybe I don’t have any real feelings for her, and maybe what I said to you before was true.” When he finally met my eyes again, there were so many dark emotions swimming in his sea storm eyes that I couldn’t see the old Bryn—
my
Bryn—in them at all. “But I want you to mate with him, and if giving myself to Nala is the only way I can make that happen”—he bared his teeth at me in a mock smile—“then I’ll do it. Make no mistake about that.”

“Bryn.” His name rolled over my tongue and out of my mouth in a hushed whisper, carrying with it a silent plea that I could somehow make him see what a huge mistake he was making.

“I was born to be your Guardian, and I swore to myself once that I would do whatever it took to protect you, even if it meant protecting you from myself.” He turned and took a step towards the door. “I’m just not strong enough—not powerful enough—not good enough to be with you. I just wish I had accepted that from day one. It would have saved us both a lot of pain.” Khol chose that moment to return and he stepped into my room, pausing near Bryn. The two of them shared a very male look before Bryn left without so much as another word to me. I stared after him, hating Khol freshly in that moment.

“We must make plans for your journey,” he said coolly, in an all business tone. He was a very wise dragon to not push me any more in that moment. He knew I’d talk to him about the task I was assigned by the missing dragon Queen from my vision, but little else.

“And where exactly am I going?” I grated.

“She will let us know where, when it’s time.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” I asked with a sinking feeling in my stomach.

“It means we have a lot to talk about,” Khol said as he closed my bedroom door behind him.

“Knock, knock,” Jenna said as she walked right into my room and flopped onto my bed.

“You know saying
knock, knock
and then walking right into someone’s room is not the same thing as
actually
knocking and waiting for a reply.” I feigned annoyance at her, even though the truth was I missed her . . . a lot. It felt like we hadn’t had any real girl time in a long while and I had a feeling that wasn’t going to change anytime soon.

“Your door was open,” she retorted.

“No,” I said as I stuffed the last of my clean laundry into my dresser, “It just wasn’t locked.”

“Same thing.”

“Not really,” I grumbled.

“So . . . you and Bryn are really over, huh?” I froze with my back to her, my heart tripling in time.

“Why, what do you know?” Had Bryn already mated with Nala? Wouldn’t I somehow just
know
? It couldn’t all be over like that . . . could it?

“Well, he did move out of your room, didn’t he? And I’ve seen him skulking around all moody and broody. So—yeah—I connected the dots. You’re not the only one that’s known him forever.”

My knees buckled with relief, and I slid to the ground. He hadn’t mated with Nala, at least not yet. “Oh thank God,” I gasped on a sharp intake of breath. Until he did, I still had a chance, and I wouldn’t believe otherwise. I scooted around so I could face Jenna, my back resting against my dresser. “Have you seen him hanging around with any female dragons . . . like Nala maybe?” I couldn’t seem to control my morbid curiosity.

Jenna’s laugh came out sounding like a sharp bark, and she eyed me with amusement from under her black fringe of bangs. “No, he’s been avoiding all female dragons like the plague. Especially Nala. Is that what he told you? That he was going to mate with someone else?”

I averted my eyes sheepishly. “Yeah, that’s exactly what he told me. Right after he told me that he
wanted
me to mate with Khol.”

Jenna groaned and slapped her hand against her forehead. “Men, I swear. If they weren’t so useful in the bedroom, I don’t think we would keep them around at all.”

I couldn’t help the smile that cracked my face. “Yeah, I guess.” In an effort to think about something else—anything else—I was about to do the unthinkable: I was actually about to ask Jenna about her sex life. “How are you and Macon doing?” And that was all it took to send Jenna off on a male bashing tirade. She went on and on for no less than fifteen minutes . . . For most of it I tuned her out until the end, when something caught my attention.

“And you know male dragons aren’t any different than any other males out there. They get all weird and possessive, and they freak out if you even talk to a friend that happens to be a guy.” She sighed loudly. “I just don’t know what to do.”

I felt my lips turn up in a wry smile. “Yeah, uh-huh . . . so who is he?” Jenna batted her dark eyelashes over her large brown eyes that appeared to be limpid pools of innocence. I knew better. “Don’t give me that face. Just spill it.”

She rolled onto her back and heaved another loud sigh. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Reeeally? Are you actually going to try and pull that crap with me? I may not be a Speaker, but I know
you
.”

Jenna rolled over again onto her stomach so that she was facing me and perched her face on her hands. “I like Macon and all, maybe even more than
like
him, but we can never really be together. He’s a dragon and well . . . I’m not. He can’t mate with me.”

“So? It’s not like you can mate with anyone else either—you’re human,” I said as I rolled my eyes at her. This whole dragon mating thing may have seemed like an awesome thing in the beginning but now . . . not so much.

“So? Let me explain this to you P.J.—
he can
. He can mate with someone. How do you think I would feel if he felt the pull of some female dragon’s powers and because he can’t mate with me went off and hooked up with her? That could happen, and no one can tell me otherwise.”

“Yeah, okay, point taken. So this other guy isn’t a dragon . . .” My mind started shuffling through the very few possibilities that could fit that bill at the moment. And then it hit me.
Holy Crap!
“Jeremy. It’s Jeremy, isn’t it?” Wow. I most definitely did not see that one coming.

“No!” Jenna snapped back much too quickly. She began studying my bedspread very intently. “And even if it was . . . I can’t let Macon know until I’ve broken things off with him . . . He would kill . . . whoever.”

Whoever my ass!
I internally huffed. Jenna was always getting so indignant when I didn’t spill all my inner most secrets to her, and yet she wouldn’t even come out and tell me that some kind of secret relationship was blooming between her and Jeremy. “Fine, whatever. But I don’t wanna hear another word . . . ever . . . about me keeping things from you.” I stood and stalked over to my closet. I felt a small pang in my chest when I looked at the empty left side where Bryn’s clothes used to hang. Why had I come over here again?

“Don’t be mad. I can’t help it,” Jenna groused.

My attention was suddenly diverted to a delicious mouthwatering aroma that was currently wafting through the air. “What is that smell?” I lifted my head and sniffed, following the scent like one of those cartoon characters led by their noses. It didn’t take me long to find the source of the delectable aroma—it was coming from a plate that Jeremy was carrying past my room with a steak and some other sides on it. I snatched the plate from him and attacked it like a wild animal. I noted his surprised face in the back of my mind as I gobbled down the entire meal, with my bare hands, in less than five minutes. When I was all finished, as I licked at my bloodied fingers, I looked up to see Jenna and Jeremy both staring at me with worry on their faces.

It was Jeremy that spoke first. “Does Bryn know?”

“Know what?” I asked as my stomach clenched unpleasantly. I rubbed my belly and frowned as a sudden wave of nausea hit me. “Oh my God, I think I’m going to be sick again.” I scrabbled to make it to the bathroom, and luckily made it just in time to throw up the entire meal I had just eaten into the sink. I was going for the toilet . . . but oh well . . . at least it wasn’t on the floor.

Both Jenna and Jeremy crowded into the bathroom seconds behind me and Jenna gathered up my hair, but it seemed like my feelings of nausea had passed just as quickly as they had hit. I rinsed my mouth out with some mouthwash and turned to face my friends with embarrassment. I really hated getting sick in front of people. “Sorry guys. I think I must be coming down with something, or maybe it’s left over ickiness from the coma.”

Jeremy studied my face for a minute with furrowed brows. He finally seemed to come to some conclusion and shock washed across his face. “You don’t know, do you?”

“Know what?” Both Jenna and I asked at the same time.

“That you’re . . .” He paused to look around and pushed the bathroom door shut behind us, which clicked closed ominously. “That you’re pregnant,” he whispered.

“I’m not pregnant!” I squeaked as I felt all of the color drain from my face.

“Of course you’re not,” Jenna said reassuringly, while she shot Jeremy a nasty glare. “Why would you upset her by saying something like that?”

“Because it’s true,” Jeremy said as he eyed us both warily like we might attack him at any moment.

“And you would know that becau—?” Jenna clamped her mouth shut mid sentence and turned to deliver me a stricken look.

“What?” I squeaked, a feeling of complete and utter dread settling over me.

“Jenna just remembered how I could know. I even knew when you were a virgin, P.J., remember? Just from reading your energies.” His eyes darted around the room and he cleared his throat. “That’s how I know you’re pregnant.”

“No, that’s not possible . . .” My voice trailed off as something very pertinent occurred to me. In all of the madness that had happened before with Khol claiming me, me trying to take my own life, me mating with Bryn . . . I might have missed a few of my birth control pills. And then something else occurred to me. “What if it’s not Bryn’s?” Khol and I had been together once, but that’s all it takes sometimes.

“You’re not far enough along,” Jeremy replied. “It’s definitely Bryn’s.”

Oh God
. . . I was pregnant with Bryn’s child and he had just broken things off with me. What was I going to do? “Don’t tell him,” I croaked. “Don’t tell anyone.”