Vampire Dragon (5 page)
What happens in thought stays in thought
, she pledged.
, she pledged.
Something tickled Darkwyn’s bare foot, so he scratched one with the other, and knocked two fur balls into the sunlight from beneath his cloak.
Ah, likely his journey’s feline companions. They had finally landed . . . on his feet, somewhat in the way he had landed
beneath
Bronte’s.
beneath
Bronte’s.
She spotted the kittens immediately and made that man-hardening come-hither sound she employed with Isis, charming the magickat hitchhikers her way.
One kitten, a pure white, bore lavender gray ears, face, feet, and tail. The other had a triangular-shaped head, almond eyes, its fur a red brown near its body and black at its tips, as if charred around the edges, head, and back, but with a full-singed black tail.
Darkwyn glanced at Vivica. No doubt those kittens came through the veil. They were as otherworldly as cats could get. Winged from another plane, they glowed, despite the sun.
Bronte could not possibly see their glow or flutterby wings, because she petted them as if the appendages did not exist, her hand slipping through the wings like air, before she scooped them into her arms and cuddled them at her neck.
She closed her eyes in a façade of ecstasy, enough to make him imagine her at an intense height of rapture, caused by his attention. A fantasy both intimate and sexual.
Sick bastard!
While Bronte coddled the kittens, and he wished she would toss him a quick gaze, the sun played tricks with his vision, so it looked as if she, or one of the kittens, cast a beam toward the hauling rope, a trick of light that even his keen dragon vision could not confirm.
The rope snapped.
Ogden shouted.
Darkwyn leapt forward and tossed Bronte from harm’s way.
With the kittens safe at her neck, Bronte flew over the corner of her property toward the body of water to the left, and—magick—he wrapped her in a bubble, invisible to the naked eye, to cushion her water fall, and spare her the pain of body-slamming the surface.
All as if in a blink, the freeze she must feel as she sank into the icy arm of the sea, inch by slow inch, ran up
his
legs and spine, causing him to shiver as the casket slammed into
him
. Pain jolted his inner dragon with bone-rattling retribution, which brought the beast to life, and his dragon wanted out, badly.
his
legs and spine, causing him to shiver as the casket slammed into
him
. Pain jolted his inner dragon with bone-rattling retribution, which brought the beast to life, and his dragon wanted out, badly.
His wings began to emerge from their muscle sacs. He fought them, and after a hard-won inner battle, they retreated beneath his cloak back into his body.
His roar did escape, however, a wretched cry of pain, reverberating in an echo that only water could magnify to such a level.
The fury of his inner beast gave him the added strength to withstand the blow. And though his knees buckled beneath its weight, the casket gave, cracked, and shattered.
One piece flew through the pub’s large window; the rest scattered like ash from a volcano.
“I’ll call 911,” Vivica said, her meaning flying as high over his head as Bronte had flown toward the water.
Bronte screamed. Darkwyn ran.
He covered her property in one dragon leap and cut into the water beside her.
She grabbed him like a lifeline, while fighting him at the same time, and he couldn’t help but enjoy their first physical contact, for which he should be pierced at short range with a throwing spear.
Nevertheless, when he lifted her in his arms, the kittens got slippery, and while he carried Bronte toward the beach near her building, he lost his grasp on the felines while trying to keep his cloak together.
Vivica and Zachary approached at a run, Vivica’s Isis stopping by the water’s edge to howl until the kittens emerged on their own—slick and ugly as porcupigs. Isis took to mothering and grooming them.
The black and red narrowed its almond eyes and hissed at Isis. The white kitten abandoned the magnificat’s attention to run in circles, her coat quick drying in a puff like a bunhopper’s tail.
Vivica cleared her throat. “The white looks like she stuck her paws in a light socket.”
Bronte, still in his arms, shivered, eyes full, lips aquiver, likely as much from happiness over the kittens’ safety as her own. “Ogden,” she shouted, seeing her worker help people to the curb. “Anyone hurt?”
“Nothing major missus. Stay there, take care of yourself. I’ve got it covered, ambulance and police. My brother’s on the force. You all right? Need the ambulance?”
“I’m fine, thanks.”
Ogden nodded and went back to his task of settling the injured on the Phoenix porch steps, though they all stood when the ambulance arrived. Darkwyn was relieved he’d taken the brunt of the blow along with the part of the building in which he’d landed.
He examined Bronte’s face for injury, the worst being her blue lips, which he’d like to kiss warm.
He realized, then, that being a man, again, made you want . . . well, man toys . . . like women whose hearts opened to yours, whether they wanted them open or not. Women who might be evil incarnate. Please not.
True, Bronte did not appear evil, but neither did Killian, unless she wanted to.
On purpose, he believed, Bronte slapped him in the face with the icy wet cape she wrapped tighter around herself, dousing his longing and distracting him until he nearly dropped her, the hellcat.
Maybe he should rethink the evil bit.
She tried to kick him. “You tossed me in icy Salem Harbor in October, Neanderthal! Me and two cats in Cat Cove, of all places. What a sick sense of humor.”
Despite Bronte’s bruises and her foul mood, Darkwyn held her tight and liked it. His dragon liked it, too. Maybe too much.
A lesson: his inner beast rose to attention and sought release when he was wounded
and
in lust. The two must be equal.
and
in lust. The two must be equal.
He didn’t care what Bronte called him, but he cared a great deal when the spikes of her heels made sharp contact with his man-parts. She brought him to his knees, a feat the heavy sarcophagus failed to do.
He shouldn’t respect her for that, but he did.
She took the opportunity to roll free, spread her cloak on a bush to dry, and turn to stand over him, arms crossed, while
he
tried not to die in front of her.
he
tried not to die in front of her.
She wrung out her skirt over his head. “My boots!” she screamed, while he tried not to enjoy the length of her legs.
Bronte examined a gaping hole in the knee of one boot, while he blew a bit of warm air her way, not enough to make him smoke, just enough to dry her off.
Scumduggers, he guessed he would stroke this woman, this cracker of man parts, in any way he could.
Jagidy blew purple smoke directly at her breasts.
The pocket dragon must have warmed her, as well, because Bronte raised her gaze and fast, then she scowled down at him as if she saw the real him—horns, scales, wings, and fire, except he wasn’t using them. “Are you out of your mind?” she asked.
He frowned. “What mind?”
“Ex-actly!”
Her ire shot through him while his middle finger throbbed. He held it up to examine and saw Bronte’s was cut,
not
his. Also, his right knee smarted where hers, behind the boot tear, dripped blood and bruised blue. He’d felt the icy water as she . . . He felt what she felt? Was this some unknown dragon magick, dragon torture, or the work of an evil sorceress? If the latter, in which of the forms around him did Killian the sorceress hide?
not
his. Also, his right knee smarted where hers, behind the boot tear, dripped blood and bruised blue. He’d felt the icy water as she . . . He felt what she felt? Was this some unknown dragon magick, dragon torture, or the work of an evil sorceress? If the latter, in which of the forms around him did Killian the sorceress hide?
Did she know he made it to earth? Did she stand before him in violet hair and eyes? Could ruining those boots cost him his life?
“What were you thinking?” she asked. “How far can you throw, anyway?”
“I was saving you.”
“Saving me? You nearly drowned me. And don’t go giving me the finger. Do you know how much these boots cost? Puck you, too.”
Darkwyn lowered his throbbing finger.
“You rang?” Puck landed on his head with a squawk. “Siren,” the bird said. “Any lady of splendid promise, dissembled purpose, and disappointing performance.”
“I don’t like that bird,” Bronte snapped.
Darkwyn realized, as he moved Puck to his arm, that he did like the bird. It amused him. Except when it perched on his head.
He regarded Bronte. “Your boots matter more to you than your bloody bruised body?”
“My clothes and hair will dry. My body will heal. My
boots
will do neither!”
boots
will do neither!”
Earth women: a puzzle he must learn to solve. Well, he wouldn’t try to learn all women. Just this one, Goddess help him.
“Bronte,” Vivica said. “Darkwyn kept you from getting crushed by the falling casket and got hit in your place. If he hadn’t pushed you from harm’s way, you could have been killed. As far as tossing you such a distance, he simply doesn’t know his own strength.” Vivica gave him a pointed look. “And
that
, he has to learn, among other things.”
that
, he has to learn, among other things.”
“More to the point,” Zachary said, his eyes narrow, making him look wiser than his years, “why didn’t the casket kill him, instead of
him
killing
it
?”
him
killing
it
?”
FIVE
This Darkwyn Dragonelli guy—he ho’d oddly offered
her his protection, she should remember—didn’t look like a casket fell on him, Bronte thought. ”Are you hurt? Headache? Anything?”
her his protection, she should remember—didn’t look like a casket fell on him, Bronte thought. ”Are you hurt? Headache? Anything?”
“A few bruises,” he said. “
You
caused the most damage.”
You
caused the most damage.”
Bronte’s face got warm. She would have preferred to put his nuts in a vice at the time. Rather late to be sorry.
Zachary scoffed. “Who are you?
Super
Dude?”
Super
Dude?”
Bronte caught Vivica giving Darkwyn a warning look. “He works out,” the owner of Works Like Magick said.
Bronte nearly laughed. That sounded like a lie, yet she was surprisingly inclined to let it pass, as inclined as Zachary seemed. She could tell by the tension leaving the boy’s shoulders that he’d found a spark of hope in this man—bad, very bad, to count on a stranger—but not surprising given Dragonelli’s obvious strength, his formidable rescue, and the offer of help Zachary overheard.
She regarded Darkwyn, the man who’d saved her, who’d sensed her need to hide—chilling thought—and offered his help, to the death, a slow route to a certain end, if only he knew it.
And yet he’d touched a chord in her, a burgeoning sense of trust she couldn’t shake. Hope, long abandoned, and a glint of faith, came to life despite her knowing better, all stirred by a cloaked stranger’s actions.
She should
not
trust him.
not
trust him.
He’d saved her, albeit brutally, offered his help, appeared like a god from the sky, naked and gazing up at her with his otherworldly savior’s eyes, violet, like hers. She’d never seen the like, except in her mirror. A grand reminder. She was no saint, and despite his gallantry, neither was Darkwyn Dragonelli.
Human, the both of them.
Humans did stupid things.
She so did not want to make another stupid mistake, like trusting this man. But he’d kept her from being crushed by a casket—some kind of universal prank, given her appalling karma. He’d saved her by tossing her in Cat Cove, then by rescuing her,
again
. Neither a saint nor a savior, just a gallant, perceptive man who saw her disguise for what it was.
again
. Neither a saint nor a savior, just a gallant, perceptive man who saw her disguise for what it was.
Pray the goddess, he would never see past it to the real her.
“You saved me twice,” she said. “I owe you my sincere thanks. Not that I do humble well, but I appreciate . . . everything.” Yes, being indebted, even in thanks, rubbed her the wrong way, but she said it, and swallowed the bitter aftertaste.
She’d declared her independence years before with no intention of going back. Not even for a man who touched her on every level, especially the emotional and physical. Of course, if they’d had a meeting of minds—if he saw into hers, which, praise be, was impossible—she’d have to abandon ship, take Zachary, and run. Again.
“Humble?” he questioned, mocking her?
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