ARC - AURUM COURT DRAGONS
Emilia Hartley
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NOTE FROM THE AUTHOR: This book is a work of fiction. The names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the writer’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, actual events, locale or organizations is entirely coincidental. The author does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for third-party websites or their content.
ASHTON DRAKE
Emilia Hartley
Chapter One
Makenna couldn’t believe it.
She froze in the kitchen doorway, waiters trapped behind her pushing to get free of the blockade even though she was squarely rooted to the floor. The sight ahead of her was one she never thought she’d see again. Years of forgotten romance flooded her mind. First kisses in the back of a beat-up truck, the dangerous thrill of betraying her grandmother’s wishes.
It came rushing back as she stared at Ashton Drake. His hair was clean cut, shorn on the sides and left long enough to sweep to the left in an old-school boyish kind of way. He rolled up the sleeves of his button-down shirt before putting his elbows on the table and grinning at his mother as she reached to adjust his hair.
Then, his eyes turned toward her. They were endless, pots of molten copper that gave away what really lurked beneath his skin. A beast. Not just any beast, a dragon.
Not only had he been her high school sweetheart, but he’d been the one that got away. Not away from her, but away from these mountains. Bitterness seared the inside of her stomach. She turned on her heel and marched back into the kitchen.
“Get back out there, Mac!” the manager snapped at her. “Table four is packed and they need service.”
Makenna shook her head. “Can someone cover table four for me? I can’t…I just…”
The manager’s brows furrowed before he glanced out the small window of the swinging door. The diner’s floor was small enough that he got a good look at exactly who was out there. The table was full of Drakes, but there was only one that Makenna could not approach.
The kitchen began to close in around her. Everything became too large, the sink, the stoves, the salamander. The appliances pressed in on her as if to remind her of just how trapped she was. She fought to breathe while the room shrank.
“Fine, Mac. I’ll have Stuart serve table four, but that means you’re taking out the trash.”
Finally, Makenna could breathe. She nodded, relieved.
Everything would be alright, she told herself. Truth was, Makenna worked so much, she would never run into Ashton anywhere else. This would be the last time she saw him. He had plenty of money. The diner had been his parents’ idea, but Makenna doubted he would return any time soon. There were better restaurants in the mountain town.
She gathered the trash bags in her hands and hoisted them from their bins. They were heavy, almost too heavy to carry, but she stubbornly hefted them toward the back door knowing each step was further away from Ashton.
***
Everyone grinned at him. They told him how happy they were to have him back home, back in the mountains. But his beast began to stir as the din of the diner grew louder. It plugged his ears and ignited a pressure in his head that he couldn’t stand. Ashton tried to keep a smile on his face, but he knew his beast would soon take over.
So, Ashton did his best to politely excuse himself from the table. His human mother’s face faltered. She looked up at him with concern, her hand hovering in the air from where she’d brushed his hair aside. His father said nothing while Ashton lurched for the door.
Faces. There were faces everywhere. Bodies brushed against him. They stepped too close. The beast’s growl ripped free of his lips. It vibrated through him. People began to sidestep around him. It wasn’t enough. There were too many faces.
A wall of greenery beckoned him. Proud pines and firs stood tall over the mountain forest, a sight he could not find in the city. He ducked into the shadow of the trees, each step taking him further into the woods, just as the beast began to tear at his body. It would be free, it would protect itself. Ashton fought just long enough to make sure he was away from town.
It was all he could bear while the beast burned him from the inside out. He loosened the tie around his neck, yanking it over his head. Next came the stifling business attire. Claws and flame tore him apart until the beast broke free. Massive feet slammed into the earth. The trees shook around him, as if they could tremble at the sight of the dragon within him. His tail lashed through the air. The tip made a cracking sound like a whip.
The beast tossed its head and roared. It charged, body filled with pent-up energy. Unlike the city, here there was plenty of room to rampage. Trees snapped when he slammed his body into them. Branches hissed and singed when he blew flames.
Ashton knew he should stop the beast. He should have fought harder to contain it.
He was just so tired.
The constant charades in the city had exhausted him. He got up before the sun every morning, dressed in his best suits, and rode the train to work just to sit behind a desk. Sure, he had the best view of the city, but it meant nothing to the creature trapped within him. The city was too small. The train was too small. His office was too small.
And none of it had been enough.
He swallowed down his secret, holding tight to it. His boss begged him to keep it to himself. They told him he was needed here, at the mountain. He’d wanted to argue and stay to help, but the beast inside him didn’t agree. Dragons didn’t care about work.
His skin had felt stretched thin. When his father called him home, Ashton had barely hidden his sigh of relief. That was until his father revealed why he was needed home. Ashton’s cousin, Jasper Drake, was losing his humanity. If only his father knew how troubled his own son was.
The copper dragon stomped through the forest. It slashed at trees as if they were the numerous people that always crowded around him. Smoke coiled in thin trails slithering from his muzzle. The fire in his throat burned along his tongue.
Ashton had a thought to take back his body when the ground beneath him quaked. The beast hesitated, snarling as it scanned the woods. The beast was not prepared for the massive, golden monster that prowled before it.
The golden dragon eyed Ashton. It raised its head regally high, neck perfectly straight while it stared down its nose at him. The size difference was startling. This was the golden dragon of the Drake mountains, heir to the Aurum Bank, and Ashton’s cousin, Jasper Drake.
For a long moment, they stared at one another. Beast to beast. Ashton knew Jasper wouldn’t see family when he looked at the copper dragon. Not only because Ashton struggled with his own control, but because Ashton couldn’t find Jasper in the gold dragon’s eyes.
The only creature that looked down at Ashton was the gold dragon. The entity was so strong that it had a mind of its own, a mind that was much more than base instincts and urges. There was intelligence in those eyes.
His golden scales caught the light of the sun overhead. The glare momentarily blinded Ashton’s b
east, bringing a snarl to his lips. Before he knew what happened, a clawed foot slammed into his head.
Ashton crashed to the ground. Dirt and small stones filled his mouth. His heart thumped wildly. The beast in him swelled. The rage that fueled it would lash out at Jasper if Ashton didn’t reclaim control. He reached for his body, tugging at the dragon to yank it back inside of him. The creature put up a fight.
For twenty minutes, Ashton and his beast fought. His body ached from the back and forth, the small changes creating a searing sensation. Once it was over and Ashton had caged the creature once more, he lay on the forest floor. His limbs hummed. He couldn’t feel his fingers or toes.
All he knew was the roar of the creature trapped inside his head.
It was getting out of control. What if he’d lost the fight inside the diner? The town was mostly filled with humans. Had his beast escaped, the casualties would have been high. Even with his father there to stop him. The old man could only do so much, his own copper beast oxidized and slow.
Ashton rubbed his hands over his face. If he couldn’t get his beast under control, then he would ask Jasper to put him out of his misery. Or, Jasper’s intelligent beast.
This town was so fucked.
Chapter Two
Makenna leaned against the back of the diner. The mountain air was thin, but she didn’t know how to breathe anywhere else. It was out here, alone, that she could reclaim her thumping heart and reorganize her head.
The bitterness never went away. It sat in her stomach like a lump, one that could gnaw and claw at her. Reason said that of either of them, Makenna should have been the one to leave Grove. Ashton and the beast hidden inside of him should have been the one trapped in this tiny mountain hamlet. She was completely human and had a chance at living in the outside world.
But that wasn’t how things played out. Ashton had gone off to work at the family bank while an anchor had wrapped around her ankles.
The woods crackled, leaves crunching and twigs snapping like a large animal was stomping toward her. She hesitated. There weren’t many bears in these mountains. Most of them were shifters that came to live under the protection of the dragons.
When sun-kissed skin stepped out from the woods, her jaw dropped. Asher cupped his manhood, a brick-red blush spreading across his freckled cheeks while he stood across from her. He was as naked as the day he was born. She had to admit, not much had changed in the years he’d been away.
His muscles had grown more defined, a V leading her eyes to his cupped hands. Her own face warmed. She couldn’t help nature’s way of directing her gaze, but she looked away as quickly as possible. Still, Ashton had caught the quick glance.
“Did you forget what it looked like?” he teased.
Her words caught in her throat like a ten-car-pile-up. She didn’t want to tell him there was no way she’d forget what he looked like, or how he felt inside her. She didn’t remind him that her first would always remain on her mind. And she certainly didn’t inform him that he was a bit, ah, thicker than she remembered.
The weight he’d put on looked good, all muscle. It broadened his shoulders and filled out his ass, noted only when he turned away from her.
“When are you going back?” was all she could manage to ask. “Back to the city, I mean.”
“I’m not. Looks like you’re stuck with me.” He winked and let go of his manhood. His chin rose.
Oh, it was certainly thicker than she remembered.
Makenna spun away from him. “The only thing I’m stuck with is bills. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to get back to work.”
Even though she scurried back inside through the employee’s-only entrance, she spared a glance through the narrow window at her naked ex. Ashton’s eyes were still copper, and when he spoke, his canines were still sharp. Those small signs told her that the man and the beast were at war. She couldn’t help but think that the man was losing the battle, a sinking feeling dragging her down.
Ashton Drake wasn’t her problem, though.
Makenna had enough on her plate. There were still two more hours to her shift, then she had fifteen minutes to get ready for job number two. The next day, she had off from jobs number one and two, but had to work four hours for job number three. It was only balancing books for the local logging company, but it was mentally taxing compared to her first two jobs.
She had no time to flirt with her high school ex, and she certainly didn’t have time to look after an out-of-control dragon.
***
Ashton wanted to follow her. The beast inside him tugged his feet forward, but he stopped himself before the door that read “Employees Only.” The beast growled at his decision, but Ashton was in control again.
Instead of heading back inside to say good-bye to the relatives that came to welcome him home, Ashton went straight for his truck. In the backseat was a pair of dirty sweat pants that he quickly put on before local cops could slap a public indecency ticket on him. Last he remembered, most of the public indecency infractions were handed to dragon shifters.
There was the story of Old Georgia Cross who streaked through town after her divorce had been finalized, but Old Georgia was probably the only exception in the last hundred years. Ashton was too young to remember the incident, but the story still traveled around Grove like a claim to fame.
As Ashton drove through town, he meandered streets just to reignite old memories. There was the dock on the edge of Crater Lake that he and Makenna had jumped off during the hot summers. The ice-cream parlor they used to visit had closed. In its place was a gourmet chocolates shop.
There was barely a place in all of Grove that he and Makenna hadn’t tormented together. They’d been inseparable for most of their high school career. Then, he graduated. He’d been a year ahead of her. When an opportunity at the family bank opened up, Ashton saw it as a way to pad his bank account.
The job took him away from Grove and the mountains he’d called home. More importantly, it took him away from Makenna. While she’d held onto the belief that their relationship could last a country apart, Ashton had seen the strain it put on her. She’d been young. He’d been busy.
Breaking it off had been the only choice he’d seen at the time.
Now, the first of Jasper’s cousins back home, Ashton was greeted with all the ways he’d screwed up his life. He’d never been meant for city living. At first, it had been bright and shiny. The city had been something to be conquered. He’d taken it one piece at a time until his beast had been stretched thin. Bar by bar, club by club, office by office. The dragon’s conquests had worn on both of them.
Unable to bear the memories rising like ghosts along the streets, he sped out of town and toward his new rental. The cabin was on the edge of town, surrounded by familiar trees. Unlike his city apartment, there were no granite counter-tops. The counters were all raw wood scarred with knife marks. The stove was blackened from the many meals that had been cooked there.
He carried his things inside, dropping them by the door. He’d hoped that someone else would have made it home first. Ryker would have filled his head with sound, raucous music drowning out the nervous energy buzzing along Ashton’s limbs. Griffin was in town, but he hadn’t answered his phone since Ashton arrived.
They’d all gone on with their lives, heading in separate directions. Last he knew, Wyatt was getting ready to propose to his girlfriend. Ryker was on the road with a band, always heading somewhere new. Griffin had stayed, but Ashton could already tell it would take more than one young dragon to hold back Jasper.
Surrounded by the walls of his rental, unfamiliar scents slowly started to surround him. He could smell the lives that had unfolded before he arrived. Someone had burnt a cake, there’d been a wet dog more times than he could count, and more bodies than he wanted to imagine. The scents were making his forehead ache.
The beast felt surrounded again. The smells of other people were no better than faces, than bod
ies. The beast writhed. He could feel scales dragging along the inside of his skin. He was ready to burst. The dragon would smash through the thin walls around him.
He gritted his teeth and swallowed back the beast. His fingers dug into the counter top. Over and over, he reminded the beast that they were alone. It wasn’t enough. The change would come any moment. He lurched for the front door.
This would make it the second change that day. The fourth change that week, and it was only Wednesday. Each time marked a moment when he lost control. It was getting harder and harder to hold the beast back. His defenses were breaking down. Grove and the surrounding mountains offered space for his beast, but he knew his days were numbered.
He whipped the door open and came face to face with a very surprised Makenna, her fist poised in the air as if she’d been about to knock. In her other hand were two take-out containers.
Ashton swallowed hard. The beast went back down, but only barely. A bit of it lingered, intrigued by the woman on his doorstep. She still had the most amazing blue eyes, brighter and clearer than any ocean he’d ever seen before. Her white-blonde hair fell in waves over her shoulder, released from the bun she’d worn it in at the diner.
She straightened her spine and lifted her chin, shoving the take-out container toward him. “You didn’t eat earlier. I thought you and your beast could use some food.”
He stared down at the gift. Earlier, he’d assumed she was done with him. It’d been seven years since he’d broken her heart. She should have healed over by then, forgotten him and moved on. Instead, Makenna was at his doorstep, making sure he ate.
He didn’t know what to say.
“There’s a hunk of prime rib and a mountain of mashed potatoes in there, but I also snuck in some roast carrots for vitamins. The smaller container has a slice of apple pie.”
Aurum Court Dragons: Boxset Books 1-5 Page 1
