by Jill Haven
Dripping and still soapy, I climbed out of the shower, not even turning off the water, and slipped and slid my way to toward the room. I flung the door open and shivered in the cool air. Mason, undressed and handsome as fuck, sat on the side of the bed, checking his phone. In the face of his naked deliciousness I couldn’t make words come out of my mouth, so I stood there like a goober.
He looked up and did a double take. “Are you okay?” He stood fast and went to walk toward me, but I held up my hands.
“You didn’t fucking use a condom, and they say, I mean, it’s ridiculous, but everyone seems convinced I can have, you know… babies.” I licked my lips. “Like Haiden.”
Mason’s mouth fell open, for real. People talk about that happening, but I ain’t never seen it in real life, not a true jaw dropper. His did, though, and he shook his head. “No, we didn’t. Dear gods, we didn’t. I’m a doctor, and I knew better.” He closed his eyes, and I was mad at him, but also irrationally hurt that maybe he wouldn’t want to be connected with me that way, through a child. My entire head was messed up, and I didn’t know what I wanted any more, so I settled on being pissed at him and rolled with it.
“This is all you and your magical fucking penis’s fault if I end up… you know.” I glared and tried to stop my hand from fidgeting toward my belly. What if there was already a little tadpole in there doing stuff, like growing?
“You were enjoying it well enough.” He clasped the meat between his thighs for a second, as if I would be confused about what he was referring to.
I rolled my eyes.
He scowled and then his eyebrows shot up. “How do you always manage to do that to me? You were the one who kissed me first. Please, explain how was this all my fault…”
I narrowed my eyes and spun around to march back into the bathroom. “I hope you enjoyed yourself because this isn’t happening again.” Satisfaction was my friend for about ten seconds when I slammed the door on him. I got back into the shower and quickly finished up, barely noticing the heat of the water on my skin. I was cold now. I’d spent my entire life on the run. I couldn’t stand the thought of that happening with a baby of mine in tow, and I wasn’t mated to any dragons, either, so what would that mean for me? Would I die like Mom had?
The morbid thought had my blood running cold. I just didn’t know enough about any of this, and I didn’t even have a clue how dragons got mated. The idea of belonging to Mason was seductive, though, but it seemed to me to be enticing in the same way heroin was a lure to an addict, like maybe it wouldn’t be in my best interest. I wished someone was around to let me know what choices the right ones were to make. I missed Dad. I didn’t know a damned thing about dragons in real life, except that every time I ran across some, they were trying to hurt me or make me do things I didn’t want. Frustrated, and not feeling any better, I left the bathroom cleaner than I had probably ever been.
Exhausted from the stress of the last few days, and coming so hard, all I wanted to do was take a nap, or actually sleep, but Mason and Bishop had other ideas. About an hour and a half later, after a fast dinner of sandwiches from a drive-through, we were on our way out of Buffalo, New York, headed south. They seemed fine, but for some terrible reason all I could think about on the open road was the fact that my father was gone.
“Where are we going?” I asked, not sure I cared much as long as it was away from the spidery web of Grandpa’s influence.
Mason was still grumpy at me after I yelled at him, or I thought he was anyway, because he’d climbed into the front seat to talk to Bishop rather than riding in back with me. “It seemed like you might enjoy visiting with Haiden at their new place. Maybe see the baby? Is that the case?” Mason turned and there was cautious tightness around his eyes that I didn’t like. I’d done that. I’d put that stress there, ruined what we’d had together. Sighing, I nodded. I sat back to stare out the window as the flat earth fields of dead winter grape fields rolled by along the New York interstate.
Oddly, even though I was upset about Mason’s withdrawal into himself, I was also cautiously happy. He was taking me to see Haiden without me begging him to, and he didn’t seem at all like he was hiding anything from me. There were no secret conversations with Bishop where I couldn’t hear, or furtive looks like they were hiding something dire. I’d lived my life too long that way, and I didn’t think I could stand to live the rest of it barely treading water. I wanted a real life, and I wanted to be safe.
Haiden had helped me when he didn’t have to. He’d cared about me, trusted me and taken my hand while I was half sure we were going to end up murdered or worse, when no stranger ever had done anything like that for me before. If we got to his house and he was in trouble, I wouldn’t leave him to stew in it, Mason be damned. I liked Mason, and I had all these mixed-up feelings about him, but if it turned out that this friendly guy was a lie, then so be it. My heart ached. I wanted to believe so badly in this dream Mason seemed like he was trying to hand me, a life not on the run with someone who actually cared about me.
It can’t be real.
8
Mason
Bishop and I switched off driving all night on the way to Carlisle’s new house. Seth loudly complained that he was perfectly capable of driving whenever we landed at a rest stop. Bishop and I caved somewhere around the Virginia border and gave him a turn at the wheel, and Seth quickly grew bored and asked to switch back. It was obvious he was nervous, but by the way Bishop gave me a dour glare as he took the driver’s seat from a completely unrepentant Seth, he was getting to the end of his patience with him—never a good thing. I tried to make peace by going into the back with Seth, but he still didn’t seem to be in the mood to talk to me. Was the thought of carrying my hatchling so bad? Seth huffed and messed around with a couple of games on his phone and generally made a nuisance of himself.
“You’re used to keeping busy?”
Seth stilled and glanced over at me, his mood making the few inches between us feel like a canyon. “I guess.”
“What do you do?” My face heated. That was a question that generally came before a romp in the sheets, but at least I was asking it.
“Computer crap. You wouldn’t understand.”
“Okay, so I’m an idiot. Where’s your computer?”
He shrugged and didn’t answer me. I gritted my teeth and met Bishop’s gaze in the rearview mirror. I swore his eyes were crinkled in a smile, but Bishop simply didn’t do that. Seth slept for a while, thank goodness, but even in his sleep his feet twitched. How long had he been moving around that he couldn’t even stop now? We roused him by breaking for a meal, which he was silent throughout. His life was changing, which I understood, but the swift dive in his mood to this quiet, subdued man had me concerned.
“Are you sure—”
“I swear if you ask me if I hit my head or something yesterday, I’m getting up and leaving this restaurant.” Seth dropped his fork onto his plate, not caring one wit about the loud clanking that drew attention from the people in the cheap diner who sat at the table near ours. He wiped his mouth with his napkin and his eyes snapped fire. His surly attitude shouldn’t have made me feel better, but it did.
Soon enough we were back on the road, and the morning sun was peeking over the edge of the horizon as Bishop directed my car down the long driveway to Carlisle’s home in the country, which it seemed Carlisle was planning to begin using as the clan headquarters. There were cars parked next to the house, one that I was nearly certain belonged to his cousin, Mabel, and one I thought might be Haiden’s friend Jade’s, and Bishop’s yellow Jeep, which he gave a long sigh of happiness about as he parked my car beside it.
“How did that lawyer guy get home?” Seth leaned up between the seats to ask me. I glanced at Bishop, whose eyebrows flew up as he shrugged.
“He ran off,” Bishop said, “and I didn’t bother with him.”
Seth leaned back and cackled, and I groaned. “Carlisle’s going to have our asses as hats for that.�
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I thought maybe since we were there so early in the morning that we would need to wait for the house to wake up, but then I’d obviously forgotten they had a new baby, and not simply any baby, a dragon-blood hatchling, to contend with. As we made our way onto the porch to the front door, a gusty screeching could be heard from inside, though it didn’t seem to be a true cry, more agitation. Where I would have knocked, Bishop simply opened the front door and strode inside.
“That shit gets you shot,” Seth said, but he followed Bishop inside, eyes wide as he checked out the sizable house. It was still winter, but the lawn was shipshape and everything was neat as a pin.
“We don’t need guns. If Carlisle wanted to hurt me, he would,” Bishop replied over his shoulder in that low rolling bass of his.
Seth didn’t relax. He glanced at me as if checking to make sure he wasn’t getting his leg pulled, and I did my best to reassure him with a smile.
“Bishop.”
He turned toward me. In the early morning creep of sun, he was a truly staggering example of a dragon, taller than me by a good bit, his hard face shaded with stubble that he didn’t usually wear. I could see where he wouldn’t comfort anyone. “What?”
“You’ve never had to put someone at ease, have you?” I asked with a smile. Deadpan, he shook his head, and I sighed.
“Seth!” Haiden appeared in the kitchen doorway that looked out into the large family room, and all at once the loud squalling stopped as the baby happily latched onto a bottle he held. Haiden looked good, if not well-rested. His clothes were new, sweater and jeans the perfect size to mold to his body and make him look put together, and his floppy brown hair was cut in such a way that it seemed to highlight his wide green eyes. Even his glasses were a different shape, so he must have visited an eye doctor. Carlisle was wasting no time in getting his omega comfortable, and I honestly hoped to do the same.
“Hey, you!” Seth cut directly across the room toward Haiden and Charlotte, but he was brought to a halt halfway as Carlisle stood from where he’d been lying on the couch. I hadn’t even noticed him. He looked scruffier than when I’d left, and he was dressed in what seemed to be his rumpled suit from the day before in the office.
“What are you doing?” he asked harshly in a sleep-rough tone.
Seth put on the brakes and raised his hands in front of him, but he still almost smacked into Carlisle. Carlisle swayed on his feet before he shook himself like a dog and seemed to really wake up. He sniffed the air and his stance changed. He must have caught Seth’s baby powder scent.
“Uh—”
“Stop being creepy,” Haiden said. His gentle voice easily melted the tense situation, and Carlisle moved aside to allow Seth to go the rest of the way to Haiden. When Carlisle turned toward us, he seemed slightly more functional. He strode across the room, bags under his eyes, but with his hand outstretched. I clasped my palm to his and we brought it into a hug where we patted each other’s backs and he sighed, bonking his head against mine. I grinned at him.
“Did you see?” I cut a look over to where Seth was leaning down to get a good eyeful of Charlotte tucked against Haiden’s chest. Haiden smiled and said something in a low patter that had Seth laughing.
“I did.” Carlisle smiled back. “Hatchlings are such work. How do they make it to childhood?” he whispered. I had to chuckle at him and then he was turning to shake Bishop’s hand, too. If Carlisle was this strung out, maybe he wouldn’t realize we left his lawyer in Buffalo without even bothering to check and make sure if he had a way home. That wouldn’t last forever, but for now, it was fine.
“The baby is keeping you up all night?”
“If it was only the baby, maybe it wouldn’t be so bad,” he mumbled and swiped a hand over his face. That had my gut dropping. Carlisle wasn’t a worrier by nature. “There have been more issues from the remaining Cloud dragons,” he said, casting a glance over his shoulder at our omegas.
“Vladimir’s people didn’t disband with his death?” Bishop asked. His scowl twisted his scar and made it even more apparent. “They didn’t seem organized enough for retaliation.”
“No. They didn’t. They decided to become a big thorn in my backside. Well, in Vince’s backside.”
Bishop’s expression went dangerous. “He helped us when we needed it. I don’t like to hear that we’ve dragged other clans into our problems. What’s going on there?” He and Carlisle had a staring contest before Carlisle broke off and rubbed a hand over his face.
“Ah, the Cloud dragons were pissed off that Vince’s men came to our aid. Without the help of the Redcaps, they were sure they would have won the day, or so said one of Vladimir’s men who Vince captured. The Cloud dragon met an abrupt end.”
“You mean they were mad they didn’t get to keep us?” Seth asked from across the room. Carlisle moved a bit so that he had Seth and Haiden in view. They were sitting together on the couch near a fireplace along the far wall—a necessity in every dragon home. The play of firelight on Seth’s olive skin and the way his beautiful eyes seemed dark and mysterious from across the room dazed me.
“Yes, that precisely. Right or wrong, they decided on vengeance against Vince’s clan.” Carlisle shifted so that he was speaking more to myself and Bishop again. “Maybe they figured if they could remove the Redcaps, then they could come at us again. They’ve been using dirty tactics against the Redcaps. Targeting women, though they got a few nasty surprises there, and picking dragons off one by one. The entire clan has retreated to Vince’s homestead. It’s a true self-contained property, about as much as you can get these days. That’s been going on while you were off looking for that one,” Carlisle said, hooking a thumb toward Seth. Carlisle cracked a yawn that came directly from the bottom of his toes and shook his whole body.
“You’ve been what? Going to the office, helping with the baby, and heading out there to help Vince?” I shook my head at him. “As a doctor, and your friend, I’m telling you dragon strength only extends so far. You have to rest, or you’ll regret it. You’ll make dangerous decisions.”
Carlisle flushed and gave me a sheepish smile. “I’m fine.”
“You’re long-lived, not immortal. You do need sleep, you know.”
“I keep telling him that,” Haiden said in an Ah-ha! Gotcha! sort of way that had Carlisle slouching in place.
“I’ll go to the Redcap fortifications,” Bishop said, even though he hadn’t even had an hour’s rest yet himself.
“No can do. We’re only allowed on the surrounding property. Vince doesn’t want any alphas out there. That leaves the three of us off the list, then.” Carlisle smiled, frustration giving his teeth a dragon sharpness. “Four of their clan have been slaughtered so far, but they’ve picked off as many Cloud dragons. There can’t be that many Cloud dragons left.”
“Why don’t they want us there?” I asked, intrigued. “That’s odd.”
“My thoughts, also.” Bishop grunted and turned to look at Seth and Haiden again. “If they’re trying to keep the Princeps Draco out, that probably means there’s something there you should know about.”
Carlisle let out long sigh. “I hate to jump to conclusions. They came to help us and are suffering for it. I’m not about to dig around for dirt on them.”
“We should go out. Surely there is some sort of regional business that needs attending to? Something that absolutely must have your personal attention. Right now.” Bishop elbowed him.
“We can cook up some bullshit reason for us to go there and snoop around.” I grinned at him. “How hard could that be?”
“And help me carry out this ridiculous plan.”
Bishop nodded and his eyebrows danced for a second.
Carlisle shoved his hands into his pockets and swayed on his feet. “I’ve been wondering if I should push this. It’s a skirmish at this point, and we did involve the Redcaps in it.” He turned to glance over his shoulder at where Haiden and Seth sat, and lowered his voice. “I hate the idea of exte
rminating my mate’s clan. That’s not strictly legal, but as long as he, Jade, and Charlotte live, I can assuage my conscience.”
“If nothing else, we should make sure the Redcaps aren’t getting starved out holing themselves up,” Bishop rumbled, ever practical.
“The perimeter isn’t locked down that tight, but there’s a thought. I could say that I’m concerned for the clan welfare as Princeps Draco.”
“We might draw attention to ourselves if we go there,” I pointed out.
“I can make sure we’re not followed home.” Bishop’s words were ominous, but I think he meant them to be.
“We’ll do it then,” Carlisle said, nodding. “Everything went well with Seth?” Carlisle asked. Seth’s head popped up from where he’d been tickling a baby foot, but he didn’t turn to look at us. That was interesting. He seemed to be able to hear us, where Haiden didn’t.
“Yeah, uh, except, well…” I told Carlisle and Bishop about the clan book that Seth wanted to recover from his grandfather, I’d at least gotten that out of him on our car ride, which had also started the mess that led to the police station adventure. Bishop raised an eyebrow, as if intrigued.
Carlisle grimaced. “Humans having that book technically falls under a reportable offense. But since it was a human omega and his human father who allowed that to happen, I don’t know what the Enforcement Council would do if any exposure happened because of it.”
“Let’s recover the book and not worry about that. No crime, no consequences,” Bishop said. “I know a few dragons in that area who might be able to help me get into the facility and retrieve it.” Though the prospects seemed dismal to me, the idea seemed to energize him. He straightened taller.
