A Shifter's Christmas Box Set

by Emilia Hartley

  “You did all those things, though. I didn’t want him to assume right off the bat that you’re a bad guy. No one should be judged like that.”

  Atticus tried to find words of gratitude, but all he could manage to ask was, “Your name? I, ah, still don’t know it. I’m really going to look like a kidnapper if I call you woman.”

  She bit her lip and his heart flipped. He stared, lips parted, as a pink blush overcame her cheeks.

  “I wish I was awake enough to make something up, but the only fake names I can think up right now are just as bad as my real name.”

  He nudged her with his elbow. The touch made his gut tighten. Her shirt had dipped low over her shoulder and revealed a small tattoo on her freckled back. She had freckles on her…back? He didn’t even know that was possible.

  Then a thought struck him. What if she was already claimed? By a human? It was clear that she had been human once. She was far too old to have control issues. Born shifters never had to fight with a new presence inside them because the beast was always there. She had a human life, one that didn’t involve him.

  Atticus hoped for something he could never have. He ached for a lover who would make him feel like he was wanted. Alone and on the edge of his own world, loneliness was a greater danger than anyone would have suspected. His beast was still the irritable nuisance it’d always been, if his desire to bite the clerk was any indication.

  “The only fake name I can think of is Gertrude. That was my grandmother’s name.”

  “Then you should tell me your real name,” he coaxed.

  She wrapped her arms around her middle. Just before the elevator doors opened, she whispered a single word.

  “Francine.”

  He tried to hide his grin. Not because he thought her name was funny, but because it was a spark of warmth in his chest. His fury and frustration were always an unbearable flame, but this spark was gentle. It was like the warmth of a heart. He would keep it close and let it ease his pain for the rest of his days.

  Unless she’d pledged herself to another. Wait, what kind of a word was that? People didn’t pledge themselves. He was an old dragon, but not that old. This was a modern era.

  He fumbled around her. His thoughts were a mess that he was frantically trying to untangle. He didn’t know how to go from his solitary life to one that included a woman, especially one that didn’t know she was his mate.

  Chapter Three

  Frankie flopped face down onto one of the queen-sized beds. When Atticus excused himself and left, she pouted. She barely knew him. She shouldn’t even be sleeping in the same room as him, let alone wanting him to stay.

  He hadn’t laughed at her name, though. Not like the dumb jocks in high school and college who asked her what Frankie was short for. Or like the old women who would excitedly tell her about their dead friends named Francine.

  Atticus just grinned. She closed her eyes and summoned the memory as she lay on the bed. At some point, she nodded off and woke to the sound of the door opening. Her beast lurched into flight or fight mode and sent her to her feet. Her heart thundered in her ears.

  Atticus held up his hands and in his low, rumbling voice told her everything would be okay. She wasn’t sure what it was about that voice, but it made her beast heel. Nothing before had ever calmed the creature so quickly. A million questions reached her lips. Atticus raised the plastic bag in his hand before she could speak.

  “I bought dinner.”

  She narrowed her eyes. “With what money?”

  Hers, she presumed. Atticus had been naked when they met. There was no way he had money stashed on him. She had already scanned every inch of his naked form and determined there were no places he could hide anything.

  He scoffed, though. “I’ll have you know I managed to access my own bank account. Which actually kind of surprised me. I know it’s only been five years, but I would have thought the inactivity would have locked it.”

  She approached the table near the wall, drawn closer by the smell of roasted turkey and tangy cranberries. “Five years?”

  Had he been trapped in an animal form for five years? It was her greatest fear, to lose her humanity to the thing trying to break free of her body. Every time she changed shapes, she feared she wouldn’t be able to get back to herself. Just thinking about it made her hands tremble.

  Atticus pulled out two take-out containers and set one in front of her. He produced a drink tray and plucked a cardboard cup from it and added it to her meal. Sweet coffee, molasses, and ginger joined the aromas in the air. She was transported home by the smells, to Christmas dinner with her mom’s sweet wine-basted turkey and crispy gingerbread men in the shape of ninjas.

  She hadn’t seen her younger brother in two years. Last time she visited, they had played with the ninja gingerbread men. Hers had broken its leg, the crumbs falling to the floor before she could catch them. Now, she’d be able to catch them. Her reflexes were lightning quick.

  How had her brother changed in those two years? He would be eighteen now. A grown man. Surely, he couldn’t be all that different.

  It was Christmas Eve. She should have been home. At the very least, she should have called to tell them she would be there in the morning. They were waiting on her. But Atticus’s story begged to be heard.

  Atticus said he had missed five years. She couldn’t imagine how much would have passed him by.

  “What happened?”

  He dragged his chair closer to her. The proximity should have been stifling, but she kind of liked it. She couldn’t recall the last time she’d been this close to someone without worrying that she would lose control. Atticus could leash her beast. And, if she did lash out, she doubted she would be able to hurt him.

  A long moment dragged on as he stared at the lid of his take-out container. Then his eyes slid to hers. He studied her face. She could feel her cheeks warming again, like he was seeing more than she wanted him to see.

  “We’re both shifters, but we’re not the same,” he said finally, as if it were a prelude to his story.

  “What’s that supposed to mean? I’m afraid I don’t know much about what I am. Can you…take a different form?”

  He smiled sadly down at his dinner. “I can tell you some things about what we are, but I really wish someone had been there for you. Shifters live in packs. If you had one, your life would be easier.” He reached across the table and brushed her cheek with his knuckles. “Doesn’t that feel good? Simple touch?”

  Her heart raced at the way he grazed her skin, like he might break her if he pressed any harder. She wasn’t breakable. Someone had already tried, and she was still standing, tougher than before. So, she leaned into his hand and heard the way his breath caught.

  She didn’t tell him that, yes, this felt amazing. The anxiety crackling in her mind slipped away until her thoughts quieted. The beast inside her lay down to sleep. Was this how it could have been all along?

  When he took his hand away, she tried not to pout or reach for more.

  “I’m not a mammalian shifter. My kind operate… a little differently.”

  Frankie tried to imagine a gator shifter or a Komodo dragon shifter, a giant lizard dragging its belly over the floor. It had to be the most awkward shape ever. But that wasn’t what she thought she saw outside her window. No, the shape that cleared the snow from her car had been much larger, much more graceful.

  “You’re a dragon?” Her voice cracked. She could barely believe what she was saying.

  But Atticus nodded. “I was sleeping in the cliff near where you went off the road. I’m afraid your accident might have been my fault. I might have shaken the ground and caused the snow to fall.”

  “You’re. A. Dragon?”

  Frankie had felt less alone, but now she wondered what kind of fantasy realm she’d been transported to. Dragons didn’t exist, but she knew what she saw. He was as tall as a house. He had wings. And a tail.

  Just th
inking about it made her own beast feel small and inconsequential. The thing inside her had teeth and claws, but no more than any other large dog. A wolf was nothing next to a dragon.

  “You were sleeping inside the cliff?” She pulled the gingerbread coffee closer and let it warm her cold fingers.

  Atticus’s gaze grew distant. She wondered what he was reliving. For her, when she had that kind of look, she was back in the alley with the wolf. Atticus didn’t look afraid, though. Only desolate. She inched her chair closer to him and put her head on his shoulder while she waited for him to go on.

  “I didn’t have anything to live for,” Atticus said. He swallowed. “Dragons claim territory. It belongs to them until the day they die, but if they can’t find a reason to stay awake, they will burrow and sleep.”

  “You took a five-year nap because you were depressed?” Frankie couldn’t tell him how much she could relate. She, too, wanted to bury herself and sleep time away. At least until the thing inside her could behave properly.

  “It shouldn’t have been a nap. When a dragon does that, it means they sleep forever. I shouldn’t be awake right now.”

  His words rang out through the room. There was something unspoken in them. The reason he was awake. She didn’t understand what it was, though. Sure, Atticus was awake when he thought he would be sleeping. It happened. He seemed to be insinuating that there was more to the situation, though.

  “I guess it’s just a Christmas miracle,” she said, even if she didn’t believe in them.

  Christmas was just a time of year to hang lights and pretend that everything was okay even though people were busy running each other over to buy things their families didn’t need. Frankie had loved the holiday at one point. Falling out of love had left her with a broken heart and more than a bit of pessimism. She glanced down at her hand and the white scars marring her skin.

  A reminder of the worst Christmas ever.

  “Tell me where you’re headed, Francine.” Atticus changed the subject.

  She cringed. “Call me Frankie. I can’t stand my full name.”

  He looked her in the eye. “Alright. Frankie it is.”

  Just hearing her name on his lips brought a trill of excitement rocketing from her core. His knee brushed hers under the table and an electric jolt rushed through her. The thing inside her changed dating forever. Frankie hadn’t felt like this, ever. Sure, her sex drive had been heightened since her change, but she hadn’t indulged it because nothing felt like this.

  Frankie shouldn’t have been sitting in a hotel room with a strange man on Christmas Eve, but she realized this was much more comfortable than where she’d been heading. With Atticus, she didn’t have to hide what she was. He was a bigger, badder predator. It was reassuring. She didn’t have to worry about frightening him or hurting him.

  She stabbed a piece of turkey with her fork. “I was heading upstate to visit my parents in Ogdensburg. It’s up by the St. Lawrence River…”

  Home would have been the best place for her wolf. The creature inside her yearned for the wild woods of Northern New York. She could almost smell the fresh air and the wet smell of rotting things on the edge of the water. Just imagining running through her old stomping grounds made her breath catch.

  But she never gave in to her beast. The thing needed to stay locked inside her. The day she let it take control was when she lost every scrap of her old life. She’d done her best to salvage her life, but all that was left were bits and pieces. The dogs at the shelters howled at her when she visited. Even the large crowds at the homeless shelters during meal nights made her uneasy.

  Atticus bent. Her chair screeched against the floor when he dragged her closer. Their knees touched and the contact started a fire in her, but Atticus commanded her attention. He gently held her chin as a soft smile spread over his lips. She felt like the center of his world. She even reached up and held his hand in place so he wouldn’t pull away.

  The wolf inside her leaned into him. It let out a comforting sigh, and Frankie felt the brush of fur against her skin. The creature liked him. It liked that they weren’t alone anymore. The beast claimed this dragon man as her own.

  The thought startled her, and she jerked back in her seat. Atticus flinched away, but she still had ahold of his hand.

  “Sorry,” she muttered under her breath, guilt making her heavy. She pinched the bridge of her nose and pushed the beast away.

  It was wrong. She couldn’t just claim people she didn’t know. This guy could walk out of her life and leave her alone if he didn’t feel the same way. Her urge to find others like herself scared her. She didn’t want to find something good and then have it run away from her.

  Promises could be made, but they were harder to keep.

  Freak. Mess. Monster.

  She lurched out of her chair and threw herself into the bathroom, making sure to lock the door behind her. The tub was deep enough for her to curl up inside. Once she drew the curtain around her, she sucked in a deep breath.

  Atticus was a nice guy. He helped people in need. She must have just been someone in need. He stuck around because he could tell she couldn’t keep her shit together. The wolf inside her was always moments away from breaking out.

  Just when her beast thought it’d been given the best Christmas gift ever, Frankie had to remind the creature of what happened with the last guy who promised them they would stay. The same thing would happen when her family realized she had changed. They would turn their backs on her and call her names, just like the guy on the highway.

  She pressed the heels of her palms into her eyes while the wolf kicked and howled to be free. It wanted nothing to do with Frankie’s rational warnings. It would do what it thought was right.

  Changing forms in the bathroom of a hotel when the door was locked wasn’t a good idea. Yet, once again the wolf refused to accept logic. It fought its way out of her. She thought her skin was being ripped apart. Her skull was on fire.

  Then the door opened, and Atticus’s scent entered the room. She didn’t look up or move the curtain, but a thought drifted through her mind.

  I locked the door. Didn’t I?

  Atticus drew back the curtain. He stepped into the tub, careful not to put a foot on her, and sank down to her. When he folded himself around her, the wolf eased its fight. Frankie could breathe. He wiped her hair away from her face and buried his face in the crook of her neck. She heard him breathe deep and her core warmed again.

  “Do you believe in coincidence? That things can just happen without meaning?” His silence after the question was hopeful.

  She didn’t know what he wanted to hear. All she knew was the soul-shredding anger crouching deep inside her. “I don’t want to think that I was meant to suffer like this.”

  He was silent for a long time. Finally, he breathed out as if her response disappointed him. He didn’t have to beat around his point. He could just tell her what he was thinking. Then again, five years was a long time away from people.

  “When was the last time you shifted?”

  She crinkled her nose. “Is that what you call shape changing? I haven’t let the stupid beast out in months.”

  He reared back and stared down at her in shock. Cold anxiety slithered in her gut. Clearly, she gave the wrong response.

  “Well, you’re in luck,” Atticus said. “I’m a dragon in need of a clan to keep me from burrowing again. You need a pack to help you figure all this out. How about we stick together to help each other?”

  Clan? Pack? That sounded different, so she asked Atticus what it all meant.

  “Dragons typically work in clans. They’re a tight family with a leader who has claimed the territory they live on. Clans protect everything, even packs living on their territory. Packs are a little more varied. They include all kinds of shifters. An alpha rises to the top of them and protects the rest.”

  “That doesn’t sound all that different,” she decided.

&nb
sp; Atticus laughed and settled back in behind her. His whole body was pressed against her back. She wanted to be more than his pack in that moment. His thighs rubbed hers and turned her into a wildfire. Images of their bodies entangled filled her mind, which she realized was her beast’s doing.

  The wolf didn’t let up. It needed him, practically begging Frankie to turn around and take Atticus. But he’d basically offered to be her boss. She couldn’t just jump her boss’s bones.

  “So, what do you say?”

  She bit her tongue and forced herself not to accept his offer immediately. “Can I think about it?”

  He pressed his forehead to her spine and shuddered. Frankie couldn’t tell what that meant. All she knew was the inferno raging inside herself. In it was need and hunger and something primal that she’d never let have a voice before.

  The primal thing inside her wanted to take Atticus, to sate the need and ease the tension that had been growing for the past year. Frankie twisted and turned to face him. It took all her leftover restraint to not kiss him when their lips were inches apart.

  He was a stranger, but the kind of stranger who could keep her from losing control. Around Atticus, she almost felt like a normal person again. It was difficult to entirely forget what she’d become when she was lying in a bathtub with a dragon shifter.

  His eyes flashed white, like the dragon was trying to get out. He certainly wouldn’t fit in the bathtub.

  “Wait… How did you get into the bathroom? I locked the door!”

  Atticus laughed. The sound vibrated her ribcage like a purr. “Interior locks are easy to pick. Plus, the keys are usually left nearby in case the guests have kids who lock themselves in the bathroom.”

  She laughed. Had it been any other time, she would have been annoyed. Instead, Atticus had arrived just in time to save her from an unwanted shift.