“All?”
“Surely you know this? After all, isn’t Robin’s niece Moira married to a Drake? The Drakes have been intermarrying with the Fae for centuries. At least the English ones have. Angie is related to Lady Drake who is married to the head of that family. In fact, Aunt Rosa introduced us.”
“For a fact?”
“Yes, until a couple of years ago we dragons lay under a curse. We only had sons. We had to marry out of our species in order to have firelings. Mostly mortal women. But we weren’t picky, as long as the females were virgins. Got to have a virgin if she is to be transformed into a dragoness.”
“Isn’t that a kind of complicated way to reproduce?” remarked Sullivan.
“You don’t know the half of it.”
“How have the kids turned out?” Sullivan asked.
“Dragon blood is dominant. The children of mixed marriages are all dragons. And before you ask, no, it hasn’t made us criminals. Quite the contrary, dragons used to be dreaded pirates and warlords, feared by rich and poor. Our race put the dark in the Dark Ages. Yet nowadays, we expend our energies in the service of our countries.” He let his pride in his heritage ring in his voice. Dragons had come a long way since their pirate days.
“A curse, eh?”
“Yes. We were cursed by the king of the elves to only have sons*. He thought one of my forebears treated his daughter with disrespect. Thus a thousand years of sons. My forebears started out thinking they had won the lottery.” Daniel shook his head. “Not so much.”
Sullivan chuckled. “I’d think a fellow who knows first-hand how potent the wrath of the Fae is would treat his fairy bride with a bit more respect than you have.”
“I treat my wife with the utmost respect,” Daniel said stiffly.
“Then how come you’re sleeping alone?” Sullivan asked. “I’m curious, because her staying with Robin means I’m sleeping alone too.”
Daniel felt a sense of shock out of proportion to the other man’s words. “You’re married to Robin Fairchild?”
“Not yet. But I’m working on it. Another beer?”
“Don’t mind if I do.”
“At least your wife hasn’t sailed west,” Sullivan remarked as they worked on their second cans.
Sailing west was a euphemism for death. Or maybe, since the Fae picked when to sail, for suicide. Angie was mad at him, and trying to make a point, but she wasn’t harboring a death wish. At least he didn’t think so.
“What makes you say that?” Daniel blurted.
A sea lion coughed. For a minute he thought Sullivan wasn’t going to answer. “That’s what mine did. Twenty-two years ago come Midsummer Day.” The skipper’s deep voice held a note of sorrow and bafflement. “Took my second-best skiff out and never came back.”
“Did you look for her?”
Sullivan barked like the sea lions. A mirthless laugh. “Me and every sailor on the island. And the mer-patrol. We never found a trace of her or of the skiff. Nice little craft too, protected by one of my best spells. I’m a weather worker and my vessels don’t sink.”
Angie wouldn’t do that to him, would she? “You ever figure out why?”
“Nope. Gale was tired of life, I guess. Or me. Robin says her sister was just plain weary.”
He was sleeping with his sister-in-law? Weird. “Your wife didn’t discuss it first?” Daniel checked.
“Not one single word.” Sullivan drained his can. “Another?”
“Sure.”
Sullivan went into the wheelhouse, leaving Daniel with his thoughts. Angie was pregnant. She wouldn’t sail west with the fireling, would she? Fear clutched his heart, stolid veteran of a thousand risky operations. Sweat filmed his skin despite the cool breeze off the ocean. She was looking forward to being a mother, wasn’t she?
“Here.” Sullivan handed him another ice-cold beer.
“You have any kids?” Daniel asked.
“Nope. Sometimes I wonder if that’s what went wrong. But it’s too late to ask Gale now.”
“And now you’re involved with her sister?”
“I guess fairies are my fate.” Sullivan’s cheerfulness had returned.
*Dragon’s Christmas Captive
CHAPTER SEVEN
Angie~
“Your own brother-in-law?” Angie was hard-pressed to conceal her shock. “Isn’t that, well, incestuous?” She clapped her hands over her mouth, appalled at her discourtesy.
Robin smiled serenely. Her reply was equally serene. “My relationship to Gordon has altered since Nightingale sailed west. I had no romantic feelings for Gordon while my sister was around, but it has been over twenty years.” Slender shoulders gave a delicate what-can-you-do? shrug.
“It’s just that I have five brothers-in-law myself,” Angie tried to explain her outburst. “They are fine men. I love them all dearly, but only as brothers.”
“And Daniel’s death wouldn’t change that?” Robin asked gently.
A ghost walked over Angie’s grave, but she tried to answer lightly. “It wouldn’t matter if my feelings changed, Daniel’s brothers are all mated, married, and unavailable to sweet talk from sisters-in-law.”
She attempted to restore her fairy composure. Daniel always returned from his missions. Always. Both the ones he was sent on by the Navy and the ones his grandfather assigned him. She could not imagine a world in which Daniel’s supernova energy was missing.
Her pregnancy had brought all these latent emotions welling up to disturb her inborn tranquility. She needed to calm down. Daniel wasn’t even on a mission at the moment.
“And he’s the eldest of his brothers?” Robin asked.
“Third son.”
“So not slated to be Lord Lindorm?”
Angie shook her head. “Not unless fourteen healthy, vigorous, long-lived dragons die first.” Which was beyond implausible. “His father will be the next Lord Lindorm, and Daniel’s eldest brother the one after.”
“More tea?” Robin raised a teapot delicately painted with pansies.
Angie’s matching teacup was empty. Not that the tiny antique cup held much. “What’s in this?” she inquired politely as she held it out.
“Mostly chamomile. And a few other herbs for flavor. They will help us sleep.”
“I have been sleeping badly.” And she never slept poorly. Never. Unless Daniel was home and wanting to keep her up. And then it wasn’t so much that she slept badly, as that she did not sleep at all. He was an insatiable, inventive, virile lover. She was going to miss him tonight. Nothing new there. She had spent most of their married life missing him.
That thought stiffened her backbone. It was about time she grew one. Fairies weren’t supposed to be doormats.
“How long have you and the admiral been married?” Robin asked. By the expression on her finely drawn features, she had asked before.
Angie focused her wandering mind. “Thirty-three years.”
“And yet this is your first child?” Robin seemed mildly surprised.
“You know three decades is a drop in the bucket to us Fae. Daniel was only twenty-five when we married. He was agreeable to waiting, so we did. And of course our marriage has extended his lifespan.”
The years had passed in an eye-blink. As time did for fairies. And suddenly she was realizing that they were stuck at the honeymoon stage of their marriage. Like Peter Pan and Tinkerbell refusing to grow up.
“And shortened yours? No?”
Angie stared at Robin. Shortened her life? What could Robin mean? Angie’s reply was cautious. “I don’t think so. Why?”
“As you know my nephew by marriage, Quinn Drake, is a dragon. He transformed Moira into a dragoness. Our working assumption has been that her transformation means she is no longer immortal.”
Another ghost stalked Angie. Was she slated to die? All the more reason not to waste another hour on that neglectful dragon of hers. “Well, I don’t feel any different, Robin. But then, I wouldn’t, would I? But I must say I don’t seem
to be aging like a mortal. Do I?” Angie’s mirror told her that her hair was still platinum-blonde, her cheeks smooth and pink. She looked and felt like a young woman.
Robin shook her head. “Around thirty, perhaps even younger. Of course the baby is making you bloom.”
“I thought that if I had a child I would feel less lonely,” Angie admitted. “But it changed everything. I just lost patience with Daniel. There I was, prepared to announce that I was pregnant with our first child, fabulous romantic meal planned, table laid, candles ready to be lit, and he didn’t show up. Again.”
“He didn’t call?” Robin was appalled.
“The next day one of his cousins phoned. Said that the Eldest – that would be his grandfather Lord Lindorm – had sent Daniel on an errand. It was the last straw. I packed my bags and headed to West Haven.”
“Now, that I don’t understand.” Robin’s cup touched her lips and returned to its saucer. “Not that West Haven isn’t a perfect spot for fairies. And not that you are not very welcome. And heaven knows it’s wonderful to have another fairy in my home. But why not return to your own people?”
“Latvia is not a suitable place for a fireling. And my people are long dispersed. The Soviets cut down our groves and paved our ancient gathering places.” Nowadays, crumbling concrete apartment buildings filled the air where oaks and firs had reigned for centuries.
“And your family? Your mother and father?” Robin asked.
“You know how it is. Once Daniel and I were married, Mama and Papa sailed west. They took my brother with them.”
“And your brother had no children?” Robin probed delicately.
“Not one. The Fae have dwindled. Or the world has changed, Robin. Our kind is doomed.” Angie rubbed her belly. A butterfly kissed her hand and withdrew. “I probably would not have married at all if I hadn’t met a dragon lord. And I think our hybrid child will be better adapted to this modern world than fairies are.”
“You may be right. But don’t you think that a hybrid child needs both parents even more than other children?”
“I certainly do. I haven’t given up hope. Daniel has to grow up. He has had a prolonged adolescence, and it is past time. However, I would rather rear my child alone, than live with such utter loneliness. West Haven has so many shifters, I cannot help but feel my child will fit right in. I think this is the right place for both of us, cousin.”
“I thought I explained about hybrid vigor,” Robin’s delicate brows met in the faintest of frowns.
Angie blushed. “I must have fallen asleep, cousin. My apologies. But why would the improved strength of a dragon-fairy hybrid trouble anyone? Surely vigor is an advantage?”
“On West Haven, hybrid vigor is a euphemism for criminal psychopathy.” Robin held up a slender hand. “I don’t think there is any reason to believe your baby will be an anti-social criminal. But on West Haven we do have an unfortunate history. The islanders find an unmarried fairy with a hybrid hunter child threatening.”
Angie’s heart sank. She had so hoped to find a home on this beautiful island. “You mean my child and I will always be outsiders?”
“I mean that you and your child will be voted off the island,” Robin said bluntly. “The Mystic Bay Town Council has the power to make sure you don’t have anywhere to live or work. I am the mayor, and the artists’ colony sits on my land, but if the council wanted to make things impossible for me...”
Robin shook her head. “Believe me, if it comes to a vote, I can try to protect you, but I couldn’t guarantee success.”
“Oh.”
“If you want to stay on West Haven, you will have to persuade your dragon to stay too.”
“I’m working on it. But you do see that adding an extra dragon to the population wouldn’t change my child’s psychological profile?”
Robin nodded. “The idea is that a hunter would better contain his hybrid child’s predisposition to crime than a fairy mother. It’s a foolish blend of sexism and speciesism. But prejudice and fear aren’t responsive to logic. Long ago West Haveners concluded that if hybrid children were embedded in a clan of shifters with no known criminals, that the kids would turn out law abiding.”
Angie chuckled. “No family was ever more moral or moralistic than the Lindorms. Every dragon in the clan is more straitlaced and upright than the next. My Daniel included. He will be a great father.”
Robin smiled placidly. “Then he must be given every opportunity to be a full-time father.”
Angie sighed. “I don’t think that Daniel is going to give up his military career, much less Sweden. I came to West Haven precisely because I believed it to be the perfect spot for me to raise my baby alone. I guess I’ll have to start hunting for another fairy enclave.”
“I would hate to see you leave, Angelina. It’s been such a pleasure having you around. Almost like having a sister again. We just have to come up with a way to change Daniel’s attitude.”
Angie laughed. Not a tinkling of fairy bells, but a forthright dragoness bellow. “Lindorms don’t change.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
Daniel~
He woke with the scent of his dragoness in his nostrils and a sense of urgency in his blood. He had to do something, or he was going to lose his mate. At first it had seemed as if his new friend had shown him the easiest method of getting Angelina back where she belonged.
He could let the unfounded fears of the Mystic Bay Town Council regarding their baby do his work for him. After all if Angie was exiled from West Haven, she would probably be more amenable to returning to Stockholm. But what if banishment drove his dragoness into sailing west? With his fireling. His blood froze at the thought of a world without his wife in it.
Maybe he should start by trying to get her back in his bed? Their bed. Did she know that her presence in Robin’s quarters was putting a crimp in her cousin’s love affair with Gordon Sullivan? Surely his sweet, sensitive wife’s finer feelings would be dismayed by learning that?
Once she was sleeping in Hyacinth, it would be easy to seduce her. They had never had any problems in the bedroom. After more than three months of celibacy, she too must be eager for a romp.
She wasn’t in the dining room of the inn where he breakfasted. She wasn’t in the inn at all. The desk clerk said she had gone to work. But she wasn’t at the art supply house either. A dragoness who looked like Angelina, down to her taste in clothing, was presiding over the stock. Her fluttery purple dress drifted over curves as rich and ripe as Angie’s. She was just as diminutive too. Unlike Angie she was wearing three-inch heels.
“Can I help you?” The slightest of smiles curved her lips. Her green eyes ran over him curiously but somehow remained remote. Angelina too had this quality of reserve.
“I’m looking for my wife,” he responded. “Angelina Lindorm.”
The dragoness held out her hand. “I’m Moira Drake. It’s Angie’s day at the co-op.”
“The co-op?”
“The Mystic Bay Artists’ Co-operative. It’s just down the street on the other side. Large wooden Victorian building. Used to be a livery stable. There’s a gigantic sign. You can’t miss it.” Moira’s words were a dismissal.
“What is my wife doing there?” he asked through his teeth.
Moira’s delicate brows rose fractionally. Magic shimmered in the air. “Whatever needs doing. Selling art with both hands this morning, I hope.”
“Thank you.” He turned on his heels.
Laughter like the tinkling of silver bells was cut off by the closing of the door. The co-op was where Moira had said it would be. He waded through the mass of people on the sidewalk. The great barnlike building had huge plate-glass windows cut into the front.
Tourists in shorts and sandals moved around peering at paintings and circling sculptures. Children stretched out sticky hands to touch apparently unprotected sculptures and art glass. Somehow their fingers never made contact. He could see his dragoness placidly sitting on a high stool, her eyes on a vi
deo screen, while some great shaggy brute sketched her.
He strode through the electric doors. Angie didn’t even blink. The artist turned his head. Thick black curls writhed in an untidy mass over an equally unruly beard. Daniel thought the man smiled. The scent of male dragon blended with the delicious scent of his wife.
“Your husband?” asked the artist.
“Uh huh.” Angie’s lips scarcely moved. Her crisp sea-green sheath dress was elegantly businesslike. But the loving way the fabric clung to her curves made his mouth water.
“Let’s take a break.” The artist stood and stretched. He held out his hand. Amusement gleamed in the feral depths of his greenish-gold eyes. “Quinn Drake. I understand we’re related.” He glanced warningly at the people looking at the art. “Mortals,” he mouthed warningly.
“Lord and Lady Drake are distant relatives,” Daniel said.
This time the curve of Drake’s lips was obvious. “I meant through our wives.”
“Good morning, Daniel.” Angie dismounted from the high stool and landed neatly on her feet.
“You shouldn’t be doing that,” Daniel told her, grasping her forearm. “What if you fell?”
She raised her left eyebrow mockingly. He gritted his teeth and let her go.
“Miss,” said a man in an aloha shirt.
“Yes, sir,” Angie moved across to the man and his wife. “How can I help you?”
“What do these black dots mean?” Aloha Shirt’s wife pointed at a tiny sticker.
“That those pieces aren’t for sale. They are just on display,” Angie explained.
“I told you so,” said the wife. “That’s why they don’t have prices?”
“That’s correct. Green dots mean the piece is for sale. The price is on the card by the side. Red indicates that it’s sold.” Angie’s murmur set every sense in Daniel’s body vibrating.
“They are going to say that they are interested in the yellow glass piece over there,” Quinn informed him quietly. “And that they will be back when they’ve made up their minds. We’ll never see them again.”
Adored by A Dragon: A Shifters in Love Fun & Flirty Romance (Mystic Bay Book 4) Page 4
